Faith in St. Arbucks

As he drives to church, the Rev. Greg Asimakoupoulos always notices the Sunday crowd gathered at one of his favorite sanctuaries.

There are a dozen religious congregations on Mercer Island, even though the island east of Seattle in Lake Washington is only six miles long and three miles wide. It's easy to spot the signs for the major brands, including the Presbyterians, Mormons, Orthodox Jews, Episcopalians, Christian Scientists and others.

But Asimakoupoulos pays special attention to the flock at the cozy haven with the simple green-and-white sign. Even though he leads the Mercer Island Covenant Church, the evangelical pastor and poet knows this other "church" well, since he visits it faithfully.

Asimakoupoulos calls it "St. Arbucks." There are six on the island.

"We like to say that our church is a genuine community of faith, the kind of place people can feel at home," he said. "Still, you may have to go down the block to get to see that become a reality for lots of people. We need to be honest and admit that people are lining up to get into Starbucks, but they aren't lining up to get into many of our churches. Why?"

There is more to this, he stressed, than pricey consumerism pushed by an omnipresent global empire. For many of its customers, St. Arbucks represents more than the individualistic era that a wealthy character played by Tom Hanks mocked in the movie "You've Got Mail."

"The whole purpose of places like Starbucks," quipped Manhattan tycoon Joe Fox, "is for people with no decision-making ability whatsoever to make six decisions just to buy one cup of coffee -- short, tall, light, dark, caf, de-caf, low-fat, non-fat, etc. So people who don't know what the hell they are doing or who on earth they are can, for only $2.95, get not just a cup of coffee, but an absolutely defining sense of self. Tall! De-caf! Cappuccino!"

It's true that local Starbucks offer their flocks a wide variety of choices, noted Asimakoupoulos. Meanwhile, the trend in many modern American churches is to embrace growth strategies that focus on music and programs that meet the needs of one type of person -- all the time.

At his own church, the pastor has even decided that it might be good to let people open the old-fashioned books in the pew racks and sing a few hymns, along with those pop-style praise choruses. Churches seem afraid of variety these days.

But the key to the success of St. Arbucks, he said, is that these establishments have become what researchers refer to as "third places" for people to gather or hide -- a safe zone between home and office. For generations, bars, diners, barbershops and a host of other locations have played similar roles.

This kind of hospitality has become rare in this rushed world.

Regulars at St. Arbucks are greeted by name and the baristas may have their favorite drink -- Asimakoupoulos is a grande-drip purist -- ready when they reach the counter. Many modern churches have grown so large that people cannot know the names of many people with whom they are praying.

It's also crucial that these coffee sanctuaries are open to all kinds of people. At the Starbucks a short walk from his church, the pastor -- people watching over the top of his laptop screen -- has even seen believers reading their Bibles.

Writing in Leadership Journal, Asimakoupoulos noted: "At St. Arbucks, I've seen a rabbi mentoring a Torah student. A youth pastor disciplining a new convert. High school girls working on a group assignment. A book club sipping mochas while discussing a fiction author's plot." Could churches try to be more open to outsiders?

However, the pastor has watched one ominous Starbucks trend. When he was a college student in Seattle, this local institution was about excellent coffee beans -- period.

These days, the place that many call "four bucks" offers CDs, gifts, pastries and super-sweet drinks of all kinds, hot and cold. Hardly anyone goes there for pure coffee.

"Maybe we can let that be a warning," said Asimakoupoulos. "It's important for our churches to think about what people want, but we can't lose sight of what people need. We have to keep offering basic faith, the faith of the ages. The extras are nice, but people also need the classics."

Final Harry Potter wars? Part II

Coming soon to a parish near you: Sunday school with Harry Potter.

This could happen if your congregation buys the new "Mixing it up with Harry Potter" study guides from the Church of England. The goal of the 12-part series is to use scenes from these omnipresent books and movies to help children discuss big issues such as death, sacrifice, loneliness, fear, mercy and grief.

