Why the Critics and the Evangelists Are Wrong About Church

This subject warrants a much longer post by me, but I want to write quickly that I'm so distraught by some of the things I read from conservative Christians, who love their churches, and also from those who grew up in those churches and have rejected them as adults. This post by Rachel Evans, popped up on my Facebook feed (I don't read her regularly), and I wanted to respond by telling her "thank you" for an honest, insightful response to her upbringing in a conservative Christian church, but also to say that this story does not paint a valid picture of the entire universe of organized religion in the United States.

I have attended several wonderful churches--particularly Methodist, Presbyterian (USA), United Church of Christ, and Unitarian congregations--that are doing all of the things most people say churches do wrong, right. They are inclusive. If you visited, you would see women on the choir risers and in the pulpit as salaried clergy. In fact, you would see people of color in those places, too. And gay and lesbian clergy. And a whole mix of folks sitting in the pews, next to one another, talking to one another, and interacting warmly and genuinely in the coffee hour after church, too. These churches are multi-generational, and all types of families show up on Sundays. Doubts and questions are expected, even encouraged. Perhaps these churches err on the side of assuming everyone is voting Democrat, but I've been to some that don't assume at all. From the pulpit, and in Bible studies, and in the impassioned conversations in women's groups (even youth groups!), talk about sin is almost exclusively about the ways people commit injustices against each other. There are plenty examples of that in the Bible. Sex is part of the conversation, sure, but it's about sexual violence, and misplaced societal value on sex, and sex as a means of subjugating certain people, not really about abstinence.

These churches believe deeply that every person (not just people in church) are works in progress, even that the Church and its doctrines are works in progress, too. People at my churches believed in evolution and also respect and study the Bible. "Community service" is an act of humbling ourselves before God, being accountable to the creation we nurture (and often destroy), and practicing an unconditional love and care for other people, as God loved us. It is often about collecting stories and sharing them with friends; breaking bread with people we might not have otherwise met at a dinner table. It is never about converting people or showing them why they are wrong to believe or live as they do. My churches make an active effort to avoid becoming a "country club" of the rich, white, and well-dressed, and instead aim to be just a meeting place, where we practice being members of the type of world we envision would bring about the most peace (in the broadest sense of the word).

I admit that these churches are rare. They take effort to seek out, but they exist, and they offer an organized, loving community whose reality and teachings run completely opposite to everything the un-churched or dislocated conservative Christians say is wrong with modern religion. I understand the need to rebel against institutions that oppress you and people you care about. I support that, in fact. But I wish those rejections didn't reinforce such a one-sided portrayal of who Christians are. I am progressive, and justice-seeking, and full of doubts, too. And going to church on Sundays edifies who I am at my core.

Why We Keep Coming to DC

Today, I achieved one of the goals I set for myself upon snagging my new job--publishing a piece of writing. My wonderful boss is also the editor of Zócalo Public Square, an L.A.-based online magazine and lecture series on social cohesion. He asked me to write a piece on the disconnect between polling data on D.C. and the experience of living in Washington. Here is what emerged...

Ms. Lawrence Goes to Washington
But the Rest of the Country Thinks I'm in Sin City

Exactly one year ago, I was packing my suitcases to move from my childhood home in north Texas to a three-bedroom group house in Washington, D.C. My mother, standing close by to inspect my work, hooked the shoulder of a blue dress on her index finger and raised her eyebrows. “Don’t forget,” she said, “what happened to Monica,” drawing out the name for effect.

Ignoring the implicit attack on my character, I pointed out a crucial difference between Ms. Lewinsky and me: “I’m going to work for a non-profit, Mom.” Later that afternoon, my father—ever the comedian—called out to me from behind the TSA security line at DFW Airport, “Don’t spend all the taxpayers’ money!”

To my parents, Washington is populated not by young idealists but rather by those eager to consort with sex-crazed lawmakers and to squander dad’s paycheck...

Read more...

Photo credit to {Wes} on flickr.com.

Becoming a Big-Time Writer

As I settle into my new job, I'm looking for ways to do more writing for a general audience. I've done writing I think is infinitely interesting and I hope also holds the momentary attention of like-minded SNAP wonks, for example; but I need to learn how to put my arms around other topics without squeezing the life out of them or using so many words (and parentheticals, haha) that nobody makes it to the conclusion. In short, I'm interested in getting out there and acquiring some journalistic skill and experience. The only issue is that I need a few provocative ideas. Here's what I've got so far--what do you think?

