A few months ago, I had never heard of Alberto Cutie. He is apparently a popular Spanish-speaking Catholic priest in Miami that was caught necking with a woman. Interestingly, he refused to become the Poster Boy for the celibacy requirement of Roman Catholic priests. Less surprisingly, he has since left the Roman Catholic Church to become an Episcopalian pastor. Despite his desire not to become a living, breathing reason to question the Catholic requirement, the departure of a popular priest who had the misfortune to fall in love becomes just that. Of course, those most likely to consider his relevance are those that already don’t agree with the celibacy requirement.

I am generally loathe to make declarations about what groups that I do not belong to ought to do. It becomes sort of like when Republicans used to give “advice” to the Democrats about how to reverse their fortunes. The same sort of advice (from the other direction) that Democrats are giving Republicans now. The problem with such advice is that it ranges from biased to disingenuous. People that lecture a group about what it should be with no real intention of joining said group simply don’t have the standing to have their advice received. Having no vested interest in the success of the group and therefore being immune to the negative repercussions of their advice (if followed), in addition to being biased and disingenuous the advice is simply bad. The churches that do everything the non-churchgoing, irreligious people say that churches should do to grow and stay relevant instead shrink and become less relevant. So I take the point of view that the discussion of matters such as priestly celibacy is the church’s to have.

All of that being said, what point is a blog if not for saying pointless things that you don’t have the standing to say? I’m partially kidding. Though my thoughts are unlikely to be received by anyone that matters, I think that it is interesting to investigate the effect that such requirements have on a pool of candidates.

It seems to me that these requirements would broadly produce candidates that fall into one of two categories: People willing to give themselves over completely to God despite the onerous requirements and people for whom the requirement is, for one reason or another, not much of a sacrifice. The first group are often precisely the people you want as priests. The second group includes others that you might want, too. People that are naturally asexual, homosexual disinclined to act on it, and widowers. The latter group also includes people that you really, really don’t want. I don’t think that there is much need to elaborate on that.

But as important as the quality of candidates is the quantity. The shortage of priests in the United States is well-known. I’ve read statistics suggesting 1 in 4 American parishes do not have priests, a statistic that seems awfully high but even if it is it is a problem that’s getting worse. But I’ve read that despite its dwindling membership that The Episcopal Church has a shortage of its own. And some are arguing that the problem is one of distribution rather than numbers:

In fact, says Fr. Paul Sullins, the level of lay involvement, combined with increased use of deacons and falling rates of church participation among the nation’s 66.4 million Catholics, makes the whole question of a priest shortage not a crisis, but a manageable problem.

“It’s not a national shortage,” said Sullins, a married former Episcopal priest and father of three who was ordained into the Catholic church in May 2002. Rather, “it’s a shortage in certain dioceses” resulting from a “poor distribution of priests.”

“If the priests were evenly distributed among the country there would be at least one … per parish. The number of parishioners has grown a lot in the past 40 years, but the number of parishes has not grown as much.”

So it’s possible that even with the requirement they can pick up the slack with deacons and better distributions. Or by consolidating parishes. Or a bunch of other ways. The celibacy requirement seems to have become part of the character of the church and I could definitely see how it would be unwise to uproot that out of short-term utilitarianism when there are always going to be ways to compensate for it.

Religious traditions are traditions and our perceptions of normalcy are often simply the product of the environment in which we were raised. The reason that I remain a member of my church (albeit a… relaxed one…) is because it is what is normal to me. If I go to a charismatic protestant service, the jumping up and down and clapping and all that comes across to me as a bit of a spectacle. I’ve always felt more at home in Catholic services due in large part to their similarities to Episcopalian. But what I see as the idiosyncrasies of the Catholic Church are… well… precisely involving the areas in which it differs from my own.

So with that in mind I can respect the differences between the Catholic and Episcopalian churches and the value they put on the differences. But I nonetheless do want to advocate one major point that, even if there weren’t a question of shortages or a sex abuse scandal or anything like that, makes me appreciate the protestant way of doing things. I like the fact that the pastors in my church are, to some extent, one of us. I think that it helps them relate to the lives of the parishioners that they have imperfect marriages and children just like we do (or will). While I can appreciate the appeal of priests that are above (or apart from) that sort of thing, I think that there is value in a priests ability to better relate to the people that he is preaching to. In the Mormon church (as well as many protestant denominations), they go a step further and don’t have professional clergy and instead have members of the congregation appointed to the position and so they not only have the wife and kids but also the job and mortgage (Episcopal pastors have their housing taken care of).

