Dao De Ben

Incline My Heart and I Shall Desire

2012-01-17T03:00:00.000-05:00

The people above have been waiting hours upon hours upon hours, braving the elements, anxiously awaiting the moment when the Apple store will open its doors and graciously allow them the privilege of dishing $500+ for the iPad2. This year I chuckled and shook my head as I saw families camping outside the doors of Best Buy...on Thanksgiving morning. Sacrificing time. Sacrificing family. Sacrificing dignity. Longing for the advent of Black Friday.

Whether it is the thrill of the deal, an insatiable desire to consume, or the fruits of a wider capitalist zeitgeist, one thing seems clear: people will do whatever it takes to spend their money on newer, better, bigger, sexier, totally-awesomer stuff. We love our stuff. Our stuff--having our stuff--pleases us. So, it is perfectly reasonable for us to go to whatever lengths necessary in order to acquire more, experience more acquiring.

We will wait as long as is required to experience again that which we find most fulfilling.

I can't help but visualize the weekly procession of church-goers slowly filing forward to receive the Blessed Sacrament of communion. I wonder how long we would be willing to wait in this line; fifteen minutes? Half an hour? Two hours? All morning? Would we pitch our tents like pilgrims on the mount? Would we pay $500 for the Body of Christ: the Bread of Heaven, and the Blood of Christ: the Cup of Salvation? What would we be willing to give up in exchange for these?

The Psalmist writes, "Sacrifice and offering you do not desire, / but you have given me an open ear. / Burnt offering and sin offering you have not required" (Ps. 40:6). "He calls to the heavens above and to the earth, that he may judge his people: / 'Gather to me my faithful ones, who made a covenant with me by sacrifice!' / Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving, / and pay your vows to the Most High" (Ps. 50:5, 14).

I cannot even attempt to fathom the public response if the Apple corporation made the following announcement: "Tomorrow, Apple will be giving iPad2s to every individual who comes to Apple stores and asks for one. The sole condition is that any individual receiving an iPad2 express sincere gratitude. Our supply is unlimited, and all stores will remain open until every person seeking this gift has received it." Pandemonium I think would be accurate. Utter, joyous chaos.

Why, then, is it so easy for us to approach the Eucharist with such morose indifference, or if we're generous with ourselves, gracious entitlement? I suppose that it's human nature in a way. We grow accustomed; even to miracles. I can't remember ever in my life praying, "God of creation, thank you for hydrogen." Without hydrogen, the universe as we know it would not exist. The very fabric of space and time would be utterly unrecognizable from the reality we find ourselves in. Without the fusion of hydrogen a few minutes after the big bang, the most basic building blocks of matter itself never would have come to be; our fate sealed billions of years before our most distant of ancestors even had a solid piece of rock to take a single step on. While I'm thinking about it...Dear God, seriously, thank you for hydrogen. Amen.

This, however is the beauty, the mystery, the reality of what is taking place before us on the altar every time we participate in the Eucharist, or in English, the Thanksgiving. The fabric of our existence, the building block, the cornerstone of our reality, the Divine Logos by which all that is (seen and unseen) came to be, makes Himself existent for us to hear, to love, to eat.

Jean-Paul Sartre has this really compelling idea of the lack. Experiencing the lack of something often shows us a lot about the thing itself. The lack of a loved one is experienced as profoundly, if not more so, as actually being in the person's presence. The lack of hydrogen certainly leaves us in a not so great place. The lack of an iPad2? Perhaps a step we can all take towards a renewed sense of gratitude for, fulfillment in and experience of the Eucharist is to consider the lack thereof. I love this prayer from St. John Chrysostom:

O Lord my God, I know that I am not worthy nor sufficient that you should enter under my roof into the habitation of my soul, for it is all deserted and in ruins, and you have no fitting place in me to lay your head. But as you humbled yourself from the heights of your glory, so now bear me in my humility; as you did deign to lie in a manger in a cave, so deign now also to come into the manger of my mute soul and corrupt body. As you did not refrain from entering into the house of Simon the leper, or shrink from eating there with sinners, so also vouchsafe to enter the house of my poor soul, all leprous and full of sin. You did not reject the sinful woman who ventured to draw near to touch you, so also have pity on me, a sinner, approaching to touch you. And grant that I may partake of your All-holy Body and Precious Blood for the sanctification, enlightenment and strengthening of my weak soul and body; for the relief from the burden of my many sins; for my preservation against all the snares of the devil; for victory over all my sinful and evil habits; for the mortification of my passions; for obedience to your Commandments; for growth in your divine Grace and for the inheritance of your Kingdom.

This red blotch is the most distant object ever viewed in the universe. To reach this compact galaxy of very hot, very massive, young stars, just jump in your car and drive non-stop at 700 million miles per hour. It will take you 13.2 billion years to get there.

With Fear and Trembling

2011-10-14T13:36:00.002-04:00

I have always been intrigued by a device featured in Søren Kierkegaard's pseudonymous work, Fear and Trembling, which re-frames the Biblical story of Abraham and Isaac. I share his fascination with the story itself and sense that the theme of faith as illustrated in the Torah is much more rich and complicated than the way it is traditionally told lets on. So, mimicking his project, I have layed out two aspects of the story that have haunted me of late. Kierkegaard's intention in his retelling of Scripture (and mine here) is not sacrilegious, but worshipful. My hope is that these alternate stories invoke contemplation on an often neglected aspect of faith which Kierkegaard sought to bring to light: The faith of Abraham is unique in that it allowed him to believe as true and act upon not only logical impossibilities, but seemingly oppositional commands, contradictory voices. He walked so closely with God that he was able to discern that the same voice which commanded him to love commanded him to sacrifice; the same God who told him to sacrifice was the same God who told him to spare. And in all this, Abraham's faith held fast. He was not shaken or disheartened or confused, and I believe all these things should trouble us to our core as we examine the role of faith in our own lives.

Abraham, the old man, was awoken from a deep sleep by a familiar voice. The voice was יהוה‎ (YHWH) calling to him, "Abraham!" In the night, יהוה‎ delivered unto him a stern command. Our father Abraham lay perfectly still, eyes fixed, awake until the early hours of the morning. Gathering two young men and his beloved son of promise, Isaac, he set out for the land of Moriah. As the days passed, Abraham rode on in silence, unable to move his lips to confess to his companions his purposes in leading them across the desert. During this time his face grew ever darker, eyes deep and empty. On the third day, he looked up and saw the mount in the distance, cursing it from the depths of his heart. "יהוה‎, You have brought into existence everything that is; nothing is beyond the depths of Your knowledge or the breadth of Your power. You do not forsake your people, yet you ask this thing of me. From the dust I beg you, that it may not be so." When father and son came to the place God had shown Abraham, he built an altar to the Lord. Clutching the knife at his side, his arm shook violently. As Isaac gazed at his father, his heart trembled, "The fire and the wood are here, but we have brought with us no lamb for a burnt offering." Abraham was unable to reply. "Father?" Isaac cried. Abraham answered him, "And yet this is what our Lord has required."As Abraham took the weapon, reaching out his hand to slaughter his son, an angel of the Lord called from Heaven, "Do not lay your hand on the boy. I know now that you fear God, since you have not withheld your only son." Abraham fell to the ground, gnashing his teeth with a loud moan. "You have counted my faith towards You as righteousness, and yet You see fit to test me and destroy my heart!" As they returned down the high mountain, Isaac saw a ram caught by the horns in a thicket. Gently, he placed his hand on the animal's head and set it free. From that day Abraham called his God אהיה אשר אהיה (Ehyeh asher Ehyeh), for the Lord stayed hidden behind Himself.

**************************************

At night, the clouds hid the light of the moon as Abraham slept. A voice crept to his ear and spoke, "Abraham." The elderly man heard this as the voice of the Lord and, casting a protective arm across his wife, replied, "Here I am." And again God spoke. "Fetch your only son, Isaac, the one you love. Bring him to the land of Moriah, to a mountain that I will show you. There you will sacrifice him as a burnt offering to your God." In fury Abraham rose from his bed shouting, "Adversary, you are not the Lord, but הַשָׂטָן (ha-satan), come to oppose me! Has יהוה brought me out of Ur of the Chaldeans that I might curse my duty as a father and slay my child as the pagans do? Get behind me, accuser, for I will not allow you to obstruct the covenant the Lord has made with me for the blessing of all!"

Raise High the Debt Ceiling, Carpenters

2011-08-04T13:24:00.002-04:00

It pains me not in the slightest to open up this little discussion by entirely neglecting the point. I wish in the first place to apologize for its title. I suppose the apology should be squared directly at two people, really. First, J. D. Salinger himself. Mr. Salinger, I trust you will forgive the profaning of one of your perfectly good stories, as well as my voice, which, the more I write, seems more lifted from them all (although it really is a matter of debate whether I first heard myself through your writing, or if the writing taught me how to be heard). Courtesies aside, you are in fact dead, and if you were not, would certainly consider the benefits of being so if you found out anyone was blogging a word about you. Second, Mr. J. D. Weichhand. Josh, I'm going to be honest: I just really want you to read everything I write and give me your approval. You are the Seymour to my Buddy Glass. Having said that, I'm thinking about it more and it's remarkable how true that is in so many ways. Just don't kill yourself.

There is no political subject matter which consistently enthuses me less than finance. I think part of this is related to the fact that most financial issues deemed political, to me, should be more accurately classified as moral questions. Case-in-point perhaps being the classic: Is it okay for some hard-working people to be outrageously rich while others who work just as hard are in poverty? Does anyone have the right to tell the rich they are too rich? If this is a simple political question, then one's answer places him or her somewhere on a scale between Bleeding Socialist and Heartless Capitalist Banker. St. Paul perhaps urges us to expand the conversation.

The other reason it is so hard to care about the debt ceiling, inflation, or the stock market is because the whole thing is so artificial to me. Wall Street invents money out of thin air by betting on a company's failure, literally getting paid for doing nothing. Meanwhile, the government is fighting a multi-trillion dollar war, and all that's needed for both absurdities to continue is the printing of more money. So why shouldn't the economic elite who know the game be able to amass personal fortunes like a slight-of-hand magician with an ace up his sleeve, when our entire monetary system is just as deceptive and slanted?

Let us also remember that this entire 'debate' is an ideological sideshow. The government spending in question has already been approved by the same phonies standing up on the Hill telling the other side to cut back. Having this debate now only determines whether or not the country will pay those bills. The only purpose of this whole charade of the Right's is to rub the bellies of their tea party supporters. Regarding these, a few words may be appropriate. In its current embodiment, the tea party movement is the worst thing to happen to American politics in my lifetime. It's not that I disagree with every single thing they stand for (which I do). It's not that people who tote guns, dislike foreigners, and hate the idea of everyone being able to go to the doctor scare me (which they do). It's not even that many of them lap up every word of a bona fide crazy person like Glenn Beck (which they do). (Dear reader, this is all starting to sound mean-spirited, but please remember that it's not mean if it's true.) (I apologize for the recent mean-spirited parenthetical disclaimer.)

What frightens me about the tea party is that they have successfully taken the entire Republican party by the throat. Any of us who follow Conservative politics for five minutes will know that the current modus operandi is: Raise taxes, you're gone. Spend money on any program but warfare, you're gone. I think to some extent all these Republicans are trying to do here is keep their jobs. What the tea party has created is a political system entirely contrary to what their dear founding fathers intended; a political system in which compromise is out of the question and one is tricked into believing that every choice is a choice between two ideological extremes. Remember when Mitch McConnell proposed a perfectly sane compromise deal at the beginning of this whole debacle? The man was practically crucified in the conservative media. Trying to see where the other side is coming from, give-and-take are tantamount to treason. A few weeks ago Glenn Beck flat out said that what our nation is facing is a choice between fascist Communism and Libertarian freedom. In other words, there is no middle ground. Wouldn't you rather be a tea-partier than a Communist??

I remember a while back, after the recent health-care bill passed (typically referred to as 'Obamacare'), I was really disappointed in Dennis Kucinich for voting for it. Kucinich is a man I have a deep respect for and one of the only people in Washington I trust. How could he sell out like this? He promised to fight for single-payer, but now has voted for a bill that effectively hands over thousands of new customers to the insurance companies! I was impressed when he sent out a letter to his supporters explaining his vote. The short of it comes down to the fact that he saw a 'yes' vote on that less-than-stellar bill as at least a tiny baby step away from the current system. After speaking with the president at length the day before the vote, he realized that a 'no' vote would be much more damaging in that it would halt the debate altogether and no one knew at that point how long it would be before they would have the majority votes necessary to pass any kind of reform again. So he compromised. He looked at the bigger picture and said, "This is too important to take an ideological stand and cast a meaningless vote." As I look back, I don't think Dennis sold out at all. His ideological stand was the countless hours he spent educating people on socialized care, working the House floor, and never arguing for anything less than what he knew to be the best thing for America.