"Jesus used storytelling to engage and challenge his listeners," said Bishop John Pritchard of Oxford, speaking on behalf of the curriculum. "There's nothing better than a good story to make people think, and there's plenty in the Harry Potter books to make young people think about the choices they make in their everyday lives."

In his introduction, study-guide author Owen Smith addressed the concerns many believers have voiced about J.K. Rowling's books. As most residents of Planet Earth know by now, more than 325 million copies of the seven Harry Potter novels have been sold so far.

"The magic in the books is simply part of the magic that J. K. Rowling has created, in the same way that magic is part of the world of Christian writers such as C. S. Lewis," said Smith. "To say ... these books draw younger readers towards the occult seems to me both to malign J. K. Rowling and to vastly underestimate the ability of children and young people to separate the real from the imaginary."

At least three kinds of critics have knocked Rowling's work, when it comes to religion. Some say the books are secular and contain no theological content at all, while, on the other side, many others insist that Potter-mania may lead to interest in witchcraft. Some simply say the books send mixed signals and should be avoided.

However, there are also at least three positive schools of thought about Rowling's take on faith.

* Like the Church of England educators, some supporters say the Potter books can -- at the very least -- be mined as acceptable sources of stories to help teach young people about faith. One early evangelical book making this case, "The Gospel According to Harry Potter" by Connie Neal, was blacklisted in many Christian bookstores.

* While Catholics have debated the merits of Rowling's work, a Vatican voice on culture has said the novels portray clashes between good and evil in a manner consistent with Christianity. Speaking in 2003, Father Peter Fleetwood noted that the author is "Christian by conviction, is Christian in her mode of living, even in her way of writing."

Rowling has confirmed that she is a Christian and a communicant in the Church of Scotland, which has Presbyterian roots. In one oft-quoted interview, she told a Canadian newspaper: "Every time I've been asked if I believe in God, I've said, 'yes,' because I do. But no one ever really has gone any more deeply into it than that and, I have to say that does suit me."

Thus, this group of Potter supporters argues that Rowling is a Christian -- perhaps one with liberal beliefs -- who has chosen to write mainstream books containing Christian symbols and language. In other words, she is a Christian who writes books, but not "Christian books."

* Some go further and find elements of overt Christian storytelling -- especially in the new "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows." They may, for example, see parallels between Potter's willingness to surrender his life to save others from the evil Lord Voldemort and the redemptive sacrifice made by the Christ figure in "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" by Lewis.

There's more. In a pivotal baptism sequence, Potter dives into deadly waters to recover a sword -- described as a "great silver cross" -- required to destroy evil treasures. Finally, there is a vision of life after death set in a heavenly "King's Cross" train station.

Literary critic John Granger of HogwartsProfessor.com has been making this argument for years. He thinks Rowling must be considered a "Christian artist," yet one who faces her own doubts and struggles.

"The Gospel messages and allusions in the series finale were so transparent and edifying, surely, I thought, the Harry Haters must be having second thoughts, if not regrets about things they have said with such conviction the past 10 years in print and from the pulpit," said Granger. "I haven't seen any sign of this. Have you?"

Final Harry Potter wars? Part I

Harry Potter and his best friend Hermione Granger arrived in the magical town of Godric's Hollow on a snowy Christmas Eve.

Carols drifted out of the village church as they searched its graveyard for the resting place of Lily and James Potter, who were murdered by the dark Lord Voldemort. First, they found the headstone honoring the family of Albus Dumbledore, the late headmaster of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The inscription said: "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."

Then the Potter headstone proclaimed: "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." Harry was mystified. Was this about defeating the evil Death Eaters?

"It doesn't mean defeating death in the way the Death Eaters mean it, Harry," said Hermione, gently. "It means ... you know ... living beyond death. Living after death."

