Future Residents of Darkest Hell

Dear Future Resident of Darkest Hell,


We noticed you recently decided to ignore every obvious truth of the Bible and turn your back on God. We're disappointed in you, of course, but we'd be lying if we said we didn't see it coming. It was, after all, established before the foundation of the world. God is receiving glory for your failure even as we type, so we're getting over it pretty quickly. We realize this might be hard for you to hear, but we'd like to remind it you it's your own fault for not having faith. As a consolation, we'd like to offer you this 10% off coupon for Christian McJerk's new book 24 Ways I Already Know You're Wrong and 13 More I Plan to Infer as We Go.


You're welcome.


Deep blessings,
The Real Christians.

- David from The Screaming Kettle, guest post at Alise...Write

Until now I haven't gathered the energy to comment on the controversy surrounding Rob Bell’s book Love Wins. What do I know about these knotty theological arguments, anyway? I haven’t read the book, either, which hasn't stopped anyone else. I imagine I’ll read it at some point, when it gets to my library. I won’t run out and buy it because I never run out and buy anything and because I read Velvet Elvis, which reminded me of Chinese food - enormously tasty going down but my stomach was empty an hour later. But I just like the fact that Rob Bell exists and makes lovely videos and is so earnest and passionate and wears such interesting spectacles. Also, I have an unexamined and immediate preference for the people evangelicals call heretics. When I think of protestant evangelicals I tend to imagine Roundheads charging into cathedrals to break the stained glass. Cromwell and Calvin make my skin crawl.

Back to Bell, who is accused of believing that everyone goes to heaven, leaving hell a vast and empty place, with nary a soul to roast. I don’t know if that is actually the case. Maybe he doesn’t say that at all. But it’s beyond me why evangelicals have such an affection for hell. They seem to think that Christendom falls apart if people aren’t properly terrified. Why it bothers Calvinists I do not know, given that whether or not you want to be saved is all up to God - you don’t really have any say in the matter and in fact can’t resist if God entices you into his lair. But you still have to have hell, which to my mind introduces a profound level of existential despair, as those who have not been ineluctably seduced get to contemplate their future in Satan’s hot tub.  Some people argue that people can’t choose heaven or hell because free will is an illusion. Others say that you can’t have heaven without hell because there IS free will. And some people seem to think that you can choose but one of the options isn’t the traditional hell but something more like an eternal waiting room with bad coffee, no donuts and the TV permanently tuned to FOX news.

(Now, if you may be wondering what “free will” is and isn’t. Do we really have any freedom or are we enmeshed in so much culturally and biologically determined stuff that freedom is an illusion?  There is a theory called “post-structuralism” that examines the fine points in excruciating detail. It made my head hurt but I'm sure some might enjoy it.)

Now, here's a few words from someone who has actually read the book. You can read Adam Ellis's whole post over at Jesus Needs New PR. It's full of awesome and this part made me laugh:

To begin, let’s look at two things that shouldn’t be surprises, but (based on the more angry reviews I’ve read) apparently are:

• Rob Bell is not a Calvinist (“New”, “Neo”, or otherwise). He doesn’t write like one. He doesn’t adhere to exclusively Calvinist doctrine. He doesn’t see the terms “non-Calvinist” and “Christian” as mutually exclusive.
• Rob Bell writes almost exactly like he talks. And that means there will be…

…words
and half-sentences…

….laid-out unconventionally….

…throughout

…the

book…

(Note: I suspect that the popular phrase "full of awesome" is already limp and tired, but I like it so much.)

Where was I going with this? I think I got sidetracked by free will and my deep-seated antipathy to Calvinism. Speaking of which: John Piper. He’s notorious for his brush-off tweet "Farewell Rob Bell." Whatever that means. Perhaps he didn't mean it to sound like the ultimate in condescension and smug self-righteousness that it appears on first, second, third and I imagine 20th glance.  I can’t claim to know a lot about Piper. I read one book, assigned at my workplace, about The Passion of Christ, which was meant to tie in to the movie. Boring book. Really really boring. Boooooring. Same old same old. You can count on a Calvinist to say that they’re digging deep into the scripture and discovering treasure when they’re really just dusting off the same old dented relic. I swear they’ve been chewing the same piece of food for years and they still haven’t digested it.

I’m glad Rob Bell got up the noses of the righteous. It doesn’t matter to me if it was a calculated marketing move, or if he’s presenting a not very original idea. I gather Origen got there first, but who the hell (ha ha) has heard of Origen? Here are the evangelicals pretty much claiming that you have to believe in hell or you aren’t Christian. Calvinists particularly like to hedge salvation with caveats, until you end up with a long list of stuff you have to believe if you are a "true" Christian.

I'm really on a tear about Calvinists, aren't I? It's just that I am familiar with the truth of that very funny letter at the top of the page; it could have been mailed to me. I feel bristly. Must be heresy taking root.

