Christian Piatt Blog

Why Al Gore shouldn’t run

Former Vice President Al Gore has hit his popular stride. In the last year, he has won both an Oscar and an Emmy, and now he has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Millions have heeded his warnings about imminent climate change, and he has won support from both major political parties who now acknowledge we’re a big part of the problem.

Gore’s visibility and popularity likely will never be stronger than they are now. More than 150,000 people have signed a petition to urge him to again run for the office of president. So far, he has refused, much to the relief of the Clinton and Obama campaigns.

Why would a career politician waste an opportunity such as this to jump into the fray? After all, if he’s truly a champion of stemming or reversing global climate change, couldn’t he do the most good in the most powerful position in government?

Not necessarily.

In a recent follow-up article to his Time magazine feature about Gore, Eric Pooley explains not only why Gore won’t run for office again, but also why he shouldn’t.

“Running for president is by definition an act of hubris,” says Pooley, “and Gore has spent the past couple of years defying his ego and sublimating himself to a larger goal. Running for president would mean returning to a role he’d already transcended. He’d turn into – again – just another politician, when a lot of people thought he might be something better than that.”

Eight years ago, I wrote a satirical piece about why Groucho Marx was the perfect presidential candidate. Many will recall Marx’s famous quote about how he never would want to be a part of any club that would accept him as a member. Beneath this self-deprecating humor lies an inconvenient truth that can be applied, at the very least, to national politics: The very act of claiming your worthiness for such a powerful office in some ways makes you less desirable for the job.

Gore has been most successful when he has put the cause before the man. This is, by its very nature, impossible when running for president. Though issues and ideas have some importance, you are first and foremost a salesperson for yourself. In Gore’s case, his resonant message about climate change would take a back seat, at least through the end of 2008.

Nelson Mandela’s moments of greatest heroism came from behind bars. Martin Luther King, Gandhi and Mother Theresa shunned political spotlights in exchange for a place among those whom they served. Though the greatest threat Jesus seemed to pose to the Roman government was the potential power to incite rebellion, he always worked beyond the reach of government, all the way to his death.

I expect there always have been those who urged such compelling figures to claim their positions of power in a more official capacity, but there is something to be said for remaining on the perimeter. If, indeed, a cause for which we advocate is of primary importance, then political office may have just the opposite effect.

It would be easy to criticize the modern media machine for adulterating a potentially pure system into a cult of personality. However, from Genghis Khan to Charlemagne, and from the Caesars of Rome to the British monarchy, there always has been a galvanizing figure at the center. While we fancy ourselves people of ideas and principles, we’re ultimately comforted more by a familiar face and a compelling personality.

If Gore wanted to cash in his chips for another run at the White House, there may be no other time in his life when it makes more sense to do so. On the other hand, if the cause for which he currently stands is in fact bigger than he is, it would be in everyone’s best interest if he pursued his agenda as far away from Pennsylvania Avenue as possible.

Christian Piatt is the author of “MySpace to Sacred Space” and “Lost: A Search for Meaning,” and is the music minister at Milagro Christian Church in Pueblo, Colorado.

A moral question: Who deserves what health care?

Former Colorado Gov. Dick Lamm has taken a bold step in engaging people in discussion around the true substance of health-care reform. While his ideas border on philosophical, the implications are very real.

While presidential candidates from both sides of the aisle struggle to convey their own version of win-win coverage, Lamm hits the issue of health-care entitlements right between the eyes.

Why is his approach an act of bravery? Because in doing so, he raises intensely sensitive implications about who should get what kind of care. Let’s consider a couple of examples.

An 80-year-old woman is diagnosed with a rare form of lymphoma that ultimately will be terminal. Without a costly regimen of medications, she will die within weeks. With the drugs, her life expectancy is extended six to 12 months. The medicine will cost $40,000 for a six-month supply, but the woman is on a modest fixed income, dependent upon Medicare for her coverage.