For millions of religious believers who embrace Harry Potter, this pivotal scene in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" -- book seven in J.K. Rowling's giant fantasy puzzle -- offers new evidence that the author is, in fact, a Church of Scotland communicant whose faith has helped shape her work.

The first inscription is from St. Matthew's Gospel and the second -- stating the book's theme -- is a passage in St. Paul's first letter to the Corinthians about the meaning of Christ's resurrection. Is this part of what Dumbledore had called an all-powerful "deep magic" built on sacrificial love?

Nevertheless, for millions of Rowling critics the presence of scripture in this final book will not cancel a decade's worth of wizardry, magic and what they believe is vague, New Age spirituality. And besides, Potter clearly didn't recognize the unattributed Bible verses. Right?

Religious battles commenced soon after Rowling released "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone." It didn't help that "Philosopher's Stone" -- a term from medieval alchemy -- was replaced with "Sorcerer's Stone" in U.S. editions. After the sale of 325 million-plus books worldwide, there are now at least three camps of Potter critics in these theological debates and three prominent camps of Potter defenders. The critics include:

* Some who insist these books are secular or subtly anti-religious. Writing in Time, Lev Grossman has argued that Rowling shares more in common with atheists like Christopher Hitchens than with J.R.R. Tolkien or C.S. Lewis, whose books were rooted in Christian faith.

"Look at Rowling's books," says Grossman. "What's missing? If you want to know who dies in Harry Potter, the answer is easy: God. Harry Potter lives in a world free of any religion or spirituality of any kind. He lives surrounded by ghosts but has no one to pray to, even if he were so inclined, which he isn't."

* Conservatives who think Potter-mania can lead to the occult. Some even oppose fantasy novels by Lewis and Tolkien -- which contain references to wizards, magic and demonic powers. The key is a Deuteronomy passage: "There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or daughter pass through fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells. ..."

Focus on the Family's James Dobson responded to "Deathly Hallows" by saying: "Magical characters -- witches, wizards, ghosts, goblins, werewolves, poltergeists and so on -- fill the Harry Potter stories, and given the trend toward witchcraft and New Age ideology ... it's difficult to ignore the effects such stories (albeit imaginary) might have on young, impressionable minds."

* Believers who see mixed signals. Evangelical activist Chuck Colson, for example, praised the books in 1999, noting that they contrasted good and evil, while the main characters displayed courage, loyalty and self-sacrifice. "Not bad lessons in a self-centered world," said the founder of Prison Fellowship.

But Colson's latest statement warned: "Personally, I don?t recommend the Potter books. I?d rather Christian kids not read them."

Soon after that Colson commentary, however, current Prison Fellowship President Mark Earley gently praised Rowling's books and, above all, the role fantasy novels can play for readers numbed by modern life.

"The popularity of these books -- and, yes, even of the Harry Potter series -- reminds us that the yearning for hope, for good to win and evil to be vanquished, is no infantile desire," he said. "Rather, it is one of the deepest and most important parts of our nature, placed in us by the God of all truth."

NEXT WEEK: Believers who embrace Harry Potter.

Grilling the youth pastor

It's the question that preachers, teachers and parents dread, especially if they were shaped by the cultural earthquakes of the 1960s. But no one fears it more than youth ministers, who hear the private questions that young people fear to ask their elders. Youth pastors work in the no man's land between the home and the church.

This is the question: "Well, didn't you do any of this stuff when you were a kid?" The young person may be asking about sex, drinking, drugs, cheating or, perhaps, lying to parents about any of the above.

If youth ministers stop and think about it, they will realize that they usually say something like the following while trying to answer these questions, said the Rev. David "Duffy" Robbins, a United Methodist who teaches youth ministry at Eastern University near Philadelphia.

"If I answer that it's none of your business and the answer is between me and God, there's a pretty good chance you'll hear that as a 'yes,' " said Robbins, writing in Good News magazine. "If I answer 'yes' to your question, there's a pretty good chance that you'll take that as permission to make the same mistakes that I've made. If, on the other hand, I say 'no,' there's a good possibility that you might reason that then I couldn't possibly understand what you're facing or what you're going through right now.

