Dave Cullen: Christians-Religion

I like Ted Haggard

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 01:00:54 GMT

Mostly. I like Ted despite statements like this on Ophah today:

"I'm a heterosexual with issues."

Ted. Please. From what you've described, bi, maybe. Probably gay, but I've never been in your head, so who knows. But I guy who has spent his whole life yearning for sex with men, is not heterosexual, with or without issues.

And by the way, "issues"? That's a really annoying way to put it.

I like Ted anyway, because he's struggling, he's trying, I believe he's sincere, and he's getting there.

I like him for saying that he spent most of his life believing the gay urges were a demon inside him, and he finally accepted "This is not a deamon. This is me."

"When I said 'This is me," Oh! So all of a sudden, everything started to change, and that's when I started to heal."

Oh, for his Evangelical constituency to hear just that one reflection alone, to hear it and take it in. It's not a demon. It's just who some of us are. God made us that way. No big deal.

Unfortunately, Ted can't quite get to the no big deal part. He has reached the point of saying that it's OK to be gay, but he hasn't internalized that belief to the point that he'll admit that he's one of those homos--or even bisexuals. Still a big dose of self-loathing in there, clearly.

But show me a homo who didn't face years of self-loathing. It takes a lot of us decades to get over, sometimes a lifetime, often that's not enough. He's been facing it for two years. Give him a break.

Two years, that's that thing. I caught myself a couple times chastising him, saying, "For God's sake, Ted, you've had two years." How easily we forget. I had a seven year "experimenting" and bi period. And I was 28 before I got that far. And my case is not unusual. Very easy to judge now that I'm on the other side and cool with it.

(Of course Ted was experimenting long before two years ago, but he was not dealing with it.) Two years, not so long.

At least he's gotten to this point: Oprah asked if he thought he was cured, and he said, "I don't think I'm cured, because I don't think I was ever sick."

That's a big freaking step.

I also realize that he took a marriage oath with his wife and he's trying to honor it: to be a part-time straightguy for her if he can. What they don't seem to face is that oath was based on a big fat lie that he probably can't live up to. Maybe they can, but what they described on the showdid not sound plausible. (If what's really happening is that Ted is going into the bathroom and jacking off to gay porn, or just his own gay fantasies several times a week, and then accepting celibacy on the sex life he craves and making do with it with her . . . OK. But is that really accepting who you are and living your life to its fullest? Or is that trapping both people into a terrible compromise?)

I like his wife Gayle even more. I really liked her honestly on the show, and she and I have mutual friends who assure me that's the real Gayle. And their two adult kids were impressive, too.

Gayle, however, seems to be deepest in delusion. Several times she tried to make the point that urges don't have to define you--you can make choices. Of course that's true about drug addiction, stealing . . . bad choices. But choose to deny your own sexuality? You can, but is that actually a good choice?

Which brings us to Oprah, my hero of the day. She did a masterful job with this interview, as she nearly always does. (If you still think Oprah is a lightweight--when was the last time you watched Oprah? Yes, she does some lightweight pop-star shows. Those are lightweight. They pay the bills. Different story.)

Gayle returned the theme and said, "You can still make choices, though. Even though there are those inclinations, waht you do, what you act on--"

Oprah cut her off that time, vigorously shaking her head. "I'm not agreeing with you on that. I'm not going there with you Gayle."

Thank you!

Gayle's situation seems kind of sad. I do believe she and Ted love each other, and can probably remain good friends and co-parents, and perhaps even have some sort of marriage. But her characterization was that she can have a gay or bi husband and he can just shut off the gay part and repress it and act like a straightguy and everything will be just fine. Good luck with that.

She kept pressing, and Oprah refused to back down:

"I don't know--this is the one thing I don't know: what it would feel like to even have an inclination to be gay. But I have a lot of friends who are gay, and have known they were gay since they were little people, and that is who they are. So to deny that part of yourself, I think is wrong. I think that God doesn't want you to deny who you are."

That is about the finest statement I have ever heard concerning gay people.

Thank you, Oprah.

NOTICE: See you on the weekends

Mon, 26 Sep 2005 18:17:40 GMT

Hey. You might have noticed I'm rarely here during the week these days.

Yes, by design. Trying to keep my focus entirely on my book during the week. Hence the big one-day bursts on Saturdays and Sundays. So look for me then. (Or on Mondays when you get back to trolling the web at the office, while your boss is away. heeheehee.)

OK, better try that bigger:

LOOK FOR ME MOSTLY ON THE WEEKENDS UNTIL THIS BOOK IS DONE!

Occasionally I may stop by in an evening, if I've had a great day and deserve an indulgence, or maybe once in awhile for a quickie. (Like just now. I figured since I was here to let you know this, I could pound out a quick reaction to the Housewives.)

But hopefully you'll see a lot of self-control.

See you Saturday.

The Fundamentalist-Evangelical Split

Wed, 15 Jun 2005 18:35:38 GMT

No, I'm not talking about some big flare-up this week or this month. The original schism between the two.

If you've always wondered what the two terms mean, Beliefnet is featuring an excerpt from Wendy Murray Zoba's book on Evangelical Christians that lays out the split.

Great little informative read, and gives you a taste of what you'll find in her book. Prolly not the most fascinating subject matter for people outside that particular fold, but gives you an idea of her style.

One step up from prostitute

Tue, 14 Jun 2005 07:03:04 GMT

Just read the Booklist review of Wendy Murray Zoba's new book (released today), The Beliefnet Guide to Evangelical Christianity. Check out this opening:

Citing a 2003 poll, Zoba reports common knowledge: "Americans generally" dislike evangelicals "more than any other social sector, except for prostitutes."

Wow. It's amazing how many people think the evangelicals have taken over the country, when they're actually getting trampled into the dirt.

And if you spend any time at all with them, you realize how badly they can feel it. Why do you think some of them behave like cornered animals?

Evangelical christianity--she wrote the book on it

Tue, 14 Jun 2005 03:09:00 GMT

I have three friends with new books out. This has never happened before.

David Plotz, my editor at Slate, has a big new book from Random House, The Genius Factory. More on that soon, as well as on David Yoo's Girls for Breakfast.

But Wendy Murray Zoba, a friend and collegue I got to know covering Columbine was asked by Beliefnet and Doubleday to write The Beliefnet Guide to Evangelical Christianity.

The two are teaming up for a series of books on the various world religions, and at this moment in time, this one and the one on Islam are arguably the most important for most Americans, who are largely unfamiliar with both.

Really cool that they asked her to write it. And she has spent her life working in the field, but still spent ages researching it.

It comes out tomorrow. I have not seen it yet, but here's Publishers Weekly's review (scroll down about one screen to the Editorial Reviews section):

Here we have evangelical Christianity in a nutshell, written by a former Time and Christianity Today journalist who describes herself as an evangelical. Using Beliefnet's characteristically breezy and accessible writing style, Zoba tells the truth about evangelical Christians. They are not all in agreement on political issues such as abortion and homosexuality; they don't all reject the theory of evolution; and while most believe in the inerrancy of the Bible ("when scripture says something, it is telling the truth"), they interpret scripture in a variety of ways. This guide claims that evangelicals share certain core religious values: they believe humans must have a "born again" experience to become Christians, emphasize a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, trust in the reliability of the Bible and "feel obliged to share their faith in Jesus (which they believe saves them from eternal damnation) with other people, in order to save them, too, from eternal damnation." The book works overtime to rescue evangelical Christianity from the notion that it promotes only individual concerns, with Zoba emphasizing the many ways evangelicals are working hard toward social justice and the alleviation of poverty. This guide delivers what it promises—a broad view of evangelicalism designed to help readers be more tolerant and accepting of this branch of Christianity. (June 14)

I have spent quite awhile covering Evangelicals, and while we definitely disagree on some key things--like the alleged sinfulness of my gay existence--I have found much more there than I expected. One of the most misunderstood groups in America. Partly because they are not one monolithic group. And that's a lot of what she tries to unravel.

