The youthful joy of fatherhood

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called honah lee.
...
A dragon lives forever but not so little boys
Painted wings and giant rings make way for other toys.
One grey night it happened, jackie paper came no more
And puff that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.

His head was bent in sorrow, green scales fell like rain,
Puff no longer went to play along the cherry lane.
Without his life-long friend, puff could not be brave,
So puff that mighty dragon sadly slipped into his cave.

--Leonard Lipton & Peter Yarrow

One of the chief glories of fatherhood is that it re-awakens in your soul a joy that has long lain dormant. Young children make grown men behave in ways that they never would otherwise. They make ridiculous noises. They crawl around on all fours. They smile in a giddy way that hasn't been seen on their face since boyhood.

When a boy transitions to manhood, he leaves behind something special. Perhaps more importantly, though, he forgets what he loses. My boys help me to remember the carefree attitude and wild imagination of youth. Without them I think I would let my infinite seriousness, my consuming drive to make a difference and to know, overwhelm me. But children don't take themselves very seriously. Nor do they take you very seriously. And that can be a great boon, especially if you are tempted to gravity like I am.

Just to be a father is my most serious and most lighthearted calling. That is hard to remember sometimes, but when I am looking with joy into the smiling faces of my children, it is all that I can think about.

A Prayer for Judgement

Lord God of hosts, you are truth and light. Before you falsehood is exposed and the darkness flees. Look down from your judgment seat upon the actions of the Episcopal Church. Hear how they have profaned your name by worshiping the spirit of the age, rejected your Son as the only Way, and exalted a false gospel.

Why do you stand so far off, O Lord? Stretch forth your hand and act. Consume all that the Episcopal Church has set up in opposition to you with the fire of your holiness. Save those who are responsible for apostasy, but as through fire, that their works may be burned up.

Cleanse us, O Lord, and nourish in America a pure expression of the faith of Cranmer, Herbert, and Lewis. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

As I wrote this, I had (among other passages) Ezekiel 22:13-15 in the back of my mind:

Behold, I strike my hand at the dishonest gain that you have made, and at the blood that has been in your midst. Can your courage endure, or can your hands be strong, in the days that I shall deal with you? I the LORD have spoken, and I will do it. I will scatter you among the nations and disperse you through the countries, and I will consume your uncleanness out of you. (emphasis mine)

The message that stands out to me is that the fire of sanctification and the fire of judgment are the same thing. It burns up everything that rebels against God. When that fire comes, you had better be sure there will be something left.

Expanse: Theology and an Old Earth

The heavens are telling of the glory of God; their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. —Psalm 19:1

While I was in college I began to be convinced by the scientific arguments for an old earth (something on the order of 5 billion years, and 14 billion or so for the universe). This was further cemented in grad school. It didn't line up with how I prefer to interpret the Bible, but I thought the Biblical evidence for a young earth less conclusive than the scientific evidence for an old earth (some remarks on that below). One thing that I never had, though, was a theological justification for why that should be so. It was an inconvenient belief, one that I did not know how to fit properly into the rest of my theology.

That changed when I compared the antiquity of the universe with what we are learning about God from the other sciences. As astronomy looks out it discovers unfathomable distances that testify to the magnitude of a God who fills it all. As Biology looks deep into the cell it discovers engineering far better than ours: ever-richer complexity, large interwoven networks of protein interactions, several overlapping layers of data storage in DNA, efficient energy transmission in photosynthesis (by way of quantum tunneling!). As Physics looks deeper, into the nature of reality, it finds an underlying order which bears witness to its Orderer. Below even that, we can see Divine whimsy in the chaos which this order is balanced precariously on top of. One could hardly think of a more counter-intuitive foundation than quantum physics, perhaps the richest paradox in the sciences. And when astronomy looks back on the incredible age of the universe, it tells us something about the Ancient of Days, old beyond human reckoning and seated on his throne.

In other words, the sciences are converging on Psalm 19:1. God is showing off! Everywhere we turn we see an expanse so massive that it displays a reckless disregard for our ability to understand. The heavens declare the glory of God, indeed. They have been singing it in ways that were not discovered for 14 billion years, and in ways that will never be discovered.