This is exactly where the Republicans are a complete and utter failure right now. The American people aren't hearing arguments for why tea party policies are the best thing for the country. We are simply being scared into believing that the country is on the verge of apocalypse unless the tea party has its way (and I say that with complete seriousness). We are being told that compromise is out of the question because one side and one side alone has access to the divine revelation of what the United States is and how to save it. No deviation from the straight and narrow can be afforded.

If we all walk away from this glorified Lebron-announcement with anything, it should be a recognition that the only way we are going to stop our country from walking down an extremely scary path is to refuse the hand we are dealt.

The Divine Life of Animals [Part 1]

2011-07-19T15:34:00.009-04:00

To my long-lost readers, I offer my deepest and most shameless apologies. We are rapidly approaching the one year anniversary of my last posting. In an attempt (yet again) to eradicate what--to anyone who has sought after any semi-regular writing regimen--seems to be an unyielding tendency towards silence and failure, I have decided to undertake a book review of sorts. My ultimate goal however is not critical, but conversational. After a period of digestion (or gestation, as the case may be), I will simply dump my thoughts into the void you and I, dear reader, currently occupy. Onward:

The Divine Life of Animals: One Man's Quest to Discover Whether the Souls of Animals Live On

Introduction

Disregarding its title, my purposes in reading this book have nothing to do with the kind of New Age, All Dogs Go to Heaven, Hollywood Hinduism it seems to imply. I picked up this book because it has long been my conviction that something is missing from the standard way of talking about animals and the created world we share with them. Even as I say that, it strikes me that in typical contemporary discourse on any topic related to nature, the idea that we actually share anything with animals is a foreign one. By this I mean more than the human choice to share one's household with an animal, or tossing seeds and breadcrumbs at a few of the wild ones, or even our moral obligation to protect their natural habitat. What I am interested in exploring is the spiritual identity of all created things; an identity we share in communion with as co-participants in the self-revelation of God. This book may or may not go into these things, but I hope at least it will be a springboard.

In this opening chapter, Tompkins brings up two interesting points of discussion. The first is a very brief exploration of the word nephesh as it appears in the Hebrew scriptures. This word is a rich, multi-faceted word which, when translated into English, is flattened out as the fairly generic word soul. He illustrates that, for the ancients, one's nephesh was not an etherial thing or essential meta-self which goes away to Heaven when we die. "Indeed, our nephesh is what makes each of us who we are" (9). In Genesis, God breathes nephesh into the nose of Adam, creating the first human. Tompkins is fairly successful here in helping break down our cultural resistance to an idea such as the animal soul. I also think this enriched conceptualization of what soul is can be helpful in our own self-understanding as image-bearers. Scripture is very clear that God is not simply interested in 'soul-winning' or taking us away from our bodies. Our physical bodies are to be redeemed, as they themselves are essential to our identity. Nephesh, the soul, is not a removed spirit that eventually flees elsewhere; it is the breath in our lungs, the blood in our veins, and our eternal identity as living things. That being said, I think more discussion is needed in regards to whether or not there is a distinction between our identity as created (living) things, and personhood.

The second point brought up in the introduction I found noteworthy addresses the transition between the child's innocent emotional/spiritual connection to and sense of wonderment towards creation--particularly animals--and the removed, informed coldness of adulthood toward the same. "'Children often identify with animals in ways that amuse and frustrate us...spending emotion with an abandon that adults, with their thrifty investments and prudent decisions, cannot afford'" (11). Tompkins gives several examples of ways in which children, who know about death, and see it in various forms in media frequently, are often struck by the horror of death seemingly for the first time when it is related to animals. As a child, the author was moved by an experience attempting to feed a starving dog in Mexico and being met with reproach by his mother who saw his actions as wasteful. He had surely seen hungry people before, but I think most of us would agree children have a unique relationship with animals and seem to have an intuitive inclination towards sharing life with them in a way that is lost with age. I resonated with this discussion myself. I don't recall the name of the movie or much of what it was about, but the important point is that the story revolved around a real, not cartoon otter. As I remember it, the otter is accidentally killed in a creek by a human digging with a shovel. For months afterward, maybe even years (my parents would know better), my bed-time prayers included, "Help me forget the otter movie." There's no doubt in my mind I had encountered death before in movies or playing cowboys and Indians, but there was something about an emotional connection I made with that animal that made the reality of death hit me for the first time: Things die. When they die, they're not here anymore. When I, with my child's mind tried to see where they would be after that, all I saw was a blank space. The idea of nothingness scared me more than any monster or nightmare.

Potable Quotable:

"We patronize [animals] for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth" (12). -Henry Beston

Cultural Isolationism: The American Right and NYC

2010-08-30T18:29:00.016-04:00

In case you haven't had the chance to talk to a conservative lately: THE MUSLIMS ARE TRYING TO BUILD A MOSQUE IN NEW YORK CITY ON GROUND ZERO AND ANY PATRIOTIC, CAPITALISM-LOVING AMERICAN SHOULD BE UTTERLY OFFENDED!!

When I first heard about the proposed plans to build a mosque near the former World Trade Center site, my initial response was pretty mild; I really didn't care. Then, to my surprise, several weeks later I realized we were in the midst of a media explosion concerning what had apparently become a supremely important, hot-button issue. Shortly thereafter I could not believe the extent to which people were losing their minds over the whole thing.

I have no interest in recapping (as I'm sure you have no interest in re-reading) this whole debacle from start to finish. I would, however, like to simply stake up a few points and present my interpretation of one side of these events, considering I have very limited knowledge of what is actually taking place 'on the ground,' as it were.

Cultural Isolationism: The American Right

I have to say the irony here is hilarious to me. For the last 2 years, the Right has tirelessly undergone a flash makeover from the aggressive neo-conservatism of George W. Bush and John McCain to a nostalgic, half-baked constitutionalism led by media stars such as Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin rather than traditional politicians. So, I suppose it's no surprise that the precious Constitution of the United States--tearfully clung to when fighting taxes and gun laws--has so suddenly been put in check by questions of prudence and (imagine!) contingency.

That being said, it seems clear that with the November elections rapidly approaching, the party of Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich have thrown their ideals out the window in order to concoct a very powerful wedge issue. The republic as we know it cannot function efficiently when people try to understand one another and find some unum in their pluribus. When we are on the eve of an election, it is essential for citizens to be pushed as far to one side or another in order to ensure a decisive victory.

The goal here, as per usual for the GOP since 9/12/01, is to exploit the emotional memories of September 11 to conjure up an Us vs. Them situation which I'm calling Cultural Isolationism. In the same way economic isolationism seeks to protect domestic product and labor by shutting out all outside influence, I see recent trends in conservative politics trying to protect American culture--and I should stress that this is an idealized, fabricated notion of the true founding-fathers-judeo-christian-American culture--and 'American values' by seeking to divide and isolate.

We must be extremely mindful of what is going on here, and what the results will be if we allow a very select few to determine what American culture--or perhaps more accurately, American demographics--should look like. For the American right, it's clear this Islamic center issue is not a Constitutional one. Nor is it even an issue of respect for the dead. This has everything to do with fear and power. Fear of the outside, fear of appearing weak, and power to melt the great American experiment down to a neatly defined, isolated conservative reduction.

There is really no debate, as far as I can tell, over whether anyone has the right to build a place of worship; of course they do. Furthermore, we all know it's wrong to forbid someone from building a place of worship just because they are of the same religion as a random group of terrorists. Let's instead think about who is benefiting from this even being a debate, and whose lives go by the wayside while it happens.

On Single Party Rule or Democracy

2010-06-12T19:20:00.003-04:00

Last week on Hardball, Chris Matthews brought up what I thought were some pretty poignant observations regarding the current political landscape in the United States:

I think this analysis is simple and spot-on, and it struck a chord with me by bringing to the fore an underlying ethos that seems to be so prevalent in ever-evolving conservative circles such as the tea party movement (and this is not to say it is not also present in much of the Democrat Party) which states, "We alone have access to the truth on how to run the country; if you're not one of us, you're out." I've always found the tea parties to be wholly uninspiring and relatively confusing; the only unifying thread as far as a political philosophy is CUT TAXES--or, if we're being generous we might be able to add KEEP THE MEXICANS OUT to the platform. Yes, people are entitled to their ideology, but why is this problematic politically?

Matthews here is pointing towards a key aspect of democratic societies that is being neglected in increasingly troubling ways both in the United States and Europe. Democracy by definition is pluralistic. I strongly believe that despite the way we typically think of democratic processes (particularly voting) as majority rule, democracy must include empowering and allowing a voice for the minority (or more accurately, minorities; and by this, I mean any person[s] either not represented by the majority, or neglected by its policies). As evidenced by the latest parliamentary election in the Netherlands, this idea can be rapidly forgotten amidst fear and xenophobia in the face of cultural change.

If we are to retain the idea of democracy any longer, we ought never adopt platforms which seek to homogenize or exclude. Rather, we should be vigilantly generous and hospitable; inviting the Other in, and seeking out any voice which is not being heard.

Deconstructions of the Fourth Kind: The Church, Apologetics, and Horror Flicks

2010-05-08T03:30:00.006-04:00

1.

I think we often underestimate the horror/sci-fi genre. I recently watched The Fourth Kind, a film about alien abductions starring the equally underrated Milla Jovovich. The film is fairly unique in that its aim is to present itself as a direct portrayal of actual events by interspersing 'actual footage' and 'real audio' compiled from various events surrounding a series of fourth kind encounters in the city of Nome, Alaska. Often, 'actual' and 'dramatized' scenes are shown on screen simultaneously. Jovovich even appears on screen at the beginning of the film, giving a sort of public service disclaimer:

I'm actress Milla Jovovich, and I will be portraying Dr. Abigail Tyler in The Fourth Kind. This film is a dramatization of events that occurred October 1st through the 9th of 2000, in the Northern Alaskan town of Nome. To better explain the events of this story, the director has included actual archived footage throughout the film. This footage was acquired from Nome psychologist Dr. Abigail Tyler, who has personally documented over 65 hours of video and audio materials during the time of the incidents. To better protect their privacy, we have changed the names and professions of many of the people involved. Every dramatized scene in this movie is supported by either archived audio, video or as it was related by Dr. Tyler during extensive interviews with the director. In the end, what you believe is yours to decide. Please be advised, that some of what you're about to see is extremely disturbing.

This opening scene is striking to me in that it really (whether purposefully or not) speaks to the entire philosophical crux of the film. On the surface, when the audience is told that what they believe is theirs to decide, the question seems to concern whether or not they will choose to believe that intelligent life exists elsewhere than earth and that these life forms have indeed been encountered and interacted with.

However, the underlying issue illustrated by this scene is not a decision regarding the facts, but rather, the filmmaker.

2.

As a kid, I picked up slight-of-hand card tricks as a hobby and still enjoy doing them, though I don't dedicate the same amount of time to it that I used to. One of my favorite tricks, and one that consistently baffles people despite its simplicity, owes its success to me, the magician, blatantly lying about what is transpiring without the knowledge of you, the observer; the shocking reveal as the desired cards are produced at the end of the trick is only amazing if you believe that I have indeed done what I said I did in order to get there--and you always do.

The reveal in the film--increasingly intense 'actual' footage and audio--is more than convincing if it is accepted as such; it would take a lot of explaining to describe why one would not believe the conclusion the film logically leads us to. The real question the audience is faced with in the film is whether or not the filmmakers are lying when they say that this is 'actual footage,' etc; certainly the film is much scarier if the observer believes it is. Herein lies the brilliance of a horror film like Michael Haneke's Funny Games: While it has become a trend in the genre to rely on the perceived reality or realness of the events to elicit the desired response from the audience, Haneke bucks this impulse at every turn and constantly reminds the viewer of the interpretive process.

The film constantly reminds you that it is a film, and that it, not you, determines what you see and when. It is without this crutch that Haneke finds a way to freak you out regardless.

3.

I've always had an aversion towards apologetics; at least the kind of apologetics used either to 'convince' unbelievers of the validity of Christian doctrine, or to frame Christianity in such a way as to make it appear 'reasonable' to those who do not adhere to it. Let it be known that I would not reject the usefulness of apologetics altogether; we of course ought to know the Scriptural reasons why we believe what we believe. But, there seems to be a line that systematic theology almost always steps over, where apologetics seems to merely subjugate the narrative nature of our faith to the modern Enlightenment's ideas of how pure (i.e. male, white, etc.) reason can break free of its own contextuality in order to grasp--on it's own--'universal' truth.

