During the announcements this past Sunday, I invited everyone to take part in our Ash Wednesday Service. I briefly shared that if you have ever had the experience that I had of sitting in a church sanctuary Easter Sunday with the realization that you were not ready to celebrate the glory of the Resurrection, I encourage you to participate this Lent with us. It prepares our hearts, enriches our lives and amplifies our worship to our Lord.

So off and on for the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking about what I’m going to do and not do for Lent. In some sense, each year gets tougher, but each year offers clarity as well so there’s a good bit of joy in thinking about this.

Speaking of joy, I started to see that for many, the time of Lent does not contain joy. Maybe it’s the time of year, where it’s cold in the South and not so cold in the Northeast ;). For others, they may be going through a tough season of life. May they experience peace during this time. Then there is the Twitterverse. I saw some negative vibes on the topic of Lent these past few days. Hopefully, those moments are not indicative of their overall perspective of Lent (or their lives).

I get that some are annoyed by the tweets and Facebook posts of what is being given up. If I may instigate for a second, perhaps they are annoyed that they are not creative enough to give up something “cool” for Lent and as some often do, push back on the attempts of others.  Perhaps they simply have chosen not to participate in Lent (in this particular way or at all). Still some are participating but do not wish to disclose their commitments because they may feel its arrogant to do so. To that I say come on, share, it may be helpful to many. It’s only arrogant if you think it’s so incredible. One could make the case that you can be just as arrogant privately and silently.

So should we share about what we’re doing for Lent? I don’t see why not if our hearts are seeking to commune with God and encourage others to do the same. For those whose hearts are in the right place and choose not to share, I respect that. I do. Just as long as you don’t think Christ’s admonition of the self-righteous Pharisee is the justification (which I keep hearing). The Pharisee stands on the corner praying loudly to get attention, praise and notoriety. Had he genuinely prayed for the marginalized and for his own legalism, I think Jesus would have said something different. I think it’s good that we share our spiritual practices with each other if our motivation is for edification and for the glory of God. He knows our hearts, we know our conscience, let us be judged by Him.

It’s in this context, that I offer what I’m doing for Lent. The theme for our Ash Wednesday service is “Broken Vessels”. Loved the idea of it and I started thinking what that meant for me. How broken am I? What about the brokenness around me? In the lives of others? Throughout our World? Eventually these questions and thoughts pushed me to my theme. And this year I’m focusing on “the Forgotten”. If you’ve been following the blog, you know f’ve been thinking about celebretism lately and to focus on the forgotten seems appropriate in consideration of where I landed.

Who are the people and what are the things that I have forgotten? And what about our “brokeness?”

This question will be in my prayers, conversations, in my readings, and in my meditations. Of course, I always add something for Lent as well. It generally includes something spiritually formative, something financial pointing towards my theme. I’ll be doing all of these in some way.

This year, I could not find anything “original” to give up. Previous years have included giving up coffee. Last year was giving up coffee and Guinness (I would have given up alcohol completely but I was running a pub church gathering and refused to not order a beer out of principle – you see?). This year I considered doing the same, or give up chocolate or social media and a bunch of others but I found none that compelling. It’s now easy for me to give up coffee and at the risk of sounding even more arrogant, it’s become cliche for me to do it. If I really wanted to suffer, I should give up drinking good coffee and drink Folgers. Now that would be suffering but I would be contributing to the unfair wages to coffee farmers as well so that doesn’t seem worthy of my Lent.

Every year, someone suggests not giving up anything for Lent.  Every year I think that’s an easy way out but this year, I think I understand.   In adding more will force me to give up something, probably many things.  This will create stress and anxiety for me which if my Lenten mindset is healthy, should force me to depend more on the Lord.

I struggled on just about every aspect of Lent this year, including the financial part of it. I enjoyed saving the money I spent on coffee in years past and giving it to either a clean water campaign or a fair-trade coffee non-profit. This year, I think I am going to give this offering to my church. Why? Because I find myself giving my extra offerings outside my local church and to now give it there seems “counter-cultural” (at least to me). To some I know this sounds very weird.  To others, you probably get exactly what I’m saying.

