Why would anyone be religious?

[angus]

We took the boy to church this morning.  He's seven and this is the first time he has attended a church service of any kind.  My wife has been nagging me ever since we were married--maybe that's not the right word--she has been asking about and encouraging me to take her to church, and especially since the boy was born.  Today she cornered me.  First thing this morning she said to my son, "We're going to church today."  I knew it would be so, therefore I quickly showered and shaved and then got on line just to try to get some info on local churches.  I googled reviews of churches in the area.  People write restaurant reviews, reviews for tourist traps and movies, even colleges and universities.  But I couldn't find reviews of the local churches.  I ended up picking the closest one, Orchard Hill.  It's about four blocks away and it made for a nice walk on a cold, clear day.  

Orchard HIll Church a suburban megachurch that describes itself as "interdenominational Christian." It has "traditional sanctuary" at 8:30 - 9:30 and "contemporary services aimed at growing Christian families" at 10:45 - 11:45.  By the time I looked all this up it was already 10ish, so we opted for the 10:45 contemporary service.  I figured contemporary means we don't have to dress up, but I thought dockers, black loafers, a nice green turtleneck pullover, and a long wool coat and scarf would be appropriate for me.  As we approached the building, I noticed that most people were wearing jeans, and there were more than a few miniskirts with luscious, muscular shaved legs sticking out of them.  Good thing I didn't opt for a suit and tie.  

The whole affair was rather more relaxing and less formal than I'd imagined it would be.  As we entered to the large, complex building, I saw coffee, tea, and other drinks for sale at a counter off to the side of the foyer, along with croissants, danishes, and other light fare.  Folks were milling about, and children were running about.  Big group.  I'd estimate that between 300 and 500 people were in the chapel.  And that's not counting the large groups that were apparently in another wing of the building with classrooms for ages 2 through 14, and another smaller group in a side chapel who were attending some sort of service simultaneously offered in a smaller chapel.

I had fretted over the whole affair, wondering if my son could handle sitting still for an hour, and imagined staid silence and a priest donning a Lenten purple cassock.  Well, I didn't think he'd be called a priest, but whatever they called him, I'd imagined a boring old man singing low and out of tune to mostly empty pews.  Five people sitting in a chapel built for two hundred.  Anyway, it turns out that the officiant is called a "teacher."  But long before we saw him, we walked into the main "chapel" which was actually a very well-appointed basketball gym with stage, with plush chairs set out in big semicircles for the congregants.  We sat on the back row.  On the stage there were many modern musical instruments, including a complete trapset.  Big red bass drum, snares, tom tom, cymbals on a high rise in the back center.  Lots of guitars and a synthesizer on stands.  Oddly, there was no piano or organ in sight.  Promptly at 10:45 a group of young people in jeans and t-shirts took the stage, picked up their instruments, asked us to rise, and vigorously started in with a very grungy march that initially sounded like the first eight measures of Bush's "Glycerine" but that quickly turned more spirited and decidedly louder.  It was a song about love and faith, and there were three large screens on the walls with words, karaoke-style, so folks could sing along.

The band played and the people sung and swayed (some danced!) for at least 15 minutes.  Standing was nice because the fetching twenty-something lass in front of us had a particularly short skirt and very memorable legs tucked into long leather boots, but eventually the teacher walked up and took the mic and asked us to be seated.

The lesson was from Genesis and it dealt with the patriarchs.  About 4000 years ago Abraham, from what is now Iraq, had some sons.  One of his sons had two boys, Esau and Jacob.  Jacob, later known as Israel, apparently was very scheming.  He talked his father into giving him the inheritance, even though he was the younger brother.  At some point Esau threatened to kill Jacob so Jacob ran away.  Jacob found himself at a "certain place" in a desert (Genesis 28:11).  Then the teacher made a point to say that Jacob laid a stone down.  He went on to talk about how we have all at one time or another may have reached that "certain place" in our journeys.  But things got better.  In Genesis 28:15 Jacob realizes that he's not alone.  In Genesis 35 Jacob decides to get rid of his foreign gods and build a house of the true God ("Beth El").  We were urged to think about what we might need to get rid of before we returning to the house of the lord.  