"So, what that question amounts to is a lose-lose proposition for both of us, and I'm not willing to put us in that position, so I'm not going to answer that question."

There was a time when youth pastors -- not to mention senior ministers -- would have felt more confident answering.

There was a time when adults thought it was their duty to tell young people that some things were right and some things were wrong -- period. The assumption was that adults had a sacred duty to serve as moral examples and that was that. Candor was rarely part of the equation.

Then the pendulum swung in the other direction, said Robbins, and many religion leaders joined what is often called the "authenticity movement." The goal was to open up and level with young people in an attempt to impress them with displays of openness and vulnerability. By sharing the details of his or her own sins and temptations, the youth pastor hoped to gain credibility -- inspiring young people not to make the same errors.

But there's a problem with letting it all hang out, said Robbins.

"It so easy to get carried away and, before you know it, your whole body language and the relish with which people tell these stories can send the wrong signal. You may end up leaving a kid thinking, 'Well, I wonder if I could do something really bad like that. That sounds kind of cool.' "

The problem, he said, is that it's hard not to cross the line between honest, transparent disclosure and imprudent, naked exhibitionism. Nevertheless, it's true that young people need to hear that it's normal to struggle with sin and temptation and that there are adults who want to help them, because they have faced many of the same issues -- in the past and in the present.

"It is completely appropriate, for example, for the students in my youth group to know that I struggle with lust," noted Robbins. "On the other hand, if I continue by saying, 'In fact, Sally, your mom is a fox!' -- that crosses a line."

This kind of self-exposure has to have a purpose, said Robbins. It's a good thing for adults to acknowledge that they struggle with sin, but it can be destructive if that's the end of the story. Young people need to know that God "loves us the way that we are, but he doesn't intend to leave us as we are," he said.

"It's one thing for me to tell my youth group that I struggled with this or that sin and, with God's help, have managed to put it behind me," explained Robbins.

"It's something else to just say that I struggled and struggled and struggled and that there just doesn't seem to be a way to be forgiven by God and go on to lead a better life. ... That isn't much of a Gospel, now is it?"

Pastor Will B. Dunn -- RIP

Cartoonist Doug Marlette got used to hearing people mix comments about his humor with references to Almighty God.

After all, one of the main characters in his syndicated comic strip "Kudzu" was the Rev. Will B. Dunn, a deep-fried Southern preacher who always remained optimistic, even as he battled with the insanity of modern life (especially trendy Bible translations).

Meanwhile, Marlette's political cartoons often inspired readers to barrage editors with the kind of God talk that cannot be printed in family newspapers.

There was, for example, his caricature of Pope John Paul II wearing a "No Women Priests" button. The caption said, "Upon this Rock I will build my church'' and Marlette drew an arrow pointing at the pope's head. Another infamous cartoon showed an Arab terrorist driving a truck containing a nuclear bomb. The caption: "What Would Mohammed Drive?"

A cartoon on my office wall -- a gift from Marlette as I left the Charlotte Observer -- shows PTL televangelist Jim Bakker kneeling before a dollar sign that towers over a stone altar framed with candles. Bakker proclaims, with his boyish grin, "Gimme that old time religion!"

The cartoonist knew he was playing with holy fire. You can't draw Jesus climbing Calvary on Good Friday -- carrying an electric chair -- and not expect people to react.

Marlette insisted that his goal was to remind his fellow believers to practice what they preach.

"As I look back through my work, I'm always amazed by how much of what I do just comes out of having gone to Sunday school," he said, taking a break in his cluttered Observer office in the mid-1980s. "The perspective, the viewpoint, comes out of that. They don't teach subversive ideas in the Magnolia Street Baptist Church in Laurel, Mississippi."

