Figure 2: Pacelli (center) at the ignominious signing ceremony of the Reichskonkordat {Wikipedia: German National Archives}

In my usual, quick quotidian scan of the Times, the articles on Judaism, Israel and the Grateful Dead usually stand out for deeper reading.  Most of us need these filters, for how much mental energy can we really devote to the Nigerian coup-of-the-moment or the latest Avatar-inspired fodder for Fashion Week. And so this morning’s bizarre piece about a self-described “shlmiel” retiree who moonlights as a papal knight and apologist for the allegedly MIA Pius XII during WWII drew considerable interest.

I’m not sure what it takes to become a source of Swiss Guard sycophancy these days, but I bet the bar is pretty high for a Krupp from Queens, and garnering pet scan machines for an Italian hospital just doesn’t quite seem to cut it.  Far more compelling for a Vicar of Rome increasingly set on a regressive agenda inclusive of this controversial canonization would be to elevate an ordinary-schmo-of-a-Jewish-spokesman with claims of scholarly support.

In an era of increasing concern about the breakdown of Catholic/Jewish relations and the repudiation of the progress since Vatican II, the lauding and exploitation of this well-meaning but clearly over-his-head refugee from a Deli breakfast klatch is, as Krupp might characterize it, a shanda.

There is a longstanding figure in Jewish history, our version of an Uncle Tom or the “House Negro,” called the Court Jew.  He supported the agenda and standing of the gentile monarch, represented his patron to the Jewish community, often against its best interests, and profited handsomely in coin and station.   Even those who sought nobler purpose could too easily buy into their own hype. And while I’m sure Gary Krupp believes he is doing his part for peace and reconciliation between historic antagonists, the seductions of this last bastion of awe-inspiring, divinely-sanctioned royalty could cloud the discernment of even the most modest of souls.

If the current resident of St. Peter’s truly aspires to promote Pius while resolving troubling concerns about his actions (or lack thereof) during the Holocaust, immediate access to all pertinent Vatican records would serve this cause far more thoroughly and honestly than trotting out suburban semites.  Suspicions borne of silence cannot be quelled by even the most unassuming of the sons of Abraham.

Tiger Wood’s poignant, highly-scripted and meticulously controlled confession-qua-press conference was remarkable in its diversity of need and intent.  It managed to simultaneously serve as narrative arc closure, fulfillment of one of 12 steps and sufficient contrition to satisfy skittish corporate sponsors.  He blended therapeutic accountability with moral awareness, adding a pinch of Eastern spirituality as answer to the Brit Humes of the world who see redemption as the exclusive province of Jesus’ hematology.

But the question remains:  Did he sell it?  Or less crassly, was he sincere?  Or more pointedly for his Q-rating, was he perceived as sincere?  The authenticity of confession and repentance is highly subjective, often assessed more in the eye of the beholder in a world in which we can never know the recesses of another’s heart. So apart from the ability to, ala Woody Allen, metaphysically cheat by looking into the soul of our classmate, how do we assess the truth and quality of contrition?

On the most obvious elements, Tiger seems to have succeeded.  He looked visibly shaken, choking up at all the right pregnant pauses.  He apologized repeatedly and without qualification, prompting a sports marketer to characterize the statement as a “mea culpa on steroids.”  And he pled his case in front of his mother, a virtual guarantee of sincerity from all except the most sociopathic.

But there is one element that was perhaps most telling of Tiger’s intent and potential to follow through.  In offering the view of the most victimized party, his wife Elin, Tiger recounted her insistence that his future actions would determine the sincerity of his vow.  This is more than merely a cliche or self-help, common sense remedy.  For many faith traditions, especially Judaism , it is the essence of true repentance.

Repentance is one of those squishy words signifying various things to various people.  For many, it is an abstraction devoid of real meaning.  But for Jews, repentance, or teshuvah, is a process rather than state of being.  Teshuvah literally means return, rich with connotations of return to the right path, our best selves or God.  This far more direct, unequivocal sense is realized in a 3 part process.  First, there is awareness of misdeeds, faults, and a willingness to change.  Second, there is public confession and vow to change, confirmed by witness to combat rationalization. And finally, often long after the initial stages, a similar opportunity to err arises and a different, hopefully better course is taken.

