Rent

I was a second-year seminary student in 1983. In a few months I would find out that I would be coming to Adrian, Michigan to serve as a pastoral assistant/intern at St. Stephen’s Lutheran Church. My biggest concern at the time was that I was still single and was fearful of entering the ministry alone. Then one morning I got a phone call from my mom telling me that my uncle Jeff had died that day. He was 24, just 8 months older than I was. What? How? When? Why?

Jeff was one of the first documented cases of what was to be labeled “Acquired Immuno-Deficiency Syndrome.” According to these statistics, there were only 620 deaths from AIDS before 1983. In fact, we were originally led to believe that Jeff had died from a type of lymphatic cancer. But Jeff had also been a practicing homosexual. As awareness of HIV/AIDS increased, it became undeniable that certain groups were at a high risk of contracting this deadly condition—male homosexuals, their sexual partners, and intravenous drug users. In short, this was no contagious germ spread by sneezing or handshakes. A person had to engage in some pretty precise behaviors in order to get HIV-AIDS. Now all that was left of Jeff was his memory—and a square on a traveling AIDS quilt.

I had another uncle named Jerry. He was a few years younger than my mom, and was a very talented performer. He performed in Las Vegas, New York, appeared on television, and eventually put together his own nightclub act featuring “clowns in the theatre.” I would occasionally help Uncle Jerry set up his sound system at whatever venue he was performing, so I saw the show quite a bit. At my great-grandma’s birthday party in 1993, I saw him perform his act one last time. He was worn out physically, drained, pale, and sick. Yes, he was HIV-positive and dying of AIDS. So many times during the coming months I would write notes, go and visit Jerry in the hospital and finally in hospice, encouraging him to repent before God and Christ would surely forgive him. To this day, I do not know for certain that he ever acknowledged that his lifestyle, by which he contracted the means of his death, was a sinful abomination before God. No, there were always plenty of churches ready to proclaim “acceptance” and “toleration” of homosexuals from their pulpits and in their counseling.

What would Jesus do? I have found this an almost impossible fence to straddle. I believe that Jesus’ compassion is unconditional, and I want to stand ready to offer love and support to those who are dying of AIDS. On the other hand, when the AIDS victims demand that I accept homosexuality as “the way God made me,” there is a part of me that says, “Look, choices have consequences. You made your choice. Now here is the deathbed you have chosen.” A recent headline affirms that the world’s largest Christian denomination, the Roman Catholic Church, has reiterated its firm moral stance that there is no compatibility between homosexuality—either as an inclination or as a practice—and the Bible. We should also be honest enough to realize that part of militant Islam’s rejection of the West and its intent on destroying the US, Britain, and the rest are due to the open celebration of “sexual diversity.” (Perversity?)

Playing now in the cinema (to differentiate from the theatre) is the film adaptation of Jonathan Larson’s rock opera/musical Rent. Rent made its Broadway debut in 1996. The composer/author died of an aortic aneurysm on opening night. As a Broadway show goes, Rent has enjoyed critical acclaim, won every imaginable award, and can claim devotees who have seen the show dozens of times—the so-called “Rentheads.” Naturally, I was curious to see the show, and went with Zeke when he was home over Thanksgiving break.

You can read a synopsis of the plot (such as it is) here. You can read reviews at Yahoo! movies as well. I’d like to offer a few remarks of my own. I do this only reluctantly, because I reject the idea that a parent or teacher is supposed to serve as censor for their children and students. I would much rather develop in you and my sons a sense of discernment and critical judgment. With that disclaimer, here goes.

