Mental Firewalls

Much of your worldview is shaped not by reason or experience on the subject, but by the inculcation of fear through the application of systematic messages and subtle abuse such as humiliation.  Unfortunately many of our beliefs regarding religion and politics are formed this way.  This is a misuse of this function of your mind which is designed to protect you from traumatic events.  In fact the symptoms of post traumatic stress are caused by this same mechanism in your mind.  When a stimuli similar to the trauma is encountered, the mind starts to attempt to protect itself from the trauma by triggering the neural pathways created from the original trauma.

This technique actually creates biological neural pathways in your brain, actual physical alignments of your neurons that "fire" a certain way upon encountering the stimuli a they were formed around.  I call them mental firewalls.  So your response is more like a mechanical movement than it is a rational reflection.  Like Pavlov's dog who could be stimulated to drool upon the ringing of a bell, it was a biological mechanical reaction, not the response to a rational conclusion.

So it shouldn't be surprising that if you disrupt the ability for these established neural pathways to fire in response to stimuli, that you'd free the person's mind to consider what they actually THINK about the stimuli.  The physical nature of these pathways is such that they can be disrupted with electromagnets, it can also be done with drugs.

Here is an example of scientist using electromagnets to accomplish bypassing the minds mental firewalls: https://www.rt.com/uk/318881-magnets-brain-immigration-religion/ 

If you don't have an electromagnet or drugs you can also use words.  If you can begin a thought process in the person's mind using words that do NOT trigger the "firewall" of preconditioned neural pathways, and then suddenly link by analogy or metaphor that idea to an idea that does trigger the stimuli, then you create a kind of conflict or paradox, a cognitive dissonance that the mind will work to resolve ultimately "rewiring" the neural pathway that make up the firewall.

For instance, if I show you a suffering child, and then I show you the child healed and happy, I've safely entered your mind without triggering your firewalls (or at least without triggering the firewalls I'm attacking).  Then I tell you that the child was healed with marijuana.  Since marijuana is a word that triggers an inculcated fear response (a firewall word), the thought of the healed child conflicts with the irrational fear of marijuana, and eventually weakens or rewrites the neural pathways associated with that irrational fear.

If you consider that in our culture religion, education, and politics are highly standardized and interrelated you can see that there are many people operating almost exclusively out of paradigms built upon these firewalls.  Almost like zombies in that they are not living a life based on beliefs they have reasoned through and come to own, but are simply responding to stimuli that either trigger a pre-programmed mental firewall or not.  This creates a pseudo objective reality that can be controlled through propaganda.  With this in mind you also see the importance of spreading ideas that tear down these firewalls and force people to consider reality with their own minds.

RISE UP AMERICA KILL ISLAM

Today I was stopped at a railway crossing waiting on a train.  I'm looking at all the cars on the train and trying to guess what's in them, reading the graffiti, etc. Then I saw something that shocked me, and upon reflection, greatly concerned me.  Some very crude graffiti (not like the stuff that is actually very artistic) ignorantly screamed in big red letters: "RISE UP AMERICA KILL ISLAM".  I was too slow with my camera to take a picture, for a few seconds I just sat and stared as it went by.  It was shocking because of what it said and the grotesque and uncreative way in which it was presented but also because of how it stood out, like a sore, from the other messages and art painted on the train's cars.  Then I began reflecting on it. 

The other graffiti on the train was colorful and bold, artistically done and although I don't know what it communicated, it intrigued me, it even captured my imagination a bit to ponder its meaning.  It was the art of a sub-culture that I'm not familiar with, that seems to have its own stories and even language.  Where did it come from?  Who wrote it? How far away is it from the person who painted it?  What were they like?  What was their purpose in painting it?  Maybe it's gang signs, or simply eccentric street artists, or an expressive teenager in love.  It was definitely, and almost comfortingly different.  It wasn't a corporate brand, or a cliche phrase, it was its own thing.  To me, that's kind of cool.

Yes, it was vandalism, and it seemed irrational, but it was nearly, if not completely harmless,  and maybe even the contributor of some beauty into the otherwise dull view of a passing train.  If there is to be crime, it seems to me, then this is what we want:  Artistically gifted vandals expressing their irrationality in ugly places and making those places a little prettier as a result of their crime.

