Why Don’t Conservatives Like Public Schools?

I just read an article about Kansas.  Seems that the conservatives in charge there have reduced taxes.  Surprise, surprise the effect of tax reduction is state revenue reduction.  Now they seek a way to balance the budget, and you guessed it, they will do so by cutting funds for public education.  We hear no less from the new leadership in Texas where our Lt. Governor has vowed to lower taxes and then guess what, we will have to cut spending, and guess where we will cut?  The same place those same voices have been cutting over the past couple of legislative sessions:  public education.  Our Governor wants to increase the availability of full day Pre-Kindergarten, but offers no new funding to do so and includes additional accountability measures for 4 year olds.  What in the world is going on? Has public education somehow sinned and fallen short?  Have we offended the political right?  Are teachers and principals and superintendents employed by some demon enterprise that is soaking the life blood from America to the extent that we must increase accountability and cut funding?  I have been thinking about this a lot and listening to the rhetoric a lot and I have some theories about what is motivating what I see as a wholesale assault on public education.  My theory is based on some assumptions:

 

The education of all children in this state and in this nation is a classic liberal mission.  In the macro sense, anytime the government provides free services to all we are talking liberal solutions.  Public schools are to educate rich, poor, boys, girls, Blacks, whites, disabled, gifted, non-English speaking, etc.  We are to teach all and promote success for all.  What a grand mission!  But this is not a conservative mission.  It is not based on the market model, nor the competitive model, nor the model practiced widely internationally of sort and select where only a percentage of kids are allowed to get an education based on their performance, income, political connections or birth right.  No, this is a model to promote the success of all.  It is purely a notion born in a democracy where all humans are created equal.  I think that rankles the conservative mind-set.  Especially those on the far right, the ultra-conservatives, the wing-nuts.  In this piece when I say “conservatives” I mean ultra-conservatives and wing-nuts.

 

Worse, the effort to educate all children is not only very expensive, it is funded by tax dollars.  In Texas we use sales tax revenue at the state level and property tax revenue at the local level.  Other states include state income tax revenue which Texas does not have.  These revenues fund all state functions, and typically public education is at or very near the top of the most expensive state function.  Why is that?  Few operations are as labor intensive as public education.  Well over 70% of each school’s budget is the salary of staff.  And, most of the staff are college educated, degreed, certified professionals who are not willing nor should they be to work for minimum wage.  Teachers and administrators merit a professional salary.  We could reduce the personnel costs by reducing the number of school employees.  We can make a few reductions, but unless we are willing to see a dramatic escalation in teacher/pupil ratios, reducing staff is not practical.  And unless we are willing to stop providing support services for kids reducing staff is not practical.  If we are to serve every single child, then we can do so better the closer we get to one professional per every single child.  Personnel reduction moves us in a direction contrary to our core mission.  Well, we could reduce teacher salaries.  But that makes no sense either.  We are facing a dramatic shortfall in the number of teachers, especially high school teachers, and recruitment will not improve with reduced incentives.  In short, conservatives really do not like the basic mission of public education and they resent paying for it via taxes.

 

So the conservative mission, as I see it, is to do several things:  Reduce taxes needed to support public education, diminish public support for public education, promote the market model and competitive characteristics in public education, increase the accountability of public education, and if we must collect taxes to support education let’s find ways to shift as many of those tax dollars to the private sector as possible.  If that summarizes the conservative mission they are brilliant at the implementation.

 

Reducing taxes is fairly simple and ever popular.  To reduce taxes simply requires legislative action to do so, and a great argument against an incumbent legislator is that he or she either opposed reducing taxes or supported raising taxes.  That argument works so well we have devolved to legislatures hell-bent on reducing taxes.  Once governmental income is reduced, cutting public education is now a fairly safe governmental function to cut.  Why?  Public support of public education has been dramatically reduced.