I know that Rent wants its viewers to feel empathy for the characters, and to see them as human beings deserving dignity and respect. The characters include a drag queen (Angel), a gay professor (Tom Collins), a songwriter who can’t write any songs because he was a junkie (Roger), a documentary filmmaker who wants to shoot artsy, cutting-edge stuff about the homeless (Mark), who has also lost his fiancée (Maureen) to another woman (!), a black lawyer (JoAnn). Mark and Roger share an apartment above Mimi (a junkie stripper) and they all refuse to pay rent to their ex-roommate (Bennie) who married a rich white woman and is now part of the conservative establishment they all hate. In fact, Mark’s parents call him to wish him a Merry Christmas, and he refuses to answer their call, asking Roger to remind him of his annoying parents whenever he wonders what he’s doing struggling in NYC. Some of the most poignant scenes are those in which the AIDS support group members get together to talk about their fears, which are realized when Angel dies in Collins’ arms. The audience also is treated to an in-your-face, defiant rejection of traditional morality as the cast gyrate on a restaurant table in the number “La Vie Boheme” (The Bohemian Life).

As much as I want to remember to be compassionate and treat these people with dignity, there is another part of me that just can’t. I especially can’t take Mark. He’s offered a job by a television show (“Buzzline”) that likes his stuff, and he quits it because it is “selling out” to all the values he rejects. Well, I thought, how about getting a job, loser? How about being responsible and paying your rent, jerk? Doesn’t your landlord have the right to collect rent from you? You’re such a big boy that you don’t live with your parents and you won’t even talk to them on Christmas. How about stepping up to the plate of adult maturity once? And you know where they all get money from? Angel shows up with a wad of money because he/she has killed a dog that was annoying a rich lady. How do you like that for liberal consistency? The majority of the characters are living the way they are, in the horrible conditions they find themselves in, because they have made the choice to do so. In all fairness, though, I did feel some empathy with Roger, who is an ex-junkie (showing hope for reform/repentance) and, although Mimi practically throws herself at him, realizes that he cannot engage in risky sexual behavior with her because he has AIDS himself, contracted via a needle. He even tries to get Mimi off of her drug habit, and eventually even writes a song that seems to save her from dying.

A parent of one of my students saw me today and said “Don’t let your students see Rent.” Well, of course I can’t prevent any students from seeing anything they want, especially a PG-13 movie. But if you decide to go, use some discretion. I think many of the musical numbers are powerful, and well-performed and choreographed. But the glorification of a lifestyle that so obviously leads to awful consequences (and the worst—hell itself—remains invisible to us in this life) is not that palatable for me.


Comment away!

Will work for food

Coretha Henderson, a 14-year-old from Edmond, Oklahoma, was chronically tardy and sassed her teachers. In order to vividly demonstrate the ultimate consequences of such choices, her mother made her stand on a busy street with a sign that read, "I don't do my homework and I act up in school, so my parents are preparing me for my future. Will work for food."

Some people disagree with this choice of behavior modification, calling it a form of psychological abuse. Read the entire article from USA Today to see their argument.

I think that the Mom was being fairly creative in providing a glimpse into what future lies ahead for people who don't finish school successfully. If a person makes the choice to be a poor student, to not try, to be mouthy with their teachers, and the like, then the consequences of those choices are unemployment and begging for handouts.

(Incidentally, some years ago when I lived in Texas, there was a well-known scam going around: a guy stood on the corner with his pathetic, bedraggled child and a sign "will work for food." Most passers-by were too busy to actually provide him with work, but they slowed down long enough to give him 10 or 20 dollars. By the end of the day he was pocketing $900. I stopped and told a "will work for food" guy to hop in, I had plenty of yard work at the church he could do. "Well, you see, I have this bad back." "That's OK, you could help me with some filing." "Well, you see, I told some other guy that I would be here when he came back." I told the guy that he was scamming, that he had no intention of working, and that if I drove around the block and came back he better be gone or I was calling the cops. He left. Now, lest you think I was cruel and uncompassionate, the Bible says "If a man is not willing to work, neither should he eat.")

What do you think of Coretha's punishment? Do you agree or disagree with those who called it abuse? What effect did it have? Is all punishment that succeeds in changing behavior correct and God-pleasing? Respond in the comment section.

