Arrogance: How our Aversion to Authority Detracts from Humility

I find myself in an interesting position as a Latino immigrant, to observe the differences between American culture and Latino culture. I was born and raised in Managua, Nicaragua. I came to the United States when I was 17 years old. I am now 30.

Latino culture is a high distance power culture, where there is less distribution of power, and economic and social classes are more marked. People in high distance cultures have "a place" where they belong, and different groups of social and economic classes usually don't mix together. In these cultures there is a strong sense of community, and the well being of this community is sought as a priority.

American culture is a low distance power culture, where there is (in theory at least) a more equal distribution of power, and economic and social classes are less marked. People in low distance cultures see themselves as equals, and different groups of social and economic classes can and do mix together. In these cultures there is a strong sense of individualism, and the ideals of the individual and his or her personal freedom is sought as a priority.

At this point in my life, I feel fluent in both cultures, and I can switch between them, though it is not always easy to do so. I see good things in both cultures, and it is not the purpose of this post to argue the validity of one culture over the other.

Aversion to Authority

Another difference between American culture and Latino culture is its relationship with authority. American culture, with its emphasis on individualism, has as a natural consequence an implicit bias against authority.

Authority is frowned upon, and the use of it needs to be constantly justified.

In Latino culture, authority is expected and wanted. We see the need for people with strong leadership skills to be in authority to guide the people with the vision and ideals of the community. If this leader is not using his or her authority to move forward with the community's vision, then the leader runs the risk of being dethroned by a revolution. Revolution is the way that high distance power cultures deal with social change. In low distance power cultures a leader (usually very limited in power by checks and balances) is simply voted out by the people, who are seen as having the power.

The American people, it seems to me, look at persons in position of authority with suspicion and sometimes, disdain.

The Fall & Arrogance

As I ponder the story of the fall in Genesis, I wonder how much the human tendency towards individualism, and our need to decide what's good for ourselves (don't tell me how to live my life!) by eating of the fruit of knowledge of good and evil, has made us more arrogant.

If this is the case then a direct link can be made with extreme individualism, The Fall (where we decide what's good and bad for us without the intervention of an authority), and arrogance.

If this is the case, then a move towards humility is a move away from unrestrained individualism. Not only that, but a move towards humility will also mean a more balanced and healthy view of authority.

It is mentioned many times that American culture is one of arrogance and entitlement, and I have heard in many progressive circles this being readily admitted as they work to counteract these societal evils. What seems odd to me, however, is how ready progressive culture is to question authority at every turn, and to deconstruct every notion and ideal just for the sake of deconstruction. Not only that, but progressive culture seems to encourage self-expression and the "whatever works for you" motto of post-modern individualism, without the slightest recognition of how these attitudes can actually contribute to arrogance and entitlements.

I am not trying to ditch progressive culture. In many ways, I consider myself a progressive. And many people who know me can tell you that I support many progressive causes, but I can't just blindly ignore the many aspects of this culture that my particular bi-cultural lenses allow me to see. I cannot ignore, for example, how prevalent an elitist spirit is in many aspects of progressive culture.

Truth be told, when I think of humility, the last thing that comes to mind is someone absorbed in progressive culture. When I think of intellectualism, wittiness, and snobbery, then the quintessential progressive comes to mind.

As I mentioned in my last post, maybe our culture is fighting against our attempts at humility.

Gentrification, Social Justice and Incarnational Ministry

My fiancé and I have been a little bit stressed out lately.

It's not just the wedding planning, which for the most part we have found enjoyable. It's not just that we have a lot of things to juggle on top of that, like a part time job and a growing ministry.

It's not just any one of those things. No, our single, most stressful thing at this moment is dealing with gentrification, especially as we are starting to look for a place to live together.

The Bay Area is ground zero for the issue of gentrification. Housing costs are rising to ridiculous heights, with San Francisco being the most outrageous. It is not unusual for a 2 bedroom apartment in the used-to-be-latino neighborhood of The Mission to go for $4,500 a month.

We now live and do ministry in East Oakland among the immigrant population. Our neighborhood has been a somewhat affordable place to live. I started to see signs of gentrification in this neighborhood three years ago. At that moment, I thought, it would take a lot to gentrify this place. Now I realize I was mistaken.

Rent prices are going crazy high here. A 2 bedroom apartment used to cost around $1,000 3 years ago. Today, the two most recent ones we saw were $1,700 and $2,000. This is way out of our budget as missionaries.

I was supposed to move out of my place in August. In order to do that, I'd need to find an affordable place in East Oakland in one week.