The Softer Side of Smut

I ran across this article in Relevant about emotional pornography. That title was an immediate draw, because I thought I knew exactly where the author would be headed, and I was so there. But then I began to read and reflect and look over the comments and realized I am not so much there after all. In the end, I’m not sure the article is even in the ballpark, much less hitting the target (mixed metaphor – so bite me).

First, the author’s eschewal of Glee just gives me the giggles. We aren’t supposed to root for the husband to cheat on his deceitful, manipulative, narcissistic, bat-shit crazy wife? Oh, sorry, my evil sin nature is showing. I’ll have to remember the next time I watch Camelot to avert my eyes from Guinevere and Lancelot. No, perhaps I should just switch the channel, because this evil musical seems to be – gasp – sympathetic to Guinevere’s illicit love! Oh, right, Camelot probably is part of the problem as the article paints it, being about fantasy, shining knights and all.

On the other hand, I do have an aversion to the emotionally turgid movies he alludes to and I’ve even thought of them the same way, as emotional pornography. The Bridges of Madison County, The Notebook, whatever else gets served up as a “chick flick.” Yep, I’d say that a lot of movies and books set up unrealistic expectations about romantic love. However, that’s been going on since the ideal of Courtly Love was all the rage in the Middle Ages. In the 18th and 19th centuries novels came in for a lot of criticism for promoting unrealistic expectations of love and life. Why? Well mostly because the novels were written by women and read by women, those sentimental, mentally unstable, hysterical women. I particularly like this line in the article “many girls never grow out of the idea that one day they will be rescued from reality by some magic and a fictitious prince.” I won’t even go into the irony of a Christian magazine talking about idealizing a magical, fictional prince. Instead I draw your attention to the focus on female delusion, which he tries to elide with an afterthought about men believing they are supposed to be the prince. Uh huh. Hey, is there a pattern here? Something about women – what women read and write and watch? Oh poor muddled women, put down that Twilight book at once. You have no idea the damage you’re doing. (I'm springboarding off the article now, as it nowhere mentions Twilight, although it comes in for plenty of discussion in the comments.)

Everyone points fingers at Stephenie Meyer. Boy do people love to tear apart her writing, her beliefs, her aesthetic – they are fuming that people (uh, teenage girls and their irresponsible moms) read and enjoy the Twilight series. Twilight is responsible for deluding populations of teenage girls into thinking that Edward is the epitome of desirable manhood. They begin to think there’s one right undead guy who will adore them and they’ll wait until they’re married and…oh wait, that sounds a lot like Christianity - God will reveal the right spouse for you and no one will get between the sheets until the honeymoon (and who’s a better undead spouse than Jesus?). So it’s Hollywood, not Christianity that sells THE wedding day? Are you kidding me? Aren’t they selling kids on how sacred sex is? So sacred that it must not happen before the ceremony with the white poofy dress and the tower of cake. Don’t you know that if you have sex before marriage it will be a disappointment? A demeaning experience? A soulless, heartless mockery you will regret the rest of your life? Because sex in marriage is a spiritual event, a holy event. You know the honeymoon has got to be OFF THE HOOK with all that build up. It’s not just a honeymoon, it’s a sacred rite. And marriage? Well, marriage is like the marriage of Christ and His Church.

That’s not unrealistic at all.

Poor Stephenie. Really, all her elements are in keeping with traditional vampire stories – sexual appetite, repression of desire, pursuit and resistance, heroic self-sacrifice, obsession – pretty transgressive stuff really, however you sweeten it - but she’s come in for such criticism. I’m not saying there’s nothing to criticize in her imaginary universe. There’s plenty to make you go “hmm.” But in case you didn’t get it, teenage girls and women in general are incapable of delineating the elements of fantasy fiction from reality. It’s all just one big luscious cake that they gobble down unquestioningly.

I’m a bit snarky there, but in truth, we (men and women both) do not question what we consume nearly enough.

I say let’s skip the novels playing the tropes of Romance and get down to the serious emotional pornography. We’ll start small, with the crap that is Precious Moments, designed to make you go all “awww, isn’t that just the cutest little wipsie bipsie?” Or, how about the “Christmas Shoes” song, carefully crafted to wring tears from the eyes of people who wouldn’t give a crap about a real child with no money, say a Mexican immigrant child with no money standing in the aisle of an Arizona Wal-Mart. Half of every Christian bookstore is full of emotionally rancid merchandise. The targets are so numerous and obvious I won’t bother to name them. They degrade human experience, make it cute or maudlin, easily digested.

Then, we can look at sporting events. Hockey, for example, with an audience salivating as they await the first outbreak of violence. Wrestling. During the Olympics, the endless nattering on about the mishaps, the dreadful mishaps that demolished the chances of X – no Olympic gold this year. All those hopes, dashed. Yummy.