 

Public support of public education has declined because the accountability movement complete with high-stakes standardized testing purports to show schools are failing, they must be fixed, and the solutions are to be found in the private sector.  Educational scholars like Bill Gates, the Koch brothers, Sandy Kress, Dan Patrick and Pearson have the solutions to fix public schools.  The solution is to spend less money, require more accountability, and simultaneously use the results of those efforts to rationalize shifting public tax money from public schools to the private sector in the form of charter schools and vouchers.  Therein is the rub.  Conservative mind set resents governmental services and supports promoting the private sector.  What could be a better strategy than to demean public schools with spurious data and then use the argument that public schools are failing to promote shifting tax dollars to the private sector?

 

The hard core bottom line is that the conservative mind set cannot include the notion of actually providing a governmental service that helps promote the success of all kids.  Do we really want all kids to be successful?  If so, there are clear strategies to help support that mission, and current conservatives do not support any of those strategies.  If not, then current conservative leadership is following a brilliant strategy of decreasing the likelihood of success, collecting crazy data to show that success is declining, and then shifting dollars from the public sector to the private sector.

 

What is so sad is that even conservatives seem to recognize, though they are not likely to publicly admit, that the government does a much better job in many settings than the private sector, especially when the effort is more moral than economic.  Should we have the private sector regulate meat production?  Nope, been there, done that.  Should we have the private sector provide law enforcement?  No, that is a frightful proposition.  Should we have the private sector manage our national parks?  Should we have the private sector charged with ensuring our water is safe?  Should we have the private sector tasked to provide our national defense?  Should the producers of products for infants be charged with monitoring the safety of those products?  On and on I could go.  The bottom line is if the motivation for performance is financial reward, then anything that increases profit is “good” and real ethics takes a back seat.  I think of organized crime operations as the classic unregulated free enterprise, private sector model.  There is a demand for drugs, prostitution, pornography, etc. and organized criminals provide those services and generate a lot of income.  They do so because making money is “good” even if it is not “right.”

 

I find these efforts of the current leadership to be beyond sad.  I find these strategies to be unethical and self-serving.  If all kids are successful via public schools, if we in fact educate all kids, rich, poor, boys, girls, racially diverse kids, then there is no special place for the children of wealth to get a leg up.  I remember a wonderful principal who was assigned to a low performing elementary school, 98% Hispanic and 100% free and reduced lunch.  In two years the campus became high performing.  Parents of kids in the affluent elementary schools where no kid was on free or reduced lunch and the student population was all Anglo, stormed the Board.  They argued it was not fair if poor kids did better on the accountability measures than their kids.  They demanded the principal be fired.  Ever since I have known there is no real support for the education of all kids to the same level of success as rich kids.  At least, no real support in the conservative camp.

 

As conservatives seek to deregulate the private sector, decrease taxes for the wealthy, and shift public revenue from the support of public programs to the private sector those of us in public education, those of us who deeply believe in educating all kids and deeply believe that there is no greater American mission than this mission, continue to labor in an ever increasingly hostile environment. 

 

What is truly amazing, is that despite all the efforts to derail public education we are doing one hell of a job.  So much so that when we begin to demonstrate improvement in all the accountability measures new accountability measures are implemented to re-distribute the outcomes and create more failing schools.  And, the evidence continues to show that public schools are performing as well or better than charter schools. 

 

Yes, public education is expensive.  Yes, public education is a governmental program designed to serve all children.  Yes, it has been very successful. And yes, conservatives have a real hard time with all that.  So public school folks will continue to be slaves to a hostile master while we strive to uplift all kids.  Know that as we continue to show success in those efforts, the conservative agenda to demean those efforts will increase.

 

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act is up for reauthorization.  The current version is called, “No child left behind,” and it is full of strategies to identify poor schools via testing and reduce the ability of schools to serve all kids.  A proposed new version entitled, The “The Student Success Act” is more of the same.  Neither piece of legislation is really devoted to the success of all kids, despite the positive, clever monikers of the bills.  The oxy morons are at work again.

