Or Deadspin, or wherever fake news is made.

An article on a NASCAR injury somehow pales next to Ben Roethlisberger playing the Super Bowl with broken ribs or next to A-Rod’s steroid admission or next to anything else involved in a real sport.

Even boxing seems real compared to a NASCAR driver’s busted pinkie finger taking up space and money on ESPN.com.

For evidence that boxing actually can be cool, watch this video:

I recently read a challenging book titled “A Black Theology of Liberation,” by James Cone. I’d rather not summarize the book too much, but instead encourage you to read it. I don’t agree with everything, but love some things. This is actually refreshing.

Based off Cone and his very extreme, concrete approach to liberation, I have a few questions or points for the church relating to the often abstract ideas of salvation and evangelism. In the Bible, Jesus uses healing, physical healing, to invite people into the kingdom of God. He does not deny a person’s physical circumstances and tell the blind man or the man with leprosy that he’s not going to heal them, but that they should still believe in God!

Don’t we do that? Don’t we hope to heal people’s souls and ignore their bodies and physical situations because they’re just too difficult?

I hope we can all agree that the church as the body of believers worldwide should be actively involved in liberation. We need churches and communities to equip us for being sent to the world. Otherwise they have no purpose and become like clubs. This can’t just be something they do to remain healthy – real service and real liberation through Jesus are the essence of their being. I wonder if being sent to the world means more than just carrying around a nice attitude in our workplace, if it means more than, as a friend recently lamented, acting happy and hoping someone asks you “why are you so happy all the time?” so you can tell them about Jesus.

I do not doubt that unbelief is a major problem in America. I would love to have more people involved in this Jesus movement. But we need to have a movement of God’s salvation to call them to, rather than an abstract idea too often embodied in just “going to church.” I firmly believe in actually talking about God rather than hoping that our actions witness to it, as I referenced above, but our actions need to back up those words.

There are other major problems in America, like race. I recently heard a statistic that 3 percent of Minnesotans are black. 37 percent of the Minnesota prison population is black. My campus, plain and simple, is segregated. It perpetuates itself as a Norwegian college with very very loose Christian ties (I would argue), which makes those outside the culture feel like … outsiders.

Right now, I don’t have specific solutions or anything. I just know that I needed to write down these thoughts and work through them. I appreciate any of your thoughts, challenges, or questions.

What are the parallels between right-wing fundamentalism and new atheism? Read this interview in The Sun with Chris Hedges. The link takes you to the second page, where Hedges delves into these issues, but his earlier thoughts on war are also worthwhile.

The University of Washington’s student newspaper, The Daily, recently printed an ill-informed, distasteful column against gay marriage. This Seattle Times article (and accompanying video) describes the entire fiasco.

It’s not a “for or against” type of issue. I stand by the newspaper’s free speech and I agree that the column was hateful. As I asked in a comment on the article (as with many articles, the reader comments are both illuminating and disturbing), is the real issue the existence of hate speech or that a newspaper exposed you to its existence? I say the real issue is the existence of hate speech. Attack that rather than those who presented it.

We need journalists to present views that many people disagree with so that we can have an open conversation. This traffics in all directions. It’s really petty to protest against the Daily rather than hateful people. Whether or not the article was ill-informed, I agree with their decision to print it.

Thank you, citizens of Washington state, for making national waves (on Fox News – surprise) with your ability to blow a situation vastly out of proportion. In case you haven’t been following this story closely, atheists posted a sign at the state capitol decrying the very idea of religion. Today it was stolen … and returned! The Seattle Times has the fast-breaking story here.

Let’s just declare an end to this idea of a “War on Christmas.” Now that one side declared it a war, it’s become one. The atheists’ sign (reading “”Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds”), while often true and protected under free speech, just isn’t that respectful or even thoughtful. It means “war.” Meanwhile, the couple protests organized by local churches against the sign also declare a battle of sorts. All this despite the state’s rather agreeable decision to allow anyone to display in the capitol building this year.

It’s foolish to use a term like “war,” especially now, and especially during the holiday season. But even some college compatriots got into the act. Local College Republicans advertised their Christmas party last night with fliers annulling the word “holiday” in favor of “Christmas.” If a joke, 10 years old. If serious, petty at best.

Here’s the thing: the entire holiday season, no matter what holiday or non-holiday people celebrate for religious or non-religious reasons, is a time of celebration. It might celebrate materialism, but at least it celebrates good cheer among people. Christmas, though a time for materialism, is also a time for necessary materialism as people practice generosity to those who are needy in material ways!