I was struck by, among other things, the language of the teacher.  I was raised in the Church, more or less.  I was baptized as an infant in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.  I had first communion at age7 and confirmation at age 15.  We didn't go to mass very often, and we rarely said grace, but my parents taught me to say grace, and once in a while they'd drag us to mass.  I always thought of priests as being extremely well-educated, and always boring.  This guy was anything but boring, and quite frankly didn't sound so very well-educated.  I counted several grammatical mistakes, and he used contemporary, common language ("stupid" and "so not good" and "wannabe" and the like.  He said that El Beth-El was such a "Las Vegasy name, don't you think?")  But he excelled at inspiration.  He was captivating, emotional, and uplifting.  It was all very positive as well.  No fire.  No brimstone.

Also, it was all very informal.  People sipped their Cafe Amachiattos and their Chais and their fruit smoothies, and children were free to squirm and roam and color in coloring books.  Folks were coming and going (presumably to the restroom) frequently.  

Then there was more music.  Hard rock, with the big words on the big screens.  

They recited the apostle's creed.  I noted that they said "the holy Christian church" rather than the "Holy Catholic Church" but otherwise it sounded the same as I remember.

There was a prayer.  We stood during the prayers.  No one crossed themselves; no one genuflected.

They passed around a plate and I gave them a few dollars.  

There was a benediction, of sorts.  The teacher asked God to guide us and he thanked God for all He had given us.  Then we left.  On the walk home I quizzed my son to see if he'd paid any attention.  He could come up with the name Abraham, so I guess it wasn't a total loss.

It was actually much more pleasant than the masses of my youth, and the message was wholesome and useful.  I could see how such modern services could inspire faith and love.  We may go back again, or we may go to another church sometime.  I don't think my wife's going to let this go, so I'll probably capitulate and start attending semi-regularly.  Who knows, it may help me become a better person.

[angus]

We're thinking about going back there this morning.  At least that's the plan.  Last two weeks I found other things for us to do on Sunday mornings, but she's pretty keen on going back.  Partly for my son's education I think.  She's pretty superstitious, in the general way, and often talks to my son about how his next life will be a good one if he's good in this life.  Apparently there are places associated with this.  (She seems convinced that his soul is one of those who died in the December 26, 2004 Tsunami just days before his birth, given that he likes the beach and the sea so much.)  But his exposure to Western religion is pretty limited, and I agree with her that he should be schooled a bit.  I got him a library book last week about religions of the world.  He seems to have taken to Sikh a bit, and in fact I saw him wearing a towel wrapped up around his head yesterday.  I'm not sure how well he'd like their diet, though.  He's a voracious carnivore.  He asks me lots of questions now.  I suppose he has sort of figured out that I'm more skeptical of all that stuff than his mother, so I'm the one he has been going to for answers.  I've always tried to re-enforce my wife's beliefs in a neutral, diplomatic way.  "Well, some people believe that you get reincarnated, and that your next life depends upon how well you treat others in this one..."  That sort of thing.  And in any case it's not a bad thing that children have some motivation not to act like jerks.

Anyway, the place we went to three weeks ago has a children's program which runs simultaneously with the regular service, so once we walk into the megachurch foyer and buy a latte or a chai and a croissant, we take him back to the "Great Adventure" which is the K-5 program for children, and the we can either sit with them or go into the main chapel for the head-splittingly loud LoveRock music and another lesson from "the teacher."  I have some trepidation about that.  Not having been raised by Protestants, I have very limited experience with "Sunday School."  I have a vague recollection of visiting a sunday school with a friend once when I was about 8, and what I remember most about it is coloring and cutting and gluing some figures, and doing some singing.  It was all pretty benign.  This church's website says that "Adventure Zone provides a loving and safe enviornment for children, infants through 6th grade to learn important Bible truths and grow in their relationship with Jesus. Our curriculum is designed to encourage and teach children to love God, love others and live out these truths in their daily lives."  It also says that today's lesson for the children is from 1Peter 5:7, which I looked up and found that it was about casting away anxiety.  Sounds good to me.  I could use a little anxiety-casting right now.

