The Unbearable Offensiveness of Names and How to Fix It - A Modest Proposal

Since names have become offensive, I have a simple solution.

First, we have to start with the states and their smaller units, such as counties and cities and towns and boroughs and so forth.  Each state will be named State One, State Two, State Three and so on based on when the state was admitted into the country.  Smaller units in each state will also be numbered in whatever order seems appropriate to the state by population or by any other method.  City one, city two, and so forth.  For instance, you might have in the state formerly known as Delaware, something like this: State One, City Three.   Streets will, of course, require renaming as well.  I suppose names like Main Street and similar such banalities can stay, but that will require very close observation.  Perhaps streets named after trees would be okay.  But let’s not go crazy here.  The idea is to rid ourselves of anything that could be considered offensive.

Second, we’ll have to get rid of all names for people.  I mean we can’t have people naming their children grossly offensive names like Jacob and Rebecca (both biblical) or other equally offensive names.  So we will call them by unit designations such as Unit A, Unit B and so forth, adding numbers and letters and numerals to distinguish.  So someone with the last name Smith would have UnitS1 as their last name. Smith is the most common last name starting with S, which is why it gets the S1 designation.  UnitJ1 would be Johnson.  This is sooo easy.  Parents would give children first and middle letters with appropriate numbers to distinguish them.  A standard name might be A1B1S1.  Of course, just like now, we can distinguish the various A1B1S1’s by birthday and social security number.

Third, this will solve the sports name dilemma.  For instance, the New York Giants and New York Jets would now be State Three (New Jersey), City 3 (I picked 3 arbitrarily) Footballers 1 and State Three, City 3 Footballers 2.  (The Jets will be 2, of course, given their overall lack of performance compared to the Giants).  The term Footballers functionally describes what they do.  Basketball teams would be called Basketballers, baseball teams would be called baseballers and so forth.

This idea can go on and on.  State governments could sell rights to be auto mechanic one or gas station one or fast food restaurant one.  I know there will be some inevitable kinks in this system, but I think we can work them out.  Let’s put some of that good ol’ Group of 50 States ingenuity to work here.

You see how fun this is and how exceedingly non-oppressive and non-offensive all this is, right?  Why didn’t we do this years ago?  Look at all the problems we’d solve.  Everyone would immediately be so much happier and so much more well behaved, thoughtful, generous, decent, kind and all other adjectives that describe the ultimately good person.  We could, of course, then immediately defund the police since all crime would stop.  We could get rid of psychiatrists and psychologists since everyone would automatically stop having any sort of mental ailments.  School would take so much less time since who cares about history in light of the new and improved us.  Plus, we’d need many fewer words so English classes could be cut down.  I better stop now before I think of any more of the sensational and beautiful benefits this great new system will generate.

Let’s all join in and sing our new Group of 50 States song which also contains our new national bird: Fly, Robin, Fly (because the eagle is a symbol of the Nazis, even though it was the American bird and American symbol LONG before the Nazis were a germ of an idea in anyone’s head).

I can’t wait.

A Social Media Re-do of the Dr. Seuss story of bee watchers

“Oh, the jobs people work at! Out west near Hawtch-Hawtch there's a Hawtch-Hawtcher bee watcher, his job is to watch. Is to keep both his eyes on the lazy town bee, a bee that is watched will work harder you see. So he watched and he watched, but in spite of his watch that bee didn't work any harder not mawtch. So then somebody said "Our old bee-watching man just isn't bee watching as hard as he can, he ought to be watched by another Hawtch-Hawtcher! The thing that we need is a bee-watcher-watcher!". Well, the bee-watcher-watcher watched the bee-watcher. He didn't watch well so another Hawtch-Hawtcher had to come in as a watch-watcher-watcher! And now all the Hawtchers who live in Hawtch-Hawtch are watching on watch watcher watchering watch, watch watching the watcher who's watching that bee. You're not a Hawtch-Watcher you're lucky you see!”

Dr. Seuss

Prescient view of social media?

Re-worded for social media:

“Oh, the jobs people work at!  On the internet, in Twit-ville there’s a Twittery-Twit his job is to thumb.  He must keep both thumbs on his I phone so that no one will say anything untoward on any day.  So he thumbed and he thumbed but in spite of his thumbing, people kept saying stuff that didn’t need saying. So then somebody said, “our Twittery-Twit just isn’t thumbing as hard as he can, he ought to be thumbed by another Twittery-Twit.  We need another Twittery-Twitter to thumb even more.”  So the Twittery-Twitter thumbed about the Twittery-Twit but people kept saying stuff that didn’t need saying.  Now all the Twittery-Twits in Twitville are thumbing, thumbing about the thumbers who thumbed not politely, saying stuff that didn’t need saying.  If you’re not a Twittery-Twitter, you’re lucky, you see.

The Sin of Opposing Homosexuality

This was written in 2013.  My thinking has changed on one issue: I believe homosexual urges can, through the power of the Holy Spirit, be ended.  This essay suggests otherwise.

