Tuesday, April 17, 2012

AIDS, Promiscuity and the Power of Monogamy

From an early age I watched the evening news with my parents. It was part of our nightly routine - eating dinner and watching the news (sometimes at the same time). One distinct memory was watching Reagan's re-election campaign against Walter Mondale in '84 (I was 6). My parents were (and are) ardent Democrats, although they knew in this case that Mondale didn't have a chance. I remember watching coverage of the space program and local news of happenings around Austin, TX. I was on the local news once with my mom when news cameras came to our house for a story going on in our neighborhood. A brush with greatness.
But my exposure to the news had negative effects as well. For instance, throughout the 1980's and early 90's AIDS coverage was on just about every news broadcast that came on the air. People were absolutely freaked out about this epidemic, and the media never ceased to report on famous AIDS deaths, research towards vaccines/cures, controversy around homosexuality and prophylactics, and the general fear that this virus could overwhelm our nation and world. After exposure to these news stories I began to have my own paranoia about the disease. As a kid this kind of news coverage was scary. In fact, not being fully educated on what AIDS was, I thought I might have AIDS! It seemed like everyone else did! I suppose that's the danger of knowing only partial facts, as well as being too young to really understand what a sexually transmitted disease is.

I recently read a book called Epidemic: A Global History of AIDS by Jonathan Engel. I think it's a must-read for anyone interested in knowing more about the history of AIDS and the current crisis. It's a well-documented and carefully researched work that deals with AIDS' origins, a history since the late 1970's, as well as various specific topics such as the AIDS crisis in Africa.

There was one aspect of Engel's research that I found particularly interesting, and that was his perspective on the media coverage of AIDS, especially from the late 1980's to early 1990's - the time when I was a kid watching the news. His research shows that the way in which AIDS was presented to the average household in America was that of a potential pandemic that would eventually take over the world. However, the statistics even then demonstrated that very view average, middle class Americans with fewer than 6 sexual partners a year had AIDS or even, based on lifestyle choices, had a very good chance of contracting AIDS. However, my guess is that even moderately educated adults during this period of history would shutter at what seemed like the impending doom of life on earth. The reasons for this pandemic portrayal are complex, but to put it simply two factors were involved: First, at the early stages of AIDS there were simply many unknowns about how and when the disease was transmitted, not to mention the fact that it was clear early in the research process that finding a cure was going to be difficult, if not impossible. Secondly, there were many political factors in view. Due to prevalent homophobia that was completely out of control in many parts of the U.S., many fought to defend homosexuals against accusations of AIDS as a "gay disease" - and rightly so. AIDS isn't a "gay disease". However, in a effort at such a defense an inaccurate picture of the AIDS crisis was painted and sold to millions. The truth is that AIDS was relegated primarily to certain segments of society -drug users, highly promiscuous individuals (in the late seventies, early eighties this was primarily homosexuals, especially those involved in bath houses of large metropolitan areas), as well as recipients of blood transfusions. These demographics are not the demographics of a coming pandemic. Granted, heterosexual middle class Americas could contract AIDS - but they rarely did.

Engel's research is not a bash on the media, although irresponsible journalism was certainly a factor. His research simply shows a growing awareness of a terrifying virus that seemed to have no cure and no end to its ability to mutate RNA strands in uncontrollable ways.

However, despite the nature of AIDS in America as primarily relegated to certain groups of people, the story of AIDS in Africa is very different. Homosexuality, and promiscuity in homosexuality, seems almost non-existent in most of Africa. In Africa, middle class non-drug using, non-blood-transfusion-receiving people, were getting AIDS, beginning in the 1980's, and the disease spread, and continues to do so, like wildfire. Before reading the book my theory was that this was due to rape and prostitution. Although prostitution is a strong factor, the biggest factor is simply promiscuity. In many parts of Africa, especially sub-Saharan Africa, promiscuity is a way of life. Traditional sexual social mores which support the unquenchable sex drive of men, as well as accept the degrading of women in prostitution, rape, and abuse, serve as the standards for poor moral choices and the conduit for the spread of the deadly virus.

The book is obviously much more sophisticated and technical than can be covered in this post. And I'm not criticizing Africa as a continent (or the countries within it) - other countries, Thailand for instance, deal with their own sets of challenges with the disease. But it struck me as interesting, and sad, how multiple sexual partners (prostitution of course included) is, at it's root, the greatest challenge to defeating AIDS. Many of the individuals studied in Engel's work were recorded as having thousands of sexual partners per year on average. Those kinds of statistics make AIDS almost unconquerable. (Unfortunately, on another note, funding to find a cure for AIDS is becoming more scant. Combination therapy has allowed AIDS victims to live for many years, thus making the search for a cure optional, in the eyes of many.) We as Americans would do well to continue the fight against AIDS in Africa, because the death toll is reaching staggering numbers, and continues to climb.