The Advantages and Disadvantages of Incarnational Ministry
My fiancé and I belong to InnerCHANGE, a missionary order among the poor. We adhere to a philosophy of ministry called incarnational ministry, which pretty much means we live among the community we serve.

This sounds like a romantic ideal of ministry, but in practice, it is anything but romantic.

Incarnational ministry means that you are limiting your options of where to live. Friends and family often ask me "why don't you look in this area? Rent is cheaper and more available there". My explanation that, I choose to live here because of ministry, doesn't really seem to clarify matters.

It also means that it limits the lifestyle that you can have. In InnerCHANGE, we take a commitment of simplicity, where our incomes are comparable to those of our neighbors.

All of this can take a lot of sacrifice, but it is a great way to do ministry. With Incarnational ministry, our lives become ministry.

Incarnational ministry also help us to share in the sufferings and disadvantages that people on the margins suffer. I no longer have the luxury of seeing the injustices done to them from a distance. Their injustices often become our injustices. Their pain often becomes our pain.

Gentrification is no longer an abstract idea of injustice. It is no longer something we can relate to and be angry intellectually, from the safe distances of ideas and imagination.

Gentrification is now our issue. We are feeling the invisible and yet tangible forces that are trying to push us out. We now know what it feels like to be wanted away, to be asked indirectly and yet deliberately to leave and make space for someone with more resources.

We feel angry.

Gentrification is now personal, and the next time you see me in a rally, a city council meeting, or a vigil in East Oakland, you'll know that I'm fighting not just for the needs of the poor, but also for my own needs.

May you join me in this struggle.

Why I Believe Liberal Christianity is Doomed

2 Thessalonians 2:15 ESV “So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter”

To put it bluntly, I believe Liberal Christianity is doomed.

Many have claimed rather infamously that the future of Christianity is Liberal Christianity. Looking purely at satitistics, it is hard to see how. It is a very well known fact that Christian denominations that have adopted liberal stances, with a few notable exceptions, have experienced a dramatic, free fall drop in church membership.

Now, this is not to say that church membership alone is a great indicator of the health of a Christian community, but, at the same time, without members there is no community, and if things continue to go as they are now, many Christian denominations, especially the mainlines, will cease to exist in this century.

Look at it from any perspective you want, memberless communities, and communities who fail to attract new members to their communities, are hardly the “future” of Christian communities.

Healthy Christ-like Communities Must Be Attractive

Reading the gospels, it is hard to deny that Jesus had some sort of attraction. We see in the gospels, especially in the gospel of Mark, that crowds followed Jesus wherever he went.

We can be cynical all we want and say that was because Jesus performed miracles, fed the crowds, and because the crowd all expected their military liberation from oppression from Him, and while all of this is probably true, I do believe there was something beyond that that attracted people to Him.

We shouldn't ignore how people were attracted to His teaching and the way He taught with “authority” unlike the Pharisees and the Scribes. We must not ignore how his character of compassion and attention to the poor were also things that attracted crowds, especially the poor and the oppressed.

I say with trepidation what I'm about to say, and I know it will sound harsh, but I feel it's true to my limited experience: whenever I go to a “liberal” congregation, it is usually not filled with the poor or the oppressed, but with people with power and privilege talking about, well, power and privilege.

That alone tells me there is something seriously wrong with these congregations.

What's more, the church, who is the bride of Christ, should be attractive! This attractiveness is described in revelation, where the church is a “spotless” bride, one who has been washed by the blood of the lamb.

Also, Jesus describes us as “light of the world”. One charateristic of “light” is its attractiveness.

If your congregation is not attractive, then a question that should be asked is “is that congregation Christ-like?

I'm not a Liberal. I am a Progressive

That might be surprising to some of you who know me and know what I stand for.

Some people might confuse and use the words Liberal and Progressive intercheangebly, as if they were the same thing. Some, filled with cynicism, may say that Progressive is just a new word for Liberal, a new marketing spin to clear a bad name.

I do believe there is a substantial difference between the two, and while I think that there is no future for Liberal Christianity, I do believe there is a future for Progressive Christianity.

Liberal, by definition is: open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values.

Using this definition, it is hard not to see why Liberalism is not compatible with Christianity. A central tenet of Christianity is the “passing down” of teaching from the Apostles, and the calling to “stand firm” on those teaching.

This “passing down” and receiving is just another way of saying “tradition”. The greek used for tradition in Tessalonians 2:15 can be translated not only as “tradition”, but also as the passing down or receiving a message.

As Christians, we are pleaded to pass down faithfully, to the next generation, what we have received. This goes in contradiction with the Liberal value of being “willing to discard tradition”.

