Bill Maher and religion...

The least interesting thing about the comedian Bill Maher is his take on religion. He's against it. There, that's about all you need to know.

But Maher can't leave it at that. He feels compelled to attack religious beliefs and the people that hold them. His attack barely rises to the level you might expect from a 7th grade confirmation class.

Maher even goes so far as to make an entire movie about it. "Religulous" a documentary style film along the lines of "Borat" is in the theaters now. Some are wondering about its impact on evangelism. I figure the people who would find this appealing beyond its comedic entertainment value are not going to be prime targets for evangelism anyway.

There is more than enough to criticize about religious beliefs, and the way those beliefs are practiced. Especially in America, where Christendom as Kierkegaard skewered it so effectively, is alive and well. (See Attack Upon Christendom). Maher offers little in the way of insight. His critiques are as infantile as the beliefs he is ridiculing.

Maher simply offers the flip side of the fundamentalist coin. He seems unable to conceive of a truth beyond the level of "fact". A fundamentalist seeks to establish the literal truth of scripture, which is as silly as the atheist (Maher) seeking to establish the literal falsity of it.

Truth, at its most profound level, is not found between the fundamentalist bookends of true and false. That's the stuff of a pop quiz. Let Bill Maher slug it out with Robertsons, the Dobsons and the big box churches. That argument produces more heat than light.

The truth that transforms hearts and lives is found in the "fabrications" of poets and painters, writers and storytellers who understand that truth is never the servant of fact. Fact serves the truth.

Truth lives where hope embraces doubt, where faith requires a great leap and while you are hanging there in mid air, before you land on the other side, truth is what you have to say.

Existential Algebra

Here's a bit of existential algebra. How much difference can one person make in the world?

I have tended to underestimate that, I think. As an artist, I have eschewed the role of 'activist' as being too limiting. Besides, my sense of anger too easily ties my tongue in knots. I wind up writing embarrassing rants that collapse at my feet under their own indignant weight.

Activism seems more goal driven. Art requires a willingness to end up in a different place than you intended when starting out. Which is to say, a willingness to be surprised. Art requires a certain detachment (from outcome) and paradoxically a sense of passion (translated hope). Therein lies the creative tension. How does one manage to maintain passionate detachment? It is easy to get out of whack. Writer's block, depression, cynicism step in to fill the gaps.

Underestimating the impact of the individual is one of those gaps. Everyone rushes in to proclaim a hero, and the artist hangs back. There are no heroes, how much difference can one person make? The hero walks hand in hand with the anti-hero. The sun casts its long shadow.

There is undeniable truth in that observation, as long as you recognize the limitations of it as well. It is not an excuse to do nothing and retreat into cynicism, or quietism, or defeatism. Instead, it is the opportunity to lay hold of your own destiny and not place it in the hands of someone else. Hero or villain.

How much difference can one person really make in the world? My answer. George W. Bush.

In eight years his incurious incompetence has changed the world in astounding ways. Mostly for the worst. Now, if one person's incompetence and unresolved father issues can produce such disastrous changes, isn't the opposite, the capacity for positive change, just as possible at the hand of one person? I believe it is.

If one person can be responsible for so much devastation, one person can also manage to turn it around. Which makes me hopeful for the coming election. Which moves me to be part of my world, with all its shortcomings. Which is to say, shoulder my share of the activist load.

I was never very good at algebra. But, in the midst of the terrible destruction and devastation of Bush years, I can be grateful to be coming out them with this measure of hope still in the social equation. No small feat.