Anyway, it starts at 10:45 so I'm going to shower and shave and put some pants on.  It's only a five-minute walk from my house, but we may want to get there a few minutes early to get him into the Great Adventure.  This place is pretty touchy-feely, and very informal.  They don't do the fire-and-brimstone schtick, and it's not Catholic or Jewish so you don't have to sit still for 45 minutes while boring some old guy sings in a low, monotone, out-of-tune voice.  Also, I see lots of foreign-looking faces there.  Not that there are many foreigners in this town, but those who are here seem to congregate at this particular church, so my guess is that many of the children there are exposed to both Western and Eastern religious ideas.  All of which makes me feel okay about having him sit through the Great Adventure.  I'll let you know how it goes.

[angus]

Today was good.  We arrived just at 10:45 and it took a few minutes to get the boy registered for The Great Adventure so we missed the warm-up band.  When we got in they were just starting a video about the youth group's spring break adventure.  It started off with a beach scene, some pop music, and a close-up on a guy so buried in sand we could only see his sunglasses.  He bounces up, starts dancing to the music and brushes the sand off, then he and his bikini- and swimtrunk-clad spring breakers start running toward the beach, whooping and hollering, frolicking in the sand and surf.  Then the music gets quiet and they start talking about their mission.  Apparently they were in Mexico.  Given the murky color of the water I'd say that it wasn't in Quintana Roo.  The beach was either the Gulf or the Pacific, and not the Caribbean.  They were down there building houses and delivering clothes (and the Good News.)  Eventually that video was over and the teacher came out.  

He said a prayer and in it he said something about how some of were here of habit, some of were here to learn, some to worship, and some were probably dragged here, or wanted to please someone else, but we were all here as part of God's plan.

This week's teacher was older, and apparently better informed, than the previous one.  His Colonel Sanders beard gave him a decidedly avuncular look, and his command of the spoken word was superb.  He was also a great public speaker.  He talked about the Major and Minor prophets a bit, naming some examples, then told a story from the gospel according to Saint Matthew.  I guess they just call him Matthew.  It's a very informal church.  Okay, the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 1.  I forget what verses.  Jesus sent some disciples to a place under an olive tree, and there was a donkey involved.  If I've got this right, Jesus wanted to come riding in on a donkey.  I think it was meant for humility.  Actually, this was the one and only time in our two visits to that church that I heard anything even remotely political.  The teacher said something like, "Can you imagine a President riding in on a donkey?  Especially a Republican one."  And the crowd laughed.  I don't think he was necessarily taking a shot at Republicans or propagating an elitist stereotype of them.  He was just making humor to engage the audience.  There was also something from Zechariah 9.  I think it was a follow-up about the donkey.

He then moved to the Old Testament.  Story of Hosea marrying a prostitute.  Apparently God wanted him to.  Old Jewish guys never like to marry prostitutes, but Hosea complied.  But after some time she ran away from him and went back to being a whore, and was eventually sold into slavery.  God told Hosea to buy her back and take her back to be his wife.  So he did.  I think the message there was about how God always wants to take us back, even if we have been whoring around.  Or something like that.  (Some of you scholars can correct me if I'm wrong.)

There was a story from Luke as well.  (As I remember from my own reading, Luke was a goy.  One of the few disciples who was a goy, I think.  And I think he might have been a physician.)  Anyway, today's story from the Gospel according to Luke was about a king saying saying something about Jerusalem.  Luke 19 I think it was.  Something about how if the people had only known on this day what would bring them peace, but now it is hidden from their eyes.  Or something like that.  To be honest, I'm a little sketchy on this one, and I didn't take the point.  I guess I missed some of it when I went to pee.  (I'd had two cups of the church's exquisite Sumatra blend and couldn't hold it in any more.)

We did catch the closing musical act.  This week featured a larger band.  Two electric guitars, one accoustic, one bass, two keyboards, one drumset, and one guy on woodwinds who played an alto sax in two numbers and a flute in a final number.  Very Jethro Tull.  There was also a sign interpreter.