This is evident in many Liberal congregations that I have been, where many people in authorities and responsible to pass down and keep the faith (like Bishops) are willing to discard, reinvent and innovate on many Christian traditions.

Jesus didn't really rise from the dead, but this is a myth that offers the hope of new life and new beginnings in our everyday life.

The Trinity is really just an ancient understanding of God, and we need not see God in that way.

Jesus is really not “Divine” but had the “divine” in Him.

Jesus didn't really die sacrificially for our sins, and His death on the cross has no atonement power, but He was simply killed by the system to give us a new model of non-violence to fight the system.

There are many other examples of how Liberal Christians are willing to discard traditions that have long been held universally by all Christians, but these suffice.

Progressive Christianity, on the other hand, is one preocuppied with the poor, stands alongside them, and advocates for their needs.

Progressive Christianity is involved in social justice, but should do so not just in solidarity with the poor, but joins the poor in their struggles and fights the system alongside them.

Progressive Christianity is not a willingness to discard traditions, but instead to stand firm in the tradition of Jesus to do His ministry with the poor. Jesus didn't come to serve the poor from a suburban, privileged place in Palestine. He came from Nazareth (what good can come from Nazareth?) had no place to lay His head. 

He ate and lived with the poor. He didn't serve the poor from a distance and didn't find refuge in a comfortable place of privilege after a long day of ministry with them. Rather, He “emptied Himself and took the form of a slave” and served alongside them.

Progressive Christians should not only talk about serving the poor, and about power and privilege, and fighting the system, but should talk about ways of emptying themselves of their privilege and power, and serve the poor in proximity, not from a place of privilege.

I believe Christianity has become a religion of privilege, of empire and of power. Liberal Christianity, despite all the talks to the contrary, it is still a manifestation of this kind of religion.

I want to see, instead, a Christianity that is Christ-like, willing to live and serve with the poor, willing to give away all their riches in service to the poor, willing to advocate and fight the system with all who are opressed.

I want to see a Christianity that empties itself and takes the form of a slave. When Christianity does this, then it will be truly Christ-like. Its light will attract all the nations, and the name of Jesus Christ will be glorified. Amen.

The Importance of Recognizing Your Own Privilege

In last week's post I talked about how God's calling to men for leadership meant that men were called to give up their power and authority and serve as "the slaves of all", and how this makes sense in Jesus' pattern of humbling the powerful and uplifting the powerless.

This week I want to move beyond gender and their relation to power, and to the importance of recognizing our own privilege and power as followers of Jesus.

Why is this important? Isn't talk of privilege and power just another way of confusing liberal political values with the Gospel?

How Jesus deals with the powerful
Whenever we read the Gospels it is difficult to miss how he deals with certain people of power. We read about his encounters, debates and clashes with the Pharisees, and His rebuking of them.

We notice as well how he deals with the Roman authorities. In fact He doesn't really deals that often with them. He seems more occupied preaching the Kingdom of God to the poor and marginalized that He spends little time trying to convert the Romans.

In one famous encounter with the Rich Young Ruler, Jesus asks him to sell all he has, and give it to the poor. He is telling this to a man who has kept all the commandments! And yet Jesus tells him "one thing you lack". The one who had it all figured it out and had it all, so it seems, lacked one thing.

If we read carefully, we see that an undeniable pattern emerges in Jesus' encounters with people. With the rich and powerful He almost always deals in a negative way. With the poor and marginalized He almost always deals in a positive way.

Of course there are exceptions. But these exceptions do little to eradicate the undeniable pattern that emerges.

Why is it important, then, that we recognize our own privileges and powers?

It is important because if Jesus is the same today as He was yesterday, that means that His pattern of dealing with people of power, privilege and authority will most likely be the same now. This means that if Jesus is truly alive and risen, as Christians believe Him to be, His dealings with the rich and powerful NOW is most likely the same as it was THEN.

The Question really is, how do we want to be dealt with by Jesus?

If we miss to recognize our privilege and power, then we risk the danger of missing Jesus, or perhaps more accurately, Jesus missing us.

I believe this is not so much mixing liberal values with the Gospels, but this is most likely something that Liberals are correct about what the Gospels are telling us.

So how privileged are we really?
If you, dear reader, are living in the United States, or from another part of the "developed world", then you don't need me to tell you about our own privilege in terms with people of other poorer nations.

To deny our own privilege would be tantamount to being in a state of hopeless lunacy or unbelievable ignorance.

On a macro level, we are unbelievable privileged to live in a privileged and powerful nation.