But the other, it was just more of the parroted drivel of the demagogues on television.  I knew exactly where it came from.  It was born of ignorance and bigotry, there was no need to be curious as to the personal insight of the author.  It was just copy and paint hate.  What personal connection or interaction could the vandal who painted that obscene challenge to America have with Islam?  How many Muslims do they know?  I can almost guarantee none, and if any, it's on the basis of a peaceful coexistence in their community. The unique and colorful language and art of the train graffiti that caused me to imagine a culture of its own expressing itself was suddenly sullied with the bland and obtuse propaganda of the network news.  It concerns me, and it should concern all of us that the hateful rhetoric of the Islamophobes and war mongers can penetrate this far.

Yes, it was also vandalism, and it also seemed irrational, but this time it wasn’t harmless.  It was exposing the symptoms of the sickness of our society.  Of a society that can nurture and transmit hatred to the depths of our most independent sub-cultures and fester even there an unwarranted hatred of people they don’t know.  “RISE UP AMERICA KILL ISLAM”: words that have little meaning to the vandal who scrawled it barely legibly across the train, except for what he was told by the television, and through those peddlers of hatred that seem to permeate all of our media. 

Sit down America.  Love your neighbor.  

Maybe I should grab a can of paint and catch that train!

Real Solutions for Gun Violence

I can see from most of my left leaning friends that you have lapped up the anti-gun agenda.  I believe you've done this with good intentions, however you've also perched yourself on a moral pedestal and are using that position to berate peaceful gun owners and attacking and insulting an important part of their culture and heritage with a very disrespectful and pompous tone.  It is a losing battle as guns will not be going anywhere in America anytime soon, so all you are achieving is to further divide the country against each other.  There are actual solutions to the problem of gun violence that don't require us to pin the blame on responsible gun owners.

If you look at the numbers, mass shootings are not the incidents by which to deal with gun deaths.  Accidents and assaults are by far the real problem, and I'll agree, they are a problem.  Way too many people are killed or injured by accidents and assaults involving firearms in our county.  However the way to address this isn't to attack the American culture and encroach upon people's liberties.

Let's look at accidents.  The way to prevent firearm accidents is the same way you prevent accidents with any other piece of equipment:  training and education.  The NRA and organizations like it used to provide excellent firearms training and education, they even did it in public schools.  However, the left has purposefully been demonizing weapons and has been increasingly attempting to prohibit them by law.  Not to mention making it difficult to even teach a firearms safety class in school.  This forces organizations like the NRA to focus their resources on lobbying against these measures (measures the American system of government has no authority to dabble in in the first place), instead of on training and education to promote responsibility in our culture.  

Firearms are a reality in our culture, as are cars, which is why they should both have a place in our educational environment to so prepare children to live in our culture.  The current educational propaganda is focused making children terrified of guns, going so far as to discipline them for playing cops and robbers, or for making a gun out of a pastry.  This is an irrational approach that only serves to demonized firearms and doing so only makes them more desirable to someone nurturing a homicidal ideation.  Education should focus on normalization and familiarity, which removes the mystical allure of the weapon and allows children to view it as the common tool that it is.

Training would go far to prevent firearm accidents, it would likely also have an affect on assaults, however ending the drug war would likely reduce firearm assaults more than any other measure.  The illegal drug trade is more common in areas and among the demographic where firearm assaults are higher.  This is because black markets such as the drug trade do not provide access to the courts for dispute resolution, so people tend to resort to violence.  This simply doesn't happen on anywhere near the same scale with legal transactions.  The black market also provides the money for the guns to facilitate the assaults.  By legalizing the drug trade the black market margins will be dried up, there will be less money to purchase black market arms, and disputes would have access to the courts for resolution, instead of solving them on the streets. 

We live in a gun culture, and a frontal attack on that culture is only good for creating animosity and division.  The responsible and sane solution to the problem of gun violence is to accept the reality of our culture and create policies that make it safer.  Education will absolutely reduce firearm accidents.  Getting rid of black markets through legalization will  absolutely reduce firearm assaults on our streets.  These are two real solutions that don't require the government to encroach upon the rights of anyone, and will have a profound effect on the safety of our communities.  Why wouldn't we try this first?  The only reason I can think of is that we are more interested in disarming the people than we actually are in facilitating their safety.