They boy managed fine, I think.  Said they played with toys for a while.  Then drew some pictures.  Then heard three stories about Jesus.  "In the first one, he touched a blind guy and cured his blindness.  Actually, there were three blind guys.  Just like that song about three blind mice.  IN the third story he healed a ratt--, um, a laph---, um.  Well, it was a disease."  

"Was it leprosy?" I said

"Yeah, that's it!  He healed the leper!"  he said.

"Okay, that's the first and third story.  What was the second story?"  I asked

After a pause, he said, "Um, well I can't remember the second one."

Okay, I thought, like father, like son.  "At least you remembered two.  What else did you do?"

"Well, then we came into the little room and I drew."

"Oh, what did you draw?"

"Here, look" and he handed me a little red piece of paper.  On it was a little stick man and some buildings in the background and some planes in the sky.  "What's this?"

"Oh, it's Jesus praying.  I think we're supposed to pray to Jesus.  Jesus loves and forgives."

Something like that.  So, it was, more or less, a good chance for him to bond with other children, play nicely in a group, draw, work on his listening comprehension, and learn some of the basics of Western theology.  All in all, I'd call it a successful venture.

[angus]

opebo, it's not like we're taking the boy to a nazi youth rally.  perspective, man.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Torie.  He's a good kid, and deserves a good education.  Boston University religious scholar Stephen Prothero wrote a book recently called "Religious Literacy: ..."  (The elipses indicate that it had some subtitle that I forget.  I can't say I've read the book, but I read about it in my quarterly BU alumni magazine.)  Anyway, in it he examined the ignorance of Americans about religion in general, and about their own religion in particular.  He went around and gave a quiz with questions like, "Name six of the ten commandments" and "According to Islam, what is the name of God's prophet?" and "Can you name at least one of Abraham's sons?" and "By what name is Gautama Siddhartha more commonly known?"  Giving this test in in many OECD countries, he found that Americans consistently score lowest.  Germans, Austrians, Canadians, Spaniards, Australians, etc., all score higher, even though fewer respondents in all those countries claim to regularly attend some religious service than US respondents.  He attributes this to a combination of historical judicial misinterpretations of the US Constitution and the fact that we are a very litigious society.  Your high school English teacher is free to let you study Homer's Iliad, but let her try to have you analyze the world's best-selling book (or even translate a few passages of the Qur'an) and she'll guarantee herself a lawsuit.  School boards are wise enough to avoid such controversies altogether, and book-publishing giants have evolved PC versions of texts that suit the school boards quite well.

Additionally, I don't think it hurts to teach children a little humility by whatever means avail themselves.  Learning about mercy and love won't hurt him.  As for religious identity or supernatural belief systems, obviously he is free to choose his own path, as far as I am concerned.  

Back to the original topic, I can see the appeal of the user-friendly, guilt-free, latte- and scone-hawking interdenominational megachurches.  Western worship has come a long way since the days of the John Robinson and Pope Pius XII.  I'm not defending the new scholarship, and in many ways it all seems like an amelioration of intellectual rigor.  I'm just reporting.  Objectively, I might add. To that end:  the music was uplifting, the dress was casual, the girls were pretty, the children were well-behaved, there was absolutely no pressure on me to give any money (or to give anyone my email address), the message was about love and forgiveness and hope, and everyone left in a good mood.  The appeal is obvious to anyone, I'd think.

[angus]

