Religion and Daily Survival

I remember back in the '70's, that on Monday and Tuesday nights, a group of us would gather at the Good Neighbor Presbyterian Church in Manhattan to play volleyball and conclude by having devotionals.  Even Ruth, who at that time was more like a little sister to me, would join us. A Christian quintet, called ¨The King's Five¨ were the main organizers of these activities.  They had put out two recordings of Christian music, and I had purchased these two recordings because I loved their music.   Whenever I came home from work, or whenever I had free time at home, I would play these records. I would engage with my youngest brother who at that time was thirteen years old.  To my surprise, one day, out of the clear blue sky, he said to me ¨All you talk about is the Bible, the Church, and the King's Five.  Can't you find something more interesting to talk about?¨  I had to ponder for a minute on what he said.  My brother was right, for the most part.  Aside from my full-time job as a teletype operator at a bank, my life did revolve around the Bible, the Church, and the King's Five. I had nothing else to talk about. I couldn't think of anything else about which to
engage in conversation.  I was living in a spiritual bubble with an emphasis an internalized spirituality which focused very little, if at all, on my immediate surroundings. I was not paying much attention to the difficulties which people, including a very close relative, were experiencing.  I just thought that if they got involved in ¨the Bible, the Church, and the King's Five,¨ that everything would be alright. All we did was to ¨focus on Jesus and prepare to go to Heaven.¨

Fourty-five years later, as I ponder on my journey through spiritual ¨Lalaland,¨ and reflecting on my mistakes,  I ask how did I survive that insanity and get to the place where I am now, by the grace of God.  I still wonder how is it that we as Christians still preach a Gospel that has absolutely nothing with ¨getting the cheese off the trucks,¨ i.e. daily survival?  How is it that we cannot be present in the midst of people's struggle for dignity and social justice?   We are so obsessed with getting people ¨to Heaven,¨ and forgetting that they are unemployed, underemployed, living in deplorable housing conditions, have little, if any, access to quality health care, few economic resources to obtain higher education, etc. etc.  I ask, what in tarnation does being economically alienated, and socially marginalized, and politically disenfranchised have to do with ¨going to Heaven?¨  We are expected to proclaim a Gospel message that gives the impression that God does not care about these human conditions because God is preparing  a ¨better place¨ for them.  Well, this type of ¨Casper the Friendly Ghost¨ message does not cut the mustard.

A colleague of mine, Dr. Harold Recinos, reminds us on an almost daily basis, that we are called to be ¨the Word made flesh,¨ i.e. the embodiment of God's love and justice for all humankind.  We can talk all we want about the Bible, the Church, and the King's Five, but if we are not in the vanguard of the struggle for human liberation, all we are doing is talking rhetoric.  If we are not struggling for prisoner's rights, the rights of our undocumented sisters and brothers, concerned with the homeless and the hungry, joining the working class in their struggle for a living wage, all our preaching and singing is empty-talk, full of cliches and slogans. What's more, if we are not present in the struggles of the people for survival with dignity, we are guilty of a pseudo spirituality.  If we are not physically present in the quest for human liberation, we are false prophets.

May the God who became embodied in Jesus of Nazareth, empower us to move over and beyond the Bible, the Church, and the King's Five into the arena for liberation from classist, racist, and sexist oppression.

In the Name of the Creator, and of the Liberator, and of the Sustainer.  Amen.

Dr. Juan A. Ayala-Carmona

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