Bush's "Gettysburg Address"

In the first winter of the Peloponnesian War, Athens' leader honored that polis' war dead by reminding the citizens of Athens of the reason they had given their ultimate sacrifice. Pericles' funeral oration spoke of the ideals of democracy as they had been realized in Athens. These noble Athenians died for their beliefs in freedom and self-government, as Pericles put it:

Such is the city for whose sake these men nobly fought and died; they could not bear the thought that she might be taken from them; and every one of us who survive should gladly toil on her behalf.

I have dwelt upon the greatness of Athens because I want to show you that we are contending for a higher prize than those who enjoy none of these privileges, and to establish by manifest proof the merit of these men whom I am now commemorating. Their loftiest praise has been already spoken. For in magnifying the city I have magnified them, and men like them whose virtues made her glorious. And of how few Hellenes 1 can it be said as of them, that their deeds when weighed in the balance have been found equal to their fame! I believe that a death such as theirs has been the true measure of a man's worth...

Similarly, Abraham Lincoln honored those who fell at Gettysburg, the pivotal battle of the American Civil War, in his most important speech, now known simply as the "Gettysburg Address." Although President Lincoln was under a constant barrage of criticism from his political enemies for his handling of the war, he honored those who had given the ultimate sacrifice by reminding Americans of the cause for which they died--the very survival of America as a democratic nation under God, with liberty and justice for all:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

This past Thursday, November 11, 2005, may be a day that history will remember in a similar fashion. In a speech to a group of veterans on a holiday that honored those who served their country and gave the ultimate sacrifice, President Bush gave this speech reminding Americans of the cause for which the Iraq War casualties have died. Here is a brief excerpt:

These brave citizens know the stakes: the survival of their own liberty, the future of their own region, the justice and humanity of their own tradition. And the United States of America is proud to stand beside them.

With the rise of a deadly enemy and the unfolding of a global ideological struggle, our time in history will be remembered for new challenges and unprecedented dangers.

And yet this fight we have joined is also the current expression of an ancient struggle between those who put their faith in dictators and those who put their faith in the people.

Throughout history, tyrants and would-be tyrants have always claimed that murder is justified to serve their grand vision. And they end up alienating decent people across the globe.

Tyrants and would-be tyrants have always claimed that regimented societies are strong and pure, until those societies collapse in corruption and decay.

Tyrants and would-be tyrants have always claimed that free men and women are weak and decadent, until the day that free men and women defeat them.

We don’t know the course our own struggle will take or the sacrifices that might lie ahead. We do know, however, that the defense of freedom is worth our sacrifice. We do know the love of freedom is the mightiest force of history. And we do know the cause of freedom will once again prevail.

I hope that Americans will not repeat the excesses of the Vietnam era, where troops came home not with honor and gratitude from their fellow countrymen but to verbal assaults and expectoration. Even as Jesus gave his life in order to free the world from its captivity to sin and Satan's diabolical oppression, so Americans have, millions of times over, given their lives to secure the blessings of liberty to themselves, to their posterity, and to millions of people worldwide.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored,
He has loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword
His truth is marching on.

Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me:
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.

Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

Battle Hymn of the Republic, Julia Ward Howe

Intelligent Design

Two lesser-reported events occurred within the past week, both of which deal with the subject of science curriculum in public schools. In Kansas, the state board of education approved the adoption of the teaching of Intelligent Design in all schools. In Dover, Pennsylvania, voters ousted all members of the local school board who had approved the teaching of intelligent design in their district in favor of the evolution-only candidates.

Just what is meant by “intelligent design?” Simply put, it is a scientific discipline that recognizes that traditional Darwinian evolutionary theory is inadequate to explain the origins of life. There are too many gaps and holes and implausible scenarios for it to have occurred. Intelligent Design’s founder, William Dembski, acknowledges readily that he is a Christian and believes in the creation account as revealed in the Bible. However, such blatant instruction in religion would never be possible in public schools. So how can Kansas do it? ID theory, as advanced for use in schools, never suggests who the designer is. Maybe it was extraterrestrials. The point is, there is ample evidence in this magnificent, orderly world of an intelligent designer.