Reading Engel's work and reviewing AIDS statistics and history, reminds me of the power of monogamy. Unfortunately many view monogamy not as powerful, but as confining. But it's the exclusive nature of monogamy that provides safety, comfort, trust, and health - not to mention true sexual fulfillment. A world living by these standards may only be possible in a Utopian society (or the future society with Christ as reigning king), but at the very least we need to fight for the sanctity of commitment, purity, and the gift of marriage.

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Scripture and the Authority of God

Scripture and the Authority of God is a book by NT Wright that was recently re-released with a few changes and additions from the original book titled, The Last Word. Authority is an effort by Wright to demonstrate how the Bible has authority in the present and continues to serve as the church's unwavering basis and dynamic guide throughout history. Written as a 'popular level' work, Authority is less polemic than other works by Wright (just as Justification) but also not designed to be primarily an academic study. The best audiences for this book are probably pastors, lay Christians, non-Christians seeking answers (although there's enough Christian terminology to cause a person to get lost) and seminary students in their early years of study. Overall, the book delivers a strong case for God's authority working through the vehicle of Scripture, but comes up short in making a specific ontological case regarding the nature of Scripture itself.

Very early in Authority NT Wright pulls from his hip pocket something he loves to do in almost every work I've ever read by him, as well as every sermon I've heard him preach. He loves to say that we (Christians) are coming to the text of the Bible with the wrong questions (or at least asking the right questions in the wrong way). In the preface he says: "Having made the Bible the focus of my own professional work for many years, I have become convinced that we are asking at least some of the questions in the wrong way." He goes on to describe an article he's written in the past concerning the Bible's authority as well as chapter 5 of his magnificent work, The New Testament and the People of God, in which he describes the biblical story as a 5-act play (also Authority 122ff). We are currently living in the 5th act, which is the last phase of God's eschatological plan for humanity and all creation. Then what are the right questions, Dr. Wright? He lays them out as such: 1. In what sense is the Bible authoritative in the first place?; 2. How can the Bible be appropriately understood and interpreted?; 3. How can its authority, assuming such appropriate interpretation, be brought to bear on the church itself, let alone on the world? These are great questions, and Wright logically works through each one methodically and candidly. However, as Wright plainly states, he believes these questions are the most important ones, and other questions that have been asked are perhaps not the most critical of questions. An example of such questions might be, "Is the Bible historically reliable?". "How do we know if the Bible is divinely inspired?" "Is the Bible free from error?". If these questions are the most pressing for the reader, he or she will walk away disappointed. These are not the questions of this book. 

Understanding what questions Wright is asking is essential in understanding his work. He's essentially asking questions about how the Bible could be viewed as authoritative, but he always answers those questions in terms of how God uses the Bible as an authority. In chapter one Wright defines what he means by the authority of Scripture: "...the authority of the triune God, exercised somehow through scripture". (Authority, 21) In other words, the authority of the Bible is never spoken of apart from the authority of God. Such an approach may seem on a surface level axiomatic, however, many traditions speak about the Bible in terms of it's efficacious nature apart from the dynamic and ever-present working of Father, Son and Spirit. (Many systematic theologies attest to this fact as Bibliology is often the basis of its foundational theology, vs. Theology Proper.) In fact it's this apparent tension between the authority of God and the authority of Scripture with which Wright deals:

"...how can we speak of the Bible being in some sense authoritative when the Bible itself declares that all authority belongs to the one true God and that this is now embodied in Jesus himself. The risen Jesus, at the end of Matthew's gospel, does not say, "All authority in heaven and on earth is given to the books you are all going to write," but "All authority in heaven and on earth is given to me." This ought to tell us, precisely if we are taking the Bible itself as seriously as we should, that we need to think carefully what is might mean to think that the authority of Jesus is somehow exercised through the Bible. What would that look like in practice? In particular, what happens when we factor in Jesus's own redefinition of what 'authority' itself might mean?" (Authority, XI)

Wright works throughout the book to resolve that tension and does so mainly by means of a brief history of the various views of the Bible, within and without the church.

In short there are three things of central importance for Wright about which the role of the Bible within the church should remind us: God is a God who speaks; God's transforming grace enables us to think in new ways - i.e. reading a book in order to be changed by God is not counter intuitive; and lastly, that the resurrection of Jesus forms the basis for the mission of the church to the world.

Across the board this book is engaging, well-written, and theologically astute. Wright's efforts at tying the authority of Scripture back to the Triune God as well as to the mission of God is a praiseworthy, and ultimately successful, effort. In addition, although brief and perhaps at times painted in broad strokes, his historical analysis of the history of scriptural interpretation is helpful. Wright is often criticized for commenting on modernism too harshly, however this book seems to offer a balanced approach. Where Authority might fall short is due to the many epistemological reasons that the church can view the Bible as authoritative - namely, it's historical credibility, it's resilience throughout history, etc. That's not to say the Bible can be understood fully apart from God's authority, but it does have some credibility within the subject of Bibliology apart from Theology Proper. Part of this issue however goes back to the questions that Wright is trying to answer, as discussed above. But Wright's purpose in this particular work does not change the need for other questions about the Bible to be asked and answered - whether or not Wright thinks those are the right (or best) questions.