Tiger seemed to embrace well the first 2 steps of this original 3 step program (the other 9 steps are commentary?).  And as Elin attests, the proof will be in more than the pouting.  But it is a hopeful sign that Tiger pursues multiple paths to personal redemption beyond exclusive and slavish reliance on either new-age transformational trippiness or the bloodless discourse of psychotherapy.  Tiger’s possibilities are grrrrrrrrrr-eat!

CBS, and the desperately-seeking-revenue broadcast media more generally, have opened the floodgates of issue advocacy advertising, poisoning one of the last bastions of civic no-man’s land.   Concerns go beyond the monied, and thus limited access to the airwaves, a process initiated with Reagan’s drive-by of the Fairness Doctrine through last month’s Supreme Court concession to corporate brainwashing.  The network of Murrow, Cronkite and now Dobson defied logic and consistency, permitting FoTF’s blatant propaganda while denying a gay dating site’s purely entrepreneurial effort–unless the very existence of gays who want to date and forge monogamous relationships is deemed advocacy.

In our increasingly and seemingly irretrievably polarized culture, the Big Game was perhaps the only place left to come together in ways transcending politics and punditry.  Who couldn’t resist the Saints’ Cinderella story, a redemptive moment for a city bloodied but not beaten, facing a hometown quarterback torn between loyalties and clearly distracted from his game?  And since Apple’s legendary paean to 1984 in 1984, the ads often surpass the game in water-cooler provocation.

In essence, CBS has ruined a good thing, releasing the Kraken of interminable rhetoric in the only place insulated from the echo-chamber of commentary and opinion resounding all reason from public discourse.  What do you think?

We have to have more than textbooks, we need text-people.

–Abraham Joshua Heschel

The Hughes brothers’ latest shotgun-and-survivor epic offers more substance and provokes more reflection than the typical post-apocalyptic fare.  It’s a refreshing departure from most end-of-world imaginings that cloak weak plot and stilted characters in costly software effects and superficial aphorisms of faith.

Though lifting the bleak atmosphere of gray and ash from Cormac McCarthy’s poignant descriptions (despite the underperformance of the film version of The Road), The Book of Eli invests an established archetype with edge and insight.  And watching the narrative unfold through the conflict between the main characters, embodied by Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman, envisions an additional level of armageddon through acting.

Eli offers themes of faith in ways both familiar and innovative, a critical blend for success in this genre:  The dichotomous tension of religion as bane and boon; the use and abuse of its power in fulfillment of mission; and the potency of faith in enabling humanity to continuously re-create itself.

Without shamelessly revealing the significant twist in the final act, the story illustrates well Heschel’s above quote.  Though all sacred narrative begins as tales told often and well, later to be centralized and canonized to preserve integrity and promote authority, at its essence a text is merely a script, a skeletal structure upon which even the most ardent literalist hangs flesh and sinew of experience, worldview and matters of the moment.  In essence, all text is us.  We are the ur-text that is transmitted to the next generation, revealing what transcends us as clearly as our foibles and aspirations.

One final note of a minor theme with major implications.  A dramatic moment occurs when Solara (played by Mila Kunis incongruously fresh from a spa day) recites a prayer learned from Eli.  In a prior conversation, Eli laments how people now kill for what they once carelessly discarded.  His prayer in a post-apocalyptic context does what prayers do best:  heighten awareness of what is given and what is lost.  In the neo-Hobbesian world of Eli, the words suggest imminent need.  But in our era of comfort, excess and waste, similar words seek to instill appreciation for the taken for granted and perspective on the distinction between want and need.

A Technical PS:  At the end (no spoiler here, not to worry), a copy of the King James Bible is placed next to an Artscroll Edition of the TaNaKH (the Hebrew Scriptures) on a shelf.  The implication is that somehow the KJV is the last “real” bible and the TaNaKH is some exotic Semitic variant.  Though lacking in the sonorous prose and interpretive license of the KJV, an English edition of the TaNaKH would provide essentially the same Old Testament.  Granted, it would lack the New Testament, but the focus throughout the film is on the OT, with nary a reference to Jesus save for a cross on a leather bound edition.  It’s a minor detail that only a rabbi would notice, but I’m available to directors for sourcing and continuity.  I’m just saying…

Art by Devlin Donnelly

Dateline:  Somewhere amidst the air traffic patterns of the Northeast.

(AP) A Jewish teenager trying to pray on a New York-to-Kentucky flight caused a scare Thursday when he pulled out a set of small boxes containing holy scrolls, leading the captain to divert the flight to Philadelphia, where the commuter plane was greeted by police, bomb-sniffing dogs and federal agents.

