I was really ready to focus on something other than social justice for a while, but last week I received a call from a woman from another church who had read that I was developing a curriculum on social justice for the North Alabama Conference.
After asking me to define social justice, she asked, “but doesn’t that mean getting involved in politics?”
Yes, I replied.
“But won’t that jeopardize the church’s tax-exempt status?”
Well, I said, my first answer is no, because precedent indicates that churches can be politically active as long as they don’t endorse candidates. My second answer is, so what? Even if we lose our tax-exempt status we still have an obligation to preach the gospel.
“Well, I have a copy of the IRS tax code right here,” she said.
Ding.
In other words, she called in order to have an argument. So, I obliged. For the next hour and a half.
“...and it says that a church can be classified as a 501(c)(3) organization as long as ‘no substantial part of the activities of which is carrying on propaganda, or otherwise attempting to influence legislation.’”
First of all, I replied, there’s a lot of leeway in that statement. “Substantial part” would be what - 5%? And do you honestly think any judge in America is going to tell an African-American church that they can’t preach about civil rights, or affirmative action, or the historical importance of having a black president? Is any judge in America going to tell a conservative church they can’t campaign against abortion?
But I’m grateful to her, because I guess if she hadn’t called, I wouldn’t be sitting here on a Saturday working on a curriculum to educate Alabamians about social justice. A large number of United Methodists get more of their political theology from Glenn Beck and Mark Tooley than they do from John Wesley. So here is a draft of the Social Justice FAQ (which will go at the end of the document).
These questions are abstracted from that conversation. I’ll post a rhetorical analysis of the questions themselves at the end of this document.
I appreciate any feedback that helps me refine the document:
——————————————
Social Justice FAQ: Doesn’t social justice mean getting involved in politics? What about the separation of church and state?
Women’s suffrage, Civil Rights, the abolition of slavery, and child labor laws were all the result of churches “getting involved” in politics. It is hard to imagine how many of these movements would have ever grown without the involvement of religious leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr., Sojourner Truth, William Wilberforce, and John Wesley. The first Methodist social creed was written in 1908 as a direct response to the crisis of child labor in the United States. Churches have always been involved in politics, because preaching the gospel inevitably means creating political conflict. When Paul visited Ephesus (Acts 19:20-41) and preached against idolatry, the city’s idol-makers tried to stir up the city against him for economic reasons.
Many churches, especially mainline Protestant churches, try to be “neutral” on political issues for fear of alienating some members or creating conflict. Even during these historical crises and shifts in culture, some Christians insisted that churches should, “stay out” of the Civil Rights movement, or of child labor legislation. What would have happened if they had?
The separation of church and state does not mean the separation of religion and politics. Separation of church and state avoids excessive government entanglement in religion, and allows religious groups to operate freely without persecution. The separation of church and state has allowed religion to thrive in the United States (while state-sponsored churches have declined in Europe), and has allowed a rich tradition of churches who promote civic engagement among their members.
Because we live in a [representative democracy], churches not only can but should be involved in politics. Since we the people make the decisions, we the people are accountable to God for how our cities, states, and nation run.
Won’t being involved in politics jeopardize churches’ tax-exempt status?
As a 501c(3) organization, a church can weigh in on matters of social policy and particular political issues, but it cannot campaign for or against any candidates themselves (Rossoti v. Branch Ministries, D.D.C. 1999). A list of the kinds of activities a church can engage in is available from the IRS at http://www.irs.gov/charities/article/0,,id=170946,00.html.
The IRS even allows the publication of “voter guides,” which often include lists of issues and a summary of a candidates’ position on those issues. The IRS code states that “...certain “voter education” activities, including preparation and distribution of certain voter guides, conducted in a non-partisan manner may not constitute prohibited political activities under section 501(c)(3) of the Code.” (page 2, http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/rr-07-41.pdf).
The same rule even says that candidates may participate in a public forum or debate as part of a voter education event. Churches may allow candidates to speak at their functions and may participate in voter registration drives. Focus on the Family has provided a summary of church political activities permitted under the 501(c)(3) rules here: http://www.citizenlink.org/pdfs/PastorsGuidelines_summary.pdf. Obviously, the same rules apply to churches of any political persuasion.
Won’t being involved in political activity cause divisions in the church?
Maybe.
