Author: Uri Brito

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Back to Basics: Community

Times like these when the Christian faith is being attacked means that our pursuit of community will need to intensify. We will need to form closer bonds and deeper relationships with one another. Those who are often content being alone will discover very soon that the only voices who tolerate your basic dogmas are those who share the values and virtues of the faith. Choose ye this day!

In a time not too far from now (unless God changes the cultural forms and fixtures of the day), Christians will be compelled to either lose friendships or keep their opinion to private conversations. Some Christians will quietly give up their convictions in order to fit in and avoid conflict. But those who are faithful will seek communities with a shared mission who does not take Christ lightly nor his calling flippantly.

Christians will be called back to their first love in a more intense and genuine way and seek the old rituals that made Christendom what it is: hospitality, friendship and the Eucharistic life. These things which have lost its vigor and practice in the Church will become once more the things that identify her and allows her to sustain an authentic Christian witness.

If the cultural forces continue to move away from the authentic values of the Church, members will have to see the community as an alternative city fully ready to provide counter-cultural measures that build the Church once again. We will have to restore our sense of the good by loving one another and surrounding ourselves with a Creed that cannot be torn by the mobs but that is embraced by a genuine community of believers.

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Neutrality No More!

One of the increasing benefits of a polarizing era is that men and women are now much more self-aware of what conservative ideals are. Of course, wise Christians know that there can be vast distinctions between conservative politics and a Christian political order. As polls constantly demonstrate, lots of conservatives know much about modern politics, thanks to a steady diet of vegetative cable news and they are graded somewhere between a fig and a potato chip when it comes to basic biblical knowledge. That chasm shows that there are a lot of conservatives who love D.C.-ness more than Kingdom-ness.

Still, many who were once naively conservatives or who inherited conservatism, are now being forced to make ideological decisions or to think more deeply about their commitments. Now, they have to answer the questions: “Are you for BLM? If not, why not?” “Do you believe there is a disproportionate use of force used by police against black people? If so, should we defund the police or seek reform?” “Are riots that end private property merely as a necessary ‘spectacle’ to get attention?” Some of these questions are easier to think through than others. They touch on the very heart of conservatism and its focus on freedom and private property (as Russell Kirk develops in “The Conservative Mind”).

The end result here is that we can no longer remain neutral on political issues. We can afford to be less frustrating, and we certainly need to seek ways to draw people to our message rather than send them away, but we cannot be neutral bystanders, playing Switzerland to our own beat.

Congregations that attempt to harmonize the Bible with a myriad of political positions as a way of appeasing the cause of diversity will eventually realize that the diversity crowd can never be appeased (see mainline churches). But congregations that equip their flock to see righteousness from unrighteousness, the ant from the sluggard, the fool from the wise will shine bright as the sun. They will build a generation of convinced humanity who know the “what” and “why,” “who” and “when” of a faithful political system. There will always be those who fall by the side and cultivate friendship with the world, but they will be exceptions.

The great benefit of our age is no one can afford not to know where they stand. And for those just starting their journey, remember, Jesus is Lord! Begin there, and a lot of things will make sense in our present age.

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Bonhoeffer on what to do in tumultuous times

Bonhoeffer takes the occasion of his godson’s baptism to offer a short treatise on Christian faith and the ways of the world. In it, he expounds on the benefits of a stable family life providing shelter in the midst of a tumultuous and unpredictable world: In the coming years of revolution, the greatest gift will be to know that you are protected in a good home….In the general pauperization of intellectual life, you will find in your parents’ home a palladium of spiritual [geistiger] values and a source of intellectual [geistiger] stimulation. Music, how your parents interpret and cultivate [pflegen] it, will bring your confusion to clarity and purify your character and outlook, and in the midst of worries and sadness will sustain in you a Grundton of joy. It is the practice of music, a prominent element in little Dietrich’s home, that will animate and sustain within him a “Grundton of joy.” The phrase itself is a musical metaphor. Put simply, the Grundton (in English, “tonic” or “key note”) is the “first degree of a major or minor scale”24 or “the main note of a key…after which the key is named.” -Quoted in Robert Smith’s Bonhoeffer and Musical Metaphor
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Music Camp and Psalm Tap

Dear friend,

I will be traveling tomorrow after worship to Monroe, LA to attend the Jubilate Deo Summer Music Camp. The week functions like a training camp for young musicians from 1st-12th grades. I will be teaching theology of music for the high-schoolers, which is always one of my highlights. I have been teaching some of these students for several years now and always relish our reunions.

Everyone plays a part in this great musical composition. They will train all week in music (in addition to art and dance) and on Saturday they will offer a performance to the community. It is truly a magnificent sight to behold and hear. We have for too long minimized music education in our youth treating it as an elective when it is should the norm for a Christian community. This camp is a noble attempt to bring back musical literacy not only to the church but to the household and schools as well. Thanks to the tireless Jarrod Richey for his efforts and friendship over the years.

The Lutheran pastor, Bonhoeffer, spoke to the need for singing in our communities as that which diminished our fears and “lifts us about our personal concerns.” Bonhoeffer understood well the role of singing as he sought to form young pastors fighting for their lives in an underground seminary. Even amidst confusion and a maniacal dictator, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was not content to live in fear, but he pursued the committed task of singing together. In fact, in singing together the church spoke for the world n “vicarious representation.”

Our mission has not changed. We teach and encourage one another with psalms, hymns and Spirit-songs in all seasons knowing that our God sings over us (Zeph. 3).

