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13 June
eastern Iowa

I managed to put all but the last hour of Iowa behind
me last night before needing to sleep (please don't tell
anyone at USX, but that was about 720 miles from
Pine Bluffs). Now I'm up again and heading for
Davenport, where my aim is to seek out a Calvary Chapel
for Sunday service, then if the rain holds off --I think I'm
driving back into the tail end of the storm system now-- I'll
catch a Midwest League game, a team called The Swing of the
Quad Cities. No joke.

Today, writing-wise, I'd like to get back to Thomas Merton and Mother Teresa briefly and put them to bed, then I think I have one more
crazy-man rant against the Biblian churches, and finally a long-overdue topic: I would like to begin the discussion of uniting Christotheistic
and Biblian spirituality, for despite all I've said in establishing these ideas as something distinct from the teachings of Bible-believing
churches, I hold that we have a lot more in common than we have that separates us.

Now on the outskirts of Davenport: once again my "aim" is not true; God is giving me something else. There were no listings under
"Calvary Chapel" in the Yellow Pages, except for one out in East Moline, Ill. -- pretty far out of my way if I want to be back downtown
for the Swing game-- and there were no ads with the telltale dove symbol that represents the Calvary affiliation. (That doesn't mean there
aren't any in town; Calvary appeals to Christians who feel a little bit alienated, philosophically or experientially, from the "religious"
churches they may have attended as a child or just heard negative things about. As such they usually portray themselves as "non-
denominational," and are pretty low-key about the elements of their collective beliefs that make them a denomination unto themselves.)
Instead, I felt myself drawn to a place called the Good News Center, because their ad says, "The 'Good News' is...you are in God's
heart." Mmmm, yes, I like the concept. It is a Charismatic church, which is a modern offshoot of the Pentecostal. I have never
knowingly gone to a Charismatic church, but I think two of them –one with Aubray in Columbus, Ohio and one by myself in Tennessee—
actually were. I expect much speaking in tongues, probably some shouting and flag-waving, and hopefully some old ladies in their Sunday
best, prancing up and down the aisles like in a Mardi Gras parade. That’s always good.

* * * *

Reporting live from John O'Donnell Stadium, on

the banks of the

Mississippi River, Davenport,

Iowa: It's 2-1 Swing,

bottom of

the

3rd, against

the Kane County (suburban Chicago) Cougars.

Sunny

and hot, most humidity I've felt in a

long

time (probably

not even

that bad for the locals).

You can see the river over the

outfield wall

from

left-center to the

right field pole and beyond,

and

the park sits

almost directly below the big bridge to

Illinois.

This makes it one of the coolest places to catch a

minor league

game. The ballpark dates back to the

1930s at this

location,

though

a complete overhaul

of the stadium grounds last winter

makes it all

look

brand new. I was here at the old

park about

four

summers

ago, when they were the Quad City River

Bandits;

got a foul ball in

the parking lot on the way

to the truck in fact

(musta had to be

somewhere, I

never leave a game early).

If you come to a Swing game, I highly recommend the Bix Brat,

which is a bratwurst (a sausage, popular in the Midwest; if you

have to

ask, you probably don't want to know what's in it) with

"Chicago-style toppings", which means peppercinis, tomatoes,

onions, some kind

of pickled cabbage, and salt. Awesome (named

after Bix Beiderbecke, early jazz legend --did for the cornet what

Charlie Parker did for

the sax-- and Davenport native son).

* * * *

The Good News Center was nice --not earth-shaking, but nice. I liked the atmosphere, all the banner-waving and the constant din of
praise and prayers during the synthesizer intervals between worship songs. One pretty odd feature was the four ladies in white-and-red
sequined dresses --not unlike cheerleader outfits with ankle-length skirts-- who danced very melodramatically behind the congregation.
For one number, they came to the front and spun around with these....things, they were like hoops they held, one in each hand, with like,
pom-pom tassels around the circumference, real colorful and festive. It seemed like a creative way to honor God, though I couldn't help
but feel like I was at a pep rally. ("GIMME A 'J'! GIMME AN 'E'!....)

There was nothing revolutionary about their doctrine or the sermon, too
many warfare metaphors for my tastes. One part I really liked is, between
the worship music (which is long and is clearly the highlight of the morning)
and the sermon, the pastor (a woman, which I always appreciate) asked the
congregation if anyone is getting a "sense from the Lord" that they'd like to
share, and anyone is free to offer anything they want: read verses, give
testimony, prayer suggestions. One woman, intriguingly, said the Lord told
her He is "healing eyes today." Whoa, really? After the service she was up
front giving prayers specifically for the healing of eyes; I told everyone
about Aubray, and she prayed for her through me. It would have been right
about the time ACF's first outdoor service of the season was staring back in
Ashland. I'll have to ask her if she felt any special hands upon her around
that time. She has certainly been in my thoughts ever since I embarked, if
only between sentences.

