Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Liberal politics and liberal religion

A recent James Carroll column illustrated for me a point of distinction between the principles of liberal religion and the strategic dictates of liberal politics.

In an interview about his book How The Irish Became White, Noel Ignatiev describes the status of the Irish in America during slavery:

...In 1841, the Irish political leader (in Ireland) Daniel O'Connell--he was something of a combination of Martin Luther King and Gandhi, the most popular figure among Irishmen throughout the world--issued an appeal--he and 70,000 others in Ireland--to the Irish in the United States, calling upon them to join with the abolitionists in America, to join the struggle to overthrow slavery. Treat the Negro everywhere as your equal, your brother, he said, and in doing so you will bring honor to the name of Ireland. O'Connell was speaking from a situation where Catholics in Ireland were members of an oppressed race. He was the leader of their movement to overturn that kind of subjugation. So he naturally reached out for alliances with the struggle against racial injustice everywhere.

The Irish in America rejected him. He went so far as to say if you don't do this, then we won't recognize you as Irish. They thought about it and concluded, okay, if you force us to choose between our love for Ireland and our attachment to the institutions of our new country, then it's South Carolina forever. What they decided to do was integrate themselves into American life as citizens, invoking the privileges of whiteness.

Having fair skin made the Irish eligible to be white, but it didn't guarantee their admission. They had to earn it.

Q: And how were they supposed to earn it?

A: There were two things they had to do. First, they had to distance themselves as much as possible from the black population of North America. They had to do whatever they possibly could to create barriers, to insulate themselves, to separate themselves from the black population.

The second thing they had to do was overcome the resistance to their own civil rights coming from the people who were better off than them--that is, the native Protestant, bigoted, anti-Catholic, anti-foreigner establishment that was running the country.

There was a relationship, in fact, between these two tasks. To the extent to which they could prove themselves worthy of being white Americans--that is, by joining gleefully in the subjugation of black people--they showed that they belonged, that they deserved all the rights of citizenship. On the other side, to the extent to which they were able to force their way into the white polity of this country, they were able to distance themselves from black people.

What my book is about, then, is how the Irish used the different institutions of American society to accomplish these tasks: the Democratic Party, early labor unions, the church, forms of urban social disorder--race riots, for example. It's about how they managed to implement and carry out an agenda which finally gained them admission into what I like to call the white race in America.


Carroll's column "America's Mess, not Bush's" lays out a small explanation of how so many of the things that (stereo)typical UUs like to accuse the Bush administration of that are not significantly different from the policies of earlier Democrats or Republicans. Of course he leaves out the similarities between the Patriot Act and the Counterterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act that I always like to remind people of.



MUCH AS Democrats and liberals hate to admit it, the Bush disaster did not begin with him. That he swatted aside the structures of international law as a mode of responding to Osama bin Laden was prepared for by Washington's habit, begun in the Reagan years, of dismissing international courts, ignoring treaties, and refusing to meet obligations to the United Nations and other transnational bodies.


Certainly, I suppose many UUs sided with the World Court when they ruled against the US for mining the harbors of Nicaragua.

The International Criminal Court, just coming into existence as America's war on terrorism was mobilized, fulfilled the impulse to replace revenge with adjudication. Completing the Nuremberg legacy, this new court would have been the perfect arena in which to make world historic cases against Al Qaeda, Bin Laden, and Saddam Hussein, but George W. Bush, in one of his first acts as president, had ''unsigned" the ICC treaty.

This momentous act of political destruction had been prepared for, though, by Bill Clinton, who, despite signing the treaty, had never argued for it. Both presidents were protective of the US military because the Pentagon regarded itself as a ready target of ICC prosecution, a fear that seemed paranoid until revelations both that American soldiers routinely abused prisoners in Iraq and high Pentagon officials unilaterally rejected norms set by the Geneva Convention. Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo were epiphanies of a new Pentagon lawlessness, but it was rooted in several decades' worth of dismissal of international law.

