music without makeup

Last night I went out Genghis Cohen, a small West Hollywood club, to hear a few singer-songwriters perform. It was a small and intimate set, where they took turns to sing one or two of their songs. Each of them was great, and sang and played with a lot of heart and a lot of skill. But what struck me most wasn't how good they sounded, but rather what they were singing to us: Their songs. Their own songs, borne of their own experiences, into which they poured their emotions and thoughts, and putting melody to their hurts and hopes, joys and fears.

And I would have to say that in a world and culture where being genuine is scary and often discouraged, and in which we are often socialized and conditioned into not being genuine, that Friday night was, for me, a genuine moment. It was a moment in which you felt you were really hearing someone, allowed to see deeper into these songwriters, behind the masks that we all put on every day. Music without makeup.

Most of us wear makeup most days of the week, a makeup of social niceties and conditioning, mixed with our own fears and aversion to being hurt or having to deal with the hurts of others. I know I do. In a city where you're surrounded by so many people every day, compassion and empathy for each person is a psychic challenge, and so is being your genuine self.

Sometimes, though, the makeup hides the fact that some of us are suffocating beneath it all. Someone close to me recently did that, suffocated and died beneath the makeup that society forced him to wear. And living in the after of his passing, I wonder who else around me is struggling to breathe beneath the makeup, unable to be genuine with anyone, and slowly, slowly, dying.

That we all may one day be able to make music without makeup, and listen to each other's songs.

Christmas...

Blogging is a great alternative to mass Christmas e-mails. And I just don't have my act together enough to send out individualized Christmas cards (I suspect that might be a gender difference - I don't get Christmas cards from any single male friends, but many of my single female friends seem quite able on their own to do the Christmas card thing).

So, dear friends and gentle readers, Merry Christmas to one and all. Here's an excerpt from an e-mail I wrote to some friends who suffered a tragic loss earlier this year, a short meditation on Christmas:

I don't have any words to bring you comfort and peace. But I don't think timing is coincidental either. We are at the cusp of celebrating the most important birth in all time and place. And here, HERE comes an answer. It is not an easy answer, it is not a simple answer, and honestly, it's not very comprehensible either. How does the coming of Jesus Christ answer your sorrow and your loss? How does it explain away such a random tragedy, why a thing of darkness comes upon children of light? I don't really know the answer to that second question - I think the answer to that one is tied more closely to our living on this side of eternity. But as for the first question ...

Perhaps my favorite Christmas hymn is "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel", with its wonderful refrain, an exhortation for us to "rejoice, rejoice!" for "Emmanuel has come to thee". As Paul wrote, no longer do we mourn as those who have no hope. I am quite sure that the hope Paul spoke of was not merely a hope beyond the grave, but a hope for the here and now. It was not a mere escapism, because escapism is counter to the living reality of the whole Incarnation, from birth to crucifixion to resurrection and ascension. We believe in faith not just for the world to come, but for the world today, with all its struggles, pains, heartaches, and tragedies.

And this Christmas, Jesus comes as an answer to all our heartache, to your heartache. From my perspective, it's sort of like a mathematical sum. I can see the problem (your loss and grief and questions), I can see the final answer (Jesus, our Loving Saviour), but I'm not sure how the working in the middle is supposed to go - I think that's because the "working" is always intensely personal, and no one can do the working for anyone else (and so life is not like math).

So, dear friends, this Christmas my prayer is that as you continue to cope and deal with your loss, that in this working out of your faith, you will be able to sing, wholeheartedly, even if the working in the middle is not yet complete, that you "rejoice, rejoice", for "Emmanuel has come" to you. For indeed He has - Jesus is here, and He has come to ransom us, more fully than we could ever imagine and more profoundly than we could ever understand.

God be with you this Christmas, and for always in all ways.

being an alien, even among your own people

I'm not sure why, but there have been great articles concerning religion and life in both the LA Times and the NY Times this weekend. I've written about the LA Times article previously, and today I'd like to mention Noah Feldman's article in the NY Times (as a sidenote, Noah Feldman is a law professor at the UCLA of the East, aka Harvard, and somewhat of a legal celebrity, at least to David Lat of ATL).

Feldman's article is a wonderfully honest story about something close to my heart - reconciling belonging to a religious community with life in the modern world, and marriage to someone of a different religious upbringing. I'd write more about it, but I need to go learn how to enact service of process upon a party under both the Federal and California Rules of Civil Procedure (and probably strengthen my resolve not to go into litigation).

PS - Professor Feldman also taught me a new word - "consilience". Hopefully I get the chance to use that on the bar exam and justify spending the 15 minutes reading his excellent piece.

followup on the last post

So my Bible reading this morning was from Romans 2:17-29. In this passage, the apostle Paul excoriates his fellow Jews who claim to have the law but do not walk in accordance with it. And as I read it, I realized that you could easily replace "Jew" with "Christian", "the law" with "the gospel", and "circumcision" with "salvation", and it would ring just as true. It seems especially relevant in the context of the hypocrisy discussed in the LA Times article I referenced yesterday.

Now you, if you call yourself a Christian; if you rely on the gospel and brag about your relationship to God; if you know his will and approve of what is superior because you are instructed by the law; if you are convinced that you are a guide for the blind, a light for those who are in the dark, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of infants, because you have int he gospel the embodiment of knowledge and truth--you, then, who teach others, do you not teach yourself? You who preach against stealing, do you steal? You who say that people should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who brag about the gospel, do you dishonor God by breaking the gospel? As it is written: "God's name is blasphemed among the non-Christians because of you."

Salvation has value if you observe the gospel, but if you break the gospel, you have become as though you had not been saved. If those who are not saved keep the law's requirements, will they not be regarded as though they were saved? The one who is not saved physically and yet obeys the law will condemn you who, even though you have the written code and salvation, are a gospel-breaker.