Even in this compromised state, apologetics fails in its task of 'convincing.' Christian apologetics consistently (and necessarily) fall back on the Holy Scriptures as their starting point. However, this appeal, while having the benefit of being simple, is nonetheless seen as circular to one who does not accept those Scriptures as authoritative, inspired, infallible, or true. In other words, at some point, traditional apologetics, like The Fourth Kind, require the audience to accept certain notions about the starting point itself. One must first accept that the filmmaker not only has correctly interpreted all the necessary information, but is also telling the truth about it.

So, the real question systematic theology fails to ask, and the question the Church should be a living answer to in my opinion, is not "How can we prove that our beliefs are true?" but rather, "How can we show that we believers (and the tradition we follow) are truthful?" Perhaps the distinction is a subtle one, but I hope what I'm getting at is fairly clear. If we go back to Funny Games, in contrast, we can perhaps see the benefit of not requiring as a prerequisite that those outside first buy into any number of background assumptions that we within have learned how to accept. Perhaps we can find a way to say, "This is not a documentary, this is a horror film. If the Christian faith were as simple as finding the right objective information to prove its reality, then it wouldn't be a faith at all. So let's be up front and honest about what's going on here."

This is why I am far more attracted to the notion of creeds, as opposed to a bulleted list of propositional truths. There is one line in particular from the Nicene Creed that I think will perhaps tie all of these things together nicely:

We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church.

This may get me into hot water with my Reformed-leaning friends, but to me, this seems to sit prior in importance to doctrinal tools such as sola Scriptura. I say this because the Word does not hang in a vacuum where any logical person will find and accept it on their own. I think even Scripture is self-aware of this. Here, Paul--perhaps the most black and white, type-A, right-brained, logical thinker in the canon--describes our faith not as an objectively perceivable truth to be proven, but rather as a powerful mystery to be proclaimed. (I would encourage you to read through 1 Corinthians 1-2 once now and again after finishing this article for a better sense of what I'm aiming at, as this passage illustrates much of this perfectly.)

In the creed, we not only affirm that we believe one holy catholic and apostolic church exists, but also that we believe and practice faith in--within--the same. There is one gospel (catholic), and that narrative has been preserved (holy) throughout history by being passed on from those who witnessed with their own eyes (apostolic) the fullness of its mystery. Recalling the transfiguration of our Lord, Peter reminds us to hold onto and embrace this, not dismiss it in favor of rhetorical arguments.

If the Church is to shed outdated notions of how salvation is a matter of using human wisdom to convince people of the truth, we must start by embracing our own identity; a unified, communal identity instituted at the cross. This identity is embodied in the Church, where the many are welcomed as one body, the Body of Christ, into God's presence. The union is not a logical social contract and there are no legal or scientific means to describe or prove what we have experienced in our lives and what the apostles witnessed with their eyes.

We might simply point to the Eucharist and invite others to partake. To me, the Eucharist is the greatest testament to the mystical union that has taken place between Christ and those who want to know him as Messiah. Not only is there immense power in receiving the Body and Blood, united with one another in spirit, but the great mystery of Christ made present adds what I think is a very real physical aspect to our collective identity of being His Body.

This is so much more beautiful and real than bulleted apologetic arguments. And hopefully, by calling the world into this picture, we won't have to rely on fooling them into thinking Christianity is something it is not; namely, some sort of rationalized scientific system. (This is not to say that faith lies in opposition to science; quite the contrary.) We are called to stand out from the world and its systems that have been tried and reinvented ad nauseum throughout the millenia. We hope that if nothing else, we are seen as truthful when with full conviction we proclaim the great mystery of our faith:

Christ has died.
Christ is risen.
Christ will come again.

Okay, Glenn Beck (Rights, the Constitution, and Soviet Aesthetics)

2010-03-04T17:15:00.032-05:00

From time to time I purposely subject myself to things like Glenn Beck's television show. Call it a kind of monastic self-flagellation. I try to be well-rounded in my consumption of political commentary, and I really do believe that we all benefit from hearing things from a different perspective. On one particular occasion, however, after watching a mere 13 minutes of his program, my head hurt so much that I couldn't even laugh at the absurdity of what was being spewed.

I love a good discussion, and I love hearing opinions that are not mine. But, dear Glenn Beck, please, for my sake, ensure that your opinions at least make sense.I've taken the liberty of transcribing the best part to give you an accurate representation of what was actually said without leaving anything out and without paraphrasing, but if you can stomach it, you can watch the full, weird, pathetic, woeful lamentation here (and i don't hesitate to use those words, because sounding pathetic and woeful is clearly Beck's shtick). Beck began his program by using an old wooden chair to represent the quote-unquote true America as it was in its 'original state.' Then came:

There were rallies today in California and all around the country (facing video of protesters lining the streets with placards). They were promoted as--look at these pinheads--they were promoted as 'saving education.' Well who--who doesn't want to save education? But the education budget wasn't the real goal. Let me show you a little something about the people involved in these protests. These were the posters that were used to promote this (walking toward a large poster featuring a slogan, and a logo of a fist on a book, painted in red, black, and white hues). Right here: 'Education is a human right.' Really? Wow. Education is a human right--boy this--almost looks like old, Soviet propaganda art dud'n'it? These people feel so strongly about education, you think they'd be educated to know that education is not a right. The Constitution doesn't mention that one. Let me clarify that; the United Sates Constitution doesn't mention that; this one does (holding a red document inscribed with Russian writing). This one. This is the Soviet constitution. Oh, it mentions education; free education for everybody, mhm. Let me help. Save the education. Rights do not come from government, they never have. If they do, you end up with a completely different government. You end up with a footstool or you end up with, what are those things that--stockades. Your rights come from God. If government grants you rights then you're a slave to the government, because if they grant them, they can also take them away. In America you don't have that right. This is what knowing what this chair is all about is all about. You gotta know what it is. Adding in education is just adding another coat of ugly paint; another ding, another scratch, somebody else just standing on it or, whatever. It wasn't designed to do that. If you want government to start granting rights then perhaps it's time to start looking for something other than a chair. Something entirely different than this because that's not what this one does. That's what this one does (raising the Soviet constitution).

First, I just want to lay out one of Beck's lines of persuasion: If the the cause is protected by the Soviet constitution (and the art looks Soviet!), then the cause is fought for by communists. Therefore, I'd like to point out to Glenn that article 53 of the Soviet constitution defines marriage as being between one man and one woman. Right now, Mr. Beck, there are people--people protesting to have an identical article added to our sacred constitution. Here--in the God-blessed U.S. of A.! Please, Glenn--reveal this conspiracy to the world. Stop these pinheads from passing these--they call them 'protection of marriage' acts--but we know what the real goal is.

Second, I think Beck is very confused in regards what he actually thinks about the nature of rights. Granted, his job is to say things, not to think about them, so we must offer him a measure of grace. Let's try to help him out, though, by pointing out a few conflicting little nuggets:

"...education is not a right. The Constitution doesn't mention that one." Again, let's lay out this logic: The U.S. Constitution does not cite education as being a right. Therefore, education is not a right. We can also infer based on this argumentation that the Constitution is exhaustive in its delineation of rights, since we should not be adding more. Furthermore, we have assurance that by way of granting us the rights it does mention, the document also assures them to us against forces which might seek to take them away. Fair enough.

"If government grants you rights then you're a slave to the government, because if they grant them, they can also take them away." Wait, Glenn, so are you saying that you and I and all U.S. citizens are enslaved by the Constitution rather than liberated by it?

"Rights do not come from government, they never have." Oh, okay good, you had me scared for a second there. But you're still appealing to the Constitution to hold your whole argument together. So, if the rights granted in the Constitution are not granted by the government, then who grants them?

"Your rights come from God." Alright, I'm following. Our rights come from God, and the Constitution is an explanation of those rights. Now, just so i can pass this knowledge on to unbelievers, can you point out to me the Scriptures the founding fathers used when they were putting this list of rights together? Maybe just the ones talking about the right to form a well-regulated militia, protection from quartering of troops, protection from unreasonable search and seizure, oh and right to counsel, I better memorize that verse, prohibition of excessive bail, and lastly, since states' rights is a big issue right now, where in the Bible should I look to show people that powers not delegated to the United States are reserved to the states or the people? ...what do you mean there's nothing in the Bible about that? Okay, I get it, so the United States Constitution is an extra-Biblical revelation the founding fathers of the nation were divinely inspired to write down. Got it.

The talented Mr. Beck has apparently acquired the unique ability to believe three distinctly different things about the nature of rights at the same time! Rights are granted by the Constitution and rights have never come from government (in fact, "If you want government to start granting rights then perhaps it's time to start looking for something other than a chair") and political rights come from God!

Well, I do think Glenn is right about one thing. If your entire conception of the rights we now or ever could have is based on the U.S. Constitution (the version we have in 2010), then you truly are a slave to it. And I must stress here, on a philosophical basis, that more accurately, you are a slave to your conception of and interpretation of that piece of paper. In Beck's case, one can conveniently forget about something like the 9th amendment (my personal favorite):

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

So here, I will try, on behalf of our good friend Glenn Beck to clear up some of his confusion:

There are indeed certain fundamental things we know about humans, by nature of their being created in the image of God, which entitle them to certain rights.
However, the rights themselves are not granted by God. It is people themselves who have the responsibility of recognizing these truths and seeking to allow various rights and responsibilities universally to others.
In the case of the United States Constitution, our founding fathers wrote down an interpretation of--not an explanation of--the 'inalienable rights' they observed; they labored within their own personal/historical/social contexts to provide the nation with a basic understanding of these. So, for them it made sense that the right to vote applied only to white, land-owning males. However, over time, our interpretation of that same right has evolved.
In addition to the evolution of recognized rights, our common collection of basic human rights, and our conceptions of them, is equally dynamic. Obviously, part of this is due to shifting collective political mindsets. However, I think the bigger reason is that the nature of our shared experiences is constantly changing. For example, not only have we chosen over time to collectively reject the idea of slavery itself, the picture we get of 21st century slavery is vastly different than the picture of 18th century slavery; the specific human rights relating to this issue often deal with things like forced sexual relations with children, as opposed to, say, racial domination.
If the communal landscape is such that people choose to deem education a right, then by way of the liberties supposedly entitled to them by prior rights agreements within given communities (such as the Constitution), the people may choose to paint their chair whatever color they please. (Or create and adopt new agreements; see The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, drafted in 1948, believe it or not. See specifically article 26.)

As far as I can see, aside from blatant errors in argumentation, Beck's fundamental error is that of making the issue of Rights an ontological question, rather than a hermeneutic one (for that matter, I think he's forgotten that rights, in practice, are a political question!). So, it's no wonder all he has to grasp onto to hold his position together are bizarre conspiracies, fear tactics, and nostalgia. Though, I'm not sure if nostalgia is the right word for pining after bygone things that were never there in the first place; I think that might be more related to dementia.

Sustainable, Responsible House Cleaning

2010-02-11T21:07:00.010-05:00

So, readers, I'm aware that many of you are, like me, seeking out ways to be more conscious of how we relate to and interact with the world around us in our daily actions. Many of you are married, have your own places, or are just seeking to be more responsible; others are wonderful, tree-hugging hippies and vegans who will no doubt think I'm way behind the times on this.

At any rate, I thought I would pass on some info about a company I've been reading up on called Ecover (yep, click that), who makes ecologically-friendly cleaning products for everything from your car to your laundry to your hands. The point of their cleaning products is to reduce the insane amount of chemicals we not only dump into the environment when we throw out our garbage, but also the harmful materials we're subjecting ourselves to. They are also all about rethinking the industry and being ethical and sustainable from factory to store. The natural plant products used are conscientiously farmed, and both of their super sweet green factories (no longer an oxymoron) actually attract tourists because they're so mind-blowingly not wretched. If you look at the picture above, you can see it's naturally insulated with grass, and there's a bunch of skylights that follow the path of the sun, so next to no artificial light is needed. You can read about that too.

Oh, and their products are vegan!

Also, the prices are pretty killer and practically all of them are as cheap, if not cheaper than the crapola we're poisoning ourselves and the environment with right now.

