scary

Have you ever seen the documentary Hell House? We watched it the other night and it is pure craziness. Hard to watch, heart-breaking in spots and jaw-dropping in others.

A few years ago, a friend of ours (he grew up in the bible belt!) was telling me about events like this. He described these "haunted houses" put on by churches that drew huge crowds ... much of it young people. They were staged just like a run-of-the-mill carnival haunted house ... but with one primary difference. The focus was hell ... literally. Have you ever heard of these? I hadn't.

Each room has a different scene where "sinners" die before repenting of specific "sins" (premarital sex, homosexuality, abortion, suicide, drug use to name a few) and were sent to hell by a taunting, masked demon figure to be eternally tortured. The sins, taunting, dying and torturing are all acted out in each scene. The final stop is a room where (in a completely free and unbiased state of mind I'm sure) you can choose to pray a prayer, accept Jesus and ensure your eternal salvation. Or not.

When my friend told me this story, at first, I thought he was just being caustic. I totally didn't believe him. But, what do you know ... he was telling the truth. Bummer.

pretty

I'm an Obama girl. Trent bought me his book last year for Mother's Day and I loved it. And I know it's beyond passe to say so, but I think he is intelligent and inspiring, and I am officially politically smitten.

That being said, I started liking Edwards a little during the 04 elections. He is a bit pretty (and there were those rumors of $400 haircuts), a little too politico-smooth, and his speeches sometimes got kind of Hallmark-movie-channelesque in the heartstring tugging. But I agreed with many of his positions. In particular, I appreciated his views on poverty being a central moral issue (yes, a bit ironic from someone rumored to spend what could feed a family of four for a month on haircuts, but nevertheless ...) and all the work he and his wife have done in this area.

I know he's not in the running anymore. But I came across this video of him primping before an interview and it was so funny. You've probably seen it before, but if not check it out. It's so very amusing.

belief

The first time I read Blue Like Jazz I was completely blown away. I felt like it articulated so clearly all the internal struggles I had within the Christian experience. I still like it a lot, though when I read it lately, I find that Donald Miller is actually quite a bit more orthodox than I am skewing these days. Regardless, I still find him funny and real and insightful. Reading it the other day, this passage struck me:

"My most recent faith struggle is not one of intellect. I don't really do that anymore. Sooner or later you just figure out that there are some guys who don't believe in God and they can prove He doesn't exist, and some other guys who do believe in God and they can prove that he does exist, and the argument stopped being about God a long time ago and now it's about who is smarter and I don't care. I don't believe I will ever walk away from God for intellectual reasons. Who knows anything anyway? "(Page 103, Blue Like Jazz)

I love the spirit of what he's saying. And before I began this trajectory of dissecting my beliefs, I would have agreed with the whole shebang. Now it makes me think about a couple things ...

First, for someone who sincerely believed that there were indeed solid intellectual and factual arguments for the truth of Christianity, I was very disappointed when I went looking for those arguments. The apologists I read just did not seem to make very persuasive points. In fact, I truly think the arguments for Christianity made a bigger dent in my faith than the arguments against it. (Note: I'm not arrogant or deluded enough to believe I somehow have a better grasp on theology than the scores of Christian apologists out there. It's just that few of the ones I've read so far have resonated.)

I've found that the arguments that do seem to resonate aren't really defending Christianity at all. They often begin there. But then the inclination seems to be to back way up ... to revert to defending the very notion of faith itself. And not defending it as something provable. But as something almost higher. Something personal, intangible, experiential and wholly unprovable. Personal experience, I've found, is always the trump card. Who can challenge that? Who even wants to? Certainly not me.

As I've said often (so I'll try not to go on and on about this yet again), for me, it is not quite as simple as a choice between belief and disbelief .... between the existence or absence of God. That's only the first (and okay, actually not-all-that-simple) step. It's the next step that confounds me. The specificity of one belief system or another. The exclusivity of truth. I feel a bit like a broken record sometimes. But these are the things I think about.

All that being said, I still think Donald Miller totally rocks. Orthodox or not.