President Bush has also weighed in on the subject, and has encouraged that ID be taught alongside Darwinian theory, so that students can make up their own mind. But, as might be anticipated, most opponents ridicule anything that is contrary to their evolutionary worldview and model as unscientific, and fight tooth and nail to have ID kept out of the public school classroom.

What do you think? Follow the links provided above and offer your comments. Should ID be taught in public schools? Is it proper to talk about the “Intelligent Designer” without identifying Him? (Would Paul in Athens not have told the philosophers about the “unknown God” in whom they lived, and moved, and had their being?) How much exposure do you have to evolutionary theory and its shortcomings?

“We are his offspring”

Criminal Activity

Over the weekend, my wife and I flew to Minnesota to see our son Jeremiah’s performance in Man of La Mancha. It was a great trip, but, along the way, I did something worthy of mentioning in the program for Fools as one of the most foolish things I’ve ever done.

Several months ago, during rehearsal for Beauty and the Beast, I happened to ask Mr. Maybee whatever happened to “the little wonder” from Oklahoma. This was a two-inch switchblade that we rigged to a kaleidoscope as a prop for that play. At any rate, Mr. Maybee gave it to me, since it was in his desk drawer, and I put it into my duffle bag and basically forgot about it. Can you guess what happened? I went through airport security with “the little wonder” still stashed in my duffle bag! It was completely inadvertent; even I wouldn’t be so stupid as to willfully bring a weapon on board a plane. So the men in blue were summoned to write me a ticket for my checkpoint violation, joining the ranks of other fools who forgot about their box cutters and pocket knives when they went to board a plane.

Over the weekend, the indictment of “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Cheney’s chief of staff, was announced. He is accused of lying to a grand jury, which heard testimony and examined evidence related to the leak to the news media of the name of a CIA agent, Valerie Plame. The story is a complicated one, but here’s the gist of it: Plame’s husband, former ambassador Joe Wilson, took a trip to Niger, a west African nation, to determine if Saddam Hussein had tried to purchase yellow cake uranium in order to use it in a nuclear weapons program. When Wilson later wrote an op-ed piece in the NY Times accusing President Bush of lying in his 2003 State of the Union address in which he included that detail as part of the case for war against Saddam Hussein. He also claimed that the Vice President’s office had sent him on this mission. In reality, his wife, who was working at a CIA desk job at the agency’s headquarters in Langley, VA, got the CIA to send him. This news was reported by columnist Bob Novak, and the investigation which ensued attempted to determine who leaked Plame’s identity to the press, and if, in so doing, they were guilty of a crime against the 1982 Espionage Act. This law specifically forbids the disclosing of a spy’s identity if they have operated undercover within the past five years, a time frame within which Ms. Plame was not engaged in covert activity. So no crime was committed until the grand jury was convened, and only one person has been officially accused of the crime of perjury.

It has been amazing to watch how the media turns molehills into mountains. One indictment—an accusation, mind you, not a conviction—and the media labels the Bush administration as “full of corruption.” A few soldiers make a terrorist prisoner wear women’s underwear on his head and make him wear a dog collar, and this is extrapolated to mean that there is a policy of torture approved by the Defense department.

I don’t know that anyone would consider me corrupt, evil, or a criminal because I happened to forget that the “little wonder” was in my carryon bag. I also find it difficult to imagine that fair-minded people would believe that this whole Plame/CIA leak affair is going to bring down the Bush Presidency a la Watergate and President Nixon. After all, Libby told the truth when he said that Wilson got his orders to go to Niger not from the Vice President’s office but from his wife, an insider at the CIA. Then again, Jesus himself was indicted and convicted for telling the truth that he was the Son of God. The righteous are always condemned by the unrighteous, and the demands for crucifixion still ring loudly and clearly.