A 5-year-old boy has a congenital heart disease that is causing the faulty organ to shut down. He is a candidate for a transplant, although the odds of surviving more than a few months after the surgery are 50-1. The cost of the surgery is in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, and the transplant organ is available, but the parents of the child are quickly reaching the coverage limits of their company insurance policy, and have no savings to pay for the operation.

Our initial reaction is to say that if the resources are there, we should do everything in our power to save, improve the quality of, or at least extend lives. No one wants to be in charge of telling a family that their parent, child or spouse will not receive care that might save them because of cost. For some, the valuation of life in terms of dollars and cents is callous and wrong. So instead, let’s consider it in more human terms.

The Center for Health Care Policy Research and Analysis reports that 18,000 people die annually in the United States because of inadequate basic health care. Meanwhile, Lamm notes that the sickest 1 percent of Americans account for 27 percent of total health-care costs. At what point do we cry foul, suggesting that just maybe we have our priorities out of order?

Let’s consider the two anecdotes above in another way. The woman facing terminal lymphoma who receives $40,000 worth of meds results in a trade-off, resulting in a lack of prenatal care for half of a dozen young women without insurance.

The cost of the young boy’s high-risk transplant means that a clinic in downtown Chicago will not be funded, resulting in hundreds of homeless people not receiving basic checkups and preventive health care. The long-term costs of hospitalization and other care for the health problems that could have been avoided escalate into the millions over the next 10 years.

Where does the moral social responsibility lie? At what point do we put our foot down and say this life deserves care and that one does not? Given this context, is it any wonder so few political incumbents or challengers want to tread into this moral quagmire?

Lamm has his finger on the pulse of a systemic issue that will have to be addressed before any substantive reform can take place.

As a society, we must come to terms with what is more important in the health-care service delivery system, drawing clear limits around what is publicly subsidized and what becomes the private responsibility of the affected family. On a case-by-case basis, this will be a bitter pill to swallow, but it will test the mettle of those who proclaim that health care for all is of paramount importance.

In a time when our state is debating the merits of a handful of so-called universal health-care plans, we’re still skirting around this more esoteric, and emotionally charged, gorilla in the middle of the room. One place where such dialogue can and should begin is in our local faith communities. If the preciousness of human life is contemplated any more thoroughly than within the medical profession, it’s arguably within the walls of our churches, mosques and synagogues.

Who would Jesus/Mohammed/Buddha cover?

Looking back on 36 years, and learning to trust

Tomorrow is my birthday. I’ll be 36.

This week, I spent a few days with my good friend, Doug, and his family. We have known each other since junior high school, and we’ve been roommates a few times over the years. We’ve played in rock bands together and we went to the same college.

Given our history, it felt weird to be driving around town in a minivan with our families. How in the world did we get here?

Five years ago, my wife, Amy, and I were living in Fort Worth, Texas, as she entered into her final semesters of seminary. We talked about getting pregnant, and we wondered where we might be called after her graduation, and what our ministry together might look like.

Ten years ago, I was working as an education consultant. I was single and traveled almost constantly. I had no home address, living for months at a time in Seattle, Chicago, Atlanta, Denver and Dallas. In my alone time, I was working on a novel that would sit on my shelf for another decade with no other home.

Fifteen years ago, I was studying music and psychology at the University of North Texas in Denton. I had hair down to my belt, and I was singing in night clubs most weekends. I had bold aspirations to become a rock star. I was working for the university, but soon I would take a job with a major record label, a step that I was sure would take me toward that coveted stardom.

Twenty years ago, I was completing what would be my final year at a private school in Dallas before my parents’ divorce and subsequent family upheaval. After much therapy and struggle, I landed at an arts magnet school in downtown Dallas, where I completed high school. Aside from girls, the only other thing on my mind was getting out on my own.