I’m reading a bunch of books and some Lenten devotionals and participating in our church’s invitation to Read the New Testament in 40 Days. I may have bitten off too much with what I have selected to read and again, I’m sure it’s in this adding that I will need to give up other things in order to do. Honestly, I look forward to it.

But reading isn’t Lent. Nor is it in coffee, or chocolate, or what we give and don’t do and all that. It’s not in sharing what we’re doing or not sharing what we doing. The most beautiful moments I’ve experienced in Lent come when the senses of our hearts are just a little more heightened and a bit more sensitive. It’s here where we find/discover/remember the truths of the Cross, of the Resurrection and the Hope and Life Jesus offers. Thanks for reading and hope you have a great Lent.

I’ve been thinking about the tragic and untimely death of Whitney Houston and how it connects to these posts on celebritism. The first thought that comes to me is that in today’s media-driven, celebrity-preoccupied culture, celebrity deaths receive extraordinary attention.

In some ways, it may seem like an odd thing to be saddened of a death of someone that doesn’t know of your existence. In some ways, it’s still very normal. People have always mourned the death of people they don’t know. The loss of life is sad on any level and it’s a good thing because the opposite, apathy, seems like an inhumane response.

I remember hearing the story of one of my grandmothers crying when she heard the news that John F Kennedy Jr. was assassinated. In 1963, all of my family was still living in Egypt, in fact, it would be almost 15 years before she could move here. Initially I found it surprising that my grandmother would be saddened by this. As was told to me, regardless of your citizenship, political views, and so forth JFK was the President of the United States and therefore he was a symbol of many things, including the American ideals and hopes. I now understand why she cried.

We probably mourn the deaths of people like Whitney, Michael Jackson, Steve Jobs, Joe Paterno for different reasons. Entertainers carry their symbols. Inventors and coaches carry them as well. Our lives are so inter-connected and only becoming increasingly more. Enter Social Media, the internet and cable news shows. Among the many changes we go through as a society is that we mourn now. Today we don’t only mourn when tragedy strikes the famous, we mourn almost every tragedy.

In some sense, we get to mourn together. We pass on our condolences. We get to pay tribute.

I know to some it feels odd that people would pay their respects online. In anyone’s timeline, there is a wide variety of messages ranging from the trivial to the profound to the practical to the tragic. Such is life. One house in the neighborhood celebrates a birth, another mourns, across the street a couple separates and next door to that one, newlyweds move in. Life is filled with everyone going in different directions all the time.

When a celebrity passes, we are reminded that no one’s life is exempt from hurt. We’re all messed up. Fame, wealth and power does not promise a painless life. We are reminded of our own humanity and everyone else’s. This is a good thing.

In Whitney Houston’s case, her voice is a part of my early adolescence, as Michael Jackson’s was. While I didn’t have posters of them on my wall, they’re part of the life soundtrack. Inevitably, there will people making unsympathetic statements, others will come to her defense. Someone will be blamed, an investigation will likely happen and media outlets will drag the story with new revelations and details for as long as possible.

Depending on how many of the details of the story you want, I find the tough thing is to not objectify the person either way. To be annoyed and dismiss it all in a way that removes sympathy for the deceased is dehumanizing. So is the other extreme of over-obsessing over the story.

Every time something like this happens, we are also reminded that not only is their pain in everyone’s life but something should be done about it. The Christian message proclaims there is hope, there is peace, there is life that Jesus invites us to. As we approach the season of Lent, I encourage fellow believers and seekers to reflect on that. I know I will. As far as the appropriate response, we ought to at least be sure it’s worthy of our human dignity.

I am continuing in my series of exploring celebritism. I had a handful of posts that I weeded out because they carried me away from my original point so I think I’ve got reset again. I’ll post about the tragic and untimely death of Whitney Houston another time as it sadly points to much of what I am saying.

In trying to outline this series of posts, I found the number of people that we regard as celebrities in some way to be incredible and a bit alarming. (In my first post on this, I simply defined a celebrity as a famous, or well known person). While I too have an aversion to stereotyping, I eventually succumbed to the need for it here – hope you’ll see why by the end.

