Merry Christmas!

Jesus' Birth

Among those whom the edict of Augustus thus from afar drove forth to the highways were a humble pair in the Galilean village of Nazareth--Joseph, the carpenter of the village, and Mary, his espoused wife. They had to go a journey of nearly a hundred miles in order to inscribe themselves in the proper register; for, though peasants, they had the blood of kings in their veins, and belonged to the ancient and royal town of Bethlehem, in the far south of the country. Day by day the emperor's will, like an invisible hand, forced them southward along the weary road, till at last they climbed the rocky ascent that led to the gate of the town,--he terrified with anxiety, and she well-nigh dead with fatigue. They reached the inn, but found it crowded with strangers, who, bent on the same errand as themselves, had arrived before them. No friendly house opened its door to receive them, and they were fain to clear for their lodging a corner of the inn-yard, else occupied by the beasts of the numerous travelers. There, that very night, she brought forth her first-born Son; and, because there was neither womanly hand to assist her nor couch to receive Him, she wrapped Him in swaddling-clothes and laid Him in a manger.

James Stalker, The Life of Jesus Christ

We had our final class last night in the eastern religions course, and one of the presentations was on yoga. I mentioned that the practice had actually been banned in Malaysia by the Islamic ruling council there. Abdul Shukor, the Fatwa chairman, said “We are of the view that yoga, which originates from Hinduism, combines physical exercise, religious elements, chanting and worshipping for the purpose of achieving inner peace and ultimately to be one with god.”

The ruling has since been reversed, but it goes without saying that it still raises several interesting questions. First of all, were the Muslims right in their assessment of the essence of yoga? I realize that pragmatic Americans are efficient in picking out what seems to work for them and ignoring the rest. In this case, it means defining yoga strictly as exercise and nothing more. But non-religious yoga seems to be a recent invention. Historically, yoga fits the description above. Within Hinduism, there is no religiously-neutral yogic path. That’s why the Muslim council objected.

But the other question, of course, has to do with religious freedom. Who should make these decisions? The reason why the ruling tends to rub us the wrong way is because we believe in freedom of religion. During our first class session, we spend a lot of time talking about the implications of the First Amendment. Ultimately, it’s the individual who ought to decide which path to follow. It’s not a decision that should ever be left up to the government.

I’ve always been very proud of my two boys. Just lately, I’ve found even more reasons to be so. My youngest, Joe, spent all day with me on Wednesday at the rescue mission in Nampa, helping me with paperwork and redesigning some forms. After that, we went over to volunteer for the huge Thanksgiving feast at the First Church of the Nazarene. We stood outside in fairly cold weather for almost four hours, unpacking boxes and then stacking the contents on the sidewalk.

They feed somewhere around 3000 people annually at this event. Anyone who shows up is given the opportunity to pick up a food box, and they’ve got the distribution part down to a science. It’s basically a drive through, and cars go past the sidewalk while volunteers put the boxes in the trunks. I supposed it might have been a little disillusioning when it seemed that half the vehicles in the line were a lot nicer than what we drive, but there were enough very appreciative people who made us realize that at least some good was getting done that day.

Anyway, the Christian school that Joe attends requires him to put in 10 hours of community service every semester. I remember doing community service myself when I was in high school (painting racquetball courts at the YMCA), but that was “alternative sentencing” and another story altogether! Joe had already spent five hours helping at the harvest party in October, but apparently, it didn’t count. Even though it is intended to be a community outreach event, it was sponsored by our church, so it didn’t fit the school requirements. All of that it just to say that I never heard a word of complaint from Joe about having to start over. He jumped in with both feet and volunteered again. More reasons to be proud.

My oldest, Max, who is a freshman this year at Boise State, was getting frustrated because his ’76 MG would never pass the emissions test. Maybe that’s not too surprising given its vintage. What made it worse, though, is that no one in town would agree to work on it. The guys at one shop didn’t have a clue what Max was asking them to do to his car. We finally did find one guy, but even after he got done, the MG still would not pass.

Max has a wooden plaque on his wall that says, “It can’t be that hard!” It’s a phrase he used to say all the time (still does, in fact). He decided to take matters into his own hands and fix it himself. Personally, I wouldn’t recognize carburetor jets if they bit me, but he ran down to the VW auto parts place and got a couple of them that were a smaller size (the fuel mixture had been too rich). OK, it didn’t hurt that the guy down the block was a mechanic and he was looking over his shoulder a little, but Max gets points for even daring to touch the carb when no one else seemed willing to. Apparently, it wasn’t that hard, after all, at least for him. The MG passed with flying colors. More reasons to be proud.

Writer's Block

Somehow I’ve managed to put off writing this book not just for weeks, not just for months, but literally for years. I have outlines for it that will turn five early in 2009. At the moment, I’m sitting in a coffee shop trying to make an anagram out of The Brothers Karmazov as a way to avoid figuring out why I have yet to commit pen to paper.

