Citizen Christian IV: Rules of Life

I grew up an Episcopalian, and while they do attempt to be open and accepting, Episcopalians have many, many rules that are active within any Episcopal community. Not knowing them can be an obstacle for newcomers, and sometimes longtime members as well. Who can do what in the service and who cannot. Who can do what in a congregation and who cannot. What types of activities are allowed of by or within the church. All of it is documented in something called the Canons and Constitution, which dictate the parameters of all these things. And yet few Episcopalians themselves, people who attend and volunteer and sustain the church, know anything about these documents and how their lives are formed by them.

Throughout the worship service texts are instructions, called rubrics, that tell you where to go and when to sit or stand and if you might have a choice about that at a certain time or situation. Rubrics tell you all of the things actually, but most of the actions tasked are so ingrained by the congregation that they are done without reading anything, simply followed.

Those are the official rubrics, of course, as a seminary professor would say “Rubrics with a capital R” but there are always little rubrics as well, sometimes more ‘important’ to the Rule of Life in that place. These are the expectations, traditions, patterns, and placements that make a congregation unique, the choices that over time have paved particular pathways of what is possible. Violating these rubrics can cause anything from embarrassment to ostracism. But it has been my experience that people know more about these rules than the others, and that they are happy, even honored, to explain and unfold the traditions of that church for new members.

But now I am an American Baptist pastor, and my congregation couldn’t really be termed as fitting into any denominational structure. Little that we do meets the ‘warrants’ of Christian worship as established. I officiated a wedding for former members of a church youth group now grown, with an assembly of almost all traditional church folk, that left blank every single box down the checklist of such warrants, those required characteristics. 

But I contend that what we do IS Christian in a broad sense, and of the Gospel, and that while few Episcopalians would recognize it as such, we have a liturgy of our weekly gatherings. As we move into our fifth year of regular worship together, we have even developed small ‘r’ rubrics, such as the chanting of one particular song and the usual use of a particular poem as an ending prayer. But these things are also changeable, and do shift as per need.

We certainly wouldn’t pass the purity tests established by many religious systems. I recently learned during an odd exchange with fringe Evangelicals that although I am an ordained minister of the Gospel in the Baptist tradition, can tell the stories of Jesus like they happened to my brother, have formed my life to live out those stories’ lessons, and deeply love the usually eschewed Paul, I did not meet their criteria for being a Christian.

I am still not sure what being a Christian or following Jesus meant to them, because nothing they said had anything to do with actions or behavior. There did not seem to be any active Rule of Life other than casting people out of the ranks of the righteous due to unbelief or a near obsessive need to testify to others.

That said, I would be hard pressed to define the Rule of Life at Living Waters other than by a few things. Firstly, we have made a commitment that no one must go through something alone. A virtue of community is that we can collectively weave trust and vulnerability together to form a fabric that covers all of us. No one person has to be that assistant. And no one person has to travel alone. Secondly, I ask members of Living Waters to consider their own spiritual journeys as valid, sacred, and real. I ask them to consider, and act upon, how their own hearts, minds, and spirits call them into the Universe. I suppose our Rule of Life is community and intention.

We all have these small ‘r’ rubric lists, sometimes known and sometimes unknown, that define for us what something is, and if it be authentically that or something else. We see this active in Houses of Worship, sure, but these lists are also a prime motivator in the political sphere. What constitutes a ‘real Republican’ these days seems to be fluid and dynamic thing, and I certainly hope the conversation keeps going there. What makes a ‘real Democrat’ was stretched and pulled into heretofore unknown shapes via the Presidential runs of Bernie Sanders, but that conversation seems stalled. Certainly what makes a ‘real American’ is infused with racial, classist, gendered, and religious projections and expectations.

But far too often these arguments are only about what people THINK, and not what they do, advocate for, or endorse. This makes the crafting of policy near impossible. I believe that politics is merely the mechanics of our common life. But right now, politics is only a stage for shallow power, and we don’t have time for that nonsense.

Politics is all about the posturing and the platforming when what we need it to be is active, engaged, and responsive to real needs. Without Rules of Life, the Evangelical church has radically lost its way, becoming so disassociated from Gospel truths that endorsing Donald Trump as President seemed reasonable. With no actions expected, no lived lives as models, and no commitments on record, there is nothing to hold on to, nothing to compare to, nothing against which to say “this thing is so far from that thing that they are no longer the same thing.”

And so what might be our Rules of Life for an engaged citizenry? Actions of dissent against injustice on the regular? Frequent check-ins and accountability regarding policy development? 

I’m not sure exactly what that would look like, but I do know it’s needed. Our current political party system has failed. It no longer serves the people, and only perpetuates monied interests. Perhaps the answer is like unto what has happened in churches and other Houses of Worship, a separation from expected systems and a forming of new communities of faith. Is regionalism one of the answers for us politically? Smaller more responsive systems could incorporate more contextual needs.

Again, I am unsure how we should proceed except to say that we must examine our political Rules of Life, not our pet theories or opinions, and see where that focus on work can bring us.

The Heresy of Alignment

I have been doing community development work and political advocacy all my adult life. I have advanced degrees in the topics, and have lived and worked in several American cities. But I have settled in Denver, CO, and notice some trends here that amplify an issue I’ve been mulling for a while, the heresy of alignment.