The following is a primer for TSA agents to assist in distinguishing exotic, mildly threatening expressions of Jewish culture and ritual from the more typical dangers found in shoes, underwear and carry-on liquids (note: a Jew would never undertake any act requiring the permanent loss of  perfectly good undergarments, the removal of shoes publicly or the sacrifice of pricey haircare products for any purpose other than what they expressly serve…it just isn’t done).

- Magen David: this small, often silver, 6-pointed star is not a tiny ninja-like throwing device surreptitiously worn as jewelry by a renegade squad of disaffected Israeli commandos. It is merely a ubiquitous bit of Jew-bling donned by those whose sense of  identity and commitment rarely transcends H20 (Holidays, two only) observance, when the item is conspicuously worn outside clothing.  Not to be confused with the chai, the strange, elephant-like Hebrew talisman that crossed over to authentic bling after Sammy Davis,Jr. and Rod Carew were documented wearing it, subsequently investing Jewishness with an unprecedented cool that has yet to be replicated. However, if the size and faux-gold density of the chai reaches a critical mass, it could overwhelm the buoyancy of airline seats-as-life-preservers in the case of a water landing .

Matzah: a tastless, odorless and seemingly purposeless flatbread that, though bearing a striking resemblance to the latest versions of the explosive C-4, is simply a Jewish form of gastric self-flaggelation, often more torturous than the mythic enslavement of the Israelite ancestors that the alleged “foodstuff” signifies. Incidentally, if these surprisingly sharp, suspiciously perforated and oddly singed sheets of flour-based circuit board were to be confiscated in the name of national security, expect little more than mild protest with a wry, slight grin and knowing wink.

Cholent: This is a difficult one to detect, even for the experts.  A melange of earth-tone root vegetables and raisins, simmered excessively in a crockpot to increase uniformity of color and texture, prepared and allegedly eaten during the Jewish Sabbath by those who are prohibited from cooking and are too lazy for take out. Though only a biohazard professional can make the final determination, it is not the latest chemical weapon designed to sublimate into poisonous gas upon contact with air.  However, upon contact with the human digestive system, a slightly less life-threatening, but quite debilitating gaseous interaction is widely reported.

The hype was borne out, despite the narrative retread.  Visually, and thus emotionally and experientially, Avatar is out of this world (typical pun for movie critic-types)! Though it took a few minutes for my 8 year old son and I to adjust to the weirdness of 3D Version 2010, the technology has definitely improved since the goofily splashing wax of Vincent Price’s 50’s foray into the next dimension.

Others have commented extensively on Cameron’s resort to tried, true and perhaps even trite plot tropes:  the White Messiah, the rapacious corporation backed by sadistic mercenaries, and the innocent indigenous more thoroughly in touch with God-as-Nature than we, the deracinated “civilized.”  Indeed, the pitch for this movie was probably:  ”Dances with Wolves meets Close Encounters with Smurfs.”

Much has been made of a few urban legend-sounding struggles with depression and suicidal ideation amongst viewers so immersed in the experience of Pandora that they are crestfallen to return to the Peoria AMC-Cineplex parking lot.  Credit is equally divided between Cameron’s successful creation of the next generation of escapism and an enervating real world of economic malaise, war fatigue and bleak weather.

And though the storyline was as hackneyed as any Star Wars remix and as timelessly trotted out as any Campbellian monomyth, there is merit to the ability to do the oft-done well.  And there is insight for all observers and analysts of contemporary culture in the film’s phenomenal success despite its unoriginality.  We still need myth to face the mundane!

Even the seemingly interminable previews evidenced this need.  Many upcoming films regurgitated  by the creatively-retarded Hollywood money machine fall into 2 categories:  Some variant of Fox’s 24 and an update on classic mythic literature.  The next few months will bring a remake of Clash of the Titans, something called Percy Jackson and the Olympians, and Russell Crow’s grizzled up Robin Hood (you could count on Errol Flynn to shave….everything!)