Believers in reincarnation.  Well that gets into spirituality, which is a different thing than religion.  I can't really answer for the believers in any sort of afterlives, except vicariously and by making assumptions.  I do know that it's common enough to find people who hold different beliefs in attendance in Christian churches.  Southerners with their Ouija boards, East-coast elites with their agnosticism, and Southwestermers with their Navajo-inspired new age mysticism can all be found regularly attending some flavor of Christian worship services.  Immigrants from the far East, where plural religious affiliations are the norm, often attend Christian churches when they come to the United States.  In Japan, a religious person might attend a Shinto shrine on one day and a Buddhist shrine on the next, as appropriate for the specific blessing sought.  In China, it's common enough to find old ladies who make offerings at the Dao temple on one day, then visit the shrine of the City God on another.  Westerners often have a hard time wrapping their heads around this idea, since we so often think of "religious identity."  Indeed, Western religions are set up to be mutually exclusive.  One cannot be both a Mormon and a Catholic simultaneously, or a Muslim and a Jew.  Easterners don't grow up thinking that religions are mutually exclusive.  Even deeply religious Easterners often don't claim a religious identity in the Western sense.  There's a Chinese couple down the street from us who attend a Christian church every sunday, regularly, with their two children, but who have made it a point to tell us that they have not "joined" the church.  I suppose that they consider themselves visitors, although they probably attend more often than some of its members.  They may come to make connections.  They may come to educate and indoctrinate their children into a mainstream mode of American thinking which may ultimately make them more successful in the United States.  They may be deeply religious and worship at Dao shrines and Buddhist temples just as often as they visit Christian churches.  They may be genuinely interested in converting to Christianity but are still exploring the issue to be sure.  I cannot answer the specific question for all of them, but I can think of many reasons why a believer in re-incarnation might want to attend a Christian church.  

[angus]

my question may have seemed too generic, but I was asking why your wife, a believer in reincarnation, wants to take your son to a Christian church?

Well, as I mentioned my wife's somewhat spiritual.  Moreso than I, anyway, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.  She has been wanting me to go to church with her for many years, actually, even since before he was born, although lately she has been bringing it up with increasing frequency.

Churches play an important role in American culture.  They serve social, educational, and, in some corners, political functions.  I assume that she wants to learn more about the culture of her adopted country.  I assume that I'd want to do the same, and in fact visiting a Confucian temple was one of the first things I did during my first visit to China.  

With the birth of my son, her maternal instincts kick in, I suppose.  She feeds him well (At 131 centimeters, he's in the 80%ile of height for his age, and I think in about the 50ish percentile in weight.  He's a big boy.  A well-studied boy too.  She makes him do math, and has bought him a physics experiment kit and a chemistry set.)  I generally tend more to the cultural and linguistic, being the gringo in the family.  I saw to it that he began taking piano lessons early on, and I taught him to play baseball and ride a bicycle and learn to use big words.  But something was missing.  She reads lots of parenting books, and they all recommend church, or at least some reasonable facsimile thereof, especially if the child has no siblings.  We had both observed how well-behaved children are who attend church regularly.  It may be anecdotal, but on this point I'm absolutely certain.  We have exposed ourselves to a variety of social types, by now, and it's clear to me that regular churchgoers are generally better behaved in school.  I cannot say whether they're happier, though.  Anyway, she wants him to learn some moral lessons.  For my part, I have long been of Stephen Prothero's opinion that folks are generally ignorant, so I saw it as a chance to educate the boy.  Jesus is a bigger part of Western civilization than just about anyone I can name.  On top of that, his message is one of mercy and forgiveness.  Seems like a reasonable course of action to let him go to church.

I can't say that I'm surprised that opebo would give me a hard time for taking the boy to church, but I must say that I'm at least a little surprised that you'd do so.

[angus]

Fellowship for her son, I suppose.  

Does Jesus love him any less if his parents are not Christians?

I mentioned the book of Matthew earlier.  A little later in the book, Matthew 19:13-15, there's a bit about Jesus' disciples giving Jesus a hard time when he wanted to pray with the children, but Jesus told the disciples to chill out.  "Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." That's how Matthew told it.  Matthew was a tax collector, not a psychologist, so he probably didn't know why the children of some parents who didn't know Jesus would pray, and he certainly could not have predicted that there would be a church 3 blocks from my house some 2000 years hence.  However, his book and others, you said in another thread, were written by people who knew that they wanted to reach a thousand generations, or more.  If you really believe that, then my wife's motivation is not important.  The boy finds the books, however he finds them, and the books speak to him, maybe.  Or maybe not.  

I don't know.  All I know is that my wife loves our son very much, and she thinks at the moment that it is right and good to let him go to a church.

[angus]

Consider Noah – by faith he built an ark, and saved not only himself, but his whole family.

You're so heavy, man.  Well-educated, good sense of humor, totally into astrophysics, but when it comes to the subject of religion you always go Taliban. 

