Setback to democracy in Egypt

Egyptian Supreme Court calls for Parliament to be dissolved
Egypt court rules entire parliament illegally elected, orders body to dissolve after unconstitutional vote


I don't know why this particular piece of news is having more of an emotional impact on me that any other ongoing disaster in the world, but it is.

I'm among those who are inclined to be alarmed that this decision stalls the handoff of power from the military. Military culture is always an undemocratic culture; you don't want people steeped in that culture running a country if you want democracy.

If the military and the court are concerned about the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood--well, I share that concern, too. But that's the risk you take living in a democracy. Egyptians need to work out that problem in a democratic, constitutional framework.

That's rather arrogant Western of me, isn't it? Pontificating about what Egyptians need to do.

Let's put it this way: my prayers are with those Egyptians who see this latest development as a setback to democracy in Egypt. Even if--grimace--those people include Muslim Brotherhood.

That law of the land which is constitutional,
supporting a principle of freedom that maintains rights and privileges,
belongs to all mankind...
And as pertaining to human law,
whatever is more or less than this comes of evil.

(D&C 98: 5, 7)

The latest on Guantanamo

From today's news at NPR:

The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to take a second look at how its 2008 decision on the rights of detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is being carried out.

Monday's move comes almost four years to the day after the court's last significant statement on the war on terrorism, its 5-4 decision in Boumediene v. Bush, which held that detainees have the right to meaningful review of their detentions in U.S. courts. That decision launched a flurry of filings by detainees seeking to have federal trial courts declare their detentions unconstitutional and order their release.

Almost immediately afterward, federal trial judges in Washington, D.C., began detailed reviews of the detainees' legal claims.

In the first two years, detainees won relief in 19 out of 34 cases heard by the trial courts....But in 2010, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit began overturning those decisions, eventually declaring that even the government's second- and thirdhand hearsay evidence should be presumed accurate unless there was clear contrary evidence.

The appeals court eventually overturned every single favorable decision that the trial courts had handed down...

I am deeply appalled by this. We're giving the benefit of the doubt to hearsay? Who thinks this is justice?

Guantanamo is a blight on this nation. And I don't have the moral luxury of washing my hands of it because, you know, I didn't vote for Bush. I voted for the administration that appealed those 19 cases in which the courts ruled the detentions unconstitutional and ordered the prisoners freed. That makes me accountable above and beyond my default accountability as a citizen of the country that Obama's administration represents.

I never thought I would say this, but I may have to sit this presidential election out or vote for some hopeless, obscure third candidate. Guantanamo may be non-negotiable for me.

Or I may shrug off the drama and my moral qualms and be a bleeding hypocrite, justifying it with some comment about how you can't be pure in an imperfect world.

You shall appoint magistrates and officials...
in all the settlements that the LORD your God is giving you,
and they shall govern the people with justice.
You shall not judge unfairly:
you shall show no partiality...
Justice, justice shall you pursue...
(Deuteronomy 16:18-20, JPS)

Mormons at Gay Pride

It's the first Sunday of the month, so I was going to write another entry in my more-or-less-monthly series exploring contemporary Dominican society as a way to commemorate the 20th anniversary of my mission. But instead, I want to comment on the recent series of Mormon "It Gets Better" videos and the announcement that groups of straight LDS are planning to march in Gay Pride parades in various places around the country. They're marching today in Salt Lake.

I have on various occasions thrown a wet blanket on liberal Mormon optimism that the LDS Church is progressing toward acceptance of gay/lesbian people. I think that's a classic demonstration of the liberal faith in the myth of progress, and I'm not buying it. Yes, we've seen some dramatic toning down of church rhetoric since the days of Spencer W. Kimball. We've seen the church retreat from its stupid, arguably misogynistic policy of encouraging gay men to marry. We've seen correlated discourse in recent years cautiously leave open the possibility that homosexuality might be immutable (but don't act on it, be celibate), which has meant attenuating the church's prior faith in reparative therapy. And certainly in the wake of Prop 8 we've seen church leaders try to avoid provoking more embarrassing protests by publicly "making nice" with the gay community.