Ironically, US military initiatives, including the invasion of Iraq, were justified with the language of human rights, as if the promotion of elections and the liberation of females defined the heart of Washington's agenda. This fulfilled a trend that began when liberals and neo-conservatives found common ground in the Clinton-era ideal of ''humanitarian intervention," as if every war in history hadn't been justified by its perpetrator as humanitarian.

The measure of the humanitarian character of interventions, of course, is taken by what happens on the ground in the countries at issue. In Afghanistan and Iraq, new levels of sectarianism, ethnic conflict, warlordism, drug trafficking, and radical Islamism are all evident in the broader context of destroyed infrastructure, widespread malnourishment, and obliterated civil society.


I would suspect however that many UUs were in the "humanitarian interventionist" camp during the Clinton era and probably during the Afghanistan invasion.


The deeper origins of the current crisis are revealed in other ways. The compelling, but rarely admitted purpose of shoring up American control of supplies of oil and natural gas is expressly reflected in the job histories of Bush's policy team, but the explicit claim of economic hegemony over the Persian Gulf region, with the threat of military force to back it up, had begun with the ''doctrine" of Jimmy Carter. The stated focus of America's Mideast war is on the threat of terrorism, yet the overriding strategic issue remains oil supply. That reflects the old thirst, the old policy.

Democrats and liberals blame George W. Bush for the American mess, but it is worse than that. In sum, the immoral and futile war in Iraq, increasingly disapproved in polls but steadily unopposed by politicians, belongs not just to our feckless president, but to the nation.


Even the current hero, Carter, for all the houses he has built since then, built the groundwork for precisely these kinds of interventions. Sure, one can argue that countries must defend themselves (or more nebulously their interests), or strategically, that the Democrats/liberals must be serious about foreign policy and appear macho if they want to be elected. But is this in line with your values?

What would it take for American Unitarian Universalists to ever have to decide to side with Unitarian Universalist values against Americanism? For the most part, even our dissenters and protesters are a patriotic bunch. Sadly though, it is not as easy as the "Peace is Patriotic" bumpersticker that is so popular here. Sometimes peace, "inherent worth and dignity" or even "the use of the democratic process" are in direct contradiction with the actions of the patria or father land.

Our faith is not one that gives us Romans 13 as a cop out, to say that the established powers are all of G-d so we should not oppose them.

I'm remind of REM lyricsfor Exhuming McCarthy:

You’re beautiful more beautiful than me
You’re honorable more honorable than me
Loyal to the Bank of America

It’s a sign of the times
It’s a sign of the times

You’re sharpening stones, walking on coals
To improve your business acumen.
Sharpening stones, walking on coals,
To improve your business acumen.

Vested interest united ties, landed gentry rationalize
Look who bought the myth, by jingo, buy America


I feel guilty for posting yet another Jeremiad. Maybe I'll move on to something else now that I have finished my Law and Prophets class. It's ironic that our situation today is vaguely reminiscent of the time of the Pauline letters, where people are called to figure out how to balance their values with their participation in the larger society.

Jumped the shark?

I think blogging may have jumped the shark. If me starting a blog was not enough evidence for blogging no longer being hip, I think I may have seen the writing on the wall (or t-shirt to be more accurate).

We took a much needed vacation (long weekend really) and among other things visited a theme park. Someone in line ahead of me had a t-shirt on that said "I'm blogging this." If I'm blogging and a random woman with two kids at Six Flags has a blogging t-shirt, te end must be near.

Wednesday, May 25, 2005

O Captain! My Captain!

Because I just turned in my final paper for this term, I thought I would share with you Walt Whitman:

O Captain! My Captain!

O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head;
It is some dream that on the deck,
You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won;
Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.


And now I bid you all good night. With any luck, after errands, appointments and some creative childcare juggling, I will be at the Alliance for a Better California rally at the State Capitol tommorrow evening. I'll probably wear my UU pin and a union t-shirt.

Sunday, May 22, 2005

Slow posting

It was good to make it to church today.