I understand the concept of the Anointed One.  It's simple and elegant.  No need to explain it.  If one only accepts that Jesus of Nazareth is the son of God, and that God loved the world so much that he gave His only son to be crucified--conveniently, you don't seem to have any qualms with capital punishment, but that's probably another debate for another time--and via this sacrifice all mankind can seek salvation.  All one needs to do is believe.  As religions go, it's pretty low maintenance.

Really, though, we're just looking to give the boy a good upbringing.  I don't get into the exclusivity contract.  I guess if I were hiring a realtor to sell my house then I'd consider such things, but I don't want to make any claims about Ultimate Reality just to be popular with the girls.  The boy is free to choose his own destiny.  He may, like you, find his way to Christ.  Or he may, like Muhammad, find his way to Allah.  Or he may, like the Buddha, find his way to enlightenment.  Or he may, like most of us, just do well enough by not ever becoming an asshole.  And that's okay too.  The messages on your doodles, and what my son is learning in the Great Adventure, is good advice.  Let's leave it at that.

[angus]

If he's free to find his way you might want to take him to some other types of services - you know, show him there's more than one religion, that people who believe other religions aren't necessarily bad, etc. Tolerant people tend to be less likely to be assholes, in my experience, and cultural exposure is good for tolerance.

Don't you worry about how I raise my son.  He has traveled to many countries, and he knows how to say some words in several languages.  He has been to a Buddhist temple, a Dao temple, a Confucian temple, a Catholic Cathedral, and a Lutheran church, although until recently never to any "services" in the sense that the Western mind conjures up.  He has rung the bell of enlightenment (so many times that the Buddhist monks came out and told us that it was quite enough), and put a yuan in the asshole of the rooster and gotten his lucky orange ping pong ball.  He has watched the faithful of Shanghai burn their paper play money as offerings to their dead ancestors and stood by as the swastika-wearing Buddhist pilgrims light their incense triad from the eternal flame.  He even lit his own candle once, in the Cathedral of San Miguel.  There's also a mosque about a mile from my house and we have driven by there a number of times and discussed it at some length, although I haven't taken him inside it yet.  (I've been reading up on appropriate mosque etiquette because I don't want either of us to do anything stupid like walking somewhere with our shoes where we shouldn't.)  I also had him read a book about religions of the world and discuss it with me, as I mentioned already in this thread.  It is true that this recent megachurch experience is the first time he has ever been to any formal "service" but he has certainly been exposed to the cult and creed of a number of important religions, at least in the abstract. 

Why don't you and jmfcst just leave my son's education to his parents.  One of you claims to be a Republican and the other a Libertarian, representatives of the two groups quickest to complain about how it's not right to let others tell us what we should be putting into our childrens' heads.  I find it particularly ironic that a Libertarian and a Republican, of all people, should be the first to offer me specific instructions in the socialization of my own child.  Don't you?

[angus]

You actually equate Jesus to the Taliban?

No, not Jesus.  You. 

angus, obviously I haven’t been referring to your son, but to you and your logical approach...

Fair enough.  That was really directed at John.

Obviously, it is logical to assume the child would be more likely to esteem Christian values if his parents were living a life in agreement with faith in Christ...

I appreciate your advice. 

Hey, on a related note, if you had to put a children's book about bible stories in the library under either fiction or non-fiction, where would you put it?  Like, just for the sake of argument, say it's a book called "Stories from THE BIBLE:  Old Testament Stories Retold" and suppose it was written by Martin Waddell and illustrated by Geoffrey Patterson.  Suppose it has a chapter on The Creation, and on Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Moses and the Bulrushes, etc.  Suppose you had to put this book into the youth section of the local public library, and you either had to organize it with the fiction books or the non-fiction books.  Where do you put it?

[angus]

You lost me, bro.  But I am interested in your answer.

How is stating “Consider Noah : by faith he built an ark, and saved not only himself, but his whole family” more like Taliban than Jesus?

