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Hi There!  My name is Jim Truxell, and I'm the
one who put this site together.  I am 49 years
married, a father, grandfather, and a retired
United Methodist clergyman.  On June 30,
2016, I retired after serving for 40 years as a
full-time pastoral counselor working with
individuals and couples.

As you explore this website, you'll find a
number of things that will give you a chuckle and even out-loud laughter.  Inevitably, you'll also find some things that may make you angry.  Not to worry:  this site intends to spark conversation and debate.  Feel free to email me your opinions, reactions, etc.  If you keep your disagreements reasonably civil, I'll read them.  Since life is too short not to be silly, goofiness and being over-the-top is part of our methodology.  But for all of it's ridiculousness, the site has a serious purpose.  (Fasten your seatbelts, please, because for once on this website we need to be serious.)

The purpose of Another-Fine-Mess.com is to bring the cleansing light of humor and satire to at least two of those things your mother told you never to discuss:  politics and religion.  (Sorry, Mom!) 

For example, in 15 to 20 years, we probably will not have the familiar mainline Christian denominations.  About 23% of the United States population writes "None" when surveys ask about religious affiliation.  Between 1998 and 2008, there was a 22 % drop in the number of adults attending such congregations who have children under 18.  Slowly but surely, they are dying.  *

When it comes to politics . . . and oh how I wish it didn't . . . we're in a real pickle right now.  Mark Twain observed that there are three kinds of liars:  liars, damn liars, and politicians.  God knows what he might have said about our current Presidential nominees.  It wouldn't be flattering, though.

Congress is so grid-locked that you have to look very, very closely to detect any form of functional, democratic life.  Partisan redistricting of congressional districts every 10 years (gerrymandering) has insured that, these days, the incumbents get to choose who will vote for them. 
If current trends continue, our democracy will die.

Capitalism, which is the worst form of economic system available except for all the others, has shown itself to over-privilege the very wealthy.  The distribution of wealth in this country surpasses banana republics in its lopsided and unjust distribution of the fruits of the labor of millions.  The top 1/10th of one percent controls as much wealth as does the bottom 90%.  The middle class, the real source of job-creation, is very nearly dead. **

This update is being written virtually on the eve of the Republican and Democratic national conventions.  They will treat us to rich entertainment but perhaps not much useful light.  We have just witnessed, yet again, further instances of white police inappropriately using deadly force against African Americans in Minnesota and Baton Rouge.  Hardly had the smoke cleared (literally) from the Pulse nightclub in Orlando when a deranged shooter killed 5 Dallas police and severely injured 11 more.  The police, whose job is immensely difficult under the best of circumstances, are now too-often being regarded with stereotypical put-downs.

Clearly, as a nation we have much work to do, beginning inside the hearts of each one of us, to address the racism that so tragically infects the body politic.  That will require us to listen to one another.  This site will have some things to say about that too.

Finally, and just to keep things interesting, AND VERY SAFE FOR EVERYONE, the National Rifle Association will again throw a roadblock in front of every sane proposal to regulate the availability of any sort of firearms.  IF WE CAN'T ALL OWN BAZOOKAS, WE'LL ALL BE DEAD!

I'll get to your "Lefty" bit in a moment. 

First, though, I hope you'll consider that in order for something new (and better) to be born, something has to die.  You see that all the time in nature all around us.  From galaxies to guppies that's the way it is.  Christianity talks about that in terms of "death and resurrection."

One historian suggests that we are living in the midst of a paradigm shift that has occured about every 500 years for the past two millenia. 
The last time institutions underwent such a death and rebirth experience was the Protestant Revolution, begun in 1515.  She calls our era "The Great Emergence." 

St. Paul, who came by his wisdom through the school of hard knocks, once wrote that the suffering and groaning of the world were better seen, not as death throes, but as birth pangs (Romans 8:22-28).  If, as I believe, our institutions are dying, I choose to lean into the Something Else that's being born . . . that's emerging. ***

That's one of the reasons for the humor you'll find throughout this site.

And if you read the free e-book LAST SUPPER RED - THE SYNAPTIC EDITION, you'll see at the very beginning that hilarity is God-like . . . a sort of Alpha and Omega . . . responsible for creation . . . transformation . . . joy.

Now, as for your calling me "Lefty." Sure, if you're into labels, I suppose that'll do.  But here's the thing:  although I constantly wrestle with other influences, the principal way I have come to my political opinions is as a Christian.  Specifically, I am drawn to a part of Christianity called "Progressive Christianity."

Progressive Christianity is characterized by:  an intelligent approach to the Bible that regards its linguistic, historical and cultural contexts as important to its being understood; an emphasis on the Bible's prophetic tradition; an openness to living into the Mystery and not having to have all the answers; and an insistence on grounding its values, ethics, and agenda on an intelligent and holistic understanding of Jesus' teachings and manner of living.  All contribute to my social and political outlook as well as my self-understanding.

Left?  Right?  Independent?  I don't much care for partisan politics.  They're each too much into black and white thinking . . . into defending their turf . . . into shouting and not listening.

I prefer to wonder what that long, often frustrating, frequently self-contradictory, sometimes appallingly offensive, but nonetheless beautiful Biblical tradition has to say. 

