We now have our complete independence from the Reformed Church in America, and it's something that we can celebrate and enjoy. But it is also a responsibility, and not one that we want to take for granted.

So, in the spirit of not allowing us to become arrogant I want to make a little bit light of our progressive religion. I hope that you receive this in the spirit that I offer it-

10 ways to tell if you are a progressive:

1. You think the Holy Trinity is "reduce, reuse and recycle."
2. You refer to the Ten Commandments as "the ten suggestions"
3. The only time you use the name Jesus is when you trip down stairs
4. You find yourself praying "Dear God, if there is a God, and if you are able, please save my soul, if indeed I have a soul.  And so, to whom it may concern, these thoughts, prayers, good vibes, karma, cosmic forces, or whatever, we offer to you, if indeed there is a you. Or not. Amen"
5. You fall a verse behind in the hymns because you are reading ahead to see if you agree with the words
6. You knock on doors in your neighborhood and ask, "What do YOU believe in?"
7. You start to wonder if your religion is working because you haven’t had any doubts in days
8. You say to the minister after service- "I can't believe half the things that you said!" and he replies, "Oh, good- you'll fit right in!" 
9.  A street corner evangelist rhetorically asks you, "Friend -- do you know what path leads to the denial of God and Christ straight into the arms of heathenism and atheism?" You answer without missing a beat, "Our church is just two blocks that way."
10. Someone asks you how many progressives it takes to change a light bulb- and you answer, "I don’t care as long as they are compact fluorescents."

I offer this in the spirit of fun, but also so that we might not take ourselves too seriously.   As we take a little distance from this progressive movement, we can see that we are part of an evolutionary flow of thought. Nothing more and nothing less. If we are think we are more than that, or if we think we are less than that, then we run the risk of becoming narcissistic.

Mine and Mine Towels

How many narcissists does it take to change a light bulb? Only one- just person standing with their bulb, while the world revolves around them.

I'm not speaking today of a diagnosed condition called narcissism. Rather I am speaking about narcissism as a tendency for every one of us to go through stages where we tend to think that we're the center of all things.

Narcissism might best be described as the image of two towels on a bathroom towel rack labeled “mine” and “mine.” But I believe that narcissism appears in far more subtle and clever ways than that.

For instance, is it more narcissistic to think life is all about me or to think that life has nothing to do with me?  Is it more narcissistic to think the world revolves around me or that the world revolves apart from me?  Is it more narcissistic to take responsibility for everything around me or to take responsibility for nothing around me?

I’d like to bring this right home now since today is Father’s Day- Is it more narcissistic for me to think that all the choices that my children have made are all my fault or responsibility, or that my children have made their own choices independent of me, and I had nothing to do with them?

Do you see what I’m getting at? Narcissism is subtle.

I want to suggest that narcissism is losing the balance of personal freedom and responsibility and failing to see yourself as a part of the whole.

How do you hold freedom and responsibility in balance? It seems to me that this is the very question that this morning's parable raises, the famous parable of the Prodigal Son. I will come to that in a moment.

Is God Your Co-Pilot?

Yesterday I was riding my bike past one particular church in the Tri-Cities, and I saw a sign out on their board that said, “If God is your co-pilot then you’d better switch seats.” It was one of those annoying, cheesy sayings that churches tend to promote But as I reflected on this pithy phrase, it struck me that they had framed my question well for this morning.

If you believe that God is an active agent in the world what might that phrase mean?  Should God be pilot or co-pilot? How do you balance self responsibility and divine sovereignty? Who’s ultimately in charge? You or God?

If on the other hand you don't believe that God is an active agent in the world but you still believe there is something larger than yourself, that the mystery of life itself is a mystery that you call God- if that's the case, how do you balance self responsibility and surrendering to the Universe, the mystery of the Universe, trusting that all is as it needs to be? Who’s ultimately in charge? You, or Life itself?

I’m not sure about the co-pilot sign, but it does frame a good question for us. However you conceive of God, whether it's an active being or the mystery of life itself, is God pilot or co-pilot? How do you balance personal responsibility and trusting all that is?

