Sitting for the Anthem

So, Colin Kaepernick, quaterback of the San Fransisco 49ers, refuses to stand for the playing of the National Anthem, until such a time that the systems under which we live in this country reflect equal protections and securities for people of color. Since refusing to stand, and explaining his actions to the media, Kaepernick has been under brutal attack. People have burned his jersey in a public act of repulsion. He has been called every name in the book - and some that aren't - on social media outlets. Team ownership has been called upon to fire him. Companies have been asked to remove him as an endorsement of their products. Fingers have been pointed at him. Shouts have rung out. Let's all hate Colin Kaepernick.

First things first. I do not agree with Mr. Kaepernick's actions. I do not embrace the act of refusing to stand for the playing of the National Anthem. While I firmly hold that he has a point about racial discrimination as a deeply seeded problem in this country, and while I believe that problem is articulated in nearly every facet of our communal life, I do not believe that Mr. Kaepernick's act will do anything toward resolution. In fact, it has simply driven a wedge.

While I do not believe that Mr. Kaepernick's act will bring positive resolution, and while I see the act as divisive, I defend Mr. Kaepernick's right to make this statement. After all, in that very anthem that Colin Kaepernick decries, we sing "...land of the free and the home of the brave." Firstly, it takes considerable courage for Mr. Keapernick to take this radical stance, or lack of stance, as the case may be. It is a courageous act of social dissidence, whether or not we agree. Secondly, Mr. Kaepernick is well within his rights to respond to the playing of the National Anthem in any way that he sees fit. He is free to do so. He is not free to force anyone else to do as he chooses, of course. Neither, certainly, are we free to demand that he act as we see fit. I have a right to stand in response to the National Anthem, even to place my hand over my heart, if I wish (see previous blog post on Gabby Douglas), but I have no right to demand that others do as I see fit.

I have seen recordings of Colin Kaepernick's act of civil defiance. As I watched him sit through the National Anthem, I took note of his important point. I am convinced that the level of vitriol pointed at Colin Kaepernick reflects a much deeper problem than his simple act of civil demonstration. Racism is a major issue in this country, one with which we must deal openly and frankly. As importantly, however, I think, is the fact that people feel the right and obligation to criticize - even reject - those whose choices differ from their own. If this is the "land of the free," then we have the right to act in the ways that we see fit, but not the right to mandate our ways in the lives of others.

It is ironic, I think, that such hoopla is created in the world of sports. Sports have no intrinsic social or civic value. If we believe that sports teach us team approaches, fairness, honesty,  and corporate values and virtues, I would suggest that history has shown as powerfully the exact opposite. The world of sports has taught us privilege, arrogance, dishonesty and lack of virtue as much as it has shown us any positive benefit. Listen to fans of competing teams interact. Be a witness to the way that the world of sports creates a different social stratum, one all-too-often devoid of social responsibility or civic duty. I am aware that there are positive examples as well. It is funny to me, though, that the loudest social statements can be made in the course of an arena so devoid of intrinsic value.

So, before we demand that the 49ers fire Colin Kaepernick, before we demand that his sponsors remove him from endorsing their products, before we burn his jersey in effigy, before we call him names, let's all consider the point(s) that he is making. Let us not extend our own freedoms onto his actions. Let us, instead, put his act of social dissidence into proper perspective, walking a mile in his cleats, watching and listening, even when we might disagree. Perhaps his witness might lead to some new attention being paid to the racial climate in America, the rights of persons to make such bold statements, and the proper place of sports in the national dialogue.  

Annual Shiloh Golf Outing

It's in the books! Another tremendously successful Golf Outing was held this past Saturday, August 20, at Cassel Hills Golf Club in Vandalia. Despite rains throughout and a 45 minute storm delay, the outing, with a record number of players, was completed before 6:00 p.m. The dinner and auction were held thereafter and were, like the outing itself, a huge success.