Twenty-five years ago, my father was riding the economic boom of the 1980s that swept through Texas. We were going on expensive trips, driving luxury import cars, and we moved into a gigantic house in an exclusive neighborhood. Though I had a miniature suite to myself in one end of the house, I hated it because none of my friends lived nearby, and it was too far to ride my bike back to my old neighborhood.

Thirty years ago, I was practicing my reading and spelling skills at Helen Vial Elementary in Garland, Texas. My teachers advised my parents that I was too precocious to remain challenged in the public school environment, and that they should look into private schools. Though this new environment would challenge me, we had no idea how it would affect my social relationships with kids in the neighborhood who all went to the same school.

Thirty-five years ago, we were living in a modest apartment in downtown Dallas. My parents didn’t know how to make ends meet from one week to the next. My father met with a man at an employment agency and explained how much he needed to make to survive. Though he would prefer the work was legal, he committed to doing whatever he had to in order to keep food on the table.

How could I have known that each of those steps, as well as so many smaller ones in between, would have led me here? I couldn’t. It’s an exercise in powerlessness to consider how little control we really have. Some believe God has a greater plan for our lives from the beginning, while others trust the winds of chance to blow us from one moment to the next.

Soon, this present moment will be nothing more than the latest step in that meandering path, leading God-only-knows where. Giving up control over life’s greater trajectory is an ongoing struggle, but one that seems to get easier with the benefit of age. For now, my focus is on three things: gaining wisdom from the past; maintaining gratitude for the present; and clinging to hope for the future.

I’ll trust God with the rest. It’s worked out pretty well so far.

Quite often, I get letters regarding one point or another in my columns. Sometimes they are complimentary, while more often, they are not. Seldom, however, are they worth reprinting. I got a note today, however, that I thought was provocative enough to post here.  Below is this gentleman’s note to me, followed by my response.

More food for thought.  CDP

>>>>>

Dear Mr Piatt, 

I am moved to respond to your recent column on Richard Dawkins primarily because of the last two paragraphs equating faith-based fundamentalism with rationalism.  Coincidentally, Dawkins has an article answering his critics in the October/November issue of Free Inquiry addressing  this tendency on the part of people of faith to believe that a dedication to reason is just another form of fundamentalist faith.  Here are the relevant passages:

It is all too easy to mistake passion, which can change its mind, for fundamentalism, which never will. Fundamentalist Christians are passionately opposed to evolution, and I am passionately in favor of it. Passion for passion, we are evenly matched. And that, according to some, means we are equally fundamentalist. But, to borrow an aphorism whose source I am unable to pin down, when two opposite points of view are expressed with equal force, the truth does not necessarily lie midway between them. It is possible for one side to be simply wrong. And that justifies passion on the other side.

Fundamentalists know what they believe, and they know nothing will change their minds. This quotation from a fundamentalist says it all “…if all the evidence in the universe turns against creationism, I would be the first to admit it, but I would still be a creationist because that is what the Word of God seems to indicate. Here I must stand.” It is impossible to overstress the difference between such a passionate commitment to biblical fundamentals and the true scientist’s equally passionate commitment to evidence. The fundamentalist proclaims that all the evidence in the universe would not change his mind. The true scientist, though, knows exactly what it would take to change his mind: evidence. As J.B.S. Haldane said when asked what evidence might contradict evolution, “Fossil rabbits in the Precambrian.” Let me coin my own opposite version of the fundamentalist’s manifesto. “If all the evidence in the universe turns in favor of creationism, I would be the first to admit it, and I would immediatel change my mind. As things stand , however, all available evidence (and there is a vast amount of it) favors evolution.” It is for this reason, and this reason alone, that I argue for evolution with a passion that matches the passion of those who argue against it. My passion is based on evidence. Theirs, flying in the face of evidence as it does, is truly fundamentalist.  

This ends the quotation. What follows are my own thoughts.