But if anyone is looking for encouraging words about going to seminary or graduate school our house is not the best place to ask. I am working on my last paper (Old Testament Exegesis: Literary and Feminist Criticism and Judges 4 and 5) and my partner is working on her last exam.

According to sitemeter, I've gotten multiple readers today looking for Phil Och's "Love Me, I'm A Liberal." I'm also seeing a couple googlers per day looking up Dave Chappelle, Dave Chappelle's mom and Dave Chappelle's religion. So to review, Dave's mom was the first fellowshipped African American woman UU minister. Dave converted to Islam last year and is taken an "extended vacation" in South Africa.

Friday, May 20, 2005

Sage

I generally try not to geek out in this space, but I really like the Sage RSS reader extension for Firefox. I can quickly check for updates on several dozen blogs and news feeds at once and see content in a handy summarized form.

Tuesday, May 17, 2005

Occupied

I've been inundated with emails of late that bemoan any development that bestows upon Palestinians or Arabs any degree of humanity. I joined a coworker's yahoogroup on eschatology and I get messages every day from Christian zionists who see anything that gives Palestinians the slightest space to live or be free of abject poverty and terrorization as a demotic and apocalyptic sign. (Of course the reverse of this is me always having to explain to Palestinian friends that I know very few people in the United States who are actively interested/involved in peace and justice for Palestine who are not Jewish).

Another coworker actually used the word "sand nigger" in a conversation. Given the curent climate, maybe I should not be surprised. But it is a term I didn't learn until college from a friend who had been its target (A friend who is in fact from a Sephardic Jewish family who passes for "Arab" in many parts of the US).

Even in a Unitarian Universalist context, I have found a certain hostility whenever I challenge stereotypes of Islam (my favorite is when people think of Islam as being a particularly and uniquely political relgion. I would make the claim that the typical Friday juma sermon is no more likely to be political than the average Sunday UU service). In my local congregation, I felt well received when I gave a sermon on Eid Ul-Fitr that looked at common ground between Islam and Unitarianism and at the idea of exploring Islam the same way many other UU's currently look at Buddhism and paganism. At least one member came up to me six months or so after my sermon and mentioned that he had started reading the Quran to be a little more informed. I suggested that he might want to read Karen Armstong's Islam: A Short History, A History of God or Muhammed: A Biography of the Prophet.

I suppose I have to be doing something right if people come to me months later and talk about how they were influenced by one of my sermons. It sure is easy to lose sight of that sometimes between exegesis papers, regional subcommittee on candidacy paperwork and the other assorted joys of being a student.

Monday, May 16, 2005

Bill Moyers rocks

A transcript as well as audio (Real Audio) of Bill Moyer's speech at the National Conference on Media Reform is online:

We’re seeing unfold a contemporary example of the age old ambition of power and ideology to squelch -- to punish the journalist who tell the stories that make princes and priests uncomfortable.

First, let me assure you that I take in stride attacks by the radical right wingers who have not given up demonizing me although I retired over six months ago. They’ve been after me for years now, and I suspect they will be stomping on my grave to make sure I don’t come back from the dead. I should point out to them that one of our boys pulled it off some two thousand years ago after the Pharisees, the Sadducees and Caesar surrogates thought they had shut him up for good. I won’t be expecting that kind of miracle, but I should put my detractors on notice, they might just compel me out of the rocking chair and back into the anchor chair.

Who are they? I mean the people obsessed with control using the government to threaten and intimidate; I mean the people who are hollowing out middle class security even as they enlist the sons and daughters of the working class to make sure Ahmad Chalabi winds up controlling Iraq’s oil; I mean the people who turn faith-based initiatives into Karl Rove’s slush fund; who encourage the pious to look heavenward and pray so as not to see the long arm of privilege and power picking their pockets; I mean the people who squelch free speech in an effort to obliterate dissent and consolidate their orthodoxy into the official view of reality from which any deviation becomes unpatriotic heresy. That’s who I mean. And if that’s editorializing, so be it. A free press is one where it’s okay to state the conclusion you’re led to by the evidence.