Simply put, our ideological institutions, from many stripes (let’s not say “both sides”) perpetuate this silly “war on Christmas” idea. I have never witnessed a single person-to-person argument about someone saying “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Holidays.” Seriously. People know how to handle themselves. For some reason, our ideological institutions forget to engage in actual conversations over the holiday season and choose to hurl bombastic public statements instead. Let’s make them stop.

I feel that there’s almost too much to grasp in the first two chapters of Cone’s “A Black Theology of Liberation.” Rather than respond to his introduction and methods, I’d rather present a couple crucial quotes. I’ll write my short responses below, but consider them for yourself (albeit largely out of context).

In Chapter 1: “The rise of Old Testament prophecy is due primarily to the lack of justice within that community. The prophets of Israel are prophets of social justice, reminding the people that Yahweh is the author of justice.”

This seems pretty straightforward – as the Israelite people turn away from God, they turn away from justice. If I may infer, Cone reverses that order and says that to turn away from justice is to turn away from God.

Cone continues from where he left off: “It is important to note in this connection that the righteousness of God is not an abstract quality in the being of God, as with Greek philosophy. It is rather God’s active involvement in history, making right what human beings have made wrong.”

Cone states what might be obvious: God can’t be righteous without acting righteous. Being is inseparable from action. If you’ll note previous posts on Kierkegaard (who Cone quotes at one point), you begin to note the sincere tension between his existentialism and the Greek-infused philosophical approach, which looks at God as real idea (see Augustine) and not necessarily as an experienced, real being. Augustine clearly believes that God exists, but he approaches theology without the same experiential lens as Cone or even Kierkegaard. Cone will later use the above principle of righteous action alone to do his black theology.

From Chapter 2: “Literalism thirsts for the removal of doubt in religion, enabling believers to justify all kinds of political oppression in the name of God and country.”

Here, Cone is talking about the literal interpretation of Scripture. Is this true? Do we want to abolish doubt? Why? Is it for the safety of our religious institution or because we truly do not doubt?

Finally, a question that the church needs to answer and act on: “Is it possible for the church to be the church (committed unreservedly to the oppressed in society) and at the same time be an integral part of the structure of a society?”

Cone’s answer: “I think not.”

What’s yours?

One, a Danish philosophical theologian. The other, an unidentified prophet of the Hebrew Bible. No one knows who he was, apparently, but the name Malachi means “my messenger.” Brought together by my theology class and my personal reading (guess which was which).

In Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard writes of faith through the story of Abraham. He creates a character called the “knight of faith” to represent the actions of a true faithful person, who sees absolutely that something is not possible but in the realm of the absurd believes absolutely that it is possible. This is an oversimplification. Anyway, Kierkegaard holds that the essence of the knight of faith is completely interior despite his exterior actions. Like Abraham, he doesn’t announce his faith. We might not know him from any other bourgeois fellow (or Joe Six-Pack) walking down the street. He’s completely in the world.

In Malachi, among other threads, the author writes of belief. The book of Malachi is different from the other prophetic books in the Bible. It’s structured in a series of questions posed by the Israelites to God and by God to the Israelites, with answers in between. Throughout the book, Malachi emphasizes the inevitable marriage of belief and actions that support that belief. This isn’t much different than the entire course of the relationship between God and Israel as told in the Hebrew Bible. God asks in Psalm 51 for sacrifices of the heart and not of animals. God simply wants faith.

How do I think faith and actions are related? If I “believe” something, I must act in a way that confirms that belief. A simple example from the modern world: If I believe that baseball is my favorite sport, I will spend more time watching, playing, thinking about, reading about, and immersing myself in all things baseball than I will in any other sport. I can’t force myself to act as if baseball is my favorite sport through doing all those actions. Those actions spring from an authentic belief that baseball is better than other sports.

In much greater significance, so it is with God. We can profess to believe in God, but that belief can fade into an abstract idea of the sort Kierkegaard condemns. If we believe absolutely that God exists and that God is good and that God alone saves us, we’ll act accordingly. Of course, I have real trouble believing absolutely, but what matters is the core belief that guides my actions. This is why God so emphasizes knowing him. We must know God as real to act with God as real and share God as real. We cannot tell someone about our abstract idea and expect them to form a relationship with it. We cannot do actions and expect them to turn into faith, though it’s different with God because grace is so much more powerful than our idolatry of process and ritual.

Just a verse from Malachi to expound upon…
“‘When you bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice crippled or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?’ says the LORD Almighty.” – Malachi 1:8
Our sacrifices to God, whether bloody animals or our gifts and talents, should be given in reverence and belief. If the Israelites really believe that God is God, wouldn’t they bring healthy sacrifices to the altar instead of keeping the best animals for themselves? Like us, they were thinking in the temporary.