In the next to the last paragraph of your column you imply that the rationalist has some responsibility of proving the nonexistence of God. Not so. The burden of proof rests with the person making the assertion. It is not up to the rationalist to prove the nonexistence of a figment of the faithful’s imagination. You also imply that the rationalist cannot prove the nonexistence of God. Not so again. The more clearly defined a deity becomes the easier it is to disprove his existence. It is childishly easy to show that the God of the bible cannot possibly exist.

A final note. I encourage you to pick up a copy of the Free Inquiry mentioned above. At the end of the article quoted there is a passage from Dawkins’ Unweaving the Rainbow   that is one of the most inspiring and uplifting statements on the human condition you will ever see.

Sincerely,    D.T.

>>>>>
(My Reponse to him)

Dear DT:

Thanks for your response. I think, perhaps, that you perceived a couple of the points made in my article differently than I intended.

My comparison of Dawkins to fundamentalists was, in my mind, regarding their seemingly shared interest in eradicating the viewpoints of those other than those they themselves hold. I don’t begrudge Dawkins being a rationalist or an atheist. My concern with him in the public forum is that he prefers to erect barriers to discourse and draw lines, whereas Krauss is more content to use his own knowledge to help enrich others’ understanding.

One of my other concerns about Dawkins’ sentiments is that he holds little or no regard for someone who maintains a view that is not based upon reason. I respect that he holds to the process of reason as sufficient to explain all phenomena in the universe, and that to do otherwise is feeble-minded. I would argue, however, that reason, rather than being an inviolable, universal constant, actually is a construct of human consciousness, as is faith.

Further, to suggest that I claim Dawkins must prove the nonexistence of God would be off-base, I think. What I claim is that he cannot (not that he must or should) prove the nonexistence of God any more than someone can prove the existence of God. Aristotle was far wiser than Dawkins, I believe, when he drew limits around the capacity of reason. He claimed that there is no way to use reason to discuss or lay claim to what existed “before” the universe, as reason by its very nature is bound by the properties of time, motion and matter. Now, Thomas Aquinas used this as a springboard to fit faith into the gap left by Aristotle, which clearly was not Aristotle’s intent. However, he understood that reason had its own limits, a concession which might serve Dawkins well.

Just a few thoughts before my brain goes too soft for the day. Thanks again for your note, and thanks for reading my column, even if it presents a point of view with which we don’t agree.  Incidentally, I’ll look for a copy of Free Inquiry.

Thanks,

Christian

Science and faith: Can’t we all just get along?

Anyone who is surprised by the recent backlash from hyper-rational militant atheist writers and thinkers clearly has not been paying attention.

As religious fundamentalists have dug in their heels, forcing such ignorant pseudo-scientific principles as New Earth Creationism into textbooks and school districts, the push provoked a visceral response from the scientific community. Most notable among the atheist polemicists is Richard Dawkins, with his best-selling book, “The God Delusion.”

In effect, what the religious extreme has done is successfully give a platform for rational fundamentalism. History certainly would have predicted this reaction, but perhaps this isolated, agenda-driven arm of religion simply does not care.

As critical as I am of “my way or the highway” religious rhetoric, I’m equally disappointed in the vitriol of the rationalists who feel not only that they must take on what they view as dangerous faith views, but also God and the entirety of human faith in the process.

In a recent issue of Scientific American, two scientists, Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss, discuss the ways in which people of science can communicate with faith communities, if at all.

Happily, though some like Dawkins seem to lump religious fundamentalism in with the complete human faith experience, others like Krauss are more measured in their approach. Though neither claims any faith in a divine entity, Krauss sees an opportunity for science to help enrich faith by illuminating some pockets of ignorance within some religious thinking. Dawkins, however, would just as soon see the entire construct of human faith in God dismantled and eradicated.

“I think religion is bad science,” says Dawkins to Krauss in the article, “whereas you think it is ancillary to science.” The two proceed to debate the inherent nature and role of faith in the human organism, revealing a broad complexity of views even within the scientific community.