While I am a great advocate for the confluence of the themes of sacred, mythic tradition and pop culture, I am an equally vociferous critic of  modern iterations becoming complete substitutes for more substantive spiritual lives.  The longing for faith, spirituality, the transcendent or whatever you call it is clearly enduring if not hard-wired physiologically. Yet the forever-seeking will frequent the Church of Cameron multiple times before ever setting foot in or lending heart to the deeper, richer, more nuanced experience of established traditions and communities.  Can it be the 3D glasses alone (I’d happily put them in the pews if it were that simple)?  Are today’s faithful so shallow, so atrophied of attention-span and so diminished of mind and spirit that they are only engaged by a spirituality that comes in 2.5 hour chunks, pop corn and Red Vines not included?  What do you think?

Aside from the ubiquitous question regarding the whereabouts of dinosaurs in the biblical account of creation, the next most asked school-age query posing modern sensibilities against divine revelation involves the currency and relevance of monotheism. Specifically, when we come to the topic of the Shema prayer (the affirmation of God’s oneness) in Sunday School classes, explanations tend to focus on Judaism’s ancient aversion to paganism, polytheism and their attendant pecadilloes (like child sacrifice and cultic prostitution–though in a G-rated presentation).

That’s a stark and convincing distinction, a triumph of humanity and idealism over a primitive and materialistic sense of the Deity. But the implication is that this central expression in Judaism is merely commemorative of a war already won. There are few physical idols demanding of subjugating worship left in the civilized world, Las Vegas and Fox Television notwithstanding.

So does the frequent recitation of the Shema prayer and its essential meaning still speak to our lives today? My standard response is to ask my spiritual charges, young and older, what are the goals and values that people cherish as gods, pursuits that they might break at least 5 of God’s Top Ten to engage. I usually elicit the intended, yet pertinent responses: power, money and fame, the last quality most troublingly illustrated by reality tv and its aspirants, from Jersey Shore to Dr. Phil, from Balloon Boy to White House Crashers.

In a recent piece, the Times’ token occupant of the A.M. Rosenthal right-of-center op-ed page column, David Brooks, offered one more candidate for Idol of the Moment: National Security. In a critique of our unrealistic expectations of airport security in the wake of the underwear dirty bomber (better than the dirty underwear bomber?), Brooks admonishes:

Many people seem to be in the middle of a religious crisis of faith.  All the gods they believe in–technology, technocracy, centralized government control–have failed them in this instance.

Brooks shames us into a bit more Churchillian resilience in the face of inevitable failures and fears.  But the concern seems less our juvenile over-reliance on the titans of technology and our surprise when they cascade from Olympian heights at the hands of Fruit-of-the-Loom fanaticism.  Rather, it is our unquenchable need for the power, mystery and beneficence of omnipotence dissonantly coupled with vain pursuits in any and all other places than what generations before conventionally deemed “God.”

The real immaturity and lack of fortitude that plagues Western society stems from our capacity (or lack thereof) for authentic faith. Our need to invest trust and security only in the tangible and concrete is more akin to our primitive, rock-worshipping forbearers than we would like to admit. And to concede sincere expressions and devout observance of established faith to fundamentalists and entrepreneurial charlatans is a further descent into a cynicism raised to idolatrous heights.  When the underwear bomber induces more of an existential crisis than our increasingly consumerist, uber-acquisitive lives, it’s time for all of us to find that inner Abraham, swinging for the fences against the pantheon of our self-importance.

But force of will wasn’t enough.  He had heard from friends about a ritual, a bit of sympathetic magic straight from the Margaret Meads and Joseph Campbells of the schoolyard: Turn your pajamas inside out the night before and place a spoon under your pillow.  I didn’t check in with him this morning when confronted with the faith-busting warmth and rain-slicked streets.  And I sense that, at his core, he didn’t really believe this little foray into the black arts would effect the change he wanted.  But as the old yiddish-inflected axiom encourages:  It couldn’t hurt.

I thought of my son’s straddling between the real and the wished-for as I read a recent Pew poll cited by the Times resident purveyor of surveys, Charles Blow.  I assume that the respondents were all reasonable adults, and thus exempt from the benefit of the doubt extended to children, the reality television-addicted and adherents of intelligent design.  While citing emerging trends on the blending of Eastern and Western traditions, a well-documented and theologically viable phenomenon, the more shocking statistics concerned belief in what is euphemistically termed the “paranormal” (less euphemistically the “bat-shit crazy”). Significant numbers believe in ghosts, the evil eye, astrology and the “spiritual energy” exuding from inanimate objects.  The outrageous success of the low-budget Paranormal Activity and the basic cable bonanza of shows recounting the literal moon-lighting, ghost-busting escapades of suburban plumbers supports the credibility of these stats.  And perhaps not surprisingly, more of the religiously affiliated embraced these delusions than the unaffiliated (who embrace other delusions, like well-functioning government or the moral integrity of free markets).