 

Prohibition is Vain Sword Bearing.

When the state bears the sword to enforce drug prohibition, it does so in vain as doing so not only fails to accomplish what it set out to accomplish, but in fact accomplishes the opposite.  Prohibition is merely the state flexing its might in order to be seen as mighty.  This is vanity.  It is not done for our good, and it only rewards and increases evil.

Prohibition makes the authority of the state illegitimate. By agressing against peaceful people and barring them access to the civil courts, prohibition delegitmizes the government that enforces it. Biblically, a government that enforces prohibition does not fit the definition of an authority that ought to be obeyed:

“For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil.”

Romans 13:4 NKJV

Prohibition delegitmizes good government and legitimizes violence.

Prohibition doesn't prevent the prohibited item from coming to market, it only prohibits those involved in the transaction from accessing the courts to resolve their disputes.  Prohibition guarantees fraud as victims cannot appeal to the civil courts for fear of the criminal ones.  Prohibition prohibits the state from hearing the pleas of injustice from those victimized as a part of the drug trade.  It only allows the state to deal with everyone involved as a criminal.

Prohibition incentivizes violence because those parties in conflict have been disenfranchised from the proper role of the government, the administration of justice.  If they are facing the sword of the state simply for entering into the transaction, what difference does it make if they face the same sword for cheating, stealing, or killing?  So fraud and violence are encouraged and violence becomes a much more common method of conflict resolution.

The incentive to deal honestly is actually greatly diminished by prohibition.  If the state removes the risk of the sword from the transaction itself, but appropriately keeps bearing it upon those who commit acts of fraud and violence, then the risk of committing fraud or violence becomes much higher than the risk of simply dealing honestly.  This makes our communities safer as drug transactions would become normalized and as prone to violence as a trip to the store for bread and milk.

As a drug policy, prohibition not only fails to rid or even reduce the amount of drugs on the streets, but it also invites violence into our communities.  It is prohibition, the misapplication of the sword of the state, and not the drug dealing itself, that must be targeted and eliminated in order to protect the peace. 

Can we lose our humanity through technology?

I really enjoyed this talk by Father Thomas Hopko that he gave a while back at St Elijah in Oklahoma City.  He really brings up some powerful questions for me concerning what it means to be human, and how allowing technology to augment us too drastically may threaten our humanity.  His point of view on the end times isn't that things will get "worse" in the way that most people consider it, his suggestion is that people will cease to be human as we try to engineer away every aspect of our humanity that we don't find appealing, yet somehow still attempt to call it Christianity.  The verse came to mind "My strength is made perfect in weakness", meaning that at some point I may have to say no to some awesome technology and remain weak, so that I am purposefully human, weak and dependent on God.  Not to eschew technology as something evil, but to do so to purposefully guard my reliance upon God as something sacred.

I think there is a ethical and even a biological element to consider to all of this as well.  It is wonderful that we live in an age that I can learn to do almost any task by simply youtubing it and mimicking the instructor.  The learning curve for so many things has drastically been shortened because of technology, however I can't help but to wonder if we aren't missing out on some other aspects of life that may be just as important, the chaos, uncertainty, and humility that is found when you have to figure something out all on your own, or even depend on some time in prayer to seek the answers.

In what way are we affecting brain development if our brains never experience the terror of that abyss called the unknown?  The humiliating aspect of learning something new?  That place where we find ourselves reaching out to others and even to God for answers as we try to solve a complicated problem?  If technology allows us to overcome that, and we grow accustomed to not having to experience it, will we even endeavor to take on challenges that haven't already been conquered and figured out by someone else?  Will we even be physically capable of challenging the status quo to seek something better?

Plenty of Hope

I'm not an expert, nor am I a Muslim. And I'm not trying to be disrespectful of anyone. And maybe I have it all wrong, and if I do, please chime in and educate me. But it seems to me that the thing about Islam is that in some ways it can change. Not the religion or the scripture itself, but in how it is carried out and understood by it's believers. Their approach to their scripture is not the same as the approach of other religions, particularly not that of Western Christianity (which, by the way, has a different approach to scripture than much of the rest of Christianity).