That's all good and well. But as long as the church is run by conservative straight males, with the ones at the very top in their 80s and 90s and living in a self-imposed bubble, a big dose of cynicism is in order. The changes we've seen in church discourse are ultimately about applying better make-up. Or, to use a different metaphor, they are a calculated "falling back" to a position that the church can more easily defend. I don't see evidence that church leadership is anywhere close to reconsidering their position that homosexual relations are contrary to God's will and an eternal dead-end. They're nowhere close to doing the kind of deep rethinking of Mormon doctrine that would be needed to create equality for gay/lesbian people in the LDS Church--along with gender equality, for that matter, since at root they're the same issue.

Cynic that I am, I look at the Mormon "It Gets Better" videos or the groups planning to march in Pride parades, and I wonder: How much do they owe to Mitt Romney? In other words, is church leadership leaving them alone, creating a space for them to operate, because the leaders know that the Romney campaign has heightened media scrutiny and public interest in Mormon controversies? If Romney loses and the media's attention drifts elsewhere, will we see the institution start applying pincers?

I will say this, though: the "It Gets Better" videos and the Pride marches have led me to revise my predictions of how "the gay issue" will unfold in Mormonism. My old prediction (which I voiced in a Sunstone symposium paper, I dunno, back in the late 1990s?) was that church leadership might be persuaded to back away from reparative therapy (happening) and might, at the absolute most, be persuaded to allow partnered gay/lesbian members to be active in the church in a kind of second-class status akin to that experienced by blacks before 1978. (Full church involvement is now allowed to celibate gays, and I've heard of bishops who encourage partnered gays to attend even if they're not calling-worthy.)

My revised prediction is this: The upper-level leadership--those conservative old men living in their bubble, along with all the yes-men who fill the bureaucracy that does their bidding--will continue to dig in their heels on the underlying issues while applying good make-up to try to dissuade the gays from picketing outside their temples. (Okay, okay, mixed metaphors.) But Mormonism will begin to look something like American Catholicism: a conservative hierarchy, but more progressive views among the laity. The clever ones will squeeze into the spaces opened up for them by the church's kinder, gentler rhetoric ("We teach our members to reach out in love to people with same-sex attraction") and then stretch those spaces much wider than the leadership intended. Wide enough to let them march in a Gay Pride parade, for instance. How much they can stretch before the institution starts pushing back remains to be seen.

You know what this means, don't you? If you want to keep the LDS Church under media scrutiny, and therefore under pressure to leave the progressives alone--you need to pray for Romney to win the presidency. If he loses, public interest in Mormons recede, and the church can go back to business as usual. If he becomes president--Mormon controversies stay newsworthy, and the institution has to walk more carefully. How's that for a quandary, O Mormon liberals?

First-Friday service

Yesterday I led the first-Friday service of contemplative song and prayer. The theme was "Christ, our living water." Instead of placing icons of Jesus at the center of the contemplative environment, I used the little Asian-type fountain Hugo bought for me back when I was working on my dissertation. In other words, running water became our iconic representation of Jesus. Aquatic images recurred throughout the readings and prayers.

************

PSALM 63

O God, my God—
how eagerly I watch for you!
My soul thirsts for you,
 my body is weak for want of you,
as in a dry, barren land without water.

Your loving-kindness is better than life itself!
I will sing your praise.
I will bless you as long as I live.
I will call on your name with uplifted hands.

As I lie in my bed, you are the focus of my thoughts.
Late into the night, I lie awake thinking of you.
For you have been my help:
I rejoice under the shadow of your wings.

My soul clings to you.
Your strong hand holds me close.
Keep me safe! Let me live without fear
of those who would do me harm.

************

ISAIAH 35:4-7

Say to those whose hearts are sinking,
“Be strong! Do not be afraid!
Here is your God!
God is coming to administer justice.
God is coming to rescue you.”

Then darkened eyes will see.
Closed ears will hear.
Enfeebled legs will leap like the gazelle.
Muted tongues will sing for joy.

Fountains will gush forth in the wasteland.
Streams will flow in the desert.
The burning sands will be transformed into a pool;
the parched ground, into springs of water.
The arid habitat of jackals will become a marsh.
Desert grasses will give way to reeds and rushes.