 

Wouldn’t it be nice to serve all kids in an environment where professionals diagnose and prescribe the strategies needed to promote each kid and had the resources to do so? 

 

I wouldn’t know.

Stumped

My self-perception includes among a variety of characteristics the image that I am a reasonably bright person.  Not a genius, mind you, but reasonably bright.  And so it is with no small degree of frustration that I must confess that after hours of cogitation the following issues regarding public education continue to leave me totally stumped.  I cannot understand the following and clearly need some help and insight from someone smarter than me.

 

If high-stakes standardized testing of children is such a wonderful strategy to improve education why did the high-stakes testing movement not begin in private schools?  To this day, private schools are allowed to opt-out of such tests and virtually all of them do so.  In many ways private schools appear to provide a better educational experience than some public schools (though in many ways they do not!)  Why aren’t we looking at the characteristics of those schools rather than inventing new strategies for poor public schools? No, we are improving public schools by adopting models not used in successful schools, but models designed to shame the adults in schools where children are not prepared to do well and parents have limited resources.

 

If high-stakes standardized testing of children is actually a way to improve instruction for children, then why do the test results arrive so long after test administration that it is impossible to alter the instructional model based on the results?  It appears that the only reason to administer such tests to children is to judge the adults.

 

If it is reasonable to judge teachers, principals, and superintendents by the results of student high-stakes standardized tests is it equally reasonable to judge hospital staff by patient mortality rates, or ministers and churches by the arrest records of their congregants, or basketball teams and coaches by average player height, or county health agencies by the number of obese citizens?  None of these measures are of those who provide the leadership or service and all of these measures are of those who are the recipients of the leadership or service.  If that in fact makes sense, then shouldn’t legislatures be judged by the very tests they require of public schools if the legislative intent is to “improve” or “reform” schools?  How can we not judge legislatures and/or departments of education for this “service” to children instigated by an elected body?  If a legislator says, “I support high-stakes standardized tests, more charter schools, vouchers, and value-added teacher appraisal strategies to improve schools,” then why do we not hold the legislator accountable if schools do not “improve” or if any school “fails”?

 

Why is it legal for a parent to opt-out of vaccinating their child when we know there is no linkage between vaccination and autism or any other mental malady, and we know that failure to vaccinate is a dire health risk to the child who is too young to participate in the decision to vaccinate or not, and we know that failure to vaccinate is a large health risk to other children?  Worse, why is it legal for a parent to opt-out of vaccinating their children but it is illegal for a parent to opt-out of the state’s high-stakes standardized test for their child?  Are such tests more beneficial to the child than a measles vaccination?  One would think so.  There is no evidence, however, that any such high-stakes test improve the condition of the child taking the test.

 

And finally, why do we allow elected officials to decide operational procedures in an area of high required expertise as well as highly required intuitive human interaction, empathy and caring?  Allowing the Texas Legislature to make such rules and regulations for public education is tantamount to allowing them to define operational procedures for NASA.  It is worse than that really.  The Legislature does not look to educators to improve instructional outcomes though we know how to do so.  They look to non-educator billionaires and hucksters whose snake oil remedies have never worked.  If they were to make such guidelines for NASA I suspect they would know that Bill Gates is not qualified as a rocket scientist, nor are the Koch brothers, nor Sandy Kress, nor Dan Patrick, nor Gregg Abbott, nor Michael Williams, etc., etc.  And yet, these non-educators continue to hold the position that they know what is best for public education.  Ludicrous.  In fact, insulting!  We continue to look to the non-educated to direct an educational institution.  Allowing the non-educator to propose improvements in education reveals that such people do not know what they do not know and have no interest in knowing even that simple fact.  Why do we allow such nonsense to continue from Congress, to state legislatures, to local school boards?  I have no earthly idea.

 

I remain stumped.

The Legislature is Coming! The Legislature is Coming!