And while the sharp increase amongst those who have had mystical awakenings or epiphanies seems hopeful of some impending evolution of consciousness a la the more positive, less dramatic takes on 2012, it probably has more to do with the inflated sense of self reflective of the Oprah Era than a bearing out of Jung’s collective unconscious.

And speaking of Jung, perhaps this trend, or more precisely this seemingly universal need for magic, mystery and mindlessness encompasses more than the unsophisticated and gullible fans of Jersey Shore and Biggest Loser.  The recent publication of Jung’s in/famous Red Book, withheld by the family until 50 years after his death for fear of damaging his reputation, demonstrates that even genius endowed with sensitivity to delusion and dysfunction is vulnerable to the seductions of the supernatural.  Jung himself was unsure whether his documented dreams, visions and messages reflected divine prophecy or descent into psychosis. He valiantly, and at times painfully, plunged into the void to attain self-knowledge as a means to better understand his patients and life’s work.  But his abrupt cessation of the project and discomfort in publishing the tome speaks for itself.

Jung’s journey is a cautionary tale, providing insight into the human condition from one who could self-consciously interpret and forge a theoretical structure upon which others can build, discount and synthesize.  Polls, public opinion and rantings on Facebook do not provide the same level of thoughtful deliberation.  But the questions remain:  Are the fantasies and worldview of childhood something we thankfully grow out of with increased knowledge and experience?  Or do we lose something essential, a unique insight into the multi-dimensional nature of reality, as we become more distracted, disillusioned and constrained by pressures to conform, to concretize, and to basically “grow up” and “out” of  the follies of youth?  Is this new facet of the new spirituality a superstitious concession to trying times and bleak prospects, or an authentic sign of evolving consciousness?  What do you think?

Image: Devlin Donnelly

Recently, I rehearsed with our Temple Rock Shabbat ensemble for an upcoming Chanukah extravaganza, a feast of lights and latkes that hopes to uplift the potato-and-oil encumbered out of an imminent food coma.  We ran through the tunes on the social hall stage, not the usual venue for worship and the first time I’d played music on those well-trodden boards.  As a baby boom aficionado of classic rock, I couldn’t help but gush over thoughts of a previous performer on that stage:  Jimi Hendrix.  Documented legend has it that one of the Be-Stratocastered One’s early public forays happened in this hall, better known for Gay Bingo, Purim carnivals and the cheesy musings of Bar Mitzvah party DJs.  Perhaps the ghost of sonic solos past was absent, but I felt a kind of privileged vibe, as though I was humbly treading on sacred ground, requiring me to remove ego if not my sandals. And I felt I was repurposing, or even rededicating this space for a musical experience that rocks the soul in different, but proportional ways.

The word Chanukah means “rededication,” a direct reference to the historic victory of the freedom-fighting Jewish tribe, the Maccabees, over the religiously repressive Syrian Greeks.  The descendants of the Maccabees became tyrannical rulers, and so troubled later rabbis cultivated the legend of the rededication of the ransacked Temple, where a vial of oil for one day miraculously lasted for eight (GM should produce such fuel efficient vehicles).  The focus shifted from a commemoration of victory and victors to a consciousness of God’s power and our ability to recognize it in our lives.

Though a celebration of triumph over religious persecution served Jews well as inspiring model throughout their daunting journey, the focus on broad, historical ideals speaks less incisively to the last few generations of Jews complacent and comfortable in 21st century America.  Domestic battles for status and opportunity are barely remembered by grandparents, and efforts to strive for the freedoms of the distant and downtrodden are limited in their power to move.

While a minor festival, and despite the protestations of generations of rabbis, educators and anxious Jews (are there any other kind?), Chanukah has continued to become the de facto Christmas for many, with a diminishing awareness of theology and values, and a seemingly annual amplification of  the lust to buy and have .  In the worst sense of having finally “made it” in America, Chanukah has become for Jews as superficial, materialistic and empty as the purported birth of the Savior nominally celebrated by the majority culture.