In that vein, I found the aforelinked Slate piece by Michael Sean Winters to be puzzling in one respect:

In fact, ending celibacy would bring on a different set of problems and issues. Priests earn very little money, making supporting a family, let alone sending a child to college, seem impossible. Would salaries go up, and are the people in the pews willing to pay for that? The first time a priest abandons his wife and children, people would be clamoring for the good old days when priests did not marry.

Keeping in mind that I go to the church of rich people, is this really an issue? Episcopal pastors support families including a wife who rarely ever works (my own church growing up had one pastor whose wife worked… it caused problems). Divorce rates amongst clergy are generally pretty low, particularly in conservative denominations where losing your family can mean losing your jobs. This isn’t exactly uncharted territory. But I guess it would be for Catholics, and that is not unimportant. Amongst the laypeople, Catholics are not much less likely to divorce than average. That could be said to say that they would get over the first priestly divorce… or to say (as Winters does) that celibacy is a way to shield their pastors from such common human failings.

Faith Fighter

Mohammad is one bad mofo. Invisibility is a hard power to fight against. I want to play this game some more, but I don’t want to screw up my laptop keyboard. I’ll have to remember this for later.

Per 2 Blowhards I found a familiar religious quiz. I take this quiz every few years and the results are generally pretty constant despite whatever it is I believe that I believe at any given point. Bahai is always at top. The Judaisms are usually not far behind (though Liberal Quaker used to be right there with them). It used to be that Unitarianism was higher up there. I’m not sure where Sikhism or Islam came from.

Anyway, it’s kind of a silly quiz, but a fun enough way to pass the time.

1. Baha’i Faith (100%)
2. Reform Judaism (100%)
3. Orthodox Judaism (98%)
4. Sikhism (96%)
5. Islam (94%)
6. Liberal Quakers (79%)
7. Jainism (79%)
8. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (75%)
9. Unitarian Universalism (75%)
10. Hinduism (60%)
11. Mahayana Buddhism (60%)
12. Neo-Pagan (54%)
13. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (52%)
14. New Age (51%)
15. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (51%)
16. Orthodox Quaker (50%)
17. Theravada Buddhism (50%)
18. New Thought (49%)
19. Eastern Orthodox (48%)
20. Roman Catholic (48%)
21. Seventh Day Adventist (44%)
22. Scientology (43%)
23. Secular Humanism (41%)
24. Jehovah’s Witness (40%)
25. Taoism (40%)
26. Nontheist (36%)
27. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (33%)

Transplanted Lawyer (self-declared atheist) brings up the story of the American Atheists trying to stop the Utah Highway Patrol’s desire to put up a white cross next to places where officers have been killed. He doesn’t think that it’s a good idea because it’s something that does not elicit an iota of general public support. And it risks backlash of the sort where the court can declare a cross a “secular symbol”… which is what the courts actually did. TL isn’t pleased by that result:

There you go — a ruling that the cross is now a secular symbol of death and mourning. Which means that not only can it go up on roadside memorials, it can go up on the walls of courtrooms, city halls, and the Utah Legislature because it can be called a “memorial” to fallen soldiers, 9/11 victims, or anyone else that no one with the remotest bit of political sense would dare attack. Good job protecting the wall of separation of church and state there, American Atheists!

There are two great ironies here:

1. The white crosses in the state of Utah are almost certainly secular in nature.
2. The Utah Legislature would have almost certainly no desire to put the cross everywhere, even if they could.

If a state in the south were to argue that the white cross is a secular symbol, I would probably scoff. Actually, not just the south. Almost any state. Any state except Utah, that is. And maybe Idaho. Why? Because Utah happens to be the only state in the continental United States that I am aware of where the dominant religion (or denomination, depending on how you look at it) does not recognize the cross as a holy symbol. Utah is, of course, predominantly Mormon. Mormons are particularly active in positions of authority such as police departments and government because they are united and civilly active. So it stands to reason that most of the people behind the push for the white cross are Mormons. And Mormons do not recognize the cross as a holy symbol.

