The comic strip, Mallard Fillmore, recently depicted Senator Ted Kennedy floating in a Palm Beach pool, thinking to himself: "Life is good... I treat women like dirt, but support feminist causes... And I get away with my extravagant lifestyle by insisting that the middle class do more to help the poor... Wow. Having a ‘social conscience’ sure beats having a personal one..."

Of course having a schizophrenic conscience is not restricted to Senator Kennedy. The church sometimes seems to have such. William Willimon has written:

• We show a curious split between private and public morality. Stanley Hauerwas has criticized the liberal church for being "public legalists and private antinomians." We couple a laissez-faire attitude toward personal morality with a legalistic, coercive stance on public policy, confidently asserting what ought to be done on all sorts of complex global problems but utterly confused about what to say to two people in a bedroom.
  

Of course, the religious right often makes the same mistake in the opposite direction. They stress the importance of personal morality and responsibility while talking little about structural evil in society (what the Bible calls "principalities and powers").

Tony Campolo has pointed to the same phenomenon:

• Sometimes, when I am talking to Christians who are Republicans, I get the sense that they believe that all we need to create a good society is to get individuals ‘saved.’ They seem to simplistically believe that society is nothing more than the sum total of the individuals who make it up...On the other hand, when I talk to Democrats who are Christians, I sometimes get the idea that all we have to do to make things good in America is to create a more just social order. Too often, Democrats convey the simplistic notion that the only reason people do evil is because society sets them up for it. To listen to some Democrats I know is to get the idea that if the government just ensured everyone of adequate housing, decent-paying jobs, and good educational opportunities, all would be well.
  

Of course, the truth is we need both a personal conscience and a social conscience and the gospel addresses both.


©1996 C. David Hess

Even after 20 centuries Jesus is still hot news. Last week all three major U.S. news magazines devoted their cover stories to Jesus. The articles dealt with the same questions with which humankind has been wrestling since Jesus first walked the earth: Who is he? Was he in fact raised from the dead?

Even among Christians there are differing interpretations of Jesus and of his resurrection. Some have emphasized the Easter experience of the disciples or the Easter faith. They would argue that whether or not the tomb was found empty is not important. The important thing is whether or not we can live lives of hope and faith as did the early disciples. Others have emphasized the Easter event. They contend that what actually happened that first Easter is of supreme importance. The latter group emphasizes the objective reality of the Resurrection. The first group emphasizes the subjective experience of the Resurrection.

I would argue that to choose between the two is a false choice. Both are absolutely necessary. When individuals speak of the "disciples’ experience," we must always ask, "experience of what?" The subjective and objective cannot be divorced from one another.

I very much believe in the historical fact of the resurrection of Jesus. I stand with the apostle Paul when he wrote: "...if Christ has not been raised from death, then we have nothing to preach and you have nothing to believe. More than that, we are shown to be lying about God..." (I Cor. 15:14-15) This preaching of Christ’s real and complete victory over death was of supreme importance to the early Christians. Ernst Bloch, the late German Marxist philosopher, wrote: "It wasn’t the morality of the Sermon on the Mount which enabled Christianity to conquer Roman paganism, but the belief that Jesus had been raised from the dead."

Of course, to contend for the historicity of the Easter event is not enough either. One must have the Easter experience, the personal resurrection within. No doubt Satan believes in the Easter event, but she (in an effort to be gender neutral) has not had the Easter experience. If the Easter event has had no effect upon the way you live your life, it really makes no difference whether it happened or not.

©1996 C. David Hess

I am writing these words just after I have played 18 holes of golf. Monday is not really my day off, but it was just too nice a day to pass up the opportunity. One of my fellow pastors tempted me into doing it. I in turn tempted another pastor to leave his duties and indulge in the game.I don't have much talent for golf, but I have a great talent for tempting others to take off from work and play the game. I find that in temptation a heavy dose of theology works well (Satan also tried this with Jesus). My most effective lines are: "This is the day which the Lord hath made for golf." & "It would be a sin not to play golf on a day like today."

I do believe there is some good theology here. There is an old Jewish saying to the effect that on Judgment Day God will hold us each responsible for His good gifts that we did not enjoy. In that sense it would have been a sin not to have played golf today (those of you who really had to work are excused).

There is that part of the Christian message which tells us to deny ourselves and take up our crosses. That is certainly a valid part of the biblical message. However, we need to hear the equally valid part of the biblical message that God desires us to enjoy His creation and His good gifts.

This is the theme of one of my favorite poems (I don't know the author):

If you are ever looking for a golf game, give me a call. My schedule is always flexible.


©C. David Hess

I’ve just seen the film, Dead Man Walking (the announcement a prison guard makes as he escorts a condemned man to the death chamber). This movie is based on the true story of the ministry of Sister Helen Prejean (played by Susan Sarandon) to a man on death row.

The condemned man, Pat Sonnier (played by Sean Penn), was convicted of the brutal slaying of a teenage couple in 1977. His brother, convicted of the same crime, received life imprisonment.

Sister Helen visits the convict on death row at his invitation. She works hard to save his life. She also visits the parents of the slain teens. She is moved to tears as she hears the parents tell of their children and how their murders have devastated their lives. Here the real power of the movie comes across. Helen (and the moviegoer) are not allowed to identify with just one side or the other. Helen (and the moviegoer) feel the whole horror of the murder, feel the pain of both the victims and the criminal, and come to care for them all. Helen and the moviegoer come to feel very much like I think Christ feels as he looks upon the same people and the same event.

Helen also fulfills the role a nun should fulfill. She very much works to save the condemned man’s soul. She succeeds. Here the movie had an unanticipated effect upon me. The movie is intended to be an argument (and not a superficial one) against the death penalty. Helen was against the death penalty because it is applied selectively. It seems only the poor are ever executed. I share her position. However, I left the theater feeling better about the death penalty than when I went in. It was because the death penalty (with Helen and God’s help) very much contributes to the convict’s salvation as a human being. As with other work, when you have "soul work" to do, nothing seems to help as much as a known deadline. Or as Samuel Johnson wrote: "Depend on it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully."


©1996 C. David Hess