Marlette, 57, was back in Mississippi recently when he died in a single-vehicle crash on a rain-swept highway while on the way to help a high school perform his musical, "Kudzu." A true gadfly, he rattled cages for more than three decades and died with more than his share of faithful friends and fierce critics.

A native of North Carolina, the cartoonist and writer burst into print after studying at Florida State University, where he tried to study art but ended up majoring in philosophy. He took classes in New Testament and ethics but also, as he loved to note, classes in sports officiating. Marlette won a Pulitzer Prize in 1988 for his work at the Observer and the Atlanta Constitution. He wrote two novels and, in 2001, became a distinguished visiting professor of journalism at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Marlette had a better grasp of the power of religion than most journalists, noted former Observer editor Rich Oppel, who led the newsroom during the PTL era. The cartoonist was a provocateur and, at his best, a prophet.

"After 10 years of our reporting, televangelist Bakker resigned from PTL and was later convicted of fraud and sentenced to federal prison," noted Oppel, in his editor's column at the Austin American-Statesman. "Bakker's handpicked successor was Jerry Falwell, who came in to see me and 'make peace.'

"From a corner, Marlette cast a gimlet eye on Falwell as the minister did his best Sunday school number on me. Marlette then retreated to his lair to pen a cartoon of the preacher as a serpent in the Garden of Eden. Falwell refused to talk to me again."

When it came to religion, Marlette thought of himself as a Baptist's Baptist, a fierce believer in the "priesthood of the believer," the authority of human experience and the separation of church and state.

There are, he told me, people who become cynical about religion and he was determined not to yield to that temptation -- very often. But there were many times when he preferred laughing, instead of crying.

While he took the Christian faith seriously, he also thought it was futile to obsess over details. There were times when he felt like a church of one.

"It's my own church, my own perspective. It certainly doesn't deserve to be institutionalized or taken more seriously than other people's," said Marlette. "It's not infallible. It's skewed. It's mine. ... It's kind of like dissecting a frog. Once you get the thing cut up and taken apart, it's not really a frog anymore. Something dies in the process."

Islamic urband legends

The rumor spread across Pakistan in a blitz of text messages on cellphones.

There was a killer virus on the loose and all you had to do to catch it was answer a call from an infected number. The virus didn't hurt cellphones, but would -- eyewitnesses confirmed this -- cause users to drop dead. The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority was forced to issue a denial telling users that it was safe to turn their phones back on.

Then there were messages claiming that Israeli trucks were carrying a million HIV-infected melons to Arab consumers in a new biological-warfare plot. This was not to be confused with other urban legends about a "Western-Zionist conspiracy" to use polio vaccines and other medical means to sterilize the next generation of Muslims.

"The contemporary Muslim fascination for conspiracy theories often limits the capacity for rational discussion of international affairs," argued Husain Haqqani of Boston University, at a conference in Istanbul entitled "Fact vs. Rumor: Journalism in the 21st Century." This recent gathering of journalists and scholars was organized by my colleagues at the Oxford Centre for Religion and Public Life.

Haqqani stressed that the "Muslim world's willingness to believe rumors is not a function of the Islamic religion. Like other Abrahamic faiths, Islam emphasizes truth and righteousness. The Koran says: 'O ye who believe! Fear Allah, and (always) say a word directed to the Truth.' And one of the sayings attributed to Prophet Muhammad ... specifically forbids rumormongering: 'It is enough to establish someone as a liar that he spreads what he hears without confirming its veracity.' "

Nevertheless, these rumors roll on, creating a cycle of fear and bigotry. The result is a climate of confusion and cynicism that prepares millions of people to believe the next round of rumors, often with violent consequences in an age in which ancient prejudices and modern technology merge seamlessly.

The results can be seen in recent WorldPublicOpinion.org surveys in Egypt, Morocco, Pakistan and Indonesia, said Haqqani, who is an active Muslim. As a rule, participants had positive attitudes about globalization, freedom of religion and democracy. Yet roughly three out of four surveyed said that Muslim nations should strictly enforce Sharia, or Islamic, law as part of efforts to reject sinful "Western values." Large majorities affirmed the belief that the United States is trying to "weaken and divide" the Muslim world and slightly smaller majorities said America's goal is to "spread Christianity in the region."