In 1844, disputes over slavery led to a schism in the Methodist church. The Methodist Episcopal Church, South, split into their own denomination. They removed from their General Rules the rule against owning slaves. So there are certainly precedents for denominations and even individual churches splitting over contentious issues.
But there are also churches and denominational bodies who are more united in how they engage the larger world. Conservative churches who protest abortion clinics and African-American churches who demonstrate against racism do not seem to worry about whether their activities divide the church.
Being politically neutral has not helped mainline Protestant churches grow in the last few decades. It has not helped them attract young people to church or lead people to Christ. Although we in the U.S. often describe ourselves in terms of “liberal” or “conservative,” there are often social justice issues that cross political boundaries. The environmentalism and creation care movement has seen churches across the political spectrum unite on important environmental issues.
Both “liberal” and “conservative” United Methodist churches have been struggling with declining membership in the last few decades. Ignoring social justice will not reverse that trend, and instead will simply make the church more irrelevant to a new generation.
Shouldn’t we just preach Christ, and Christ alone? Isn’t the real message of Christianity about saving souls?
Jesus kicked off his ministry with a political statement: ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’ You can read the whole story in Luke 4:16-30.
The “year of the Lord’s favor” is a reference to the Jubilee year, when all debts were canceled and all slaves were freed (Leviticus 25:8-13). This commandment was supposed to be carried out every 50 years, but had long been neglected. Jesus was saying that his ministry was the fulfillment of the prophecy in Isaiah, that God would reset the clock and bring justice to the world. (Some people say that Jesus never preached against slavery, but I believe his first sermon made explicit where he stood on the subject.)
Even before Jesus was born, people knew the messiah would bring social justice. Listen to his mother, Mary’s song from Luke 1:52-53: “He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.”
Jesus talked more about the “Kingdom of God” than anything else. The Kingdom was not just a place we go when we die - it was the reign of God on earth. The language he uses is firmly in line with all the language of the prophets. When Jesus preaches his famous prophecy about the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25, he describes very clearly the kind of behavior he expects from his followers.
The people who heard his message would have known, when he talked about judging sheep and goats, that he was also referring to Ezekiel 34:17-19. This is one of the clearest examples in the Bible about God’s interest in environmental justice: “When you drink of clear water, must you foul the rest with your feet? And must my sheep eat what you have trodden with your feet, and drink what you have fouled with your feet?” So when Jesus talked about feeding the hungry, he wasn’t just telling his audience to be charitable; by using the language of Ezekiel he was also reminding them that they should be stewards of the earth.
So, preaching Christ means preaching social justice. There is no way to split one from the other. Evangelism, missions of mercy, and social justice go hand-in-hand
I understand that Jesus says we should individually help the poor, but he doesn’t say anywhere the government should. Isn’t it enough for Christians to help the poor individually?
Jesus also never said that there should be a separation of church and state, or that democracies are better than dictatorships. Making this kind of distinction between individuals and government puts modern ideas and words back into Jesus’ mouth. Roman Emperors and Judean Kings had no concept of things like “democracy” or “the consent of the governed.”
Amos told the nation of Israel that they were experts at acting individually religious, but that all their worship was worthless as long as they continued to oppress the poor. He called on the nation to let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream (5:24). Is this a command directed at individuals? At governments? At whole societies?
God repeatedly holds entire cities and nations accountable for their treatment of the poor. Ezekiel 16:49 says “This was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy.” God punishes the firstborn of every family in Egypt for Pharoah’s reluctance to let the Hebrews free from slavery. The prophets accuse whole societies of idolatry and injustice to the poor. If God holds nations accountable for the actions of their rulers or even of a majority, would God not hold every [voting member of a republic] accountable for their nation’s actions?
In addition, as shown above in his reference to the sheep and goats, Jesus frequently cites the prophets in addressing how whole communities should behave. He assumed that his listeners would be Biblically literate enough to make the connection between the prophets’ words and his own. Jesus did not just come to save souls - he came to save the world.
Historical examples show us that it is impossible to address some injustices as individuals. As a slave owner in the 1800’s, you might be kind to your slaves and still believe you were doing what the gospel required of you. But even a slave owner who freed their slaves could not end slavery without government action. As a factory-owner in the 1900’s, you might refuse to hire children. But you could not end child labor through your hiring practices.