1. Related to my previous post on academic achievement and job expectations, I've found it interesting that, even internationally, as performance on standardized tests goes up, the percentage of kids expecting to go into medium- and high-skilled work goes down. (The opposite relationship is also true.) This is a surprising finding, and I'd like to investigate the possible causes and what they could mean for U.S. education policy. Why, when kids do poorly in school, don't they expect to be punished in the globalized job market?

2. Despite the fact that more than 4 in 5 Americans label themselves middle class, we don't have a good definition for what that means. Is being in the middle class just about income? Probably not--it's probably also about wealth, education, and job status. Is is also about political engagement, savings rates, and social networks? I think we could turn a (potentially boring) literature review into a provocative story about how Americans see themselves relative to their neighbors.

3. A number of writers and researchers have found that income equality breeds broader economic prosperity. In an age of ballooning CEO compensation (and severance) packages, I wonder if this is also true for businesses. Does more equitable pay all the way down the career ladder in a company result in more productive and successful firms? Can we add an economic argument to our equality-based case for more reasonable CEO pay?

4. After WWII, the GI Bill sent millions of veterans to the schools of their choice and paid for living expenses for their growing families while they studied. A survey of 10,000 veterans and nonveterans estimated that 20 percent of veterans who went to college wouldn't have done so if it weren't for the GI Bill. (Though I admit there were tens of thousands of women and minority veterans who were unjustly kept from the benefits.) Historically, the military seems to have served as a major engine for social mobility. But what about now? Can we still count on the military to train and educate Americans such that, upon putting down their guns, they can forge successful civilian careers or retire without worry?

These are some of my ideas, a few of them admittedly better fit for whole books or academic studies that online magazine articles. All of them are also the subject of others' study and writing. Still, I think asking any of these questions might bring forth interesting and timely answers. In the context of "broke" governments, political polarization, and a protesting "99 percent," I think deep research into any of these issues will unearth something new.

Photo credit to Opedagogen from flickr.com.

Are we studying for unemployment? OWS and education reform

The following is a reproduced version of my guest post on www.amandaripley.com, the blog site of Amanda Ripley, author of The Unthinkable and The Smart Kids' Club (forthcoming).

A few days before my 6th-grade graduation in Richardson, Texas, my teacher asked us to write poems about the jobs we hoped to have in 10 years. In clumsy rhyme and loopy cursive, we proclaimed our intentions to become singers, pilots, doctors, race car drivers and pastry chefs. With the audacity of youth, I predicted my own success as an author, lawyer or architect. (I was keeping my options open.)

Mrs. Babb affixed a gold star to each page and lovingly pinned them to the bulletin board, silently affirming that yes, these jobs are waiting for you if you work hard. Not a single child prophesied his future as a barista, a telemarketer or a perpetual job-seeker.

Since then, I have graduated from college and been fortunate to find a job that allows me to use my brain and pay the bills. But some of my highest-achieving friends are still grasping for the very bottom rung of the career ladder.

We know that the Occupy Wall Street protest is partly a response to corporate greed, but I suspect it also reflects the disconnect between our aspirations and our reality. It feels like the engines of social mobility (namely education) are failing us. After talking with the protesters in Zuccotti Park, the Washington Post’s Alexandra Petri described the sentiment this way:

“Growing up, we were told: You are special. You are brilliant. Go to school, get a degree, pursue what you love. Four years later, we are mired in debt. Jobless, with no prospects. This is not what it said on the motivational poster.”

It’s as if we are catching up to the data, which has for years shown a mismatch between our academic performance and our occupational aspirations. In its 2007 report Child Poverty in Perspective, UNICEF evaluated countries’ performance along 40 indicators of child well-being, six of which measured educational well-being. Among 25 “economically advanced” nations, the U.S. ranked 21st in educational achievement of 15 year-olds in reading, math and science. The U.S. also had higher drop-out rates than similarly prosperous countries. Of the 23 countries ranked, the United States ranked 21st in “percentage of 15-19 year-olds in full-time or part-time education.” In fact, the United States ranked second-to-last (20th of 21 countries) in child well-being overall.

But at the same time, U.S. kids trounced all others when it came to optimism about their careers. Just 14% of 15 year-olds surveyed said they expected to go into low-skilled occupations—the lowest rate in the world. Although many could not compete with average students elsewhere in core academic subjects, very few believed they would pay a price for this mediocrity. (By contrast, over half of Japanese 15-year-olds expected to be doing low-skilled work—while the country ranks fourth in overall academic achievement and has a lower unemployment rate than we do.)