The impact of the rumors can, perhaps, be seen in another paradox seen in these surveys, said Haqqani. Large majorities in Egypt, Indonesia and Morocco (results were mixed in Pakistan) agreed that violent groups that kill civilians are guilty of violating the "principles of Islam." However, less than a quarter of those polled believed that Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda were responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks.

"Many Muslims seem to believe that 9/11 was a great achievement, but that Osama didn't do it," he said. "They are confused by all the rumors."

Leaders in the West must understand that almost half of the world's Muslim population is illiterate. Meanwhile, the 57 Organization of the Islamic Conference nations contain about 500 colleges and universities, compared with more than 5,000 in the United States and 8,000 in India. That is one university for every three million Muslims.

Yet this painful fact is not the only source of this predisposition to embrace conspiracy theories, said Haqqani. After all, the digital consumers who use their cellphones to spread ridiculous text messages are not illiterate.

"What we are seeing is not just a crisis rooted only in religion or education," said Haqqani. "This is a culture-wide crisis of politics and economics and technology and education and it is easy to see the role of religion because of the powerful role that faith plays in the lives of millions of people.

"The greatest fear of most Muslims is that their societies will be over run by the Western world. ... They believe that modernity equals Westernization, Westernization equals promiscuity and licentiousness and all of that equals a loss of faith. We cannot change that overnight. It is a project of a century or more, in which millions of people must learn that the modern world is built on values, laws and tolerance, not just highways, airplanes and cellphones."

Mike Huckabee still believes

Like any other Bible Belt state, Arkansas contains more than its share of church camps.

Gov. Mike Huckabee thought about that after Hurricane Katrina. The ordained Southern Baptist minister also knew that the summer camping season was over and that thousands of people fleeing New Orleans had to go somewhere.

"I saw on TV people on the bridges of Interstate 10 stranded for days without water, and I thought, this isn't Rwanda. This isn't Indonesia. ... This was the United States of America," said the former governor, who is now part of the throng of Republican presidential candidates. "These were the neighbors just to the south of us in Louisiana. It was beyond my comprehension that we could get TV cameras to those people but we couldn't get a boat or a bottle of water to them."

Thus, he asked religious leaders to open camps all over Arkansas to the evacuees, while urging the public to rally around this blunt public policy: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

This was one case in which critics didn't challenge his link between private faith and public action, said Huckabee, meeting with journalists at a recent talkback session at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. This didn't turn into another nasty clash between God and the government because the need was great and this faith-based effort united citizens instead of dividing them.

Activists on the right will have to do more of that. Of course, Huckabee told the journalists that he has no intention of surrendering on moral issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage. Nevertheless, religious conservatives need to be less confrontational when it comes to convincing skeptical Americans that faith can be a positive force in the public square.

After all, he said, it's hard to believe that anyone actually thinks that political leaders are supposed to separate their personal beliefs from their public convictions.

"I sometimes marvel when people running for office are asked about faith and their answer is, 'Oh, I don't get into that. I keep that completely separate. My faith is completely immaterial to how I think and how I govern,' " he said. "To me, that is really tantamount to saying that one's faith is so marginal, so insignificant and so inconsequential that it really doesn't impact the way one lives. I would consider it an extraordinarily shallow faith that does not really impact the way we think about other human beings and the way we respond to them."

No one debated that concept after Katrina. Thus, Huckabee listed several other unifying moral issues that he thinks deserve attention on the political right.

While Americans disagree on what to do about health-care reform, the nation could rally around efforts to provide health care for children, he said. Liberals and conservatives also could focus on funding health-care programs that fight the big three activities -- smoking, overeating and "under-exercising" -- that fuel soaring medical costs.