And that is why I think God took His time in creation. He poured Himself into it. It cannot hold his infinitude, of course, but it can give us a glimpse. And that tiny glimpse is enough to drown us a thousand times over. The great age which we find in astronomy and geology testifies to a God who is not slow as some count slowness. He is patient, eternal, and waiting for us.

Appendix: The Age of the Earth in Science and Genesis

This post is not about whether creation is old or not, it is about why an old creation is consistent with (and perhaps expected by) God's character. But I know there are lots of people (probably most of my 7 readers :-) who are still back at whether, which is a prior question to why. Briefly, this is why I think it makes sense to believe in an old creation:

1. About the accuracy of radiometric dating: yes, those methods are based on assumptions and any of them could be incorrect. However, the rocks which are used to help date the earth were tested by several different radiometric methods, and all of them gave roughly the same answer (you can find this out in 5 minutes by googling "age of the earth"). If radiometric dating methods are unreliable, wouldn't you expect them to give wildly different age predictions?
   
2. A shameless appeal to authority: J.P. Moreland gives an able defense of an old earth, and points out that some exceptional Hebrew scholars think the days of Genesis 1 aren't literal for textual reasons.
   
3. Some thoughts on the Genesis account from an old-earth perspective (take with a grain of salt, I am not an expert): Genesis does not record the creation of the earth. "In the beginning" it is formless and void, apparently covered by water. Interestingly, this corresponds more or less to the scientific account of the early earth being, well, covered by water. So even a literal reading does not provide an absolute beginning date for its creation (how long was the earth "formless and void"?). Also, the order of creation corresponds very roughly to the order in which we find animals in the fossil record - plants (including photosynthesizing bacteria?), fish (birds don't seem to fit?), land animals and finally man.
   
4. On the length of days in the Genesis account: the presence of evening and morning in the 3 days before the sun and moon were created argue against a literal reading, I think. The events of day 6 in Genesis 2 would be hard to fit into a 24 hour period (God creates land animals, man. Adam names all the animals, feels lonely, God creates Eve before sunset). This account (2:4-24) does not even mention the "days" of chapter 1, but it does use "day" in another sense: "in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens" (2:4). Also, there is good reason to think that the seventh day was not 24 hours. It is never closed out by the "evening and morning" formula of the other days (2:1-3), and Hebrews 3:18-4:10 make a convincing case that the seventh day is eternal: there remains a "Sabbath rest" for the people of God, in which we enter in to His rest. Verses 4:4,10 make it clear that God's rest in this passage refers specifically to His 7th-day rest from creating.
   

I've glossed over some of the serious theological problems caused by an old earth. The best and most honest attempt to resolve these issues that I know of is this book by Bill Dembski[1]. I obviously don't think the problems are worse than those confronting a young-earth view. However, given the theological difficulties and my preference for interpreting Scripture straightforwardly, I respect those who hold to a 7-day creation. Sometimes God requires us to trust Him in pitch darkness when all of our reason cries out against it[2]. This kind of complete submission to the Word is a virtue, and it could be that I am wrong and the age of the earth is one of those areas where God requires it of us.

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[1] Disclaimer: I've read a paper on which the book was based, not yet the book itself
[2] The faith of the thief on the cross is one of the most vivid examples of this.

Heresy and Authority: On the Viability of the Anglican Option

I have watched for the past 10 years as the Anglican middle way, which I have come to love so much, has been turning into the broad way. Times of heresy are not new to the church - she has denied Christ's full deity and tried to sell the forgiveness of sins - but I am hard pressed to think of a time when the departure from Orthodoxy has been so total as it is today in the Episcopal Church. It is no longer surprising when they deny the uniqueness of Christ, approve every sort of immoral behavior, profane Christ's body by offering it to Hindus, or elect a Buddhist bishop. I call myself Anglican because I am ashamed to admit I attend an Episcopal church. I can't overstate the burden of oppression that weighs on my soul. I live on a tiny island of orthodoxy, in the midst of this abyss of heresy, called Blessed Sacrament. What are we to do?