Some obstacles that keep people poor - lack of health care, poor education, bad neighborhoods, lack of access to healthy food, human traficking - can only be overcome by community or government action. Of course, others can only be overcome by individual action. The answer is for the church not to put all its emphasis either on individual or collective action.
I understand social justice for life and death issues like slavery and child labor, but what about others? How do you decide which issues are important?
One incredulous woman told me that she understood that slavery, women’s suffrage, and child labor were important. These historical issues were “life and death” issues. But she did not consider Alabama Constitutional reform, grocery taxes, and other such issues “life and death,” and thought the church should stay out of them.
For privileged and comfortable people, slavery, child labor, Civil Rights, and women’s suffrage were not “life and death” issues, either. Slave owners had a vested interest in saying that the church should stay out of politics. After all, they would argue, they treated their slaves well. 100 years later, white opponents of civil rights could claim - rightly - that white churches would drive some members away if they preached against segregation. Here in Birmingham, some of those churches never recovered from their principled stand. Earlier in this century, wealthy factory owners actually claimed that keeping children out of the workplace would deprive poor families of important income and drive up the cost of labor. All of these examples point to the fact that everywhere that churches preach social justice, they will encounter resistance from people who want to keep things as they are. People who benefit from injustice have all they need - money, political power, health care, a supply of cheap labor - and they don’t want the power of the gospel disrupting their lives.
For those who live in privilege, grocery tax legislation, Alabama Constitutional reform, public transportation, gambling, environmental justice, health care reform, and American foreign policy are not “life and death” issues. But for those who are struggling in poverty, those whose lives are affected by climate change or industrial pollution, those who do not have access to health care, these are “life and death” issues. Oppressed people long to hear the words of Jesus, that today is the day they will be set free.
Every injustice that keeps people poor, or voiceless, or that treats people as something less than human beings created in the image of God is an issue worth addressing in church. God is still at work in our world, freeing prisoners, giving people second chances, and transforming lives. God will continue to work, with or without your church. The question for your church is simply, “Will you get on board with what God is doing in the world?”
——————————————-
I think it’s worth pointing out that each of these questions is really intended to undercut the idea of preaching social justice. Let’s unmask the rhetoric operating in each question:
a) there is no need for it because the issues are not important enough (to me),
b) there is no Biblical mandate for using government or collective action to address justice; individuals should handle it on their own,
c) the issues may be important but avoiding conflict and retaining members is more important,
d) preaching social justice will divert attention from the more important task of saving souls,
e) preaching social justice is somehow against the law or will result in negative legal consequences
Folks, that’s really all they got. Learn to recognize when someone deploys these rhetorical strategies. They are pretty easy to refute if you know your Bible.
This is a documentary based on the transcripts from the 1901 Alabama Constitutional Convention. The institutionalized racism these delegates created has crippled our state for a hundred years.
But there’s this amazing quote from Rep. Gipson: “The whole bill is a redistribution of wealth. Washington is doing such a good job of that I don’t know that we need to get involved with that.”
He’s already been taken to task in this editorial, but I thought this is an excellent example of the concept of privilege: the failure to recognize your own power, status, and position in society.
See, we already redistribute wealth with taxes. We just take it from the poor and give it to the rich. Alabama has some of the lowest property taxes in the nation, a fact that directly benefits those who own the most land. We make up for the lack of state revenue with sales taxes. The poor pay a greater percentage of their income in sales taxes than the rich. They are actually subsidizing farms, timber industries, and wealthy landowners every time they put food in their mouths.
Here’s another way to look at it: two to three weeks of groceries. Out of a year’s groceries, the government takes two weeks of food away from the poor and turns it into swimming pools and big lawns with automatic sprinklers for the rich. And board feet. And soybeans.
The fact that Gipson uses the kind of rhetoric worthy of FOX news to claim that this is unfair to rich people illustrates the concept of privilege: rich people are entitled to the money they earn. Poor people are not.
Last weekend I overheard a table full of elderly medicare recipients at church bewailing our country’s new “socialized medicine.” I heard from a friend that one senior citizen, after talking about her multiple extensive surgeries (all paid for with Medicare) said, “if those people can see my doctors, who knows how long I’ll have to wait?” The attitude of people in privilege is “I’ve got mine!”
