Don’t you wish you’d chosen UMM?

Now that the academic year is starting, the Star-Tribune puts out a short summary of success at Minnesota colleges. We’ll use it next year to recruit more students.

The University of Minnesota, Morris stands out among the state’s public four-year institutions for generating more grads than expected at a good price. UM-Morris Chancellor Jacquie Johnson attributes that result to a tight-knit, supportive campus culture that allows the nearly 1,800 students to build strong relationships with faculty. One of every three students at Morris is either minority or international in origin. The school’s success with that diverse student population warrants examination and imitation.

Yay, us!

Last call, Minnesotans

The fun and informative Minnesota Regional Atheists conference is over for another year, but there’s a little tiny bit more. After Atheist Talk radio this morning, Annie Laurie Gaylor and Greta Christina will be joining us for brunch at Q Cumbers — an open event. So if you weren’t able to make it to the conference, but you’d still like to meet some of the guest speakers, this is your chance.

Al Franken exceeding expectations

Salon has a nice review of our senator from Minnesota, Al Franken (quick, who’s the other one?*). He really has been doing well, working hard, mostly coming down on the side of goodness and reason, and he’s also a darn nice fella in person — he’s even visited our quiet rural backwater a few times.

We could use a few more like Franken in congress.

*No, it’s not Michele Bachmann. It’s Amy Klobuchar, the woman politician from Minnesota who always gets unfairly overshadowed by the kook from the 6th congressional district. We have two Democratic senators and a Democratic governor, I’ll have you know.

An atheist goes to church: Federated Church of Morris

Today I attended the Federated Church of Morris. I’ve actually been here many times before in a different capacity — it’s where my district goes to vote (but that’s a different bag of worms to complain about). It also has a reputation as the most liberal church in Morris, so this is where a lot of the believing faculty go, and I suspect most of the registered Democrats in town.

So I was not at all surprised at all of the effete decadence I saw going down in there.

First, the service starts at the odd hour of 9:30 — they just have to be out of phase with the rest of the town. One of the notable things I saw at the other churches was their remarkable punctiliousness, with every service starting precisely on the hour, and ending exactly one hour later. Not the Federated Church; they were a little more casual with their time, starting 5 minutes late, and the service went on for an hour and a quarter. I know, you’re already shocked, but the worst is yet to come.

Unlike the other churches, we were asked to stand once at the beginning (and then, only “if you are able”) and once at the end. I could spend the whole dang hour and a quarter with my butt firmly pressed against my seat (And, of course, the pews were padded, but then that seems to be par for the course here in degenerate Morris). My knees did not get a workout in this place at all.

The pastor is a woman, and the opening hymn even included a line about “Mother God”. The church isn’t even organized traditionally. There was a central altar, and the pews were arranged in the round around it. Or, should I say, since there were 5 banks of pews, they were arranged rather pentagonally…or perhaps [duh-duh-DUUUUHH!!] pentagrammatically.

So, anyway, so far it seems to be my kind of place. Thumbs up on ambience and clientele and hosts. What about the content?

And that, alas, was all too typical. Hymns, prayers, and invocations of some dude named Jesus all over the place; readings from some stodgy old book; a list of prayer recipients we were supposed to remember. Somebody has been giving the pastor lessons in good pedagogy, because rather than lecturing at us, she called for active participation from the audience. If only the interactions had been interesting! We had a blank page in the papers we were handed at the beginning, and she asked us to come up for names for their god — and so people were offering up happy pablum, like “love” and “service” and “parent” and so forth. I was coming up with names that I would not have wanted to utter in the respectful atmosphere of a church, so it’s a good thing she didn’t call on me. I think the nicest things floating around in my head were “nothing”, “ghost”, and “nonsense”, and even those would have been disruptive to use. So I kept silent.

Don’t ever say I don’t know how to be polite!

