Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Post 15: A Better Tomorrow

In our culture, the mere act of having children reflects some measure of optimism in society’s future prospects. I’m guessing a sentiment shared by almost every parent is the hope that their children will see a better life than the one they saw. Certainly this was the rationale for both mine and the wife’s parents coming to the United States from the Koreas. They took significant (but calculated) risks in making the trek here, and it’s fair to say that their hopes for a better tomorrow were largely realized in the lives of their children. The American Dream was alive and well in all its glory for our parents’ generation’s progeny. I envy the fact that it is unlikely that I will ever feel that same kind of satisfaction of having taken a significant risk and seen it pay off in such a grand fashion in my own kids. In fact, it is more likely than not that my children will realize a less prosperous lifestyle- both in absolute and relative terms.

Of course, economic well-being is only one component of a life well led. However, it feels like there’s a growing sense among large swaths of our population that we can no longer take the premise of economic growth and higher quality of life in the future for granted. There are well-documented statistics regarding the shrinking middle class, zero real wage growth over the past several decades, growing income inequality, jobs going overseas, etc. These all point to the broader meme that the American Dream while not dead does not have the same promise that it had yesteryear. Now, of course we as Americans live in a bubble where the worst off here have problems that the poor in other parts of the world would love to have. That being said, I do think that the political ramifications of zero (or even negative) economic growth would be damaging, and a realization of this state of the world would test the resilience of our social fabric.

To some extent, the aforementioned sentiment has been captured in the “Occupy Wall Street” (OWS) movement that has announced its presence over the past month or so. I have to admit that my initial reaction to seeing the protest was dismissive- not because I didn’t see validity in its premise, but because all protests seem futile in the long run. But more than a month in now, and with similar movements being spawned in other cities and nations, this seems to be more than just the 15 minutes allotted to some fringe of our country. Politics makes strange bedfellows, and thus I am generally hesitant to join in with any political movement. I spent some time talking with people at the main site last weekend, and the divergence in worldview between me and the crowd that I was speaking to was quite apparent. Yes- we all agree that the taxpayer-funded bailout of the banking industry was the single greatest heist in the history of mankind, but shouldn’t homeowners who took out mortgages beyond what they can reasonably afford bear some of the blame for their part in the housing crisis? I thought the blame was somewhere around 50-50, but the consensus among the crowd was that it was more like 99-1. And that was after I had “dropped some totally legit science” (their words, not mine) on their heads.

Despite this and a multitude of other differences, I think there is one thing that the protesters and I can definitely agree on: something is deeply wrong with our political regime and it’s not clear to anyone exactly what can be done about it. The problems seem so overwhelming, it’s hard to even know where to begin. One of the most common statements you hear from those who find this movement vapid is, “What do they want? Where are their lists of demands?” I think the very fact that no one can clearly define their discontent and reduce them to a set of policy prescriptions is part of what makes this movement so widespread. In my mind, trying to reduce OWS to a political action committee is similar to those who want Christianity defined as a set of beliefs and behaviors- it’s convenient for sound-bite media and when you get down to brass tax, of course there are things you want to get done. But at some level, it’s too broad and you’re not going to get any consensus on things at that level of granularity. As some protesters put it so eloquently on their placards, “Sh%! is F-ed Up and Bull-Sh%!”

In attempt to put some words to what is vexing the theoretical 99%- I offer the following. What is really bothersome about our system today is that there appears to be essentially a partnership between the State and a handful of industries/entities. The most obvious one is the banking sector- not only because of the bailouts from 2008-2009, but the ongoing free put option that debtholders in these banks have to the Taxpayer allows them to borrow at zero percent (i.e. below market) interest with the objective of having them rebuild their balance sheets. The gross lack of fairness of such a policy notwithstanding, the moral hazard implications for this are staggering. Unbelievably, this is just the tip of the iceberg on how regulation basically crowds out competition, and allows the biggest banks to get bigger, to the point where they are “too-big-to-fail”, which basically means they can hold the rest of the US economy hostage. Our current president (and his predecessor) folded like a wet noodle when the time came to “be the change we want to see”. Now, the average US citizen probably has little idea of what was stated above- all they know is that “Sh%! is F-ed Up and Bull-Sh%!”. Importantly, I don’t think this is a Right/Left or Red State/Blue State thing-maybe it’s not 99% but I would bet that well over 75% of the country identifies with the core sentiment of the movement. It seems silly to consider the average citizen of the United States as politically powerless since we are all taught that democracy is fundamentally about empowering the people. But I would argue that in any complex system, there are emergent phenomena that lead to properties that are far away from what you would expect when examining the initial design.

Trying to restore some measure of virtue to our politics sure seems like a pipe dream. I’ve largely thrown up my hands and decided that there is no point in expending limited time/resources to the political sphere. But then it would be correct to rebuke me and say that I and anyone else with this disposition is getting exactly the government we deserve. Fair point- so we are at sea. At some level, I think I just go back to my fundamental premise that the Gospel is about redeeming both individual lives as well as institutions, and the church really is America’s (and the world’s) last best hope. Specifically, I certainly don’t have anything to offer, other than perhaps more time on our knees. As Karl Barth wisely stated, “To Clasp the hands in prayer is the beginning of an uprising against the disorder in this world”. If we could only get the protesters at OWS to buy into that idea...

So on a lighter note....






Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Post 14: The Other Decision - Vaccines


About a month ago, I mentioned how the first real deliberate decision the wife and I had to make for S was sleep training. That statement is only partially true. The real first decision we made on his behalf was actually made a couple weeks before he was born- and that choice is to figure out who S’s pediatrician is going to be. And that decision is essentially about one issue: vaccines. Before going into this topic, I should probably indicate that I haven’t come to a firm conclusion on the topic, and a lot of the data that I’ll be talking about below is potentially subjective. Perhaps the only thing I’m sure of is that I get a little queasy around folks who are doctrinaire (either about the pros or potential cons) of vaccinations. When I talk to some parents about it, it feels like I’m talking with a Likud representative or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Emotions can run at a fever pitch, but I suppose that’s how almost everything is when it comes to parenting these days.