I can remember the exact moment the idea first came to me. I was standing in a checkout line before Easter one spring day, and I saw all the videos they had on the rack of Biblical films: The Ten Commandments, The Greatest Story Ever Told, etc. It struck me that, since I was on the faculty of a Bible college, I ought to teach a class that simply put those films in chronological order, to see what they might have to say by way of understanding the Scriptures a little more deeply.

What followed was a massive amount of research. I’ve got entire file boxes full of books, articles, and photocopies all related to the Bible on film. I guess it’s one of the things I’ve always been good at. I applied for the Westinghouse scholarship when I was in high school and I did the same thing. I ended up with extensive notes that went all the way back to the turn of the century, but not a single experiment by the time I was done. It happened again this year when I was looking up information on a high-frequency antenna for ham radio, and I convinced myself I should seek a patent. All I have to show for it now is a binder full of articles, but not one single prototype.

These experiences should probably tell me something but I’m still not quite sure what. I’ve thought that maybe it means my real calling is to become a librarian, and that way I’d be able to do research all the time (supposedly), but it just doesn’t seem to be the right fit for me.

More to the point, I seem to have “blockage” somewhere, sort of like a clogged artery. I was thinking that I can’t convince myself anyone would want to read what I write. But it’s worse than that – I’ve got myself completely convinced that no one ever would. Thus, no book.

Even more amazing is the fact that I have so many new tools at my disposal now. I’ve got a voice recorder much smaller than the palm of my hand, and I can play it back into a program that will instantly transcribe my words. I’ve got other software that will read back to me any text in an amazingly realistic human-sounding voice. The speed at which I can do online research now, and the databases I can access, was only a geek’s daydream when I first taught the Bible on film class. So what’s the problem?

Are there too many words out there already? Would the world really be a better place with one more book?

As far as the anagram goes, the best I could come up with is: Mark Voz Bothers Her Rat. Well, I’m bothered, too, I must say. I’ve got a bad case of writer’s block.

The other night, I sat down and watched the Marx Brothers in Go West. It’s one of those that I very rarely see – I usually go for Monkey Business or Duck Soup first. It was definitely good for a laugh (I knew there was a reason why I got the entire collection on DVD), but maybe it wasn’t quite as funny as some of the better known films. I owe a lot to the Marx Brothers, by the way. The week we moved to Tacoma (right in the middle of seventh grade) and I had to adjust to a new school, they were having a film fest on public TV. It was the first time I’d seen them and they helped me laugh at a time when I didn’t feel much like it.

Nat Perrin made some interesting observations about Go West in an interview once. Perrin contributed countless jokes to the Marx Brothers over the years, particularly for Groucho. In later years, he was the one who produced The Addams Family on TV. He said, “After [Irving] Thalberg died the people who produced other features for the team thought that because the Marxes were zany comedians that anything goes. Without that strong hand, you had three comedians who paid very little attention to the story line.” Thus Go West, even though it kept to the same formula as Monkey Business, was not nearly as hysterical nor as memorable.

I know there’s a moral there somewhere. Another name that I always associate with my junior high years is Kurt Vonnegut. One of the characters in his novel The Sirens of Titan summed up his existence by saying he was “a victim of a series of accidents. As are we all.” Vonnegut’s absurdist outlook had a certain appeal when I was 13 years old, and certainly Groucho’s did, too. Now, not so much. I find at this point in life I’m at least trying to pay more attention to the story line. The idea that there really is a plot underneath it all, and that it’s not just a series of unrelated sketches (no matter how funny) is what gives me hope.

Thank You, Nampa Police!

It seems as if there’s never a dull moment at a rescue mission, as I’ve said before. Yesterday, right after I got there, we heard yelling down the hall, and I mean, it was someone screaming at the top of their lungs. We started for the door but just as we did, a female police officer warned everybody to get back. One of the guys caught a glimpse of someone who had been forced down to the floor, and half a dozen cops had surrounded him, with guns drawn, as I understand.

It turns out the man was Pete Roberts, who was wanted for the murder of Bob and Idella Young five years ago. I remember the headlines: it was particularly grisly, and the elderly couple was well loved by the community, and especially by their church. Everyone was glad to hear they had finally made an arrest. My friend Roger even got his approximately 12 seconds of fame in front of the TV news crews, as he described how the suspect had run into the mission looking for a place to hide.

Of course, all of the excitement around the place pales in comparison with the sense that there may finally be justice done in this case. Cops tend to be under-appreciated for the most part, in my opinion. I got a verbal warning the other day for improperly changing lanes, and I wasn’t too happy about it at the time. This situation, though, reminds me that we owe them a lot more than we’re usually willing to admit.