The Efficacy of Prayer as a House of Cards

Imagine you wanted a promotion at work.  So you prayed to a milk jug for two weeks and then applied for the promotion.  If the promotion came through, would you say it happened because the milk jug answered your prayer?  Most people would not.

Most Christians say that God answers prayer in three ways: yes, no, or wait.  If God says yes, you get whatever you were praying for.  If God says no, then you don't.  If God says "wait," then you keep praying for your desired outcome, knowing that God's timing is different from your own.

But the problem is, that covers every possible outcome.  Things either happen now, later, or not at all.  There's no other possibility.  How can you be confident that prayer works if there's, literally, no scenario that could prove it to be false?

Finding God in the Waves by Mike McHargue, p 50

The Nihilism Of The “Age Of Accountability”

I've written previously on the so-called "Age of Accountability" here. It's been a big deal to me over the past few years. 

I left the following series of thoughts over in the comment section of one of Fr Kimel's posts at Eclectic Orthodoxy.  Thought I'd reproduce them here.

I'm of the opinion that the mere presence of the question of an "Age of Accountability", an impossible question that arises inevitably from infernalist (or annihilationist) formulations of Christian eschatology, finally either deconstructs that eschatology or forces us to choose existential nihilism - to irrevocably move on from the concept of God's universal salvific will and love as a divine attribute.

I feel the strain of this tension.  I teeter on the edge of an abyss.

I don't wish to say a whole lot on the Calvinist (double) predestination scheme in regards to the age of accountability.  A brief story:

A few months ago I started writing a satirical piece framed as an interview with a "guardian" angel divinely chosen to "guard" a child divinely "elected to perdition for the glory of God" & chosen for lifelong illness and a painful death at the age of 3.  As the story goes, this angel (always present before the Lord per Matthew 18:10) was also present both at the moment of the child's conception and at the moment that the child entered the world and fell into the loving arms of her parents. "A thousand kisses wasted" - words of reflection that I placed in the mouth of this guardian angel in observation of that scene.  That line haunted me and I ultimately lost the ability to continue writing.  Theological language becomes equivocal in this universe.

Sticking with the free will model of perdition (and it's pillars of both universal divine love and irrevocable eternal torment), I've observed that many of the most ardent infernalists believe in (and actually have a soft spot for) an age of accountability whereby babies and other young children who die young enough are sort of automatically given eternal life (though I'm assured that the appearances of it being "automatic" or a "loophole" are false).

But whether one believes in it or not, I'd argue that the very question of an "age of accountability" is a necessity and an inevitability arising inexorably from an underlying hermeneutic of perdition.

And the implications of an "age of accountability" are so clear, so problematic (I think) and so inextricably tied to the assumptions that generate it in the first place that I think there is no choice but to examine the assumptions themselves - either divine love and pascha and/or irrevocable torment.  It's starkness creates theological problems with enough clarity that they can't be so easily dismissed as "philosophical speculations" or the "faulty reasoning of men".  You're damned if you do and damned if you don't (pun intended).

Without this "age", hell is thoroughly populated with babies but "a span long" (Calvin).  No doctrine of love as divine attribute can tolerate this, not without rendering "love" as virtually meaningless.

Could the heart that sustains such a created order really be one that wills the salvation of all?

So suppose there IS an age of accountability.  What are the implications?  This could be it's own book.

William Lane Craig has stated in regards to OT genocide, for example:

“If we believe, as I do, that God’s grace is extended to those who die in infancy or as small children, the death of these children was actually their salvation. We are so wedded to an earthly, naturalistic perspective that we forget that those who die are happy to quit this earth for heaven’s incomparable joy. Therefore, God does these children no wrong in taking their lives.”

You die young, you go to heaven. Period.  I wonder why there haven't been more "crusaders" like Andrea Yates, determined to save children from the flames.  Thank God there haven't been.

Again, please understand how much I dislike talking about this.

I don't have the nerve to say much because the implications are so dark.  But essentially, from the moment of birth, each subsequent moment of existence is characterized by infinite eschatological risk with no additional reward.

Die as a child?  Eternal bliss.  Live long?  Eh.  50/50 at best. Probably far lower.  Lower mortality rates, better health care, etc, actually have a negative correlation to "going to heaven".

Few things could make life more meaningless.

Furthermore, an earthly "free-will" choice (it's lack of development being the whole reason for this so-called age of accountability in the first place) apparently ceases to be a metaphysically inviolable obstacle for God in redeeming people if they're young enough.

Perhaps one can keep this at arms length or reason through this on paper or in a classroom. But start looking at actual babies or children (whom the Lord calls us to become like) or the mentally disabled (and incidentally I have a 2.5 year old daughter and a brother with Down syndrome), and one realizes that this isn't an abstract theological problem to be solved.

Rather than go through the hermeneutical gymnastics to justify an age of accountability, look instead at the system that necessitates such insanity in the first place.

Getting Sucker Punched by the Age of Accountability

Bear with me.  This story does have a point.

There was an incident with my daughter when she was just a baby - maybe 6 or 7 months old (she's 2 and a half years old now).

My wife and I had recently started giving her "people food" - oatmeal, rice cereal, puréed fruit and veggies, etc.  We’d buy the fresh food, cut it up, steam it, purée it, and scoop it into little containers that we'd keep in the refrigerator for later.  I actually quite enjoyed making it.

When you keep it in the refrigerator, you naturally want to warm it up.  Who likes cold puréed cauliflower?  Gross. It's key to not make it too hot.  That’s trickier than it seems though, because it only takes a few seconds in the microwave to sufficiently warm up an ounce or two.