Happy January in an odd numbered year in Texas.  Our state Constitution of 1876 requires our elected representatives to meet every other year for 140 days.  Wow.  So, at noon on Tuesday, January 13, 2015 our Legislature convened for the 84^th Legislative Session.  Given the size, the complexity, and the money involved it is very difficult to picture any group convening for less than half a year to serve every other year as a governmental body and be effective. 

 

Among the most important things they will do is pass a budget.  They will pass a budget that must be a balanced budget and must fund state functions for the next two years.  That in and of itself is scary as hell.  I could not project a two year budget for my family, much less the state.  Could you do that and not borrow money?  No house loans, no car loans, no higher education loans, etc.?  Whatever you earn is all you can spend.  How in the world do we know what the state will generate in terms of income generated mostly from sales tax beginning in September 2015 and ending in August 2017?  The Comptroller makes a guess and the Legislature is shackled by that guess.  They then pass a budget that shackles all of us.  More importantly, the Legislature’s priorities will be reflected in that budget.  For years we have heard state leaders talk about education as a very important component of their platforms while they have consistently voted to either decrease funding for education or to shift tax dollars from public education to private education experiments. 

 

And this January we have a new governor and a new lieutenant governor.  Governor Gregg Abbott has posted his proposed “improvements” to public education and it is one of the most off-base, outlandish, right-wing lists I have ever seen.  Clearly, Mr. Abbott does not know of what he speaks.  I suspect he did not talk with educators.  Like others of his ilk he talked to wealthy, conservative business people.  Wrong crowd to seek advice from on an operation that clearly resembles churches and families more than fracking.  Asking Bill Hammond how to improve education is worse than asking him for marriage counseling.  He is not qualified!

 

And, OMG, we have heard from Dan Patrick as well.  In what I perceive to be a declaration of war on Texas public schools, Patrick proposes to cut taxes, rate schools using an A to F scale and institute vouchers.  What in the world did public schools ever do to Patrick to earn such enmity?  Does he honestly believe that reducing funding for public education will somehow magically help public education?  Does he believe the same is true for the department of public safety, the highway department, and border patrol?  Does he believe that a state funded program will somehow improve if we reduce funding?  And giving schools a report card grade is so ludicrous it would be funny if I could stop crying.  It will be as simple as labeling every family as an “A” family or an “F” family.  Or using the same to label churches.  Schools are highly complex, multi-mission driven, social organizations that are labor intensive and child focused.  For such complexity there are simple solutions, and they are all wrong.  Finding another way to shame schools and educators accomplishes no gains for kids no matter how we measure such gains.  Other states have tried this and failed.  But why in the world would Patrick want to simultaneously decrease funding and increase accountability?  No one who can honestly claim to support the education of children would support either of these notions, much less both.  And all of that falls in line with Patrick’s support of charter schools and vouchers, both of which take money away from public schools and place it in the hands of private sector folks.

 

So, instead of the current political posturing regarding public education that is based solidly in pro-private sector models and anti-public school models, I propose some other ideas for the Legislature:  First, let’s increase the funding for public education.  If we really want to improve education for all our kids we must pay teachers more and we must reduce class size and we must put in place support systems for our kids of poverty.  We could accomplish some of that by ending this charter school experiment which has not shown to be any more effective than public schools.  And the voucher idea is worse as it will allow parents of wealth to receive public school dollars to support their tuition in private schools.  I do not know about you, but I perceive that to be immoral.  Throw money at it?  You bet.  That is exactly what I do when my kids get sick or my truck breaks down.  If you feel public schools are in trouble then surely you must recognize the need for more funding, not less.