Can we continue to peddle the American Dream in classrooms that don’t prepare students to compete in a globalized labor force? One anonymous blogger wrote on the “We Arethe99 Percent” tumblr page:

“I have a bachelor’s degree from a top-ranked liberal arts college and a master’s from an Ivy League university. After graduation, all I could find was a year-long internship that only pays about 1/4 of my living expenses. The fellowship ends in under three months, and I still don’t know if they plan to hire me on permanently.”

Occupy Wall Street is not just about deadlock, dysfunction and disenfranchisement. It is about our nation’s willingness to over-promise and under-educate. It is about the urgent need to finally get serious about making our education system worthy of our ambition.

Putting SNAP on the Map: When it comes to eating, place matters.

It’s no secret that where you live affects how you live—everything from the length of your morning commute, to the quality of your neighborhood park, to whether your child’s teacher writes with broken chalk or SMART Board™ technology.

And the same is true for food. You likely know from shopping and eating and penny pinching that where you live affects how much your groceries cost. As a Texas native recently transplanted to D.C., I have endured the wide-eyed, light-wallet symptoms of supermarket sticker shock. The same items—bread, milk, eggs, and other staples—I enjoyed in my home state cost far more in D.C. stores. Though the mechanisms that drive such food price variation across regions, states, and neighborhoods are many and entangled, the effects on consumer buying power are substantial: the more food costs, the less we can afford.

When I decided to participate in the Arizona SNAP Experience from afar, my Texas-to-D.C. sticker shock got me thinking: How does food price variation affect buying power for people who rely on SNAP to cover their grocery bills? The answer was not difficult to uncover. The USDA publishes a table on the average per capita SNAP benefit for every state, and Feeding America, the nation’s largest emergency food provider, recently released Map the Meal Gap, an interactive map with food insecurity and food price data for a variety of useful geographies.

Using two simple formulas, I calculated the average weekly SNAP benefit per capita in each state in the U.S. and the average cost of food for an individual for one week in each state, assuming s/he consumes three meals per day. By dividing the average SNAP benefit for a week by the average cost of food for a week and multiplying the quotient by 100, I found the percent of average food costs covered by SNAP for each state in the nation.

And I couldn’t believe what I found. First, SNAP covers far less of an average shopper’s food budget than I was expecting. For example, SNAP covers just 44% of the average weekly food cost for a shopper in D.C. That's just 9 of the 21 meals you will eat in a week. Although the USDA admits that SNAP is “supplemental” and therefore not meant to cover an individual’s entire food budget, 44% is simply insufficient, especially since many families cannot afford to spend money out-of-pocket. Second, I was surprised to find that there is incredibly high variation across states. In the best case, SNAP would cover 68% of your food (Ohio); in the worst case, just 44% (Vermont and D.C.). The national average is 58%. In Arizona, the number is 59%.

Check out the interactive map for information on other states. After the map opens, use the slider at the right to zoom out, place your cursor over the state of interest, and the relevant percentage will appear in the map legend.

The biggest problem resulting from such variation is obvious: if your food costs are high and your state’s SNAP benefit does not rise to meet them, you must leave some items on the shelf or reach deep in your pockets to pay for food not covered by your benefit. This is a problem for low-income people, who are often stretching their budgets to cover things like rent/mortgage, child care, health care, and utilities. I would hypothesize (though I haven’t formally researched these claims) that other phenomena may be related to geographic variation in what SNAP buys you, such as the following:

• Geographic variation in which foods (type and quality) families choose to purchase with their SNAP benefits.

• Geographic variation in food insecurity rates. (SNAP provides a different level of in-kind benefit to families depending on where they live!)

• Geographic variation in health outcomes associated with food insecurity and/or consumption of unhealthy foods.

• Geographic variation in SNAP participation rates. (One might ask him/herself: Why participate if SNAP only covers a small portion of my bill?)

These questions require formal analysis, but it’s easy to see how a failure in the SNAP “system” to account for geographic variation in food prices could result in important differences in health and other measures of well-being based solely (and unjustly) on where people have chosen to lay down roots.

Of course, food price variation is local. Examining food prices in your state is better than looking at food prices nationally, but using more localized estimates is even better. For example, within New York State, the average cost per meal in New York County (Manhattan) is $3.72, whereas the average cost per meal in Chautauqua County (rural NY county near the PA border) is $2.27.

Use the three simple steps below to calculate what percent of an average food budget in YOUR county or congressional district is covered by SNAP. Compute the number for your community, reflect on your week participating in the SNAP Experience (or the blog posts describing the experience), and write your state and federal politicians about it! I would bet your whole food budget and mine that your elected officials don’t know just how little SNAP is doing for your most vulnerable neighbors.