On a micro level, we know that even in this powerful nation of ours, we still have people with less privilege and power. We will always have the poor among us.

We can recognize that minorities are statistically marginalized in this nation. People of color, undocumented immigrants, formerly incarcerated,  all of these are populations who we can recognize as underprivileged.

To deny this is to turn a blind eye to the statistics.

On a more personal level, I can recognize my own privilege. First, I am male. As a man, according to statistics, I am more likely to earn more money than women.

Yes, I am Latino and immigrant, and this has put me in a position where I lack power and privileges. I can tell you thousands of stories of how this has played out for me, but that is beyond the scope of this post.

And yet, within my own Latino community, I am privileged. I am college educated and have a great paying job with benefits. To deny my own privilege would be the definition of denial.


The Call of the Gospel
After we have examined our own power and privilege, then the crucial question, as followers of Jesus, is to ask ourselves, what is the Gospel calling me to do?

I believe the Scriptures are clear on this: we are to give up our power for the empowerment of others.

Whether we earned (or feel we earned) this power and privilege is irrelevant. Jesus rarely asks the rich and powerful how they earned their positions. Failing to see this can moves us to meritocracy, where we see ourselves as deserving and the poor as undeserving.

In my experience of living in the United States, I have time and time again seen how privileged people see themselves as deserving of this privilege, because they worked hard or because their families worked hard to get where they are.

While this may be true, failing to recognize your privilege often leads to a self-righteous perspective on the poor as lazy, not driven enough, and therefore undeserving of our sympathy, or worse, our help.

If this is our attitude to the poor, how can we reconcile our attitudes with Jesus' attitudes and dealings with the poor?

If Jesus is our example, shouldn't we imitate this undeniable characteristic of His ministry?

The calling of the Gospel is simple and yet terrifying: give up your power and use it not for your own comfort, but in service of others. If you can't identify your own power and privilege, then you won't be able to empower others as effectively.

It is hard to give what we ignore we have.

Rediscovering the Orthodox View of Male Leadership

[Mat 20:25-28 ESV] 25 But Jesus called them to him and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. 26 It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, 28 even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."

[Phl 2:5-7 ESV] 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

[Eph 5:25 ESV] 25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.

OK, seriously, what is wrong with me? Am I going all patriarchal and Westboro Baptist on all of you? Am I suffering from some sort of ultra-conservative and temporary lapse of madness?

Before you declare me clinically insane, or worse, a conservative, I pray you read what I have to say!

I will base my theological musings on these 3 verses. These theological musings emerged from a conversation I had with my fiance about leadership in relationships, and she deserves half the credit for what is written here.

Before I start however, I want to say that there is a huge difference between being conservative and being Orthodox. Conservatives love to think of themselves as Orthodox, but their "orthodoxy" is so entangled with so many political assumptions and values that it is no longer Orthodoxy.

Conservatism is a counterfeit of Orthodoxy.

If only we would realize this, in my opinion, we would avoid many serious mistakes, like the exodus of Christian Liberalism from Orthodoxy, in the hopes of distancing themselves from the horrific mistreatment from conservatives of Orthodoxy.

Anyways, that's another blog post! Back to our topic!

I believe God calls us man to be leaders. Crazy huh?

This leadership, however, is so radically different from what the world views as leadership. They are diametrically opposed to the point that I am willing to say that male leadership does not equal patriarchy. If anything it is the subversion of patriarchy!

Say what?!

I know. But before you sent me to a medieval asylum, or before I get killed by an angry mob of radical feminists, let me explain my exegesis of these verses!

I believe that Jesus was trying to destroy patriarchy by transforming our notion of leadership.

What Jesus is saying in Mathew 20 is this: leadership does not equal authority! If we truly follow the logic of what He is saying, then having leadership is not having authority, but literally becoming slaves of all.

Now, we may read this and think, "this is just Jesus being poetic and cute, you know that hyperbole thing". I don't think so. I think He means what He says, and it is crazy.

First, He starts by asserting an undeniable fact: rulers lord it over others. This is our basic definition of authority. Authority over others means that your will dictates what others do. Plain and simple. And yet Jesus says "it shall not be so among you",

Crazy!

He is saying, you should not lead with authority! Why? This is more than just a lesson of humility. This is a lesson on Christian leadership. Lord it over others, I believe, is the way the world leads, and as a consequence, and by the simple command of our Lord, it is sinful for the Christian to lead this way.

It is sinful not because it is wrong, though a case can be done for its wrongness. It is sinful because it disobeys a command of our Lord and therefore misses the mark of Christian leadership: "it shall not be so among you".