Viggo on Dennis

2010-02-10T17:21:00.005-05:00

Obama's best material during the campaign was cherry-picked from the things Kucinich had been talking about for a long time. And Kucinich continues to be really the people's congressman. He is the one with the most conscience regarding health care, the banking issue, the bailout. He's the guy who said we should not go into Iraq, and was called a traitor for it. He was a guy who said, "This Patriot Act is not a good thing, we should not vote for it." Even people in his own party were saying, "Why do you say that?" And he says, "Because I read it," and there was silence. 'Cause none of them had read it. They just voted yes because they were told to. Same with health care stuff.

Viggo Mortensen: actor, poet, painter, publisher, photographer, smart dude. You can check out the full interview over at Mother Jones.

Terrorism: Act or Label?

2009-11-11T01:38:00.000-05:00

Several weeks ago, you may may remember hearing about the Boston man who was arrested for plotting an attack on a shopping mall as an act of jihad. What struck me about the coverage of this story was the constant use of this word terrorism and its other forms.

I immediately recalled the horrific events that transpired in an Amish school house several years ago.

I remembered when news broke of a brazen shooting in the Holocaust museum in Washington, D.C. and how I wondered what can cause a man to hate like that.

I also flashed back to my sophomore year of college, sitting in the lounge at school, watching as the surreal Virginia Tech shooting unfolded. The Virginia Tech attack particularly affected us as students, hearing about the massacre of 33 people just like us.

Then, news of the execution of John Allen Muhummad today brought back memories of the D.C. sniper shootings and the way a whole portion of the nation was stricken with absolute fear.

The list goes on, and I couldn't help but notice that I never remember hearing "terrorist" or "terrorism" in connection with these events or those who perpetrated them. I wonder, is there some sort of rule of thumb that determines whether vicious attacks like these are either terrorism or just your typical, plain, old, run-of-the-mill mass-murder?

Certainly we can't say that it is the number of victims which crosses the line into terrorism territory; the Virginia Tech shooter killed 33 people in a matter of hours, but wasn't deemed a terrorist.

Nor are we led to believe that targeting a specific group of people for being who they are, because of some sort of agenda, grievance, or twisted logic makes one a terrorist; the anti-Semite in D.C. had every intention of killing Jews, and the man in PA specifically targeted Amish girls.

So, I couldn't help but wonder whether the term "terrorist" only applies to Muslims. I have to say that this largely seems to be the case in post-9/11 United States.

However, I recall that the D.C. sniper professed to being a Muslim, and even talked about jihad in his writings. Being a militant Muslim did not make him a terrorist. And for that matter, neither did brainwashing his teenage accomplice. Perhaps most astonishingly, even INCITING TERROR on a massive scale did not qualify John Allen Muhammad.

Where is the disconnect?

This question was suddenly thrust into the spotlight after the tragic news of the shooting at Fort Hood came out last week. Fox News even put up this poll asking whether the massacre was an "act of terror or a horrific crime".

There is so much wrong with this picture! Not only do we not have a clear picture of what even constitutes terrorism--which, by the way, we are apparently fighting a War against--but what benefit does this distinction even offer us?

I therefore have three questions:

If (and this is a majorly huge, theoretical if) one concedes that it is possible to defeat terrorism through the use of War, how can said War be won if its target has no clear definiton? Would not the extent of such a War become as indefinite as its target?
If the moniker of "terrorist" does not coincide with a specific act, type of act, or motivation, is not the label then a purely political one?
Are not all "acts of terror" and "horrific crimes" one in the same?

A victim of an act of terror in Jerusalem. A victim of a horrific crime at Virginia Tech.

Rediscovering the Good: or, The Black Eyed Peas Made Me Think??

2009-08-27T02:06:00.013-04:00

I've been hearing a lot of the Black Eyed Peas at work lately; my boss is convinced their new album is really good. Undoubtedly, the quartet is one of the most over-exposed pop groups of the last several years, and under normal circumstances I would advise against taking the time to think intelligently about any of their songs, as this could result in a wide range of side-effects from self-inflicted violence to loss of faith. However, a particular section of the song, 'One Tribe,' did stand out to me and I thought I'd throw out a few thoughts:

Compositionally, the lyrics of the song are absolute rubbish, but I was intrigued by one passage which chanted:

Forget about all that evil, evil / That evil that they feed ya, feed ya / Remember that we're one people

I think in a lot of ways The Black Eyed Peas can be seen as representative of (or at least, their success can be seen as a result of) our current over-stimulated, hyper-consumptive, ultra-modern culture. A scary thought, I know, but let's run with it.

It is interesting to me that even in the shallowest cultural outlets of our society, there is this acknowledgment of the existence of evil; and beyond acknowledgment, a condemnation of it. My mind also jumps back to the foreign policy speeches of President George W. Bush, which were not shy about pointing out exactly who and what was evil.

I often hear (and am peeved by) individuals within the Church who, in pontificating vaguely about the destructive influence of (what they call) post-modernism, talk about how the advent of post-modernism has resulted in a moral relativism which causes people to think that anything a person does or believes is 'okay for them.' The essential claim is that there is no longer any recognized concept of sin, evil, etc. I think in rare cases, this may be true for a very small segment of society. However, I think if we look at cultural outlets such as the Black Eyed Peas song in question, we can see that the rise of post-modernism--rising out of modernity--has actually had the opposite effect.

After witnessing widespread, systematic, and cataclysmic violence resulting from the radical culmination of modern ideals, post-modernism, if nothing else, is keenly and tragically aware of the presence and effects of evil in our world.

It seems to me that while much of the Church--at least its conservative or evangelical (I hate that term) branch--is focused on harping at those outside it about what is Bad, what they really need to be teaching (practically and theoretically) is what is Good. I want to stray as far as I can away from talk of 'relevance.' But I do think what we are looking at is a disconnect between the biggest problems facing our world, versus the issues much of the Church is preoccupied with; we are not answering the right questions.

If we look at the work of post-modern philosophy, or the music of the Black Eyed Peas, foreign policy rhetoric, or the face of our culture, there is much agreement on the existence of evil; we see it in racism, warfare, poverty, etc. However, beyond this, what we are struggling to uncover is the existence of good, or at least an agreed upon universal sense of the Good which is more than giving to charities, or supporting local artists. For example, while George W. Bush was very clear on what was evil, he was seemingly very confused about what types of actions or inactions against it were good.

People do not need to be convinced that building up walls between ourselves is wrong; what we are desperately searching for is an answer to how to tear them down and why there is meaning in doing so. What does it truly mean to be 'one people' as the song says?

I am intrigued by the prospect of the Church preaching a radical sense of Christ's gospel message which can perhaps be summed up as, 'Turn from evil and do good!' Furthermore, what he chose to elaborate on at great length was what exactly is the good we are to do (and who gives us the power to do it, and especially why--but that's a topic for another time). When Christ took up John the Baptist's message of repentance, admission of guilt was only half of the equation. It seems the much bigger half (I'm sure there's some crazy mathematical way to show such a thing to be possible) is learning to embody and live out the life we turn towards. I am not saying we should do away with talk of sin, but I think once we have a clearer conception of our task as image-bearers to be salt and light, imitators of a perfect God, and heirs of a Kingdom, specific examples of the evil already recognized in general terms will be brought into stark contrast on their own.

War According to the Artful Dodger

2009-08-14T00:24:00.012-04:00

After getting sidetracked for a while, I recently resumed reading Oliver Twist. One passage in particular stood out to me as I read it several nights ago, and I thought it would be worth sharing.

To set this up, the pure and innocent character of Oliver is in the midst of being indoctrinated into a band of young pickpockets headed by the cunning and self-interested Fagin. One of Fagin's most gifted boys, the artful Dodger, is attempting to help Oliver overcome his intrinsic moral objections to adopting a criminal lifestyle:

'If you don't take pocket-handkechers and watches,' said the Dodger, reducing the conversation to the level of Oliver's capacity, 'some other cove will; so that the coves that lose 'em will be all the worse, and you'll be all the worse too, and nobody half a ha'p'orth the better, except the chaps wot gets them--and you've just as good a right to them as they have.'

Fagin commends this explanation and directs the impressionable Oliver to take the Dodger's word for it; he being a boy who "understands the catechism of his trade."

Within the larger context of the book, I think what Dickens wants us to be aware of are the underhanded, often imperceptible ways in which society is taught to accept and even perpetuate various forms of violent exploitation (particularly in this book, systematized, class-based poverty). Taking this a step further (and I'm sure this will roll a few eyeballs belonging to some of you who think I sound like a broken record) I couldn't help but think while reading this how similar the Dodger's enticement is to many contemporary justifications for war.

What the Dodger has successfully done is create an argument which appeals to both the altruistic and the selfish aspects of human nature. People are going to get robbed; that is a fact of life. If indeed people must be robbed, wouldn't they be better off in the end if a good person like you did the robbing? There's no telling what a very bad person might do to the poor soul in the process of robbing them. Furthermore, not only will the person getting robbed be better off if you do the robbing, but you will better your own situation in the process. Everyone wins!

It is worth adding here that in a later conversation with Bill Sykes, Fagin reveals that he sees great promise in the future criminal career of Oliver (a career which will almost strictly profit Fagin himself). However, the key would be to entice the boy to commit his first robbery; then and only then would Oliver fall securely into Fagin's pocket. There he could develop into the next Bill Sykes (but conveniently less strong-willed), who, in addition to burglary, would not shy away from taking a person's life if he saw fit.

I admonish the reader to seek a deeper sensitivity to the sly way in which our societies are sold a proverbial bill of goods relating to matters of war. What the Dodger does not disclose to Oliver is that one's perceived righteousness in carrying out an immoral act does not make the action any less evil. This I believe includes supposed "necessary" evils, as well as those which seem "natural" or inherent to our present reality as robbery in this case was made out to be.

I also found it interesting that Fagin refers to the Dodger's explanation as being an illustration of the "catechism" of the criminal trade; the term catechism being typically used in a religious sense to describe an outline of the beliefs within a given faith. This is another aspect of the way we think about war which I think we need to be keenly aware of. In accepting the rationale for--thus necessarily, acts of and loss of innocent life resulting from--war and warfare, we are not simply making a one-time decision or casting our vote for a single issue; we are choosing to adopt an entire system of belief.

We must also seek an awareness of the principalities (to use the old Biblical term) into whose control we place ourselves when we affirm the tenets of such a "catechism." In many cases, one well-intentioned act can have far-reaching repercussions which place control of our lives (as well as the lives of countless others) in the hands of very dark forces that seek only to desensitize us and further justify increasingly abominable acts.

Questions About Consitutionalism

2009-08-02T22:06:00.009-04:00

Over the last several years, I have noticed a pointed rise in the popularity of Constitutionalism. To be fair, I want to note the necessary distinction between what I've seen to be two distinct brands of the movement: The first is Constitutionalism as a comprehensive political stance. I see this platform as being traditionally positive in that its impetus is an affirmation of what they interpret to be a strict adherence to the verbage of the constitution. This is in contrast to the second brand which resides within certain conservative Sean-Hannity-like circles who nominally describe themselves as Constitutionalists when it is politically advantageous to do so (generally during important Supreme Court goings-on such as the Sotomayor hearings), while conversely discarding it altogether when they see fit (generally during times of widespread panic, where it can easily be defended as an action which will protect the nation, for example in support of the Patriot Act). Their use of the term 'Constitutionalism' is typically negative, in the sense that it is almost always invoked when painting themselves as the victims of oppression, e.g. "They want to tax us more and change our health care!"

Obviously, the latter type requires no extended critique, as its absurdity is blatant. (Though I do want to clarify that the absurdity lies only in the use of the term at hand. The political stance is, I believe, as valid as any other.) I do want to briefly address the former, which to me, is very interesting. As previously noted, I do find the comprehensive nature of Constitutionalism admirable. Ironically, I think there are intriguing parallels to Marxism in this regard. At any rate, I think the best way to outline my critiques of and questions about Constitutionalism will be to pose a few broad questions and leave them open for response.

* Why the Constitution? Why not the Articles of Confederation, On Walden Pond, or the Qur'an?

* What exactly is a 'pure' interpretation of the Constitution? Is such an interpretation even attainable for people who are by nature contextual, and carry with them a variety of background assumptions?

* At its root, does the Constitution imply the freedom of future generations to step away from it?

Politweets

2009-07-13T22:24:00.013-04:00

The disputed 2009 Iranian presidential election sparked an unprecedented amount of U.S. media coverage, which of course led to a curious amount of attention in pop culture. As I basked in the warm glow of various electronic screens, I couldn’t help but feel a strange sense that something was awry within the bombardment of images of, chatter about, and support for the ensuing political demonstrations.

