Feeling brave, might delete later (Aug 27- Sept 2)

This week’s snapshots:

Happy Saturday, dear humans!

I would love to tell you that, I’m “not in Kansas anymore!” But alas. Until late o’clock tonight, in Kansas I will still be. It’s been interesting - I’ve been working through jet lag, a vigorous cold (I slept 12 hrs and almost missed the truck leaving the hotel one morning O.o), and all of the electricians have been treating me like a princess: fixing my tools when I didn’t realize they weren’t working, holding doors I could have opened just fine myself, appearing out of nowhere to help any time my lift was being inconvenient. Is this Kansas hospitality? I feel really weird (yet grateful) about it xD

Several Sundays ago I was absolutely floored by the sermon I heard, and I’d like to talk about it. After the introductory remarks my blood pressure was up, and I could not believe that someone would be willing to claim to gather the Body of Christ together for the purpose of worship, encouragement, and strengthening, and then preach about… politics.

All right, sensationalism aside, I realize that the Gospel applies to all areas of our lives, including politics. I was admittedly impressed because the sermon wasn’t exclusively a tirade from within the pastor’s personal echo chamber: they had asked their congregation for the “real” questions they were facing, and then attempted to provide “real” answers from a godly perspective. As much as I respect that this shepherd was intending to equip his flock, I found myself wishing the whole time for even an acknowledgement of the “other” perspective instead of just affirming their “insider” bias with strong rhetoric.

At the end of the service, I stalked up to the speaker, and politely asked, “Can I have that list of questions you spoke on today?” They VERY KINDLY said yes, and generously gave me the complete notes for their sermon T_T

If you find your blood pressure spiking because I’m about to do to you in my letters what this Sunday morning sermon did to me, feel free to look at my pictures and close my email for the next couple weeks, because Imma answer the same 5 questions they did. But - I invite you to join me. So please tell me:

Question #1: What qualifies YOU to address controversial questions?

I hunted down these questions not to refute the answers from the sermon (they were not bad or wrong even though I generically disagreed with their presentation), but because I have an uncommonly-heard perspective when it comes to politics and the United States... The US, though my passport country, is not the country that directly educated me or taught me how to think about itself. I find that has left me as an functional-outsider on a lot of controversial topics.

I'm just an ordinary person with a penchant for factoids and a preference for nuance and seeing the forest for the trees. I make connections most insiders don't express when they address controversial questions - because I'm living as an insider but my brain approaches it functionally-outside.

Furthermore, with regards to what is actually being taught as history today… I taught in history classrooms as a substitute from 2019-2022. I went through the entire M.U.S.H. course for juniors in 2020-2021. If you are curious what Wyoming’s public education is teaching the kids in Natrona Country, I know, and if you’re worried about what it’s teaching them, stop. (Unless you worry about Natrona County trying to teach kids critical thinking, in which case you might continue to worry slightly about the 2 kids in every classroom who aren’t actively trying not to learn ;)

So while this invitation to dialogue may or may not have any functional use, I find this kind of discussion is an invitation to participate in defining our cultural values and how we the people uphold them or tear them down. Hilariously… I think the boomers share all of the same cultural values as Gen Z and Gen Alpha, and only disagree on how we uphold them. A big deal, sure, but an important bridge between the generations nonetheless~

I don’t think you need a qualification to address a controversial question, but it does help to qualify where you’re coming from so that your bias can be identified and challenged. I grieve that most of these questions are asking for right and wrong answers - it is difficult to build relationships with others on the basis of moralization. And at the end of my day, politics (esp. with a history like the USA’s) is about protecting the other as well as you protect the insider.

Please tell me what you think - is separation of church and state a good idea? Does that mean churches should/shouldn’t preach about politics? Would you qualify your background and biases so that we can better understand each other as I ask “controversial questions”?

Let me know what you think!

—Beth