For anyone interested, I will be also speaking at the first Psalm Tap Colloquium along with Theopolis Institute president, Peter J. Leithart and others on various topics related to music and its role in the church (you can see the link below).

An entire week of teaching and communion with gifted musicians and eager singers will keep me relatively away from my daily missives here. As a side note, I do want to thank those who have sent me kind notes about these daily posts. I do try to be intentional about them, and in a social media platform made for the mundane, I try to offer a substantive outlook that helps form ideas and visions about the world with as much biblical zeal I can muster.

Hearty cheers and solid joys,
Pastor Uriesou Brito

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Choosing your Causes

When the advocate of some form of justice says, “hey, if you don’t protest this or that, or fight for this or that cause, or don’t follow our narrative, you are therefore a racist,” what they are asking is not for us to love humanity, but to love their tribal agenda. Most times the same people cheering for some reform have no interest in other reforms, but they will crucify your ideology because you happen to not care as deeply and profoundly about theirs as you do yours.

Every culture has its particular struggles. In our country there are many reforms needed in every system: education, police departments, governments, the department of kale in Seattle, etc. Some of these deserve a chance to go into obscurity; others need a revamping and others a taste revival. But do not believe for a moment that certain ideologies want only your time. No, certain groups, especially prominent ones in our day, want your time and your convictions to follow their own. It’s the basic “no-neutrality” principle embedded in all of creation.

The Bible urges us to care for the least of these. Some will be called to particular tasks. The new mother should not feel guilt for not making it to the abortion clinic at 6AM because she is literally nurturing life at home. The young father who cares for his wife, serves his neighbor irrespective of color or tongue is not guilty for failing to attend a rally somewhere, the pastor who is faithfully shepherding his flock teaching them to love one another as Jesus loved, to contend for truth in the public square, and to condemn acts from any member who diminishes the value of an image-bearer is doing his job in word and in deed.

The modern call to take up social media and transform it into a guilt-manipulator for private causes, or that revolution in the streets is as important as regeneration in the Church, or that the only way to love someone who looks different than you is by purporting certain belief systems regardless of facts and civil discourse are another attempt to take the kingdom by force.

Service to God is multi-layered. Your rewards in heaven do not come because you protested for two hours (though it may be good and right), or because you attended an event where a prominent issue was discussed, or because you transformed your social media platform into a cause of choice; no, service to God comes in one thousand little acts of kindness and generosity and hospitality that affirm each person as creative embodiment of the Holy One. Justice, mercy and love don’t wait for grandiose spectacles; they are ready to act in the mundane.

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The Face of Evil

Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin killed an image bearer. He is a barbaric human being whose history of violence did not begin on May 25th, 2020. In his 20 years of service to the MPD, there were 17 complaints about him; several of those complaints entailed violence. Shame on the MPD for not removing such vile from their midst.

A white male named Kristopher Bergh in 2013 recalled being accosted by Chauvin and another police officer in what he described as a “terrifying” experience. When hearing about the death of George Floyd, Bergh noted: “I think Derek Chauvin intentionally escalated incidents because he enjoyed having that power over people.”

Though he is not a solitary example, Chauvin does not represent the entire police force nor is he a common example of the systemic racism of an institution, this was a tyrannical man in search for “power over people.” In fact, here is the heart of the matter: the abuse of power. Such cases exist in politics, religion, and other institutions where power is used as a tool of abuse.

What we are witnessing is the unadulterated disobedience to the fifth commandment. The Westminster Larger Catechism notes that the sins of superiors (those in authority) are the “inordinate seeking of their own glory” and a failure “to protect others and procure the glory of God” with the authority given him.

What Chauvin did is to assume that the power given him was a carte blanche to de-humanize those whom he was called to serve and protect. Once a human being forsakes truth and righteousness and submission to a greater Superior–God himself–he has nothing left but whatever authority is given him to use for his own selfish ambition.

Sin is insanity, and the remarkable power of sin is to make you lose the ability to see reality–to abuse power in the light of day under the watching eyes of recording devices, and a man screaming for mercy. Others in authority may abuse power in the dark, but Floyd suffered by the hands of an abusive man who long ago forsook the reality of what he was called to do. Chauvin is the embodiment of the demonic: the epitome of the union between man and the offspring of the serpent. May judgment be swift!

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A Letter from a Concerned Citizen

Dear editor,

It has come to my attention that one of your writers misspelled “anemone.” He added the wrong vowel thus creating cognitive dissonance in my behavior. In fact, when he misspelled that word it offended me to the core of my being, thus leading me to cause damage to my neighbor’s property. I couldn’t help it; I had no other choice but to destroy the furniture in his front yard because of the great offense done to me.

As a result, I call for the termination of the contract from such writer expecting that he never be allowed to take up the pen or the keyboard again. He is worse than an infidel; yes, worse than J.K.Rowling, that Voldermort of a creature who dares challenge the status quo of trans-sexual orthodoxy.

I am tired of the universal abuse of the doctrine of toleration upheld by all those who share my cause in the house of grammatical excellence, and I am shocked that you have allowed this scoundrel to get away for so long. There is no atonement for his sins.

I trust you will punish accordingly this vagabond and see to it that his life ends, professionally, of course. There is so much more I could say, including an offensive tweet from 1974, or something like that. Either way, it doesn’t matter. Deal with him appropriately, or else.

Tolerantly yours,
a concerned citizen

P.S. Make him suffer.