My model for responding to heresy has always been the early church's reaction to the Arian heresy which nearly engulfed her. The few orthodox bishops who remained appointed several "replacement" bishops in Arian dioceses, so that there were in some places 2 people claiming to be the rightful Christian bishop. I infer from this that one can forfeit his spiritual authority by embracing heresy. A diocese with an Arian bishop is a diocese without a bishop.

The closest thing to this "dueling bishops" model that is available to us is the newly-formed Anglican Church of North America (ACNA), a confederation of conservative breakaway groups, a potential and hopeful 39th province, a way to be Anglican in the United States (and Canada) under bishops who confess the faith of the apostles. I see ACNA as a way for orthodox bishops to stand in the vacancies left by the apostacy of the Episcopal Church (TEC), rather than as a formally different church. I also expect the distinction between TEC and ACNA to be temporary. TEC is shrinking rapidly, as the liberal, Christless Christianity it has embraced is demonstrating itself to be unsustainable. When you jetison the gospel, you don't leave any compelling reason to want to be a Christian. I think my children will live to see this reunification.

But how do I, as a member of Blessed Sacrament, align myself with ACNA? It seems to me that by far the best course would be for the entire parish to leave TEC and join ACNA. But that is not going to happen. There are many in my parish who feel strongly about staying. The church belongs to God, after all, not General Convention. And they aren't about to let heretics kick them out of their church.

I've already explained how I don't see ACNA alignment as a fundamentally different church, but the fact remains that there are irreconcilable differences in the parish on this point. This forces a critical question for me: is full ACNA membership important enough to warrant leaving Blessed Sacrament? On the one hand, I desperately want to be part of an ACNA parish in repudiation of my bishop's authority. Some people who I respect are leaving for this reason. On the other hand I deeply want to stay. I courted here, I was married here, I've had 3 children here. The community is orthodox and nurturing, and I can't think of a better environment in which to raise a family. There is hardly any hope of making an unbiased decision.

I have decided, though, that whatever I do I cannot give up attendance at Blessed Sacrament[1]. It seems to me that there are two conflicting goods before me: being a part of an orthodox, nurturing community, and completely removing myself from the authority of a heretical bishop. It is not clear to me that I can't do the second without doing the first, or that the good of joining an ACNA parish justifies breaking fellowship with an orthodox body of believers who agree with me on most doctrinal matters except the proper response to systemic heresy in the church - which, as theological differences go, is fairly minor. I'm just not sure that the best way to decisively stand againts TEC heresy involves leaving an orthodox parish. If it sounds like I'm trying to have two contrary goods at the same time, it's because I'm Anglican. We've been doing it for 500 years.

There's another reason I can't leave Blessed Sacrament. One of the things I've picked up from Anglicanism (and the Rule of St. Benedict) is the importance of obedience to authority in church life. When I call my priest Father, it implies a certain spiritual authority over me and over the life of our parish. He has been very supportive of those of us who feel we need to re-align, but has also been constant in not supporting any courses of action that would split the parish. I am not convinced that removing myself from his authority for the sake of removing myself from my bishop's authority is productive or (for me) allowable. The question here is not "is this the best course?", but "is this course so wrong that I must reject my priest's leadership on the matter?" For me, it is not.

Having said that, it is obviously very important for me to be removed from the authority of TEC to the degree possible. What might that look like for those of us interested in the "Anglican Option", as we're calling it, who want to align with ACNA but can't leave Blessed Sacrament? This is still being worked out, but here are some of my thoughts:

1) Blessed Sacrament is already doing this to some extent. 3 of the priests who regularly help with the service are under ACNA bishops. It would be nice for one of them to co-consecrate the elements as often as is practical.
2) It's important for me to have an ACNA priest associated with our enclave. He could be from Blessed Sacrament or a local ACNA parish, and hopefully would provide a regular (bi-weekly?) evening mass - possibly piggybacking on an existing service.
3) It is also important to financially support both ACNA and Blessed Sacrament. That could mean the Blessed Sacrament vestry allocating a piece of the budget to regularly support them (which I would prefer), or perhaps the enclave could work something out internally.
4) This one is admittedly a little vapid. For years I've wanted to take down the "The Episcopal Church Welcomes You" sign outside the church. That won't be happening, but I wonder if we couldn't put up an "ACNA welcomes you, too" sign next to it.