 

Second, we need a hiatus on accountability and high stakes testing.  There are two main purposes to administer such tests:  one is to fund the Pearson oligarchy and the other is to collect data to shame schools.  Neither of these help schools and school people teach kids.  There is absolutely no sound instructional reason to give such a test.  The reasons are political, not educational.  We know that the schools that serve poor kids tend to do worse than the schools that serve kids of wealth.  We know that the schools that spend more money per pupil tend to do better than schools that spend less per pupil.    Shaming the victims of poverty and those who serve kids in poverty is not a motivator to somehow improve.  If one really believes that low performing schools exist due to a lack of motivation or professional competence of the faculty, then simply require that every low performing school swap teaching staff with a high performing school and see what happens.  (We know that the low performing school will perform worse, and the high performing school will perform better.)  The teacher is a large variable when it comes to student learning, but he or she is not the only variable nor is the teaching staff the variable of greatest impact.  Student wealth is the variable of greatest impact.  Finding another measure, like A to F, that confirms the correlation between wealth and outcomes will not help anyone improve.  Adding another gauge to the dashboard will not improve car performance without actually spending money on maintenance.  And, with kudos to Larry Lezotte, weighing the cow does not help it gain weight.

 

Third, honestly look at public school finance in Texas.  We know it is unconstitutional, even though round two of the court case will not be resolved until after the Legislative session.  We must fix this broken system now.  I think it will take an amendment to our 1876 Texas Constitution to do so, but the Legislature should have the guts to tackle it.  Among many problems large and small in public school finance is the basic notion that schools with high property wealth per kid should divest themselves of some of their local tax revenue to help fund schools with low property wealth per kid.  Sounds noble, but it is not.  Even when the wealthiest districts send money to the state they still have more money per kid than most school districts in the state, and the taxpayers in those districts highly resent sending “their” money to educate someone else’s kids.  No matter how much money poor districts receive from the state it is not nearly enough to provide a fair and equitable education, especially when compared to the high wealth districts even after they have sent money to the state.  In other words, the quality of public schools appears to be based on wealth, and the available money for schools is based on property values in a given zip code.  That is neither fair nor equitable.  To fix it I believe we need to fund all schools from the state based on a state collected tax.  That tax could be property tax levied and collected at the state level and returned to public schools based on numbers and needs of kids.  That tax could be a progressive income tax designated solely for the funding of public schools and returned to local public schools based on numbers and needs of kids.  Many will scream about an income tax, which really is the only fair tax, but even collecting the property tax at the state level will maintain current tax structures and rates as well as equalizing funding.  Wealthy districts will scream that they cannot live on the same revenue as the poor districts, assuming that such a plan would lower funding for public education to an average level.  It does not have to be that way.  We could leverage everyone up to the highest level if the wealthy people in the wealthy districts lobbied to increase taxes so that the funding pulls everyone up and pushes no one down. I do not think the Legislature has the guts to address this issue.

 

There is an array of other issues I wish the Legislature would address:  review the role of the school board vis-à-vis superintendents, review the rule allowing charter schools to dismiss students that are hard to teach or slow to learn, review and increase the funding for the teacher retirement system, review local district athletic expenditures versus instructional expenditures (funny to me that athletics is not a required program by the state and that school boards tend to understand that throwing money at athletics likely will result in improvement even if they do not believe the same is true for instruction,) review the requirements and the required training of school board members, remove the authority for approval of curriculum essential elements and textbook selection from the state board of education, update the transportation allotment, etc., etc.  Most of these topics will not be addressed, and those that will be will likely send us in the wrong direction.

 

A minority of Texas voters put these men in office.  Only 28% of registered voters in Texas bothered to vote in the November elections.  A victory was had by a mere 14% or more of registered voters.  And yet, we are now stuck with Abbott, Patrick and their ilk during a critical time in public education.  As the rest of the nation seems to be waking up to the negative impact of the so-called “reform” movement, Texas continues to not only embed that movement in law but to extend and expand.  So sad.  What’s good for business is not good for public education.  We are in the business of making every single kid successful.

 

Regardless, the Legislature is in session.  Hold on to your hats.  I predict we will continue to go down the wrong road even faster:  No brakes for kids, schools or educators.

