The Six Line Narrative

                                                        The Six Line Narrative

In our recent classes, some people expressed dismay at my usage of the circular model of dwelling in the Kingdom of God as opposed to the Six Line Narrative.  So, I thought I might explain them more fully here in the hopes of gaining an endorsement.

Firstly, here is how they are represented:

           

The first model, the six line narrative, the one we grew up, with tells us the story of how Humankind fell from grace and is now faced with gaining personal salvation in order to get to heaven. It is in short, all about me. It is about my personal transformation; about my being born again; about my acceptance of Christ as savior; about my transcendance; about my gaining some place in the afterlife, about my rewards. It is about me and not you. While it might have something to do with loving God it has little to do with loving your neighbor, the twin commandments of Christ. It is also rife with Christian exclusivism.  Ghandi can't get into heaven

because he is not Christian. As if God would care what religion one professes. Religions are man-made. Spirituality is God's.  And if Ghandi wasn't spiritual I don't know who would be.

Many of us find this model to be inconsistent with the life and teachings of Jesus because it is an exclusivist theology which emphasizes what happens to us after we die rather than transformation in this life on earth. Some pastors and six line narrative devotees, might claim that when we are "saved" we would behave in the way that God asks us to behave.  If that is true, look around and tell me who is "saved"....not many I would guess.

This first model, the six line narrative, says to us that the primary meanings of the Cross of Jesus are that suffering is a necessary adjunct to salvation; that despite Christ's salvation act we are still in danger of hell through our behavior; that we are asked to forgive our enemies seventy times seventy times but that God won't forgive us but, instead,  will sentence us to Hell for our misbehavior; that we are required to accept the cross as the defining act in God's plan for us and that God has no love for those who defy him.

Many theologians would answer with one word. "Nonsense". The problems with this first model are legion. But one glaring issue is, ironically,  that it doesn't go far enough.  It stopped at personal transformation and is now about rewards.  Whereas, Christ taught primarily about experiencing our personal transformation, our baptism of the heart,  in order that we might start dwelling in the Kingdom of God.

The second model, The Kingdom of God model, says "OK, once you get "saved" you aren't really saved, your journey has only begun and now you must act, do something, make a difference that will transform both you and the community and ultimately the world. This second model is all about us, together.  About affecting our community in a way that is transforming for both it and the world.  That as we affect it, it will affect the world and make the globe more about the Kingdom of God, or heaven on earth. That our reward is the personal satisfaction of knowing we are doing the right and compassionate thing; that we are attempting to bring the Kingdom of God to earth. It is about ecology, sharing and love.

This second model says once we learn to accept God then we have to complete the drill by loving our neighbor. It is about unlimited compassion.  The same goal which is inherent in all religions. It says to us that we can transform ourselves to a place where we are in heaven while here on earth. That if we could ever attain unlimited compassion we would BE in "heaven" no matter what our state, this life or the next. It says we are not neutered or helpless, but empowered. But it does question the salvation act of the Cross.

Many of us reject the idea that Jesus purpose was to "die for our sins",  in favor of a theology that says Jesus "LIVED for our sins".  A theology that emphasizes the Incarnation rather than the death of Christ. We ask what sort of God requires the blood sacrifice of His Son in order for humans to transcend. Doesn't this smack of Old Testament blood offerings to a human-like God of jealousy and rage and other human traits which we then attribute to God?

Isn't it a better model to simply acknowledge that God meant for Jesus to live a long life and teach but that the free will of men interfered and killed Him before his time even though he may have known in advance it would happen?

Why not see the cross as a transforming example of how we must die to the kingdoms of earth that we live in, in order to dwell in the Kingdom of God on earth? That the cross is a vivid example of what happens when we emphasize the riches of earth for ourselves rather than sharing; when we are driven by competition rather than love; when we drive out and crucify those who do not share our vision; when we see the goal of life as a new car or house rather than a peaceful supportive world, when we see our ultimate goals to succeed in Rome's terms, rather than God's? What do we mean when we recite, "Thy Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven." Christ spoke that prayer for us and we recite it every Sunday.  How do we expect the Kingdom of God to come to earth? For those who will claim some post-apocalyptic re-visitation with flaming swords, we might answer, is that what you see in the teachings of Jesus or in how you interpret "Good News"? That a wrathful, vengeful God will retaliate against those whom He allegedly loves with violence?