I know there are some people for whom these or similar steps are insufficient. I hope we can work together so that the ACNA parish they land at is the same on the enclave associates itself with, so that we can maintain contact and establish a certain amount of fluidity between it and Blessed Sacrament.

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[1] Thanks to Tim Motte for helping me think through some of these issues.

On Fathering

Parenting young children is hard, but incredibly rewarding. As a father, you have enormous responsibility: to model the fatherhood of God to your children, to guide their behavior through discipline and (what is infinitely harder) by example, to love them when they are least loveable. You must model those two attributes of God which are so hard to reconcile: nearness and authority, friendship and otherness. Your mercy must sometimes be severe, though you cry out against it. Your task is impossible, which is actually a comfort: If it were not so you might be tempted to think that you could actually do it. Instead, you just stumble along asking your children to forgive you when you fail and asking God to cover your mistakes.

The magnitude of your task bows your head in humility, but it does not crush your shoulders under a weight too heavy to bear. For your yoke is easy, and your burden is light. You have the enormous priveledge of watching a young life grow up and mature under your care. You see a new personality emerge, and you rejoice in every new thought, every new ability. Fatherhood spans the range of human emotion: joy, laughter, anger at defiance. Tedium as you correct a fault for the thousanth time, sadness when your child is hurt by the world you have brought him into, compassion when you hold him sick in your arms.


Along my journey, I've picked up some principles which guide how I try to raise my children. Caveat emptor: since I'm making this up as I go along, I don't really know anything about parenting children older than four. I should also mention that as a rule I don't pay much attention to parenting advice. Thoughtful and prayerful introspection on your child is worth more than a thousand books. That said, it does have its place.

One of the things I've been most surprised by is the degree to which children respond to consistent parenting. The "why can't my children act like that"? thought which every parent thinks almost always has a simple answer: it hasn't been important enough to you to instill that behavior. Of course children will fight you when you tell them to do something they do not want to, but if you hold your ground you will be surprised at how quickly they get the idea.

This has an interesting corollary: your children are probably not misbehaving for the reasons you think they are. This will make a big difference in how you react to them, so it's important. It's really easy to take defiance personally, as an affront to your authority. But children just want to know where their lines are and they will keep pushing until they find out. Young children do not listen to what you say. They listen to what you do. Instead of being upset that they ignore you, just follow through on your words with action and wait for them to get the picture. It doesn't take very long.

Rarely raise your voice at your children. As a tool for teaching them to behave, it is mostly useless. Children, remember, do not listen to what you say. You can't change this, so you might as well accept it and move on. If you yell when your children disobey you, they learn that they do not have to obey you when you use a normal voice because you never actually punish them until after you start yelling. Children are very good at finding out just exactly how much you will let them get away with. Much better for both of you to just give the command in a normal voice, and follow through if they disobey.

Yelling also gives your children control over you. If you show them that they can alter your mood by acting in a certain way, you give them a power that they should never have. Children manipulate each other like this all the time (cf. the sibling's smug, satisfied smile), and it weakens your authority to submit to it.

One more thing. Your children almost always understand more than you give them credit for. This seems to be especially true for younger siblings, because we as parents want to cherish their youth. Shoot over their heads by asking them to think about things that are too advanced for them and do things they can't yet. They will surprise you, and the effort is good for them even when they fail.

Young children enter the world as sinners. As soon as they are old enough to know you want them to do something, they are old enough to not do it. Like St. Benedict says of Abbots, our job as parents is more like caring for the sick than exercising authority over the healthy. But with care and love we can allow our children's personalities to bloom under the careful constraints of moral instruction, which makes them more rather than less free.

Whisperings

I find arguments for the existence of God to be academically interesting and engaging, but I don't expect them to be very good at converting people to Christianity. Most are inductive and probabilistic, which means their force is largely dependent upon the subjective weight that an individual gives them. This weight is determined by the individual's worldview, and accepting Christianity induces a huge change on a worldview.