Folks, if good news for the poor sounds like bad news to you, then you live in privilege. It may be the privilege of race, or class, or age, or some other system of power. But my faith says that good news to the poor is good news to everyone. The prophets proclaim a time when everyone who works for it will sit under the shade of their own fig tree (Micah 4:4), and live in houses that they built with their own hands. The idea is that in a just world, people get to enjoy the life they build for themselves and nobody will steal it from them and send them into exile, or turn them into debt slaves. City streets are safe, and there are plenty of public spaces for kids to play around retirees (Zech 8:4-5). These are not visions of streets paved with gold and towers of rubies. These visions are fairly tame: a just world where people live with some measure of security, and are able to enjoy the simple things of life. They plant their own gardens, build their own homes, and hang out with friends.
Here’s my response to two comments made on my previous post:
While God calls us to do those things, there is also 2 Thess. 3:10 that says if a man doesn’t work, he doesn’t eat .... as well as Proverbs 29 that talks about true justice coming from only God. While Glenn may have made sweeping generalizations, the point is a church that focuses on the social justice verses but ignores the responsibility verses - is in sin and disobedience. many churches do this. and as blessed as we are in America, there are very few within our borders that are genuinely voiceless and “poor”. The “poor” in our country are richer than most of the world. So keep that in mind…
Posted by Ben on 03/27 at 08:39 PM
The confusing part about the social justice debate always takes me back to Luke 10:30-37(a priest and a Levite passed him by on the other side or maybe even went and told someone what they saw).However the Samaritin took action,bandages,oil and wine and housing.The priest and the Levites in those days were the “good guys"the advocates for the masses if I may.So who helped the man in need.Sometimes I think people confuse guilt with compassion and pass some by hoping to advocate for him to the government.I am not as concerned about what you think of the poor but more about what you do (like the Samaritin).And its amazing that those that advocate for the poor often saying we all could pay a little more to Ceasar to help the poor.They sit under tax exempt status groups that pay no federal tax,maybe its time that be re-examined imagine how many poor people could be helped if they just started paying their fair share.
Posted by Samaritin on 03/28 at 08:57 AM
You mention that churches that focus on social justice to the exclusion of “responsibility verses” are in sin and disobedience. So I must ask - where are these churches? Are there specific churches you have in mind? Because I don’t know of any myself. I think if you actually look for such examples, you will find very few. I think you would find it much easier to find churches that NEVER preach social justice, and only preach an individualistic gospel about getting souls into heaven. Are these churches also in sin and disobedience?
I ask this question because I suspect that the real issue for Beckists and politically conservative Christians is not that social justice is preached too MUCH, but that it is preached AT ALL. Moreover I believe it is the assertion that God may care more about how we vote in ways that go beyond abortion and gay marriage bills that really bothers Beckists. I am not saying this is true of you, but I believe that it is true of Beck.
I have to say I think y’all’s exegesis is pretty thin. You mention Proverbs 29 (I’m assuming verse 26) which says that many seek the favor of a ruler, but it is from YHWH that one gets justice. It is preceded by verse 14 and verse 4 (and many others, some of which I listed in the original post - by the way, how do you interpret those?), which suggest leaders and their nations are still held accountable for doing justice to the poor. Even if true justice comes from God (as do true love, true beauty, and truth itself) does that then mean it is not our duty also to do justice (Micah 6:8), even if it “approximate” justice? Do I no longer have to love my neighbor if true love comes from God?
As for the parable of the man robbed on the Jericho road - do you really think the priest and Samaritan passed by because they thought the Roman occupiers would take care of the beaten man? How do you think the original hearers of that parable understood it? How would you react if Jesus said that a conservative Christians passed by, a liberal Christian passed by, but then a gay Muslim stopped and helped the beaten man? Would that rankle a bit?
However, I do take your point. Liberals who think they can abdicate personal responsibility to love their neighbor by passing the buck to social service government agencies are not loving their neighbor. But neither are conservatives who practice conscience-salving individual acts of charity that do nothing to address the structural problems that keep people poor. In Alabama, we pay very little property tax, but sales tax on groceries is 10%. This means in a given year, the poorest people in the state are still giving to the government the equivalent of 1.5 months of groceries. So the poor are subsidizing the property of homeowners with their food. We are taking food out of the mouths of the poor to pay for education and local service for the wealthiest people. But I find that many Christians are happy to bring canned goods to food closets rather than the far less sexy and far more boring work of calling their representatives to advocate for the poor. So who really loves their neighbor?