Loving somebody

Fri, 29 Apr 2005 18:38:29 GMT

Ever have doubts? Big, horrible, momentary flashes of doubt about the entire direction of your life?

Like, say, God actually not being cool with you loving guys, smiting you down the minute you die for it?

Perhaps I should keep these to myself, but . . .

I don't have them often. I'm pretty comfy that He'd be pissed as hell at me if I contorted myself into some abomination completely alien to how He made me.

But those little moments.

At the strangest times.

I was merrily making my breakfast just now, kind of all giddy cause my writing is finally kicking into high gear on this magazine story, plus I woke up and spilled out three pages in bed for the memoir that I'm still years away from reworking, but there it was, the answer to so much of the ending.

And I was doing a little happy dance, so I gazed up for a second and thanked God for all the great gifts I had been given, feeling slightly guilty again that I haven't done that in awhile, seem to have lost my way on how to pray again, but grateful that the feeling just struck me for a mini conversation and I went with it, and for some reason I was struck with an unexpected thought, and of course it popped right out my mouth, cause I was born without an editor: "God, I hope you exist." (No pun intended on the first word.) "I think so. Hopefully." He usually does, for me. Sometimes He slips away for awhile, but usually.

Then right on its heals, "Hope it's OK, me loving men." Man, where the hell did that come from? That's when the smite feeling zipped up my spine, though it failed to translate into words and hence steered clear of my mouth.

Very calm feeling immediately after, though. "At least I'm loving somebody."

Yup. Pretty damn sure that's what He wants. (Pun intended that time.)

I'm sure the doubts have been lingering in my air because of the story I've been working on off and on for months now. Evangelical Christians are the subject. Hard not to feel a little of it rub off on you after while. (Quite a bright lot, actually, and sincere, good-willed people I've been dealing with.) At least needle some of your assumptions. Which is a good thing, really. I need more of that. But that particular one can get a little unsettling.

Never have I felt more right about it, though, than the moment right after. If there is a god up there somewhere who made me, He and I are both pretty damn clear on how he made me, after all the decades I spent fighting it. And I'm pretty sure He put me down here to love somebody, along with all the exploring and writing He expects out of me. To help me with it, in fact, to share in it. And we both know He didn't make me capable of loving a woman that way. What a pathetic buffoon I would be to curl up in some corner and let my heart wither up and my life with it just because some jerks down here insist they've got the whole freaking thing figured out for us: me, Him, The Plan--they know everything, including what's in my heart, including how He speaks to me as well as them. Right.

So happy to be past all those silly years chasing after the mirage of love with all those women. (And sorry, ladies, for leading you on with something that could never work out anyway.) I feel better than ever this morning, actually. Nice to have the shudder of doubt bubble up to the surface and get answered.

This was a good one. Sometimes I'm not so lucky.

I Would Love to be White

Thu, 28 Apr 2005 06:16:37 GMT

Luckily, I already am. God, am I white. That's after weeks of struggle in the tanning salon in that shot to the left. But Margaret Cho is not, and I just stumbled upon a mildly heart-breaking post on her blog by that title. Opens like this:

I would love to be white. Not forever, but perhaps a weekend. Don't you ever get sick of being a minority?

God. That's how I feel like being gay sometimes.

Like after writing the last part of that last piece. Just a break sometimes. Not have to worry about it. Just be normal, like everybody else.

Not that I feel abnormal that much of the time, but that's because I did exactly what I swore I never would when I started facing up to my urges in my 30s. I gradually surrounded myself almost exclusively with gay people or gay-friendly. Probably too many of the former, too few of the latter. Because I don't want to get up every morning and deal with, it's just easier just to be normal, most of the time.

But then I venture into that other world, or I write stories for all the straight people, or consider the content of my blog and how I don't want it to be too gay, do I, or I'll scare off all the straight people, even though God knows I lost that battle a million years ago.

Here was my favorite part of Margaret's piece, the end of the last paragraph:

I have posed this question to other minority artists, and get stumped by answers like "No, not ever have I ever wanted to be white." And I just don't buy it. Why would you not want things to be easier?

Me neither. I just don't buy it.

I'm perfectly happy being gay most of the time, something I never thought I would be comfortable with. But even though I don't notice it most of the time, it is a freaking load to carry around with me everywhere, and it should would be refreshing just to set it down every now and again.

Just for a weekend.

Eyes, definitely

Thu, 28 Apr 2005 06:00:13 GMT

I watched Eyes for the (fourth?) week in a row tonight.

Not a fluke. Definite keeper.

Really don't feel like going into it all, trying to unravel it. It's just got it. Clever scripts, interesting characters, great tension between them, lots of smiles, the good kind that go on and on and on.

OK, that's what I was sort of mentally composing during the final commercial break. (I don't watch them, thanks to tivo, but they are natural pauses, and I do use them to take my breaks, or sometimes just to sit and reflect.)

Then, in the final two minutes of the show, the kinda studly FBI agent who had guest starred briefly in this episode dropped by to thank one of the lead characters for his help on the case--the slick, sharp, ultra-cool black guy with the shaved head. And studly asked leading character to dinner, "If you're free."

"Free?"

Nervous laughter on both sides, hemming and hawing . . . "Single, available . . . unless I've got the wrong idea entirely, then--"

"How about Friday night."

Nice. Didn't see that one coming. (And I did the dio from memory, so it may not be precise--though I watched it about eight times, cause it was just so irresistable.)

God, is it nice to see a couple gay guys depicted as normal guys, particularly in hardass professions. They don't all have to be queens.

(And those poor anti-gay crusaders. They're right, you know: that gays are waging a battle of acceptance, and using the media to do it. Of course they're just using the media to depict reality. There are studly gay FBI agents out there, and there are cool gay private detectives, and I'm sure plenty have dated before. Does anyone actually doubt that? For the first half century or so of television, they conspired to hide that. Nice to see them opening up and showing the real world now and then. Even on a silly cop show.)

One good Catholic

Thu, 21 Apr 2005 06:03:10 GMT

Wow. Finally.

Just watching Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete of St. Joseph's Seminary in NY, on Charlie Rose.

Struggling for the words to describe this guy. Wise, thoughtful, reasonable. Firm grasp of the world around him--the real one, the one this century.

Funny, too, and not in that BS church-humor way.

Most of all, honest. Candid. Sincere. Every word out of his mouth, I believe.

Of all the qualities to be so rare among leaders of this giant church.

Tonight I have hope.

More so because I had to look up the title. In all my years as a Catholic, never ran into a monsignor personally. My dictionary reads, "A title and an office conferred on a male cleric by a pope."

I'm assuming JP would be the pope in question. So he can spot a good man when he sees one.

Or maybe he's just a clever con artist? How should I know, I've only spent half an hour watching him on the teevee. But I'd lay money he's a good guy.

All it would take would be one man like this one to sneak through the system. (Or in the case of a con artist, one man actually like the guy he's pretending to be.)

One day.

Finding all that Columbine info on the web

Wed, 20 Apr 2005 22:57:32 GMT

Well, it's that dreaded anniversary, six years ago today since Columbine. It's fittingly and uncharacteristically bleak and overcast in Denver today. I know that's how a lot of people I've gotten to know feel today. I can only hope it passes for you quickly this year.

Meanwhile, and coincidentially, I happened to get around to organizing some information this weekend, and decided to make it available to you all:

In the fall of 2000, the cops released 11,000 pages of police files on Columbine. It's all online here, and provides a wealth of information, but you could spend weeks wading through it and still not find anything in particular you're looking for.

