AND GOD CREATED THE LAW . . .

Well, yes, He probably did. He probably planned the whole darned three-year misery known as law school and Socratic training as one more way to put us mere mortals in our place ... or at least to teach us to think more logically and write more concisely, which is actually much harder than it seems like it should be. God created lawyers, and courtrooms, and judges, and yes, even the United States Constitution, and the men in powdered wigs who wrote the Constitution. And God probably even planned for those wise, powdered old men to establish the separation of church and state, for He in all His wisdom probably knew what would happen to people's relationships and to society overall if public life were to be governed by those of a religious Judeo-Christian majority, with a Judeo-Christian perspective, to the exclusion of all others.

But the question remains for me, and other Christian lawyers like me: what exactly does separation of church and state mean and how are we to work within it? If Jerry Falwell had his way, it would mean doing away with the "extreme rationalism that draws a strong distinction between faith and reason." Or so implieth Bruce W. Green, the dean of Liberty School of Law, the law school whose chancellor is, sigh, the Reverend Jerry Falwell. In a way, Dean Green (ok, that's just funny and it made me giggle) is correct, for many of the leading Christian -- and I'm NOT talking Falwell's followers -- writers and thinkers and apologists directly and unapologetically wove reason into their faith, and indeed made their faith so reasonable and logical, that no atheist could shake or refute it. Jonathan Edwards, J.I. Packer, C.S. Lewis -- now these were intellectual powerhouses who knew what they believed in. And that is as it should be, for we all who believe or proclaim to believe should be able to rationalize and explain our faith in a logical and infallible manner. There should be no distinction between faith and reason, for they are not mutually exclusive, and never were.

However, and there always is a however. I'm not against living and working with social and political conservatives -- such is the diversity of this country and idealistically speaking, I believe this social and political spectrum makes the cogs of America turn in the cycles that make life go 'round. But do we really want judges who will be "presiding under the Bible?" Do we really want attorneys who don't want to be committed to being good divorce laywers, but want to be "reconciliation lawyers" instead? Not that this is inherently wrong, for yes, I agree that murder = bad. Stealing = bad. Actions and hatred which turn human against human and create chaos and hurt and pain in society = bad. These things should be punished or redressed or healed, and prevented if at all possible. But the law is the law for a reason: it is evenhanded. (It can be made MORE evenhanded, but for now, it'll do until we can figure out a way to make it better, and until we can raise up officers of the court who will apply it more evenhandedly.) Despite what Christian law schools contend, I don't believe there is moral relativism in law school or in the law practice as we know it today. There are corrupt lawyers and scumbags among us, as there are in any profession or line of work, but the teaching of the law itself, I have never viewed to be morally relativistic. As my Contracts professor screamed into my brain (he evenhandedly screamed at every single student in the first semester class): "THE LAW IS THE LAW IS THE LAW. AND THAT'S IT."

I believe there is "a law that's fixed, that's uniform, that applies to everybody, everyplace, for all time." That is God's law, the law presented in the Bible, the law by which all believers abide or strive to abide. It is the law given to us by Christ who commands us first, to love our God, and second, to love others as we love ourselves. But Christ also commands us to submit to earthly government, to be in this world, though not of it. To contravene the law is the law is the law here on earth ... is that really that much of a service to God as much as it is a disservice to our earthly community?

If the concern of Christian lawyers is not becoming one of the "nameless, facelss lawyers who populate the giant law firms in New York and Washington and Chicago, grinding out thousands upon thousands of billable hours, often toward no end other than getting rich and determining whether one huge insurance company will have to write out a check to another huge insurance company," then my answer to that is simply ... don't. Don't go there. Don't work for those law firms. If you believe in behaving 'morally,' then just do it. If you believe in treating your clients and adversaries as Christ treated you and as you would treat yourself, then just do it; behave thus. If you believe your calling is to transform lives by enacting social justice, then do it. For crying out loud, Jesus was all about social justice: don't forget that He fed the hungry, rescued the downtrodden, allowed His feet to be washed by a repentant prostitute, healed the untouchable by placing His very hands upon them, took precious time to speak and play with undervalued children, and forgave the sins of the unforgivable. But if you're going to take the oath of a lawyer, if you're going to sign that piece of paper that says you swear to uphold the Constitution and serve the needs of your clients zealously and honestly, then stand by your oath. Why is it okay to renege on these sworn promises, to tell your divorce clients that you will not zealously represent them in their divorce but will try to get them to reconcile perhaps against their wishes, to inject religion where it should not be? Why is it okay to say "well, God's judgment trumps civil judgment, so I'm not going to work within the existing framework, so there!"? Will God love you more and give you a better seat in heaven for breaking your oaths and fighting the system here on earth, the very system I believe He placed here as a method of keeping order and enacting justice as well as we mere humans can manage?