While you can certainly go serve a meal in a homeless shelter, that doesn’t help them get or keep a job. Until you get to know the people who are homeless and learn about their stories, you can maintain the illusion that they are poor “because they don’t work.“They DO work, many of them, but their jobs do not pay enough for them to have safe and reliable housing. Many of them also do not have reliable transportation in a culture that requires cars. So people who advocate for social justice also advocate for public transportation. So they CAN get to work.
So, no, I don’t buy the argument that social justice is a cop out for loving your neighbor. Much the reverse, in fact.
The final point you want me to keep in mind is that the poor in America are better off than the poor in some countries. That is true. I have been in developing countries where the poor have no social services whatsoever. But you can also make the counterpoint that the poor in developed nations are MUCH better off than the poor in our country. They have public health care, for example. And the longevity and health statistics in those countries are much better than the averages in ours.
I would also argue that poverty is not measured in absolute terms. Poverty is not just how much money you have, but how much access you have to political power, how much access you have to employment opportunities to change your station in life, etc. Poor people in the US are far less upwardly mobile than in some other developed countries because they don’t have access to those social services. Again, you have to own a car in many cities in order to hold down a job. That’s a big hurdle for many. While they may be better off than someone without a job in Bolivia, their prospects for changing their future may be about the same.
That, in my opinion, is why Micah 6:8 says we should do mercy AND justice. We don’t merely bandage people’s wounds - we try to stop people from robbing them.
Since Glenn Beck keeps ranting about left-leaning Christians* who use the word “social justice” to advance their agenda, I thought I’d also point out a few other groups who have infiltrated the church, many of whom use the Bible to support their agendas:
These people are inside your church! Some of them are clergy! Scary!
——————————————————-
*He didn’t actually say “left-leaning” - he said “communist” and “Nazi.” That’s part of what makes this particularly dishonest. He knows very well what he’s talking about: Christians who support healthcare reform and justice for the poor because they believe in the Biblical mandate to love their neighbor with more than superficial charity.
I really hope he keeps talking about this. The more he talks the more transparent he becomes.
Edit (3-13-2010): Credit where credit is due: Lewis Archer was the first person I heard the phrase “self-avowed, practicing evangelical” from. Now I think I want a bumper sticker with that phrase.
All Language is Political: “Negro Dialect” and the Power of Words
One of the neat things about studying social linguistics is the way it makes explicit the things everyone already knows. Harry Reid’s tone-deaf comment about Barack Obama is a great example. He chose an inelegant way of saying something everyone knows is true: “Obama doesn’t talk black.” Others have made similar offensive observations. “He is articulate,” which is a coded way of saying, “he sounds white.” But it isn’t really enough to say that he sounds white. He sounds like a certain kind of white person, one who has been educated and has not grown up in a rural or poor environment; which is, in fact, true about Obama. Which brings up all kinds of questions about what it means for someone to sound “white.”
If only Harry Reid had spent a couple of semesters studying sociology or linguistics, he could have put it in a much less offensive, more academic-sounding way. Instead of using the phrase “negro dialect,” he could have said: “One of the reasons the president is popular across racial and class lines is because he doesn’t use African-American Vernacular English.” He could have even sounded more legit (isn’t that a “black” word?) by using its acronym, AAVE.
The irony, of course, is that in his comment about Obama’s use of language, he himself made a sociolinguistic blunder. He demonstrated by his failure to use correct language that he is morally and intellectually deficient. He is not one of “us.” These are exactly the kinds of judgments racists make when they hear AAVE, what some call “ebonics.”
What is so delicious about the whole brouhaha is that it demonstrates the way language works. Language is not merely the communication of ideas. It is the communication of social status, power, and group fidelity. When we deploy language, we advertise to which groups we belong, what values we accept, and what kinds of persons we are. If I drop the g’s off of my words: “listenin’ and learnin’,” I can show that I am folksy or populist or one of y’all, the way George W. Bush and Sarah Palin do. If I borrow words from popular black culture, I can demonstrate that I’m hip - unless I deploy them incorrectly or in an incongruous style, in which case I’m revealed to be a poser. These are all “social discourses,” ways we use language to pull off being a certain kind of person.