I grew up under the impression that vaccines were one of the all-time great innovations responsible for dramatic improvements in the quality of human life. They are rather cheap to administer, and diseases that used to threaten entire communities are essentially eradicated today due to widespread vaccinations. I largely embraced the conventional view and like most pre-parent people, I didn’t really give this much thought... until my friends started to become parents.

Then over the past couple years, I started to notice something. This is purely anecdotal but a too-large-to-ignore percentage of folks in my not-too-distant social circle were dealing with the challenges associated with raising a child w/ autism. If anyone has ever been around a child with autism, it’s an incredibly difficult situation and I have so much admiration for the parents that I’ve seen who deal with this condition courageously/admirably. Autism rates were supposedly 1 in 10,000 a couple decades ago and they’ve risen to the order of 1 in 100 today. It seemed like 1 in every 15-20 parents I knew were in this boat. Furthermore, every single one of these autistic children are boys. If you do the math, what set off a little bit of an alarm bell within me was that my colleagues and peers seemed to be experiencing this at a rate that was far higher than the unconditional mean. To be totally frank, many of my friends are similar to me in that they are a little older when having children, and on the higher end of the socioeconomic spectrum. A couple articles I read indicated that autism is one of those rare conditions who’s prevalence appears to increase with socioeconomic status.

When I asked these parents about their experience, a not insignificant portion- (maybe even the majority) believe that the vaccinations were the root cause. I am not formally trained as a biochemist, and so I cannot comment or critique the validity of their thesis, but suffice to say that these are individuals with the best educational training the world can offer, and some are experts in medicine. What’s even more interesting though is that children growing up over the past decade or so though is that cheap/easy access to HD camcorders and storage allowed us to document their lives moment by moment (I have nearly a hundred of Gigabytes of video/pictures already on Samuel!). One close friend has a wife who was a videographer before she became a full-time mom, and so she has hours of footage every week. When she went back and watched the videos of her son after receiving the diagnosis, she specifically noticed a drastic change in his behavior in the days/weeks following a particularly intense sequence of vaccinations. Of course, it’s just one data point, but an interesting one.

When I began to consult the medical profession about whether or not there is a linkage between vaccines and autism, I got an extremely strong reaction. Books written by doctors reference study after study that indicates that there is no relationship between vaccines and autism. The first pediatrician we interviewed, I asked what he thought about the possible linkage. He promptly rolled his eyes, said that parents who are out there saying that vaccines are linked to autism have lost their minds and are responsible for a potential public health crisis, and furthermore stated that he refuses to take on any child where the parent is not willing to stick by the vaccination schedule recommended by the American Pediatrics Association 100%. I certainly appreciated his candor and transparency, but for the record, we decided not to go with this pediatrician.

To be fair, there are equally strong and charged statements that come from parents of children with autism. Some have written extensively (the Internet was made for this kind of stuff) about their reasoning for why a linkage exists, and they are accusing the medical profession of “poisoning our children”, and argue that there is a vast conspiracy between Big Pharma and the Medical “Priesthood” that perpetuates the myth that there is no downside to vaccinations. Vaccines are certainly a big business, and so there’s enough data to support a conclusion like that, if you’re the type that wants to go there. Especially with ever increasing amounts of evidence that seems to support the idea that big government and big business are largely indistinguishable.

At this point in the game, I have decided to hold off on giving S any vaccines. It’s not because I think big Pharma and the State are evil (well, actually, about the State....). I do find mandatory vaccinations schedule today a bit heavy-handed- especially things like Hepatitis B- why does an infant need to be vaccinated for a sexually transmitted disease? But the primary reason why we’ve decided to go this path resides elsewhere. At some level, this boils down to me going against the advice of the medical establishment. Isn’t it a little arrogant to think that I know better than all the doctors and institutions that have come to the conclusion that sticking to the vaccination schedule is the best for my child? This is a totally valid question and I suppose I am swayed a little by experience in my own field. As most of you know, I’m in the business of investing. I may not know anything about most things, but I think it’s fair to say that I am reasonably qualified to speak on matters of investing/finance. After 13 years in my profession, I’ve basically come to the conclusion that conventional wisdom as determined by the finance and economics equivalent of the AMA (you know- professors at places Harvard and MIT) is somewhere between 80 and 100% wrong about how best to invest your money. Yes- I repeat- the vast majority of financial advisers who the general public go to for investing wisdom are giving you advice that is at best suboptimal, and quite possibly at odds with your goals. What makes this comparison relevant is that there are interesting similarities between investing and medicine. While both fields have benefited enormously from deploying mathematical rigor to the problems they seek to solve, there are severe limits to reductionism. In addition, I think that one of the things that leaves both fields in tenuous places is that there is really no common way to think about risk. Statisticians/Economists try to capture it as the 2nd moment (variance) of a distribution, but in reality, risk is a highly subjective concept. What I perceive as a very safe investment is perceived as unbelievably risky by another. What I perceive as a very risky medical intervention is viewed as very safe by another. Thus attempting to come up with general rules that work across any reasonably sized population is unlikely to be fruitful. The medical establishment has taken the view that there is no relationship whatsoever between vaccines and autism. I’m actually not quite so sure, but perhaps more accurately, I am more willing to bear the risks of not vaccinating than I am of bearing the risk of vaccinating. Life is about trade-offs, and this is the one I’m comfortable with right now.