************

JOHN 4:6-11, 13-14

As Jesus rested by the well,
a Samaritan woman came to draw water.
Jesus asked her to give him a drink.

The woman replied,
“How is it that you, a Jew,
are asking me, a Samaritan, for a drink?”
She said this because Jews would not use vessels
that Samaritans had used.

Jesus answered,
“If you knew who I am,
you would have asked me for a drink,
and I would have given you living water.”

The woman said,
“You have no bucket, and the well is deep.
Where do you get this living water?”

Jesus said,
“Water from this well
will quench your thirst for a time.
But the water I give
will quench your thirst forever.”

************

PRAYERS OF INTERCESSION

Jesus Christ—
you are the source of living water.
You alone can satisfy our souls’ thirst.

Refresh all who are weary, sad, or suffering.
Immerse them in your loving-kindness.
Wipe away all tears.

Rain down gifts of grace on every person.
Nourish them in their needs.

Teach us to love others as you love us.
Make compassion well up in us like an overflowing fountain.

Make all that is barren, fruitful.
Make all that has been laid waste, flourish.

Make justice flow like a river.
Sweep away prejudice and oppression as with a flood.

Fill the earth with knowledge of your goodness
like water fills the seas.

Endowment 2010

Today is Pentecost, the feast that commemorates the disciples being "endowed with power from on high" by the Spirit (Luke 24:49). Two Pentecosts ago, in 2010, I announced my intention to start work on a revision of the endowment along liberal theological lines. It's a quixotic project, since I'm creating it for a liberal Mormon worshiping community that doesn't actually exist--but it's a gesture of faith and hope that someday such a community might come into being.

I've been working on "Endowment 2010," as I've been calling it, little by little for the past couple of years. And now I'm ready to unveil it for anyone out there who might be interested in taking a look:

DOWNLOAD ENDOWMENT 2010

Be advised that the PDF download is over 100 pages long. That's because the revision is heavily annotated. In producing this document, I followed the same policy I did for LDSEndowment.org: I do not include descriptions of those portions of the ceremony that are specifically covered by covenants of non-disclosure, namely the signs, tokens, and keywords. I hold the view that those items of ritual information should be communicated only "live," in the context of performing the ceremony.

The document includes an intro that lays out the principles that guided this revision--or "re-visioning," as I prefer to call it. As a sample of what you'll find in the re-visioned ceremony, here are a couple snippets:

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MOTHER: Children, look—go down to that unorganized matter.

FATHER: Organize it into a world like the worlds we have formed previously. Fill it with all kinds of plant and animal life.

MOTHER: Counsel together in each period of your labors, so that all things are done in wisdom and order.

FATHER: When your labors are complete, return and bring us word.

JEHOVAH: It will be done, Elohim. Come, my brothers and sisters, let us go down.

ADAM: We will go down, Jehovah.

EVE and the MESSENGERS: We will go down.

************

ADAM: We are looking for the further light and knowledge Mother and Father promised to send us.

LUCIFER: Oh, you want revelation. For that, you must have a prophet. I can provide you one.

(The PROPHET enters, wearing a business suit.)

LUCIFER: Good day! Are you by chance a prophet?

PROPHET: I have been ordained to that office.

LUCIFER: Then you receive revelations?

PROPHET: (Cautiously) I would say I am susceptible to the impressions of the Spirit of the Lord upon my mind, just as any other good church member might be. (Suddenly emphatic) But I am the Lord’s anointed and the mouthpiece of God, and when I speak, the debate is over.

LUCIFER: That last sounds very promising.

First-Friday service

I just realized that last week was the first-Friday service of contemplative song and prayer, and I forgot to post the readings, as I like to do. Because we're in the season between Easter and Pentecost, the theme was "Risen Christ," and the readings focused on the meaning of the resurrection and Jesus' promise to send the Holy Spirit to his disciples.

By coincidence, the first Friday, May 4, was also the anniversary of the administration of the first Nauvoo endowments. So there was special meaning, for me, in Jesus' instruction to the disciples to wait in Jerusalem until he had endowed them with power on high. He's referring, in context, to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at the day of Pentecost. But for me, the words double as a reminder of the endowments of heavenly power that occurred at Kirtland and Nauvoo and, for me, in the Provo Temple some . . . well, let's not count how many years ago, shall we?