Unfortunately, despite the well-meaning attitudes of this congregation, all I heard was a lot of mumbo-jumbo. I’m afraid that even the mildest of Christian habits, praising a non-existent god, is as nonsensical to me as going to a charismatic church and seeing people twitching on the ground, chanting “FALAFA DOOBA SHADA BAKA LAKA ZALA FA NA”. It left me cold, bored, and wondering what the heck people got out of this repetitive fantasy. It’s sad. I think they were all good people, but they have this need to dress up humanitarian good-heartedness with goofy old legends, and for some, I’m sure, the goofiness is the point. But I can’t share that view.

So I’m hanging this project up. The Federated church would have been the high point of my experience, I’m sure — these are my kind of people, except for the religion thing — and it would all be downhill from here. There was still our local biblical literalists, the Apostolic Christian Church, and the Morris Assembly of God, and the Kingdom Hall, but those folks be batboinking nuts, and I think I could only get a worse opinion of religion by visiting those. So that’s enough. I’ve had a charitable sampling of local faith.

Also, I’ve got to tell you — church services are goddamned boring. I think that’s how the tediously dull game of football got to be such a big sport in this country — they only had to be less boring than church.

Mother Nature rebukes the trees

We’ve had a spate of ferocious weather here in Morris lately; a huge thunderstorm ripped through the area last night, keeping me awake with the constant rumble like freight trains rushing through my attic and the strobing light show of continuous consecutive flashes of lightning. I walked through town today and it was a scene of total tree carnage, with branches littering the roads and whole trees on every block shattered and lying broken. Nature was declaring that this whole countryside is supposed to be prairie, dammit, with grass that would bend before the wind, not trees that would break. She wasn’t very happy with those annoying houses, either.

But what she really hates are parking lots.

morrisparking

And cars. Yeah, screw those cars.

I don’t think she did quite enough yet, either. We’re under a tornado watch for tonight.

Baseball and atheism

Minnesota Atheists’ regional conference will be held in St Paul on 10 August, with the always awesome Susan Jacoby as the headliner. Sign up and join us! We’ll also have Amanda Knief, Hector Avalos, Greta Christina, and some boring local guy they always bring in because he’s cheap and convenient. But it will be great fun!

Also, sign up for the baseball game the night before. Maybe you aren’t into the sports stuff, but it’s more of a social event with our local team, the St Paul Aints, having a great time clowning on the field, and lots of cheerful godless conversation over hot dogs and beer. I went last year, and greatly enjoyed myself.

An atheist goes to church: The Catholic Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Oh, gob. I’m beginning to crack. This whole series was a ghastly mistake. As I was sitting there in the pews (unpadded this time!), it began to sink in that I was bored, excruciatingly deeply terribly bored, that these people were saying nothing of any interest to me and never would, and that the whole affair was a dreadful waste of time. It was all coming back to me, the dreary tedium of church, and I wondered how all these people can bear it, going to this same ritual week after week after week.

I’m trying to make a sincere effort to learn what the religious folk in town are getting out of this tedious affair of going to church, but it’s evading me.

But there must be something to it — guilt, a sense of obligation, inertia? — because this was the biggest one so far. Over 150 people were in attendance on a beautiful summer day…another reason it was such a waste. It didn’t help that the Catholic service was so much more coldly formal than the protestant churches we attended in the last two weeks, either. There was lots of bouncing up and down, stand, sit, kneel, but I suspect it was all part of a plan to keep people from falling asleep during the service.

Let’s see…anything good I can say about it?

Well, the music was much nicer. The hymns were a little bit more sophisticated with more complex melodies then we got elsewhere. Part of that might have been that they were all led by a woman who had a most excellent singing voice. Usually, church congregations singing a hymn is an example of regression to the mean — the song averages out to a mumbly drone. With this woman in charge, though, I could actually listen to the music, and it was good.