Their churches do not have crosses. Their temples do not have crosses. Necklaces around their neck do not contain crosses. In short, Mormons don’t do crosses. So if Mormons (or Utahns) want crosses on the side of the road, it is almost certainly secular in nature.

What’s bizarre is that someone in the American Atheists must know this. Or if they didn’t know if off the bat, the Utah branch of the ACLU might have given their erstwhile allies a heads up. I had to check, but there is an ACLU in Utah, though I couldn’t find anything on American Atheists of Utah. Somebody, somewhere must have told them that this was not the fight to pick. Even if knowing that crosses are not a Mormon thing and that the crosses are religious in content if not in intent, surely someone, somewhere must have looked at this case and known that it was a fool’s quest. Right? Or are these people so insulated that they don’t know any Mormons to inform them of the whole cross thing or that suing cops wanting to honor their fallen brethren is a bad idea?

In short, to the extent that this case drew my attention, it actually convinced me that white crosses are a secular symbol. Had this taken place in South Carolina, I would have doubted it very strongly. And if you would have told me that someone was suing the state of Utah because of some improprieties involving Church and State, I would almost certainly give the plaintiffs the benefit of the doubt. This is the case that convinces me that Utah isn’t always wrong on Church/State issues and that the cross is indeed a secular symbol, at least in it’s white-by-the-road form.

I don’t think that’s what the American Atheists were going for…

I stumbled across this video, which is a Christian explanation of the Greek town of Colossae, from which (indirectly) my hometown has been pseudonamed:

No particular point in posting this except for the connection between the city’s name and a religion I’ve done more reading up on than many.

Cascadia had a gubernatorial election this year and I think that I was conned.

The election was slated to be pretty close. The Governor had only barely won the last one and despite the leftward tilt of the state as a whole, the sour feelings over her first election and only modest popularity suggested that the Republican challenger might have a shot.

I’ve been commuting for over three months now. I don’t have many nice things to say about Cascadia’s transportation system, but one of the really nice things are the signs over the Interstate informing me how long it’s going to take to get to New City, near where I work. Not only is it good to know how patient I’m going to need to be, what the sign tells me tells me whether I should go straight through New City by way of the Splinterstate or go through Zaulem to New City on to Mindstorm HQ. It was really, really nice to have that kind of information on the road. I don’t think that there were any days that it wasn’t up there.

Until the day after the election. Since then, the signs were only on one day and on two other days only one of the three signs I usually see was lit. Oh, and this morning it was wrong by a factor of three, suggesting a shockingly short day when in actuality it was one of my longest commutes to date. I didn’t even get any notice on the way home the other day that they were cutting the Splinterstate down to one lane for construction. Would have been helpful to know!

So I smell a conspiracy. The Governor needed state government to appear to be working while The Governor was angling for re-election. Now that that’s happened, the state says “screw it” and saves on whatever the lighting and monitoring cost.

Part of me now wishes that The Governor had been unseated, the worm. Then again, if this is what happens when they were re-elected, one can only imagine the havoc that would be wreaked if it had gone the other way!

An Arkansas court has sort of declared that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints does not qualify as a “protestant” faith. The case in particular comes down to an agreement in the divorce that the children should be raised within the protestant faith. When the father started advocating the LDS Church, the mother took him to court. The court found that the contract was valid and enforceable and it was applicable to this case.

The latter part of the ruling isn’t hugely controversial since the LDS Church itself does not consider itself protestant. It does complicate the notion that Christianity primarily divides into two camps, Catholic and Protestant. Some would argue that the distinction still exists because Mormons (and any other groups) that don’t fall into one of those two categories aren’t actually Christian. Many of these people would use the LDS as an example of this. Others might use the Unity Church, which is vaguely Christian but becomes less so the more you scratch beneath the surface, or the Unitarian-Universalist Church, which used to be Christian but has become less so as time has rolled on. What makes the LDS different from the Uniteers and Unitarians, though, is that while the latter have beliefs that are somewhat vague, new-agey, and open-ended, the LDS is none of these things. Another example of a church of what some would call dubius Christianity but that nonetheless sees itself as Christian are Pentacostals, who are denied the right to call themselves Christians by some because they reject the concept of the Trinity but who are generally (moreso than LDS) considered Christian. Also along these lines are Christian Scientists.