So this weekend, I posted two indexes. One is general and comprehensive--I found online long ago, but it long-since disappeared. The other I compiled myself. It is much more specific, and will guide you directly to topics frequently of interest, like Dylan Klebold's bloody creative writing story that foreshadowed the attack, the contents of Eric Harris's website, and interviews with the Marine recruiter which debunk the myth that Eric was infuriated at being rejected by the Marines shortly before the attack. (He never even received the news.)

I posted it all here. It's buried inside my Columbine Almanac, so most of you would never come across it, but if any of that interests you, there you go.

---

Well, as I dug around on the web, today, I came across one of the best Columbine resource sites I've ever found out there.

The Columbine Research Site is just a dream come true for anyone researching Columbine.

It is mainly restricted to official government releases, but those are a key part of the record, and it has nearly all of them.

It includes the obvious sites like the various government reports, diagrams, some of the audiotapes and the first 11,000 pages of police files. But you will also find many more obscure items, like the search warrants (where I found a surprisingly useful trove of info, and had formerly only found in paper, bound in the Columbine Library in Littleton), the second 10,000 pages of police reports (not even available at the Columbine Library), and much, much more.

And it's got a much better compilation of the 11,000 pages of police files than the link above, with its own detailed index built right in.

If you want to dig down into the nitty gritty of Columbine, this is your new home.

---

On a very different note, one of the silver linings of Columbine for me was all the great people I met. Often in the most unlikely circumstances. One of the most unlikely was Rev. Bill Oudemolen, who provided the title for my Salon story on Columbine Evangelicals, I Smell the Presence of Satan.

He wasn't thrilled with parts of the piece at first, and he emailed to tell me so, so I revised it for a reprint in The Denver Post, and oddly enough, the more we talked, the more we liked each other. (Not in a homosexual way, of course.) My first Evangelical friend. And I believe I was his first homo friend. He's a really nice guy. Not all all the close-minded ninny I was assuming.

Same on both counts for his wife Jan. She's cute, and blond and adorable, and of course my first thought was trophy wife! Not a bad trophy, but she's got a great heart, too, and a great mind. Haven't seen them in awhile. Really miss them. Can't wait to catch up on The Amazing Race--though I'm afraid Bill has missed his chance to compete on the show with me.

(Eventually, my second and even more unlikely Evangelical friend, Wendy Zoba, interviewed Bill and me for a Christianity Today piece called Building A Bridge--between gays and Evangelicals.)

Bill started a blog of his own this week, Mile High Rev, and posted early this morning about his own memories of the tragedy six years ago.

The Middle Ages were so much fun the first time

Tue, 19 Apr 2005 18:52:52 GMT

Hey, why not repeat them?

Continuity . . . collaborator . . . ultraconservative . . .

These are the phrases being repeated most fervently about our new Pope Benedict.

Guess we'll have to take comfort in the press' storied ability to get nearly all prognostication wrong.

Small comfort, in this case. Hard to picture John Paul's right hand man steering the ship in a completely different direction, but who knows. Popes are among the last remaining absolutist monarchs--maybe Ben was just wily enough to know how to keep his right-hand position intact.

Scary, though. Scariest phrases so far. From the just-posted NYT story on the election results:

One of the closest collaborators of John Paul II, as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Ratzinger has been the Church's doctrinal watchdog since 1981.

And from their wonderful Sunday piece focused on him--correctly pegging him as the prohibitive favorite:

"Ratzinger represents continuity - he was the right-hand man of the pope," said Giuseppe De Carli, head of Italian public television's Vatican bureau . . .

And of course, "ultraconservative" is being used all over the place--this on a spectrum where that defines banishment of women from the priesthood as mainstream. Ultraconservative compared to that? Whoa.

Hard not to wonder just how hopelessly out of touch that old college of men could be. The last thing this fading church still muddling around in the Middle Ages needed was continuity with the man who spent the past few decades trying to drag them back there.

It feels like a very sad day for this poor suffering chuch, but who knows. Human organizations tend to behave a lot like humans. And we know that humans in crisis tend to wallow around in denial until . . . until they hit rock bottom. This poor church may have to really find itseld on the rocks before they can break out of this downward spiral.

As long as John Paul refused to ordain bishops--much less cardinals--who were not as hopelessly out of touch as he was, a continuation of the slide was probably self-fullfilling and inevitable.

But eventually, when it gets bad enough, one man among them may percieve the folly of their ways and send the ship screaming around in the opposite direction.

Who knows. Maybe this is that very man. Maybe he's been holding his fears about the course they've been on close to his vest.

Probably not. But maybe he'll be wise enough to let a little light in and promote wise men even if they don't share his views. Or maybe one or two will sneak in without him realizing it--or see the light once their inside the college. One way or another, they'll find their way eventually. I hope. Would be nice to see it in my lifetime, though.

---

On a lighter note, via Gawker, traffic seems to have crushed the Ratzinger Fan Club.

(You clicked, didn't you. Just trying to make it worse?)

(And if you're not enjoying Gawker regularly, you're really missing out. Guess I should add them permanently to the blogroll. Duh. OK, next time I update.)

---

Another quick thought. Sorry to sound insensitive, but since church leaders often speak about it openly . . .

At least they picked a really old guy. Check out the Times' graphic running for more than a week highlighting the 15 top contenders. Ratzinger is the oldest of the entire lot.

So . . . sorry again, but they generally do this by intention -- they picked someone they expect to be dead soon. Relatively soon. Or in the more polite lingo, they coalesced around what they hoped would be a shorter, interim papacy. You say tomato . . .

The downside, of course, is another incredibly old man as chronologically remote as possible from the demands of the modern world. When are these people going to start grasping concepts like term limits and mandatory retirment ages?

Oh, bother. More modern concepts.

They'll assume their ususal dodge: God willed it this way.

Really? Just because God let humans discover ways to live that long, He never commanded that popes keep pontificating that long.

(Seriously. Do these people not feel guilt about all these obvious dodges? Aren't they supposed to be famous for the whole guilt thing?)

Is it ever going to dawn on these guys that life has changed a bit since St. Peter? And when they fail to keep up, it's their own throats they're slitting?

Let's review: A fading church getting clobbered by modernity, oblivious to the dangers because it's run by a group of ancients trapped in a system guaranteeing control by ancients precisely because of the changes imposed on it by modernity. (If that last link isn't clear, it would be modern medicine, driving up the average age of pope and cardinal by several decades within a century or two.)

You can't manufacture irony that intense.

More tears for the surfer dudes than JP

Wed, 06 Apr 2005 18:36:29 GMT

True, actually. Though not as long.

I hate to quit harping on the briefness and shallowness of my response to the popewatch, but it does seem rather insistent at jumping out at me as this preposterously low benchmark.

Truthfully, I can't remember my cheeks ever getting wet for John Paul this weekend, though I did feel kinda weepy half the morning Friday. (Before the anger set back in.)

I only wept for a minute for the surfer dudes, but they did provoke real tears this morning, as I watched them get bonked off The Amazing Race over breakfast.

And I don't find the disparity odd. In the short time I've "known" them, those boys taught me more about joy, kindness--particularly to each other--and zest for life than that sweet-yet-spiteful old man did in 20-plus years in Rome.

Seriously. I know people marveled at the old man's charisma with a crowd, but I never felt it. Nice warm smile, but I never felt his passion. The joi de vivre of these two--God, it was just palpable.

And the contentment. (What a rare combination. The giddiest people I know seem to marry it with bouts of rage and despair. Me, for instance.)

Contentment with each other, their competitors and they people and places they encountered along the way. But especially themselves--each of them with himself. They tried their little hearts out, and when it worked out, they were euphoric, when they failed they were OK with that, too. And we sure saw them bungle enough little tasks during their brief pass through our lives. They didn't blame each other, and they didn't blame themselves. Not for long. They were just happy to have enjoyed the ride.