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PSALM 30 (selection)

I will praise you, Mighty One,

for you have lifted me out of danger.

You rescued my soul from the grave.

The underworld opened to receive me,

but you restored me to life.

There was a time when I looked for you

but could not find you.

I was terrified.

I cried out to you—

I pleaded—

“What good am I to you in the grave?

How can I praise you or proclaim your faithfulness

if I am dust?

Hear me, Merciful One,

and help me!”

Then you turned my grief into dancing.

You removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy.

For this, I will praise you with my whole being!

I will shout my praises loudly!

I will never stop praising you!

I will give thanks to you, my God, forever!

************

EPHESIANS 2: 4-6, 14, 18

Once, through our sins,

we were dead.

 But God,

abounding in mercy

and impelled by a tremendous love for us,

has made us all alive in Christ.

 Because we are in Christ,

when he was raised from death

we were raised with him.

 By bringing us all into himself—

into his body—

Christ has made us into one.

Thus he has broken down the walls that divided us.

 Through Christ,

all of us have access to God,

because all of us have received the same Spirit.

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LUKE 24: 36-51 (selections)

As Jesus’ followers were together, talking,

they were shocked to see Jesus standing among them.

They were terrified, because they thought it was a ghost.

Jesus said to them, “Don’t be afraid.

It is I, myself—not a ghost.

Touch me and see!”

Then he taught them how to interpret the scriptures.

He said: “It is written that the Messiah must suffer,

and rise from death on the third day.

It is also written that repentance and forgiveness of sins

will be proclaimed to all nations,

in the name of the Messiah,

beginning at Jerusalem.

“You are witnesses of the fulfillment of these prophecies—

you will proclaim these things to the nations.

But wait here, in Jerusalem,

until I have endowed you with heavenly power.”

Then he led them out of the city almost to the village of Bethany.

He lifted his hands and pronounced a blessing on them,

and as he did this, he was lifted away from them into the sky.

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PRAYERS OF INTERCESSION

Risen Christ—

in you

all are made alive.

Lift up all who are in danger.

Bring healing and joy to all who grieve.

Risen Christ—

you descended into death

and rose from death.

Be with all who are sick

and all who are dying.

Risen Christ—

in a mysterious way,

you have united us in yourself.

Teach us how to overcome

the walls that divide us.

Risen Christ—

through the Holy Spirit,

you have endowed us with heavenly power.

Show us how to effectively proclaim your message.

Show us how to carry out your work.

5/6/1992 - Guaricano

As I said I would do in last month's mission retrospective post, I'm posting this month some photos of what Guaricano looked like twenty years ago. Within five years of these photos being taken, this rural-looking barrio had become much more urban. The "multis"--apartments built by the government for public housing--had turned into a dark, scary-looking slum: I drove through on the bus during a return visit. That was my first sign that Guaricano was not going to be what I remembered.

This is what Guaricano used to look like as you approached it from the capital. You can see the multis, still under construction, off to the right.

This is a view from the opposite edge of town, where the cane fields began. The beanpole with the white shirt and the bad posture is me.

The house my companion and I lived in. Relatively nice lodgings as our options went. A fancier house would have been two stories--as this one had become when I returned five years later. The little boy off to the side, with the white plastic jug, is on his way to the house behind ours, where he can buy water from their cistern. During rainstorms, he and other neighbor kids would catch the run-off from our flat roof in jugs.

This is the view looking across the street from our house, during an aguacero (rainstorm). Five years, later, the street was paved (and elevated several feet), the wood houses had become block houses, and the vegetation was gone. The transformation was stunning.

Electrical power was pirated--and therefore even more sporadic than usual for Santo Domingo at that time. You can see how all the surrounding houses have plugged themselves into this dangerously leaning power pole. When we moved in, we paid a neighbor to shimmy up the pole nearest to us and plug us in.

I have to keep reminding myself not to romanticize the simple conditions at my comfortable remove in time and space.