“I do not think we will rid humanity of religious faith any more than we will rid humanity of romantic love,” claims Krauss, “or many of the irrational but fundamental aspects of human cognition.” Dawkins argues this point passionately, however. Though he acknowledges that such non-rational dimensions of human experience as love and appreciation for art help make life worth living, and may even be tangentially related to rationality, faith is not.

“Positively irrational beliefs and superstitions are a different matter entirely,” says Dawkins. “Isn’t it . . . condescending to assume that humans at large are constitutionally incapable of breaking free of them?”

While Krauss is content to illuminate through rational means, Dawkins prefers to argue a personal agenda. In doing so, he comes across much like the Bible-banging fundamentalists who claim, rather arrogantly, “Reality is as I say it is: nothing more and nothing less. End of conversation.”

Krauss offers perhaps the most helpful clarification about his desire for the future relationship between faith and science when he says, “What we need to try to eradicate is not religious belief, or faith, it is ignorance. Only when faith is threatened by knowledge does it become the enemy.”

Krauss’ issue, then, seems to be more with ignorance promoted by rigid, unyielding faith practices. Dawkins, on the other hand, is in attack mode against all strains of faith.

There are glimmers of the source of resistance Dawkins has when he refers to New World Creationists, fundamentalism and much of the harm done in the name of faith throughout history. To this point, I stand in agreement with both him and Krauss – that such damaging and ignorant positions should be challenged.

However, for a rationalist who can no more prove the nonexistence of God than a fundamentalist can prove the existence of the divine, his short-sighted – and I would argue, emotionally based – objections sever any possibility of reconciliation or further communication.

This sort of fundamentalism, whether based in faith or rationalism, is at the source of more pain than healing. Even for someone like Dawkins, who claims morality from a humanist context, this sort of rhetoric is hurtful and essentially flawed. Some might even argue he’s made a religion of his own militant belief in atheism.

Defining church, churches harder than one might originally believe

How many churches are there in our community?

This is the question posed to me this week by a friend of mine who is a successful church coach. He has taken a dying congregation and, in two years, increased its weekly worship attendance to more than 300 people. I began thinking through all of the buildings and various denominations I see in a week. I estimated we probably have 300 or so churches in Pueblo.

Then he nailed me.

While we have hundreds of church buildings and dozens of denominations, he said, there is only one Christian Church. Church doesn’t just happen on Sunday mornings, or whenever services take place. Church isn’t nearly as much about what we do inside the walls as it is about what we do when we leave.

In a world where people are more institutionally suspicious than ever before, we who cling to our bricks and mortar, programs and Sunday sermons as “church” will continue to wonder why the world sees us as isolated and out of touch with the rest of society. People care less and less about denominational affiliation, and more about how we – all Christians – respond to the world’s needs.

We worry more about members going from one Christian church to another than we are concerned about living out what we believe as witness to those who don’t come to church at all. We get more obsessive about our membership roster than about training and empowering disciples to do God’s work, from wherever they choose to do it.

My friend who put such a challenging question to me said he recently had a hard discussion with his church. He explained that he intended to spend half of his weekly hours engaging people who did not regularly attend worship, including those who had never come to the church building at all.

Initially, everyone approved, but they soon realized that, after sermon preparation, meetings and study groups, there was little time left for him to pay pastoral care calls.

At first, I was shocked. If he had to choose between coffee with a nonmember and visiting a regular member in the hospital, he said, he’d go to coffee. It seemed callous, but he reminded me that he is not the church, and that if we’re doing our job of empowering people to minister to the world, there should be plenty of people in the church ready and willing to call on the church member.

On the other hand, there were few who could sit with someone curious about his congregation’s ministry and lay out their vision like he could. He was called to revitalize a dying church, and so his first priority is to evangelize. The word “evangelism” has a bad connotation these days, but at its heart, evangelism centers on building relationships. He was hired with the charge of bringing new life to the church. The problem is that, too often, churches say they want one thing, and then act like they want another.