Gary Hall, the Dean of the National Cathedral in Washington claims it is sin to oppose homosexuality.  He offers up the socially acceptable notion that “sexual orientation is a gift, and the religious question should be about how to responsibly use that gift.”  He cites no Scripture for this proposition because he cannot.  As is typical with so many ideas in church history, the remedy is often worse than the illness.

The problem Mr. Hall and other homosexual advocates are confronting is real.  There has been too much stereotyping, too much anger, and too much finger pointing from many heterosexual Christians and not enough concern for the individual, not enough love, and not enough gracious understanding.  I am in full agreement with Mr. Hall that Christians have not done a good job of handling the question of homosexuality.  However, he cannot provide any clear biblical authority for his position, making it tenuous at best, heretical at worst. 

While society is certainly fully prepared to accept homosexuality, apparently without reservation, that does not make it right.  The last line of the book of Judges is instructive: “In those days, there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes.”  We live in such an age.  Jesus is not king in the United States, and the bible has no real force.  Frankly, one of the reasons Christians have badly botched their handling of homosexuality is the utter lack of biblical literacy among the last several generations of Christians.  It’s odd that there are now more bibles available than ever, in more formats than ever, in better translations than ever, yet we read it less and less than ever.  However, someone like Mr. Hall can get away with saying what he has said and many who claim some form of Christianity will agree with him, mostly because they have not carefully read the bible, or have not really read it at all.

A casual reading of the bible makes clear that “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” and that we are saved “through grace by faith” and “not because of works, lest any man should boast.”  Ephesians 2:8 – 9.  No Christian has any reason to act as if he or she is superior in any way to any other sinner – all the heavy lifting is done by God – the Christian simply gets to enjoy the benefits of what God has done for him through Jesus Christ’s atoning work as a result of his death, burial, and resurrection.  Where Mr. Hall is partly right is that no Christian has any business taking a holier-than-thou attitude towards other sinners.  Where Mr. Hall is utterly wrong is his non-biblical belief that homosexuality is somehow a gift from God.

This then points to the primary problem in this discussion.  Those who accept Scripture as authoritative look at the multiple passages which seem to fairly clearly demonstrate homosexual behavior is sinful and conclude it is wrong.  Where those in this camp have failed is they have simply pointed to homosexual behavior and said “bad” and have made no effort to engage with homosexual sinners.  Christians have embraced alcoholics, adulterers, thieves, drug dealers, and a host of other sinners, often with significant results.  Interestingly, however, Christians have long now accepted the idea of “once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic.”  In other words, the sinner may stop the sin, but the urge never fully goes away in our fallen world.  Had Christians handled homosexual behavior the same way early on, the current situation might not be in such bad shape.  In other words, understand that while same sex attraction may be something that a homosexual can curb, the underlying desire never really fully leaves.          Unfortunately, while Christians are forgiven of their past, present, and future sins, the fallen world in which we live beckons.  Our underlying desires for our pet sins, whatever they might be (gluttony? greed? covetousness?), remain.  The same is true for the alcoholic or the homosexual.  Our response should be the response we would wish for others to have toward our pet sins.  We have not reacted this way toward homosexual behavior.

That said, the non-biblical arguments which Mr. Hall makes have no value, either, in moving the conversation in a positive direction.  In fact, it is arguable that his rhetoric ironically smacks of the very kind of holier-than-thou finger pointing of which homosexuals have long and rightly accused so many Christians.  The underlying reason for the kind of argument Mr. Hall makes stems from an unwillingness to accept Scripture as authoritative.  This takes two forms: (1) exegesis which attempts to read the Bible in light of a so-called modern understanding of homosexual behavior which is, allegedly different than the biblical understanding; or (2) the view that the Bible simply isn’t authoritative whenever it says something that doesn’t jive with modern sensibilities.  In other words, sin really isn’t sin, it’s something else, depending.  So if you are really good with Hebrew and Greek (the two languages in which the Bible was written) you can make all kinds of arguments about things not being sinful.  What about the many passages that decry drunkenness?  Since I am neither a Hebrew nor Greek scholar, I don’t know how one manages these, but I can just about guarantee that some crafty thinker can rationalize away the otherwise clear proscriptions against drunkenness.

This leaves the parties in a stalemate in some sense, because we’re not really even talking about the same thing.  I am talking about a Bible that I believe transmits the word of God, written by writers inspired by the Holy Spirit to write what God intended in a way that didn’t overwhelm each writer’s individuality.  Mr. Hall isn’t really talking about the what the Bible says at all.  How do we bridge that gap?

 We cannot.  The Holy Spirit can.  Christians must stay the course, regardless of the personal cost and say what we know is true without reservation and without fear.  Our job never has been to bridge the gap, our job has been to simply state the gospel message in clear, unequivocal ways and let the Holy Spirit do his work.  Mr. Hall is simply wrong – not because I say so but because he has gone onto a heretical, non-biblical limb that he will find doesn’t support the weight of his arguments.  I cannot fix him, persuade him, or browbeat him into changing his view.  I’ll await the Holy Spirit to do such a work and continue simply saying what I must say.