I think a better strategy is to confront a person with truths about human nature which every reflective person must acknowledge. Given these truths, which worldview offers the best explanation of them? And which worldview offers the best advice about what to do about them?

These are subjective questions, of course. But they are more immediate. More personal. Less cerebral. Christianity makes certain truth-claims about history and the nature of reality, and they are important. But at bottom it is a Way, not a Proposition. Commenting on Jesus' words in John 14:6 ("I am the way, the truth, and the life", Thomas à Kempis says "Without the Way there is no going, without the Truth there is no knowing, without the Life there is no living".

In Christianity's answers to the deepest questions of humanity (Who is well off? What does it mean to be good? What is the good life?) I hear whisperings, resonances, intonations. Something deep inside me responds "ah yes, only that can explain who I am, who I ought to be, and why I am not". Someone who does not hear the same whisperings is unlikely to convert. But you can challenge them to listen, and let the Holy Spirit take it from there.

Here are some observations that evoke those deep questions in me, and how Christianity whispers a response that my soul recognizes.

Consuming does not make us happy

Inside everyone is a voice that says "if I just had a little more money, enough for X and Y and Z, then I would be happy and content". But that voice is lying. This experiment has been done many many times, and it has never worked. If you're honest with yourself, you should be able to verify that the voice is never satisfied. It always wants "just a little more". Studies have shown that, above a certain income level necessary for basic needs, having more money does not make you happier. But even basic reflection should show you that this is the case.

Sexual freedom does not make us happy

You'd never know it from how the culture portrays it, but promiscuity and uncommital sex does not make you happy in any ultimate sense. This is also fairly well-confirmed. People that follow basic, conservative (Christian) sexual moral rules are just happier and more satisfied than those who don't. It is not even hard to see why. The fact that we are increasingly divorcing sex from commitment, at tremendous cost to ourselves, only shows that we are not very reflective and we trust what we see in movies more than our own experiences.

We do not do what we know is best for us

This one is strongest and, in a way, most shocking. Not only are we constantly pursuing courses of action which do not make us happy, but we know we are doing so and do it anyway. Furthermore, we choose not to pursue those things which we know do make us happy. Again, you should be able to confirm this easily by self-examination. Here are some examples to get you started:

• TV/YouTube/the Internet. Have you ever squandered an hour, or an evening, or several evenings, watching television you didn't even like, or YouTube videos you immediately forgot, or browsing internet sites you do not even consider that interesting? And have you ever thought afterward how you really should have been doing something else, which you actually prefer?
  
• New-Years resolutions. Everyone makes them. Everyone knows that keeping them would make him happier, more fulfilled, and a better person. Everyone breaks them. Swiftly.
  
• Conscience. Everyone has a conscience that gives them basic moral principles, and everyone violates it. Everyone knows they are flawed, everyone does things they know to be wrong.
  
• As an extreme example, there are many homeless persons who would rather stay homeless than give up their booze. I know of some. Surely it must be clear, even to themselves in moments of sober honesty, that this is wild foolishness. Is there a dark part of you that is almost that crazy?
  

Anyone reflective person concerned about living well should be deeply concerned about these features of human nature. Where did they come from, and how do we overcome them? Why do we have a longing to make ourselves happy by continually doing things that we know will never make us happy?

Surely there are several possible explanations, and you will have to evaluate their explanatory power for yourself. You could construct a story according to which this is all a product or byproduct of an evolutionary process of competition and survival. But this is the Christian explanation: We are sick - no, we are dead. The voice that cries out for more and is never satisfied, like an Ungoliant in our breast, is bearing witness to a real need - but it is a need we cannot satisfy unless we are reborn. It is a need that shows we are incomplete. We are not what we were intended to be.

What Christianity offers is, in part, a vision of how to be transformed. How to fill the empty place that your inner voice alerts you to by, paradoxically, nailing that voice to a cross. Because only once it is dead can it be satisfied.

That is what I hear, when I listen. What are your whisperings?