Religion, Transformed

How far can religion go into the popular culture until it doesn’t even resemble religion at all?  In my mind’s eye, I see a robed figure, walking with dignity, gradually being enveloped in a crowd of people who are shaking their arms, some dancing, and most definitely making a racket. When the robed figure starts acting the way the crowd does, we look closer, but we’re not altogether sure we like it.

Look at this picture, for example. Isn’t it just what we’ve been longing to see through this long, cold winter — our favorite movie stars sporting fashionable smudges on their foreheads, letting us know that they can move seamlessly, and smilingly, from the glamour of the Academy Awards ceremony to the solemnity of Ash Wednesday?

Just kidding, of course. An evangelical guy in Virginia thought he was pretty clever to doctor up the original picture that had been tweeted a zillion times already. Plenty of religious people went right for it, believing that it helps to spread the Good Word, I guess.

My husband and I don’t agree on everything, mind you, but we sure did agree on this: that image does nothing to deepen anyone’s faith in anything that actually matters.  I’d get more inspiration, truly, from looking into the fireplace when there’s no glow at all, seeing just this.

I mean, really, the very idea of a “selfie” is about as far from Christian values — as I understand them, anyway – as you can get.  Apparently, this year there’s been a big spike in the number of people snapping themselves and sending proof of their brush with religion –“Selfies Bring Ashtags to Lent.” Good for them!  They must be achieving a higher elevation, or would it be a more profound place, than the rest of us who, perhaps, have brushes with thoughts about how to be better people while just doing our regular daily chores. Does taking a picture of some activity thought to be virtuous make the activity any more virtuous or could it be the other way around?

Yesterday, Ash Wednesday, our local daily paper ran a front page story that also raised questions – to me, anyway – about what true religion actually is. The headline said: “ ‘Duck Dynasty’ star’s event put off.” Apparently a local school here, called the Concord Christian Academy, extended a speaking invitation to Phil Robertson, star of the popular TV show, one I’ve never seen. The event has been postponed (nothing to do with the recent controversy over his incendiary remarks, we’re told) but the headmaster of the school is quoted as saying that he is planning a whole series of speakers.

The criteria is that we want to get people who have been successful believers, Christians who have been successful in their area, people who have something wholesome and good to share with the community and our students. (The Concord Monitor, 3/5/2014)

What, I wonder, is a “successful believer”? Someone who has been on the cover of a magazine or made millions and also happens to espouse a particular faith?  Or is it someone who has managed to maintain integrity of self and generosity towards others through both good and bad times?

Yesterday, in cities around the country (including this one) clergy offered “Ashes to Go” to people going about their regular workaday routines. The idea, I suppose, was not to care whether these people were “successful believers” or not — they were busy, because everyone these days is busy, and so they needed a little convenience with their church. Takin’ it to the streets – that must be good, right?  Well, probably.

On the other hand, is a meditative experience in community just the same as grabbing a cup of coffee on your own? My husband was out there, getting mighty cold in the line of duty; he’s writing about his own ambivalence and doesn’t need me piping up about it, too.  I’ll just say that, from my perch out in the trees somewhere, it all kind of makes the head spin. Run this by me again….What are the key elements that make up a true faith again?

To me, a picture like this one bespeaks the feeling of Lent much more. It’s kind of grey, pretty somber, gathering itself in, but this same landscape can – and will – transform itself into something ravishingly beautiful in due time.  And the only tweeting will be that other kind; do you remember it?