Ordinarily, I would be angry at someone who so misuses scriptures that are important to me. Everyone who treats scripture as if it were a book of code (which he, the author, has been able to crack) or a book of prophecy (of the telling the future kind, not the Thus Saith the Lord kind) or a guide for investment in the stock market, cheapens texts that mean something to me and set me up to be lampooned by the next jerk who wants to package me and Camping in the same box because we read the same book.
But not this time. When I saw this photograph, or one reenacted in imitation of it, I realized I was feeling more sympathy than anger. The sign I saw said, "False Alarm. My bad." I can't read all of this one.
“My Bad” seemed like a collegial sort of thing, as it is when a member of a team who has played his heart out, says, on behalf of his team, “We just didn’t want it enough tonight.”
And right after that, I had a quick little mini-vision of various slaves standing up, one at a time, saying “I am Spartacus.” This is not a sharing of the load of persecution, givien what the Romans had in mind for Spartacus, but a complete shifting of the load. It amounted to “Crucify me, not him.” It seemed an odd sequence to me, but in fact, the Spartacus image followed immediately after the "My Bad" picture.
OK, that’s not what I had in mind. Ridicule me, not Harold Camping. On the other hand, I wondered whether we—some of us—couldn’t manage to treat Camping’s several predictions as the kind of utterance a Tourette’s Syndrome sufferer might make. They are unpredictable; they are often vulgar; they are entirely out of the control of the speaker, and people often feel compassion more than disgust. “I know. He says these things. It’s a shame, but you mustn’t take it personally. And when he’s not saying them, he’s a perfectly nice man.”
Maybe I’ll be angry at him next time, but this time, I’m thinking we might just as well offer him our sympathies—especially since he has only postponed until October—and move on.
Man, I really hate it when I write something, go to post it, and lose it all. And, of course, the better the comment, the more likely it is to get lost. Or is it that only after a comment is lost can it be remembered in all of its brilliance?
ReplyDeleteThe entire sign you have there reads, "False Alarm--Sorry, My Bad," so you were close.
You have a great deal more patience and compassion for Mr. Camping than I have, and it's all the more impressive given that you have a much better reason to be angry with him. Impressive.
I really like your reason for disliking what he said, and the line between religion and those who use it as a hammer to achieve their ends is getting blurrier every day. I recently saw a picture that said, essentially, that religion causes people to fly planes into buildings. I won't even dignify that with a response.
But I think these are all growing pains. I think our society is finally going more secular and what we're seeing on the far right is a disproportional reaction to that action. Eventually, it is my sincerest hope that a presidential candidate goes to church EVERY Sunday will no longer be a requirement of his candidacy. That would be a good start.
But in the meantime, reasonable people like you, who use the Bible and its teachings to better understand how to live a better life, are giving the rest a good name.
-Doug
Thanks for everything, Doug. I always admire your provocative take on issues and I was delighted by the nice compliment. You get one of those from a son, it kind of sets you up for a week or so.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you think of "spiritual" as intermediary between "religious" and "secular?" Oregon is the "spiritual person" capital of the U.S.
When I first saw the story about Camping’s prediction (on CNN), I was surprised at my response to it—instead of laughter, anger, or even indifference, I sighed a heavy sigh. I thought it might be boredom at yet another “crazy” on the news, but when someone turned to me, smiling with that greedy glint signifying delight in another’s stupidity or embarrassment, I realized it was a sigh heavy with disappointment and, yes, pity. Camping is misled, and because of our technological advancements, our pandering voyeurism, and the current mood of ridicule toward religious followers, his mistake “went viral.”
ReplyDeleteWhy was the story broadcast in the first place? Commitment to public service? Hm. Or was it a pander? Ooh, we love to see people mess up in public, especially if we can watch from our armchairs.
Maybe you’re right, Doug, that we’re experiencing growing pains and that the religious right’s popular and vocal stance is a response to our growing secularism. Maybe. But I can’t help thinking that the belief that Every Word Of The Bible Is True, on its face, without examination, is characteristic of an ever-growing, intellectually indolent populace, not a reaction to secularism. I know that’s broadly negative. I also know it’s a conclusion born of this year’s difficult teaching experience, so, please, take it as such. But it seems this lack of desire to really know what we are talking about has caused people who are passionate and outspoken about religion to cobble together ideas and beliefs that are problematic, inconsistent, and even contradictory. The people I know can’t explain their beliefs so much as restate them, and they have a loud voice, and money. Dale’s analogy to Tourette’s sufferers seems entirely apt. They blurt; they don’t edify.
That’s too bad, but, to me, it doesn’t have much to do with “religion” or Christianity. Unfortunately, the Camping escapades capture t.v. ratings and influence people’s understanding of Christians and Christianity. Even your assessment of “using the Bible and its teachings to better understand how to live a better life” seemed to me to just miss the mark. It may look like that’s what Christian’s do, use the Bible as a guidebook for a better life, or it may be one way to “say it,” but doesn’t it sound much like the practices Dale decries in his second paragraph—using the Bible for secular gain? What I see as being religious is learning what our religious texts say—exactly, not kinda-sorta—learning what they meant in their time, learning what they can mean today, and, finally, practicing behaviors informed by that study. That is a tremendous amount of work—cognitively, emotionally, and behaviorally. It is humbling work, fraught with failure, and, so far as I can tell, not a lot of secular gain. I don’t see that kind of Christianity blazoned across the t.v. or internet. What I see is spectacle.
So I sighed out of pity for Camping, his followers, and their kind for being so personally misled and so publicly humiliated; but sighing also expelled a weary pity and disappointment in the viewing audience who fall prey to the panders that “cheapen texts that mean something to me and set me up to be lampooned by the next jerk who wants to package me and Camping in the same box because we read the same book.” Exactly.
Peace,
Bonnie