Two other things worth mentioning about GNC: on the tithe/offering envelopes they've printed an affirmation that everyone recites before
the collection is taken: "As I am giving in today's offering, I am believing in the Lord for-- Jobs or Better Jobs, Raises and Bonuses,
Benefits, Sales and Commissions, Settlements, Estates and Inheritances, Interest and Income, Rebates and Returns, Checks in the Mail,
Gifts and Surprises, Finding Money, Royalties Received, Bills Paid Off, Debts Demolished. It's offering time --hallelujah!" I really don't
want to nitpick, and I know we want to leave all these matters to God and not try to acquire on our power alone, but....isn't the point of
tithings and offerings to support the church, and to help us understand that it's all God's stuff anyway, that we're just using it on loan?

Oh yeah, and they use cheddar Goldfish for communion wafers. That's cool.

* * * *

Don't look for John Uhl (Yule) in the big leagues anytime soon. Kane County exploded for five

runs off him in the ninth, most on a series of laser shots over the Swing outfielders, one over

the fence and into the grass berm with a

thud about 15 feet to my right as I strolled the

walkway around the park. The Nashua,

N.H. native (born in October 1980, while I was attending 3rd grade just a couple miles

upstream in Litchfield) will have a season ERA

over 5.00 when this mess is over. Last out --

final score: Kane County 7, Quad Cities 2. Time to mosey toward Mishawaka.

* * * *

I don't think there is much that needs to be said really about Thomas Merton and Mother Theresa's quotes earlier, not much that shouldn't
be clear after the elucidation on what John's Gospel means to me vis a vis the Word of God. You can disagree still with its validity on
whatever grounds you like, but it should be clear what Merton meant when he said all people are "walking around shining like the sun,"
("in him was life; and the life was the light of men") and what Mother Teresa meant when she said each one of the people she served
was Jesus ("all things were made by him, and without him was nothing made that was made"). I don't suppose Thomas Merton
stopped everyone on that street corner to ask if they were Christian before he saw the light in them that is His life, nor did Mother Teresa
likely ascertain that all the suffering humanity around her were "born again" before declaring that they all belong in the Body of Christ.

(Her exact choice of words, "Each of them is Jesus," is interesting. Well before I read them, while working on the first draft of P&K, I
was meditating on the best way to describe the relationship between the finite individual and the infinite God, looking for something that
rang true. What occurred to me is that, maybe it is an equation that only works one way: I am not God, but God is I. * One time at ACF
I was doing a "one-on-one discipling” session with a friend and associate pastor, a man whose pre-Christian background included dabbling
in the many varieties of Eastern philosophy, and he knew that mine did too (I don't think he knew that my present background still does).
He said several things during our sessions that I took as efforts to help rid my mind of whatever pantheistic or monistic notions may be
left in the dark recesses (I actually subscribe to neither theology), and in one such instance he pointed to a chair and said, “This chair is
not God.” Oh if only I had known to say, “You’re right, Steve, but God is this chair,” because I would have been able to use his own
words about God to explain why. More on that later….)

* This idea probably came from my recent studies in Alan Watts' The Supreme Identity: Essays on Oriental Metaphysics and the Christian
Religion, his most scholarly, least gotta-be-hip-for-the-beatniks book, and consequently, I find, the deepest and most fruitful; in fact I'd
say it did more to unlock my comprehension of non-dual reality than any other single written work, therefore I wholeheartedly
recommend it without reservation to all. In Supreme Identity, Watts espouses and explains the common sense idea that the finite and
infinite are not exclusive of each other, not opposites; that the finite cannot contain the infinite, but the infinite most certainly does
contain the finite. The whole concept led to the development of a new theological strain and
the expansion of some important dialogue in P&K. I now see it also as a resounding refutation of
and disaffiliation with "New Age" philosophy, which Watts and others have convinced me is
twisting the root metaphysical concepts of the East into an untenable Western mishmash, more
out of ignorance than malice. I would rather P&K not be published at all than to see it in the
New Age section at Barnes & Noble. Maybe I can persuade them to start a Christotheism section.

© 2004 by Hermit Crab
a Fish Out Of Water production

Next -- Chapter 6