Shiloh needs to express its appreciation for the Miami Valley business community, which donated around $5,000 to sponsorships, to members of Shiloh Church, who provided about $4,500 in sponsorships and another $1,500 in direct contributions, for those who attended and took part in the auction, that raised around $1,800, to those who donated, made, or arranged for auction items, and for all who supported the Annual Shiloh Church Golf Outing. Because of your generosity and hard work, more than $13,000 will be dispersed to local needy families through the upcoming holidays. Last year, we raised just over $10,000 and helped about 80 families. This year, we will be able to do even more, maybe providing a holiday blessing to as many as 100 local Miami Valley families.

This is important ministry. It is more important to the families Shiloh assists than it is even to us. The success of the event can be measured by the extent to which we touch the lives of those around us. That is a different measure than money or people or participation. Shiloh directly touches lives through the Shiloh Golf Outing. Each of you touches lives. Your ministry is important to the people who benefit from the Outing.

To ensure the ongoing impact of the Shiloh Golf Outing, your work is just beginning, however. You can continue to lend a hand and increase support for the Outing throughout the year. Here is how. Visit the businesses who support the Shiloh Outing. Tell them that you appreciate their support and that you are there because of their assistance. (A list of supporting businesses appears below.) Thank those who contribute. Let them know that their assistance goes a long way toward the success of the Outing, and is a direct way that Shiloh touches lives. (A list of individual contributors also appears below.)

The mini-golf outing has now been organized as well. On Saturday, September 10, starting at 1:00 p.m. we will gather on the patio at T.J. Chumps in Englewood. From there, teams of four persons will be called to Putter's Par-A-Dise, located behind Chumps, for your tee time. Lowest aggregate team score wins. Pizza and appetizers will be provided. Drinks and other food is at additional cost. Cost of the event is $15.00 per person. All proceeds join those of the Shiloh Golf Outing in support of needy families through the upcoming holidays. We anticipate being done around 4:00 p.m. Sign up now on the Green Table, in teams of four persons. Choose a team name. Then join us on September 10.

A list of those companies that supported the Shiloh Golf Outing:

Johnson Investment                                                      Roth and Company
Market Match                                                               Dillard Electric
Tony's Italian Kitchen                                                  Meijer Englewood
Super Tech Automotive                                               TJ Chumps - Englewood
Diversite' Salon                                                            Superior Mechanical
Tobe Lawn Care                                                           Copp Integrated Systems
Boord-Henne Insurance                                               Kindred Funeral Home
Architectural Group                                                      Sandi's Clothes Encounters
Baker, Hazel & Snider Funeral Home                         Requarth Lumber
Joseph Airport Toyota                                                  Uptown Hair Salon
Beau Townsend Ford                                                   The Kid's Institute
Titan Flooring                                                              Wings Sports Bar and Grill
Abracadabra Hair Salon                                               Ben Rupp Insurance
TJ Chumps                                                                   Beavercreek Golf Course
Roosters                                                                       TGI Fridays
Texas Roadhouse                                                         Buffalo Wild Wings - Englewood
Mantra Salon                                                                La Fiesta - Clayton
Kroger Marketplace - Englewood                               Heidelberg Distribution
Outback Steakhouse - Miller Lane                              BD Mongolian Grill
Republic Services                                                        Frickers
Brio Tuscan Grille                                                       McCormick & Schmidt's Seafood
Company 7 Barbecue                                                  Cincinnati Reds
Old Towne Books                                                        Dayton Dragons
Victoria Theater Association                                       Chick-fil-A
Miami Valley Golf Club                                              City of Clayton - Meadowbrook
Pipestone Golf Course                                                 Kroger State Liquor Store
North Main Dental