Time for reflection has helped me get closer to uncovering what I couldn’t put my finger on before: the benefit of devoting mass amounts of media coverage to the Iranian demonstrations, and the specific type of attention it was getting in the United States, would ultimately have nothing to do with the state of democracy in Iran.

As they often do, a few words from Slavoj Zizek ring true for me and seem to speak precisely to such a phenomenon. Describing the techno-savvy, business-minded, yet cause-sensitive people who are at the forefront of capitalism’s recent evolution into a non-self-perpetuating (i.e. not driven by greed alone) system which is very good at making lots of money by trying to care about Stuff at the same time, Zizek notes their odd political ethos by sarcastically pointing out the way they have reworked Marx's observation about the steam engine:

What are all the protests against global capitalism worth in comparison with the invention of the internet?

We are apparently a step even further now, for the overwhelming sense I had when the protests in Iran and the coverage of them were at their peak was that the message we were intended to receive had little to do with Iranian democracy; the real message was, “What is the struggle against totalitarianism worth in comparison with the onset of Twitter?”

Indeed, let’s ask ourselves who the winners of the whole ordeal were: the Iranian people? Certainly not, as their potentially flourishing democracy remains restrained by a totalitarian theocracy. The Iranian establishment? Obviously, Ahmadinejad will always look bad, but even Khamenei will find it hard to possibly look good after suppressing an opposition with very real concerns over the legitimacy of the election. Twitter? The company quickly discovered what the neo-capitalists have known all along, that nothing is as good for business as a humanitarian crisis. This is not to say that Twitter’s end-goal was to exploit the situation of the people of Iran. Nor am I suggesting that the awareness the Western world was allowed via Twitter was not beneficial in some way.

However, I think the subsequent inane Twitterization of everyday life we have seen since that time is evidence that the web site walked away with much gained. From inconsequential celebrities to legitimate news programs, Twitter has suddenly become some kind of proxy journalism; journalism being the institution formerly made up of professionals who sought the public good by seeking out first-hand, the developments society needed to be aware of, in order to bring about change.

It’s not that I find Twitter annoying and pointless (which I do), I just find this growing trend toward e-politics troubling. I remember during the last presidential election in our own country how often I heard facebook and MySpace group numbers being cited on the news. The advent of e-campaigns was the true focus, not political change.

Just as the internet boom failed to translate into deep political change in our own democracy, it is no surprise that we witnessed the same impotency in regards to Iran. While the people of Iran risked their physical well-being to take to the streets and demand to be heard, we in the U.S. failed to do the same. The Western media in general failed to move beyond the fact that Iranians were tweeting, and thus missed why they were doing it. I hope would-be activists in the U.S. soon realize that we can't tweet our way to a better future.

Race as Oppressive Social Construct?

2009-07-04T01:40:00.015-04:00

Of late, I've become more and more interested in exploring the philosophy of race. After reading several essays by Cornel West--who for obvious reasons has a vested interest in the subject--and working extensively on theories concerning the identity of the Other in politics for my thesis, I continue to notice the complex ways in which a philosophy of race must necessarily be considered inextricable from a cultural theory of violence.

I'll admit that all these various ideas came crashing together very unacademically tonight as I watched The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (which, by the way is the second best late night talk show behind Conan). During a chat with Corkie Roberts about the self-designated supremacy of the white male, Craig made the comment, "Do you know we just elected a black president?"

In light of the context of the conversation, I suddenly thought to myself, But, isn't Barack Obama as WHITE as he is BLACK?

The simple illustration of a man with a white mother and black father being labeled 'black' seems to me an indication that we are talking much more than ethnicity when we talk race. This ironically coincides with a book I had just started earlier today, "Violence" by Slavoj Zizek. In the introduction, Zizek writes, concerning necessary distinctions between various types of violence:

...Subjective and objective violence cannot be perceived from the same standpoint: subjective violence is experienced as such against the background of a non-violent zero level. It is seen as a perturbation of the "normal," peaceful state of things. However, objective violence is precisely the violence inherent to this "normal" state of things. Objective violence is invisible since it sustains the very zero-level standard against which we perceive something as subjectively violent. Systematic violence is thus something like the notorious "dark matter" of physics, the counterpart to an all-too-visible subjective violence. It may be invisible, but it has to be taken into account if one is to make sense of what otherwise seem to be "irrational" explosions of subjective violence.

We Americans are acutely aware of the disturbing volume of subjective violence perpetrated as a result of racial tensions. But, if we take Zizek's cultural theory and examine race in this light, I wonder if the imposition of race itself is the latent systematic act of violence, which, like dark matter, physically holds together our conceptions of peaceful racial normalcy (which, as we know is itself rife with various forms of objective political and economic violence). This ties into an earlier comment of Zizek's that:

...There is a more fundamental form of violence still that pertains to language as such, to its imposition of a certain universe of meaning.

The universe of meaning associated with being black is a universe I personally can observe but never experience or fully understand. However, there is commonality between it and my own racial universe of being white in that both, in my opinion, are violently imposed from without, rather than arising out of self-revelation.

Resulting from externally imposed racial identity, the impulse towards self-segregation is maddeningly more common than I think most people realize, and it's evident everywhere from the locations we choose to live, to the language we use to even talk about race. Imagine, for instance, a white immigrant from Johannesburg who chooses to call herself an "African-American." The term carries with it all of the associations and prejudices of the term 'black,' so I find it puzzling that it is often seen as being more politically correct. While racial identity makes us comfortable by drawing neat lines between us, these lines seem to be the very thing that must be examined and questioned if we are to understand and effectively act against the violence perpetrated because of them.

Returning to the example of our new president, we see this in his own profession of being a black man, in that this identity is entirely a result of experiences resulting from the larger system of racial prejudice and violence which has pre-defined him as 'black.'

So, again, I wonder if I'm way off in thinking that racial identity is itself violent. For the record, I think a 'color-blind' system is equally violent by imposing some sort of neutral identity, over a self-revealed one which would of course include skin color and resulting conceptions based on one's treatment because of it. Yet, behind segregation (self-imposed, or forced), behind prejudice, behind political and economic oppression, the ultimate act of violence seems to be defining who is black and who is white.

Eschatological Musings

2009-06-09T18:48:00.026-04:00

In recent weeks I've found myself part of or in the midst of numerous conversations about the so-called "End Times," or eschatology, which I prefer to think of more as the study of the eternal destiny of creation, rather than the "end" of it. I've also found myself constantly running across various articles, essays, and other writings dealing with the subject, some of which I find intriguing and enlightening, others destructive and annoying. Here, I just want to throw out some thoughts and frustrations that seem to frequently recur:

1. First, a pet peeve. The number of Christians whose views on eschatology are shaped primarily if not solely by a popular fiction series rather than Holy Scripture is disturbing. Alright...now I got that out of my system.

2. Second, a little nugget. A rich and helpful conception of a Christian approach to eschatology, perhaps typified by the neo-Calvinists, is that our entire Christian walk is predicated by our desire for the reality of the eschaton to insert itself into our present now. Indeed, Christ taught us to pray precisely this. In this sense, the Lord's coming is very much immanent; as immanent today as it was for the first century Christians St. Paul and St. John wrote their letters to.

3. I think too many people, because of given systems they have adopted, get so hung up on deciphering endless minutia such as what various items of prophesy might represent or point to, subsequently come to believe, or at least tend to lead others to believe, that eschatology is all about "End Times" and our job is to determine when, where, and how those times will come about. Not only do I not see much reason to think "End Times" prophesy deals strictly with Final Things, but we are told numerous times in Scripture that it is not our place to know the hows and whens. Our role is to be watchful and expectant of that future Hope. Being watchful and expectant seems to me to have dense and life-giving ramifications; the ramifications of the former stance seem to be suspicion (e.g. "World government is an evil concept"), false accusation (e.g. "Barack Obama is the anti-Christ"), and a shedding of responsibility (e.g. "Why take care of the earth or stop wars? They're signs of our ticket out of here!").

4. I get confused by the logic of the fundamentalist/dispensational line of thinking which, after declaring that it takes a "literal" view of Scripture, figures: Millennial Reign = literal 1000 years. Tribulation = literal 7 years. The 144,000 = symbolic/figurative number. I am certainly no Jehovah's Witness. Therefore my question is: If the 144,000 is not literal, upon what basis does one so adamantly insist that the Millennium and 7 year Tribulation must be literal numbers?

5. There are also overtones often, but certainly not always, present in the dispensationalist camp which are troubling in that they are more political than Biblical. By linking prophesies and other Scripture concerning Israel directly to its current manifestation as a modern nation-state, this interpretation promotes unquestioning support of the Israeli government to the level of a moral imperative good. I believe that the Christian Church indeed has an intimate link to Israel which demands our support of the Jewish people, but as I engage the pertinent prophesies, I always come out with the conviction that Zion never has and never will be confined by political boundaries.

6. I think it's important to keep in mind that God's end-goal for creation is redemption, not destruction. Redemption is a loaded term, I know, especially if you're not hip to church lingo. Basically, before sin entered the world, all of creation was in harmony with itself and with God. That harmony was subsequently disrupted; dire consequences ensued that still effect us today. I've never seen anything in Scripture that leads me to believe God ever messed up, nor any evidence to think our universe will be simply done away with and a do-over called. I disagree with the thought that sin and evil are powerful enough to utterly ruin what God declared to be Good. God's plan to welcome the universe back into harmony with Himself is a plan of restoration which will right past wrongs, not an apocalypse that will throw the baby out with the bathwater. Even today, God tells us, the power to live beyond the constraints of evil is ours because of the work of Christ.

7. In an effort to end on a symbolic number, perhaps representing the tribulation of reading this blog, I'll present a few random tidbits. >Yes, there will be animals in heaven; not the souls of animals, just your everyday soulless hyenas, chickens, aphids, and orangutans. The only difference will be that in heaven (the restored universe), they won't hurt us or each other and we won't hurt them. >No, I don't think there will be a rapture of the church before, during, or after the tribulation period. (Yes, I'm still allowed to be a Christian.) >I was once told there won't be any oceans in eternity. No, I don't agree. The idea comes from a frequently debated passage in the book of Revelation. However, I think a better interpretation than the "literal" one is the literarily informed one which remembers the ways in which oceans represented divine wrath in Scripture; for instance, when the evil Egyptian army was consumed by the sea, God's chosen people walked straight through it on dry ground. It makes sense that in a description of future Hope, St. John would point out that the wrath of God will disappear along with the corruption which necessitated it. >No, I don't have an eschatological timeline. (Yes, that's cheap.) I'm looking forward to the Bema Seat, but I think after either raising up out of my own freakin grave or watching Jesus descend out of the freakin sky, I won't be too concerned with schedules. Plus to me, timelines, much like systematic theology in general, do more in the way of restriction than they do illumination. >I honestly don't think eternity, heaven, the new earth, whatever you want to call it, will consist of us holding hands with angels singing Don Moen songs non-stop forever. Not that that wouldn't be cool, I just think our eternal activities will be indicative of our new ability to faithfully embody our roles as bearers of the image of God, all the time. I think we'll be eating awesome meals with St. Francis, painting portraits, watching the French Open, taking hot-air balloon rides, loving each other unquenchably, all as an act of worship in the presence of God.

Why U.S.-D.P.R.K. Nuclear Negotiations are Doomed

2009-05-27T20:38:00.015-04:00

A few of my thoughts and opinions on what is lacking in current efforts to stop the North Korean quest for nuclear armament:

To put this into a little bit of perspective, let me refer you to this article from Al Jazeera that I think accurately shows just how troubling the rhetoric from coming from both sides of the Pacific Ocean is getting. While Hillary Clinton's pledge to defend South Korea and Japan against North Korean aggression sounds at least more sane than Pyongyang's promise of "merciless punishment" for any future Western interference, I can't help but notice how old-fashioned, childish, and ridiculous the whole situation is. It's high time our leaders stop acting like this is an episode of 24 and realize that words having meaning, and there are consequences to thinking that torturing the right people can make up for a lack of insight, sensitivity, and reevaluation of outdated foreign policy.

1. Lack of Moral Standing

The success of nuclear proliferation, disarmament, and the eventual banning of nuclear weaponry altogether relies on, in my opinion, the willingness of influential proponents including the United States to lead by example. Call me idealistic (or perhaps I'm merely being ultra-realist), but Washington has little basis from which to demand a halt to the North Korean nuclear program. The U.S. is the only nation to ever use nuclear weapons, and it chose to do so twice, both times against defenseless civilians. In more recent history, it has failed to repaint its foreign policy image as anything other than troublingly self-interested, while at the same time (perhaps in a related sense) dangerously inconsistent in the when-why-and-how of world policing. Why then are we surprised when countries choose not to take the ever-beneficent U.S. at its word when it says it is working for the well-being and freedom of others? The point being not that the U.S. is evil, but that its history and lack of concrete moral standing causes even its most honest efforts to be held suspect and fall impotent.