This is my constant struggle ... how do I be a Christian lawyer? What exactly do I have to do differently, or more, or less? It is my fervent belief, and I'm sticking to it, that God put me in law school, that God put me in this job, that God gave me a career to abide in at least for a short while. But does He want me to take the black-letter law that I've learned in the three years of training that He provided, and turn it about in His name? I don't know ... Am I alright with the fact that people can break oral contracts and get away with it, that people are discriminated against, that people are murdered and raped and abused, that people can find loopholes that enable them to fulfill their greediness, that people are hurt, that people spill coffee and themselves and get reimbursed for their own stupidity by the hundreds of thousands of dollars? No, of course not. But aside from applying the law as best as I can ... what is my further responsibility? How else does God call me to apply my skills and training? And is He really saying that I was trained incorrectly to begin with?

I guess it just comes down to this simplicity: if you are a Christian, you are a Christian. Doesn't matter if you're a lawyer, a doctor, a homemaker, a teacher, a pizza delivery person. God will judge you, people will judge you, based on how you act and live during your time here on earth, whatever your training, wherever your offices are located, whoever your clients. Have you done your job well and to the utmost of your ability? Have you loved others as you have been loved? Have you shown others what it is to love as Christ loves? Well, then ...

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AND SPEAKING OF MORALITY . . .

Sometimes, I think The New York Times does it on purpose, because it will take a juicy article about Liberty School of Law, and place it smack next to "Many Who Voted for 'Values' Still Like Their Television Sin". People don't want to separate faith and reason, but they will separate "entertainment versus politics."

The number one and two shows in the nation right now, according to this article, are "CSI:" and "Desperate Housewives." Now, you all know how much I absolutely adore "CSI:." But my undying love doesn't absolve the show of its 'sins': gore, guts, blood, 'adult content and themes'. I haven't watched "Desperate Housewives," partly because I'm usually never in a position to watch television on Sunday evenings, but mostly because I'm just not interested. I hear there's a lot of gratuitously naked people in it though. And just yesterday, PEK exhorted us in his sermon to not get sucked into television 'news' shows such as "Access: Hollywood" for they are not really so much NEWS as they are gossip and demeaning exposes meant to blow the lid off of people we look up to, in order to titillate the viewing public.

But the old adage holds so true, and Kevin Reilly, NBC Entertainment president, said it again: "We say one thing and do another." What we do and proclaim and accept as proper or improper public gets turned on its head once we are in the cozy and dark privacy of our own homes. This has always been the case, and probably always will be so. It just strikes me as highly amusing and more than just a little annoying to read about Falwell's constant blathering, then imagine him sitting in his living room watching "Entertainment Tonight" and being smugly satisfied at the fact that no, Britney is no longer a virgin.

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AND KICK ME WHEN I'M DOWN . . .

It seems that when I find one thing in the morning news about which to get all jacked up, I find another, then another, then another. "Enforcement of Civil Rights Law Declined Since '99" didn't do much to calm me down.

The Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University (whoever they are) conducted a study and found that:

* criminal charges of civil rights violations were brought against 84 defendants in 2003, down from 150 in 1999
* FBI and other federal investigative agency recommendations to prosecute civil rights cases occurred 1,900 times in 2003, down from 3,000 in 1999
* the number of complaints about possible civil rights violations received by the Justice Department has remained constant, at about 12,000, for each of the past five years

I'm not saying nuthin' but ... would Shrub and John "I'll Uphold the Constitution When I Feel Like It and Apply It Against Whomever, Whenever" Ashcroft have anything to do with this alarming trend? Can I get a whut, whut? It's hard to get an answer to the first question, because "[t]he Justice Department had no comment about the study." Dang, they didn't even take the time to refute it!

Alright, to be fair and evenhanded (for that's what I'm all about, you know, with my lawyerly training and all), I have to also include that the report merely "speculates that [the decline] could have resulted from federal prosecutors and investigators having spent far more time than in previous years on terrorism cases after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." But STILL. In the interest of being even more evenhanded, allow me to inform you that the article goes on to state that:

* only civil rights and environmental prosecutions declined from 1999 to 2003, even as the total Justice Department caseload rose by about 10%

Chew on THAT.

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END ON A BRIGHT NOTE . . .

My morning rant winds up with a piece that brought a smile to my face. Normally, I shun human-interest stories that are supposed to warm the cockles of my heart (I always skip those pages in People Magazine), but when I hear that at least eight of the thirty-two newly-announced Rhodes Scholars are immigrants or children of immigrants, I am truly, deeply gratified and proud.

The face of America, presented unto the world, is swiftly changing. We're serving our nation well. We're educating and growing ourselves. We're seeking new experiences, more knowledge, greater scope. Our voices are getting louder, our faces less foreign. We're here; we're making it.