This trying situation begs the age-old semitic query:  What’s a mother to do? Is there a way to counter both the alienating abstraction of Chanukah’s lessons and stem the flow of value from what has become a bloodless homage to purchase power?  In many ways, the Chanukah challenge reflects the growing disenchantment with religious traditions and communities.  While rejecting institutional faith, many profess a deep and abiding “spirituality.”  Public joining has given way to personal journeying as the most authentic expression of faith in the modern world.  What does this new dynamic mean for those of us who hope to restore Chanukah to its more meaningful, less pecuniary past?

Perhaps the answer lies in going with the cultural flow rather than fighting it, not pandering to what Chanukah has become, but repurposing, or even rededicating the holiday observance as we rededicate ourselves to its highest ideals.  The Jewish High Holidays during the fall are the classic time to re-evaluate and repent.  But September is filled with distractions as the summer ends, school begins and work-a-day schedules reboot.  The Gregorian calendar refreshes around this time of year, and with it, a secular re-assessment of self has seeped into our cultural conscience. New Year’s resolutions rarely transcend gym and Jenny Craig memberships.

What if Jews, and even the spiritual descendants of the most famous Jew, embraced this season as a time for an accounting of the soul toward spiritual and moral refinement?  With winter’s pressures toward a physical and emotional turning inward, our hearts, minds and attention-spans are free to focus on more than just Bowl Games, calorie counting and looming credit card debt. We can give our children something beyond a gift that will barely be remembered by MLK weekend. Here are some new holiday approaches:

-Take some time as a family to make 2 lists on a 3X 5 card.  Place a plus on one side, a minus on the other, and a line down the middle. Under the plus, write things you want to do better and more often.  Under the minus, things you want to avoid and do less often. Do this individually and as a family unit.

-Insist that at least one of the days of Chanukah is dedicated to learning about a needy organization or cause, and giving time or resources in support.  The more physically present and personal the effort, the better.  The best giving is done face to face.   Gifts through the postal service or paypal are a good start, but nothing impacts like the human touch.

-Give the gift of self this season. While family trips and festive meals are wonderful, it’s easy to get lost in a houseful of guests and a laundry list of logistics.  Try to spend genuine and concerted time, one on one and as a family.  And, God forbid, turn the TV and computer off for an afternoon.  Who knows what you can find surfing a spouse or sibling?

I doubt that I will channel any searing Jimi jams this Friday night on my humble axe, though I will certainly open myself to any stray astral rays on that sanctified stage. And I hope there will also be openness to new perspectives and new ways to re-energize tired and exploited rites, forging cynicism and consumerism into fresh and refreshing pathways to personal faith and the principles that sustain community.  This is religion at its best.  This is a faith worth fighting for.

As the climate conscientious gather for this week’s Throttlin’  in Copenhagen

Leaving it to the bloggersphere and punditocracy to hungrily pour and paw over the cultural carrion, I have been heartened by the substantive support of faith communities.  The usual suspects have come to the fore for flora and fauna: historically left-leaning, mainstream Protestants and Jews, and ideologically consistent Catholics whose absolutist passion for life encompasses the planetary conditions necessary to sustain life.  And in a transformation even the skeptical might deem miraculous, the next generation of conservative evangelicals have moved beyond the old guard’s dismissal of the environment as irrelevant to Jesus’ Triumphant Reunion Tour, focusing on Creation Care as a priority transcending even the Holy Trinity of fetuses, fornicators (especially the same-sex variety) and forced prayer.

And while this is definitely a welcome evolution in engagement and advocacy, it also reflects a deeper theological change.  Christian theology often seems to focus on the afterlife as resort destination, and thus the morality of our earthly sojourn is merely means to an everlasting end.  Judaism offers a definitively present-centered approach to embracing good and combating evil.  Heaven and Hell with small “h’s” are forged here and now through our actions and inactions rather than serving as cosmic carrots and sticks to sway and scare.  But concern for the present alone is insufficient.  More compellingly, we are cosmic debtors to a deity imbued with obvious power and infinite compassion, Who created the unnecessary-but-invaluable.  God didn’t need us.  Let’s be glad God wanted us.   The least we can do for this act of superfluous grace from the Ultimate LandLord is to live and care for our patrimony as grateful guardians of our generously subsidized housing.

This shift of emphasis on sacred stewardship as payment for proven debt rather than investment in uncertain reward possesses the power to unite disparate faith communities into a movement that is more than the fashion of the moment.  It is nothing less than a theological revolution, and, as with the best theology, the gateway to a change in consciousness.