From my understanding, there is no apostolic (obviously) understanding that is passed from generation to generation, but instead, a deference to scholars and thinkers who can apply the message of the Koran to their current context. There is no central authority, but instead a general consensus that develops over time, obviously with outliers.

In many ways this is like the Post Reformation Christian handling of the Christian Scriptures in their rejection of the Roman Church . The differences being in the vestiges of interpretation that are left from the pre-reformed and ancient times (the great Church Councils, etc) that most all of modern Christianity accepts as authoritative by default, even while implicitly rejecting the actual authority of those bodies of believers (but I digress). The point is that modern reformed Christianity also claims to have no central earthly authority and defers to a consensus of scholars (theologians, authors, etc) to ascertain meaning that is, over time, unofficially accepted by general consensus, and also with its fair share of outliers.

Now, from the stand point of holding to a true interpretation of Scripture, I would say that overall this is not really a good thing for Christianity and has lead to many problems, as the Church's tradition helps to protect the context and original meaning of what was written, and departing from that authority is what opens the doors to heresies. Particularly this method threatens the actual gospel and our definite understanding of the person of Christ (which were some of the primary concerns of the early Church councils).

However, when speaking of Islam, and again, me not being a Muslim, I would say that the way in which I understand their method of interpretation leads me to have great hope, because the consensus seems to be building toward an Islam that marginalizes the violent sects, focuses on the love and forgiveness of God, and encourages believers to act in charity and good will toward their fellow man.

If this is the case then one can imagine that there is plenty of opportunity and even theological basis for Muslims and Christians and people who believe in peaceful philosophies of life to come together and really explore the differences that they have and the similarities that they share and to do so with mutual respect. I would think that people of every religion would see this as the ultimate opportunity for evangelism.

A wink and a nod.

Personally and as an Orthodox Christian, I can't seem to justify homosexual behavior. I have been reading and considering a lot from all sides and the arguments are compelling, however I can't let go of the idea that our physical nature as human beings is heterosexual, and spiritually our union is a picture of Christ and the Church, not only in a sense of sacrificial love, but also in the creative sense of how the words of our marriage covenant become flesh through childbearing, in a like way that Christ became flesh by means of God's covenant with mankind.

That being said I cannot help but to empathize with those who are homosexual.  I cannot imagine the struggle it must be, particularly in our culture.  The standard counsel given to homosexual Christians seems to simply be that they must be chaste from sex.  And I agree with this, theologically, however I also shudder.  It's a burden that almost all heterosexuals could not and do not bear, even the most pious being able to flee to marriage and safely contain their passions.  However, it seems that for the homosexual, in most Christian circles, including my own, that is not a possibility, and I understand and agree with it, while I still lament it.

It seems so reasonable to me for a Christian homosexual to be able to also flee to a committed relationship to contain their own passions and also enjoy the other fruits of such a bond.  In many ways I can truly see how God could be glorified in their commitment to Christ and to each other and in their desire to honor each other and to contain their sexual passions within that commitment.  

This may seem strange, but I am heartbroken that I cannot fully join them them in rejoicing in such a covenant.  I can't because I can't deny our human nature.  Not our human nature to love or the admirable qualities of commitment, I'm simply speaking of our actual and ideal physical nature, that we were created as male and female.

I'm saying this to say that I won't be advocating for Christian Churches to recognize homosexual marriage, because I don't believe it is appropriate.  However, there is a big part of my heart that is happy that there are Churches who are willing to see this differently than I do, and provide gay couples, as couples, a place to seek the same grace and mercy that I seek daily from Christ.  I cannot support it, but by grace, and seeking God's mercy, I applaud it. I at least can give it a wink and a nod.