No doubt that there are physicians who are reading this whose opinions I deeply respect that might think I’m foolish for coming to this conclusion. I am fine with that. In some sense, what this whole exercise has demonstrated is that you really can’t outsource the important decisions in your life. If I don’t believe something deep within the core of my being, then it doesn’t matter who says it’s a good idea. In any event, so much of parenting is less about what is objectively the best thing to do and more about what approach meshes well with one’s internal compass and overall disposition. I don’t want to sound relativistic, but I guess I feel like there are so many ways to do parenting well, and it’s less about the rules and more about general rhythms. In that way, it’s quite similar to stage 4 faith as I understand it [go to Post 1 for a definition]. There was a time when I thought that believing something because some pastor or author who I respected held that view was sufficient. But in many ways, this thinking is quite similar to believing that one’s relationship to God needs to be mediated through a priest. My reading of the bible tells me that a grave mistake that is repeated throughout history by the people of faith is the belief that some surrogate exists or that knowing God through a proxy is sufficient. There is understandably an enormous temptation to think that there is someone or some elite group of people that has “the answers” or at least “a blueprint” to making everything work well. We all want to feel concrete under our feet. However, I have attached myself to this wildly optimistic (and ambiguous) idea that we have direct and personal access to the God of the Universe and that His statement, “I am the Truth”, implies that the truth about all the important things to make life work can be known directly by each of us. Granted, I can’t prove that this approach is working. I don’t always hear perfectly and the periods of silence when I can’t hear anything are maddening. The Richard Dawkins of the world would be correct in dismissing my judgment as irrational and my only response would be similar to the one the man born blind gave to his interrogators in John 9:25- “I was blind, but now I see.”







Conan O'Brian hair style

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Post 13 - S's Surgery

About a week ago, S had a minor surgical procedure to correct a malfunction in his left kidney. We had known about this issue since he was about 6 months in the womb, and we were monitoring it since he came out of the wife. Since a person only needs 1 kidney to function, there was no impact on his life thus far as his right kidney is perfectly fine. For the most part, this is the kind of thing where most people don’t even realize there’s an issue until they start drinking in high school/college years and one’s kidney starts to go into overdrive. Nonetheless, the doctors recommended that we perform this procedure now since the sooner this is corrected, the better. Given that it had a high 90s success rate (and little downside, other than the fact that he had to go under), we acceded.

The simplicity of the process notwithstanding, we were still a little queasy about a 4-month old having surgery. Yours truly has managed to avoid the medical system for most of his life and has never so much as taken prescription medication. The one time surgery was recommended for a torn labrum in my right shoulder, I decided to instead enlist in the help of our church’s prayer team- and I am happy to report that a lot of prayer, and a little change in diet, and some simple physical therapy has led to a shoulder that has completely healed itself. The thought of S going back to the same hospital months after his birth really irked me. I probably have a slightly irrational fear that only bad things happen when engaging with the medical system, and so I am admittedly not at my best when dealing with hospitals and doctors.

The surgery was totally fine. It took a little longer than expected, but as of now, it’s been deemed a success. It was after he came out of the operating room and entered the recovery wing is when things got difficult. I had figured that since sleep is essential for a recovering child, we would have our own private (i.e. quiet) room in the pediatrics ward to get S back to 100%. However, they showed us to a room which was set up for two, and there was another patient behind the curtain in the room where we were assigned. As we settled into our designated quarters for the next 24 hours, I was annoyed with our situation as the child on the other side of the room had his television on at a volume that was likely to preclude S from getting the sleep he needed to get well. Even more disruptive was the manner in which he would holler/moan loudly every 5 minutes or so, thus pretty much ensuring that as soon as S was lulled to sleep, he would be startled awake by the sounds on the other side of the curtain. I had finally had it after S was woken up the umpteenth time, and I decided to make my way over to the other side of the curtain to politely ask the young boy to turn of the television, and quiet down so that my 4-month old son who had just endured a surgical procedure could get some sleep.

When I rolled back the curtain, what I saw could only be described as heartbreaking. On the bed was a quadriplegic child with the face and torso of a 10-year old, but arms and legs that were emaciated and mangled in a way that rendered them physically useless. He clearly could not communicate in an articulate fashion. When I made eye contact with him, I wasn’t sure if he saw me, but I was sure that he had no idea that I was the man sharing a room with him. What was probably the most heartbreaking of all was the sadness in his face. There was no parent in the room with him, no family member tending to him, the only contact he received was the nurses who came in every so often to change the channel, feed him, or give him a sponge bath. Here I was dreading the fact that S would have to spend another 24 hours at the hospital, and I later learned that this poor young fellow had been in the hospital for quite some time, just laying in bed all day, alone the vast majority of the time, unable to communicate meaningfully with other people, and no family or friends by his side.

I thought about these two young boys- my son and this severely disabled fellow briefly sharing a physical space, and yet their lives could not be more different. S had both his parents in the room with him, 2 of his grandparents, and countless other friends and family praying for him during his brief stint in the hospital. This other boy was completely alone. In a matter of hours, S would be back in his home, being tended to and loved on by so many, continuing a life full of blessings and promise. This boy right now is likely still in the same bed, watching the same cartoons, and moaning and hollering in the same unexpectedly predictable way. It all seemed just so... unfair. How is it just that one child is dealt a hand like S, and another is given such a drastically different lot? I had a moment where I was just so upset at the boys parents- how could they just leave him in a hospital like this, and then it occurred to me that perhaps the boy’s parents are not alive, or perhaps they just couldn’t take trying to tend to him anymore. Indignation quickly became empathy.

I first felt a deep sense of shame as my frustrations with this helpless boy revealed how self-centered and myopic I can be when it comes to the comfort of my precious son. I turned my anger towards God, and I was reminded how in The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevksy shares his view that the suffering of children is an inescapable objection to God’s goodness. This objection to my faith was never more poignant than in seeing this boy’s situation. I recall when reading TBK many years ago, issues like “the problem of evil” and “how can a good God allow innocents to suffer” were something to ponder, but it was always done at a safe distance. I knew (know?) so little about genuine suffering- it was more of an academic exercise where reconciliation of two seemingly contradictory ideals was the goal. But everything changes after becoming a father. The same question is out there, but the power of logic is subordinated to narratives and personal context. It’s a little bit like what happens when I see a homeless person on my street- I used to try and assess the likelihood of individual X- as a recipient of a random act of kindness- might allocate those resources towards unproductive/addictive substances. These days though, it’s less about assessing that probability and more about realizing that at some point many years ago, these people too were probably being doted on and receiving the same kind of love, affection and hope that S is experiencing today. We all begin with such unbridled hope and endless possibilities for infinite upside. My mind can’t help but to ponder, “What went wrong between then and now?”

