How better questions make better answers

Back in junior high school we learned about the Great Depression and Franklin Roosevelt and how our country overcame the Great Depression. We learned about Roosevelt's leadership and the programs he implemented.  I came away thinking of him as a hero. I learned that he was pragmatic.

I didn't really understand the word pragmatic, but I thought it had to do with trying different things until you found something that worked.

Later as I started understanding politics, I found out that Franklin Roosevelt actually ruined our country with his policies and the programs he implemented. At that time I learned that Ronald Reagan was a hero. He overcame the programs Roosevelt implemented. No change on what I thought pragmatic meant.

When I came to work for the church and started working with groups, I mentioned to one of them that we should be pragmatic.

I was met with a chilled response.  We won't be pragmatic said one of the leaders.  Yes, said another, not pragmatic.  I got the feeling being pragmatic was a bad thing. At least where faith was concerned.

Turns out to be pragmatic has three tenets that could be troubling to people of faith.

1. Truth does not exist "out there"- reality is shaped by our existence in the world as much as how world shapes our existence. It happens to us. It happens because of us.

2. People base their knowledge of reality on what is useful to them and tend to discard what doesn't work.

3. People define the social and physical objects they encounter in the world according to their use for them.

4. If we want to understand each other: we must understand the interaction of ourselves with the world, we acknowledge we and the world are constantly changing, we interpret our interactions differently.

Are these thoughts dangerous to faith?

I can see where this philosophy would interfere with our charge to believe in things we can't see and prove.

But, if you have ever sensed a disconnect when attempting to connect people, God, and ideas; the reality may be that we are all on some level pragmatists.

The problem is that we are unwilling to talk about it.

Before we discard pragmatism (which in itself would be pragmatic) as bad (or not useful), we might want to make sure we understand how pragmatic we each really are.

For the particular idea you are attempting to share:
1. Is it true?
2. Does it work?
3. Is it worth it?

We often get stuck on the first question. And we spend lots of time arguing with and giving the silent treatment to those who disagree with us.  Question number two is where we might get bogged down in a discussion of pragmatism.

I have found the richer conversations I have are spent with question number 3.  The reason you do what you do is because of question 3.  Here is where faith and pragmatism can be held in a healthy tension.

Figuring out which questions we respond to leads to better answers.

What if the photo at Iwo Jima was staged?

When you gather pictures for the church directory or write up a bulletin article asking people to participate in the soup kitchen meal prep you are in many ways mediating your ministry. Like the media does.

You are portraying something that is or something that you hope is or something that you want to become. Like the media.

What if I told you the photo of the flag raising at Iwo Jima was staged?

When I first heard that, I was incensed.  The photo represents to me a turning point of the war. A moment when good overcame evil.

I'm really not sure if the photo was staged or not.

I have learned some a few things about the flag raising at Iwo Jima.

The photo was taken before the battle: not after. Many of the men pictured in it were killed in the battle.

There were several photos taken of the flag and at least one was staged or posed.

There were two raising of the flags.  The photo of the first one wasn't very inspirational to look at.

And none of it really matters in terms of what the photo means to me as an American.

It's about good overcoming evil.

Some of the pictures in your directory or the stories of you ministry may or not be staged.

Some of the stories I read in the Bible may or not be historically accurate.

And none of it really matters in terms of what those pictures or stories mean to me as a person of faith.

It's about love overcoming fear.

The way in which we are made by as we participate in the sharing of our faith touches in some way every thing we do. Our context, our history, our scriptures, and our experiences.  Do they lead us closer to God and to each other?  How we embrace that and each other is what really matters.

How to deal with deviants

de·vi·ant  

/ˈdēvēənt/

Adjective Departing from usual or accepted standards, esp. in social or sexual behavior.

Noun A deviant person or thing.

W.I Thomas noticed that "Things which men perceive as real are real in their consequences."

In mission and ministry with the groups of people who have something (let's say us) and those who don't (let's call them deviants) we sometimes stop at attempts to economize how to best get the stuff that we have to the people who don't.

If we take a step further or take a step back, we might try for a moment to understand these deviants.

The homeless, I was told by a homeless person, wish sometimes that people would "quit trying to figure out homeless people."

What we think of deviants often comes from news sources, friends and family, and our pew and Sunday school seat.

Our perceptions of deviants are mediated by the media of our ministry.

In this scene from West Side Story we get the idea that these deviants are missing something that can be provided by the right resource.

The troubles of the deviants are seen as systemic and sociological.  But our troubles occur individually as well.

What we often think of the deviant (you can substitute homeless, poor, unbeliever, fundamentalist, liberal, or any "they are wrong to my right" label you wish) comes from news, theology, or religious beliefs that we figure are just "showing it as it is".

And the fact is that they are all wrong.

Wrong for a reason.

They might even be wrong for good reason.  For earnest, committed, Biblically based reason.

When a member of a church focus group heard some of our ideas about developing ways to get to know some of the folks we minister to on a personal level and then help each other get to know our abilities and gifts that we can bring to the community development table, she remarked "you better check with the mission people about that."

As in maybe the mission people wouldn't like that? Because the mission people had different reasons?  Like getting people on board with a belief system that would make it so that they could get to heaven too. Like us. Like me!

In reality the mission people, if this is their reason, know this is wrong and the people in the focus group know it's wrong, but we seem to have this understanding that we are wrong and the people in our congregations know we are wrong, but we both have a role to play and we are doing it for the right reason (in this case salvation.)

The way to discipleship might lead through coming to understand what these good reasons are for this wrong way thinking.

How do we interpret each other's experiences and beliefs so that we can get to know each other and God?

It might start with trying to get to know the deviants before we try to understand them, much less fix them.

How to deal with deviants?

Make sure you know some.