Football Teams Should Be Named After Local Industries

Rick Reilly points out that the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers, who (you read it here first) will play each other in the Superbowl this evening, are the only two remaining NFL teams named for local industries. Way to support the American worker, AFC and NFC champions! This is the sort of boost the American economy needs. In fact, I think other teams should follow suit and re-name themselves after their local industries. Here are some suggestions:

1. Houston used to be the Oilers, before the Oilers became the Titans and moved to Tennessee and the Texans took over in Houston. Changing the Texans to the Oilers, and bringing back the ketchup on pail-blue uniforms would be a start.
2. Speaking of Tennessee, it is nowhere near Greece or their mythology, so Titans won't cut it. Tennessee is known for the music industry, so here are some ideas: The Banjo Pickers; The Record Producers; The Elvises; The Partons; The Tennessee Twang
3. Wait, aren't the Cowboys a local industry in Dallas? Maybe I'm wrong...
4. Piracy is no longer a thriving occupation in the Tampa Bay, moving to Somalia in this era of globalization. As the church of Scientology has bought up most of the Clearwater area, one idea would be to change the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to the Fightin' Hollywood Stars. This works especially well as LA no longer has an area football team.
5. Atlanta is known for Coca Cola, not for Falcons. So let's change their name to the Secret Formulas. Or the Corn Syrupers.
   
6. The Bay Area is home to the new engine of our economy, the tech industry. So change the 49ers or the Raiders (again, piracy has long been outsourced) to the Techies. Or the Red Bull Consumers.
   
7. Detroit already has a car-themed basketball team, but the Lions could still change their name to the SUVs, or the Engines, or the Hummers (please add your joke about them not lasting as long as a Japanese football team here).
8. New York has two teams. The Giants should represent the beleaguered finance industry. They could be the Financiers or the Hedge Funders. New York Jets could change their name to the New York Hipsters, representing that other great NY industry, and attract players who are "over" the whole sports thing and want to show you their vinyl collection.
   
9. My local team, the Washington Redskins, has plenty of options. The Presidents, the Senators (once Washington's baseball team), the Congressman, the Justices, the Battlin' Bureaucrats, The Military Industrial Complexers, the Lobbyists, the Protesters. Perhaps the Kansas City Chiefs could move to the D.C. area and change their names to the Commanders and Chiefs...

After what local industry would you name your local team?

As a Bears fan who thinks Troy P. (sorry, didn't want to look up the spelling) has amazing hair, let me say, Go Steelers!

Flying While Parenting

The reactions people have to my baby daughter when I bring her out in public is one of the hidden joys of parenting. My daughter, more than her father, is a people person. Wherever I bring her - church, supermarket, work functions - she hands out smiles, and when I'm carrying her, I get to experience what it's like to have charisma. This is true anywhere, anywhere except the airport.

She's over a year old now, and I've flown with her several times. Whenever someone sees me sitting in front of their gate, bouncing a cackling little girl on my knee, they give me a look that mixes pure dread with a scowl of indignant injustice. You'd think I had just published their TSA body scan on my Facebook page. I see the visions flash before their eyes: a crying, screaming, kicking, food-throwing child, next to me, when all I wanted to do was go to my company's convention in Orlando in peace. I deserve so much better, they think.

Thus, I was not surprised when Gulliver, the Economist's travel blog noted that 74% of businessmen polled considered children the most annoying thing about business-class travel. The writer explores childless sections in airplanes, but rightly concludes:

"But while all travellers would agree with the appeal of a quiet flight, it's a big step to ban certain passengers from certain parts of a plane. I'd rather sit next to a well-behaved five-year-old than an adult with bad body odour, but I don't think smelly people should be herded to the back of the plane. Easier, I think, for airlines to continue to treat everyone equally, and do everything in their power to ensure that passengers throughout the plane are given all the help they need to rest."

The writer also reflects on a late 90s Economist leader by a less-gracious colleague:

"For children, just like cigarettes or mobile phones, clearly impose a negative externality on people who are near them. Anybody who has suffered a 12-hour flight with a bawling baby in the row immediately ahead or a bored youngster viciously kicking their seat from behind, will grasp this as quickly as they would love to grasp the youngster’s neck. Here is a clear case of market failure: parents do not bear the full costs (indeed young babies travel free), so they are too ready to take their noisy brats with them."

I suspect the writer has never flown with her own children (a six-year-old's delicious rebuttal is published on the original post). Whatever cost there is to a child on the plane, the parents bear them in spades. If you hear a bawling baby on a plane, keep in mind that he is rows away from you, underneath the nose of a sleep-deprived parent whose book is in pieces on the floor who likely is not enjoying the in-flight movie. If there's a bored youngster viciously kicking your seat from behind, remember that the kid's mom feels his sneakers on his skin, probably after an unsuccessful attempt to have him eat an inflight meal.

And while we are on the subject of negative externalities, the original blogger is right to mention that children are not the only flying annoyances. So perhaps there should be a charge for body odor or for too much perfume. Heck, whenever someone in front of me leans their seat back, he's unloading a built-in negative externality on my knees (it makes me want to viciously kick the seat). Or, why not an extra tax on crotchety business travelers who sneer in distain at innocent little girls, sitting in their papa's lap on the way to grandma's house? It would sure make my flight more pleasant.

When we arrive at our destination, my daughter and I are greeted with happy, relieved fellow travelers. "She was so good!" they explain, nearly in tears. Yes, she was good, for the most part. But she cried when her ears popped, she talked, babbled and sang. The cojourners don't notice because planes are loud and crying is temporary. It all gets lost in the dull roar of an airline engine. And for the 75% haters from the poll: if you can afford business class, you can afford a good set of noise-resistant headphones. Slip them over your head, order yourself a cocktail, and reflect on the fact that you can zip around the world at speeds your grandpa couldn't dream of. Yes, travel can be a nuisance, from security pat-downs to the quirks of the guy sitting next to you. But don't take it out on the kids.

Do We Need God to Stand Fast?

Add me to the list of those who recommend Eric Metaxas' excellent biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I'm embarrassed to say that I've personally read very little of Bonhoeffer's works. I have Life Together in German and have been stubbornly trying to read it in its original text. It's possible for me, but it requires an amount of mental energy to keep up, and it sits on our shelf, a reminder of how far my German needs to go. I've recently read some of Wilhelm Busch's (Germany's answer to Billy Graham) straightforward Gospel sermons with more success.

Whether we have read him or not, we Christians are familiar with Bonhoeffer, even if his books are a thick jungle of theology, scholarship and challenge. He stood out among the Christians who stood up to the Nazis. He was theologically sound, truly spiritual and unusually courageous. He helped start the Confessing Church (in response to the nazification of the German church), trained pastors, rescued Jews and conspired to kill Hitler. For his efforts (particularly that last part), he was martyred, executed two weeks before the liberation of his concentration camp. We remember him, because unlike many (and unlike many of us would have, we fear), he did the right thing. He recognized an evil for what it was, recognized it has no place in Christianity, and stood fast to the end.

Who stands fast? Who will do good in the face of such evil? Bonhoeffer himself asked this question (we'll get to that later), and, in his reflection after reading Metaxas' biography (published in The New Republic), Alan Wolfe asks the same question. Take some time to read Wolfe's essay; his reflections are good and provide some additional background. As a Christian, I always wonder how such a work as Metaxas' Bonhoeffer, where a devout Christian honors the life of a considerably great devout Christian, will be accepted. There's a certain comfort to know that Wolfe thinks it a "fine biography," and even more so, it challenges the liberalism in which, to use Wolfe's words, he puts his own faith. It challenged him enough so that he writes a defense in that same TNR article:

"Throughout his book, but especially toward the end, Metaxas turns this erudite and at times abstruse theologian into a living and tragic human being. I would be less than honest if I did not admit that bringing this man—and his intransigence on all the important questions of our time—so vividly to life raises awkward questions for the liberalism in which I put my own faith. How, precisely, would a Rawlsian have acted in those dark times? Must we not move beyond this-worldly conceptions of politics as a struggle for power to other-worldly concerns with repentance and days of judgment, if we are to grasp how the Nazis were able to combine their own rational plans to kill millions with satanically inspired ideas about a Thousand Year Reich, and also how some people were able to resist those plans? Is it possible to face death with courage without knowing that a better life awaits? Can one be loyal to one’s collaborators in the resistance without being loyal to some higher power? Can faith help overcome torture? Lurking behind all such questions is the major one: if the problem of evil is not one that humans can solve, have we no choice but to rely on God for help? Does Bonhoeffer’s greatness prove his rightness?

Yet when I put this book down, I realized that its author, no doubt inadvertently, had helped me to answer these questions. Bonhoeffer may have been convinced that God was telling him what to do, but I am not convinced. Ironically, Metaxas’s passion, the intensity of his engagement with his subject, wound up persuading me of the importance of the very autonomy that Bonhoeffer believed that we do not possess. Even if God told Bonhoeffer what to do, it was Bonhoeffer who chose God in the first place. It was not a humble servant of the Lord who involved himself in the resistance, but a singular human being who, for whatever reason, was able to know what to do when faced with the problem of evil.

It is important to note in this context that there is no simple relationship between faith and courage. The German Christians who collaborated with Hitler may have abused religion, but they considered themselves religious. At the same time, many—if not most—of the resisters to Hitler were not Christian believers and did not take orders from God. They included Prussian generals, and left-wingers (including even a few communists), and the student movement known as the White Rose. Their bravery had nothing to do with religion. One should come away from the Bonhoeffer story impressed by religion, but not in awe of it. The human picture is more complicated."

The human picture is indeed complicated. I wonder, though, if it works both ways. He addresses part of this in his essay, but Bonhoeffer was not proud of whatever human freedom he possessed. In his essay, "Who Stands Fast?", Bonhoeffer writes:

"As to the man who asserts his complete freedom to stand foursquare to the world, who values the necessary deed more highly than an unspoilt conscience or reputation, who is ready to sacrifice a barren principle for a fruitful compromise, or the barren wisdom of a middle course for a fruitful radicalism — let him beware lest his freedom should bring him down. He will assent to what is bad so as to ward off something worse, and in doing so he will no longer be able to realize that the worse, which he wants to avoid, might be the better. Here we have the raw material of tragedy."

Freedom can easily be asserted bad and good, evil and virtue. For Bonhoeffer, the one who stands fast is one who is ready to sacrifice that freedom to his faith in God. Bonhoeffer would say, in disagreement with Wolfe, that this is why he stood. Wolfe, in contrast, does not give us another reason. He only provides examples of religious Christians who compromised, and some non-religious folks who did not (though, among his list, I should point out that at least one of the members of the White Rose movement was a Christian).

I do agree that the relationship between professed faith and courage is complicated. I suspect that Bonhoeffer wrote so strongly, in part, because he was unimpressed by the many Christians who compromised, or perhaps tried to avoid the issue all together. But claiming to follow God does not make us God-followers. I can write, in a comfortable house far away from any sort of political persecution, that however blinded by fear, patriotism or what have you, the religious appeasers of Bonhoeffer's day serve as shameful examples of what not to do in the in the face of evil. Whenever we Christians do wrong, or fail to do right, we are not taking orders from God, whether we believe we are or not. For Bonhoeffer, faith led to actions - actions that, whatever or in spite of our own personal inclinations, took God at his very Word - His Word that took on human form and dwelt among us. His Word who said things like, "love each other," "love your enemies," "I am the way, the truth and the life," and "follow me." This Word took sides with the poor, beleaguered and persecuted, and when Bonhoeffer stood against the Nazis, he did the same. Tell me, whose word does an atheist fail should he not be moral? His own? If so, then on what grounds should that concern him? And why should he not deconstruct those grounds to suit his own purposes?

How then, should we understand the noble non-believers? I'm curious how Bonhoeffer would answer that question (perhaps he has in one of the books that I have not read), but Metaxas provides a clue in the German pastor's reaction to another 20th century giant who did not share his faith. A reoccurring theme in the biography is Bonhoeffer's desire to visit Mahatma Gandhi to learn more about non-violent resistance. He was never able to make the trip, but they did exchange letters. It seems that Bonhoeffer thought God was using the actions of a non-Christian to shame Christians into right behavior. Gandhi did not believe in God in the same way Bonhoeffer did, but who is to say that the same God wasn't somehow involved in those actions? What if he is more intimately involved then any of us could have guessed.

Wolfe writes that there were plenty of heroes resisting the Third Reich who were not taking orders from God. But how could he know? More to the point, maybe the leftists, any non-religious Prussian generals and any other didn't know they were following God's Word, but if they stood for up for the oppressed against unadulterated evil, then frankly, they were. What if they were made in God's image, and there was something written in their hearts that compelled them to right action? What if they were blind agents of God, putting to shame many who claimed to see?

Wolfe did not leave Metaxas' biography "in awe" of religion. That's perfectly fine. Who says we should be in awe of religion? The Bible, with all of its religious instruction, never instructs us to glorify religion. Rather, we should be in awe of God himself. His Word, his fulfillment, was in the person of Jesus Christ. I am impressed with those like Bonhoeffer or anyone else, who follow his example, and I wish to learn from them. My religion does not guarantee that I would stand fast in such a time, nor does Wolfe's lack thereof guarantee that he would not. The answer to Wolfe's and Bonhoeffer's question lies not in some sort of triumph for our own will, but in God and his will. May he give us the grace to stand fast when the time of trial comes.

Twain, London, Creativity and Sin

I heartily second almost all of Kathleen Parker's defense of Mark Twain's original text. Eliminating the "n-word" from Huckleberry Finn is a good-intentioned denial of part of our past that could give way to more insidious denials. It is up to teachers to help children navigate and understand the plot and the language, and I am personally thankful to the teachers at Robious Middle School in Richmond, Virginia who did so for me.

I quibble, however, with one sentence: "...it seems to me that racism and the sort of worldly intelligence that inspires men and women to art are incompatible." Now, according to what I've read and heard, Twain was no racist, and, as far as I can know, neither were the other authors Parker lists (Faulkner, O'Connor, Warren, Melville).

It's much more likely, however, that Jack London was racist. Having only read, but not really studied the author, I was surprised to hear the accusation for the first time on NPR while driving my car to a work event. London, along with Twain and Tolkien, were among those who first opened my young mind to reading. His stories of animals, nature and humans under extreme circumstances enthralled me. He may not belong on pantheon Parker mentions, but he had the "worldly intelligence that inspires men and women to art." Yet the fact that London wrote this short story should give us pause.

Whatever London's views, we should not let the creative off that easily. I'm a fan of the creative mind, but I can tell you from experience that sin is even stronger. To say a certain virtue always neutralizes a certain sin risks pride. Pride, in art or in virtue, comes before a fall, and falls can surprise us. Whatever the sin, however disgusting, however horrific, the old Reformed idiom, "There but for the grace of God go I," remains a good reaction.

List Nauseum

The following is my end of the year list. Now, before you navigate back to your Facebook page, let me at least say that this list is different then all the other lists you've read. For starters, Kanye West's new album is nowhere on it.

First an introduction (no seriously, don't go to your Facebook page just yet). My favorite end of the year list is David Brooks' annual "Sidney Awards," where Brooks' mines the best magazine essays (this was a particular gem) of the past twelve months. I would like to do something similar, but with my own twists and biases. I would like to introduce you to my friends. At least some of those who have an online presence. I want to highlight their best 2010 writing to bow out the year. I found their words edifying, and I suspect you will as well. Trust me, it'll be worth the time, as you recover from your New Years party, college football in the background.

Following Christ is a growing-up process that involves and a lot of falling and a lot of grace. It often feels clumsy, Spiritual Klutz is a weekly reminder, via personal stories, of grace and redemption - big, small and always relatable. If you are new to Spiritual Klutz, I highly recommend his series about forgiving his father. However, if his own statistics are any indication, I suspect what you're really interested in is the series on singleness.

Hyde Park Heroes follow E. (or is it L.?) and her husband M. as they take on the Second City (that's Chicago, if you're still wondering). Working in an urban non-profit, E. (or is it L.?) has a good word, with links to resources, on poverty and Christianity. Or, for something more light hearted, you can read about their trip to Chinatown, where the fish are, somehow, worse than the Washington Monument.

With Clearspring taking off (become a customer by clicking the orange button with a plus sign to the left of this page), Justin has not put a lot of updates on the Oatmeal Stout blog (c'mon buddy, pick up the slack!), and the last update to his food blog was written by a rather untrustworthy guest. I can, however, recommend his relatives. In fact, Via his dad's blog, you can read about a family who embraces the online life. Plus, his future wife has a great blog on art, craft and small business.

If there were any good spiritual ideas on Un Till, I probably got it elsewhere. Take a moment to check out my pastors' new blog, or learn all about my father's church in O-town.

Finally, no Kanye, but I do have some musical recommendations for you. Ben is back in Washington and writing some great indy rock. (You should also check out his wife's, Lauren's, paintings) Crowds and critics eagerly anticipate Wendell's new album in 2011, but you can preview his new stuff via YouTube (for example). Tortoise and Hair made in on the radio with a great series of interviews and songs. These videos brought back plenty of fond college memories (I lived with the Tortoise during my junior year).

If I left you out, it's because I forgot, so forgive me for goofing. Go ahead and link to your blog in the comment section. Plus, I'd love to meet the online versions (and maybe even the real versions) of your friends. It is, of course, different than meeting them in person. But if read an essay or listen to a song written for art, processing or fun, you will know a part of an author you may have otherwise not discovered. Send me your recommendations. I hope you had a great 2010, and I wish you blessings, peace and God's love in 2011.

A Place for Everyone

I resonate with Makoto Fujimura.

When I meet someone on a plane and I tell them I am an artist, I almost always have to go into “explaining mode” to answer the same common questions: “What kind of art do you make?” “Why do you do it?” “Can you make a living?”

If I said I was an electrical engineer, explaining would not be necessary. But tell people, particularly Christians, that I am an artist and I am immediately regarded with suspicion and thoughtless dismissal: “You don’t paint nudes, do you?” “I don’t understand modern art.” “You make that weird stuff that my kids could paint and then call it ‘art,’ don’t you?”

No wonder artist types sit in the back of the church and leave as soon as the music ends, if they come to church at all. Church is for successful people, for respectable folks with real jobs.

Now, I am not an artist, I have a "real job" and sometimes I am good at playing the respectable insider at church. But I have an artist's leaning and an artist's sympathies, and among my regrets is the wish I had patiently nurtured these inclinations, particularly in high school and college. I attempt to do this now. This blog is an outlet for my creative and thoughtful side, and I take particular joy in leading worship at my church, because I get to be play a creative role in genuine Kingdom work. Thus, I am encouraged when Fujimura goes on to describe how blissfully artistic God and many of his chosen people are. Like the typical artist in the back of the church he describes, I have often felt left out in church settings where the artist's gifts and sensibilities are unappreciated.

This train of thought reminded me, however, of a post by John Mark Reynolds in First Things' Evangel blog. Reynolds reminds us that, whatever her flaws as an artist or a philosopher, Ayn Rand sticks up for the businessman. I would argue with anyone who treats productivity as the highest virtue, but it is a virtue, and so much of what's good about our country was built on the back the business folk who produced things, with efficiency, in an effort to maximize potential. Rand stands out, Reynolds notes, because so much art and entertainment treats business types with contempt. But it is these types who create wealth, jobs and prosperity, and make a real contribution to art and flourishing.

So, both the artist and the businessman feel under attack. Anyone else? Perhaps the traveler, or the domestic? The lawyer? The politician? The athlete? The un-athletic? The academic? The less educated? A particular class? Gender? Race? Background? Interest? Political persuasion? Personality type?

The good news is, the church has a place for you. John writes in Revelations that every tongue, tribe and nation will be represented. He might have added that every occupation and Myers-Briggs letter combination will be there as well. Strange, isn't it, in light of our continued sad divisions? Strange as well, even in churches where the people seem relatively uniform, we can feel isolated in our interests and inclinations. Perhaps an artist can sit next to a businessperson in the pew, both wondering if they are judged, if they are among the left out?

I don't think the answer is more niche-market churches - we will spend an eternity together (which will indeed be heaven and not hell), so we should learn to make everyone feel welcome. We certainly need the likes of Fujimura and Reynolds to remind us how our types, strengths and indeed our very diversity reflect our Creator. When we go to church, we need to find those who are like us, who understand us and who we understand. They will be water for our souls. We also need to find those who are different, and learn from them. If done well, with genuine love, honesty and openness, they will strengthen us. They will point us in the right direction to make the church as it should be. As it will be.

Pastures and Valleys

During a sermon, our English pastor said that of all the books on prayer he has read, A Praying Life by Paul Miller is the only one that actually helped him pray. Plenty were great books which helped him better understand prayer, but this relatively short text brought him to his knees.

I started Paul Miller's prayer journey while on vacation in Germany and just finished it next to our house's new and still-naked Christmas tree this afternoon, and so far I agree. I pray more. By God's grace, I am confident that I will continue to do so (I know, I know - ask me in a few weeks).

The last book on prayer I started was Richard Foster's beautifully-written Prayer, which moves from elementary to graduate school level praying. I quit half way through. I write this blushing; I'm not proud. I learned good things about prayer, and I gained wisdom from the saints, and Foster's one of the few living Christian writers whose prose is worth the price of admission. But with each chapter came a new level of method and petition that was not going to happen in my life, between early rises and baby cries, Metro rides and computer screens, work, church, marriage, rest, reading, writing.

I read With Christ in the School of Prayer when I lived in Germany several years ago. How I remember it, it was almost the opposite of Foster's book - plenty of passion with less method. My own passion was inadequate to the challenge, and I put the book down feeling tired and thirsty. A good posture for prayer given my need, except I didn't pray any more than I did when I started.

Given my history, I was reluctant to start another one, even after my mom, my pastor and my wife all said I should read A Praying Life. My mom even bought us a copy. The tag line on the back cover, "Let's Face It, Prayer Is Hard!" did nothing to encourage me. It sounds like the squeaky slogan of some Christian salesman who is about to insist that it really isn't hard. "Shields up!" I thought.

If what I just wrote resonates with you, ignore the cynical instincts that protect the old wounds of misplaced hope. Read a book by someone whose experience, suffering and growing care for others has taught him to pray. Paul Miller, without pretense or arrogance, presents himself as someone we can learn from, not because he is an ueber-saint but because he is human. And yes, he honestly and graciously addresses cynicism, wounds and hope deferred.

Here are a few reasons I could stick with A Praying Life. First, he acknowledges reality and reminds us of God's grace. He gently reminds us that in our imperfections, our distracted minds (mine seems particularly prone to distraction), God loves and will meet us in our imperfect offerings. In one chapter, he describes his morning prayer routine. It requires coffee and is interrupted by his autistic daughter and conversations with his wife. No matter. God meets him there, anyway.

Second, Miller keeps us from chasing the rainbow's end called "experience God," and instead reminds us that prayer is to build a relationship. God is there, whether or not we are "feelin' it," and prayer is our way to build nearness and intimacy to One whose love beyond all our asking and imagining.

Many of Miller's prayers are people focused, which helps me. Rather than formula's or recipes, he shows how he prays for his family, his friends, the lost He shows how that in praying for others, he can trust God with them. In doing so, his trust in God grows, as does his love for others. None of the prayer books I've read took me in such specific and intimate prayer journeys.

I could go on, but read the book instead. If it does not help you pray, put it back on the shelf or give it to someone else this Christmas. But I suspect it will. I am thankful for A Praying Life. In it, Miller not only tells but shows how the Lord is our shepherd, how he is there in green pastures and dark valleys.