I’ve always felt that those (like Dostoevsky) who criticize our faith for its inconsistency had a very valid point. However, a gentlemen who I’ve gotten to know recently mentioned to me that he likes our church because we are comfortable living with the inherent contradictions in our faith. I thought that was keen insight into one of the key attributes of our community. Seeing S’s life path cross this boy’s in the pediatric ward of NYU was a perfect demonstration of the kinds of contradictions I am forced to get comfortable with. I suppose when God told Adam to “fill the earth and subdue it”, He was telling us that the evil in the world is not something that requires an explanation, but instead something that must be confronted and subdued by the children of God.

Samuel learning how to do praying hands on cue:


Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Post 12: Sleep Training


For S’s first 90 days or so, we as parents didn’t have many choices to make. For the most part- parenting has been a reactive affair- we generally respond to whatever S needs- and thus far, that’s just food, diaper changes, and nap time.

But in the past few weeks, we embarked on our first truly deliberate act as parents: Sleep Training. I’ve never heard the term prior to becoming a parent, and so for the non-parents out there, sleep training is about trying to get your baby to sleep on their own as long as possible. As parents know, the significance of this cannot be overstated- being able to put a child down at 7 PM and not worry about having to do anything until 7 AM the following morning is one of the great milestones that all new mom/dads look forward to. As I read various parenting websites, it appears that S is a great sleeper, but that basically meant that he slept from 7 PM until 1 AM, and then 1:15 AM until about 5 AM, and then 5:15 until about 7. Apparently 6 consecutive hours qualifies as sleeping through the night for a newborn, but the aforementioned schedule certainly didn’t meet my standard of mom/dad being able to sleep through the night.

There is no shortage of theories and materials out there written by folks with diametrically opposing views on both the methods and virtues of getting a child to sleep through the night. One camp advocates for letting a baby “cry it out”, which at the extreme implies that you plop a baby into the crib at 7 PM, shut the door, and don’t return until 7 AM the next morning. The expectation is that a child may cry- up to several hours if they’re the persistent type, but eventually they’ll give in and go to sleep, hence the term cry it out. No sooner did this method develop some modicum of acceptance that a class of “researchers” came out talking about the dangers of allowing a child to cry for too long. The claim was that a child’s mental/emotional development could be severely compromised if subject to long periods of crying, and they therefore advise that parents constantly tend to a child’s needs. The downside to this attachment theory approach was obviously spoiling an infant to the point where, well, they become spoiled children/adults and nobody wants that, and so we can naturally see how the cry it out method started to gain some traction in the first place. And the pendulum continues to swing...

What surprises me as I read a lot of the literature out there is the deep, borderline fanatical passion with which each group argues its case. Like most things in life, the answer to the question of how to get a child to sleep through the night is probably “it depends”, and what’s best for most kids is probably some combination of the two extremes. But when you combine the neurosis of parents, and the dogmatic religiosity of most researchers, you end up with is something that resembles our public discourse. Each side claims to have “the answer”, and whichever path a parent chooses- there’s this lingering voice in the back of our heads warning us that we’re creating some kind of permanent damage- either by raising impetuous pansies, or emotionally stunted future criminals.

As one might expect, my inclination with S was to put him in the room at 7 PM and come back at 7 AM the next day. The little voice in the back of my head whispers, “Don’t raise a wimp... It’s time for him to be a man!”. Thankfully, the wife resides on the other end of the spectrum, and she’s ready to pull her hair out if S so much as cries for 30 seconds. We met in the middle, and so far, the results seem to be promising. When we put S down at around 7 PM, he usually puts himself to sleep with minimal whimpers, if any. The past several nights, he’ll stay down about 8-9 hours- not quite the whole night, but certainly an improvement to two weeks ago. The hardest part has been that 3:30AM to 6 AM window- keeping him down during that time is a challenge, and one we’re still probably a couple days/weeks from declaring victory. But freedom does appear to be around the corner.

Regardless of when we get there, there’s still the theoretical possibility that we were either too harsh (or too easy) on S in this endeavor. As wise parents remind us, you don’t really know what kind of job you did as a parent until it’s basically too late to do much about it. I don’t think they’re trying to be fatalistic about things; they’re simply highlighting the basic reality that our control over the child-rearing process is inherently limited and our best bet is to just roll with who we are and let the chips fall where they may. While I have no idea if this sleep training is causing some form of longer-term harm, I do believe that there is no doubt in S’s mind that his parents love him very much. Him knowing that is actually all I really need in order to sleep well through the night.


100 Days Old


USA! USA!

Friday, April 15, 2011

"And may their first child be a masculine child" -Luca Brasi

Dear Samuel,
A significant part of your father’s view on life has been shaped by books and movies. One of the things I look forward to is reading and watching the classics together and guiding you through the process of discovering truth. There is something satisfying about digesting the thoughts of a writer or filmmaker who lived in an entirely different time and context, yet you are able to connect to their ideas in a manner that speaks powerfully in your own life. And it’s even more fun when you are able to do this with others who are traveling a similar road.

One film that we will probably view together multiple times is the Godfather Trilogy- a film about the rise and fall of the Corleone organized crime family. The first part of the series was made even before your father was born, and it was widely considered to be the best film of its era. Nearly 40 years and two sequels later, it [the entire trilogy] is now widely considered the best film of all time, and that will still probably be the case 40 years from now when hopefully you’ll be sitting with your own children watching this epic drama. There is so much to discuss, we can’t possibly get through all of it in one sitting. But here are a few things that resonate most with who I am and how I view the world.

One of the attributes of all good drama is the presentation of man as neither all good or evil but rather inherently flawed with the possibility of redemption. The most compelling characters of the film have a myriad of shortcomings- not the least of which is that for the majority of the trilogy, they use violence, deception, and murder to achieve their business objectives. To be clear, your father doesn’t condone any of this! However, there is something about their story that drew me in- perhaps because I saw myself in their narrative, or because some deeper truth about the nature of reality was revealed through their broken lives.