A man is not a Christian if he is only one outwardly, nor is salvation merely outward and physical. No, a man is a Christian if he is one inwardly; and salvation is salvation of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise is not from men, but from God.

Romans 2:17-29 (adapted from the NIV)

A test of faith

I obviously wouldn't interrupt studying for the bar by blogging unless it was something terribly important (alright, maybe that's not entirely true. Forcing yourself to study can be a real pain). But I came across an article in the LA Times, by its former religion reporter, sharing his spiritual story: how he came to faith and then lost it.

It's an honest story without very much in frills. It talks very honestly about some of the real failings of organized religion: the Catholic Church's covering up of sexual "abuse", the excesses of some televangelists and faith healers. I really liked the article, mostly because it's honest - it chronicles the struggle of a soul trying to make sense of God and religion when those who claim to be God's people live lives that are anything but marked by God's grace and goodness.

I'll spoil the ending for you - the reporter ends up walking away from faith. After seeing all the wrong done by God's people, he decides that he cannot believe in God, and walks away (he does a much better job describing it than I do, but then again, he is after all the professional writer and I'm the blogger with a readership of oh, probably one).

I disagree with his conclusion, but I certainly can't fault him for reaching it, nor can I impeach the evidence he presents. God forgive the Church for what it does, every day.

Maybe the Calvinists are right after all - maybe some people are just chosen to believe. And maybe I'm bordering on or plainly am being heretical in saying this, but sometimes I find the struggling and wrestling with belief, and all the accompanying angst, more beautiful than the certainty of belief. But perhaps that's because real faith is filled with struggle and angst, wrestling with God and this reality that he doesn't always seem to fit in, yet doesn't always seem to fit without him.

Unfortunately, I need to return to the urgent (the bar exam) rather than the important (God, life, and faith).

You Know You've Always Wanted One

As they say, "You can't make this stuff up." Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I give you the iPod t-p holder. (Wonder why Steve Jobs didn't introduce this in a keynote address?)

iCarta iPod Stereo Dock w/Bath Tissue Holder

Law School Menace: Rollie Bags

The N.Y. Times actually has an article on those darned things. I've never personally been involved in a rollie bag hit-and-run, but I know friends who have, just as I know friends who actually have the things.

I've never taken a true rollie bag to law school, but I admit that I have a carry-on rollie bag for airplane trips. Hiking through O'Hare or Dulles with a duffel on your shoulders is not fun once you've done it once or twice. The roller totally gets my vote for convenience on that one.

As for law school? I wonder if getting run over by a rollie bag qualifies as an assault, or if consent is implied, as one of those normal contacts of life...

Recent Supreme Court Decisions and the Long View

After the first full year of the Roberts Court, pundits are weighing in on the new Supreme Court. I figured I might as well get my two cents in as well - it sure beats learning about Wills & Trusts. The WSJ Law Blog has a post reporting on how some liberals are disappointed that the new Chief Justice turned out to be more conservative than they were hoping for.

I've been reading the autobiography of Lee Kuan Yew, undeniably Singapore's preeminent statesman and the person who led Singapore from being a swampy British colony to a vibrant global city. It's interesting to hear his views on politics and political leaders from different countries. One observation he makes about the U.S., is that U.S. politicians often have a very short-term view measured in terms of election cycles. In contrast, he remarked that Deng Xiaoping and other Chinese leaders thought and planned in terms of decades.

Those observations have made me look at the latest Supreme Court decisions with new eyes. To take the long view, as it were. Yes, the implications of some of the decisions are troubling to me. But I think it's far too early to think all is lost. To quote an aging rocker with a head and heart full of big dreams, "The journey of equality moves on." And to quote Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (at least, I think he's the one who said this): "The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

So blame my faith and belief in truth, justice, love and what is right, but I do believe things are going to be alright. We just need to keep our shoulders to the plow and take the long view.

ugh

California Bar Exam = "major suckage."

I was enjoying it until I realized how much work I have to do between now and July 24. And then there was, of course, the freakout. Sigh. Back to the mines.

Staying Alive... with BarBri

It's been, in Internet time, what seems like eons. But I'm back, albeit briefly. Since my last post, I've taken all my finals, graduated law school (I'm one grade away, and I don't think that professor will fail me - I didn't put in enough effort to fail), moved, and started BarBri.

For those of you who don't know, BarBri is cram school for the bar exam. In just about every state in the Union. 4 hour lectures every day (sometimes 8 hours), sometimes including Saturdays. (They also recommend spending 5-8 hours a day studying on your own aside from the lectures.) Which is essentially a really good prescription for institutionalization in your favorite psychiatric health facility.

But BarBri has given us some pretty entertaining professors who lecture on topics diverse and somewhat interesting. Mr. Torts was pretty good. Mr. Agency & Partnership was... interesting. And every once in a while, their practice questions deliver a good zinger. Here's one from Torts:

Cisneros was sailing down the deep water channel to Lake Washington using the kicker on his sailboat when LeBeau roared by in his cabin cruiser at about 20 knots, nearly swamping Cisneros. Cisneros raised his middle finger in the timeworn salute of the impotently angry and shouted a few well-chosen references to LeBeau's anatomy and ancestry....

Now if that isn't classic ... I'm just lame (okay that statement is probably true independent of whether or not that quote is "classic" in the sense of being humorous). Of course, given how strictly BarBri regulates its materials and protects its copyright, that might be an actionable quote right there. Nonetheless, I think it's worth putting up, if only to illustrate that BarBri isn't that bad after all. Especially since Mr. Performance Test today demonstrated to us that all we need to do to pass, is fail the essays. How can you not feel better about yourself after a lecture like that? After all, how hard can it be to fail?