Too Many Different Types of Celebrities:

1. “The Classic Celebrity” – The A-listers of A-listers. They have been talked or will be talked about for decades. Hollywood types like George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie. Music types like Bono, Lady Gaga, and Jay-Z. Athletes like Michael Jordan, Derek Jeter, and Tom Brady. There is always a handful of modeling celebrities in this grouping, television icons like Dick Clark and a handful of what we could call American royalties like former Presidents. They were the Mickey Mantles and the Marilyn Monroes, the James Deans and the JFK’s.

2. “The Entertainment Celebrity” – Jerry Seinfeld, Betty White, Jake Gyllenhall. All the “It” people whose faces are pictured outside theaters, who critics promise us played an “unforgettable performance”. The really good ones create a connection with us through our screens. It’s interesting how we begin to identify them as “friends” over the years. It’s worth noting that according to the tabloid system, you can up your celebrtism by marrying another celebrity.

3. “The Industry Celebrity” – They “entertain” in a different way – their innovation changed our lives. Steve Jobs was one, Bill Gates is and now people like Mark Zuckerberg fit in this group. People talk about them in a way similar to the way I imagine they did about Edison, Rockefeller and Carnegie.

4. “The Temporary Celebrity” – Katy Perry and Justin Bieber. I know it seems that they will never go away but they are the Alanis Morissette’s and Kid Rock’s of today.

5. “The Villain Celebrity” – Kim Kardashian, LeBron James, Paris Hilton and now Casey Anthony and Jerry Sandusky. Previous villains included the controversial Madonna who was loved again after releasing successful hit albums. Sinead O’Conner, Marilyn Manson and OJ Simpson have fallen off the map into general indifference in perhaps what’s called the “Forgotten Celebrity”.

6. “The Fall from Grace Celebrity” – Tiger Woods, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Lindsay Lohan (as posted about earlier). Adored until we hear the words, “Breaking News, reports have been released that …”

7. “The Christian Celebrity” – Being a pastor, I felt the need to include this as every sector/profession of life has theirs. Depending on your corner of the church, these names vary. In my corner, these names are Billy Graham, Tim Keller, Rob Bell, and John Piper. All are white men and three of the four are mid-age to older. Historically, there was really one name you knew, it was the Pope and interestingly enough, his name was always changed. That was until the reformers arrived on the scene and as they had hoped, now preacher’s names are hanging above the stage where the cross of Christ traditionally hung. Ok, that was certainly not their intention, I digress.  But for better or worse, we do need to realize that there are celebrities in the Church.

What This Tells Us
In these categories there are overlaps, there is an A-List, B-List and countless other sub-categories including the wanna-be’s, has-been’s and never will-be’s. They line up at auditions, veg out in front of televisions and never take risks. We could go on here but I have three points to this exercise:

One, we clearly have no shortage of celebrities – and among the many things it reveals, is our need of consumption. And if money can be made from this product, chances are there will be a celebrity to endorse and sell it to us. As mentioned in my first post, the celebrity will always be with us.

Two, it also reveals our apparent need to objectify people. They may be famous but they only matter to us if we like what they do. Even worse, when they no longer interest us, we discard them and when we do, we are in effect saying, people are disposable.

I liken this to us each having a “gladiator” arena. Throughout our week, people are collected for our enjoyment, their performances analyzed, and our pleasure is tabulated by our response at the box-office, the sports arena, how we purchase the products they endorse and how many people “tuned in”. There are now shows that demonstrate how all this done, complete with auditions, judges and “text in your vote”.

When we no longer have any use for them, we give the “thumbs down” sign and whether we look or not, they are quickly removed from our midst.

Third, in light of all of this, we need to be aware how we endorse and help create this system. Know that I am not saying to the fellow Christian that we need to boycott the entertainment industry or culture in general (I find that way of thinking to be unhelpful). Know that I am not saying that we need to save, rescue, or destroy the celebrity system any more than our many other dysfunctional “systems” we have all taken part in creating (political, health, class-system, etc.). What we as believers should already be doing is proclaiming and bringing the redemption demonstrated to us through the person and work of Jesus in all that we say and do.