Never was that more intense than their closing comments. And that's when I started losing it. I wasn't crying because they lost, I was crying at the beauty of the relationship they have with each other. And with themselves. The serenity they exude about their own lives. Did Siddhartha ever reach such tranquility so young? These boys just toss their bo trees onto their backs, carry them around with them everywhere.

And maybe I was crying a little out of envy. It wasn't until at least my mid thirties that I ever let myself get that close to another friend. My two brothers? Not in this lifetime. I can barely exist in the same room with the older one without an explosion. The younger one, infinitely better, but still highly combustible.

And sure, I was crying about losing Greg and Brian, too, not that I ever got their names straight or figured out which one was older. Not about them losing the race, me losing them. I'd love to see them win, it would be great to see such good guys up on the podium, but my mind jumps straight for the picture of their faces as they approach the steps. Could they possibly gush or weep harder than last week, gasping for air and flopping arms and torsos onto each others backs after they flipped the jeep and then beat the wife absuer in a mad dash to the mat? My imagination doesn't spread that wide. But I'd give their million dollars up to see it. (heeheehee. Is that selfish?)

My own little religious experience each week. Just a brief visit with a pair of walking Buddhas. Without the fat!

Heeheehee.

I love reality TV. What a remarkable pair of souls to behold each week. Have they tried showing highlights in church? Those old chestnuts from the bible offer some great examples, but the immediacy of this footage--how do you match the example of that?

An hour a week with those two shot me up with more inspiration for living divinely than than I ever recall receiving from a pulpit. How many people do you know that gush that kind of exuberance?

I've got one friend that joyful out in Chicago. (Get to see him again this weekend. Yeaaaaa!!!) Lost another last November. (She was past retirement age, had to push an oxygen tank everywhere, but her eyes still sparkled and she never bothered to hold back a giggle.) That's about it.

Maybe I just need better friends. Heeheehee. I don't think so. I know some incredible people, amazing in all sorts of ways, but it's rare on this planet to encounter someone brimming with that kind of ebullience.

Cherish it when you can.

More tears for Peter

Wed, 06 Apr 2005 01:21:35 GMT

Now Peter Jennings with lung cancer.

That got me all choked up.

Always liked him. Always respected him.

Dan Rather gave me the shivers. Tom Brokaw I comed to like a great deal, but somehow Peter was always the one for me. Feels like a real shift.

---

Meanwhile, Joan Walsh's Salon cover story made me cry:

Why I can't mourn the pope
Dying of cancer, my mother was driven away from the church she loved by its doctrinal rigidity. That I can't forgive.

Joan is editor of Salon now, but she's also one of the great writers of our time. And when she writes about her own family, she can be devastating.

Who dropped the ball?

Mon, 04 Apr 2005 06:20:43 GMT

Next big theme I keep hearing repeated about John Paul:

That as strongly as he fought against communism early in his papacy, he tried to fight what he considered the excesses and injustices of capitalism in the later half.

Hmmmmm. While I did hear the occasional phrase about this, I think it would come as news to most Americans that the pope had been waging a concerted campaign against injustice in our system for the past couple decades.

Certainly nothing remotely like the impact he had on communism, as many a church official has lamented in the past week.

So what happened? How did the message fail to reach us?

Who, I think is the pertinent question here: who dropped the ball?

Did our media lap up his attacks on our adversaries, but roll their eyes and ignore similar campaigns "against us"--even if they were actually for us as a people, by attacking the parts of our own system directed against us?

Or was it his bishops and priests ignore the message, refusing to regularly and passionately invoke it?

I come from a large family of Catholics, I'm often surrounded by them, and I can't recall ever hearing a single one reacting to such a message. Many of them are arch-conservative--I can't imagine not having heard about it if their priests were preaching it.

If that's true, why is it? Did they disagree with the pope? Resent the authoritariansm with which he ran the church, which we're suddenly hearing so much about? Were they just getting too cozy politically with the fiscal conservatives in the business community to take them on aggressively? Or something else?

I don't have the answers here, just a lot of suspicions. But it's puzzling to me. More puzzling still that I've have been hearing this idea so regularly this week--about the pope fighting so hard on this front and gained so little traction--but I've yet to hear the question of why? Of how dropped the ball and why they did so?

From Moral Infants?

Sun, 03 Apr 2005 21:45:20 GMT

Listening to all these TV analyses again this morning, I'm struck by the prevalence of one common theme being repeated relentlessly from nearly all quarters: the incredible openness of the Vatican and the pope in these last dies. And the corollary, is always how this pope showed us how to die, by doing it so publicly.

Open? Public? Compared to what?

Oh, compared to the centuries of secrecy and deception, of course. An endless stream of reporters, pundits and cardinals have rejoiced at the candor, always contrasting it to the traditional Vatican secrecy, particularly about papal health. A little group is crowing about it right now on ABC's This Week, recalling the Vatican's traditional emphasis on secrecy and deception to keep a lid on any papal weakness. Here's Marco Politi, Vatican reporter for La Republica magazine and John Paul biographer:

"This has been a great teaching for the people. . . . Generally, the popes, when they were ill, they were hidden in the Vatican. They didn't show that they were frail, that they were trembling. And this man, instead, did just the opposite. He wanted to show the world that also suffering, has dignity."

Wow. What a concept. Honesty. Candor. A holy man recognizing the importance of death in our lives, and a willingness to allow people a glimpse into his own suffering.

The idea these would be new concepts to an organization dedicated exclusively to God and the advancement of goodness is just preposterous. Sad. So, so sad.

Especially when you consider the standard of what they were rejoicing about. Just yesterday, Wolf Blitzer remarked to a senior Vatican official about the stunning (relative) candor and half-apologetically mentioned that as recently as John Paul's last hospitalization in the past few weeks, the Vatican was keeping a tight lip and in several cases putting out statements that were outright false and deceptive. The official acknowledged the deception without a thought, and focused on the stunning change.

Today, I was even more stunned, watching Friday night's Charlie Rose, to hear Newsweek's papal correspondent Christopher Dickey mention that the Vatican had still not admitted that John Paul even had Parkinson's even though he was in the final stages of it.

Can you get more ludicrous than that?

All I could think was: Why is it not sinful to lie? Of all organizations? It's not like we're in the midst of a Cuban missile crisis and they have to tell a brief lie to ensure the safety of millions. This is the example they set?

So finally, in the last 24 hours, they give up the deceits and start leveling with the public--presumably because they decided it was in their interest to prepare the public a bit for the news--and this is a matter for rejoicing?

And this idea of the pope showing this great example by revealing his suffering? "In his very public way--although not in any way jarringly--He showed us how to die . . ." Cokie Roberts just gushed. It's remarkable only in contrast to a long papal legacy of hiding it.

In what way was it public? There were no photographs of the pope once he tumbled into serious condition, certainly not videotape. He did not speak to the public about his condition; we didn't even get second-hand descriptions of his suffering. Or clear information about his condition, to tell the truth. We got these brief, vague statements every eight hours or less, providing minimal information, which the networks had to guess about.

You will recall that the nets went into part-time popewatch Thursday afternoon (eastern time) based mainly on the tone of voice from Vatican insiders, and the fact that the sudden "openness" of the Vatican press office suggested they were prepping the world for impending news.

That constitutes teaching the world a lesson about dying?

Morrie Schwartz allowing Nightline to come in and film him on his sickbed for (months?) and right up to his deathbed dying of Lou Gherig's disease, answering all of Ted Koppel's unimaginably private questions, that's teaching the world a lesson about dying.