I am Charlie

Awaking to the horror that occurred in Paris yesterday turns my stomach and grips my heart.  I just posted “The Death Penalty for Being Different” on December 20^th.  Therein I said, 

“Attacking people because they are different is intellectually and emotionally equivalent to those 5^th graders.  Sadly, very sadly, we see it all over the world.  Immature humans in some state of power waging a war of persecution on folks who are different, think differently, look differently, and believe differently.  The worst, in my opinion, are those who believe their hate is justifiable based on their religious faith.  Surely to believe in the persecution of a fellow human is not inspired by a deity of love and forgiveness.  I remain absolutely amazed that some humans are capable of such hypocrisy, such self-deception, such cognitive dissonance.  To claim one’s position as a persecutor is somehow morally blessed and thereby legitimate is by definition immoral.”

The sin committed by this Parisian paper is satire.  It poked fun at some core Muslim beliefs.  Therefore, employees there as well as police officers were sentenced to death.  If we lack the freedom to look at issues and beliefs differently than others we are not free.  If we cannot poke fun, scrutinize, disagree with belief systems we are not free.  Any effort to straight-jacket human intellectual thought and human belief systems is an effort to establish tyranny and must be resisted on every front.  If, that is, you believe in freedom.  If you do not, then we will continue to wage war and terrorist attacks on each other, discriminate against fellow humans for thinking differently, and somehow justifying our persecution based on our own interpretation of our own beliefs.  As they opened fire with automatic weapons on unarmed, civilian journalists, the attackers yelled, “God is Great.”  What blasphemy!

Two brothers remain at large as I write this, two suspected perpetrators.  I am sure there is a sense of anger and revenge inherent in those who seek those who committed such terrible crimes.  It would be so easy to kill them once found.  But we must not do that.  We must support a civilized, legal response to everyone accused of crime.  We cannot afford to have police serve as judge and jury.  Police do not want that responsibility, though police are human too.  I pray for French law enforcement officers in pursuit of these killers.  I pray they show restraint.  I pray they are safe.  And I understand that if the villains come out shooting they must protect themselves.

In all of this I have hope.  All over the world groups gathered last night under the slogan “I am Charlie” in reference to the name of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.  As they lit candles they held signs in multiple languages saying “I am Charlie.”  Thank God that there remain among us people who cherish freedom even if they disagree with others, and people who remain horrified by acts of terror. 

This morning, I stand with them.  This morning, I am Charlie.

The Beat Myself Up, Guilt Trip List

Oh no.  It is the last day of 2014 and time to consider New Year’s Resolutions.  Apparently, reviewing previous years, these lists are not really resolutions.  They are more like a wish list, kind of like UN resolutions.  So, here is my wish list for 2015.  Here is my list so that on December 31, 2015 I can feel guilty and beat myself up.  (As an aside, how do I beat myself up?  I get up about 4:30 and I cannot beat whatever time I arise.  My wife gets up about 7:00, but I do not want to advertise that I beat my wife up.  Where is George Carlin when we really need him?)

Simple Stuff I Probably Won’t Do Anyway:

Lose 20 pounds.  That is really misstated. I do not want to lose the weight for fear I may find it again.  I really want to permanently reduce my mass.  I’m not sure why I want to do this as I know it involves self discipline and self-torture.  Not just to reduce the mass, but to maintain the reduction.  Who am I trying to impress?  If I were successful at this it would mean I have suffered a lot and would have to buy a new wardrobe.  Regardless, perhaps I would be more light-hearted if I weighed less.

Exercise regularly.  To be clear I am talking about my body.  I faithfully exercise my mind each and every day.  Once again, however, I am not sure why I want to do this.  It will hurt.  It soaks up time.  It may contribute to success in the lose weight dream, but I once ran track and hated it.  Getting out of the recliner to replenish snacks probably does not count, though it exercises my right arm and my stomach muscles.

