March 15, 2009
News Briefs for February 2009
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Is Golf a Religion? and other important questions
Back when a Sunday was still a Sunday, Stephen Leacock spoke of a court’s having ruled golf an acceptable Lord’s Day pastime. The reasoning was that golf isn’t really a game. It’s more “a form of moral effort”. So, a Sunday out on the golf course is obviously OK.
Some of us might go further than that, though, and say that golf is actually a religion. Consider -
- It’s all about getting as close to perfection as possible (with your handicap to tell you just how well you’re doing);
- It has its sacred places - open air cathedrals like Augusta, Pebble Beach, the Royal and Ancient;
- It has high priests - Tiger, Ernie, Bobby, Jack, . . . , as well as lower level clergy, the club pros;
- It has sacred implements - the mashie, the niblick, etc.;
- It even does TV evangelism (the Golf Channel);
- And at its centre is a mysterious but profound religious rite: while a few Muslims occasionally throw rocks at Satan, each day millions of golfers whack away at little white balls (obviously Lucifers), trying to coax them down a series of small holes (thereby sending the devil back to hell).
T.S. Elliot may have come close to getting golf right when he wrote of “decent godless people” whose only monument is “a thousand lost golf balls”, but he was wrong in declaring these folk “godless”. They do indeed have a god – and it is Golf.
But to get serious - Why all this blether about golf? What’s the point being made? Answer: It’s to show how, if taken seriously enough, almost any human activity can become a religion – just as in our denomination some people are taken seriously when they argue for other gods than the historic Trinity (or even for no god at all). Accepting that sort of thinking ultimately leads to something quite unlike Christianity, and “A Song of Faith”, approved by our General Council in 2006, is clear evidence of where things are going for us.
As many people know, the NACC tried to provoke formal church-wide discussion about this theological grab bag of a statement. Our efforts went nowhere, with the General Secretary rejecting our criticism of “A Song”, and the Judicial Committee Executive accepting her recommendation that our appeal not be granted a hearing. That should have been the end of things – except that late last year we decided to hang in and go public with our concerns.
We cast a wide net, but so far the response has been almost invisible: nothing in the media (including the Observer); nothing has come back from congregations; nothing from Presbyteries; nothing from the Executive of General Council; and less than ten responses from General Council Commissioners, one or two of them slightly supportive, some puzzled, some scurrilously angry with us. But who cares? – others have trodden this path before. Listen to Jeremiah, who spoke to Israel in very similar times:
This is what the Lord says: Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, Ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’ I appointed watchmen over you and said, ‘Listen to the sound of the trumpet!’ But you said, ‘We will not listen.’ Therefore hear, O nations; observe O witnesses, what will happen to them. Hear, O earth: I am bringing disaster on this people, the fruit of their schemes, because they have not listened to my words and have rejected my law.
(Jer 6:16-19)
Well, Israel had her disaster, in spades. But what about now, two and a half millennia later? Listen to what our Moderator had to say several months ago:
As a community we are learning about the ‘valley of shadows’ after a history spent primarily on the top of the world. We are experiencing tremendous change and loss as a community. The church we have known is dying. Death is always part of transformation. We don’t know where it will lead, but we do know that we no longer claim special authority and place in our culture. For a long time we rode a great white charger. Now we are learning to ride the donkey. There is confusion, denial, and pain, as well as hope, in our body. I think we are closer to Jesus.
Important words, including prediction of death, no less. But unlike Jeremiah, David Giuliano makes no mention of God’s instructions being ignored. And just where does he see room for hope? In the confused hodgepodge of “A Song”? Moreover, what makes him think we’re getting closer to Jesus?
As the NACC sees it, to get close to Jesus requires deep contrition. Is there some hint of that in what Giuliano says? Hmm, . . . . Shifting from sitting astride a “great white charger” (echoes of Rev 19:11 and the triumphant Christ“ of the Last Days”) and onto a donkey (echoes now of the self-sacrificial Jesus of Palm Sunday) seems to suggest self-aggrandizement rather than penitence. Surely a better reference would have been to Balaam’s donkey, with the discredited prophet off his mount and groveling in the dust before an angry angel (Numbers 22). Like Balaam, we should be recognizing we’ve got things badly wrong, that our course is suicidal –as was that of the Israel Jeremiah spoke to.
Still, while people like us have good reason to be concerned, we shouldn’t be pessimistic, because, to return to our opening theme, we’re just small players on one of the many holes of God’s enormous, cosmic golf course. There are lots of hazards there – elephant-high rough, water obstacles of incredible width and depth, bottomless bunkers of quicksand – but this is God’s course, and Jesus is playing it with us. Moreover, the final Masters’ Championship is God’s to award, and Jesus (he plays with no handicap) is going to take that title, hands down. Maybe, just maybe, we’ll be allowed to tag along behind him – perhaps even to caddy for him.
God bless, and please pray for the April AGM, in Alberta this year -- Geoff
Posted at March 15, 2009 03:44 PM