The court case itself needn’t have been decided on theological grounds. The question in the divorce settlement was not whether in the spiritual sense the LDS Church is theologically protestant but more whether the parents, when they signed the agreement, both believed that it was. Only if there was no consensus on the issue do you start asking questions of theology and church history. Since generally neither Mormons nor Protestants consider Mormons to be Protestants that’s an easier question to answer than it would be whether the agreement had said Christian rather than Protestant.

Whether Mormons are in fact Christians is a subject of debate at least within the Christian community. By and large the answer is that they are not and Mormonism is a separate Abrahamic religion that shares much in common with Christianity (as Christianity does with Judaism) without actually being a part of it. On the other hand, Mormons project themselves as being Christian and publicly emphasize the similarities with the general Christian community rather than the differences. On the other hand, when I was in Deseret, the general view seemed to be that these were two different groups rather than being a part of a single community. On the other hand, you get the same sort of things in Catholic areas even though there isn’t much (some, but not much) debate that both fall under the Christian label.

The question does naturally arise as to whether or not self-identification is (a) valid and (b) determinative. Can Mormons be Christians just by saying they are? I would say that they cannot. But they have more than just self-identification to go on. Jesus is a substantial figure in their teachings and the stuff that was added on in the end is positioned as a continuation Christ’s teachings and legacy. One may think that the uniquely Mormon beliefs of what came after Jesus and the Bible are false, but believing something that is incorrect does not get you kicked out of the Christian community in any helpful use of the term. Sure, a lot of denominations think that they are the only ones to get it right (comes with the territory!) and some that they are the only True Christianity and that the others preach False Christianity, but we’re still debating True and False Christianity and brands of Christianity rather than Christianity vs Something Else.

Even using more than self-identification, though, a lot of dubious groups could get themselves under the Christian Tent by the methodology that the Mormons would use. Members of the Unification Church believe that their guy is merely a continuation of the Christian story (and the Muslim Story, and the Buddhist Story, and on and on). Even the Branch Davidians fall into this category.

I don’t see any easy answers to these questions. The easiest answer may be that the courts should never be put in the position of having to decipher theology. I think that this is generally true. I’m not sure that I agree with the court’s ruling that the agreement was valid. It could be on the basis that one parent explaining his or her religion necessarily involves the other spending an eternity in Hell and that could cause trouble or maybe on the basis that it could simply be jarring to a child to hear alternating explanations of our existence and of the supernatural depending on what parent the kid is with.

Maybe it’s because I was raised in the staid Episcopal Church and I was not raised to believe with absolute conviction everything that the Bible or our church leaders say, but I’m not entirely convinced that the children couldn’t process multiple explanations of our existence and whatnot. I’m inherently skeptical of religious systems that are fearful of people being taught alternative religious systems. Children alternating between churches until they can decide which one is right for them is not a thought that particularly troubles me. Naturally, I would be a little concerned that they might make the wrong choice, but I’m inherently uncomfortable with blocking them from coming to that conclusion by depriving them access to contradictory information. I guess this is why I am not a particularly good Believer even if I do believe in believing in God and I do not think that all religions are created equal in thought or in action.

“‘You have some good ideas,’ they would tell me. ‘Maybe if you joined the church you could help us start a community program. Why don’t you come by on Sunday?” I would shrug and play the question off, unable to confess that I could no longer distinguish between faith and mere folly. Between faith and simple endurance. That while I believed in the sincerity I heard in their voices, I remained a reluctant skeptic. Doubtful of my own motives. Wary of expedient conversion. Having too many quarrels with God to accept a salvation so easily won.” -Barack Obama, “Dreams From My Father”

Given that I was raised an upper-middle class white boy in the posh suburbs and he grew up under much different circumstances, there haven’t been many things in Obama’s books* that I can relate to on a purely “me” level, but in both works the way that he approaches his religious beliefs and concerns: The desire to believe met with an instinct of skepticism. Obviously, Obama’s church is not my church, but nonetheless this part spoke to me.