Narcissistic Religion

People have tried to find this balance in various ways through the centuries and more often than not religion ends up being narcissistic in its attempt, by creating a dysfunctional relationship between God and humans. Just think about what much conventional Christian teaching has been through the centuries. Many have believed in a personal, invisible man, and then called it God. Because it's an invisible man its beyond any rational conversation or discussions, and this invisible man called God gives you rules and says you must obey these rules, and if you don't obey these rules you go to Hell. And when you go to Hell you will suffer, you will be in torment, you will weep, you will gnash your teeth, burning and suffering, agonizing and lamenting…….ah, but this God love you!

That’s the type of dysfunctional relationship that so much of religion has created in its narcissism.

But in much new-age spirituality, a different form of subtle narcissism has crept in. The notion that God is within has also led to a form of narcissism. It's best described by a story from Helen Blavatsky, the founder of the theosophical movement. Blavatsky was primarily responsible for bringing this notion of the God within to the west. And it has become mainstream in new-age circles. But there is a wonderful situation that's described where Helen Blavatsky is with some of her students, and one of them is walking around chanting, “I am a spark of the divine light. I am a spark of the divine light.” And Helen Blavatsky responds by saying, “I think the divine light is snoring.”

This is a sarcastic attempt to make a point. It is not enough to pronounce platitudes of God within, because the whole journey is about awakening to something very deep and profound. That is our very humanity, the expression of God within.

When the God within just becomes a platitude, something that we can recite so easily and glibly, it becomes narcissistic.

So we need to be aware that, as we move away from the God who is out there and sovereign and move more toward a subjective inner experience, we need to be just as careful about the subtle forms of narcissism that can so easily creep in.

Let’s get to the parable of the Prodigal Son. The word prodigal, we assume to mean “returning”, but it doesn't.  Prodigal means “extravagant” or “lavish”. And so we have in the parable of the Prodigal Son a situation where the son has extreme experiences, ranging from self centred hedonism to family loyalty.

Taking a closer look at the parable, consider this riddle- What do Rumspringa, Oedipus, and Bette Midler have in common?

Rumspringa- the Spring Break of the Amish Community

Rumspringa, which literally means “running around”,  takes place in some Amish communities when teens turn 16. After they turn 16 many will leave home and have an experience in the city. When they return home, they can freely choose to be baptized into the Amish Church or not as the case may be. There have been documentaries made about this phenomenon.

What generally happens, and it’s becoming more and more the pattern, is that the 16 year olds don't know what freedom is until they go out and get in all sorts of trouble- they begin drinking, using drugs, and many young girls become pregnant. Many lives are left in a shambles.

What strikes me about Rumspringa is the extreme shift from home, where all values are prescribed by church and family, with no personal freedom,  to complete personal freedom away from home. This extreme shift is just too much for many of these young people. So their lives end up in tragedy.

It seems much healthier if the home experience is the beginning of learning about freedom in a safe context. Rumspringa is all of life. Every moment is an opportunity to balance freedom and responsibility. Every moment is an opportunity to manifest that balance, to live well and to live with both freedom and responsibility for self, for other and for planet. So much for Rumspringa!

Oedipal Tension

Oedipus is well known to some of you as a classic figure in Greek mythology, who unwittingly killed his father and married his mother. Just imagine! If a Freudian slip is when you say one thing but mean your mother, an Oedipal slip is when you marry one woman and then wake one morning with your mother.

A condition called Oedipal complex is described in the world of psychology. It describes the battle that takes place between a son and a father because they want the undivided attention of the mother.

This is part of what’s being played out in the parable of the Prodigal Son, where the son is in tension with the father around this issue of freedom and responsibility. We need to go back to the story of Oedipus and the Greek myth to find that long before he unwittingly killed his father, as a young child his father had left him on a mountaintop, exposed, with his feet bound, to die. Oedipus’ father intended to kill him, while Oedipus unwittingly killed his father.

The point is that it's not about one responsibility or the other; it’s about interdependent responsibility.

If I could offer a message to fathers this morning, and it applies to all of us in our relationships, it's that it is just as narcissistic to think that you're responsible for all the choices that your children make as it is to say that you have nothing to do with them. It’s not all the parents fault, it’s not all the children’s fault. It's an interdependent set of relationships and dynamics.