Leading by example also involves self-restriction. I whole-heartedly call not only for the end of the North Korean nuclear program, but also that of the United States. Cold War-esque military buildup is no longer a sufficient buffer, and continual armament only serves as provocation and a hindrance to stepping onto the moral high ground. Nuclear disarmament of the U.S. will be the first bold step towards proving to the rest of the world that this nation is a proponent of peace, not mutual destruction.

2. Burning our Bridges

The People's Republic of China is one of the few nations in the world with a semi-open relationship with North Korea. While this relationship is still limited, it is a major mistake to continue burning bridges with China. Tiffs over big business and trade have caused a senseless riff in diplomacy. If the U.S. focused its efforts on bridging these gaps and touching up recent damages in its relationship with China through seeking, among other things, mutual cultural understanding, it will find itself a powerful and much-needed addition to allies in the region.

Embracing a Chinese ally in the North Korea situation would also create a crucial meeting point for important issues such as Taiwanese, Tibetan, and Uighur freedom. Along these lines, another important step towards finding common ground on these as well as the North Korean problem is a recommitment to the terms of the Shanghai communique. There is currently much uncertainty among the Chinese people as to whether or not the U.S. is seeking hegemony abroad. An added bonus to quelling these fears through an end of military aggression and halting our nuclear program would allow again, by means of taking the moral high ground, room to urge China to do the same. While I do not personally fear Chinese aggression outside its own borders, this move would most certainly not hurt.

3. The Sinking Ship

Above I have alluded to the major underlying problem of Washington's current foreign policy which will not cease in sabotaging efforts in North Korea and elsewhere until it is addressed, deconstructed, and revamped. The Obama administration, particularly Secretary Clinton and the President himself, need to realize that this is not World War II, this is not the Cold War, nor is this the Persian Gulf. Sovereign nations do not respond well to threats (empty or serious), nor are they comfortable with the U.S. continuing its role as world police (invited or not). The U.S. would do well in my opinion to take most seriously its role as a member of the United Nations and participant in various international treaties. Treaties have no pull and the UN is powerless as long as its most influential and respected members continuously lecture other nations about adhering to regulations they themselves regularly circumvent.

It seems to me that the New foreign policy of our age, if it is to be effective, should be characterized not by the power-grabbing, aggression, and threats of economic competition but rather by the friendship, understanding, and creativity of cosmopolitan cooperation.

Why I Love Charles Dickens

2009-05-16T13:30:00.008-04:00

I've heard from various people on various occasions that Charles Dickens is indulgent, overly-descriptive, dry, and boring. On such occasions I have found that the majority of these people have never actually read more than a few pages of his work, and on these occasions I have found I need only suggest a book or two of his in order to defend him.

Right now I am reading Oliver Twist, which has always been one of my favorites. I would also highly recommend Hard Times.

Here, I wanted to share a couple excerpts from Oliver Twist that I found particularly amusing, both of which illustrate in his own satirical way what I think is Dickens' acute sensitivity towards the industrialized age's particular brand of poverty, and which might convince some of you into reading some Dickens before you decide he's lame and boring.

Sevenpence-halfpenny's worth per week is a good round diet for a child; a great deal may be got for sevenpence-halfpenny, quite enough to overload its stomach, and make it uncomfortable. The elderly female was a woman of wisdom and experience; she knew what was good for children; and she had a very accurate perception of what was good for herself. So, she appropriated the greater part of the weekly stipend to her own use, and consigned the rising parochial generation to even a shorter allowance than was originally provided for them. Thereby finding in the lowest depth a deeper still; and proving herself a very great experimental philosopher.

...at the very moment when a child had contrived to exist upon the smallest possible portion of the weakest possible food, it did perversely happen in eight and a half cases out of ten, either that it sickend from want and cold, or fell into the fire from neglect, or got half-smothered by accident; in any one of which cases, the miserable little being was usually summoned into another world, and there gathered to the fathers it had never known in this.

I also enjoyed this later exchange:

...Mr. Bumble...returned; and, telling him it was a board night, informed him that the board had said he was to appear before it forthwith.

Not having a very clearly defined notion of what a live board was, Oliver was rather astounded by this intelligence...Mr. Bumble gave him a tap on the head, with his cane, to wake him up: and another on the back to make him lively: and bidding him follow, conducted him into a large white-washed room, where eight or ten fat gentlemen were sitting round a table. At the top of the table, seated in an arm-chair rather higher than the rest, was a particularly fat gentleman with a very round, red face.

'Bow to the board,' said Bumble. Oliver brushed away two or three tears that were lingering in his eyes; and seeing no board but the table, fortunately bowed to that.

...'I hope you say your prayers every night,' said another gentleman in a gruff voice; 'and pray for the people who feed you, and take care of you--like a Christian.'

'Yes, sir,' stammered the boy. The gentleman who spoke last was unconsciously right. It would have been very like a Christian, and a marvellously good Christian, too, if Oliver had prayed for the people who fed and took care of him. But he hadn't, because nobody had taught him.

...Oliver bowed low by the direction of the beadle, and was then hurried away to a large ward: where, on a rough, hard bed, he sobbed himself to sleep. What a noble illustration of the tender lawas of England! They let the paupers go to sleep!

2nd Week of Easter: The Woundedness of the Messiah

2009-04-21T18:42:00.025-04:00

A great deal of my Scripture readings, thoughts, and conversations of late have begun to spin a dense web concerning the events following the resurrection of Christ. It has never struck me until now, how much attention is paid--by the characters within the narratives, and the authors themselves--to the physical wounds on Christ's body, and what this woundedness says about our God and our relationship with him. As I have continued to reflect on this concept, I want to bring up several areas I have been dwelling on for some time that this resonates with greatly, particularly the eschaton. I don't intend to explore them at length, so feel free to leave thoughts, questions, and concerns.

1. On the Bridegroom

I'd like to open this discussion by examining two very old paintings which depict Christ's ascension.

First, check out this rendering by Dali, and then this one as Rembrandt pictured it.

You perhaps noticed, especially in the context of this discussion, two very striking differences: the hands and feet of Jesus. To me there is something very powerful and compelling about the truth contained in Rembrandt's rendering. I would imagine that most of us, when we envision Christ seated at the right hand of the Father, don't picture Him with nail holes in his hands and feet, and a chunk of flesh missing from his side; an eternal reminder of the pain and horror he suffered for the people He loves. (For that matter, I wonder how many people think of Christ as even having flesh.) It's far less complicated to settle for Dali's picture in that regard.

2. On the Bride

The Church's union with Christ is referenced throughout scripture, notably here in St. Paul's letter to the Galatian Church, in which he locates the point of unity precisely at Christ's crucifixion. It has been discussed previously that the death of Christ allowed us to be free from the strangle-hold of sin in our reality. However, the other half of the equation is equally important, as St. Peter points out here. Again, we see this reference to the wounded Savior, and what is being alluded to here is not only our unity in death, but also our unity in the resurrection and life (characterized by righteousness). The wounds are precisely and paradoxically what bring healing.

I am intrigued by the ways in which the identity of the resurrected Christ seems to be so inextricably tied with his woundedness. St. Luke provides us with this interesting exchange between Jesus and his disciples. Indeed, a great deal of the way in which we relate to Christ and interact with him revolves around our desire to draw near to him and put our hands on the wounds which allow us to do so.

In another sense, Jesus blunty draws attention to a seemingly simple, but all-too-often misunderstood aspect of human existence (which He Himself experienced): our embodied nature as creatures made in the image of God is characterized, among other things, by our physical existence. We are not ethereal, anonymous ghosts. We are embodied individuals known personally by God and to one another.

Therefore, why should we think that our eternal existence will somehow be carried out apart from this embodied nature? I love the beautiful portrait the prophet Isaiah paints of this in his own poetic way.

3. On the Wedding Feast

This post-resurrection scene recounted by St. Luke is a wonderful image, I think, and a great place to end this discussion. I like to think that our eternal existence, dwelling in the full glory of a resurrected Messiah, bearing His wounds in full view, will be a lot like this.

Holy Week Day 3: Thoughts on Divine Child-Abuse

2009-04-07T14:20:00.020-04:00

I remember hearing an interview on NPR some time ago with an espoused atheist (whose name has since slipped my mind) who wrote a book dealing with the violence of what he labeled the "Christian" God. He invited his audience to ask how an ever-loving, good God could condemn anyone to hell, and how a just God could murder his own son as payment for the sins of others. This latter question is the one I'd like to open up in light of Holy Week.

Though I think the author's perspective is rooted somewhere between an ignorance of and a misinterpretation of the Christian narrative, such questions are nevertheless valid for anyone seeking to understand these acts, especially those outside the Church who have legitimate concerns, hesitations, and suspicions about it. Furthermore, it is no surprise, given the plethora of violent interpretations of the Cross perpetuated among many Churches, that one would choose atheism over barbarism.

If the Church is intentional about how it engages in such conversations, there are as many benefits to answering these questions as there are to having them answered. Too often in certain Christian circles, staunch defenders-of-the-faith jump at the chance to dismantle piecemeal tenets of atheism, carelessly dismissing the idea of divine child abuse as yet another example of how heretical 'the world' has become. (Never addressing what such a continuous downward spiral of culture would reveal about the effectiveness of the Church.)

I also think it's important to espouse the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity without using it as another tool to dismiss the question. It is valid to say that since Christ is God, the cross is not divine child abuse. Yet while true (albeit incomplete), this 'defense' leaves itself open to being boiled down to divine self-mutilation, which is no more attractive. Luckily, however, it is also valid to say that Christ has a separate personhood from God. In a real sense, Jesus is the Son of God, and while simultaneously focusing on this distinctiveness is scarier for some, it is the only way to address the situation accurately and fully in the context of the Christian narrative. For, we know that rather than God simply acting as some sort of medieval flagellant, Christ, in individual expression, humbled Himself, obedient and subservient even to the point of death.

That being said, I'd like to move on to an interpretation of the Cross which I have found deeply compelling, and I don't want to frame it as a 'defense,' (at least in the overly loaded sense of the word) as much as an 'articulation.' I don't think it's helpful or productive to answer these questions merely in opposition to atheism, the ermerging church, or what have you. I think the 'challenge' of atheism calls us to affirm and know and claim our own story, rather than militaristically defend it, trench by trench, as if it were a piece of territory.

I want to draw from Rene Girard's rich, anthropological conception of the cross. What I find of value in his interpretation is that the responsibility for the violence of the crucifixion is rightly placed on human beings, not God. As a sort of cliff note, Girard's historical setting might read like this: the Roman and Jewish governments both desired absolute authority and were, at the end of the day, violently at odds with one another. However, what was found in the figure of Jesus of Nazareth was a suitable scapegoat, whose violent destruction would appease both sides, at least for a brief period. It seems reasonable to say that neither the Governors nor the Sadduccees believed that Jesus was the Messiah, yet both (and for similar reasons) saw his elimination as being advantageous to solidifying their own claims to power. This conflict is indicative of the cycle of violence which has been in motion since Cain and Abel.

"Part of the problem in the history of Christian interpretation, beginning already with the fathers, was that the Passion was for them a unique event. That is understandable of course. They saw it as a unique event, a single, unique event in worldly history. It is indeed unique as revelation but not as a violent event. The earliest followers of Jesus did not make that mistake. They knew, or intuited, that in one sense it was like all other events of victimization since the foundation of the world. But it was different in that it revealed the meaning of these events going back to the beginnings of humanity: the victimization occurs because of mimetic rivalry, the victim is innocent, and God stands with the victim and restores him or her. If the Passion is regarded not as revelation but as only a violent event brought about by God, it is misunderstood and turned into an idol. In the Gospels Jesus says that he suffers the fate of all the other prophets going back to Abel the just and the foundation of the world (Matt. 23:35; Luke 11:50)." - The Girard Reader

As the preeminent scholar and theologian, Brian Robertson, said in a sermon this past Sunday, God did not cause the events surrounding the crucifixion, he used them. I think it's dangerous to say that from the beginning of time, God's intention was to have his son murdered, and furthermore that such a murder is the only way forgiveness could happen. I know this will open up the proverbial can of worms, but I think what Girard offers is an interpretation which seeks to describe the overflowing, selfless nature of God's love.