Persons who donated:
Terry Neff and Family                                                 Shiloh Church Women's Board
Shelby and Tom Parnell                                               Linda Peterson and Family
Wayne and Bari Bowser                                              Tammy Greenberg & Routson Family
Lou and Dave Tiley Family                                         Women of Shiloh
Tia Smith and Family                                                   Kim Hannahan and Family
Connie Neef                                                                 Randy Zuercher and Family
Carl and Lisa Robinson                                                Laurie Moore
Doris and Tom Murph                                                  Lisa and Brian Salata Family
Dale and Jerry Engel                                                    Kim and Gary Wachter
Dr. Bob and Zoe Hitner and Family                             Sue and Roger Cox
Jayne Townsley                                                            Ila Ward
Bobbi Harbach                                                             Maureen Aukerman
Jeanette and Jim Patton                                                Patti Hines
Judy Peck                                                                     Casey Sierschula
Ashley Pack                                                                  Lisa Neff
Marilyn Jones and Family                                            Tom Homes and Family
Jay and Dawn McMillen                                              Matt Weaver and Family
Carl Bomboy                                                                Anonymous

A special thanks to Jay McMillen, who did much of the leg work, planning and running of the Annual Shiloh Church Golf Outing. It takes hundreds of small and large investments to make the Outing such a huge success. Thanks to those who golfed. This year's teams scored within nine strokes, ranging from a winning score of 63 and a high number of strokes at 72. Well done, everyone! Shiloh is Living the Word by Serving the World!

Olympic Bullying

Gabby Douglas represented the United States as a gymnast in the 2012 Summer Olympics. She was accomplished, of course, but, more than that, she was a genuine team player. She appreciated and applauded the accomplishments of every gymnast who competed as a part of her team. Much to the surprise of some who know the gymnastics world, it was something of a shock when Gabby was selected to represent the United States on the 2016 women's gymnastic's team. Her scores were borderline. The determination was made on her attitude, her team approach to gymnastics, and her ability to stand by and support her teammates. To put it bluntly, Gabby Douglas was good for the team.

It is a shame, therefore, that social media critics have recently bullied her. I saw three criticisms. First, after the "Final Five" won the team gold medal, as the National Anthem of the United States was being played, Gabby did not hold her hand over her heart. Her second offense occured while her teammates were competing in all-around and individual event compititions. Apparently, Gabby was not demonstrative enough for her critics. While she applauded her teammates, and while each one claims to have felt her support, people online pitched a fit. The third criticism is simply ridiculous. I mention it here because I saw it on social media. Apparently, Gabby's hair is too straight to please persons in certain communities, yet too "nappy" (their word, not mine) to please others.

For crying out loud. What is wrong with people? Gabby Douglas deserves our respect. Who cares if she placed her hand over her heart during the playing of the National Anthem. This is a free country, folks, and persons can stand and respond however they see fit. It turns out that Gabby comes from a military family, where she had been taught to stand at attention during the playing of the Anthem. She reflected the respect that she had been taught in the way that she had been taught.

Gabby was in the stands and with her team during individual all-around and apparatus competition. Every team member who competed in those events has stated that they received Gabby's support. They knew that she was there and applauding their efforts. I have played team sports and individual ones. Contexts differ and means of support vary. Unless we are in the situation, it is next to impossible to understand its dynamics. I trust that Gabby Douglas, who was on the team, at least in part, because of her ability to compete from a team perspective, supported her teammates in the most appropriate possible manner.

Her hair? Really? The Final Five consisted of two African Americans, a Jewish woman, a woman of Hispanic origin, and a blond, blue-eyed caucasian. The team reflected beautifully what it means to be American. Yet, some will criticize Gabby's hair? Have we not grown up? Can we not accept people for whoever and however they are, especially when they are national heroes? Can we not put aside our biases, judgments, criticisms and negativity even long enough for us to celebrate with all of our gymnastic gold-medal winning team?

While I make these statements in support of Gabby Douglas, I find that they have a far wider scope for application. When given the opportunity to say or write something snarky, choose to refrain from doing so. When gvien the opportunity to tear someone down, in order to support our own opinions, biases, background or prejudices, choose to refrain from doing so. Keep your opinions to yourself. Grow beyond them.

