Spaghetti and waffles

Last evening, my daughter and I went for a walk.  Trump signs and flags have been continuously appearing.  One neighbor even put up a full-sized picture of Trump on their front door.  Once again, I find myself wondering why churchgoers have so much faith in a man who has proved himself to be so untrustworthy, disrespectful, and dishonest and how they can sincerely believe that God has chosen him to lead our nation.  Have we become so turned inward and attached to our white privilege, guns, and self-interest that we, good people that most of us are, are calling out to Pilot, “Give us Barabas! Crucify Jesus!”   

Yesterday, while setting up for our annual village yard sale, I learned of an upcoming schism in our denomination.  Why, in heaven’s name, is it so hard for us humans to get along? Why are we so determined on having it my way or the highway?  Why is it so hard to get along, to agree and disagree in love?  The information our pastor shared with me reminded me of that passage in Matthew in which Jesus taught us how to resolve differences.  He says that if we have a difference with our brother we’re to go talk to him.  If that doesn’t work, we’re to take a mediator along the next time.  If that doesn’t work, we are supposed to go with a larger group.  If our brother still isn’t convinced, we are to treat them like social outcasts (tax-gatherers and strangers).   This, of course, is the basis of the Amish practice of shunning.

My daughter likes to say women are like spaghetti while men are like waffles.  Men have this ability to compartmentalize things and keep them separate, while women get everything tangled up like a bowl of spaghetti.  This inherent difference in how we function makes for confusion and tension as men tend to be the rule makers while women are the nurturers.  It also applies to the ways we read scripture.  I, for one, am a spaghetti reader and react strongly to the waffles that try to control my life.

As a spaghetti interpreter, when I read Matthew 18, I hear something different from what my Amish bishop brothers do.  They interpret those few verses within a waffle while I read them as part of a bowl of spaghetti.  Instead of the punishment being disenfranchisement or shunning,  I hear Jesus say we need to erect some healthy boundaries but to continue to interact.  After all, we have many many accounts of Jesus eating and socializing with tax collectors and sinners and if he got angry with anyone it was the Pharisees, their so-called church fathers..  So what is that text really saying?  Might it just be that when we disagree, we keep working to keep the lines of communication open?  It may be important to cool the relationship for a time and establish some clear boundaries, as I already said, but still treat the other with respect.   Better to keep them close than to create an enemy, after all.   There’s a lot of truth in the old saying that a carrot works better than a stick.

It hurts me to see people I know and love fall under the influence of a terribly unhappy, unstable, mentally ill man, but to shun them?  How is that helpful?  They are still my neighbors.   They are still part of my community.   And what better way of changing their minds (or mine) than disagreeing and dialoguing in loving non-threatening ways?  

I certainly don’t have solutions for the mess we seem to find ourselves in.  If only we weren’t so caught up in a win-lose paradigm in which there is no space for a win-win-one. Why this all-or-nothing mindset? Perhaps we need to leave our waffles behind for now, at least, and opt for a spaghetti bowl this time around.  Surely, there is a middle ground on most of our divisive issues, such as abortion, sexual identity, taxes, immigration, etc.  

Ah, well, enough for now.  I’m tired.  So I’m going to crawl back into my spaghetti bowl where I am most comfortable and take a nap.