I guess it was the whole post, or better yet, the whole dialogue:

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How scholarly.  How very agenda-driven.  You seem to have a good sense of humor about almost everything else, even sensitive issues like federal judicial appointments, but when it comes to religion, and in particular Christianity, you get very serious.  Maybe I picked the wrong word.  My arabic is a tad rusty, so I went to look it up in my Hans Wehr Arabic-English dictionary and Taalib means "student" or "claimant" or "applicant" or "seeker of knowledge" which is what I thought, and the plural is slightly different.  Then I looked on line and found that "talibaan" is actually Pashto plural for students.  Close enough.  I'm sure they borrowed the word from Arabic.  And when the word is used in the United States, it's usually on the news, usually negative, and usually refers to a particular type of students.  They are a militant political group.  Okay, you're not really militant in a literal sense, but you're definitely political, definitely agenda-driven, and definitely a "seeker of knowledge" and very strict about your own interpretations of scripture.  I think Taalib is right.  (not Talibaan, technically, since there's only one of you, but close enough.)  FWIW, I'm a bit of a Taalib myself, when it comes to certain issues.

The book question arose today.  They boy had some wicked diarrhea and vomiting today, beginning at about 5:30.  Woke us up.  Since my wife had a more hectic schedule, I played full-time parent today.  Called the school and said he'd be absent.  I did have a lecture at 9, so I took him with me and put him in my office with two books for that 50-minute period.  One book was "Jack in the Beanstalk" and the other was the one I mentioned.  But I didn't stay at work long.  Cancelled my office hour and took him to a clinic.  The physician on duty said she thought it was a 24- to 48-hour virus, no antibiotics recommended, but rest and liquid and a very bland diet.  Turned out she was right.  He's much better now.  In fact, by about 3:30 he was better, and wanting to go out and play ball and ride the bicycle.  Right at the time school dismisses he was all better.  Funny how that works.  Anyway, today was music and a spelling test and reading quiz.  I always try to emulate what they're doing in school if he's absent, so he doesn't waste his mind, so I made him play some songs for me on the piano, and I made him spell a bunch of words for me, and I quizzed him about the books he read. 

When I asked him about the Bible Story books--which was from the public library, I should point out.  Today's public schools, unfortunately, wouldn't even think of stocking such books, as I have pointed out in this thread--he commented that even though it was an apple book, it reminded him of an orange book.  (Apparently in his school, there are Apple Books and Orange Books.  Apples being fruits that you have to eat in one sitting, starting from the outside and going sequentially toward the core.  Oranges, so long as you peel them, can be taken one wedge at a time, and in any order, and the wedges will keep, unpeeled, for quite a long time without oxidizing, so you don't have to eat it in one sitting.  When I probed more deeply, I found that this is how his school discriminates between fiction books, which must be read chapter to chapter, in order, and non-fiction books, which may be referenced and order isn't important.)  The fact that he commented that the Bible Stories book was an Apple Book may make your point for you.  It would not have occurred to a child whose father had not always prefaced all religious discussions with "Some people believe that..." to call the Bible Stories book an Apple Book.  Especially since the local public library has it marked with a series of Library of Congress Call letters making it seem like a regular Youth Reference (i.e., non-fiction, or orange) book. 

Just thinking out loud, I guess.

[angus]

LCBC today.

We have been living in Pennsylvania for about three months, and the wife has been bringing up the idea that we should take the boy to church for a while, and I can tell she's getting serious, so last Sunday I took my bicycle out for a long ride, looking for a big come-as-you-are interdenominational megachurch.  I found one, and decided that's where we can go.  It's on the other side of the tracks, where the population is much denser and the buildings taller and closer together.  It's called LCBC.  No indication anywhere about what it stands for.  (I'd decided it was Lancaster County Bible Church, at some point.  Turns out it's "Lives changed by Christ" as I learned today.)

Starts at 11.  We sauntered in at 11:05ish today.  Free coffee.  Decaf or Vanilla Creme options are available as well.  I'll just have the regular, thank you.  No scones, but there were "doughnut holes."  For the unitiated, it's a small, spherical doughnut.  I didn't try it.  I'm not a fan of doughnuts to begin with, so even if it's a small sphere rather than a large toroid, it's still a doughnut.  There was also steaming hot water with tea bags, for those who prefer tea.  