Where I live is an unusual place, socio-politically. Very different types of coalitions and tables exist here. Alliances shift and new circles are drawn. Some councils and such have expectations of permanency or requirements of confidentiality, but these are fewer in number than I’ve encountered in other places. Essentially, I have found it to be a place where if you can show up in any of a variety of ways, it’s noticed and appreciated. Showing up matters, actions speak, and first impressions are regularly adapted.  It’s possible that these characteristics be appropriately claimed for more of the state as well; I suspect this to be true. I just don’t know yet for sure. #ComingSoon.

But one of the as of yet unchallenged realities of political life here can be a dizzying array of authenticity tests and purity warrants. These proscriptions are especially strong in the social media realms. I think one reason coalitions and communities are formed here more easily than in other places is that schism is also a matter of course.

We know that a significant obstacle to quality broad conversation in current American culture is our siloing, our thought-segregation, our echo chambers. A major engine of this inward movement is our desire to find for others who think like us, and who agree with our basic sense of ethics. There’s nothing wrong with this, not really.  But alone, it’s dangerous. Drawn lines -which may or may not ever be put aside- are often present but invisible and unspoken until transgressed. Sometimes, a desire for conformity and alignment supersedes the need to act. 

Even the “search for common ground” can become fuel for growing and nurturing only like minded conversations when common belief dominates common action in whom we ask to the next table, in who is deemed worthy. Our larger works would benefit if we sought out differentiation among stakeholders, if this were an ethic for all collaborative work, if we formed coalitions with a high value on difference instead of an insistence on alignment. What if we sought out varying assets, skills, mindsets in an attempt to build something new from the intersections of where these things meet?

It’s not that finding like-minded allies is a bad thing. In fact, doing this is necessary for any movement or endeavor. We each need peers and colleagues and our organizations and programs need a wider community. But even within a themed or wholly aligned circle, different bodies do different things, have varying specialities and opinions. Clearly, there is no collaboration where all parties can have completely the same function, nor any group of people wherein all members believe precisely the same thing. 

We also seek like-minded groups because they make us more comfortable. And again, nothing wrong with comfort in and of itself -we all need it at times. Yet an underlying tension to comfortableness as a goal is always the reality that growth, development, and change only happen when we are at least slightly uncomfortable, where there is conflict of some kind.

We also seek ‘alignment’ when at some level, we honestly believe we know best, have the best solutions, or the most appropriate resources. When we believe these things, we confuse understanding with agreement. When alignment or agreement are not immediately forthcoming, we reiterate our facts (or process, or model, or rationale) again and again, ensuring even further the inability to hear each other. There is also a fundamentally toxic miasma of paternalism, colonialism, privilege, and hubris enshrouding arguments for alignment. It takes a certain amount of arrogance to assume YOU are the one with whom others must align.

It is also incredibly frustrating to be the one who believes you yourself have failed to communicate well or thoroughly or in just the right way. This is happens easily when agreement from others is your goal. Understanding is deeper, requires acceptance, and doesn’t always lead to consensus. You can truly understand a thing you don’t agree with, and may never align with. On the basis of understanding and acceptance can come respect, and an increased capacity for common work.

Behaving like any heresy, alignment taken too far perverts the concepts of solidarity themselves. If the betrayal of an idea -a heresy- be, as my first spiritual director proposed, simply a good idea taken too far, I would agree and add an important second. Presence of perversion. I know a heresy for truly dangerous when this twisting of a core concept or tenet happens. The search for alignment is pushing all my buttons pressed by other deadly heretics of our age: Joel Osteen and the Heresy of the Prosperity Gospel, Franklin Graham and the Heresy of Male Exceptionalism. We know them, these figures who preach such abominations. I don’t have a primary heretic on whom to hang this obsession with alignment.

Instead of establishing impossible vows of alignment, we must establish undeniable areas of common good, common work, and common appreciation. A friend recently told me a story of playing in a long established orchestra in the only urban area within a large consevative section of the state. These musicians have been playing together for decades, and know each other well. They are also all over the political and religious spectrum -Trump voters, Green party advocates, the apolitical, churchgoers, and atheists all sharing scores, rehearsing and performing. These orchestra players have done the common work of showing up and making something transformative and generative. They are aligned only by purpose and intent and not belief or opinion. They make music. 

We undermine the Heresy of Alignment by leaning into a theology of difference, a celebration of the wild diversity of Creation. We must adopt those unlike us into our ranks, seek out divergent models that overlap ours but aren’t contiguous, find entities and voices far too long left out or dismissed. We must put aside the seduction of being “right” or “better” in any competition and instead focus on what can be built. This does not mean abandoning any principles of justice or discernment. Not everyone will be able to be a part of every collaboration; not every entity can sit down with every other. Sometimes, the divide might be too wide, damage done too deep. Not only is this alright but it is to be honored and heeded.

But like any orchestra, we all have voice, and we can never really tell how our voices will blend with an instrument completely foreign to our usual repertoire. The Heresy of Alignment crowds out the difficult and uncomfortable, and sabotages the deep and sustainable change our world requires.