Perfect religion from the neck up?

Just wanted to highlight a discussion on the livejournal UU community about passion and the lack thereof in a lot of UU services.

Calliope writes:

I don't want to return to Christianity because the box it comes in is too small to hold my beliefs. But, oh! I want that emotional experience in my worship! Is Unitarian Universalism inherently unable to move us so passionately, or is there a way to bring what's missing into our fellowships, congregations, societies, and churches? Is the lack of one common belief structure the cause of this emotional distance?Because truthfully, I find most UU services to be dry and lacking passion.


A good number of comments follow, with comparisons between youth worship and adult services. I know Scott Wells and others have discussed this before.

I have to take something of a middle ground. I am a very low church kind of person, but I do think that sermons should not be the same as academic lectures. I would like our services to have a greater sense of majesty that traditional rituals often have, but I very quickly start to react against the sense of artifice I feel from many contrived rituals.

Sunday, May 15, 2005

UU Tax Exempt Status and Social Security: A Threat in Indiana?

Perhaps Chalicechick was on to something when she was worried about UU churches' tax exempt status.

From Talking Points Memo:
And back on Monday, Rev. Lisa Doege of South Bend's First Unitarian Church was planning to hold a program on the topic of Social Security at the church, which included Notre Dame Professor Teresa Ghilarducci, a pension policy expert who President Clinton appointed to the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation's advisory board and Indiana Governor O'Bannon appointed to serve on the Board of Trustees of the State of Indiana Public Employees Pension Board.

But Monday afternoon Doege got a call from State Representative Luke Messer, the executive director of the Indiana Republican party, who warned her that her church's program on Social Security might cost the church its tax-exempt status.


Talking Points Memo is covering in depth the social security privatization issue. This particular post was really intended just to cover one particular congress member who has taken several different positions on the issue.

Jim Wallis from Sojourners had something to say about the morality of Social Security destruction:

The Judeo-Christian faith tradition has much to say about intergenerational commitments. The Old and New Testaments could not testify more clearly that we must "honor thy father and thy mother" -- and care for widows and orphans, the ill and the disabled. And there is no trust more sacred to biblical faith than the injunctions to care not only for our immediate families but also the larger family of all humanity, especially the least, the last, and the lost. In Jesus' words from Matthew 25, "As you have done to the least of these, you have done to me.”

We are commanded to “Honor your father and your mother,” which is linked to our own well-being and security, “so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.” (Exodus 20:12) Deuteronomy 5:16 repeats the commandment and adds the motivation “that it may go well with you,” again connecting the generations in a mutual sense of responsibility for one another. Proverbs 23:22 tells us to respect the generation which has gone before: “Listen to your father who begot you, and do not despise your mother when she is old.” And Proverbs 28:24 goes further and warns against any economic ill treatment: “Anyone who robs father or mother and says, 'That is no crime,' is partner to a thug.” Ezekiel 22:7 extends the warning to “orphans and widows.” The Christian New Testament picks up the same themes and in Matthew reminds us again to “honor your father and your mother.” Ephesians 6:1-3 says: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. ‘Honor your father and mother,’ this is the first commandment with a promise, ‘so that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.’"

The constant theme is that the well-being of our parents and the next generation is spiritually connected to our own. Social Security is a major way in which our society honors the previous generation by representing a civilized nation’s answer to the age-old problem of old-age poverty. This covenant assures the old in our community that growing old should not be a tragedy, and this commitment is strongly interwoven into the fabric of American society. Without Social Security, nearly half of elderly Americans would be in poverty; with it, only 10 percent are. For nearly two-thirds of the elderly, Social Security provides the majority of their income. In addition, over one-third of benefits from Social Security go to non-retirees, increasing opportunity for families facing unpredictable challenges. Social Security helps more low-income children than welfare (TANF), providing support to children who have lost a parent to death or disability. And when a worker becomes disabled or dies, the entire family is protected from poverty by benefits. There are now well over 4.5 million widows and widowers who depend on Social Security.