God can be neither violent nor unloving. the interpretation of those apocalyptic devotees must contain some errors.

So, finally, we should seek the Kingdom of God within ourselves and help others to see and achieve it.  We should practice centered prayer and contemplation and we should bring compassion to the table as a regular part of the menu. We might  ask our politicians "What Would Jesus Cut"?  The Kingdom of God answer would not be "essential services for the poor". The idea of a world transformed by love was Jesus vision, we need to make it ours.

Greed and Politics

Here are the consequences of the House Republican proposal to cut more than $60 billion for the rest of this year. The bill would:


• Cut $1.1 billion from Head Start depriving services for 218,000 children.

• Cut $1.3 billion from Social Security delaying benefits for 500,000 Americans.

• Slash $1.3 billion from community health centers taking primary health care from 11 million patients.

• Reduce or eliminate Pell Grants for 9.4 million low-income college students.

• Cut $405 million from Community Services Block Grants affecting 20 million seniors, families with children and the disabled.

• End job training and other employment services for 8 million Americans.

All the while we will remain in Afghanistan and Iraq, and continue to develop weapons at an ever increasing pace. Unlike previous times when, after a so-called "war", we scaled

back the military industrial complex, these last few years have seen no cutbacks. We, as a nation, continue to believe in the power of the sword rather than the power of the plowshare.

We continue to believe the so-called War on Terror can be won with a Blackhawk as if it was won with a tomahawk.



We continue to trust in missiles rather than diplomacy. We continue to believe people must be forced into democracy and that our way is the only way.

We continue to act imperially while our citizens suffer.

The promise of America is now bound to a perception of success that is about only money. Neither sustainability, nor education, nor sharing, nor progress is valued in any way beyond their ability to make money, make profit, and short term profit at that. No longer may we say "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!", because we no longer mean it. We no longer believe in that promise.

The promise of America is reserved for those fortunate to have money and power...clout...influence...the Oligarchs, the privileged elite of what was once the heart of freedom for the most undeserving of us.

We have hoisted the flag of mediocrity rather than the flag of the middle class. We have traded our belief in the divine within all citizens for the belief in the divine within some, and English speakers only need apply.

We are losing our place in the world and are universally excoriated. A sad fate for what we have been...the most generous of nations, once giving rather than receiving. But now I am terrified of you no matter who you are. Now it is all about us....our little enclave.... protected from the creeping forces of aliens, socialism, diversity and sustainability behind our fenced communities, behind our guarded walls of sameness, behind our featured mantra of "you must eat and act and talk and vote like me. You must embrace only my values and my sustenances because I am the majority, and what I say, goes. I cannot trust you to act honorably because you are not as wealthy as I am and do not look like me."

There is a price to be paid for our arrogance and greed. We were warned of it by the eighth century prophets of the Old Testament and the Christ of the New. But we disregard those warnings as old and ineffective in a place where only money is valued, only my profit today is valuable.

It is not too late to take back the reins and rein in the engines of destruction. It is not too late to make a mark that sustains the poor and doesn't penalize them. That makes a mark for the future generations that will lift them rather than doom them. It is not too late to turn the grim specter of a student loan payback into a student scholarship, a jobless worker into a contributor, a family in peril into a family that stays on course. But we cannot do it with Wall Street. It requires Main Street....you and me.

We could do it. And we do not have to go into further debt. There are ways, there are methods. There is a possibility for everyone to share. But not this way. Not the way we are headed. Not down the path we are on. Not through profit and loss, not through killing collective bargaining so the worker has no voice in his future, but through empathy, sharing and responsibility.

I pray for our people's deliverance from the prisons of greed.



John P. Middleton