Skip

George Scipione died yesterday.

He was my counseling professor in seminary and let me sit in on sessions one summer even though I wasn't enrolled in the official program. Skip had a strong personality and was kind of a piece of work, but he was always kind to me (which is not universally true of my seminary professors). Not just me, but as far as I could tell, to everyone. He had a natural gift for rubbing people the wrong way, but that was never his intention.

The last time I talked to him was a couple months ago, when he called me out of the blue. (This was before the cancer diagnosis; he was talking about plans for starting a retreat center for pastors in his retirement.) He had heard the rumors about the train wreck which is my pastoral career and just wanted to encourage me and pray for me. I wasn't surprised because that was Skip. I wish everyone knew that about him.

I was praying for him yesterday morning. I knew he was suffering, but I also knew he had spent much of his life struggling with various physical ailments. Suffering was something he knew how to bear. I thought about what I might tell people about him, and I realized the most obvious and important thing about him was that he loved Jesus. Really, really loved Jesus. At that moment, I was sad he was suffering, but even more I was happy for him because pretty soon he would be seeing Jesus in person. For Skip, I knew that would be as good as it could possibly get.

I am so happy for him now.

Fantasyland

Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire (A 500-Year History) is an entertaining presentation of the thesis that the culture of these United States tends to encourage the citizenry to entertain views and lifestyles not well-tethered to reality. In broad strokes, Kurt Andersen makes his case.

As a researched document, though, "Fantasyland" disappoints. Andersen has an annoying tendency to mention persons without giving their names. For example, this occurs twice on page 333, where he cites a "Pentecostal Christian author" and "the co-host" of the television program 20/20 without naming either. Obviously, these omissions make it difficult to check on his use of sources.

With regard to my areas of expertise (things Biblical, Christian and Church historical), Andersen disappoints still more. In footnote 12 to chapter 31, he describes Ephesians as having been "translated from ancient Hebrew to ancient Greek to Old Latin to New Latin to Middle English to Modern English…," which demonstrates breath-taking ignorance of Bible translation methodology and of the New Testament itself. In an earlier chapter, he identifies Jonathan Edwards, a Congregationalist, as an Episcopalian. Because his errors are so gross and unnecessary in this area, I suspect him of similar problems in the other fields he discusses.

Andersen has a provocative and fun argument to make, but I doubt he has backed it up very well. I'll continue to mull over his descriptions and ideas, but am not persuaded he writes from the realitiy-based perch which he seems to think he occupies. American may not actually be as haywire as he believes.