Friday, May 13, 2005

Where is between?

I asked a few questions about UU Christianity in an earlier post. I wonder what language there exists between "Its all mystical nonsense like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny" and "There is one God, whose nature is Love, revealed in one Lord Jesus Christ, by one Holy Spirit of Grace, who will finally restore the whole family of mankind to holiness and happiness."

In the last year, I have read the entire Bible and all three volumes of Paul Tillich's systematic theology. I've always said that as a person from an unchurched background I was able to explore Christianity, Judaism and Islam in much the same way that other UUs might explore Buddhism or Native American spirituality.

After two years of seminary, I have a newfound appreciation for the questions of Christian theology and the tensions that are mediated in the Bible. I know some of my colleagues resent the time we have spent on the Bible, and would never take the time to study Tillich because of his Christianity or because of the difficulty.

I appreciate contemplating the dialectic between the eternal infinite transcendent and the present finite immanent.

Given this I'm never sure whose side I am on in the great UU theological catfight. I wouldn't say I am a Christian but I'm sure my atheist friends would feel like I am not one of them anymore.

If I was a Christian I would adopt a Tillichian doctrine of the spirit with an understanding of God as the infinite ground of being. I know that I could say the same thing in panentheist terms, process theology terms and Buddhist terms (among others).

GA

Trying to get serious about GA plans. It seems like all the workshops I'd like to go to are scheduled against each other. I wonder if I can manage to get all my paperwork for aspirant status cleared in time for the discount too. So who is going and for which days?

Monday, May 09, 2005

songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work

On Sunday morning I posted a favorite Woody Guthrie quote. "I hate a song that makes you think that you are not any good. I hate a song that makes you think that you are just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you are too old or too young or too fat or too slim or too ugly or too this or too that. Songs that run you down or poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or hard travelling. I am out to fight those songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood. I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work."

I've shared before that I am from an unchurched background. A child of agnostic parents with fundamentalist parents. So I didn't have much church as a child, but I did have folk music.

Most of my objections to Christianity when I was younger pretty much would be addressed by replacing the word song in Woody's quote with the word church or religion. I hate a church that makes you think that you are not any good. I think that is why I was so infatuated, like all good new UUs, with talk of "the inherent worth and dignity" of all individuals. (I'm vaguely reminded of The Life of Brian: "We're all individuals!... I'm not!")

I was in my Unitarian and Universalist History class a couple weeks ago and was struck with the fact that the Humanist Manifesto really did approximate my beliefs at a particular point in my life. It still is not that far removed from how I see the world. I started this blog with a post about how I feel about that kind of supersessionary rhetoric now. I have a degree in literature from a "good" enough school to lay out a rap about normative gaze and erasure, intersubjectivity and pluralism if I really thought it was necessary.

I've heard it said that the new more spiritual UUs are just waiting for the cranky humanists to die off, and I've weathered the deluge of UUs and other hipsters who think they are too smart to believe in anything. I've heard that most of the faculty at my school are Christian and they are taking over, and I've heard that it is very hard to "come out" as a Christian there.

Personally, I'm not sure I really know what UU Christians believe. I think I can't quite figure out Christianity without the belief in "Jesus as your personal savior" like my neighbors. I'd love to hear my articulate UU Christian blogger colleagues describe this more.

There are times when I am so proud of how Unitarian Universalists really do include people and help "you take pride in yourself and in your work." But there are times when I feel like it is just a smug club, of people who feel too good to be like other people. Yuppies who look down on working folks with big families and big cars. A kind of nontheist or posttheist prosperity theology. Some notion that if people only ate better or had more schooling they wouldn't have health problems or money problems. Churches that, "run you down or poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or hard travelling."

How do we live up to the Universalist charge to give people hope and not hell? How do we "sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work."

I know a good discussion about heaven is better than the real thing. But what end does it serve to rehash the same arguments endlessly?

Sunday, May 08, 2005

I hate a song...