So, regarding celebritism, what I am saying is that people are people, created in the image of God and deserve that dignity regardless of what our media or even our friends say about them. In doing so, the “celebrity” de-celebritiizes, becomes a normal person, becomes like you and me. Even more importantly, understanding this may allow us to see people the way God sees them.

Thoughts, comments, push backs, feel free …

During the introduction, Pastor Bryan told this story.  Legend has it that Ernest Hemmingway was having dinner with his writer friends and he told them he could write a story in only six words. They bet him he couldn’t so he took out a napkin and wrote these words: For Sale, Baby Shoes, Never Worn.

A powerful and sad story invoking many mental pictures and conjuring numerous thoughts.

More of these stories can be found at sixwordstories.net and examples include:
Missed my plane caught her eye.
Nerdy kid, rocket launcher, bully gone.

As Bryan, said, it only takes a a handful of words to make us laugh or break our hearts.

This sermon focused on the fall of Jerusalem and their six word story was: Covenant made, Covenant Broken Disaster Falls. Judah had already fallen to the Assyrians in 609BC but Jerusalem hung in there. In just 5 years, the Babylonian empire conquered the entire region, the Assyrians, took over Judah and the Egyptians retreated back West.

Jerusalem tried to survive the but was finally conquered in 587BC by King Nebuchadnezzar’s army. Then the exile would begin. More on the exile next time but that was the sermon that I was privileged to give the following week.

I re-listened to this message the other day (a semi-consistent habit that I have made a difference in a few ways, you can listen here) and it made me reflect on the fall of Jerusalem. Back in college, I had the opportunity to visit the holy city (and look forward to one day going again). One of the consistent themes throughout the tour was when the guide would say, “This is where (insert significant landmark here) is believed to be but of course, underneath all of this in one of the older layers of the city.” Jerusalem had been destroyed and rebuilt so many times that so many of the landmarks of the First Century are lost below. That’s why archaeologist dig.

It made me wonder of what I have seen fall over the years. Naturally, I thought of 9-11, and then remembered quickly that thankfully, the entire city had not fallen which magnified the idea that the entire city of Jerusalem had fallen. I have seen so many “natural disaster and alien invasion” type movies where cities and masses of people have been annihilated but I was really struck by the tragedy of what happened in 587BC.

As I thought a little bit more, I thought of other types of “falls” – like the Fall of the Berlin Wall was a great moment for us all. I thought of some trivial types of falls like when a sports team fails in spectacular fashion in the midst of high expectations. I thought of how marriages and relationships and people “fall”. I reflected on my own failures and while I don’t have anything epic enough to impress you with here, I do remember the pain of these times.

It’s a pastoral instinct to finish a sermon, study, blog post on some type of a higher note. But since it’s a sermon journey, I think it’s good to linger here in the ashes a little longer. Maybe there is something for you to reflect on. I’ll just end with a six word transitional story:

Hope Looks Lost … To Be Continued

The previous post made the point that we will always have celebrities. It’s part of the human experience – some are more “famous” than others. So I see no point in trying to find ways to stop celebritism. Therefore, like with most things beyond our control, I’m more interested in how we respond.

But as usual, first a little context.
As mentioned in the About Page, among my interests, is the intersection of faith and culture. So I always have an eye on pop-culture.

Like most people, I scan the tabloids when I’m in line and a couple were featuring the latest on Lindsay Lohan. As usual, the picture they chose was well, let’s say it was one she would never use as her Facebook profile pic. It was not only intentionally non-glamorous but highlighted her anguish adding credibility to the headline. Like many celebrities, she was being objectified for the opposite reason of her success – her failure. I realized something I realized many times before but always quickly forget – she’s like anyone of us.

If she were a member of my youth group, I would have been heartbroken for her. If a friend was sharing about a some girl named Lindsay, I would have listened and been sympathetic, maybe even remembered in my prayers that evening. But this is was a character on a screen somewhere and now she was on a tabloid cover which I have been conditioned to understand “This is just entertainment to be consumed, it’s not real”.