Thank God for Sinners

Do you know the kind of people I like to be around?  Moderately honest sinners.  They're the best.  They're people just being who they are, trying for happiness, trying to extract meaning from life.  Sometimes they'll lie about it, but you can always tell, and you're glad for it.  They're sinners, they know it.  "Sin" just means to miss the mark, but the impressive thing is that they're taking a shot at it.  Some of them are atheists and Christian and Muslims, Jews and Hindus and I'm sure there are others too.  They're straight and gay, single, married, divorced.  Some are rich, some are poor.  Some are really nice and a lot of fun, some are real jerks and total bores.  Every once in a while they'll try on the suit of a prefabricated persona, just for a break from the chore it is to discover their own, but you can always tell that it doesn't quite fit, and you appreciate them for it.  They can't even do that right, thank God.  Somehow we've been convinced to applaud the story book successes and then we use them to measure our own happiness.  But I've changed my perspective and have come to see that the sinners and strugglers really show us the glory of what it is to be human and how precious is a person with personal passions and heart longing for happiness and purpose.

Privacy as a commodity

I've been listening to KUCO lately, the classical station.  I like the music, but I also like the little history lessons that they throw in between songs.  So many of the great composers seem to have spent some time being employed in the courts of royalty.  

It got me to thinking about how music is such a commodity today, everyone has access to almost any kind of music instantly with little or no cost.  In the past only Kings could afford music on demand, and this came at great expense.  The peasants had to settle for what they could come up with on their own, and anything with any level of orchestration and instrumentation had to be heard at Church or at a state function.  

This is what the free market and technology does.  It takes the things that are desired by all but only attainable by the rich and privileged and makes them available to everyone.  Music, books, food out of season, travel, hygiene, entertainment; all of these things are now commodities to all but the very poorest of people, but they used to be the exclusive property of royalty.  

Look at what the "royals" of today enjoy that is out of the reach of the masses, and you can bet that technology and industry is trending to equalize that disparity.  I predict that the next luxury soon to be commoditized by technology and the marketplace will be on-demand personal privacy.

The cost of freedom is suffering, even for God.

God created us to be free and that had to include the possibility of sin. If every time we abused our freedom and sinned and hurt each other, God intervened and stopped it, we would no longer be free (and we'd probably complain about that too). Yet his response to our condemnation of Him for the atrocities he allowed in our freedom is profound. Not only does he have mercy and forgive, but he also takes the sin upon himself. This not only reconciles us to him, but also to each other. Because it would not be enough simply to forgive the rapist, because where is the justice for the victim? The rapists might be reconciled to God, but now the rapist's victim is not only still embittered against the rapist, but now also against God. 

So, since God's mercy is effective, when he looks upon a sinner and makes a judgement of righteousness upon them, then he necessarily takes the responsibility for their sin upon himself. Just as if a human judge declared an obviously guilty person innocent and let him go free, would not the victim now accuse the judge of a crime? Would the judge not now be culpable for the crime of the person he had mercy on? With God His judgement it is actually effective, meaning if he judges you innocent you are innocent, and naturally, to all those you have victimized, your sin necessarily and totally now falls upon God. 

So by God having mercy on sinners, the victims of those sinners now blame God. But what are we going to do? Crucify Him for it? 

There is a reason why Christ is the Judge of mankind, because he is also the one who is willing to take our sin upon himself, by means of his mercy. It is simple enough for Him to simply forgive our sins against Him, it is another thing all together for him to forgive our injustices against each other and for us to still be able to call him just. But as it is, He is both just, and the justifier of those who believe in Him.

The cost of our freedom is suffering, even for God.

Habitual Rededicaters

When I was a pastor and just growing up I remember at church, when we'd have the invitation and people would come down the isle to get saved, there were many times where the same people would repeatedly make the trip every few weeks if not every week.  We called it "rededication" or something, and repeat rededicaters would inevitably get an eye roll, at least an internal eye roll, if not an actual one.

I mean, you're already saved, why do you have to keep on coming back and doing it over and over again?  Part of me questioned their faith, but ultimately I questioned my own faith too, I rededicated several times growing up.

Heck, I was baptized three times, I guess I was a habitual rededicater too, I probably even got some eye rolls.  It wasn't until I considered and participated in the Orthodox sacrament of confession that I realized what was happening.  

The rededicaters were really seeking confession, but the their tradition didn't really provide for it, so walking the isle and getting saved again was the closest thing they could figure out.  