(Mitch Albom saw the Nightline shows, which spurred him to visit Schwartz and write that ghastly book Tuesday's With Morrie about the same thing.)

Timothy Leary allowing cameras in and posting blow by blow accounts of his downward spiral and candid reflections on it on the internet, eventually announcing his death to the world on the internet, that was a lesson about dying.

The old Jewish people who allowed anthropologist Barbara Myerhoff full access to their lives and deaths which she portrayed so vividly in the unforgettable book Number Our Days, followed by Lynne Littman's documentary of the same name which won the 1976 Oscar for short-subject documentary, that was a lesson--a wealth of different lessons--about dying.

There are countless examples of people who have truly bared all the pain and misery and insight and hope and fear of dying to the public.

This? This was a really important first step for the Catholic Church. A little itty bitty baby step. A step away from dishonesty and deceit, and toward, perhaps, putting the needs of other human beings above their own--at least in a very limited way, for an extremely brief period of 48 hours.

The fact that a church dedicated to Christ is just making these itty bitty baby steps two thousand years later? Well, it's beyond pathetic, isn't it. Despicable comes to mind.

The sight of them crowing about this brilliant success -- and naturally our lapdog press going right along with it, reinforcing it -- feels right out of a Kafka novel.

Good work, guys. You're finally starting to grasp the faintest inklings of the concept of morality. Tiny little steps you're making toward it. I applaud you for the progress. And shudder at how long it's taken you to learn so little. Two thousand years later, still infants in your conception of morality.

And you, of all people, seek to speak on behalf of the God you're just dimly growing aware of?

Extraordinary.

As usual, I can't feel a thing

Sat, 02 Apr 2005 21:14:28 GMT

Well, the popewatch is finally over.

And of course, I now feel nothing.

I guess I got it all out yesterday. Felt so much more than I expected to yesterday, so much less right now.

I've always had a problem with that. I go numb. Can't really feel a thing right now, though I'm sure the sadness and the anger and the frustration and the hope will all return soon. For some reason I can emote about it while it's looming there, and again later as it begins to recede, but where it's right there upon me in the present my heart can batter down like a black hole. Nothing in, nothing out.

(I am feeling one intense emtion, actually, which began yesterday. Why why why did CNN have to bring in that horribly shrill abrasive Christine Amanpour to spit all her pomposity over this otherwise solemn event?)

I have learned and relearned a great deal about John Paul in the past 24 hours, though.

Good things, mostly. He made me so freaking angry, sometimes, it often got hard to see past all the good stuff.

And of course my early optimism has faded again. Been reading lots and lots of prognostications about possible sucessors--best I've see so-far in Slate--and although they nearly always turn out to be wrong, nearly all the possibilities seem bleak, since our man JP appointed nearly the entire electorate.

Oh well. Lots of popes have surprised us.

Naive hope for a new pope

Fri, 01 Apr 2005 17:26:32 GMT

This pope has made me so incredibly angry for so many years. So I'm a little taken aback at my sadness.

Suddenly overwhelmed by sadness. A little guilt washing back? The guy really tried his heart out, I need to give him that. He must have thought he was doing the right thing, even if he was trapped in the Middle Ages in so many ways. Guess it's time to forgive him for that.

I guess I knew in my heart that he was a really nice guy, with a sweet heart. He just did so many bitterly mean things. Now that he's slipping away, I can finally separate what he did from who he was. And also to give him credit for so many of the wonderful things he did. He made me proud to have been raised a Catholic during the end of the cold war. Been kind of a rough patch since then.

I do feel a little bad that I've been so grudging about what a nice person he apparently was. While he was standing in the way of reform, while he was keeping my church locked in this tragic state, I couldn't feel anything past the rage. How do you feel good about the guy barring the door?

And I'm suddenly hopeful. Guardedly, naively, hopeful.

I'm not expecting any changes in the crucial symbology of the "coronation," though. That's actually what it's called. Before the successor is installed in his various "palaces." Man. That is their symbol of Christ on earth? Doesn't sound much like the guy I read about in the new testament.

I little humility would help. The new guy could start by renouncing that audacious infalibility claim before he even accepts the crown. (Whoever you recognize as your god, isn't infallibility one of the key aspects of the definition? Pretty appalling to claim godliness for a human. Especially for that human to claim it.)

He could refuse to be called "His Holiness." That also smacks of superiority above the human race. They could give him a prestigious title, I have no trouble with that. But holiness seems best left to God to judge, no?

There have been good popes and bad popes over the ages, including thoroughly corrupt, ruthless and despicable men (and one woman pretending to be a man). The office itself doesn't make him holy, he's got to earn that. And only God is qualified to assess whether he has.

This idea of insisting that your leader is automatically holy, automatically doing the right thing every time. That, I think, gets them into a lot of trouble. And perhaps causes them to wallow in hundreds of years of mistakes and repeat them. If all the guys who did the same thing were holy, it stands to reason . . .

You're human guys. Humans make mistakes. A new pope who refocused the church on the humanity of its leaders would be taking a powerful step on the road to real success.

My other big problem, far bigger problem, with the Holiness title is the insanely dangerous way it smacks of . . . holiness.

That whole concept makes me shudder. Holy water, holy objects, blessing of objects by the pope to make them holy, burning incense as they utter a "sacred" passage required for some mystical transformation . . . I shudder. Truly shudder. What are these, magic acts? Incantations? Time to shake off all the paganism.

The Middle Ages are over.

It's understandable that the church adopted all this paganism centuries ago. They were trying to convert pagans. So they adopted a lot of the magic acts, changed the names, attributed them all to one monotheistic god, and worked in the gospel to sit along beside it. OK, that was progress, I guess. Pretty compromised progress, but you take it once step at a time.

But its ten to twenty centuries later now, and it's really time to let all the magic and paganism go. Yes, I stood in St. Peter's square once, and held up an object to be blessed by the pope, just to feel the charade acted out. Appalling. The idea that this object in my hand now was "holy," and could act out magical powers of healing or whatever I had in mind because the pope had raised his staff and imbued it like a wizard with a magic wand.

Are we about to meet the pope who will finally renounce paganism?

I don't like everything about the Protestant churches, but I tend to feel so much more comfortable there, because they've stripped away all the magic acts.

If my church could just strip away all the symbology of the paganism, of the magic, I might feel comfortable to come home.

I'm not blaming John Paul for all that, it's been hundreds of years in the making. All he did was continue to go along.

And when will God send us the man who will refuse? The man He will deem holy when he dies. (He may deem John Paul holy, too, I'll leave that to Him, but I do believe one is coming who will bask in a truly profound glow for bringing this huge church back to the gospels.)

I hope it's not too callous dreaming about the future on the morning that nice old man John Paul lies dying. Sorry. But he's one man, the church is responsible for a billion. At least it was. It's fading fast in some parts of the world. Like America, currently the most potent national force in the world. That's a big one to lose.

Have you been to a Catholic church lately? Most of them are half empty. Many have already been closed down.

This world is rushing ahead so quickly and the Catholic church is losing ground fast. They galloped ahead a few centuries in one burst through Vatican II in the early 60s, but that left them at half a millennium still behind, and they have spent far too long regrouping since then.

We desperately need a man to step up and make this church meaningful again. It's going to take one strong pope to tackle that. But who knows. For all I know, there's a guy out there right now who's been working the rituals all his life through gritted teeth, just praying for the day he can help guide the church back to the role it was designed for.

The dirty little non-secret is that nearly every religious person I know, or have interviewed--and I've been doing a story on Christians, talking to quite a few prominent ones lately--has been waiting for this nice old man to be called back so he can get the heck out of the way. The church needs a bold new leader and they need it badly.

So let's mourn for the man, for all the sweetness and goodness and good intentions in his heart. And look to the heavens with a full heart, for the man who will take his place.