Quit drinking beer every night.  OK.  This is a ringer.  I stopped drinking beer altogether back in 2013.  Well, I may consume 2 beers a month, a minor cheat that does not count as far as I am concerned.  And I have not shifted to any other form of alcohol consumption.  Amazingly and completely unfairly, once I quit drinking I gained weight.  Go figure (pun intended).  And, this was not an act of great sacrifice and self discipline.  One of my meds makes alcohol taste very metallic and I simply do not like it anymore.  Regardless, seems only fair to list at least one “resolution” I know I will be successful in achieving because I already have.  I feel better about me already.

Submit for publication.  I have been writing a couple of books since fall of 2013.  It is time to stop editing and simply send them to publishers.  Yes, there is fear of rejection involved, but I will not know until I write some letters and do some mailing.

Hard Stuff I Really Should Do:

Forgive those who have hurt me.  This is hard for me.  I remain angry at the Edna Board for what I see as malfeasance and an act of ignorance, cowardice and prejudice.  I remain angry at an employee who deceived me because of a false fear.  I am working on forgiving them.  I pray for them, and for me.  But in all honesty I am not there yet.  Until I release the anger around the pain and truly forgive I will burn inside.  I hope I can do this in 2015.

Let go.  This too is hard for me.  I devoted so many years, so much of my very being in my previous employment that I seem unable to totally disconnect.  I feel anger when I see current actions by the district knowing they are shortsighted and violate the mission, if not downright inappropriate.  I had this picture of announcing in December of 2014 that I would retire in June of 2015 and spend the spring saying goodbye and receiving some recognition for my work here.  None of that happened.  I was asked to disappear and I did.  And yet, I know the public schools in Edna are worse off whether they know it or not.  Not sure how to let go of that but it is critical for me that I do.

Cheer Up and Move On.  The self-flagellation I feel over my pain and loses of the last year inspires nightmares and loss of sleep.  I suspect I am still grieving.  It is time to stop.  It is time to cheer up and look to the future.  It is time to find other ways to contribute to the improvement of planet earth, the USA and Texas.  Not there yet, but I should be.  The alternative is continued wallowing in the past thereby destroying the present and the future.  Now, how exactly do I do that? 

So, there you have it and there I have it:  a list of possible improvements for 2015 which may or may not be fulfilled.  If not, the list will serve as fodder for beating myself up and feeling guilty this time next year.  That is scary.  How might I feel if I accomplished most or all of this list?  Honestly, that is equally scary as I will have let go of many of the things I care most about. 

So, here is to conquering fear in the coming year.

Happy New Year.

2,014 Years Ago

I find Christmas to be a time of reflection.  What do I believe?  What do I know?  What if?  These reflections seemed more pressing this year as I completed my 65^th year on this planet on December 27^th.  I never really liked my birth date much, though I am very glad it was not December 25.  And more than any year in recent memory I have participated in a wide array of Christmas music.  One of the most recent pieces our church sextet sang was, “Welcome to Our World.”  Wow.  That title got my head spinning.

My reflection this year has centered on the fortuitous birth of Jesus 2,014 years ago.  I know, I know, there is evidence it was either slightly more or slightly less than 2,014 years ago, and even more evidence that his birth date was not in December but was in either April, June or August.  My spring board for thinking is not about those issues.  I am totally intrigued by the question, what if Jesus was born to Mary in the US in the year 2014?

First, it is unlikely that we would call this year 2014 as we mark the beginning of both the Julian and Gregorian calendars with Anno Domini (AD) for the birth of Jesus.  What year would we call this year if not 2014?  The Romans numbered their years based on the founding of the city of Rome, so we would likely have kept that calendar as there would have been no good reason in western thinking to change it without the birth of Jesus.  If so the year would be 2767 A.U.C. (ab urbe condita – the founding of the city). 