I'm thankful for the wisdom of the Church in providing for a sacrament that I can regularly participate in to confess my sin.  I've always known I needed it, I just didn't know really what to do until now.

I am the first sinner.

"This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief." (I Timothy 1:15 NKJV)

I've always read the word "chief" to mean "the worst of sinners", which is surely an appropriate way to read it.  

However the word can also mean "first".  As in, my sin was the first sin, or that I was the first sinner.

In Christ's view of time, my life doesn't happen after Adam's, but in a sense happens at once with all of reality.  When He looks upon me, he can, if he pleases, view all of creation from the perspective of its beginning with me.  

What an honor it would be, to have God consider me first, not in the context of a history forced upon me, but choosing to view me first, only defined by what I am in and of myself.  

When he takes the opportunity to do this, I am the first of creation, the object of His creative Love, and my sin is also first, followed by and even the cause of all other sin.

Thankfully no matter who he looks at, or how the beginning they establish manifests itself, there is always a future beyond that beginning where Christ has come into the world to save the first sinner, every one of us.

Beware the Fear Porn

The fear media uses the airwaves to create a constant environment of fear. People tune in and quickly develop an addiction to it. It's called "fear porn". Glenn Beck is just one of many that make use of this tactic. The programming is entertaining, but unlike the Rush Limbaugh of the old days (the 90's for all you kids out there), many of the new entertainers neglect to admit that is what their programs are, entertainment. Or more precisely, "amusement".

("a" being the prefix for "without" and "muse" meaning "thought". Without thought. Perfect description, as the programming is doing the thinking for you.)

The fear hustlers make money by selling advertisements to other companies who capitalize on a piggy backed scare tactic. It's how much of modern media works. From ISIS to Ebola to the illuminati and financial meltdown, it's just a way to sell you stuff. They are just applying the old saying "Never let a good crisis go to waste." And the stuff they are selling is over priced cheap goods that are easy to source and distribute, so their margins are huge. And they have to be in order to pay for all the advertising.

Seriously, this is an email I got from Glenn Beck, "there hasn't been anything like it since a giant meteor wiped out the dinosaurs from the face of the earth"

WOW!! Please take my money!

If you really want to prepare your family for an emergency, all it takes is a little research and maybe a trip to your local Mormon Store House and you can be pretty well prepared without all the fear that will end up just costing you money.

Turn off the talk radio and the TV while you make your plan, you'll come up with something much more reasonable, effective, and less expensive.

Terrorism and Eternal Security

I think the systematic reduction of the process of salvation to an eternally significant but otherwise irrelevant identity decision has much to do with the psychosis infecting some Christians with regard to the irrational fear many have of the Islamic religion.

It is taught that when you choose to be "saved", that day when you made your profession of faith in Christ, it marked the moment in time where you went from being eternally damned to "eternally secure" in your salvation.  Never mind the fact that it basically had no other effect on your life.  It was like choosing to be a Cowboy or a Sooner, only with eternal consequences.  In fact it's probably been preached like that before.

Many cling to this simple concept because it is all they know with regard to their hope of salvation.  Once they walked the isle or raised their hand their job was done, as was the person's who preached it to them.  If there was more to be known it was understood to be optional.  To question or dismiss this reasonably suspect process is to risk damning themselves.  They've been told they have "eternal security", and that makes them feel good, so it becomes an anchor of their identity, even if effectively only as a label.

With this in mind it's no wonder the fear that can overtake a person when they consider the idea of someone accepting a faith that has been propagandized to them as the dogmatic institutionalization of pure evil.  If all one has to do to be a Christian and fundamentally change the nature of their eternal being is make eye contact with the preacher and repeat a little prayer, then if someone even half heartedly considers faith in a perceived evil such as Islam, are they not similarly, but obversely affected?

It's irrelevant whether the person actually follows the Islamic faith, particularly if they seem to be a GOOD person.  Because the religion, as it has been taught to the American public, is the institutionalization of pure evil.  So while a Christian is to be judged not by their actions, but instead simply by the label they had chosen for themselves at church camp twenty years ago in order to escape Hell; a Muslim, even one who is honest and hard working and welcoming despite the clear teachings of their religion to be thieving, hate filled barbaric murderers, must likewise be viewed by the label they have chosen for themselves, and not by the content of their character.  Not to identify them with their label would undermine the whole concept of "eternal security" as it is fairly commonly understood. The foundations of American salvation itself would begin to crumble lest we put upon the Muslim the full horror of our perception of their religion, despite their curious lack of any of the nasty traits we've been taught that their religion demands.