And my daughter. So beautiful and innocent. She'd look at me and open her mouth as wide as she possibly could, fully trusting that whatever I put in her mouth would taste good, would be safe.  That it wouldn't hurt. She'd smile and coo.

I was normally VERY cautious about not overheating food. I'd mix it, taste it, blow on it, mix it some more, taste it again....

But one time I screwed up. I must have heated up the sweet potatoes for too long or not mixed them up well enough.  The moment that I put the spoon in her mouth and she closed her mouth, she jolted in her chair at the burning sensation, closed her eyes, and opened her mouth to scream. Because the pain was more than her tiny, growing brain could process, it took a few seconds for the scream to come. But after that moment of unholy silence it did come.

Most parents have probably done this. Even so, it's unnerving to see your child in pain.

But for some reason, in that moment, my thoughts traveled beyond the immediate context of a mild infant mouth burn and went all eschatological.....to human destiny.  For reasons I can't quite understand, the sheer terror of hell that my own particular tradition had so meticulously and thoroughly placed within me took form, stood up, and stared back at me like a hooded grim reaper or Harry Potter’s dementor, sucking the life and happiness right out of me. The terror certainly hadn't been dormant within me prior to that moment. Far from it. Rather, it was a moment where a deep discomfort within me, a skepticism and distrust, a knowledge that my "faith system" was latent with irreconcilable tension and did not make sense of reality became unavoidably clear.

(Don't misunderstand me here. I'm not (in this post) making an argument - philosophical, theological, biblical, emotional, etc - for any of the issues that I mention.  Just a story of the experience and some of the immediate thoughts that I had).

In that moment I simply couldn't steer clear of the "infernalist" eschatological smackdown that underlies so much of my evangelical heritage.  No more excuses for it.  No avoiding it.  No rationalizations.  Just a cold hard acknowledgment of what it was.

I don’t know why the realization hit me in that specific moment.  How did I get from a baby burning the roof of her mouth....to hell?  What??  Only religion could do this.  And this isn't "extremist" religion.  This is just paying attention in church.  Basic, fundamental stuff.

In that moment I saw a microcosm of what my own tradition believed was the eternal destiny of most of humanity.  A child (and each adult was once a child) incapable of processing the pain.  Nothing outside of the moment.  No past.  No future.

The Christianity that I was raised with contends that God is, in one way or another, the inflictor or sustainer of a pain directed at "unbelievers" that will endure forever and ever.  After 100 billion years you’re just getting started.  God irresistibly resurrects you, graciously provides you with a body that cannot be destroyed, sustains (or even enhances) your ability to feel pain, and then tortures you forever.  There is nobody to help you - nobody to appeal to, no defender.  The time has expired on whatever divine love there was for you, if there was ever any to begin with.  Mercy has passed. "Holiness" and wrath are thus made manifest in unending judgment.

This is very dark.  If it makes you squirm...well...it should.  If it doesn't....it should.

Back to my little girl.  

Amidst this flood of thoughts and theology, my most concrete and primal thought was "This can't happen to my daughter. It's not possible.  Not my little girl. It can't."

She cried for a short time from the mouth burn, but her ordeal was soon over.  It was a fleeting moment. An accident. She’s just a little girl.  This eschatological fate doesn’t apply to little girls, right?

She hadn’t reached the “age of accountability” yet.  Phew.

Of course not all traditions believe in this “age of accountability”.  Calvin infamously said that that "there are babies a span long in hell."

This belief in infant damnation (a more commonly held belief than one might hope it to be in a “religion of love”) is just the result of consistently held doctrines of “original sin” and “election”.  No more, no less.  Simple. To these folks an infant is just as wicked and detestable in the eyes of God as any adult.  A massa damanta.

And yet I realized that the existence of an age of accountability, in the end, is no better.  

Nobody actually knows what this "age of accountability" actually is.....which seems mildly important. And the "biblical support” for such an idea is just silly.

In an "age of accountability" world, a child is born hurdling towards a magical age-threshold which, once crossed, causes some sort of irreversible existential change.  A child's “eternal destiny” is safe prior to reaching this threshold, but not after.  “Free will” apparently isn’t an inviolable obstacle to salvation for the Divine prior to crossing this threshold, but it becomes so afterwards.  Every new day, every heartbeat, is thus infinitely risky.  If you die as a baby, you’re “in”.  Period.  But after this threshold, there is a real possibility that you end up "out".

In fact, as human compassion and technological advancements have decreased infant mortality rates, we’ve actually succeeded in allowing more children to live beyond this "age of accountability".

You understand what I’m saying here?

It’s disgusting.  Vile.  Monstrous.  Madness.  It'll suck the life out of you.  But the logic of it is inexorable given the underlying beliefs.  And it isn't hard to find people who have acted according to this madness.

To the believing Christian masses, an “age of accountability” should serve as an indication that there is something very very wrong with a system that necessitates such a thing in the first place.  This must be faced.  It should cause us to rethink a few things about God and about ourselves.

The $64,000 question is, "Why doesn't it?  If one does indeed see the impossible hopelessness and tragedy of an "age of accountability", what sort of a "faith" looks the other way?"

For all the sleepless nights that have come (and are yet to come) as a result of looking closely and critically at what I believe (and I mean that quite literally), I'd still rather face it.

That's because in my better moments I believe there is a better Gospel.  I have to.

Christ have mercy.

All this from a teaspoon of overheated sweet potatoes.