The family’s journey starts in the town of Corleone, Sicily with the birth of Vito Andolini in 1891. Vito is a seemingly ordinary boy who is thrust into a difficult situation by circumstances beyond his control. His father Antonio and older brother Paolo are killed by the local warlord because they refuse to genuflect to him. Vito’s mother goes to the warlord and begs for Vito’s life to be spared, but the warlord refuses, and Vito’s mother is martyred while giving Vito a chance to escape. He ends up being secretly transported out of Sicily by donkey, and finds himself on a cargo ship traveling across the Atlantic and heading to America. He arrives in New York as a young boy with no possessions and unable to speak the language. In some sense- all great stories start this way. No one is born extraordinary- but it is instead how we deal with the difficulties that life presents to us that will determine whether or not we unleash the extraordinary potential that exists within all of us. No doubt there will come a point in your life where some external factors will force you to leave what is familiar/comfortable and you may find yourself in what seems like a foreign land without the wherewithal to make it. I encourage you to embrace this challenge and not shy away from it. Though it is undoubtedly a difficult and uncomfortable place to be, it is also when you know you are at the beginning of your own version of the Hero’s Journey.

Later in on the film, we see Vito as a young man in the little Italy section of New York City working in a grocery store. It is not a particularly glamorous position, but it’s clear he is someone who does what is asked of him faithfully. One day, the local mafia chief comes into the grocery store with his nephew and speaks with the grocery store owner (Vito’s Employer). The chief suggests that the grocery store owner give a job to his nephew, and the grocery store owner who receives protection at the hand of this man is forced to accede to these demands. Vito sees the conversation that’s just occurred and he knows what’s coming when the store owner approaches him. The employer explains that he must hire the warlord’s nephew, and that means that there is no longer a position for Vito. In what ensues is a wonderful display of Vito’s character and disposition. His job has been unfairly taken away from him- by a combination of hubris/nepotism on the part of the mafia chief and cowardice on the part of his employer. However, Vito does not lash out- he instead expresses his gratitude for what has already been given to him, and indicates that what he will remember most is the kindness of his employer and not the unceremonious manner in which he was relieved of his duties. Many wise men believe that having this kind of attitude is one of the keys to happiness. Your father is doing his best to live with a similar lense on life, but when he falls short as he often does, he reminds himself of the virtue that was encapsulated in this brief sequence.

Finally, there is much debate regarding what the film is really all about. The common view is that the film gave the gangster’s perspective of the Mafia as a necessary response to a corrupt society. The Mafia represents an alternative to the state as the entity that establishes both society’s rules and its enforcement. And the Mafia as represented in the Corleone family has a long list of virtues to go along with their more obvious shortcomings. There are many interpretations- all of which are valid. But I think I find this film so compelling because the Corleone family’s desires are really the desires of ever man. While the family business through most of their history operated in the realm of vices like liquor, prostitution, and gambling, the goal was always for the family business to become a force to be reckoned with in the legitimate world. In the third installment of the trilogy, Vito’s son Michael sells the Corleone family interests in all the seedy businesses in an attempt to purchase a controlling interest in a real estate enterprise called International Immobiliare. While his attempts ultimately fail, I viewed the family’s struggle to emerge from the underworld into the business world’s primary stage as a metaphor for every man’s desire to be recognized and respected by his peers. In some sense, the fact that they failed is the film’s way of saying that our attempts to achieve this kind of recognition and legitimacy from our fellow man is futile, and that the one and only source that could imbue the kind of meaning and purpose in our life comes from Above.

There’s so much more to say, but perhaps it’s best at this point to just wait and see what you take away in your first viewing. I’ve scheduled your first viewing to be on your 15th birthday, which was around the time I first saw it. We’ll watch it together, because in the immortal words of Don Corleone

“A man who doesn’t spend time with his family can never be a real man”





Sunday, March 27, 2011

Post 10: The Father's Heart

“The central problem of any society is to define appropriate roles for men” - Margaret Mead

It occurred to me during the many long and sleepless nights over the past six years that my desire to be a father is a decidedly counter-cultural trait. Sociologists talk about fatherlessness as one of the hallmarks of modern Western culture- apparently, nearly 50% of American children born between 1970 and 1985 did not have their biological fathers around by the time they reached 17. While its precise sociological impact is probably debated, nearly every measurable outcome is worse for fatherless children. Physical health, emotional health, educational attainment, economic well being, and likelihood of being involved in crime. Richard Rohr (reflecting on his time as a prison chaplain) states that the one thing that every incarcerated man serving time had in common was the absence of their father (or equivalent father figure). To call the current state of affairs a crisis does not strike me as alarmist in the slightest.

In many ways, the church is a reflection of the culture. Male “absence” in the home is reflected in low male participation in today’s congregations. Walk into any weekend service- regardless of denomination or socio-economic composition- and you’ll generally find about ⅔ of the seats are occupied by women and ⅓ by men. If you assume roughly half of a congregation is married, then the ratio of single women to single men goes to 3:1 [sort of the opposite of what you see on the lines waiting to get into the hottest club]. To the outside world, the stereotypical man of faith is either nice [spineless], or chauvinistically religious. Of course, it’s not much better on the outside. In an essay in last month’s Wall Street Journal titled “Where Have the Good Men Gone?”, the author claims that men in their 20s and 30s come across as “aging frat boys, maladroit geeks or grubby slackers”.

One of the beautiful things about the gospel in my eyes is that it contains within it the breadth to address all the world’s problems. Yet there’s a sense in which the gospel becomes specific, relevant, and alive for the particular problem or issue that God can lay on a single person’s heart. One thing I discovered in my desire to become a father is that there is something much broader and deeper within me than simply wanting to raise (at most) a handful of good children. Being a father to S (and hopefully more like him) was really just a specific manifestation of my desire to see young males discover their true selves, and become the kind of men that God designed them to be. As crazy as this may sound, I sincerely believe that the church represents the best chance at facilitating the transformation of the modern male spirit. The good and noble life as modeled by Jesus is really the only hope in attempting to successfully navigate an increasingly complex world with many competing paths to salvation. While the contexts are always changing, the fundamental pillars of a man’s life- his vocation, his family, his friends, and his public persona- are subject and subordinate to the same immutable truths that were made apparent when The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

Of course, the glaring thing that is missing in all of this is a leadership that inspires and draws out the greatness that truly resides in all men. With all due respect to the clergy, I have long felt that the principal burden for this kind of leadership must be born by the laity. Of course, good teaching and guidance are paramount, but what’s really needed is men who can do life with other men and model the larger-than-life existence that we all desire. Here again, the gospel’s core nature is revealed- under no circumstance could I or anyone else presume to have the qualifications to actually carry this mantle. However, it is because we believe in a God whose power is most complete in our weakness that an individual like myself can even ponder taking on this responsibility. And after all, the true essence of leadership is not to create followers of the leader, but to point others in getting intimately connected to the well that never runs dry. As Henry Nouen would say, we are “Wounded Healers”.