The idea that we are operating under a misconception of Islam can be rejected outright.  For obvious reasons.  If people see any good, or are even neutral about the religion of Islam, or any other shallowly understood concept or culture that could be used as the basis for a flippant label applied to one's self, then they are in danger of overlooking the only flippant label that grants eternal life, Christian.

Attributing eternal security to being the exclusive byproduct of something not much more significant than a fleeting thought may help to fill up the Churches, but it fills them up with people scared witless of their neighbors who's fleeting thoughts aren't founded in the "eternal security" of the same theology that we all inherited.

How the State Leaches Power by Abusing Minority Rights

I'm preparing to Emcee the Libertarian Party of Oklahoma's "WTF (Where's The Freedom) Day" at the Capitol on Monday.  We are highlighting some of the most Liberty unfriendly bills that are being introduced this session.  As I am familiarizing myself with some of the different speakers we've lined up to discuss each bill, I find I will be in the company of a very diverse group of people.  

It seems these laws are all targeting groups of people that are in the minority in some way, be it because of race, religion, lifestyle choices, etc.  Some of them controversial, but some of them are just in the minority.  

It struck me how the state can establish and maintain power through this kind of bigotry.  Increasing their power to regulate the lives of minority groups, and doing so not only with little push back from the majority of their constituency, but with their enthusiastic support.  

If I wasn't paying attention to this, I would have likely just let it pass.  These are people I don't associate with, some of them I don't even agree with, so the effect these laws have on me isn't readily apparent.  But when I consider the foundation of power these laws establish for the state, at the expense of other people's rights, I realize that my rights are being traded as well.  

The importance of standing against these kinds of actions by the state cannot be over stated.  If we allow the state to traffic in the rights of others, then we've allowed it to establish itself over all of us.

Icons teach us to commune with Christ, the Saints, and each other.

My family and I have recently embarked on a journey to join the Orthodox Christian tradition.  Our path in arriving here is an interesting one and will the the subject of some future post I'm sure.  This journey has been an enlightening and surprising one.  Many of the strange and ancient traditions, coming from a protestant perspective I was sure I was going to hate, have actually taken me by surprise and served not only to cause me to fall in love with the Orthodox Church more and more, but have also deepened my faith and my relationship with Christ.  One of the most interesting of these is the Orthodox tradition of icons.

In my protestant turned neo-Calvinist understanding of Christianity, icons never really entered the picture (See what I did there?).  Icons from my perspective were strange bits of idolatry that my greatest exposure to was in the Mexican section of the grocery store with those odd Roman Catholic candles that were right next to the corn tortillas.  The idolatrous label that I had accepted toward icons pretty much prevented me from exploring the concept any deeper. Why would I entertain this idolatry? I already knew enough to reject it on its face.  Besides, as a good little Calvinist I already had my theology all the way figured out and all I needed was Scripture.  Icons were minimally a form of Christian art, but the incorporation of them into worship was likely a heresy.  This was my take on the issue, although I will admit that in the two or three years prior to my first setting foot into an Orthodox Church I also went through a great doctrinal softening, so to speak, and even an abandoning of many of my hyper Calvinistic tenants.

We arrived at Orthodoxy by means of some friends who's journey intrigued us, but as I've illustrated, I arrived with some reservations.  We took the inquirer's class offered by St Elijah's, and taught by Deacon Ezra.  Deacon Ezra is a great teacher who isn't afraid to use some really big ideas to get a point across.  Being a former Baptist minister, his own history and his excellent teaching helped put me at ease a little as he presented some of these very new (to me) ideas.  I quickly was able to grasp the idea that icons were not idols.

My understanding of icons began with them simply being additional tools used to tell the Gospel, and the history of the Church.

"Icons do with color what Scripture does with words."

