Anyone who has ‘known’ me for long enough will know that I spent most of my life working with a Christian organisation and within those circles had a fairly public role in talking about Faith, God and Social Justice.
They might also have noticed that over the last few years I have become increasingly critical of the generally accepted version of Christianity that I see around me and of course through the never ceasing bombardment through the various media we are surrounded by. Social Media of course but all media has shown a religion I find myself wanting to critique and I admit at time my criticism has been at least harsh and at worst unfair. The why of all this is something I wanted to reflect on.
In the generation before me, that is the Baby Boomers many Christians believe it was a sin to dance
RD
I was in late Primary School when I was still being made to attend a Baptist Church. Mum had always been a church goer and had a genuine faith that didn’t include any of the preachy stuff that has been a hall mark of modern christianity. It was a pretty dower church service every Sunday morning, many women wore hats as part of their responsibility as christian women. Hat wearing in church was a big thing back then and was based on a bit in the bible written by a guy called Paul insisting that women should be quiet, not speak, they should not be allowed to teach either and, importantly they should cover their heads. I have no intention of providing the bible reference for that passage, if you need to I’m sure you’ll find it online.
I also don’t want to present an argument against Paul’s writing only to say that I believe he was a man of his times and in those times women had little to no value other than producing children and serving men.
One day at a church picnic we were there enjoying a few games and a general relaxation of the usual Sunday morning formality. There was even a radio playing music someone had set up on one of the tables. The women were preparing the picnic lunch and one of those women, a particularly formal one was slice a tomato up with a happy look of her face. I’d never ever seen her looking like that but as a 10 or 11 year old I remember it feeling wonderful. Then, with the music playing, this women with a happy look on her face did another thing I’d never seen, she began to gently sway with the music. Let’s not get carried away, she wasn’t remotely doing anything you could call dancing but she was happy, she was enjoying the music and she had begun to sway as she sliced up those tomatoes.
For a boy in difficult circumstances this was the most wondrous and joyful thing I can remember seeing. In fact her mood, her visceral happiness somehow transferred to me and in that moment I felt her and then my own joy. Keep in mind the woman, about my mothers age had a gentle smile and a gentle sway while still taking good care of her ‘womanly responsibilities’.
It’s not just now that I remember this moment, I remember it often. It still makes me feel a similar joy, not as full and not as deep but it still makes me feel pretty good. It’s only now that I’m old that I understand it more. I think it’s possible in that unguarded moment I saw and felt God. Maybe not but I do think it might be what was happening and if it was then what happened next was to leave an indelible mark on my ‘Self’ and was to inform me, perhaps subconsciously that ‘God’ is not welcome in the ‘Church’.
Right in this perhaps eternal moment as I stood mesmerised by this beautiful woman radiating joy, her husband appeared next to her. A tall and stern looking man drew close to his wife and said a few words. I could not hear what those words were but there was only a few quiet words spoken by this man to this woman and the effect was instant and absolute.
The joy drained from her in a second, the swaying stopped, the smile left and she was once again a ‘Christian Woman’. I am certain that man walked away confident he had rescued his wife from sin
RD
Now travel through time to a family Christmas holiday in Bali, just a few years ago with my partner and our adult children and two of their partners. It was a wonderful week staying at a gorgeous compound just outside one of the more legendary party towns people go to for a break from their usual lives. The kids had located a bar called the Mexicola and the decision was made to have dinner there that night.
On arrival we found a table, ordered a kind of all inclusive food and drinks deal and began to get our bearings. There were dozens of fairly tall tables and stools, a huge bar in middle and a decent size dance floor with a rail around the edge across from the bar. The music was loud but not so loud we couldn’t talk albeit with raised voices. We were happy together. No doubt we all had the usual things bubbling down deep somewhere that weren’t so happy but here in this place we were, as most people experience happiness, Happy.
The drinks arrived first and they were shots of some kind, down the hatch. I had two because I am blessed enough to have a partner who can party long and hard with the best of them but she not into shots! Woohoo.
The food arrived by the plate load and so did the shots, apparently someone in our family group had ordered another round, and another. In fact I can’t remember how many shots we had the night but it must have been few. To be clear. I don’t really order shots. They’re not really my kind of drinking. I like a glass of wine or a glass of whiskey with ice in a heavy glass. I love the experience of sipping it slowly, I like the effect as well of course but it kind of feels grown up I think.