The children's program was called "Zooplosion" but apparently is also called KidVenture Island.  I got a cup of Joe and then signed the boy up for that.  The tinkertoy/lego/barbie doll time was just ending when we got into the big room full of about a hundred children ranging in ages from about 3 to about 10.  His circle of 2nd graders had maybe 15 people.  Today's lesson was about forgiveness.  I hung around for a few minutes just to make sure he wasn't going to start making paper airplanes or shooting spitwads from his straw or otherwise doing anything weird.  Once I sensed it was okay, I went into the main chapel with my wife.  

When we walked in there were stage lights of alternating colors filtering through smoke or liquid N2.  The effect was very Pink Floyd.  There was a deafeningly loud band playing hard rock, made worse by the fact that the only row where we could find two empty seats together was near the front.  When the music died down the teacher, or pastor, or whatever they called him came out.  He was maybe mid-40s to early 50s and wore blue jeans, sneakers, and an untucked shirt, mostly unbuttoned.  He started talking about salvation.  Very upbeat.  He read from Ezekiel 18 and Jude and 2nd Thessalonians.  There were big LCD screens on the walls which showed the passages he read, and showed him in close-up when he wasn't quoting scripture.  He talked about the view that after death there's nothingness, and about another view that said after death you get re-incarnated in some other body, human or animal.  He then mentioned that there's a view that there's a life after death but that you might have to spend some time in purgatory, depending upon your life.  He then said that his understanding didn't really fit any of these models.  He was all about Jesus' sacrifice, and that the sacrifice meant that you don't have to be perfect to go to Heaven.  He showed a video of the local fire department, and likened saving people from fires to carrying the message of Jesus and salvation.  It was a fairly coherent message.  Upbeat.  All smiles.  He was really into it.  He then passed around little squares of cloth to all 900 or so in attendance.  They stank of smoke and burnt bacon.  They were meant to.  He said he wanted us to perceive the aroma of rushing into a burning building to save someone.  He wanted us to write someone's name who was irreligious or whatever on it.  I wrote angus on mine.  He said that if we couldn't think of anyone's name, then we must be spending too much time in church, and that we needed to get out a little more, and mentioned the fact that there were about 500 thousand people in a ten-mile radius and that statistics showed that only about 20 percent of them went to church on a regular basis.  He wasn't judgemental, and was seriously in love with Jesus and confident in his beliefs.  He wished us well, reminding us that Jesus died for us.  At the end there was some more very loud rock music.  The whole time the lights had been very dim, except for the colored rock-stadium stage lights.  As the main lights came on, I could see that it was a very diverse crowd.  Young and old.  Black and white.  Rich and poor.  

Afterward, we went back to Kidventure Island to pick up the boy.  He looked bored, and I kinda regret getting there late as he didn't have time for the early activities.  We showed our bar code scanner symbols that they'd given us which matched the one on his nametag sticker.  I guess that's how they prevent kidnapping.  Ever security-conscious, we are, even in church.  Anyway, on the way back to the car I asked him if he was a good boy and he said he was, so I said we could go to the science factory later, and that could have his choice between pizza, Chinese, and Vietnamese for lunch.  He picked Chinese.  Over lunch I asked him about what they talked about.  He said it was about a king whose son asked him for his inheritance.  It was unusual because normally you don't inherit your father's money until the old man dies.  But this boy was impatient.  The father gave him the money.  Unfortunately, the son squandered the money on lavish parties, or at the casinos or whatever.  When he was broke, he went back to his father with tears in his eyes, and a little afraid.  But the father accepted him, and in fact was joyous to see his son alive and well.  I'm not sure he really got whatever message they were sending, but I was satisfied that he was basically paying attention, and not making paper airplanes or spitball launchers.  

I don't know if we'll have to go again next week.  Of course I won't bring it up, and I'm kinda hoping she'll forget about it as well, but if she brings up church, I'm okay with LCBC.  I'm a little torn about when to arrive.  Arrive too early, and I have to sit through all that christian rock.  Arrive too late and the boy won't have time for legos and roughhousing before the KidVenture lesson.  Life offers such tough decisions.  I guess we could go early enough for him to play, but then we could sit in the foyer sucking up the free coffee and tea till the band stops playing.