Can one man shake off the entire Middle Ages in my lifetime and return the church to the messages of the gospel?

It's a lot to ask for. But I'm ever naively hopeful.

God, the magazine

Sat, 08 Jan 2005 22:56:29 GMT

Heeheehee. Sounds kind of funny when you put it that way, but it actually looks to be a really interesting publication.

How come nobody thought of this before? What a great name for a magazine.

It's the brainschild of my friend Wendy Zoba, who I met covering Columbine--initially as adversaries, but she turned out to be such a wonderful person, how could we avoid becoming friends? She was one of my first Evangelical Christian friends, and I do believe I was her first gay friend, although perhaps I should check on that.

I stopped being her gay friend and she stopped being my evangelical friend a long time ago, though. Now we're just friends. She brightens me up when I hear her voice. She cares about what happens to me. I care about her. I appreciate her wisdom, and her concern, and I admire all the painful struggles she has continued to endure.

We come from different worlds in some ways, and you would think it might be hard to see past that, but it's really effortless. She's a wonderful human being, who is also thoughtful, passionate and driven. She believes she landed here on earth with a purpose, and has spent her life running around the planet trying to find it, but it has never come easy, and she's still searching and probably will be for life.

Just like me. Turns out most of the fundamentals of who we are and how we strive to spend our lives matches up very closely. (Including our attraction to men. Or if you want to look at it the other way, I'm drawn to my same sex, she's drawn to her opposite--big deal.)

When she first told me she wanted to create something called God Magazine, I thought it was a wonderful idea--for her and for the world she would be bringing it to. I assumed it would be strictly a Christian Magazine--she is best known as a senior editor for Christianity Today Magazine, as well as author of many books--but was pleased to see she had a wider vision than that.

The goal she has in mind is incredibly ambitious: The quest to know God (better). Jew, Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Zoroastrian, unaffiliated . . . anybody out there searching for a better understanding of the being that created them. Rather than fight amongst ourselves over what to call him or even the particulars of our his messages, this magazine is aimed at anyone out there just ready to make a go of it.

(If you're interested in a particular message, there are already plenty of Christian, Muslim, and yes, even Zoroastrian magazines out there today. When I worked in Kuwait, my Zoroastrian boss subscribed to a Parsi Monthly or something like that.) God Magazine hopes to engage anyone interested in why we're here, what we're up to, what we're supposed to be doing with this strange little planet.

Huh. Sounds a lot like my goal. Me, I drove myself nuts trying to get to the bottom of Him, and I finally figured out that's not the route He put me here to travel. Looks more like I'm down here to explore us: human beings seem to be my assigned task, but all roads circle back to the same place eventually, don't they?

Wendy and I are pretty much after the same mystery in a different way. She's taking it head-on, and I really admire her for that. The purpose of the magazine is to explore anyone who is out there searching. However they're searching. Whether or not they know what they're searching for.

That makes me smile. So many people I know, myself included, were chased away from God by too many people trying to hit us over the head with Him. And with some really warped conceptions of what the guy is all about.

It scares some people to even admit you believe in God. That's a problem.

Not a problem with Him, more a problem with the people who have represented themselves as speaking for him. He's had some really ghastly marketing done in his name. Personally, I had to let go of the Catholic Church completely for at least a decade before I could even think of re-establishing a relationship with the guy. (I think of him as a guy. It helps to picture something specific.)

I'm drifting, I know. This is kind of hard for me to write about. Kind of personal. Let me tell you a few things about Wendy, though. Why I think this will be such a wonderful magazine. She asked me a couple years ago if I believed in God, and I said yes, most of the time. 80/20, probably. Up from 60/40 just a few years before. But I had a lot of doubts. Some days I didn't believe at all. Didn't really know how to. Sometimes it was just there. I was really embarassed to admit that. Had a hard time admitting that to anyone, especially a true believer.

"Of course you do," she said. "Everybody has doubts." Really? "Of course." Oh. Duh.

The doubts pretty much drifted away after that. Slowly. But steadily. Surprisingly. One of those many moments in life somebody slapped me into remembering that I was not expected to be perfect.

And liberated into doing better in the process. The doubts were driving me nuts. Making it tough to face him. How do you look a guy in the eye when you know he knows you're not convinced he's even out there? Talking to someone like Wendy can help a great deal. When she reassures you he's expecting a few imperfections. He'll forgive you. Just keep talking.

Good advice. For dealing with anybody you're having a little trouble with. Just keep talking. You'll figure it out.

So, I just amble along. I have my little chats, though I still worry occassionally that I'm doing that the wrong way too, but I try just not to focus on my improper technique.

I'm just paraphrasing her quotes up there from memory, by the way, and I'm going to butcher this one even worse, but the most amazing stream of words just rolled off her tongue one day recently, about all of us broken down people just searching for a way to make some sense of this wide world.

Refreshing. I don't need no God Magazine telling me they've got it all figured out and here's how I should be living my life. Man, I've been working my butt off to get it right already. You think you've got it figured out? Look at your miserable life. Now a magazine from people ready to admit they're as messed up as the rest of us, just doing their best to make sense of things and engaging us in the conversation along with them? Interesting. I can embrace that.

It made me all the happier when she asked me to contribute, when she said how badly she wanted to include voices from traditionally liberal or lefty publications or outlets. God is not a Republican. Or a Democrat. This country has gotten ourselves into one big mess by starting to concieve ourselves that way.

Most of the people I know are liberal, and the vast majority of them believe in God. All we've done with all this polarizing is shut them out of the conversation. And make them feel ostracized, driven them away. Driven me away, for much of my life.

I don't know how this magazine will turn out. First issue is due out this month. But I'm very excited about the possibilities.

Excited enough that I agreed to be included on the masthead, and I've got an adapted version of my New York Times piece on the Barbie collectors in the first issue. (And in an odd stroke of timing, I finally got around to composing this moster of a message on the week that my piece is featured on the front page of the website: GodMagazine.net)

Check it out. Sign up. Consider being a benefactor. This is going to be one amazing magazine, one day. Be there from the start.

Women and Islam, the great big irony

Tue, 09 Nov 2004 20:57:25 GMT

This Clash of Civilizations bs scares me a bit. But one early victor seems to be emerging, which is as pleasing as it is unexepcted.

Perhaps the most prominent of all Western charges against Islam has been its treatment of women. Leading of course, to the standard strange bedfellows: feminists joining the neocons and the Christian Right. With the latter two leading the charge, since it's primarily their fight.

I can't tell you the number of times in the past year I have heard conservatives advance one particularly powerful argument: That a society choosing to supress half its population is doomed against adversaries who can always double their output.

The longer this goes on, they more they internalize that idea: that suddenly we need our women to advance to the top ranks of medicine, technology, art, business, politics. If we hinder their advance, they cannot unleash their potential, and we, collectively cannot unleash ours. We fail to advance on our foolhardy Eastern cousins as we could have, and we may actually fall behind our allies, who will once again overtake us. Especially those pesky Japanese.

This is the argument being advanced from The Right!

It's remarkable how quickly the women's movement--just gaining steam 40 years ago--has gone from women demanding rights, the old order making them fight to the death for every last inch, to the old order beginning to see them as an opportunity. They picked a good time to launch their movement, just a step or two ahead of the emergence of Globalization. As long as we saw the American economy as a zero sum game, every gain for women translated into an equal loss for men.

Or a loss for families and institutions led by men and/or whose wealth, status and power was built on a world run by then, and therefore at risk in a male/female power-sharing arrangement where the rules would be fundamentally alterted. Which means just about anyone who had significant wealth, status and power to weild. Including most of the women in those positions.

No wonder women still only earn a few cents more per hour than they did 40 years ago.