As the fruit of my body, Little S demands the lion’s share of my attention today. My hope is that he will one day have many brothers whose biological lineage may be diverse (or even unknown) but who trace their spiritual lineage back to me and will thus name me as one of their spiritual fathers. Then he will come to understand that while he is and always will be the Prince of our household, his ultimate citizenship resides in the family of God.





Friday, March 11, 2011

Post 9: Initiation Rites

One of the true marvels of being a father is witnessing what it takes to be a mother. It really shouldn’t surprise me, after all- observing many of my friends as parents over the years taught me the one and only iron law of parenting: moms are just way tougher than dads. However, when you witness it up close on your own child, it becomes seared into your consciousness in a deeper way. Before it was known, now it’s owned.

I suppose it all begins shortly after conception. A mother with child deals with nausea, fatigue, and all-around discomfort to varying degrees during the 9 months of pregnancy. Expecting fathers like me try to get in as many rounds of golf as possible knowing that junior’s arrival effectively puts the kaibosh on any future early morning walks down the fairway. It culminates in the whole delivery process. As I’ve mentioned on several occasions, witnessing what my son did to my wife gives a whole new spin on good ‘ol Genesis 3:16. I, on the other hand, got bored at various points during the 18 hour process and found myself playing tetris and reading about Carmelo Anthony trade rumors to pass the time between contractions. Post delivery- I don’t think the balance has changed too much. The wife is up at least once, and sometimes twice a night to nurse. Deep sleep is a distant memory not to be visited for at least several more weeks. As for me, I sometimes wonder how much my life has really changed. I think I’m doing about as much as I can, but the simple fact that I can’t nurse and I leave for work 5 days a week basically renders anything I do as the proverbial pimple on the elephant’s ass compared to the work of the mother. This realization has made me even more impressed with all the moms out there who do a “good job” raising children, and has led me to have significantly more grace for those moms who are doing a “not so good” job, or maybe even opted out altogether. The single moms, of which there are appear to be so many these days, they are my new heroes.

Richard Rohr- the man who’s writings inspired this blog’s title- often laments the lack of initiation rites for the modern western male. He attributes this lack of meaningful transition from boyhood to manhood as a principle reason behind the lack of manliness and virtue in the vast majority of modern men. (Would anyone really dispute this observation?). Specifically within the christian church, many observers are calling the lack of male participation an all-out crisis. Much ink has been spilled about how the church is producing a lot of “nice” or “religious” men, but very few men who are larger than life. On the other hand, women (in general) have childbirth and child rearing as a natural initiation rite. This forces them to come to terms with their pain/fears, and they typically need to call on a higher power to get through to the other side of the barrier. But when they do, they tend to emerge stronger, wiser, bonafide. I have to admit that the number of quality single women in the communities of faith that I am involved in outnumber the quality men by a factor of 5. Maybe 10. And this is even before they go through the whole kid thing.

I often wonder about how S will be initiated into manhood. When I reflect on my own upbringing, while I grew up in a middle class home, I like to think that I still had that edge and toughness that is a natural extension of first generation immigrant parents. I often share how my mom first sent me to sleep away camp for 1 week when I was six years old. It was largely against my will, and thus I cried like a baby every night because I was so homesick. The way she decided to deal with that was to send me to a camp that was even further away for 8 weeks the following summer. (My mom was a real Tiger Mom) During the winter months, many Saturday and Sundays between Thanksgiving and Christmas were spent waking up at the crack of dawn and setting up shop with my parents at the local outdoor flea market. This is just what we did to make ends meet.

S’s reality is unlikely to look to anything like what his father had growing up. To be frank, he is now part of the privileged. As much as I want to give him every opportunity to succeed, a part of me also feels this desire to manufacture hardship in his life. I don’t know of any other way besides struggle for him to become the man he’s destined to be. I see it already just 5 weeks into his life- I’m inclined to let him cry and figure things out instead of picking him up to comfort him. There’s a voice in my head that ironically replays the thought, “Stop being such a baby!” The wife and his grandmothers promptly scold me for being so obtuse. This will likely be a constant struggle throughout the coming years- the mother’s desire to nurture/protect will clash with the father’s desire to toughen him up. I can only pray that we find the right balance between these competing ideals. May God help us to do so.

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Post 8: Helplessness

One of the most common phrases used by various visitors over the past week was, “Oh... look at him! He looks so cute and helpless”

There are times I wonder if that is a more apt description of how we, the parents feel. Maybe not the cute part, but definitely helpless. Over the first 26 some odd days of S’s life, it’s fair to say we were relatively spoiled as parents. He ate well, slept well, pooped well, and was overall a predictable baby. I almost felt guilty as my neighbors would run into me in the elevator on my way to the gym and say things like, “How come you’re working out- you should be sleep deprived and overall disheveled!”. The surreptitiously legalistic side of me would quietly think thoughts like, “I suffered deeply waiting for my baby’s arrival, so God is therefore rewarding me with a calm and happy baby”. The Pharisee within me that still sees life in terms of cosmic bargains is sadly alive and well.