Furthermore, it's an interpretation which takes into account the wider story of God's continual work of redemption and salvation in his creation. If we look at Christ's conversation with Nicodemus, we hear him directly address how mankind is to receive the gift of salvation. While Christ knew this work would literally culminate on the cross, he chose to explain it to Nicodemus, who was undoubtedly well-versed in the Torah, by comparing himself to the bronze snake in the book of Numbers.

Just like the poisonous snakes in the desert, God chose to use the violence which theretofore had justly condemned humanity to death as a means to save us. The fact that Jesus is the only human being who has ever been truly innocent, makes him the ultimate skapegoat toward whose death humanity might look to in order to see their acts of violence for what they truly are. Christ's words become clearer and we understand why those who refuse to look to the cross and recognize their own faults will be condemned.

So we see how God, rather than using his son as a whipping boy and an outlet for his wrath, in his infinite love and mercy chose to sacrifice his Son so that all who look upon him will find the salvation he desperately wants us to accept.

Brief Thoughts on GM

2009-04-01T13:19:00.009-04:00

I've been asked by several people how I feel about Obama and the Federal government essentially telling GM's CEO, Rick Wagoner, to step down from his leadership position at the private company.
First, we should be accurate about how we use the term 'private.' I think the distinction people are trying to make is that it's not a federally owned company. However, GM is not a private company, it is a public company. I only point this out as a pet peeve, and I'm not arguing that that makes them a federal company. I'm simply saying that a publicly traded company is not private. That being said, here's a few thoughts on questions raised over the last few days:

Over 15 years ago, GM had the opportunity to place itself on the cutting edge of automobiles with the production of the EV-1. This car consumed zero gallons of gas per mile and had zero emissions. For detailed information about what I'll briefly outline here, watch the great documentary, "Who Killed the Electric Car?". The short story is, a culmination of forces including the oil lobby saw to it that the production of affordable electric cars cease and desist and even ensured that EV-1s already on the road would be reclaimed and promptly destroyed. In place of the Electric Car, GM began production on the Hummer. All this to say that GM dug itself into a deep hole by confining itself to the production of vehicles that were so inefficient and consumed so much fuel, they couldn't even be sold in most foreign markets; nor, as we're seeing now, the U.S. market.

As a result of such business practices, GM could no longer keep itself afloat. The leadership turned to the federal government. I am not well-versed enough to know whether the stockholders of the public company were unwilling to support it, or if the company was bent on receiving taxpayer dollars. At any rate, the federal government approved billions of dollars (your dollars) to go towards this failed company. Then, as we all know, the company asked for more money, and got it.

For this reason, as much as the federal government deserves to be critiqued on their use of taxpayer money, GM should be critiqued just as sharply, for their willingness to even think about taking tax dollars from the American people directly for themselves completely isolated form any type of service offered, goods sold, etc. If you want to talk about rewarding failure, here's a perfect example.

Finally, having received an outlandish amount of funding from the federal government, GM effectively sold their soul. If the federal government and its money are the only thing keeping your company afloat, then Barack Obama can put whoever he wants in charge.

As a sort of aside, I would also be interested in hearing whether the company, whose demise or even the thought thereof warrants the absolutely insane type of bailout we've seen (the defense of which rests on the fact that if the company collapses, our entire economy will collapse), is in fact already nationalized.

Thoughts?

The Conservatives' Big Lie + How it Won Obama the Presidency + The Truth

2009-03-28T17:02:00.013-04:00

Villagers protest drone bombings authorized by President Obama which have murdered donzens of civilians.

“Barack Obama wants to wave the white flag in the war on terror.” I think most people can remember hearing similar statements during the exceedingly long presidential campaign. Some people might even remember believing it after having it drilled into their heads for so many weeks by GOP politicians, conservative pundits, and right-wing talk radio. The intense onslaught of spin and propaganda was intended to “wake up America,” “expose the radicals,” and in short, damage Obama in order to keep a Republican in the White House.

However, I regret to inform Rush Limbaugh and the lot that the effort to paint Obama as a European-style peacenik (an image Obama was happy to accept) is precisely what handed the election over to him. It is a dying shame that the overwhelming effort to make this big lie into a publicly recognized truth put the Stop Obama Express on a countdown to self-destruction.

The irony is that, rather than inflame the conservative base enough to drown out or reeducate the left, the lie actually ignited overwhelming numbers of young liberals. Once the idea of Obama as a candidate for peace began to be perceived as true, the GOP could kiss their presidential hopes goodbye, as that is exactly the type of candidate so many in our generation want. Even outside left-leaning student circles, America was ready for change, ready to leave the ways of militaristic power struggles behind; and conservatives showed them exactly who to vote for. The only problem was that many of these Obama voters did not have the wherewithal or desire to do the research necessary to find out they were being duped.

One needed only listen to what President Obama expressly stated in any number of nationally televised debates during the primaries to know that, far from waving the white flag in the war on terror, he would keep the nuclear option on the table in relation to Iran, raise troop levels in Afghanistan, carry out military operations across Pakistani borders without their permission, and continue anti-terrorism aggression in Iraq. For what it’s worth, Obama was at least honest, since he has followed through on all of the above.

Just this week, President Obama reminded the American people that they should be scared; al-Qaeda is “actively planning” attacks on the U.S. from Pakistan! He then had the gall to ask Congress for over a billion dollars to fund a military solution to the problem and mask it as a favor to the people of Pakistan. He also stated that we will "defeat terrorism," yet refrained from defining either what terrorism is, or exactly how many people need to be killed in order for it to be defeated. I hope I’m not the only one having some major déjà vu right about now:

"The regime has longstanding and continuing ties to terrorist groups, and there are Al Qaida terrorists inside Iraq." - George W. Bush (9/28/2002)

"If we're successful in Iraq, if we can stand up a good representative government in Iraq, that secures the region so that it never again becomes a threat to its neighbors or to the United States, so it's not pursuing weapons of mass destruction, so that it's not a safe haven for terrorists, now we will have struck a major blow right at the heart of the base, if you will, the geographic base of the terrorists who have had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11." - Dick Cheney (9/14/2003)

If Conservatives wanted to win the election, they need only have pointed out the bare naked truth about Obama’s militaristic tendencies and refusal to Imagine a United States that can hold itself together without a war. Loyalty would have then been fragmented away to third party candidates who offered a platform of peace, and John McCain would have won the election.

Bearing this in mind, for the time being, maybe we should count our blessings.

Urban Evangelism?

2009-03-20T12:37:00.006-04:00

I read an article in the current issue of Comment magazine about Christian attitudes toward cities, and I was struck by a comment the author, Robert Joustra, made about the nature of urban mission work:

"If our urban activities as people of faith are consistently predicated on conversion, we shall quickly become very bad neighbours. I think of this as a kind of spiritual narcissism which grows out of an interior insecurity about our own faith and life."

He later goes on to suggest that rather than viewing missions work, particularly in our home cities of urban North America, in a truncated sense, with conversion and proselytization as its exclusive goal...

"...we learn to live and share the Gospel story in ways that far exceed a simple dualistic mission--we start to think of worshipping God and honouring him by building efficient transit [etc.]...the Gospel in the urban metropolis calls us forth into all the manifold spheres of city life, to enact justice, sustain and cultivate beauty..."

I think this observation is right on, and I think the practices of even the most adamant, unapologetic, and conservative Christians show that they agree. The most evident example of this that I see is the way in which most overseas missions work, especially when there is a language barrier, is carried out. I've never heard of a team memorizing the Romans road in Spanish or Chinese; but they do have faith that the Spirit of God will be evident in their work of building a home for a single mother, or teaching English to students.

I am not saying that I think preaching the gospel has no place in missions work. Obviously, even in the above example, for instance, the gospel is at the forefront. However, I am indeed suggesting that there are benefits to reexamining urban missions along the lines mentioned. Rather than conversion being our number one goal, what if our goal was to cultivate life-giving practices within an urban context so that the gospel can be embodied through our actions, rather than (often empty) words? And what would happen if we partnered with inter-faith non-profits, government organizations, and all resources at our disposal creatively and faithfully to do it?

I think implicit in Christ's command to go and preach the gospel to all nations is a call to constantly deconstruct the practices we employ to accomplish it. While it may have been appropriate and effective in St. Paul's context to walk into a city, head to the synagogue and start converting people, our own reality is much different.

While there are appropriate times to evangelize and a number of people who respond positively to it, I think one thing that is lacking in our Church culture is a desire to serve with absolutely no ulterior motives including the desire for the one served to come to Christ or attend a church service.

What if we serve selflessly, often, and creatively enough that we become known as lovers rather than preachers, and by the work of the Holy Spirit, our cities invite themselves to a Sunday service? Amidst a culture of death and violence, there is something so compelling about the Church, whose gospel offers life and peace.

Rejecting Obama Bush-era Policy

2009-03-18T12:45:00.002-04:00

Amidst the Hope expressed in the impending closure of Guantanamo bay and the official rejection of torture as a legitimate interrogation technique, we cannot help but feel short-changed by the White House as our watchful eyes make us painfully aware of what these symbolic—nevertheless important—acts are intended to mask.

Beneath the façade of Change and progressive foreign policy, lies a disturbing cache of stockpiled Bush-era stratagem ranging from extraordinary rendition to preemptive war, combined with the same destructive ego/natio-centric worldview which takes great pains to justify every sort of evil by way of self-interest and self-preservation.

As civilian casualty rates in Afghanistan reach an all-time high and the documented number of such deaths in Iraq approaches the 100,000 mark, we are compelled to reflect on the high price paid for our national security. We are compelled to beg of President Obama an answer to the question first posed by Mahatma Gandhi, “What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?”

We can no longer bask in our own privileged circumstance, averting our eyes from those unfortunate enough to live on the wrong side of the world; the side where a family is just as likely to be blown to pieces by a suicide bomber as they are to be incinerated inside their own home by a Coalition missile.

Despite the wave of popularity surrounding the new President, and the dizzying array of inane economic noise, we, the American public, refuse to be seduced or distracted. We challenge our new national leaders to publicly defend the policies they reject in their rhetoric, yet retain behind closed doors. We will not stand idly by, smiling to ourselves as 17,000 more U.S. armed forces are sent into Afghanistan to kill or be killed in service of the nation, its market, its consumerist ideals, and its political interests.

Let us remember that, “To fight violence with violence can only ever result in a victory for violence, not a victory over it,” as Bishop N.T. Wright warns.

It is high time the American people, particularly Christians, call into question the appropriateness of Obama’s decision to continue drone bombings in the sovereign nation of Pakistan, which invariably result in the murder of innocent families.

We, the Church, must openly reject the destroy-them-before-they-destroy-us mentality which President Obama has allowed to carry over into this new administration, as all resulting policy is in no way life-giving, redemptive, or reflective of faithful human be-ing. This mentality, being in every way inappropriate for any type of Christian or civil interaction, can no longer be seen as legitimate policy, blindly accepted, or passively coalesced.

So, What About 9/11: The Cost of National Security (If it Exists)

2008-12-20T14:47:00.002-05:00

Addressing the U.S. Army War College on December 17, the outgoing President Bush delivered a direct and extended final defense of his administration’s foreign policy over the last 8 years. While the speech covered a range of topics, a key point was the President’s adamant reminder that because of his post-9/11 policies, there has not been a major terrorist attack on U.S. soil. It is this point, which enjoys frequent play from conservative mouthpieces and White House spokespeople alike, that I wish to examine along several lines which I believe beg acknowledgment and harsh critique.

1. “So, What About 9/11?”

Even more puzzling than the attempt to take credit for the nation’s post-9/11 safety without ever admitting the failure to keep the nation safe on that particular day, is the herd-like sheepishness of those who accept such desperate school playground tactics. It is not my intent to open a 9-11-truth discussion; at this point I do not believe that the U.S. had a hand in planning or purposefully allowing the attacks. My point is simply that the hard line Bush is trying to draw between pre and post is faulty. There indeed have been no terrorist attacks on U.S. soil since 2001. However, if he desires any praise to rest on his shoulders for the policies which have kept the homeland safe, he MUST also accept responsibility for the policies which failed to protect us on 9/11. To my knowledge there has been no formal apology to the families of those who lost their lives, or to the nation. Rather, the events of that day have been exploited in ways that need no extended description here. Let it suffice to point out that for the majority of Americans since the founding of the nation, a basic role of government is to protect its citizens from foreign powers who wish them ill. Having failed in that role on 9/11, this administration has sought to (perhaps successfully) redefine the way its citizens conceive of protection. Rather than protection meaning a kind of preventative measure to ensure safety, people are now content to observe vicarious vengeance and disproportionate aggression in a volume sufficient to drown out the pain of having not been protected, and provide a false (yet sufficient) sense of security amid fear of not being safe. Incidentally and circularly, this fear is what allows said government to continue carrying out its failed policies.