Easy as 1, 2, 3: Calculate “Real” SNAP Benefits on Your Own

1. Visit Feeding America's Map the Meal Gap site at http://feedingamerica.org/hunger-in-america/hunger-studies/map-the-meal-gap.aspx. Locate your county or congressional district of interest and trace your cursor over the area until it changes color (to orange). Note the average cost per meal in the right hand corner of the data that appears. Multiply the average cost per meal x 21. This is the average cost of food for a week in the geographic area you’ve chosen.

2. View the USDA chart of average SNAP benefits per person for FY 2010 at http://www.fns.usda.gov/pd/18SNAPavg$PP.htm. Find your state's average monthly SNAP benefit per person and insert it into the following formula: Monthly benefit x 12 / 365 x 7. This is the average SNAP benefit per person for one week in your state.

3. Divide findings from STEP 2 by findings from STEP 1. Multiply the result by 100 to get the percent of an average weekly food budget covered by SNAP benefits in the geographic area you’ve chosen.

A new leaf?

Life is very good right now. I've started my new job, and I'm very excited to be assisting four accomplished journalists with their book projects. I'll be working on a number of topics, including immigration, education, political philosophy, and economic policy. I've already had opportunities to be involved in the design and planning of new projects as the organization looks to bring on a "food fellow" who will write on agroecology--the urgent need to feed the growing masses and preserve the shrinking planet at the same time. I've also made good on at least one resolution from a previous post: I joined a gym near my office, where I plan to do all manner of de-stressing, muscle-building, dessert-ameliorating, sweat-inducing exercises. And I'm currently thinking I'll do all of that in the morning before work. We'll see how it goes.

In other news, I recently returned from yet another round of traveling. My first "trip" was local, but long overdue. I hiked across D.C. on Upshur to the end of a quiet residential street and into Rock Creek Park. I had a nice time convening with nature and temporarily escaping the city. The following week I went to Lake Tahoe to see my grandparents and lots of loved ones I've not had the opportunity to bug in a long time. (Incidentally, in so doing I avoided both an earthquake and a hurricane back in D.C.) And finally, I went with Jimmy and friends to New York City for his roommate's wedding. Though the travel logistics got tricky and stressful at times, the wedding was beautiful, the food was bountiful, and Jimmy and I had a great time on the dance floor. See a few choice photos in the previous post.

This coming week I'm looking forward to meeting more of the journalists and academics I'll be rubbing elbows with at my new job. God- and coffee-willing I'll also make a few trips to the gym I paid so much for. I'll also spend the tail end of the weekend planning for next week's food stamp challenge, hosted by my previous employer, Arizona Community Action Association. Check out this year's blog or the online chronicle of last year's efforts,"Challenging Preceptions". I'll blog at least once here and on ACAA's blog about the experience of eating on the budget afforded a low-income household of one by SNAP, formerly called The Food Stamp Program.

Being crunchy

Weekend Wedding

Life lately

Wireless at last!

Hooray! At long last, our house has wireless internet. I have been living for the past year without regular access to internet at home, thus this site has been a sad excuse for a blog. I hope to post more regularly now, even if each post is shorter.

Updates. My fellowship experience is complete. I am more grateful, humbler, and wiser than when I first began. I also have some of the most wonderful new friends there are.

I am enjoying two-week+ vacation beginning last Thursday! I went the wedding of my friend Caroline in Sarasota, FL, and after a week "getting me life together" in D.C. (read: doing laundry, securing internet service, and catching up on sleep), I'm headed to Lake Tahoe in CA/NV to visit my grandparents, cousins, and Uncle Matt.

I secured a new job! I'll be providing research assistance to fellows writing books for a nonpartisan think tank in D.C. I look forward to meeting new work buddies, honing research skills, and learning new policy areas.

I'm working on getting my life together in a broader sense--ensuring that the way I use my time reflects my priorities, and that I stick to a path that makes me happy, contributes to the world in a positive way, and keeps me in a state of constant self-improvement. Some of the little things on my to-do list include: Cooking for myself more often and with whole ingredients. Attending church regularly. Reading and reflecting on good books. Taking a yoga or modern dance class. Making some time for my creative, crafty side. Getting out into nature--the National Arboretum and Rock Creek Park are high on the to-visit list. Volunteering with children--I miss young souls not yet jaded by the craziness in Washington.

And now a song.