White people often misunderstand AAVE as being incorrect or improper English. But even if we look at language as the communication of ideas, vernaculars often use much more elegant and consistent grammars than (implicitly white) Standard Academic English. One common example is the pair of sentences “she late” and “she be late.” The first is a perfectly correct grammatical construction in many languages. The verb “is” is implied. “She late” means she is late. “She be late” is a grammatical construction which implies a continual action. To translate it into SAE, you have to add cumbersome words: “She is habitually late.” You don’t have to do that in AAVE. You just say, “she be late.”
The same thing applies to Southern and Rural English as well. “Y’all” is a perfectly good word that often serves as a class or regional marker in our language. It’s a word shared by southerners, rural whites, and speakers of AAVE. There is no second person plural in Standard Academic English except “you.” “Y’all” makes clear who is being addressed: “all of you.” “Ain’t” is likewise a perfectly good word which has been in use for centuries as a contraction of the words “am” and “not.” The only reason to shun it is for class prejudice: people who say “ain’t” have not had it educated out of them.
Now, I think it’s really important to be careful about what we say and how we say it, especially if your vocation (like mine) is built on words. But the reality of human communication necessitates a measure of grace. You have to give folks the benefit of the doubt. Rather than react to someone’s socio-linguistic failure with glee or schadenfreude, we should ask how it could have been said better, and then ask if it really makes a bit of difference. When Reid said “negro dialect,” you knew what he meant. And chances are, you’ve thought the same thing.
And if you’ve thought the same thing, perhaps that’s where the real discussion on race, language, and how we treat each other could begin. There are no absolute lines around what constitutes AAVE, and no rational reason why Standard Academic English is considered “white,” or why what is “white” is considered more proper than what is not. Yet we make these kinds of judgments all the time at an unconscious level. We even modulate our dialect, sliding into one kind of vernacular or another depending on who is around us.
All language is political, because we are always indicating through it to which groups we belong, what our values are, and where we call home. Had Harry Reid said something like this, I doubt anyone would argue. Obama uses the language of power, and it is in part his artful use of that power that won him the election.
————————
[edit 1-23-10]: I should have pointed out that President Obama obviously gets some of his excellent speaking skills from black preachers, and I think he demonstrates a skill at “code switching” - the ability to “pull off” multiple social discourses at the same time. For a great movie about code switching (and its perils), I recommend Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai.
I was a bit stunned by Nate Silver’s blog post on the data on Obama’s approval rating in Alabama. According to the survey, Obama’s approval has gone up at the end of August among white voters in Alabama.
You could never tell it from the chatter I hear. Of course, I spend most of my day around white middle-class people. Mostly it’s parenthetical, politically-loaded statements like, “if we still have medicare,” or “if inflation doesn’t get us.” But I can tell that there’s an undercurrent of fear for our country’s future, anxiety about national debt, etc. I would have figured that if anything, overall support for Obama would have gone down, given the tenor of media coverage. I live in Homewood, which in some ways is a model of the dynamic of Whitopia (people here even refer to it occasionally as “Mayberry”). There is plenty of diversity here, but there is also significant class and geographical segregation within the community.
So for you Alabamians and southerners - regardless of your political orientation - I’m curious about why you think this might be. 98% of black men and men voted for Obama back in November, and only 10% of whites. Yet according to the above survey, Obama’s approval rating is at 28% among white voters at the end of August.
Now, I know that approval ratings don’t always carry a lot of long-term significance. I’m just curious why. Thoughts?
There’s a song titled “More Precious Than Silver,” which goes:
Lord you are more precious than silver
Lord you are more costly than gold
Lord you are more beautiful than diamonds
And nothing I desire compares with you.
Which is all fine and good, and it certainly has a pretty tune. But it struck me today as I was reading Proverbs that it’s an appropriated metaphor. The original text is a praise of Lady Wisdom:
Happy are those who find wisdom, and those who get understanding
for her income is better than silver, and her revenue better than gold
She is more precious than jewels, and nothing you desire can compare with her. (Proverbs 3:13-15)
Most congregations, of course, are far more comfortable addressing our hymns and love songs to THE LORD, who we will refer to in the masculine gender. I wonder, how many congregations would be comfortable singing a love song to Lady Wisdom? Look, it’s more Biblical, and it even fits the meter just fine. So why do the lyrics substitute THE LORD for Lady Wisdom?