I have another friend, also a pastor, who recently left his church. He started the congregation with nothing five years ago, and now he’s positioned to walk away because his congregation would rather he “spent more time caring for them,” rather than reaching out to the community.

There are times when we all need the support and nurturing that a church family can offer. But when the leadership of that church becomes the sole source for this care, rather than the leader who empowers others to carry out the daily ministry, something’s wrong.

Those of us who focus more on our own needs – or the needs of our church building or denomination – rather than the needs of a world mired in suffering and spiritual crisis, have lost focus of the true vision of the church’s purpose.

We cannot serve two masters.

OK, enough messing around. We’ve heard rumors for years about Chipotle coming to Pueblo, but now is the time for action!

Click on the link below and sign to show your support for a Chipotle restaurant in Pueblo, Colorado. Then send the link along to friends. We need thousands of signatures to overwhelm them, so get to work: 

http://www.PetitionOnline.com/puebloco/petition.html 

Fight the good fight,
Christian Piatt
Chipotle Activist
Pueblo, CO

The last shall be first, except when it comes to worship

There are certain events where ticket prices are so out of hand that the average person simply can’t afford to go. Prime concert and sports tickets run sometimes in the thousands, and even base prices for many shows keep those of less than extravagant means out in the cold.

At least we can always find a seat in worship, right?

Maybe, and maybe not. A recent story about a temple in Miami auctioning off on eBay front-row seats for life, to the tune of $1.8 million, raised a few eyebrows and even more questions. The offer, done somewhat tongue-in-cheek, included engraved nameplates on the seats, premium parking spaces and custom-made holy gear for the winners.

While the creators of the auction did not expect anyone to pay such a price, they did acknowledge the offer was legitimate, and that the extra income certainly would be welcome.

Shows such as Larry David’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm” have parodied the idea of scalping temple seats for high holidays, and this is not far from reality. Reports online have suggested that chairs for high holidays can go for as much as $2,000 apiece in certain areas.

We Christians are not exempt from this sort of elitism within our hallowed walls, however. From services being conducted in languages the general population doesn’t understand to walls and elevated platforms, we have any number of systems in place to keep people separated from those things we deem just a little bit more special than they.

I’ve struggled in a number of churches with the concept of elders or deacons sitting up front, facing the congregation, throughout a worship service. I actually was asked to serve as a deacon at one church where we served, but disagreement about how we served ourselves Communion first before serving everyone else caused me to resign my post.

Sometimes the preferential treatment is even more subtle. Though there is a strong case for keeping ministers uninformed about the weekly giving of individual members, there is a rather legitimate case to be made as well for the pastor to know such things.

The problem is that, once you know person “X” or family “Y” isn’t giving what you think they can or should, you can’t help but let it affect the way you see them and how you interact with them.

Would we bend over backward to keep a very generous giver in our church, more so than the poor couple who drops the equivalent of a few denari in the plate, sacrificial as their modest act may be for them?

Would we pay an extra visit here and there to our best volunteers and those congregants with the most prominent social standing? In most cases, I would argue the answer is that we would, and do.

I’m not exempting myself from this equation. It’s part of human nature to want to preserve that which benefits you or your community the most. However, if we’re not aware of such tendencies, the risk is that we lose perspective on exactly who it is we’re there to serve, and why we come together as faith communities in the first place.

There’s plenty of worship that goes on in our churches, temples and synagogues every week, but it’s not always worship of God. Sometimes it’s of people, or our buildings. Sometimes we’re so proud of our own achievements we are practically worshipping ourselves.

Here’s the question I pose to myself to gauge where I am compared to where I want to be: Would I go as far out of my way to greet and make room for a slovenly dressed, somewhat smelly visitor as we would if a movie star or political dignitary walked through our doors?

Most of us will struggle to answer “yes” to this question. I know I do. Until we can, every time, we’re part of the problem.