Then day 27 came around. It started like any other day- the normal schedule and routines. Then, around 3 PM, the floodgates opened. There were a series of farts- but really no other indication of the tsunami of crying that was about to ensue. Like any neophyte father, I have a checklist of things that I go through when the baby is crying- is he hungry, is his diaper wet, does he need to be burped? Checked all of the above and none were the root cause. I did the five S’s from the popular DVD “Happiest Baby on the Block”- the SSHHH, Swaddle, Sideways, Swing, Shake- I subsequently kicked it up a notch and tried a few more of the things I’ve added to my arsenal- placing him in a stroller and moving him around the loft, holding him and swinging him back and forth (a great core exercise, btw), drawing isosceles triangles on his tummy, etc. All of my best efforts yielded absolutely nothing but a 10 pound ball full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

The wife was asleep in the bedroom- the least I could do to help a breast-feeding woman is give her some temporary respite on a weekend afternoon. It was just me against S, and the scoreboard was 82-0, in favor of the progeny. I shall reveal my rookie colors in sharing the overwhelming panic that descended upon me as nothing I tried altered the state of affairs. I pride myself in my level-headedness, but an hour of nearly constant screaming left me frazzled. Ultimately, i placed him down, put my hand on his tiny paws, and tried to transport myself to a different place. Miraculously, I succeeded. I somehow calmed myself by simply acknowledging that there was something God was trying to tell me in this small little episode. If nothing else, this was another reminder about how little control I have over S, and perhaps even life in general. Having been formally trained in applied mathematics, my default disposition is to create a model in my head for how every system behaves. If it can be modeled, it can be understood. If it can be understood, it can be controlled. And control, of course, is the key to life going well. I had lulled myself into this sense that I had a comprehensive understanding of this little system. If he eats well and poops well, then everything else ought to be well. Instead, I was promptly reduced to a state of complete helplessness. There appeared to be little correlation between my actions and whether or not S looked like this:

or this:

All I could do in the end was just hold him close against my shoulder and tell him everything will be alright. While my right ear may be deaf after another 30 minutes of S screaming into it, I have a slightly richer understanding of this unconditional love I kept hearing about prior to S’s arrival. Naturally, I can’t help but to draw the analogy of me as the screaming, unpredictable child and God the Father as the parent. They say God is omniscient, and of course He is, but I have a sense that I’ve done my fair share of unpredictable things that leave Him bewildered and disappointed. But despite this, I can sense how God too has held me on His shoulder, and He’d whisper that everything is going to be alright.

For sure, parenting is going to try my patience and reveal the myriad of my shortcomings. But on this day, I was reminded that we are, indeed, made in the image of God.

Monday, February 21, 2011

Post 7: Our Father's Faith

This past weekend was spent at the St. Ignatius Retreat House, located about 20 miles outside of New York City. This was the site of the River Partner’s Retreat- a one night getaway where the most committed servants of our church community get out of Manhattan to rest and recharge.

While modernity is justifiably skeptical of almost all organized religion, I view the local church as the world’s last best hope. I love my church (The River), but perhaps at an even more fundamental level, I am deeply committed to it- both its mission as well as its people. Of course, like any institution, we are far from perfect and our dysfunction manifests itself both individually and collectively. But I think the weight of my commitment rests on the sincere (though potentially misguided) belief that the Christian faith as practiced and preached at this church is as close as possible to what Jesus would be doing if He were to dwell among us today. The three pillars of our approach are to be biblically thoughtful, spiritually powerful, and culturally relevant. This basically means that we strive to be theologically/intellectually rigorous, but understand that the locus of true transformation resides not in our heads but in our hearts. We are charismatic and thus take seriously Saint Paul’s prodding to “eagerly desire the gift of prophecy”, but we would say that a person’s character is far more important than one’s spiritual gifting. We believe it is paramount to engage with the modern culture, and not withdraw from it. But we recognize that an authentic faith will ultimately be profoundly counter-cultural. At a more general level, on any matter that has historically divided people of the Christian faith, we would give a whole-hearted YES! to both sides of the debate. In my opinion, this proper blending of seemingly contradictory ideals is this most satisfying attribute of our polity.

The sociologist within me can’t help but to notice what I perceive as drastic differences between the Gospel as it is understood in my home church, and what I see in the many (most?) other congregations. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised- the history of our faith is littered with a wide variance in interpretations and practices about what it means to be true followers of Jesus. Unfortunately, the forces that lead to greater splintering of the Body have outweighed the ecumenical ones. When I see the manner in which organizations like the Christian Coalition or National Association of Evangelicals chooses to express its faith both in the private and public sphere, I do find myself scratching my head confused as to how we can both follow the same God yet come to such drastically different conclusions about what that means in real life. When I see the contra movements (like the Emergent Church) that have arisen in response to the perceived shortcomings of their “father’s church”, I continue to scratch my head, but perhaps with my right hand instead of my left. I firmly believe that each subset within the faith loves the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, mind and strength. At a minimum, discord is a reminder that we are on the wrong side of eternity. And if it is indeed true that one side is far closer to the Heart of God than another- then I suppose we’ll find out on the other side of eternity.

I suppose a primary hope of any Christian parent is that their children will follow in their footsteps and embrace their faith. Of course, I find myself in this camp, and I will certainly end up raising S in a “Christian home”. However, I suppose I’m not only prepared for him to seek out and explore other paths to salvation, but I find myself almost wanting him to do so. Our pastor preached yesterday on the well known parable of the Prodigal Son- some call this the entire Gospel in a parable. It’s the first time I thought about that story as a father, and it occurred to me that the father may have felt the tension of being hurt by his son’s rejection of him but simultaneously feeling its necessity. Could the son’s faith have been real if he did not squander a fortune on wine and women and find himself starving among swine? Having become born again towards the latter year’s of college, I long believed that it was important for me experience and embrace the world and all that it offers, conclude that it would leave me wanting, and thus completely own my faith.

In pushing S out into the world, I run the risk of him rejecting his father’s faith. Will he spend his early adult years among the secular humanists? Or will he find the structure of the conservative movements appealing? Or maybe he’ll be drawn to the Emergent crowd- or whatever is the hip and cool thing in 20 years. As I write this, I realize there’s another possibility- perhaps S will be the one who teaches his father new things about what it means to follow God. Throughout this, I assume that I’ll always be ahead of him, the more advanced one, the one overseeing his progress. But maybe it will be the other way around, and as spoken by the prophet Isaiah 11:6 “a little child will lead them”.



Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Post 6: Day 15

It’s hard to believe that only 2 weeks have gone by since S first breathed NYC air. Both the wife and I feel like we’ve been doing this for years. Overall, it seems as though we’ve been on the fortunate side as first-time parents- S eats quite well (like his father), he’s been sleeping up to 4 hours at a time during the night, and he pees and poops at appropriate intervals. Of course, I’m quite certain that tonight will be the night that S awakes every hour crying inconsolably. But the unexpected downsides have been pretty manageable so far, and life has resumed some measure of normalcy.

One of the pleasant surprises in the first two weeks has been the outpouring of affection from the extended community of friends and family to the arrival of S. This is to be somewhat expected given the collective years of waiting, but still, there’s something incredibly touching about some of the reactions we’ve seen. Foremost on my mind is my three nieces, age 10, 8, and 5. I get emails from the oldest one saying things like, “Please send me more pictures of your new baby- he’s soooooo cute. I want to put him on my screensaver for my ipod touch.” My sister tells me that they forward pictures to their friends, and they’re super proud of the arrival of their new cousin. For some reason, I had feared the opposite- I was even concerned that they might feel a certain cousin rivalry- that their auntie and uncle in NYC might not pay as much attention to them now that they have one of their own kids.

Though quite young, my sense is they too went on a journey where they passed through some liminal spaces. My nieces have basically been praying for us to have a baby- well, seemingly ever since their parents taught them the concept of prayer. The final words uttered before every meal we’ve ever had together was, “And please God help uncle and auntie have a baby”. I know the years of waiting left them confused- at one point, they asked my sister, “Why is it that some families have lots of babies, and God won’t give uncle and auntie even one?” I’m not sure how their mom responded to this, but I can’t imagine any logical attempt to answer the question being satisfactory. Alas, during their trip to NYC this past summer, the oldest one who’s a bit of a ham took my iPhone4 and began videotaping her random thoughts and musings as she strolled around the loft. There’s this one priceless moment where she stumbles upon pictures from the sonogram on the coffee table and she exclaims to her audience, “Look! here are pictures of the baby that we’ve been praying for!!!” I suppose part of their joy must come from this childlike sense that the God of the Universe heard their prayers and took the time to answer them. At the same time, the road was marked with enough hardship and disappointment over the years to give them a glimpse of what a mature, circumstance-invariant faith might look like in their own future.

I think one of the things I look most forward to in fatherhood is walking with S and teaching him how to navigate the inevitable disappointments in life. Perhaps more than anything else, I want to instill in him a heart of thankfulness and appreciation for all things- no matter how broken or messed up things appear to be both in his world and the broader world. I recognize that I’m fighting a massive headwind as cynicism/nihilism are the hallmarks of our culture. If we continue to raise him in NYC, he will no doubt be surrounded by people who were so aptly described by Louis CK in his “Everything is Amazing and Nobody’s Happy” rant on Conan several years ago. But my daily prayer when I peer into S’s eyes each day as I hold him is that he would begin to develop an ability to hear God’s voice, feel His Presence, and commune with Him as a friend. This is truly the only effective antidote that I’m aware of to resist the temptation to develop a negative worldview. I would love for him to own the great prayer captured in Habakkuk 3:17

“Though the fig tree does not bud, and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD”

S- it is this kind of faith from your parents and others that brought about your physical life- and this same faith is the key to the abundant life as promised in John 10:10.



Thursday, February 10, 2011

Post 5: The Visit

One of the joys of being a parent for 10 days is that anything seems possible for your child. The reality of limitations haven’t yet set in, and this allows me to fantasize about what my son will be doing 20 years from now.

Those who know my story are aware that aside from the Great Commission, one of my dreams is to see the United States win the World Cup. I grew up playing the Beautiful Game as a child, and there was a brief period of time when I entertained the thought of playing professionally. I surrendered this dream by my mid-teen years as I came to terms with my physical attributes were only above average, not extraordinary. But soccer was my first love, and I find myself attached to this sport and our US National Team like no other. When I feel sad, I go to youtube and watch replays of Landon Donovan’s goal in the 90th minute against Algeria that allowed the US Team to win its group and sent us through to the round of 16 in the 2010 games. I’m not sure what it is- perhaps it’s because soccer is the greatest sport in the world, and it’s the one sport where the US is clearly an underdog. But after we learned in week 18 that we were having a son, I immediately began to just dream and imagine what it would be like for my son to lead the US Men’s National Team to a World Cup title in 2030 or 2034. Hey- I figured the odds of us even making it to 4 months given our history was 1 in a big number- why not ponder him being 1 in an even bigger number?

This brings me to last week’s visit to the pediatrician. We get to the doctor’s office, and our physician is this woman named Monica who’s a nice blend of warmth and competence. She’s going through the routine battery of tests that they do for newborns, and she places my son on his tummy. Lo and behold, he flipped himself over onto his back. I didn’t think much of it, but our physician had this startled look on her face. Apparently, this is something babies do at 3 months, not 4 days. She couldn’t contain her excitement, and she remarked that she had never seen a baby do this at this age. She waves over to her colleagues about what my boy just did, and she starts to call him “the little Olympian”. She turns to the parents and asks if there’s an athletic heritage in the family. I’m sitting there with my arms folded trying my best to contain my excitement, but I mutter somewhat bashfully, “Well, I was once a soccer player”. The doctor responds, “Well, he appears to have very strong legs too.” She puts him on his belly again, and sure enough, he flips over again onto his back. I’m immediately transported to July 18th, 2030 and my son is making an overlapping run from the left wingback position in the 94th minute of a 1-1 tie between the United States and Brazil in the World Cup Final and a perfect through ball is placed by the central midfielder and S runs onto it and hits it in stride and the ball is thrust like a laser into the upper 90 just past the outstretched hands of the Brazilian keeper.

I suppose all parents do this at some level. We so desperately want our kids to experience and accomplish things that eluded us. At the same time, I warn myself that it’s very easy to become the kind of parent that tries to live his unfulfilled dreams through the children. Prior to S’s arrival, my pastor sat down with me and reminded me that my son does not belong to me, but that he really does belong to the Lord. He knows me too well. Ironically enough, he’s named after the prophet in the Old Testament who’s mother said, “I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give him to the LORD.” I hope I have the courage and wisdom to live by those words in the coming years.

But for now, I still daydream from time to time about the summer of 2030... ;)