While Huckabee acknowledged that environmental issues cause heated debates, he believes that it's time for conservatives to become more involved in efforts to promote the "better stewardship of the environment and in development of an energy source that is not foreign based but domestically produced."

And then there is the issue of corporate corruption, with business leaders drawing giant bonuses while wrecking their companies. Surely, conservatives can agree that this is immoral, said Huckabee.

"I don't see how we can call it anything other than a moral issue," he said. "That's not free enterprise. That's theft."

The point is that religious conservatives are will have to broaden their agendas and be willing to work on new issues, said Huckabee. They can do this without compromising on the essentials.

"I really do think that if Christian conservatives, who have ... held the Republican Party's feet to the fire on issues as they relate to traditional conservative social areas, no longer play that role, it not only is going to be the end of relevancy for them, but I also think that it means that the Republican Party will lose a lot of people. They will say, 'Well, you know what, if they're not going to be the party that really cares about these issues, I'll go home to the Democratic Party.' A lot of those folks came from the Democratic Party to begin with."

Obama's awesome testimony

Play the right guitar chords and worshipers in megachurch America will automatically start singing these words: "Our God is an awesome God. He reigns from heaven above. With wisdom, power and love, our God is an awesome God."

So Barack Obama caused raised eyebrows when he turned to that page in the evangelical songbook during the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

"We worship an awesome God in the Blue States," he said in the speech that made him a rising star. "We coach Little League in the Blue States and have gay friends in the Red States. ... We are one people."

Obama has mixed gospel images and liberal politics ever since, and his ability to reach pews without frightening the skeptical elites is crucial to his White House hopes.

Thus, all kinds of people paid close attention last week when he spoke to the 50th anniversary convention of the United Church of Christ, a small flock that has proudly set the pace for liberal Christianity. At the heart of his speech was his own spiritual rebirth two decades ago, when he responded to an altar call by the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. at Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.

"He introduced me to someone named Jesus Christ," Obama said. "I learned that my sins could be redeemed. I learned that those things I was too weak to accomplish myself, He would accomplish with me if I placed my trust in Him. And in time, I came to see faith as more than just a comfort to the weary or a hedge against death, but rather as an active, palpable agent in the world and in my own life.

"It was because of these newfound understandings that I was finally able to walk down the aisle ... and affirm my Christian faith. It came about as a choice, and not an epiphany. I didn't fall out in church, like folks sometimes do. The questions I had didn't magically disappear. ... But kneeling beneath that cross on the South Side, I felt I heard God's spirit beckoning me. I submitted myself to His will, and dedicated myself to discovering His truths and carrying out His works."

Over at the Christian Broadcasting Network, commentator David Brody offered a candid evaluation of the speech, "That, ladies and gentlemen, is called a conversion experience."

While conservatives will certainly criticize that Obama and his church have taken on sexy moral issues — the UCC ordained its first gay pastor in 1972 and backs same-sex marriages — they also need to praise his candor.

"Besides Obama, how many times have you seen a presidential candidate get up in front of a large crowd and talk in depth about his salvation? I'll give you the answer: Zero," said Brody, on his CBN weblog. "For Obama to stand up and talk about how Jesus changed his life, my friends, that takes guts. ... Shouldn't we like it when someone talks about Christ being the missing ingredient in his life?"

It is also crucial for Obama to define his faith in his own terms. After all, his father, stepfather, brother and grandfather were Muslims and his name, "Barack," means "blessed" in Arabic. Meanwhile, his mother was a disillusioned Methodist who was deeply spiritual but most of all a skeptic about organized religion. As a child, Obama attended a Catholic school and then a Muslim school. Later, he was drawn to the writings of Malcolm X.

Eventually, he told the UCC convention, he knew that he had to make a decision about his own faith. Obama is convinced that he isn't alone in feeling a hunger that's deeper than a desire for political change.