This quote made sense to me.  Orthodoxy had already validated many fundamental shifts in my theological paradigms that I had been entertaining, one being the authoritative nature of the Church and of it's tradition in the keeping of the doctrines and of the pure Gospel, and in this context icons simply do as Scripture does to a similar effect.  Now I was beginning to be intrigued, but I had no idea what was in store.

As we continued in some classes on the subject the concept of icon's was explored further. When God says in Genesis 1:26 "Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness," the word in greek for "image" is the same word we get the word "icon" from. An icon differs from a picture, or an idol, or even a painting. An Icon is the likeness of the person in the Icon. It is similar to the person and serves as a physical window to a spiritual reality. The saint in the icon did not cease to exist, we simply cannot see him or her at this time, and the Icon helps to remedy that. The person being depicted in the Icon is real, existing in the invisible reality that we are blinded to by our physical condition.

As soon as this idea hit me I looked around the room, which was a chapel in our church filled with icons, and the room came to LIFE!  All of the sudden the presence of those Saints, and of Christ himself, surrounded me like the cloud of witnesses in Hebrews 12.  Deacon Ezra says that during worship it isn't uncommon for the veil that separates us from the invisible to be momentarily parted, and I believe that is what I began to experience.  As I gazed upon each icon I saw past the wood and the paint to the spiritual reality that was the person who's likeness the icon was communicating.  As I looked upon Christ and Mary I was almost overwhelmed, and even as I looked upon the saints that I was unfamiliar with I somehow sensed their presence.  Deacon Ezra explained that we are living inside the icon of the Transfiguration of Christ, Christ manifests the invisible reality of His Kingdom right here into our physical world.

The next Sunday at the Divine Liturgy the experience resumed, Christ and the Saints joined us in a very real and visible, if not tangible way.  I was now experiencing a fullness of the Church that I had previously not even been able to imagine.  Christ was the focus and I was worshiping him along with the Saints and with every other person in attendance. Even the work of the priests took on a whole new meaning as their colorful vestments and their purposeful movements caused them to create a living transition between the physical world and the spiritual reality they and the icons were leading us to participate in.  This was amazing to me, I was awestruck at moments and almost welcomed the fleeting nature of the revelation occurring around me as it seemed it could at any moment be simply too much to take in.

Divine Liturgy at St. Elijah's in OKC

I now understood why many in the Orthodox Tradition venerate or pay special honor to the icons, even kissing them.  This was not idol worship, they were simply honoring and communing with their Savior and with the Saints that have kept the Church throughout history.  Just as we might greet, hug, and honor a wise, loved, and respected elder as we pass by the pew where he sits, in fact, exactly like that.  This honor doesn't detract from our worship from God, it adds to it.

Then a thought hit me that changed me.

It is amazing and incredible and fulfilling for me to be able to commune with Christ and the departed Saints in the way that the icons facilitate. This experience edifies me. Which is good, I need to be edified, but many may argue that they experience similar things in other methods of worship, through song, speaking in tongues, even through a powerful sermon. And while edification of the self is good, shouldn't we be seeking to edify the whole church? Icons may edify the individual, but how do they edify the Church? I had learned to experience the iconography of the Church to aid in my worship, but it occurred to me that the icons were also teaching me so much more.

If we are made in the likeness of God, as Genesis 1:26 says, more literally we ARE icons of God. Each person is made in the likeness of God, just as each icon is made in the likeness of the person in the icon. When I look upon the wood and paint of the icon, it teaches me to see beyond to the spiritual truth and the person that the icon is communicating.  If every individual is an icon of God, what if I began to look at other people in the same way that I looked at icons?  What if I saw them as more than what they were presenting to me in the physical, but looked beyond to the spiritual reality that was just as much a part of their being as is their physical appearance?  I could now begin to see the whole person.

Icons have not only taught me to commune with Christ and the Saints in a way that I had never before considered, they not only created a fullness of Church that I had never imagined could be possible, but they had now taught me to see other people in a way where the likeness of God in them was plain and apparent, no matter their physical appearance, or even my personal opinion of them. Try hating a person who's mere presence communicates to you the likeness of God, try defrauding them, try hurting them.  In a very real way icons are teaching me to love others in a superior way.

Once you see it, you can't un-see it.