I’ve been trough various phases with alcohol. The first phase as a teenager included fairly extreme and very dangerous binge drinking. One or twice I had alcohol poisoning and ended up in a very sick way. I regret those binges and don’t find a single redeeming thing about using alcohol that way. Then as I began to take my faith seriously I stopped drinking for years. While we lived in South Australia my Lutheran friends, especially the Reverends reintroduced me to the joys of wine. Up in the Barossa Valley there are many Lutheran Churches and many of those churches have members who are also wine makers. They own vineyards and either have their own labels or sell their product to the bigger wineries.
One Lutheran Rev invited me to a dinner where he had also invited a few parishioners all of whom where those wine makers I speak of. If you ever get such an invitation I suggest you accept. That night these wine makers and their partners sat round a big rectangle table eating wonderful food and all had a carry bag on the floor next to the chair. Every now and then, I think whenever the wine bottles were getting empty, they would reach down to their bag and pull out another bottle. Some had proper labels but many of them didn’t. I found out later that these wine makers had brought wine from their private stash and every bottle they brought that night was pretty much as good as you can get. No mention of value was ever discussed but to give you an idea every bottle of red that night would retail for more than $100 and most would have easily been worth many hundreds of dollars if you could buy it which you can’t, as I say they were from their own private collection they had built up over the years.
The most expensive bottle of wine I’ve ever held in my hand was worth $8000 dollars and by now would be worth well over $10,000. I held it in my hand but of course didn’t open it. It belonged my best friend and was an investment he’ll sell one day to pay the bills. He told me that there were people he was aware of who do open this kind fo bottle of wine and think nothing of it.
The most expensive bottle of wine I’ve ever actually opened and had a glass of was worth $2000. In comparison, the wine I drink now retails for $3.95 a bottle and while not memorable, tastes fine to me and I’ll be happy if that’s all I ever have. Still, that 2K bottle of red was extraordinary and an experience I will enjoy till the day I fall off the perch.
So I’ve come and gone for drinking alcohol over the years, currently I love a bottle of red or chilled white while sitting with any of my family in the back yard having dinner or just a catch up. I also love the idea of going to a wine bar with my partner and having a cheese and meat board along with my favourite affordable red wine called Pepper Jack. I say affordable but it’s about $20 so it’s not affordable to most of us and certainly not for me these days. I got two bottles of it from my son this year. A very observant young man I feel.
So there we were, Mexicola in Bali all together eating, talking and of course having a few drinks. the music was increasing in volume, the crowds increased in size and the dancing began on the dance floor and also on the tables. Clearly this was not your average bar and was not going to be an average night. It was in fact it ended up being one of the best nights of my life. Not exaggerating, not even a bit.
As the night wore on and the food had been dealt with the style of music began to change to more familiar tracks, at least they were more familiar to someone of my era. Everyone at our table was beginning to sway in their seats. Then gradually we all were standing, still talking and sipping on our drinks but the swaying increased to gentle dancing as we stood around our table. When the ‘Nutbush’ came on! My partner and I had no choice but to hit the dance floor. She, like me loves to dance but we don’t get to do it often. We’re not really club type people and apart from rare exceptions like this night at the Mexicola we pretty much only get to dance together at weddings and while we love a good waltz it’s hardly the letting down your hair type of dancing.
By the time we found our place on the dance floor our swaying turned to dancing and within minutes we were joined by the rest of our family in full flight. The self consciousness that always effects the first dance or two disappeared and we were all dancing with what I think was more than just our bodies. It was, conscious or otherwise our whole ‘Self’ cutting loose in the dimly lit dance floor at the Mexicola. I have no doubt at all that the earlier shots and a couple of beers made the transition to the dance floor a lot easier but it doesn’t explain everybody’s experience. My partner for example had barley had half of a drink and was mostly on her classic, a Lemon Lime and Bitters that she loves so much, yet here she was, with what appeared to me to be a fully integrated ‘Self’. Unselfconscious, uninhibited and radiantly happy. In my opinion my partner never looks more attractive as when she’s on a dance floor letting loose from all the expectations we all have in our normal lives. For the rest of that night we all came and went from our table to the dance floor and as the night became morning not even the constant pain of arthritis was enough to make me want it to end. I wanted that night to never end, I felt fully alive, I felt happy I felt full and joyful and in retrospect there was something about my whole family, free, uninhibited and dancing that made felt Fully Christian.
I realise for some people the idea that I felt ‘Fully Christian’ could not possibly be right and while I don’t know their individual reasons for not thinking this could be true, I need only remember back to that Church Picnic to at least understand where that thinking had it origins.
Religion to me is different to how I experience Faith and how I understand and experience my life as a Christian. Religion in my experience is a male controlled system used to ‘Inhibit’ people.