The sermon wasn’t the informal punditry we usually get. Instead, they led up to it with three bible readings, all on the theme of sin and forgiveness, and then the priest gave a short discussion interpreting and explaining the meaning of those verses. It was much more universal (hey! Catholic!) than a rant about the latest news or candidate or Americanism. So I actually kind of appreciated that it was a more philosophical discussion, even though I fundamentally disagree with the whole premise of original sin and redemption through belief.

We got to see a baptism! It was preceded by a litany of belief (Do you renounce Satan? “Yes, we do,” replies the congregation. Do you believe in Jesus, the Resurrection, etc.? “Yeah, yeah, you betcha” (or words to that effect) intone all the people (except me)), and then the priest dumped a whole pitcher of water over the kid’s head.

And finally, “Behold the Lamb of God,” said the priest, and he waved a cracker and a cup at us. It didn’t look like mutton to me. Everybody filed up to get their mouthful of Jesus, again except for me. I refrained since I knew that if I was recognized, there might be an unruly spectacle, and also because I’ve had enough of Jesus’ meat in my mouth for my entire lifetime.

Another concern is that they all share the same wine cup. How unsanitary. I mentioned to my wife on the way home that if ever the zombie apocalypse starts, the vector is probably going to point right back to a Catholic church somewhere. I get the cruds at the beginning of every school year just from being in the same room with mobs of students, I can’t imagine sharing spit with ’em all.

So we escaped right after that. One noteworthy thing that did save me from terminal boredom: all of the church services we’ve attended so far have been impeccably timed. Every one begin precisely at the stated hour, and exactly one hour later, we’re being sent on our way. I’ve been impressed so far.

But still, an hour is an hour too long. I feel obligated to go to another one next week. I may need to pray for strength.

An atheist goes to church: First Baptist

This is Minnesota, where all the Scandihoovians are Lutheran and all the Germans are Catholic, and there ain’t no one else. Well, at least that’s the stereotype. Since we went to the liberal Lutheran church last week, because that’s what I grew up in, my wife suggested that for parity’s sake we attend a church like the one she was brought up in. She was Baptist, once upon a time. Would there be any Baptist churches here?

Yes, there’s one. So we dropped in this morning, and Mary introduced me to Baptist culture.

First shock: Baptists sleep in. The service didn’t start until 11am. I know! They’re stealing an atheist advantage there! Mary said that was typical, though. There were also more Baptists in town than I expected, with about 60 in attendance.

The second mild surprise was that the whole service is practically non-stop hymn singing, and that they had a pianist, an organist, and a violinist up front to accompany us. I was used to liturgies & chants & recitatives breaking up the occasional hymn, but no, we opened up the hymnal as soon as the service started (promptly at 11, and again, it ended promptly at noon) and worked our way through a series of hymns with one interruption for the offering collection and one for the sermon. And we sang every verse of every hymn! Of course, every song had the same structure: two line verse, followed by two line chorus, then repeat and repeat and repeat.

The music did nothing for me, but then I wasn’t brought up in it. Mary got caught up in the rhythms, which I found interesting — early childhood experiences seem to program us to respond to particular patterns, and I could tell that I’m a Lutheran atheist and she’s a Baptist atheist. Irreconcilable differences, I guess we’ll have to divorce.

Wait, no, I think the atheism cleared those conflicts away. Whew!

Then, the sermon. Scratch that, the “message”. It started off well.

It was built around Psalm 147, and the pastor was telling us about the things God is not impressed by…and the first one was by show of force. Was this going to be a pacifist message? I might like this guy after all.

Alas, it was to be that only certain shows of force fail to delight the Lord. God is not impressed with North Korea’s parades of tanks and missiles, and they keep shooting missiles at us (Really? Where?) and they keep missing. And hey, Napolean invaded Russia with 600,000 men, and nearly all of them died to God’s winter, and the same for Hitler’s army. Ditto for Pharoah’s army, which chased Moses across the Red Sea, and then God made their chariot wheels fall off. They’ve found those chariot wheels at the bottom of the Red Sea, too. (No, they haven’t. This is more propaganda from wacky Ron Wyatt, who made that claim — I can tell what kind of literature the good Reverend is reading!)