Wisdom is more precious than silver
Knowledge is more costly than gold
Wisdom is more beautiful than diamonds,
And nothing I desire compares with her.
In the last post I said that the primary reason the Church is missing lots of young adults has little to do with the the mission, theology, or politics of the Church, but much to do with demographics. The economic and social forces that prolong adolescence and delay “settled” adulthood are what keep people from participating in worship. I’m also bracketing my qualms about equating “adulthood” with “settling down.” Some of the most visionary and mature Christian adults I know never settle.
But now I want to backtrack a bit and say that this extended adolescence is also part of what creates friction between unchurched young adults and “The Church.” There are two components to extended adolescence. One is physiological and sexual, and the other is social.* These are related issues, but I want to illustrate them separately.
First, the physiological and sexual. People hit puberty earlier. The research varies, but the most extreme research suggests that the average age of menarche has fallen from age 15 (or even 17 in rural, nutritionally-poor areas) to age 12, with some girls having their first period as early as 8 or 10. The most conservative research suggests that the drop is more modest, perhaps from 13-and-a-half to 12-and-a-half. Regardless, people’s bodies mature earlier and they marry later than they did 100 years ago. If you roll the clock way back, some people estimate that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was just 13 when she was betrothed to Joseph.
Now, if people are maturing earlier and marrying later, they have a longer period of time in which to be sexually active. While Jane Austen’s heroines typically married somewhere between 18 and 21**, the average age of marriage these days is 27 or 28 (as I pointed out in the last post). So the time between when someone begins to sexually mature and the time at which they marry (if they marry at all) can be as long as twenty years. That’s two decades.
During this time, a human being becomes socialized to their peer group. They begin placing more weight on what their peers think than their families. We encourage this process through factory education, where we isolate persons from those in other age groups, teaching them as a class or cohort, and refer to them as a “generation.” So their primary source of character education comes not from family, not from church, but from their peers.
And media.
Mary Pipher, Carol Gilligan, Jeane Kilbourne, and a number of other feminist psychologists, sociologists, and other researchers have pointed out that this is when girls get socialized to think of themselves as objects, to lose their voice, to develop eating disorders. Although their parents have been telling them from birth that they can do anything, be anyone, and have social equality with men, they are relentlessly educated by the media and by their peer group that their primary value is derived by being sexually attractive and sexually pleasing to men. There is a similar social travesty that happens to boys, but for the purposes of considering extended adolescence and how it impacts what we do as church, it’s easier to see in our culture with girls. What is on the cover of men’s magazines? Women. What’s on the cover of women’s magazines? Women. Women as objects. Women as infantile. Women bound, powerless, and dehumanized.
We dump young teenagers into this environment, and the only advice they hear from the church is “do not have sex.” For 20 years. Oh, and don’t touch yourself. Although the Bible doesn’t say a word about masturbation, it’s assumed that any sexual pleasure you give yourself is wrong and shameful. It’s a theme the popular culture is all too happy to take up with either mocking or shocking. Mocked in movies like American Pie, or expressed as shock when the surgeon general mentions the word.
Imagine yourself as a teenager immersed in this environment. You are told you must suppress all sexual feelings for 20 years. Save yourself for marriage. Yet you know that nearly half of all marriages end in divorce - in fact, it’s likely that your parents are divorced, and one or both of them may be living with a girlfriend or boyfriend. See the problem?
Now, follow me carefully here. I am not talking about premarital sex,*** or pornography, or media culture. I am talking about the church’s credibility. From the beginning of puberty, everyone knows the church is not credible on this issue. We all know it, and nobody says a blessed thing about it. Into this credibility gap we are sold a vision of ideal sexuality, involving all kinds of products ranging from cosmetics to viagra. Sexual fulfillment becomes something you buy, not something that comes from deep intimacy with another human being. We are taught to be immature, and to linger in this state well past “adulthood.” Our extended adolescence is characterized by immature sexual attitudes and sexual anxiety.
By contrast, adulthood is associated with boring and unsexy things: minivans, baby spit-up, balancing checkbooks, paying the bills. Corporate-produced mass culture offers us a choice between this world, and the world of young, idealized, sexualized hipness, and even the most media-savvy of us buy into it.