I prefer to read the Bible as though it is a community library written over many centuries and containing a good deal of hard-won wisdom.  I find reading it as though it is a constitution, quoting small passages as a way to win an argument with an opponent, an exercise in ignorance and a waste of time.  Too often it only serves to baptise our current limitations and bigotries as something whole and "of God." 
Nonsense. ****

As for "here's another fine mess you've gotten us into," it was Oliver Hardy who said that to his sidekick, Stan Laurel.  They even made a movie called "Another Fine Mess."

To me, "another fine mess" is a metaphor for our lives.  There are 7 billion other fine messes in this world.  Yours and mine are examples of two others.  After 40 years of work as a Pastoral Counselor, I'm persuaded that . . . warts and all . . . the shameful and glorious parts all together . . . the mess that is your life and mine is like compost. 

It can produce wonderful, beautiful things.  But if you don't turn it over periodically, it can lose its vitality . . . and raise quite a stink!

You might consider that to be Another-Fine-Mess.com's mission:        to keep turning the mess over . . . to let the air in . . . to keep things alive . . . lively . . . fertile. 

So grab your pitchfork (and a torch if you're so disposed!) and join me in turning over our religious, political and cultural compost heaps.  Another fine    . . . truly fine . . . mess awaits us all!  How's that for a statement of faith!?  

I hope you'll feel free to contact me with your responses to this fine mess.  To do so, just click on the link below or enter it into your browser. 
Your e-mails and identity will not be shared by me with anyone.  And I won't be in contact with you unless you indicate that you desire it.

Another-Fine-Mess.com began in the spring of 2011 as a place to put some photos, poetry, and maybe a sermon or two that had unfortunately escaped the shredder.  But then, as probably often happens in your life too, something unexpected happened.  Hilarity insinuated itself into some of what I was writing. 

I began to sporadically post (a chapter at a time) an emerging story featuring two most unlikely characters:  Snark, whose name suggests an aspect of his character; and Advocatus di Aboli, a rather stuffy, rigid old prelate who knew some of the Roman Emperors.  I had no idea where this silliness would lead, but the writing was great fun. 

So was the literary conceit that the chapters represent recently discovered and translated writings that had been buried, Dead Sea Scrolls-like in the sub-basement of the building where Another-Fine-Mess has its headquarters. 

Gradually these chapters, to which I gave the deliberately abstruse title  Dialogues Upon Sundry Occasions, became a satire of how the church sometimes tenaciously clings to an outmoded theology:  a perennial and unfortunate habit which has the effect of turning off millions of people who otherwise might find both Christianity and involvement in the church a live option for them. 

As a sub-text, the texts also suggested what is often necessary for my-way-or-the-highway adversaries to forge a more useful relationship . . . which is, of course, a topic of absolutely no relevance to our time.

I told myself that my granddaughter might want to know this side of her grandfather when she's of an age for wrestling with her own philosophy/theology of life.  That thought kept me going.  At some point it also occurred to me that other people . . . particularly the many Seekers who have left the church in disillusionment and disgust . . . might profit from giving the story a read as well.

Consequently, a little over a year after the site was created, the then-completed Dialogues were heavily revised and expanded.  Since January 5, 2015, they have been available, exclusively here, as a free e-book renamed LAST SUPPER RED - The Synaptic Edition.  It's point of view, voiced chiefly by Snark, is informed by the Progressive Christianity mentioned earlier.

(Reading this far indicates you have some spare time . . . as well as appealingly low literary standards.  Therefore, I invite you to spend some more of your spare time reading the book!)

The book gets its name from one of Snark's wine labels of the same name.  The label intimates that it is the Official Wine of the Last Supper.  Advocatus, an early, traditionalist mentor of Snark who staked him to the winery for their mutual benefit, goes apoplectic when he sees the label. 

The e-book tells of what happened next.  Along the tortuous path of their subsequent relationship and eventual reconciliation, the 200-page story skewers a great many things, including frequently Snark himself.  I hope the skewering serves to keep him humble.

Thanks for dropping by!

Jim Truxell

____________
*  Sources:  Wikipedia and The Pew Research Center

**  The Guardian,  November 13, 2014. 

*** See Phyllis Tickle, The Great Emergence:  How Christianity is Changing and Why, (Baker Books, 2012).  See also the lyrics to "Something's Comin'" by Leonard Bernstein in the musical West Side Story.  Although the context is romantic, as the musical is a contemporary re-telling of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, if you think about the Something Else that is emerging, the lyrics take on different meanings and fuels our optimism. 
       As for the reference to what St. Paul said, the version of his words in Eugene Patterson's The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language (NavPress, 2014) is so refreshingly accessible that Paul's words are printed below in their entirety.  (Patterson directly translated from the Hebrew and Greek texts and then paraphrased them for the purpose of reading them rather than for close textual study, where a literal translation would prove superior.) 

Romans 8:22-25 All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it's not only around us; it's within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We're also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don't see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

Romans 8:26-28 Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God's Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don't know how or what to pray, it doesn't matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

**** This follows the approach of Brian McLaren, one of the leaders of the Emerging Christianity movement.  For more information, see his book, We Make the Road by Walking, Brian McLaren (Jericho Books, 2014).