I hate a song that makes you think that you are not any good. I hate a song that makes you think that you are just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you are too old or too young or too fat or too slim or too ugly or too this or too that. Songs that run you down or poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or hard travelling. I am out to fight those songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood. I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work. And the songs that I sing are made up for the most part by all sorts of folks just about like you. I could hire out to the other side, the big money side, and get several dollars every week just to quit singing my own kind of songs and to sing the kind that knock you down still farther and the ones that poke fun at you even more and the ones that make you think that you've not got any sense at all. But I decided a long time ago that I'd starve to death before I'd sing any such songs as that. The radio waves and your movies and your jukeboxes and your songbooks are already loaded down and running over with such no good songs as that anyhow. Woody Guthrie


More later, after the Mothers' Day festivities. Strangely, I'm going to use Guthrie to talk about religion and theology.

Friday, May 06, 2005

Love Me I'm A Liberal

I think I have shared before my own ambivalence about political liberalism and its relationship to liberal religion. Here for your entertainment are the lyrics to Phil Och's classic Love Me I'm A Liberal and a modernization by UU folksinger Evan Greer.







Love Me, I'm A Liberal
by Phil Ochs
I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
Tears ran down my spine
I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
As though I'd lost a father of mine
But Malcolm X got what was coming
He got what he asked for this time
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I go to civil rights rallies
And I put down the old D.A.R.
I love Harry and Sidney and Sammy
I hope every colored boy becomes a star
But don't talk about revolution
That's going a little bit too far
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I cheered when Humphrey was chosen
My faith in the system restored
I'm glad the commies were thrown out
of the A.F.L. C.I.O. board
I love Puerto Ricans and Negros
as long as they don't move next door
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

The people of old Mississippi
Should all hang their heads in shame
I can't understand how their minds work
What's the matter don't they watch Les Crain?
But if you ask me to bus my children
I hope the cops take down your name
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I read New republic and Nation
I've learned to take every view
You know, I've memorized Lerner and Golden
I feel like I'm almost a Jew
But when it comes to times like Korea
There's no one more red, white and blue
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I vote for the democratic party
They want the U.N. to be strong
I go to all the Pete Seeger concerts
He sure gets me singing those songs
I'll send all the money you ask for
But don't ask me to come on along
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

Once I was young and impulsive
I wore every conceivable pin
Even went to the socialist meetings
Learned all the old union hymns
But I've grown older and wiser
And that's why I'm turning you in
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
Love Me, I’m a Liberal (2003)
new lyrics by Evan Greer
I trade Internet jokes about Dubya
They sure are funny to me.
But don’t even think about asking
Me to give up my new SUV
I don’t know what you mean about oil,
I just wish that gas could be free,
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal!

Well I’ve signed about a thousand petitions,
And my golf score is six under par.
I keep myself up on the issues
By listening to N.P.R.,
And you know that I’m changing the world
With these stickers all over my car!
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal!

Well you know that I’m not a racist
Been on the side of the blacks all along.
And I always give a few extra dollars
To the young man who mows my lawn!
And I’ve never read Emma Goldman
But I know that she must have been wrong!
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal!

I went to that pro-choice rally,
I think women should get equal pay.
But it’s sure nice that my wife cooks me dinner,
And puts my clean laundry away!
And maybe our country ain’t perfect,
But revolution is never the way.
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal!

You know I support Gay marriage,
And I want the environment clean.
But I’m too busy at work to take action,
So I’m just voting for Howard Dean.
I know we must work inside the system,
It’s the best one that I’ve ever seen!
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal!

I cheered when they caught Saddam
I knew that the news wouldn’t lie,
Thank god that the war is now over,
And my 401-K is on the rise!
Because you know that I love my country:
best democracy money can buy!
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal!








Tuesday, May 03, 2005

Seminary weeks

I having one of those endless seminary weeks, where it seems I will never finish my program, let alone do CPE, internship and settlement.

I'm working on papers on creation in Romans 8:18-39 and on the Song of Deborah in Judges 5:1-35, particularly Jael's killing of Sisera.