God is also not impressed with snobbery — he’s all about the little people. Somehow this was illustrated by the example of our president traveling overseas to visit terrorists and communists, but being unable to find time for the funeral of the great Margaret Thatcher. I didn’t quite get the connection, but OK, he was rambling on at this point.

The third thing God does not find delightful is…secular thinking. Modern people are all bowing down to the god of medical science, and engineering science, and geological science, and did you know that George Washington almost died because the doctors kept bleeding him? But William Harvey, a Christian scientist, discovered that the heart was a pump, and showed them all to be wrong. I was feeling rather confused at this point, since a) the doctors who were bleeding Washington would have been Christian, too, and b) William Harvey discredited the practice of bloodletting in 1628, and can’t really be credited with saving George Washington in the 18th century.

Then my favorite part: “Evolution is only a theory, not a proven fact, and did you know that intelligent people don’t believe that theory?“ He actually said it. I guess I won’t be joining his church, then.

Then the sermon got really incoherent, and not pacifistic at all.

This guy was really obsessed with Israel. He told us a story about how as a boy delivering newspapers he read about the Six Day War in 1967, and how Israel with God’s favor whipped all of its enemies until the United Nations forced them to stop, and now the UN is trying to force Israel to turn over most of Jerusalem to Arab Terrorists. Israel good, UN bad.

He also told us how the US had the North Koreans beat and chased them all the way to the Chinese border, and then the Chinese started massing troops, and General MacArthur asked to use nukes on them, and got turned down by Truman. I got the distinct impression that this servant of a god who is not impressed with shows of force thinks we should have nuked the Chinese.

America has become more concerned with its own house rather than God’s house, and is in moral decline, what with all this homosexuality. We must pray for America to humble herself so that God will heal her — if we don’t pray, we’ll find ourselves in the midst of a Nazi-Communist America! We have forsaken the Chosen People of Israel! God has made a covenant with one nation, Israel — not America, not Germany, not France, only Israel, and Israel is a monument to God and a witness to show that the End Times of the book of Revelation will come to pass!

You get the idea. It wasn’t quite my cup of tea. I would have been curious to learn if the majority of the congregation were as rabidly pro-Israel as their minister, but then it ended abruptly, the minister announced that we were dismissed, and we left.

I was impressed that it started precisely at 11am and stopped exactly at noon. So far these services have been remarkably well-timed. Otherwise…no, I’m not tempted by any of them.

By the way, this particular church is a member of the New Testament Association, which has a few rules.

Q. What is the NTA position on sexual practices?
A. Each local church sets its own standards, but we commonly hold to these practices. We believe in monogamy and sex only within the bond of marriage (between a man and a woman). We do not accept homosexuality, abortion, and other conduct that is contrary to the teaching of Scripture.

Q. What does the NTA believe regarding dietary practices?
A. We believe it is improper for believers to use alcoholic beverage in any form, tobacco in any form, or illicit drugs of any kind. A balanced diet (consisting of meat, vegetables, and fruits) should be maintained conducive to good health.

So, no gay vegans allowed in this congregation? I can’t even wash out the taste of the sermon with a beer afterwards?

There are other people who aren’t welcome.

Affiliated churches of this Association: 1) Shall be composed entirely of immersed believers. 2) Shall have declared by vote their agreement without mental reservation with the Statement of Faith and the Preamble of this Association. 3) Shall not be in affiliation with any other national association of churches. 4) Shall not be in affiliation and/or fellowship with any organization which condones the presence of religious liberals or liberalism.

Darn. I guess I shouldn’t go back then.

P.S. Padded pews again! What is it with these decadent modern folks and their pampered butts?