Gabby's mother said in an interview that, in many ways, these attacks have ruined Gabby's Olympic experience. That is shameful! But it is part and parcel of our tendency to criticize, gripe, judge, and tear down other people. I wish we would stop doing that! I apologize to Gabby Douglas, and to all who have had otherwise wonderful experiences destroyed by unreasonable atttitudes and need to write and speak negatively about others. I am embarassed. I am so sorry! 
    

Evolution of the Kingdom

During the time of the Deuteronomic Old Testament prophets, the people who heard them had been blinded and deafened to God's presence in affluent and comfortable lives. Those people despised the word of God. It attacked their way of life, assaulted their comfort level, and afflicted their compliance with the ways of the world. They did not accept God's will as their way of life. Instead, they clung to empty religious practices that accomplished nothing for those in need but justified their own isolation and insulation from the suffering around them. The people rejected the prophets.

Jesus taught an awakening from the religious practices of his day. Jesus invited followers and authorities to move beyond simple adherence to laws, rules and regulations and invited them to embrace, instead, a new ethic for life. This ethic consisted of intentionally sacrificing one's own advantages and benefits in order that everything a person had may be used to exalt others, particularly those who struggled and suffered. The religious authorities of Jesus' day saw his teachings as attack on their long-held traditions and historical religious identity. Those who sought emancipation from the way life worked, by which they were victimized and because of which they suffered, understood Jesus as a source of liberation. But the typical religious practitioner of Jesus' day hated him and everything for which he stood. The people rejected Jesus.

In the Great Reformation, Luther and others led those who now had the Holy Bible translated into the vernacular to read and study for themselves, and to question the religious authority of their day. The permission created an alternative to authoritarian religious organizations and law-based Christian identity. That authority excluded many. The theology of grace, that Luther and others recovered in the Reformation, seemed like an attack on those who practiced religion from the moral perspective. They hated everything about the Reformation. They were told that it was a threat to their way of life. Those who had a stake in the authoritarian religious traditions rejected the Reformation. Even those who appreciated the theology of grace and the new attitudes toward acceptance and openness carried the Reformation spirit only as far as their organizational roots allowed. They fell beck into denominalism and offered only an alternative brand of orthodox practice. The people rejected the Reformation.

The great societal machine of post-WWII America chugged along fine. Most had a position to fill, a job to do, and roles to play. The roles were sometimes unjust, providing advantage to some while excluding others from its benefits. Then came a stream of literature than seemed to attack life as mid-century America had known it. Books like Brave New World, 1984, Fahrenheit 451, A Clockwork Orange, etc., articulated dissatisfaction with the depersonalizing and unfairness of the great machine. The literature urged readers to dare to step outside of the control and authority, to question and demand the kind of equality and justice that challenged societal structure. Many saw the literature, and the resulting movements, as an attack on "right and proper" ways of living. We are just discovering the lengths to which protectors of 'the establishment' went in defending the systems from those who would dare challenge, question or reject them. Those in power or positions of authority, or those who had a stake in the system, rejected social change.

Since the 1960's, America has joined the rest of the world in what looked like a new cultural evolution. Culture began to move in the direction of acceptance, tolerance, grace, diversity and the rejection of systems and institutions that belonged to the antiquated notions of privilege and sectarian benefit. The world began to change. Black Americans, and others, found their civil rights protected, at least on paper. Equal rights for women have begun to be practiced and protected. Persons who love persons of the same gender were allowed to ratify their relationships in legal marriage. The culture began to work for the benefit of those who had been excluded, rejected or ignored. It began to focus attention on those who had been victimized, disadvantaged or invisible.

The shift has been seen as an attack on people's lives and the 'moral' existence that 'we used to live.' Pockets within religious culture have certainly seen the wider cultural evolutions as attack upon those religious cultures. So much so, in fact, that right wing religious culture, of whatever faith tradition, has tried to pull culture back into a previous articulation. Sometimes, those attempts have been subtle. Sometimes, they have been anything but subtle. Ask the teenage girl who was shot in the head for pursuing education for young girls, or those victimized by extremists. The acts of religious protectionism have been brutal, violent, angry and increasingly wide-spread. There is an increase in name-calling, hatred, and vitriol of every fashion, fueled by attempts to turn culture from the course of its current evolutionary process.