The Oedipal complex has been essential  for patriarchal cultures through the centuries, and it's been important for gender relations, because in societies which thrive by military warfare it's been in their best interest to create boys who know how to be aggressive and become warriors.  So this complex over the centuries has sustained armies.

In our world, where we no longer depend on warfare for progress, we have a wonderful opportunity to model balanced gender relations to our children; the ability to manifest both firmness and receptiveness; the ability to manifest all possibilities across gender differences. So much for Oedipus!

Bette Midler- From a Distance

Finally, Bette Midler. This ones fun. Bette Midler sang a song in the 1980s that became very famous. Its called “From a Distance.”
 
From a Distance

From a distance the world looks blue and green,
and the snow-capped mountains white.
From a distance the ocean meets the stream,
and the eagle takes to flight.

From a distance, there is harmony,
and it echoes through the land.
It's the voice of hope, it's the voice of peace,
and it’s the voice of every man.

From a distance we all have enough,
and no one is in need.
And there are no guns, no bombs, and no disease,
no hungry mouths to feed.

From a distance we are instruments
marching in a common band.
Playing songs of hope, playing songs of peace.
They're the songs of every man.
God is watching us. God is watching us.
God is watching us from a distance.

From a distance you look like my friend,
even though we are at war.
From a distance I just cannot comprehend
what all this fighting is for.

From a distance there is harmony,
and it echoes through the land.
And it's the hope of hopes, it's the love of loves,
it's the heart of every man.

It's the hope of hopes; it's the love of loves.
This is the song of every man.
And God is watching us, God is watching us,
God is watching us from a distance.
Oh, God is watching us, God is watching.
God is watching us from a distance.

I went back and forth on this song through the week. I couldn’t work out  if this is pure genius or takes us back hundreds of years in our theology. My conclusion is that it is pure genius.

If you understand God as an active being in the world who operates from a distance, intervening and correcting things from afar, then the song  is problematic. It leads to all sorts of existential problems.

On the other hand, if you see God as the very mystery of life itself, then what might it mean for God to be at a distance?

What it means is to go that distance within yourself, to stand at a distance from yourself, to stand at a distance from your situation, and this enables you to see things more clearly. From a distance the world looks blue and green, it looks like it's all connected and beautiful in its variety. From a distance you can see that balance of responsibility and freedom.

I believe that's what happened in the parable when the father stood at a distance. He didn't go all the way to meet his returning son. Rather, he allowed the son to make choices and come to him at the right time. But he didn't stay right back, he was there waiting. I believe that’s a metaphor for what we can do internally with ourselves and with others.

Watch the watcher. Stand back and observe your thoughts, reactions and emotions. The beauty of this form of “witnessing” is that you realize that you aren’t defined by these thoughts, feelings and reactions. They are fleeting manifestations. When you can separate from your changing expressions, you see that you are much more than them. At your essence, you are the One who sees all things, hears all things, feels all things but is not contained by any particular sight or feeling.

In the parable, the father watches all things come and go around him. The brother has various reactions of anger and envy. The prodigal seeks the balance of the father’s equanimity and the brother’s passion. It’s a beautiful story, and one that gets at the heart of our very human struggle for balance.

A Riddle of Human Evolution

What has four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon, and three legs in the evening?

The answer is a human. A person, who crawls on all fours as a baby, walks upright as a youngster, and walks with a cane in old age.

This riddle may well be the antidote to narcissism, because this riddle expresses the very evolutionary flow of history. We are on a journey, and our kids are on a journey, moving from four legs to two legs to three legs. The world is on its own journey, and we are part of the evolutionary flow of the universe. Nothing more and nothing less. As soon as we make it something more or something less we end up lost in narcissism.

I’d like to offer a final word for fathers, and it is something that I’ve been thinking a lot about lately. It relates to every one of us in our relationships of all kinds and sorts: Your kids are on a journey. They are each evolving and learning as they go. The choices they make are neither your complete responsibility, nor are you removed from them. You are together a family of interdependent dynamics and realities.

The parable of the Prodigal Son is a wonderful reminder to us to come back to that balance between freedom and responsibility. When you learn what it means to stand at a distance and see things clearly, you see things as they really are and you realize that all is exactly as it should be.