Of course a lot of enlightened men and women were willing to risk it all for that grand idea of equality, but when it comes right down to it, most people will go to the mat with you to retain every last ounce of inequality they've been lucky enough to muster.

But the more we see America as just one world contender--military, financially, etc.--the more we think in terms of marshalling all our resources. Still, we tend not to let go of old, ingrained notions like that until we really feel threatened.

And we spot a sharp contrast.

Suddenly we feel very threatened, and it's hard not to notice the gulf. When spotted the Japanese economic engine in the rear view mirror in the 70s and started panicking about them into the 80s, nothing about the struggle suggested using women as a weapon. No more than, say, using underutilized blacks or latinos. We did notice the Japanese and quite a few other countries beating the crap out of us in childhood test scores, and that's when Education suddenly became our focus, particularly math and science.

But The Islamic Threat seems to be thrusting women to the forefront. Suddenly we see them as Our Competitive Advantage.

Ahhhhhh. The panacea of the business-school set. If you're not familiar with the phrase, google it for a quick 4.56 million entries. This opening entry from QuickMBA.com gives you the general idea:

When a firm sustains profits that exceed the average for its industry, the firm is said to possess a competive advantage over its rivals. [Emphasis theirs.] The goal of much of business strategy is to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage.

It's one of the few grand business-school ideas that actually makes profound sense in practice. Find one powerful advantage you can always hold over your competition, figure out how to exploit it effectively, and as long as you don't screw up the rest of the operation horribly, you're always going to find yourself leading the pack.

It's a pretty powerful idea.

And appealing for a whole lot of reasons. We've got a whole lot more women around here than blacks or latinos or any other underutilized--notice the different mindset from "underpriveldged"; shifting from a focus on what we have to give them, to what we might get out of them. Women present a unique opportunity to actually double the output of our adversaries.

That's in addition to all the advantages we know we're starting with. Those can get a little scary sometimes, because we know tortises have tendency to catch up. Especially when the rules shift, and suddenly we discover, say, a few trillion barrells of oil nestled underneath their sand. We could lose our starting advantage. But year after year, keep doubling their output with double the brainpower, and we're certain we've got them licked.

It's also comforting to know that we've already got these women right here woven into our very own families. We get to double our wealth, and keep it!

And none of those pesky damn problems with the education system we never figured out how to fix in the 80s anyway, because we knew the underlying source of the problem was that rich and powerful nations always grow a little lazier, and our kids our never going to feel the same hunger their ancestors did, unless we let more of the damn ferners into the country. (Sarcasm alert, in case you weren't onto it.)

These women actually want to share their ideas in the workplace. Win wins all around.

Not the dose of reality. I'm not suggesting the women's struggle for equality is all magically ended. There are innumerable barriers still in place, not least of which is the paradox of their inherent strength. Women, taken as a whole are different than men, taken as a whole. Duh. We know this. That's what's so powerful about what they have to offer: not just double the manpower, they also offer new ideas and new approaches.

We'll be massively more powerful and successful once we fully integrate them and take advantage of them (in a different sense than we've been taking advantage of them the past few millenia), but it's going to be one hell of an upheaval to get there, and God knows how much we humans hate change.

So it will be awhile.

What I am suggesting is that we may have reached a turning point, here.

As long as it remains a battle for rights, it's going to be a painful struggle at a glacial pace. But when the old guard sees opportunity, it changes everything. They quit trying to beat the women down from the walls of the castle, open up the gates and escort them up to the highest chambers to see what they can gain from them. That's a whole different world. And the drive is coming from the hardest right of the old right, old guard.

Odd how women might look back a hundred years from now and point to Islam as their ultimate savior in The West.

No way out but the cliff?

Sat, 14 Aug 2004 04:17:34 GMT

Arianna Huffington just posted an incredible column about New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey coming out and resigning.

It thoughtful and articulate throughout, but it also raised an idea I had not considered, but seems so obvious in retrospect:

It's hard to resist playing armchair psychoanalyst and wondering: Did McGreevey unconsciously make certain choices -- like putting his lover on the government payroll in a high-profile position he was not qualified for -- in order to force upon himself Thursday's public announcement: "I am a gay American"?

Of course that's really dangerous, but the more I sat there pondering it, I wish she had continued that line of thought. And then I read on. And she did:

We can't, of course, know what was going on in McGreevey's psyche, but hiring his lover, Golan Cipel -- an Israeli foreign national unable to obtain a federal security clearance to be the homeland security czar of New Jersey (and at a salary of $110,000 a year, no less) -- is the height of recklessness, and only makes sense as a taxpayer-funded cry for help. Clearly no good could come of such an appointment -- unless the governor was unconsciously hoping that the appointment would eventually force his hand.

The reason this idea has such a hold of me, is because I've seen it play out that way so many times. With homosexuality in particular, and characteristics we're ashamed of in general. We just can't bring ourselves to admit them, so we force ourselves into a situation to get them out.

I know one guy whose girlfriend found some embarassing photos, and the poor little weasel--after squirming and denying awhile, finally latched onto a better idea. He suggested she talk it through with his mom, who had a similar reaction, and was the one person who could empathize. The girlfriend made the call. His mom knew nothing. Until the call. His dad drove all the way from Seattle to Denver to get him.

The things we'll do to free ourselves of the bondage. It seems so silly in retrospect, because the weight we were dragging around looks so puny now that we have unloaded it and see it for the ghost it always was. But on our backs . . .

Here's how Arianna begins to wrap it up:

By the time the curtain comes up on this drama’s Act Five we could be in the middle of a serious political scandal that may force McGreevey to step down even before Nov. 15. Or we may be in the middle of his political resurrection, looking not at a tortured politician with a secret draining away precious energy but a free man fully -- and finally -- accepting himself. Either way, he had to practically drive the car right off the cliff in order to put himself on the road to Thursday’s declaration. And that's an indictment of our society and our political culture wars.

Man, she sure knows how it feels. (Except, "practically" off the cliff? As far as his career goes, not to mention his marriage--pretty much everything he ever dreamed of, he's crashing into the jagged rocks right now. But better that than up on that horrible cliff.

Of course she gets it, her husband came out. And for every one of us, I think it feels that way: driving the car right off the cliff is the only way to get there.

Tough day for homos

Thu, 12 Aug 2004 23:34:01 GMT

First the California Supreme Court annulled all those gay marriages performed in San Francisco, now the governor of New Jersey has resigned because he was gay.

What? Resigned because he was gay? And had an affair? That one doesn't quite make sense. Surely there's more to come out. Politicians admit to affairs all the time, and I can't remember one resigning over it.

I'm not sure what the silver lining is here--another signal to straight people that there are gays hiding among us all over the place? That lots of normal people they respecte enough to elect governor are gay?

Or perhaps just one more indication for arch-conservatives trying to stamp out homosexuality--or whatever it is they think they're doing; "discouraging" it?--of what they're really accomplishing: Persuading gay men to marry our sisters and daughters. Who is being served by that?

I don't think it will sink in for the hardcore anti-gays--who will just say this guy lacked the morality or willpower to stick by the straight path he was attempting--but perhaps it will occur to some level-headed straight people in the middle.

Especially if they read the transcript. It's heartbreaking. And brief enough to read in about a minute and a half.

This part really chocked me up:

Yet, from my early days in school, until the present day, I acknowledged some feelings, a certain sense that separated me from others. But because of my resolve, and also thinking that I was doing the right thing, I forced what I thought was an acceptable reality onto myself . . .

I do not believe that God tortures any person simply for its own sake. I believe that God enables all things to work for the greater good. And this, the 47th year of my life, is arguably too late to have this discussion. But it is here, and it is now.

At a point in every person's life, one has to look deeply into the mirror of one's soul and decide one's unique truth in the world, not as we may want to see it or hope to see it, but as it is.