Like I said, I have already thought through this but here’s what I’ve learned about our engagement of celebritism in line that day.

If we care too much and obsess and create “gods” out of the famous, we don’t actually deify them, we dehumanize and objectify them. Because in our minds, it’s still about us and what they do for us so to speak.

On the opposite end, if we villainize too much or are too apathetic, we dehumanize and objectify them in another way. Because still in our minds, it’s about us and what they don’t do for us. In short, they’re not deserving our honor or worth our concern.

We have the potential to do this with just about everyone from the marginalized and oppressed to the family member or coworker.

When we recognize that all have been created in the “image of God” and ask God for the eyes to see all people as He sees them, that’s when the man-made idea of “celebritism” not only becomes irrelevant but when we live in the better way that God intended.

More to come … hope you stay tuned.

Every so often I think about the idea of celebrity and what it does to us, to society and to the individual him/herself. Being a pastor, this eventually brings me to the idea of the “Christian celebrity”. Initially, I think the term is ridiculous but by the end of the thought, I find it somewhat normal, unavoidable, maybe even necessary.

In light of this year’s Mark Driscoll drama, last year’s Rob Bell hoopla and the countless others that have and will happened, we need to put “celebritism” in its place. This series of posts will hope to offer a perspective on that.

For the purpose of these posts, I am simply defining “celebrity” as a famous person; one that has recognition.

It happens on every level. At the summer camp I went to, I remember hearing someone saying, “John is like the ‘camp celebrity’ here”. Until then, I didn’t know we could simply create one. Though I never formally inquired, I figured there was paperwork involved and the signing of petitions, applications and a celebrity ordination council of some sort. Turns out, when enough people think it and say it and it affects social behavior, you become one.

Susan and I saw Jimmy Fallon walking through the Theater District in NYC and while neither of us are fans of his (Fever Pitch sucked!), it’s not every day you see a celebrity and we probably talked about it for a few minutes and told people when we got home that we saw Jimmy Fallon and muttered ‘hey’. “No, we don’t think he heard us.”

I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I got excited about seeing certain people. You would probably be lying too. Maybe you can’t think of anyone in your “bored moment of life” right now but if you have ever been out in public and someone yells, “(insert name of prominence) is here!” Everyone, and I bet you included, everyone gets a bit excited and the dynamics of that place change.

Almost two years ago, a few friends and I threw ourselves on the hood of the vehicle carrying Tom Wright as a reenactment of those numerous pictures of teen-age girls chasing after the Beatles, “OMG It’s the Bishop! (sorry guys, I know I swore I wouldn’t mention that but …). Ok, maybe we didn’t do that and I’ll only speak for myself,but I was definitely excited to see him. I tend to get more excited about people who have influenced/informed my thinking. I have numerous examples.

Among the problems with “celebritism” is that it takes on a life of its own. Some are treated as “gods”. Some start thinking they are. Attention changes us. Imagine if suddenly everyone you walked past recognized you and wanted to strike up a conversation with you. Or if they ran up to you in “shock and awe and tears” and wrapped their limbs around you and screamed in your ears. It would change you.

Many like to say that they are against the idea of celebrity. They may say it’s ridiculous and unnecessary and talk about how awful our culture is. Some think that eventually they will go away. They won’t. And while there are many aspects of “celebritism” that are ridiculousness or disturbing, there are other aspects that simply point to the human experience – some humans are more well known than others. This is why the celerbity won’t go away.

There will always be famous people among us. Even in ancient times, there were celebrities. They are among the names that are talked about today. Moses, King David, Cleopatra, Confucius, Jesus to name a few. Prophet, warrior, royalty, teachers, and the second person of the Trinity have had their names celebrated in their lifetimes and remembered long after.

It’s not a recent phenomenon. Paparazzi (and tabloid culture, TMZ) is a more recent phenomena in human history but famous people, well again that’s normal. We will always have celebrities, now what?

Next we tackle our response to “celebritism” in society, in our church, and in our hearts.
Stay tuned, consider subscribing and see you around.