Image by bernardoh via Flickr

My story recently published in the Huffington Post about introverts in church is still getting some traction.

Some of you might remember the classic piece in The Atlantic Monthly about introverts, where Jonathan Rauch wryly described them as “people who find other people tiring.”

Well, my piece focuses on introversion within the church. Specifically the way an introverted personality can sometimes clash with church life, most especially evangelical worship practices. In fact, Adam McHugh, a writer and pastor in Southern California, recently wrote a book on the topic, which is what inspired me to write the story in the first place.

So what do you think: If Jesus were to take a Myers-Briggs personality test, would he rank as an introvert or an extrovert?

Read the story here.

Image via Wikipedia

I went to the press conference today in downtown Los Angeles at the  Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels where Cardinal Mahony introduced his successor: Mexican-born Archbishop Jose H. Gomez of San Antonio.

Gomez hails from Monterrey and was a member of the conservative Catholic movement Opus Dei. As Mahony’s replacement, Gomez will lead the largest diocese in the nation.

You can read the entire article here…but I have to say one of the most touching moments of the press conference came when Gomez spoke about San Antonio, and the people he worked with there.

As Cardinal Mahony stood behind him looking on, Gomez said, “I’m sad to be leaving San Antonio.”

He had to stop to take a sip of water because he was almost in tears.

Then quivering, he said, “I will never forget them, and I will never stop thanking God for the privilege of having served them.”

“But the life of a priest or bishop is not his own,” he continued. “The only real home we have is in the love of our people.”

It was a reminder of how difficult the life of a priest can be, forming intense relationships with people only to have to pick up and leave.

Image via Wikipedia

“60 Minutes” aired a segment Sunday night on the Armenian genocide of 1915 that is worth watching. It’s not a subject that gets a lot of media attention and thus, not one a lot of people know about.

Ottoman Turks deported and killed Christian Armenians, a minority in the predominately Muslim region. Moreover, historians argue that the genocide served as an example to Hitler. Turkey, however, has long said that what happened during World War I under the Ottoman Empire does not constitute genocide.

Today, Congress is debating whether the U.S. government should officially recognize the Armenian genocide. It’s something they’ve argued about before, and it’s an issue President Obama himself has taken up, but one that has been left unresolved because of a fear of damaging U.S./Turkey relations.

Here is a peek at the 60 minutes segment…

Image via Wikipedia

Ted Haggard’s wife, Gayle Haggard, has just released a memoir explaining why she chose to stick by her husband. Haggard, of course, is the evangelical megachurch leader who was caught having various affairs with men. The discovery forced Haggard to step down as leader of  New Life Church and as president of the National Association of Evangelicals.

RNS spoke to Gayle upon the release of her book “Why I Stayed: The Choices I Made in my Darkest Hour.”

“The reason I chose to stay with Ted was because I knew that there was more to the story than just the scandal in our lives,” she said Tuesday (Jan. 26) as the book was released, “that my husband was truly a great man on many levels and I wasn’t willing to deny all the good that we’d built in our marriage, in our family and in our church.”

What’s interesting is that in the book she writes that Ted confessed early in the marriage that he struggled with sexual attraction to men. Still, she says their sexual relationship “had always been strong and satisfying, and I didn’t believe for one instant that Ted had been regularly visiting a gay escort.”

So it seems neither she nor he were completely in the dark about Ted’s, shall we say, dual nature.

What has struck me as most heartbreaking about the situation is the way bisexuality or homosexuality is perceived as an illness almost, though of course, I can see how acting on that proclivity in the context of a marriage is wrong.

Haggard’s wife says in the end she chose forgiveness to be their coping method.

“It seemed as though everyone was pulling away from him and he was suffering enough, and I wanted to draw near to him and love him and show him forgiveness.”

Image by United Nations Development Programme via Flickr

The Los Angeles Times has a heartbreaking snapshot of Haitians turning to God in the midst of the destruction.

In front of the broken churches, which in some cases still harbored bodies, worshipers looked to powers beyond their grasp for help. “Don’t pray for the dead,” boomed Joel St. Amour, preaching outside the Evangelical Baptist Church. “Pray for the living.”

The rest of the article is mostly a summary of the state of the country just days after the earthquake, which has left thousands dead and affected millions of residents. But toward the end, the piece does turn to religion once again and in particular, the problem of evil: If God is benevolent, all powerful, and omnipotent, why does he let bad things like this happen to good people?

One doctor treating children in Haiti tries to offer a response by clinging to hope…

“Just because this happens doesn’t mean God doesn’t love you,” said Mary Marthe Joseph, combing the hair of a 4-year-old girl she didn’t know. “He will help us go on. I have no idea if the foreigners will help. I haven’t seen anything here yet.”

Here, God isn’t blamed for the tragedy but offered as a means to move on. Of course, there are also those — like Pat Robertson and Wiley Drake — who try to get around the problem of evil by blaming the Haitians themselves and their alleged pact with Satan. A theory, as outlandish as it is, that is inappropriate to espouse at this time of pain and tragedy.