If we lead, according to Jesus, then we must serve like slaves, or bondservants. I have said before that the word translated here as slave is from the Greek doulos.

If you had told a first Century Jew that slaves were full of authority and therefore leaders, they'd have laughed at you! I think the irony was not lost to Jesus' disciples, and His words were as perplexing then as they are now.

Now, this is not to say that all authority is evil, but an authority that forces and commands others to do as you will is definitely evil.

Philippians 2 tells us that Jesus "emptied Himself by taking the form of a servant". Here is that doulos word again! It is not that Jesus didn't have authority. That He has is undeniable to the Christian. But in order to lead, He had to serve, and in order to serve, He had to empty Himself!

In other words, in order for Jesus to lead, He had to empty Himself of authority, and lead as a servant!

Leading, therefore, is not a position of authority. Leading is a position of servitude.

See where I'm going with this?

The third passage from Ephesians commands man to "love your wives". How? "as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for her".

How did Christ give himself to the church? By emptying Himself and serving, and giving His life as a ransom for her!

Now, leadership demands not that we have authority, but that we have initiative.

To lead is to have initiative, and to lead as a Christian is to lead in service, to take initiative in service.

Why is the task to take the initiative given to man, and not woman? Isn't that unfair? Isn't this more or less a more "gentle" form of patriarchy?

I don't think so, and here is why.

Man are asked to take initiative out of the simple fact that in society, historically speaking, and even true today, are the ones who have more power and authority. This was an undeniable fact in Jesus' days, and it is an undeniable fact today.

Women, sadly, are the ones whose society bestow less power to. This is unfair, and I'm not advocating for this.

Therefore, since men have more power given to them by society, it makes more sense to make the demand of them to lead, and by leading, to empty themselves. To lead is to give up voluntarily that power, and offer it to the powerless.

Crazy huh?

I think what Jesus is saying here is this: you guys are used to having all the power. Guess what? I'm asking you that if you want to lead, you must give it up and become a servant.

To ask women to give up what little power they had would be unfair. Therefore, it is the task of the men to lead, and by leading, to give up that power in service to the powerless.

This is not patriarchy. This is the subversion of Patriarchy, and it is beautiful.

The Pharisee prayed every morning what is called the three morning blessings, thanking God for not making him "a gentile, slave or a woman".

The Kingdom of God comes and subdues these blessings and declares: The Kingdom of God is also for the gentiles, requires its leaders to be slaves and to give and offer their lives to the powerless, including, in Jesus' days the woman.

Rev. Eric Law says that Jesus, in His encounters with the rich and powerful, preached the gospel of the cross, and to the poor and powerless, He preached the gospel of the resurrection.

This means that to the rich and powerful Jesus is asking them to give up that power and give it to the poor (sell all you have and give it to the poor) and to carry the cross and follow Him.

To the poor, He already calls them blessed (blessed are the poor, for theirs is the Kingdom of God).

It would be wrong and unfair to ask the poor to give up their power and preach a gospel of the cross to them, for they are too familiar with the cross.

I believe Jesus is doing something similar here with leadership.

God calls the powerful to lead by giving up their power and become servants. If men were and continue to have more power then God will continue to ask them to give up their power in servant leadership.

Relationship and the sharing of powers
Lastly, how do all of this relate to relationships between a man and a woman?

Man, in a relationship, is asked to lead. This is how I interpret earlier passages of Ephesians 5, where man is seen as the "head".

This sort of leadership, however, has to be closely tied to Christ's leadership. If man is to lead, he is to do so like Christ, by loving his wife and giving himself to her like Christ did to the church.

In doing this, man becomes the servant, and by becoming the servant, he is "emptying" himself and sharing the power with this wife. This takes tremendous courage and vulnerability, for here they become vulnerable to their wives.

The wife, in return, honors this servant leadership and shares that power back to the husband, and an intimate circle of power sharing is created, where one doesn't "lord it over" the other, and thus obeying God's command, but where the man leads by serving and emptying of his power, and the wife "submits" by honoring the husband and sharing the power back.

In this vision, both man and woman share power by giving up power.

When we give up and share power, we are exalted. The Scriptures gives firm testimony of this. Christ, in that same passage of Philippians, is exalted above any other name, since He was willing to empty Himself.

The Virgin Mary in the Magnificat proclaims that He "casts down the mighty from their thrones, and lifts the lowly".

The mighty shall be brought down, and the humble shall be exalted. If we have power, whatever our circumstances, then we are called to give it up in service of others, and God will take care of the exalting.

Leadership is one way to do that.