And so my truth is that I am a gay American.

liking Ted Turner again

Sat, 24 Jul 2004 22:54:06 GMT

It has been a long damn time since I could stomach Ted Turner.

Maybe too long since I checked in. Watching him on Charlie Rose, for the hour, and just enjoying the hell out of him. Maybe because he did finally find a little humility. And I've learned to look past a little bit of the bluster.

Just love his candor, and his bluntness, so damn rare in someone who has reached his heights.

I loved when Charlie asked him if he was driven at all by greed, and he shot back Yes! without hesitation. Some, he said, he had to admit it. He's still angry as hell at Levin and Time Warner.

Liked it even more when Charlie asked him about his faith, why he personally had none, and he interupted, almost testily, "I do have faith! You do? I have some." First time I saw him really conflicted, almost in pain. I hate people trying to put me in boxes, too: you do or you don't. No. I do some days, others it's a little hard to find.

The Depressive and the Psychopath: At last we know why the Columbine killers did it

Tue, 20 Apr 2004 17:40:57 GMT

That's the headline of my Slate story, just posted.

Long story of how it came about, but the short version is that last week I came to the conclusion that I may never revive my Columbine book project, and made a last minute decision to pitch the pretty big news I had uncovered researching it as a magazine piece during the media window of the five-year anniversary (today).

Slate really got behind it, and they will be moving it into the cover slot as soon as they get the graphic set. And they just notified me that MSN is picking it up as their cover shortly, too, which will mean a lot more exposure, which this story really needs.

And best of all, I really like the edit they did on it. Thank God. I always worry. We had to cull it down from 10,000 words to 3,000, including the sidebar--which is still extremely long for them--and I had nightmares about whether we could do the ideas justice. But I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. I really like my editor there, David Plotz. Really talented guy. Which is great, because that is NOT always the case with editors. He really made it better--trimmed the fat, kept the meat. How it's supposed to work.

I'm also really happy that they're going as aggressive with the conclusions as I believe they deserve. (So nice to have an editor believe in your story.)

The head of the FBI's investigation in the case and the other top shrinks they brought in don't believe the "why" of Columbine is not any great mystery at all, and they're ready to explain why.

I always get excited working on a big story (to me, and what I've spent a good chunk of the past five years on, it's a big story), and I was in this case as well, but I'm also incredibly relieved to get it out there, and off my chest. I have spent so much time with Columbine over the past five years--it really had an effect on me. And the frustrationg so many people felt about how it could have happened really bothered me, when I had access to a very different view and could not share it. I have never felt this kind of relief as a journalist before.

(God, I hope this doesn't sound self-serving. I'm just spilling my thoughts and feelings as I feel them--same as I ever do on this blog. Feels a bit weirder knowing strangers may come here after reading the story, though, and then see me blabbing like this about it. But that's what I do here. Blab like this. Heeheehee. I also have barely slept in the past 24 hours, so consider cutting me a little slack.)

And I'm eager to hear what you all think. I'll try to answer any questions here. I'm sure there will also be a discusson in Slate's The Fray.

Columbine Never Sleeps -- The best story I've ever read on the tragedy

Sun, 18 Apr 2004 19:57:34 GMT

At least so far.

I've been reading about Columbine and writing about Columbine for just under five years now, and for years now, I assumed the definitive story would explain what actually drove the killers. And of course I hoped to write it.

Then I read Michael Paterniti's piece in this month's GQ, "Never Sleeps." (Does not seem to be online, but it's in the issue dated April, on newsstands now--Viggo Mortensen on the cover. Ten thousand words.)

Of course. It was about the survivors.

That's what I thought the real story was about five years ago, stumbling around Clement Park in a daze, stunned over the fifteen dead, but terrified about the two thousand young zombies staggering around about me.

Now I wish I had written that story. But I'm kind of glad I didn't, because as I read on and on, I went from amazed to intimidated. It actually made me question my own abilities as a writer, the way reading Nabokov used to. Can I ever do this? Hopefully, someday. He's definitely ahead of me as a writer, though thank God for me, he's been at it awhile longer. (He's a bit younger, damn him, but I took more than a decade to come back to writing.)

So both topics are important--the killers and the survivors--I don't want to get hung up on that, and I'll get my chance to tell the other story here in the next few days. But what he did with his story was just incredible. The writing is just dazzling. I sat there looking up as I read it, thinking "What word can even describe the artistry that is having such an effect on me?" Dazzling. Only word to do it justice.

It propels you first back into the tragedy, in a moving but non-manipulative way, then straight into the lives of five survivors of sorts, in a powerfully empathetic way. Beware: It had me sobbing uncontrollably. But gave me fresh insights into the lives of subjects I had interviewed many times and thought I very well already. The most personal story I've ever seen on Columbine, and the most moving. Five years later, someone has truly gotten it pitch perfect.

Now the disclaimers: I worked as a researcher on the story, but had nothing to do with the writing. I got to know and like the writer, Michael Paterniti during his reporting, but I tend to judge my friends much more harshly. I couldn't read the story for a few weeks, fearing I might hate it. If you believe that biases me, discount my opinion, but I assure you that it made it all the harder for the piece to win me over.

And as a self-appointed guardian of the Columbine myths flame, I have to admit that Mike gets swept up in a few here and there, or in a case or two he just has a different view than me. (He sees it as much more revenge on jocks than I do.) (If I had known he was going to cover some of that ground I would have consulted more closely on that. I may have done him a disservice by not being more aggressive on warning him about certain things.) But that's not what the purpose of the piece, and one of the elements that I think makes it come alive is that he has some experience with Columbine, but not too much. He covered it when it happened (he might have still been with Esquire then), but left after a few days after he felt it starting -- hmmmm, I can't remember, now. He said he sensed at the time, that to do the story he wanted, he had to get out of there, because staying was starting to change his perceptions. Then he came back this January, for a fresh take. And don't get me wrong, he did a tremendous amount of research, but there is so much garbage out there, that unless you've been following the story relentlessly for five years, you're never going to weed out all the myths. So just ignore that quibble and immerse yourself into a story that has been aching to be written.

One final word. One of the subjects of the piece, Rev. Don Marxhausen, the respected Lutheran minister who got fired in the fallout of performing Dylan Klebold's funeral, and one of the wisest men I have ever encountered told me six months after the massacre that no one could tell the real Columbine yet, because that world was still in such a frenzy. It was like one of those Christmas globes with the water inside that you shake up and all the little snowflakes flutter around for a few minutes and you can't see anything. Our little world has just been shaken up, he said. The truth is still obscured. If you care about this story, come back and see me in a year, or better yet five years. Mike Paterniti came back in five years. What he produced went beyond stunning me. It was so powerful, so revealing, that it shook my own confidence in myself as a writer. This is the story I wish I would have, could have written. If you have any interest in this subject matter, do yourself a favor. Go read it.

First they came for the vibrators, then they came for Janet, now they're came for Howard . . .

Wed, 14 Apr 2004 06:19:22 GMT

Last December, I linked to a great little piece Atrios titled "First they came for the vibrators." God, little did we know. Just seemed like an oddity at the time.

Then Janet showed a breast, and our puritan country had a heart attack. Now George Bush's FCC appears to really be knocking Howard Stern off the air. And God, what a coincidence that Stern has been ruthlessly attacking Bush, with serious stories being written about Stern's huge audience being a huge potential problem for the pres.

Hard to decide whether that's more appalling or just the free-speech issue.

Salon has a pair of cover stories on it just posted. Dan Savage is oddly not up to his usual stunning prose in the sidebar, but the main piece by Eric Boehlert is pretty freaking scary. (Just in case, I'm not using the word fucking on here anymore.)