If we want to talk about TV shows, forget about Glee, the show with a tart shell but a soft squishy center. Consider Spartacus: Blood and Sand, a show happy to deliver both graphic sex and enough graphic violence to make you think twice about eating before viewing. Are you thinking this is cynical pandering to a ravenous hunger for everything ugly, brutal and vicious, a blatant manipulation of the connection between violence and sexual arousal. Not at all - it’s authentic. We would be doing viewers a disservice if we toned it down. Those freaks screwed anything that moved, you know, and we do mean anything. And if they castrated their prisoners, by golly we will take one for the home team and let you experience genuine Roman perversion, just like the Romans experienced in the Coliseum! Thank God we didn’t live back then, huh?

Now many good Christians would balk at Spartacus anyway as too lewd. So how about 24 (ever popular among Christians), a show that all but does a tap dance of joy every time Jack Bauer gets the opportunity to torture someone? How many people watch it and consider how it mirrors a culture invested in the idea that it’s okay to torture sometimes – if you need the information, if your country is in danger, if you’re short of time? Jack’s a hero for leaping over those tiresome hurdles like due process and the Geneva Convention that let terrorists run amok. Jack Bauer could kick Edward Cullen’s undead ass.

Wow, our entire culture seems to slurp up a hearty helping of emotional pornography every day. It’s served up by TV and Fox News and, dare I say, church. How adept are we at recognizing it? Do we really look or do we choose our targets rather carefully?

Naw, I suppose the greatest enemy of genuine, realistic human relationships has got to be the Bridges of Madison County.

Selling Our Soul at the Crossroads

Do you know who Louis Giglio is? In our Sunday School class we’ve been watching snippets from the movie Expelled along with some video of Giglio performing preaching. I guess the point of these sessions has been to reassure all of us that evolution can’t take our God away from us. At least that’s how it’s felt to me—a big warm hug and it’ll all be okay as long as there’s Intelligent Design. Huddle round the wagons, folks, the atheists are coming. So we hear some scientists speak vaguely about a first cause and how nothing so complex could just come about spontaneously and the big bang as God shooting the starting gun, and then we listen to Giglio wax poetic over the wonders of the universe.

I find this sad and problematic.

First, I think Intelligent Design is a lot of hooey. There’s nothing wrong with evolutionary theory. It works just fine. Why can’t we get over the debunking of a 7-day creation? It’s like we feel the need to stand heroically in front of God, protecting Him from the light sabers of science.

I don’t see how it makes any difference to science if scientists acknowledge God. Does it make any difference to my pipes if my plumber is Christian? So what if we say God started it all? God started it all and then, well, ah, oh, evolution carries on. Or, no, I guess we have to have God tweak it all the way along. Who knows why we had dinosaurs. One of God’s fun experiments, I guess. Maybe they existed just so we could have fossil fuel. Not very far-thinking, though. And hominids, what were they all about? Did God love Neanderthals? Gee, we’re back to the same bloody questions we had in the first place.

On to Giglio. Maybe he’s a fabulous guy. Maybe he’s an amazing preacher and loves God a whole bunch. Me, I tend to distrust preachers who fill auditoriums and sell tickets to their worship services. Giglio loves the universe. Its beauty astounds him. That’s great. He’s got lots of beautiful photos. The universe is beautiful. God’s creation is astounding.

Then he starts talking about something called laminen, a protein molecule that “holds us together,” as he puts it. He shows us a diagram of the molecule. It’s in the shape of a cross. Lots of ooos and aaaahs. Then he shows us a picture of laminen taken by an electron microscope. There’s the cross again, a bit squished and toppled. More hushed admiration.

Alarm bells are going off in my head. Is this guy telling me that God built us out of crosses just so he could make a point gazillions of years later about Jesus dying on a cross? Is that what he’s saying? That God would do something so ridiculously pointlessly stupid just so we could stare slack-jawed at a photo as if we were watching a freak show? Does laminen even really look like this?

No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t look much like a cross at all, actually. Or no more than about a billion other cross-shaped things in the universe. If a cross (as we know the cross) was even what Jesus was nailed to. I don’t think anyone drew a diagram at the time.

Next he shows us photos of constellations. Lots of wowie zowie isn’t this just fab-u talk. He has a letter from an astronaut that acknowledges God (take that, you atheists!). I decide to pass over the “eye of God” comments. I give Giglio the benefit of the doubt that he doesn’t think the center of the constellation is literally God’s eye. We see a photo of the furthest constellation that’s been photographed. “Now I’m going to take you even further out,” he says.

Oh, no. He’s going to show us a picture of the crucifixion, isn’t he? He’s going to be that obvious, that banal. Yep. He beams and nods sagely as the audience laps it up. But that’s not all. For the grand finale we get to see a special photo of a constellation, with, you guessed it, the shape of the cross in the center.

Groan.

Evangelism has sold its soul to the scientific method but still can’t tell the difference between metaphor and reality.

Do we really think that if we pile up enough scientists who believe in God it will erase the doubts and fears raised by what science reveals? If we see enough crosses in the world, will we finally be certain that God’s eye is watching us?