But is he patriotic if he drinks their beer?

In college I majored in international affairs. I lived in Europe and I married a Schwaebin. As you can imagine, the perspectives foreigners have on my own country have always fascinated me. A good and well thought-out example is this editorial by Christoph Peters, a German author, in the July 17^th New York Times on Barak Obama’s impending trip to Berlin. 

Saturday Reading on Immigration, Religion, Sex and Vampires

While I am at it, I thought I would post the links to two interesting articles in today’s New York Times. First, a fascinating story about the intersection of the pastoral and the political, as illegal immigrants seek refuge in a Roman Catholic Church in Iowa.

Second, Gail Collins wrote an interesting commentary about youth, sex, gender and society after reading a high school, romance, vampire novel by a Mormon stay-at-home mom. For a better discussion of chastity and sexuality, however, I would recommend Lauren Winner's book, Real Sex: The Naked Truth About Chastity. 

Under with Undershirts

When I spent a summer working and ministering in Yellowstone National Park, there were quite a few European students who had traveled across the pond for their American mountain adventure. Being a student myself at the time, a popular topic was the differences in atmosphere between European and American universities. I remember a French girl whose face lit up with a smile of disbelief when I explained that it was not unusual for girls in my school, to show up for class in their pajamas. “If I did that, everyone would talk about me!” she laughed in her disarming French accent.

In truth, I was not taken aback myself by the casualness of the American student. Indeed, I have found it natural and refreshing, a statement to the world that appearance, smooth faces, combed hair and pressed shirts don’t matter. However, perhaps showing my age, as well as the conservative, professional attitude of the city in which I live, I have noticed the rise of a fashion that is too casual by even my low standards. It is now cool among young men to walk around in their undershirts, without an overshirt to hide them.

I understand part of the appeal. They are very inexpensive, they breathe well (any material that thin and cheaply put together breathes well) and, for those who have it, they don’t hide the shape masculine broad shoulders and big biceps (though this is not a precursor to most of the young men who wear them).

However, these thin shirts are designed to be sweat-catchers, and nothing more. These sweat-catchers prevent, sometimes in vain, us men from fouling our offices with body odor or turning our nice work shirts a putrid shade of tan. Moreover, they are not designed for modesty. The unsightly man-nips can be seen, particularly when the classroom air-conditioning is cranking to combat the summer heat. Chest, armpit and even back hair sprout through the translucent  material like weeds through a city sidewalk. Any sign of sweat turns even the freshest white shirt into a shade of fleshy pink.

Undershirts also give an aura of mediocrity. It is by far the most un-creative of clothes, surpassing even tighty-whities. The white blandness simply lacks personality. Most rebellious fashion statements – tattoos, piercings, heavy-metal T-shirts – gave the wearer a sense of color and character. An undershirt that is not under anything seems to drain the wearer of all of these things. This does not mean our white-clad young friends are as colorless in their minds as they are in their clothes. However, our clothes, even the most mundane and casual, are a great way to express the quirky parts of our personalities that we don’t always get to put into words.

This is particularly troubling given the wide and cheap availability of T-shirts. Indeed, we are living in a golden age of cheap cotton garments. There are hundreds of competing websites where aspiring casual fashionistas can submit and sell their design or joke. The best ones usually end up in Justin's collection. Moreover, every event, sports-team, university and politician will have a cool T-shirt just for you. On Thursday night, I saw the Capitol Hill athletes of the DC soft-ball leagues. They were having their post-game drinks at the Southeast Capitol bars. The shirts were creative and had cool colors and pictures.  My favorites were a team called “big in Japan” and had an ancient, Asian-looking fish on the front. As I write this, I am wearing one of my favorite T-shirts: a kelly-green shirt from my Katrina-recovery days. Good work, good color, good memories, not to mention, much more exciting than any of my barely-threaded sweat-catchers that I wear under my button-downs.  

Forgiveness and Reconciliation in the Washington Post

This past April, I had the privilege of seeing Laura Waters Hinson’s excellent film, As We Forgive, on forgiveness and reconciliation in Rwanda. See the film, buy the film and tell your friends. This past Saturday’s Washington Post wrote about Laura – not just the film, but about how the lesson of forgiveness and reconciliation met her on a very personal level. Read all about here. As We Forgive should inspire all of us to a Christ-like forgiveness. His ministry was of reconciliation to God and to each other. It's beautiful to read how it started with the filmmaker herself.  

Jesus in Colorado Springs

While I was working in New Orleans, some of my colleagues were listening to a Mo Leverett live CD. Between spiritually laced folks songs, Mo argued that New Orleans was the kind of place where Jesus would hang out. I wish I remembered precisely what he said, but the gist was that Jesus was attracted to the “sinners” and the marginalized. Because of this, New Orleans is more of a place for Jesus than Colorado Springs, the "Vatican of the evangelical movement". I have been inclined to agree with him. 

The Civilians provided me (along with a few friends) some good food for thought, however. I had never heard of the Civilians before, but I love their concept of theater. They develop "original projects based on creative investigation of actual experience." As anyone who has darkened the sleek glass doors of a mega-church could attest to, they did this very well in This Beautiful City.

This Beautiful City explores the evangelical political movement in Colorado Springs, as well as those whom they rub up against, and those who feel left in the margins. If I understand it correctly, the characters in the play are Colorado Springs residents they met, interviewed, dined with and went to church with. It included Air Force cadets, church members, political activists, ministers, a transvestite and fallen pastors. One of the fallen pastors was none other than Ted Haggard. His scandal of homosexual prostitution and meth addiction broke during their visit, which, of course, gave a very public dose of reality to an already interesting backdrop.

The six of us who visited the play were all Christians, and I noticed we laughed more than many of those around us. They were knowing laughs. The stage was set up like a mega-church with two screens on either side of it - during one of the sequences, words to the songs appeared on them.  We laughed knowingly as songs, inspiring words, calls to stand and technological savvy attempted to create a space for spiritual experience. There was a Pentecostal church called RHOP whose members saw visions of demons in every corner and prophesied whatever seemed to come to their mind. They reminded me of some of the Pentecostals who were in New Orleans after Katrina, such as the preacher who excitedly promised that every one of the dilapidated houses would have a big screen TV. It is a strange disconnect - yet these were the people who were the first to risk life and health to recover the city. 

There were a few things that were foreign to me. Politics from the pulpit is something I rarely experience. Seeing this play, one would think that is the only thing that New Life Church preached (I wouldn't know). 

Yet, behind the politics, behind the very human stories of those who felt abandoned and judged by the church, behind the nervous apologetics of inarticulate evangelicals, there were some dim lights of Gospel. One of the most compelling characters was a mother and New Life Church member. She loved her father deeply, in spite of his homosexuality and his abandonment, in spite of protests from other family members. The Gospel of Christ seemed to encompass her, because of and in spite of the church community. The Gospel and church community helped her and her family overcome drug addiction, to work and provide for her children. As she did with her father, she was out to love those whom others rejected. She wanted to create a group in New Life about loving homosexuals, but only two people came. My biggest criticism of the play is that they did not explore this character further. Her scenes are all before the Haggard scandal broke; I was hoping to see her reaction. 

"This Beautiful City" showed that even in a city with so many churches and Christians per capita, there were still "sinners" left in the margins. I wonder if Mo Leverett was wrong. Jesus came and loved those in the margins. He healed diseases, forgave sins and changed lives. He was no stranger to religious authorities, often rebuking them and warning of hypocrisy. Judging by the play, he might feel right at home in Colorado Springs. But not necessarily in the parts one might expect.