To inhibit means to: ‘hinder, restrain, or prevent (an action or process)’ and is intended to: ‘make (someone) self-conscious and unable to act in a relaxed and natural way’
Dictionary
This definition of Inhibit and its purpose is exactly what I saw as a boy at that Church Picnic. I saw the woman slicing up the tomatoes listening to the radio unselfconsciously, naturally and in a relaxed way being to sway to the music with an almost imperceptible smile on her otherwise dower disposition. Then I saw a man step in, to inhibit, restrain and prevent her from her action. It worked perfectly as though it was a well established interaction between them. I can’t prove it now but I had no doubt at all that, in his mind, in his ‘Self’ he was being ‘Fully Christian’, that way he lives out his Faith is to inhibit his wife and I imagine anybody else in his orbit. It was as if the purpose of religion is to suppress people and keep them from falling in the dangerous temptations our humanity uses to trick us into being happy. I have come to believe this is because of the way I see religious people think about humanity and what they think the bible and therefore, in there mind, what God thinks about humanity.
Fundamental religious people, even vaguely fundamentalists have a particular view of anything that triggers pleasure that while is rarely said so bluntly, it is woven into the subtext of many sermons, bible studies and religious books and general teaching.
I will never forget being given a book called The Act of Marriage early in our married life. This book is still in print and no doubt still being given out to young couples as a guide to how they should experience sex in the confines of their marriage. It strongly recommend the ‘Missionary Position’ as the most appropriate sexual position. it gave a couple of others but very much expressed that the missionary position was an almost God Given practice.
That’s not the worst bit though. It had a small section on other ‘practices’ some people engaged in and one of those was Oral Sex. I can still remember what they wrote almost word for word. “While we can find no biblical reason why oral sex is against Gods will, we neither practice nor recommend this practice” (It’s a long time ago but that’s pretty close to what they wrote).
It’s as if, after scouring the bible from start to finish they were terribly disappointed they couldn’t find anything against it and then, being disappointed with the bible they went on to argue that oral sex is not something God had in mind when that God created us.
RD
To me, this is the essence of fundamental kind of religion and why it makes less and less sense to people and why churches are becoming less and less full and less and less influential in our society. To be plain, this kind of religion is not for me and it isn’t one I can recommend in fact I would strongly warn against it. I can’t say it isn’t Christianity but if it is Christianity then I am not a Christian.
Perhaps I’ll come back to this subject in future and write more about why I think these things but for now I will say it’s been a long journey and it isn’t arrived at because I am a ‘Back Slidden’ Christian. That’s an old term that its still used to describe church people who have become less inhibited and are now living in a ‘Worldly’ way. For anyone who is reading this and doesn’t know what the term ‘Worldly’ and ‘Back Slidden’ mean, inside the church, the best way I have of describing it is that it means to behave exactly how we behaved that night at the Mexicola.
I don’t believe there is anyway of changing this in the church not even through individual conversations with fundamental or conservative or similar Christians. I feel the need to say that not all conservative christians think exactly this way and no doubt many of them don’t align with the instructions found in that book “The Act of Marriage’. What I find difficult though and means I can no longer align with ‘the church’ is that while in ‘the privacy of their own home’ they may well behave in very different ways that they would publicly admit, the reality is that this kind of christianity is a mechanism to inhibit and control. It is about keeping us all from being naughty so we don’t disappoint God and end up missing out on going to heaven.
There is a lot of church history that shows us that it has been people who threw off the shackles and gave their whole self to their faith who are now heroes of faith.. Famously St Francis actually took off all his clothes and walked out in public stark naked a symbol of leaving behind all that he felt had kept him from being fully human. (My words, not his).
So there it is. I feel uncomfortably compelled to say that none of what I’ve written here means there are no healthy boundaries we need to have, without boundaries we would cease to have a society. Without boundaries I doubt we’d have marriages survive past 7 years and without boundaries we will fall victim to the part of us that is self centred, wants only self pleasure and has no real care for anybody including myself. I believe human beings need boundaries in fact I believe we thrive with good boundaries. What are good boundaries versus what are simply controls to inhibit anything that looks like I have lost my way I am still working out. How do I find the lines that God had in mind when she told the story of creation and what she wanted humanity to look like.
Perhaps one clue might be found in the Creation Narrative when God in all her wisdom told us the following:
“Even though both the man and his wife were naked, they were not ashamed about it.”
Genesis 2
I honestly don’t know where all the right lines are, I want to know and I’m actively working on it but surely a good place to start is to get naked, resist the impulse to feel shame I have learned to feel and the shame others project onto me in the name of religion.
Being ‘naked’ is where it all began and somewhere ongoing the line we decided it was better to cover up and hide.