Let’s assume then that Mary is pregnant with Jesus in the year 2767 a.u.c.  So much would be different!  If nothing else, her OB/GYN would never let her travel, much less on a donkey, that close to her due date.  She would be at home, which would be OK as the census is now completed at home.  If Mary and Joseph did travel, they would likely have had reservations at a Motel 6 or a La Quinta and the entire birth setting would be different.  Once labor began, Mary would end up in a local emergency room.

Shepherds would not be out watching flocks as we have fences, security night cameras and have eliminated most predators.  Oil field workers would be out, as would first responders.  Perhaps the heavenly angelic visit would have happened for these folks.  I bet had that happened one of them would have captured that heavenly chorus on their smart phone and posted it to some social media. 

Once posted, Jesus birth would have become paparazzi heaven!  Scientists would speculate on how the special effects were created and some experts would proclaim the video to be a fraud, though they could not prove it, while other experts verified its authenticity. 

Astronomers would soon be working on a similar dilemma as a new and bright star appears over a La Quinta.  The “star” would be in low earth orbit if it were able to pin point a spot using the naked eye.  Satellites and telescopes would focus on the star, airline routes would change, and the military would buzz the celestial body.  Needless to say, these wise men would have gone to the designated earthly spot to see what was up.  They would find a parking lot full of remote TV broadcasting vans. 

Mary and Joseph’s relatives would have been interviewed and the first crisis would have occurred.  So, when did Joseph and Mary get married?  Ah, so she was pregnant prior to marriage.  Joseph was not the father?  Who was?

The world would become divided into believers and non-believers with live coverage 24/7.  Mary would have to complete the Acknowledgement of Paternity form for the birth certificate.  If you thought Obama had a tough time regarding his birth certificate it would be nothing compared to filling in the “father” blank with “Holy Spirit”.  Blood samples taken at the emergency room would no doubt lead to DNA testing.  OK, Joseph is not the father.  But is the paternal DNA God’s DNA?  Does God have DNA?  Jesus must have, and I suspect Jesus’ DNA would be highly unique.

So, is Jesus an alien?  His father is other-worldly.  His father is in fact an undocumented alien. 

From this point on there would be no peace for Mary and Joseph.  Birth of future children would trigger intense coverage and investigation, but in each case the DNA would confirm Joseph as father and the excitement would dwindle.  Meanwhile, Jesus cannot go anywhere nor do anything as he grows up without media coverage.  We would have digital documentation of his entire childhood.  He would likely join Cub Scouts, play soccer, and go to the job site with his dad. 

Surely by age 13 it would be clear that Jesus was very different; perfect in fact.  As he has his bar mitzvah (yes, he would be born Jewish) he would interact with theologians of all sorts, though he probably would not get lost in a temple as there would literally be nowhere he could go without press coverage.  The interactions would likely be electronic.  He may very well have Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, email accounts and write blogs regarding his message.  He would be a frequent guest on every talk and news show whenever there was a national or international disaster.  I can only guess what he would have said regarding the Mideast conflict, gun control, tax breaks for the wealthy, etc.

I could go on and on.  The intriguing thing to me is that I am not sure how different Christianity would be with the scrutiny that would have occurred if Jesus had been born in the US this year.  Each “miracle” would have been digitally documented and publicly shown.  And who would be willing to sentence him to death?  Wow.  Death and resurrection are critical components of Christianity and would have to happen.  Would that have most likely happened in Texas, the capital of the death penalty in the US?  Scary thought.  At least it would not be death on a cross.  Not to mention the cameras trained on the burial site 24/7.

I think it is a pretty good deal that Jesus was born some 2,000 years ago.  Faith emerges as the foundation of this and every other religious belief system with the absence of scientific documentation.  In the ongoing pseudo war between belief and science it appears to me that had Jesus been born this year, science would have confirmed the faith. 

But that may only be because I believe.  I recognize it could very well go the other way.

Have a Happy New Year.