The fact is, we would be better off if we would listen to the Dueteronomic prophets. We would benefit from fully embracing Jesus. Our world would be a different place if we were to seek out the Reformation theology of grace. We would be wise to heed literature that assesses the depersonalization of the great societal machines. We would protect the well being of every person if we could give up the old segregationist practices of the past and press on to the greater virtues of acceptance, toleration, affirmation, compassion and love. If it all seems like an attack on our lives, then maybe we need to spend some time assessing how it is that we fit into the inevitability of cultural evolution, as we move toward the fulfillment of the promise of Jesus Christ as a way of life.

Change is never painless or easy. It is inevitable and positive, however. We are moving toward that kingdom. Let's 'keep on truckin'.'        

The Interface of Persons of Faith and Politics

I whole-heartedly embrace the Constitutional stance on the separation of Church and State. I also believe, however, that the concept may mean something other than how we have applied it to the interface of faith and politics.

As I understand it, the separation of Church and State in the United States Constitution guarantees that there shall be no establishment of an official United States religion, and that no person should be coerced by the government into any particular religion's practices. The American system was founded on religious liberties. Coming, as it had, from a system of religious hegemony, where a particular religion was required by the government, the statement of religious liberty was key to those who formed the American governmental system.

Frankly, I would not want to live in a system that required the practice of any particular religion, even mine. Unfortunately, this is not the way that many have practiced the American separation of Church and State. Some practitioners of my own religious heritage have demanded that the system was created by "Christian men, according to Christian principles." This designation is intended, in its application, to claim that the American Constitutional system favors those who practice Christianity.

Honestly, I do not know the religious status of each of those who might lat claim to being a "founding father." I do know that the system was founded on the philosophies of John Locke, and are intended to remain non-religious in both inception and application. The founding principle was, instead, the ownership and protection of property. Our Constitutional system is economic instead of religious. The American system was founded in such a way that no religion could impact ownership of property and the conduct of authority that accompanied it.

The American system is therefore not Christian. The Constitution guarantees that no such distinction could possibly be intended or inferred. Religious liberty formed the foundation of the separation of Church and State in America. That does not mean, however, that there is no dialogue between persons of faith and the government. Quite the contrary, in fact. The promise of religious liberty, guaranteed by the Constitution, allows every person the right and obligation to apply her or his liberties to the demands and expectations that he or she places on the government that represents her or him. Each persons has the right and obligation to ask that the government reflect the ethics of whatever faith that person practices.

While there is a clear separation of Church and State, guaranteed in the United States Constitution, there is also a protected exercise of the religious liberties that form the ethical basis of interaction between the government and those same religious liberties. Faithful men and women, of whatever faith, are obligated to exercise their religious liberties in interaction with the government. Every faith has equal access and equal voice. No religion has more power or authority than any other. This does not free Americans from the exercise of their religious liberties, however. Each person votes her or his conscience. Each person is permitted to act from the foundations of whatever religious principles drive them.

This is good. While some may consider it an attack on Christian principles, I see it, instead, as permission to act from the religious principles of Christianity in relationship with the government, politics, and the systems under which we live as Americans. Instead of arguing the point of Constitutional Christian hegemony, perhaps we could spend our time asking what ethical principles we might demand of our government, our representatives, our systems and ourselves. Since the ethical core of most, if not all, of the world's religious traditions rests in the sacrifice of the self in service to others, then our government, politics and systems benefit from the interaction, as do those who have previously suffered and struggled against them.

The interface between persons of faith, of whatever faith, and the government, politics and systems under which we live is crucial for those who have been victimized, excluded, rejected, even advantaged, by those same systems. That is what is guaranteed by The United States Constitution, as I understand it. That is what is better for all and each of us in the conduct of the religious liberties, so granted and guaranteed.