The second component of extended adolescence is social, and it has to do with responsibility and the relative value of your contributions to society. I like to use the illustration of a reality television show that came on PBS several years ago called Frontier House. Three families go to spend several months in Montana, living as the pioneers did. When the kids first begin the adventure, you hear them complain. “What are we going to do for all these weeks? It’s going to be horrible! There’s no television, no cell phones, no video games, no malls.” Over the course of the program, you get to see what they fill their time with. They learn to ride horses. Because they have no mp3 players, they make their own music. Some learn to play the guitar. They milk the cows. The collect the eggs. If they fail in their chores, the family suffers. But the cool thing about the program is that you see the kids absolutely bloom. They grow up.
At the end of the show, they return to their homes. They wander their McMansions like zombies. The modern world sucks the life right out of them. And they say, “there’s nothing to do here but watch television, play video games, and go to the mall.” In Montana, they are useful. They actually contribute to the survival of their family and the flourishing of their community. In the modern world, they become surplus people. They have no social value except as consumers, and they know it. They can do two things - go to school, and buy crap. This is why all media culture is geared toward teenagers, who have the most disposable income and the most time on their hands. They have no other use.
Again, follow me carefully. I’m not arguing that “kids today just need to get a job.” That’s just it. They don’t need to get a job. There’s nothing that depends on them getting a job except some external expectation that they “learn responsibility” or some such dreck. You can’t just give them more chores and drill a work ethic into them. Our society considers them surplus people. They are an economic problem, which is why we need to delay their entry into the workforce for 20 years (during which time, by the way, they aren’t supposed to “do it”). And they know it! On a gut level, the place that tells them they are a fully functional, competent human being who have the skills to survive on their own, they know that they are still children.
And when they act out this anger, frustration, lust, or despair, we blame it on hormones. Or we make up some ridiculous generalization about “kids today.” I say it makes sense when prisoners act like prisoners.
When these teenagers become young adults, the landscape changes a bit. Now, when you work in a retail store to make money to pay bills, you get to become part of that shallow society. Now you get to sell crap to teenagers. And when you grouse about having a dead-end job, or about your tremendous debt-load, or about the fact that your career has no meaning, or if you demand better, you are vilified by news pundits as belonging to an “entitlement generation.” Why can’t you just shut up and work for The Man, like your grandparents did? Why are you so spoiled? Preachers parrot back this conventional wisdom in pulpits all across America, again losing credibility with young adults.
But I do believe that part of what the church needs to do is to help people grow up. Not just by helping “young adults,” because we have several generations of people who have grown up under this same model who have been educated to be consumers. Nor am I suggesting we all need to move back on the farm or become Amish (though there is something appealing about that). But I do think that part of what is called for is a radical re-visioning of our lifestyle and how we behave as communities together. How do we give teenagers meaningful work? How do we create a community in which “unsettled” young adults can make important contributions to a community’s thriving?
*(When I use the term “extended adolescence,” I do not mean to denigrate adolescents or to use it as a purely negative term. Donald Joy’s book Bonding: Relationships in the Image of God is where I first grew to like the idea, and I’ve found it to be useful in explaining the way that we simultaneously idolize and infantilize youth. “Adolescence” the way I use it here is a social construction which our media culture uses to educate children to be consumers and to prevent adults from growing up.)
**(I’m not claiming that Jane Austen’s works are reliable estimates of average age of marriage, but it’s a nice reference point to consider. There is some debate about whether these age differences are as extreme as I’m claiming. Regardless, I think it’s pretty significant for the church if 100 years ago, the span of time between when one matured sexually and the time of socially-acceptable sexual experience was shorter than today.)
***(When I’ve talked about this with other church workers, they inevitably get frustrated and ask, “well, what should we do, then - pass out condoms?” This misses the point. I do not seriously think the church should either a) promote earlier marriage or b) encourage sex outside of marriage. But I do think our credibility is at stake if we do not honestly confront the economic forces which impact families and human sexuality.)
Maybe it’s just because I don’t watch much television, but I’m amazed at how the mainstream media can turn a handful of comments into a “bitter, racially-charged fight.” It’s a great way for people to pretend concern while managing to avoid any substantive discussion about race.
Heavens above, I wish someone would have a bitter, racially-charged fight. This wasn’t it. But the argument we need to have involves payday loan and cash advance establishments, public transportation, universal healthcare, poverty, education, social capital, and media bias.
And that’s why this is the perfect smokescreen for the real bitter, racially-charged fight that nobody is willing to have.