"It seems to me that each day, thousands of Americans are going about their lives — they're dropping the kids off at school, driving to work, shopping at the mall, they're trying to stay on their diets, they're trying to kick a cigarette habit — and they're coming to the realization that something is missing," said Obama, drawing laughter from the crowd because of his own struggles with smoking.

"They're deciding that their work, their possessions, their diversions, their sheer busyness, is not enough. ... And so they need an assurance that somebody out there cares about them, is listening to them — that they are not just destined to travel down that long road toward nothingness."

Ruth Graham, the X-factor

There was a time just after the Watergate scandal when Billy Graham, stung by his ties to the fallen President Richard Nixon, tried to let his hair down a bit.

Graham began addressing a wide range of social issues, including nuclear arms control. He focused less attention to America and said that the church's future was in the Third World. Some long-time supporters began to grumble -- literally -- about his hair.

"People were worried that Billy was letting his hair get too long. We were getting telephone calls about it," said one insider at the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, years later.

Eventually, Graham's wife heard about the mini-crisis and responded in her own way. Ruth Bell Graham quietly suggested that Billy should consider growing a mustache.

"That was," the insider said, "her way of saying, 'Leave my husband's hair alone. For that matter, leave my husband alone.' "

Anyone who has studied the career of the world's most famous evangelist knows that Ruth Graham was much more than his wife or even his "soul mate," the label many commentators adopted after her death on June 14, at the age of 87.

Historians will always ask how Graham evolved from a narrow Southern fundamentalist into the evangelical who preached to the world. Here's one obvious answer: "He married Ruth Bell." She was nothing less than the X-factor, the source of that sense of otherness that, when blended with her husband's essential humanity and North Carolina sense of grace, added a note of mystery to his career. His instinct was to try to get along with everyone. Her instinct was to resist the people who wanted to own him, body and soul.

Graham kept saying, in that "ah, shucks" way of his, that Ruth was smarter than he was. Still, it was hard to determine her precise role.

The basic facts were amazing enough. She was the daughter of missionaries in China and as a girl yearned to be a martyr. She never planned to marry, yet raised five children in their unique North Carolina home (she hired mountain men to combine several abandoned log cabins) that she defended like a lioness.

On one memorable occasion, she kicked her husband under the table when President Lyndon Baines Johnson tried to lure him into political talk. When asked if she had ever considered divorce, Ruth passed along this wisecrack to Barbara Bush: "Divorce? No. Murder? Yes."

It is no surprise that Ruth declined a thousand interview requests for every one she granted. When I left full-time reporting to start teaching, I included this item in my farewell Rocky Mountain News column: "Allowed to interview one living religious figure, I would choose Ruth Bell Graham, the media-shy Presbyterian poet who also happens to be married to the world's best-known Southern Baptist preacher."

I hoped to interview her in 1987, when I spent a day with Graham before a Denver crusade. But the timing was ironic. He was at home, while his wife was away -- visiting a clinic due to her already fragile health. Graham offered a tour, but admitted that he was not the best guide.

"My wife runs all of this, to tell you the truth," said Graham, mystified by a leather-bound copy of "History of the Reformation in Scotland" on a den table. Ruth, he stressed, was the theologian in the family, the one who could dig into Greek texts.

"She's way over my head when it comes to the books. ... She knows everything about everything in this house. She's collected and read a lot of wonderful things and they're all here somewhere," said Graham, before settling into one of their twin rocking chairs on the back porch, facing the mountains.

"I just wish she were here."

There were, of course, far more days when Ruth missed her globetrotting husband. She poured her emotions into poetry, offering glimpses into a private life behind the very public ministry. Here is one of her poems.

When

in the morning

I make our bed,

pulling his sheets

and covers tight,

I know the tears

I shouldn't shed

will fall unbidden

as the rain:

and I would kneel,

praying again

words I mean

but cannot feel,

"Lord,

not my will

but Thine

be done."

The doubts dissolving

one by one.

For I realize,

as I pray,

that's why it happened

and this way.