* – I finished Dreams From My Father, finished The Case Against Barack Obama, and by tomorrow I will be finished with The Audacity of Hope. I should have spread these out as I am going into overload. I think I’m going to pass on Barack Obama: Illuminati Puppet for the moment…

A lot of guys can tell you stories about this girl that they liked that confided in him what a jerk her boyfriend was wherein the confidee silently asked “What about meeeee? I wouldn’t treat you like that!” But no, she stays with the jerk while saying that she just wishes that she could find a guy that’s not like the jerk at all. Some believe it happens all the time and some believe it really truly happens rarely, but whatever we believe about it, we’ve heard it.

Sometimes I feel like the whiny jilted guy when it comes to religion. As most of you know, I am a member of the Episcopal Church, which has been struggling lately. There is the recent schism, of course, but it goes beyond that. Church attendance numbers aren’t very good and growth in the United States is anemic.

Yet at the same time The Episcopal Church is precisely what a lot of people say that they want. Specifically, there is a target group that TEC seems incapable of picking off: disaffected Catholics.

Now there are two kinds of disaffected Catholics: disaffected liberals and disaffected conservatives. I haven’t much advice for the conservatives that are upset about the litergical changes of Vatican II and the like or like my Webmaster are upset about the liberal political positions that the church has taken on issues such as immigration and welfare. Other than perhaps the Orthodox Churches, they really don’t have a whole lot of options.

But the liberal Catholics are a different matter. They have the church that was founded as a reaction to the rigidity of the Catholic Church: My church. I hear a lot of Catholics complain about how the church won’t open its eyes on celibate priests, women priests, homosexuality, contraception, or a host of otherwise. Or else I hear complaints that the church doesn’t respect differences in theological opinion and has such a top-down view on everything.

These are areas in which the Episcopal Church is not necessarily perfect by their reckoning, but at the very least it’s closer to what they say they want than their own church is. Yet they continue to go to Catholic Mass (or make a point of Refusing To Go) and most are dismissive of the idea of converting to Episcopalianism.

This may sound like my simply trying to boost my own church, but it really isn’t that. It isn’t about the virtue of TEC at all. Who am I to say anything? I barely go to church myself. But what I find notable is that I’m not blaming the church for my failure to attend or going despite making a big point about how dissatisfied I am with it. If I wanted more energetic sermons I could go to a Baptist or otherwise charismatic church. If I wanted more rigid doctrine I could convert to Catholicism. But what I wouldn’t do is sit here and complain about how my church has failed me as if it were my only option.

But Catholics, like Pygmalion Girls, often prefer to seek to change what they got rather than admit what they have is not necessarily right for them. Or perhaps more precisely they (and by “they” I am referring most specifically to liberal Catholics as I concede that conservative Catholics are more limited in their options) would rather be indignant than satisfied.

This is all how it seems sometimes, though on a separate level I know that it’s not quite that simple. Catholicism is as much a tradition as a specific belief. So while on one hand it seems to me that to say that the Pope is wrong is to be a 0 in the binary world of Catholicism (in which the Pope is infallible)… on the other hand I can see Catholicism as much a tradition of heritage as it is a tradition of theology. I can move as far away from the south as can be if I find New England to be more to my liking… but it doesn’t stop me from wanting the south to correct its various faults and wherever I live a part of me will always be a southerner.

Nonetheless, it just remains frustrating to me that a great Sorting hasn’t taken place with the rabble-rousing angry conservative Episcopalians joining the Orthodox churches where they belong, liberal heretical Catholics joining the Episcopal Church, and so on and so on.

Buddhism sees its role fading in Japan (Christian Science Monitor)

When it comes to funerals, though, the Japanese have traditionally been inflexibly Buddhist – so much so that Buddhism in Japan is often called “funeral Buddhism,” a reference to the religion’s former near-monopoly on the elaborate, and lucrative, ceremonies surrounding deaths and memorial services.

But that expression also describes a religion that, by appearing to cater more to the needs of the dead than to those of the living, is losing its standing in Japanese society.

“That’s the image of funeral Buddhism: that it doesn’t meet people’s spiritual needs,” said Ryoko Mori, the chief priest at the 700-year-old Zuikoji Temple here in northern Japan. “In Islam or Christianity, they hold sermons on spiritual matters. But in Japan nowadays, very few Buddhist priests do that.”

Not much to add here, other than that I found the article interesting: