An Ecumenical Ash Wednesday

Well, maybe the theory of my liberal pastor friend at Hampton Park Christian Church is not always true. I'd written in this 4th post on traditional vs contemporary worship about his theory that "the most liberal and contemporary churches in style tend to be the most conservative and traditional in their theology (CedarCreek for example). And likewise, the most liberal and contemporary churches theologically tend to be the most traditional/conservative in their worship styles (Episcopal Churches)".

I had visited some examples confirming his theory over Holy Week of 2008: St. Michael's in the Hills Episcopal Church, Trinity Episcopal Church and St Andrew's Episcopal Church on the liberal side and CedarCreek on the conservative side. Yet, I knew of the churches on both sides of the spectrum, not validating this theory.

My experience with this ecumenical Ash Wednesday in Carbondale was such an example. This was a joint service by Church of the Good Shepherd (a UCC church) and First Presbyterian Church, both liberal churches. The former is an interesting place. What do you think about a church that has a forum for live folk music? Interesting? Maybe. But as a poor student, I'm not interested in any music forum that requires me to make suggested donations (read buying tickets). Even if it be 5 bucks. Make it free and I'll be more than happy to make observations. Anyway.

First thing I noticed in the program was their instructions about Prayer Stations: "You are invited to spend time at one or more stations at anytime during the service". Anytime during the service? Come on. When people attend a service, shouldn't they do things in unison, instead of being individuals on their own? Personally, I found it distracting.

And my visit to those stations at the end of the service made me correct a false assumption: those stations were not Stations of the Cross. Rather, they were completely progressive (post-post-modern) prayers and meditations. One station even had pads and crayons for people to make graphic depictions of salvation. Or there was a station where people would write about their mistakes and put in a bowl (to get rid of it). Or another one had a sand box for people to draw their sins in the sand and then smoothen it with their hand as a sign of shedding their sins. Got the idea?

And that was not all. When it came to the Communion, it was a self-service table in the middle of the chairs where people would go there and pick a piece of bread and dip it in the wine or grape juice (although a more formal sacrament followed at some point later in the service). And there was instructions for this also: "The bread is Christ's body broken for you - you need not take a small pinch. Take freely and generously from the loaf".

The meditation on starting Lent was even more interesting. It was a skit by the two pastors. The male pastor (UCC) was gloomy and solemn about starting his fasting period. The female pastor (Presbyterian) countered him by singing a very jolly song about Lent (she is jolly in real life as well). He continued nagging and even found it inappropriate to sing a jolly song for a such a solemn thing as Lent. She continued singing and then explained to him why Lent should be a happy time: "it is a time that we are guests of God". Amen.

This is exactly how we Muslims look at Ramadhan, our month of fasting. In Islamic teachings, Ramadhan is called the Banquet of God. By avoiding pleasures of the body, we enrich our spirit. Have a look here, here and here for my reflections on my past 2 Ramdhans in the US.

Eventually, the male pastor was convinced that Lent should be a happy time and he joined his colleague in singing happily (of course, this was a skit; both were of the same mind in reality). The rest of the service was more or less routine.

What was not normal however was the setting. Instead of sitting at the pews in the sanctuary, they had put chairs at the back in a circle with the table in the middle. So, basically we were in the sanctuary, but had our own cozy corner in the back. And I couldn't quite understand why. Maybe sitting in the pews of a host church while members of another church are there as guests, doesn't make it completely ecumenical. The host would have an upper hand and not on the same ground as the guest? Maybe, maybe not. I've been to ecumenical services before and they used the sanctuary in the ordinary way.

As I was hurried for a meeting after the service, I couldn't stop by the pastors and ask about this and my other questions. I should visit each of the churches in the future to get a better understanding about how each of them would perform their own services.

Happy Birthday Charles!

When you're in a liberal school you should be proud of your liberal heritage. And part of this should be fighting evil unscientific things such as Creationism or Intelligent Design. Long live Charles Darwin! Or to be more creative, Happy Birthday Charles Darwin!

We had a series of events this week celebrating the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin. I'm not going to discuss about scientificity of Creationism or Intelligent Design or Evolutionism. All these debates come out of literal interpretation of the Bible. Even Darwin himself didn't propose his theory to deny Creation. But one thing struck me going to a couple of these events.

Ardent supporters of Evolutionism, discredit Creationism as a doctrine that comes out of religion, not science (as if the two are mutually exclusive). They find Intelligent Design equally abhorrible (if not more), because it is basically the same old non-scientific Creationism disguised as a scientific theory. But I found something in common over these events which were supposedly about the promotion of science, scientific thinking and rationality over irrationality and dogma.

What I saw, basically amounted to efforts to expose the conspiracy and stupidity of those Creationists who sell their Intelligent Design as a scientific theory. Exposing the conspiracy of some people or making fun of them, instead of refuting their arguments (or doing so just as a minor side theme) doesn't sound much like a scientific method. And building your arguments in a way to draw emotional laughs and jeers at those fanatic idiot naive religious conspirators doesn't give you much a feeling like being in a scientific or rational environment.

While sitting in these events, I had a feeling of being among fanatics, just of a different variety; instead of believing in Creationism, they had a different religious doctrine: Evolutionism. And they expressed their emotions and religious fervor exactly the same way as the people whom they tried to discredit as irrational and unscientific.

Well, let's go to the fun stuff. The last and the most interesting of these events was the birthday celebration of Charles Darwin. It began with yet another exposé movie about those cloaked Creationists. And it was followed by a break to have refreshments. Yay, cookies and cakes. And even a real birthday cake. And they had announced about a surprise guest (that could be easily guessed). We found Charles Darwin out there who had attended his birthday ceremony, holding his Origin of Species book dearly to his chest with a very venerable look. And there were a lot of enthusiastic fans who wanted to take pictures with their guru. Scientific environment, eh?

At one point, Darwin gave me an interested look. With my long hair and beard, I was the closest in appearance to him (well, not white-haired, but Darwin has been young at some point in his life). And I was looking at him with interest. Maybe he was thinking I was a shy fan, feeling timid about asking for a photo-op.

Although I respect Darwin as a great scientist and I find his theories very interesting, I'm not a fan, not interested in taking photos in such a manner. At least, not with a reenactor of Darwin. If it had been the real Charles Darwin, maybe. But while I may not be an evolutionist (in its religious fanatic sense), I am definitely a very hard-core cookieist. Happy Birthday Charles!