In some ways, I think the hopes expressed here are for perfect faith, which only comes through grace, but which also seems to always get fouled up by my imperfections. So it’s not like you’re not a Christian once you do something bad, that’s not my point, but rather that we should really understand our beliefs – all of them – through our actions and words done and spoken in the moment and not premeditated as what we “should” do. Thoughts and feedback welcome.

Alternative news outlet Crosscut.com, with at least a cutting-edge vision for local news, even if it hasn’t been financially successful yet, plans to move toward nonprofit status. Check that out here

Interestingly, the New York Times also featured a front-page story about nonprofit news websites in various American cities, mentioning Crosscut and the more-developed Twin Cities-based site MinnPost. If I choose to enter the journalism world after college, I’d likely apply to work at one of these places. Read that story as well, here.

Check out Crosscut.com here.

Apparently, the city of Seattle is going to give $10 million more in new programs to youth-violence prevention programs and to homeless shelters and other services. I hope that the Times and other Seattle news outlets can keep the city accountable for responsibly spending this money. It’s a step in the right direction, particularly for a mayor who has continually antagonized the city’s homeless population in the name of a positive image, so much so that a new tent city named itself “Nickelsville” in his honor. Overall, this story is great for me because I don’t live in Seattle but support anything that helps the city’s homeless. Read the Times story here.

For the last story, I was fascinated by this story from the Snohomish County bureau. I have several friends with families who own homes in the unincorporated Snohomish County area (which Lynnwood proposes to annex). The story is fascinating for its look at Lynnwood’s perception relative to Edmonds, which the article claims is changing, though the article neglects to mention the new convention center Lynnwood built a few years ago (crucial in their desire to change the city’s identity/perception). I don’t know much about all the zoning details mentioned in the article, but I’ll definitely ask people more about this possibility when I’m home for breaks. Read the article here.

Hope you enjoy today’s most important Seattle-area news, at least from my perspective!

No, Kierkegaard himself didn’t have any thoughts on American Christianity, but as a citizen of a country (Denmark) where becoming a citizen also meant instantly becoming a Christian, even his less explicit thoughts on the relationship between a state and faith hold relevance for us. Here’s a quote from Problem III of ‘Fear and Trembling’:

“The ethical is the universal and as such in turn the divine. It is therefore right to say that every duty, after all, is duty to God, but if no more can be said, then one is saying as well that I really have no duty to God. Duty becomes duty by being referred to God, but in the duty itself I do not enter into relation to God.”

In other words, saying “I’m doing these things for God, man” too often becomes an abstract concept. We don’t actually encounter God. Actions like that, and living with a duty to God (we might use the words “worship” or “constant prayer”) can become about detaching ourselves from the action and dedicating them elsewhere. If I see my homework as a duty to God in an abstract sense, then I fail to see what the homework itself might do to draw me closer to God. (For example, reading Kierkegaard for a religion class has provoked conviction in my own life).

I’ll let Kierkegaard say a little more (this directly follows the above quote): “For instance, it is a duty to love one’s neighbor. It is a duty by its being referred to God, but in the duty I do not enter into a relation to God but to the neighbor I love. If I say then in the connection that it is my duty to love God, I am really only stating a tautology insofar as ‘God’ here is understood in an entirely abstract sense as the divine, i.e. the universal, i.e. the duty … God becomes an invisible vanishing point, an impotent thought, his power being only in the ethical, which completes existence.”

For Kierkegaard, faith is all about transcending the ethical. We can certainly apply that to a legalistic brand of Christianity. Let’s begin to pursue a relationship in knowing God through what we do, rather than viewing what we do through some abstract lens.

On folks who say simplistically that Christians walk in complete light and pagans walk in the dark: “Such a statement may be explained by one not knowing what one should say but only that one should say something.”

On the source of greatness: “If the one who is to act wants to judge himself by the outcome, then he will never begin. Even though the outcome may delight the whole world, it cannot help the hero, for he only came to know the outcome when the whole thing was over, and he did not become a hero by that but by the fact that he began.”

Too often I do exactly what Kierkegaard identifies in the first quote: say something just to say something. I don’t mean anything by it but to show effort and excuse myself from any further action. Proverbs emphasizes at several points the importance of the tongue, as does James. I, as I know others in the church do, waste the tongue. The church wastes it on movements like Proposition 8 in California or otherwise meddling in politics as an ideological-interest organization rather than as church people voting their considered conscience. I waste it on trite answers to important questions like “How are you doing?”

The second requires more difficulty. In some sense, as Christians, we all attain to Christ’s victory. We want to participate in his “heroism” on the cross. But we can’t attain that end, Kierkegaard says, without simply beginning. The end does not demonstrate greatness. The process, and even the beginning, demonstrate greatness. Today, where are we called to begin, today and every day?

I’ll try to get James and Proverbs verses up.