Post or Revert to Draft?

Scrolling back through my +Time Weblog of more than a decade turns up any number of posts marked "draft", that I didn't like, or that failed to communicate what was on my mind at the Time, or that at the Time I realized would offend someone who did or did not deserve to be offended, and that I'd be called on to apologize and would refuse!, or that I'd posted and then, upon second or thirteenth thought, maybe because it could have made me a target, thought good better best of for whatever reason, so tapped "revert to draft" and left it hanging for the heir who cleans up my affairs to deal with. This may be one of those blogposts, because

along with the monarch elephant, who like Dumbo the Flying Elephant surely can fly if s/he gets a running start, it reminds me that I'm not at all like you! Our worldviews are vastly different! I don't share your religious certainties! I vehemently differ with your politics and your social views! And your opinion that religion and politics don't mix! So more likely than not, even though at this point I'm not at all sure where it's going, this blogpost will be consigned to the shadows.

Mind, I'm not mad, not in a bad mood because it's Monday. Because, unlike your workweek, Monday is not the first workday of my workweek, but the first day of my weekend; your Monday morning is my Saturday morning; in this my third vocation, Sunday afternoon is TGIF, nomesane? Don't get me wrong, I love Sundays, love what I do now, finally, after forty-five years of not and of, as the rector who got tough with me asked, "How much longer are you going to ignore God's call on your life?" and I responded, "Oh, what the hell, I give up."

What set me/this off this morning? Although browsing Facebook is not my thing, this morning something caught my eye as I posted a copy-and-paste of Richard Rohr's blog for today. Fr Richard is a Franciscan, which is what I would have to be if life had birthed me Roman Catholic instead of Episcopal, Anglican. Franciscans are more worldly concerned than pious, more concerned for others than for defining God. Pope Francis, e.g., is Jesuit, an intellectual, but seems in his heart more Franciscan, more a man for others than for doctrinal surety, more Love than Dogma. ? IDK, but seems so to me.

At any event, I saw this on Episcopalians on Facebook:

R_ P_ L_ Episcopalians on Facebook

April 24 at 5:49 PM ·

Something has been bothering me a lot lately. If God is a loving God, then why are we unworthy of his love? And if we are created out of love, then the concept of original sin should never be.

Right on, RPL, the concept of original sin is absurd, ridiculous, outrageous, a human notion that is out of sync with both creation stories, in which God, the Lord God, creates us special, lovingly, to exercise His dominion on earth. In one story we are spoken or sung into being in His image, in an older story we are formed from dust, earthlings, and quickened with His Breath. The notion of original sin comes from Genesis 3, Adam, Eve, & ha-Nachash the serpent, and is a read-back into an etiology that's meant to explain What Is: why we have to work for a living, why childbirth is painful, why snakes crawl on the ground and we're scared of them and always want to kill them; and that it's all our own fault so don't try to blame God!

God is Love. Jesus was not sent to suffer and die for my sins and save me from hell, an early human retrospective reconstruct of the Incarnation for reasons that members of my Sunday School class understand; Jesus came to Show & Tell us how to live in the godly image in which we are created, how to move beyond selfishness into godliness. Love God, Love Neighbor are His summary commandments to steer us, guide us, away from self. Refined by Anselm, rationalizing what we did to Jesus as the divine plan of God finding a tortuous, ultimately torturous, way to forgive human sin(s) is unfortunate and ungodly. And has been used by the Church down through the ages to assert and exercise control through fear.

The Love of God is not God obsessed with my sins and trying to find a "just" way to forgive me, but God trying to help me to live into my baptismal covenant with God:

Will you ... ?

I will, with God's help.

Friends, the Incarnation is God's help. The Indwelling of the Holy Spirit is God's help. God is not obsessed with forgiving me, but with helping me.