To reiterate, ultimate responsibility for the thousands of murders which took place in the terrorist attack lies on those who carried them out. That being said, we and the President must at least be consistent in our giving and receiving of praise. If Bush is responsible for successful policies, as President of the United States, he must also accept responsibility for the failed ones.

2. “How We Got Safe.” and “Are We Really?”

‘Torture’ is the word of the day here, and for Vice President Cheney, it’s almost as easy to redefine as ‘protection’ or maybe ‘executive branch.’ In order to even discuss this topic rationally, we must put behind us what seems to be, based on back-and-forth contradictory statements the White House has made over the last 8 years, the Bush administration’s anti-rational confusion about what exactly torture is, whether or not they use it, and whether or not it is immoral. Let’s simply pick up with their most recent story—they do use it, and that’s okay because there hasn’t been a single terrorist attack on U.S. soil since 9/11. Amid CRIMINAL investigations into the U.S. government’s use of torture in the war on terror, Cheney cited, in so many words, his clear conscience on the matter because of the legal advice the White House sought regarding the use of torture and how to not call it torture anymore.

What this all comes down to then, is that torture, which has, since the dark ages, until recent years been universally frowned upon as inherently evil, is now being presented as not-so-bad if it keeps the people perpetrating it safe and is okay with their lawyers. I will expand on just how torture is NOT okay in section 3.

It may be relevant to address the question of whether torture has indeed made us safer, despite the inconsequentiality of the answer next to the prime question of its morality or lack thereof. The Bush administration has been clear and consistent in asserting that it is indeed effective and, in case you’ve forgotten, has on various occasions saved us from terrorist attacks on U.S. soil. However, this is in direct conflict with the unanimous conclusion of counterterrorism officials and experts (besides Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld, etc.) in the U.S. and around the world who know that “not only have coercive methods failed to generate significant and actionable intelligence, they have also caused the squandering of resources on a massive scale through false leads, chimerical plots, and unnecessary safety alerts.” The facts of the matter are simple: A tortured person who knows nothing will at some point tell the torturer whatever it is that he or she wants to hear, while by and large, a dedicated individual who does have information, will never give up sensitive details essential to the success of his or her cause (take for instance, John McCain).

To conclude this section, let us recall that according to the Bush administration, the safety of our homeland is thanks in large part to the implementation of the medieval-Spanish Inquisition-barbarian-style practice of torture. God bless the USA and God bless the desecration of human dignity. (I’ll leave it up to you to decide whether it is the dignity of the torturer or the tortured being desecrated.)

3. “At what cost?”

Another striking aspect of the gloating declaration of the safety of our homeland since 9/11 is its blatant ego- and ethno-centrism. Are we Americans to smile and accept this ‘safety’ without reflecting on the murders of hundreds of thousands of people who are unfortunate enough to live in Iraq, Israel, Afghanistan, Pakistan, or other countries who endure DAILY terrorist attacks? Some of which, specifically in Iraq, are in response to the presence of U.S. military forces. Furthermore, are we to ignore the thousands of murders which have directly resulted during military and counter-terrorism operations, basking in our own privileged circumstance of not living down the block from a terrorist? Though I won’t expand on this here, if one were to do so, the President’s statement at the Army War College, “We expanded our efforts to combat the conditions of despair and hopelessness that give rise to rage and radicalism,” is more ironic than true. Again, to my knowledge, there has been no formal apology from the White House to the families of the innocent civilians killed in the War on Terror, and until there is, the President cannot expect to receive any praise for the ousting of Sadaam Hussein and the Taliban.

Similarly, when we return to the subject of torture, we must ask ourselves what the cost of our ‘safety’ really is. Now that torture has been implemented and defended as a legitimate policy, the U.S. government has placed itself in the company of many less-than-savory historical and contemporary characters, and listing any will no doubt invite angry responses from readers; but, I think we can all think of a few. Like such villains, it is hard to imagine how history—in a manner Bush is banking on—could smile on such tactics, those who carried them out, or those who endorsed and defended them.

The final cost I want to open for discussion, rather than draw out here, is theological in nature. Christians universally affirm that all human beings are created in the image of God, and I believe it is necessary, especially for Evangelicals who so readily tow the neoconservative line, to reflect on how the use of torture and pre-emptive aggression relates to our view of this image-bearing. James tells us that faith is dead if we simply claim it without putting it into practice. Relating back to other topics I’ve mentioned, are we justified in viewing people who bear the image of God as collateral damage in a desperate attempt to save our own nation, our own hyper-consumerist economy, or our own political interests? And how are we to derive from Scripture a kind of guideline as to when a person ceases to bear the image of God, or what types of behavior or situations grant us the right to treat them as if they do not? Finally, when we torture another human being or intentionally kill an innocent human being in order to get the bad guys, in what way are we fulfilling our own roles as image-bearers? Christ tells us in Mark 12:17 that we who bear the image of God belong to Him and are to go about the work of HIS Kingdom, not Caesar's.

Policies of pre-emptive aggression and torture, while touted by many as having kept our nation safe, must be sharply criticized and no longer blindly and passively accepted as effective and morally right. Furthermore, these policies must be questioned as to how they reflect or do not reflect the events of 9/11 which have since been exploited to justify them. For Christians and non-Christians alike, the Bush mentality of destroy-them-before-they-destroy-us is directly reflective not of the good life enjoyed in the Kingdom of God, nor the civility of human-being, but the violent, sociopathic behavior of the prison yard.

The Presidential Dichotomy (10/16/08)

2008-10-25T13:31:00.000-04:00

before adding my thoughts, i wanted to share a section of an article written by james k.a. smith (some of you are familiar with him) that i came across on his website.

the article addresses several issues that i think will present us with some interesting and beneficial points of discussion. at the very least, some of you will decide to be offended, which if nothing else will make things lively.

Ronald Reagan was no intellectual, but he had an earnest faith in ideas and he spent decades working through them. He was rooted in the Midwest, but he also loved Hollywood. And for a time, it seemed the Republican Party would be a broad coalition — small-town values with coastal reach.

In 1976, in a close election, Gerald Ford won the entire West Coast along with northeastern states like New Jersey, Connecticut, Vermont and Maine. In 1984, Reagan won every state but Minnesota.

But over the past few decades, the Republican Party has driven away people who live in cities, in highly educated regions and on the coasts. This expulsion has had many causes. But the big one is this: Republican political tacticians decided to mobilize their coalition with a form of social class warfare. Democrats kept nominating coastal pointy-heads like Michael Dukakis so Republicans attacked coastal pointy-heads.

Over the past 15 years, the same argument has been heard from a thousand politicians and a hundred television and talk-radio jocks. The nation is divided between the wholesome Joe Sixpacks in the heartland and the oversophisticated, overeducated, oversecularized denizens of the coasts.

What had been a disdain for liberal intellectuals slipped into a disdain for the educated class as a whole. The liberals had coastal condescension, so the conservatives developed their own anti-elitism, with mirror-image categories and mirror-image resentments, but with the same corrosive effect.

The federal electoral game has come down to a tribalism. The presidential debates have amounted to little more than another opportunity for the candidates to preach to their respective choirs. And thus campaigns come down to little more than a bet on who has the bigger choir, and who can motivate their choir to come out and vote. Since the elite choir that the Republican party really serves is so small, they had to look for a cagey way to find another choir. Their bet--embodied in Palin--is that there is a massive, perhaps largely quiet, choir composed of Joe Sixpacks in the middle of the country--a choir whose anthem is a long disdain for complexity and "learning."

But that's not "conservatism." It is a wanton disdain for the wisdom of the past that has spiraled into a reverie of ignorance cloaked as "common sense." That such people get a vote is exactly why conservatism has always had an uneasy relationship with democracy.

i don't think anyone from any edge of the political spectrum will deny after some reflection that the dichotomy smith observes as developing over the last few decades between the anti-elitism of the right and the condescension of the left, has manifested itself in the current nominees for president and vice president from the two dominant parties, or at least in the way their campaigns have operated.

consider the rejected candidacy of dr. ron paul. i would argue, and i think many would agree that no candidate from either party is more qualified to address the current economic crisis of this country. furthermore, in my opinion, ron paul was the ONLY republican candidate with a sane foreign policy. obviously, i can't prove this by any means, but i wonder how many people chose not to vote for him because of the way he spoke (that is to say, his vernacular was that of a college professor rather than a big game hunter) and the fact that he was interested in engaging in legitimate, intelligent political debate about relevant issues, rather than stirring people up with one-line zingers or cheap appeals to patriotism, anger or fear.

understandably, what the GOP has come up with are two candidates who either are, or present themselves as, the opposite of intellectual. an example would be in tonight's debate, mccain criticized obama, who, after presenting his energy plan which he claimed would aggressively pursue alternative energy and push oil companies to drill on the thousands of acres of land they already own but have yet to make use of, said he would also think about off-shore drilling. mccain chuckled and emphasized obama's use of the word, 'think.' off-shore drilling, he insisted, must be started immediately; considering one's options, reflecting on the possible consequences of one's actions, etc—that's pointy-headed east-coast mumbo jumbo!

it cannot be ignored that mccain's critique here is indicative of a hyper-consumerist worldview which demands immediate (and necessarily temporary) satiation of one's most immediate desires (which are perceived as needs).

then we have sarah palin, who makes barack obama look over-qualified. what at first to me seemed a very curious choice for a running mate, is now making more and more sense. she is the complete opposite of an academic, for one thing. she stays away from the big words ron paul used, as well as the big issues he addressed. while she accurately reminds us that she didn't come out of washington and is just like all the joe (and jane) plumbers out there, she brings nothing new, innovative, or interesting to the political table; she totes the neo-conservative line and is sure to throw in a few smackeroos in her speeches. while i would thus not be inclined to vote for jane plumber, that, my friends (as mccain would say), is more than enough to scoop up the votes john has been after since 2000.

of course, i can't go without addressing my problems with the other side of the aisle, but i'll save that for another time.

thoughts?

On the Eucharist: A Few Quandaries (9/16/08)

2008-10-25T13:30:00.001-04:00

The topic of transubstantiation is a complicated one and has been creeping around in the recesses of my brain for the last several months. The purpose of this note is to hear the opinions of as many respected friends and elders as possible, because at this point in my research and meditations on the subject I’m still left with more questions than answers.

Lately I’ve been working from the (in)famous John 6 discourse. If you’re not familiar with it, I’d recommend reading 6:23-58 and the surrounding context. Generally what this comes down to in the never-ending historical debate is whether we are to take Jesus’ words literally or figuratively; and I’ll also go ahead and just posit my own opinion that verse 63, which is often argued as Christ’s clarification that he was speaking metaphorically, does not point to the use of language, but rather to the nature of faith.

What also strikes me about this passage is that Jesus, as he does often in his teachings, seems to be drawing a parallel between the words he is speaking and the Old Testament canon. In this case, at least as I read it, he wants his listeners to identify themes of the current topic—which is his claim that he is the bread of Heaven—with the events in Exodus 16 where God provides the Israelites miraculously with manna from Heaven.

I think it’s also important to note how confused his disciples were after this conversation, so when we look ahead to the Last Supper in Luke 22, I wonder if light bulbs were going off for them at that meal. While at the time it had seemed so strange for Christ to tell them that those saved by him would eat his flesh and drink his blood, it must have finally clicked to see him holding the unleavened bread and the wine, saying “This is my body, broken for you, and the blood that I will spill for you to establish a new covenant between you and God. Remember me and what I have done for you every time you have this meal.”

So here again we are faced with this same question as to what sense Jesus was speaking in. Yet, whether figurative or literal, it seems to be clear that we are to understand the bread and wine of Holy Communion in a similar sense as the manna from Heaven.

Beyond this, I also wonder how important this issue is to our theologies. It was expressed to me by one pastor that he would rather err to the side of transubstantiation because he does not want to limit the power of God to perform such a miracle. To me, the strength of such a position would be that it provides room for the mystery of our faith in which we so often hope against hope, as Paul put it, that the impossible will be made possible. On the other hand, I am sensitive to the concerns of many denominations about this; namely ramifications leading to the bloated role of the clergy in Eucharistic prayer, versus the priesthood of all believers. I think this is the issue most important to Protestant Christians since we would obviously reject the need for the historical Roman Catholic re-presentation of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, which is often used as another argument against transubstantiation. This idea, to me, does not seem to be essentially tied up with the notion of transubstantiation. What I mean to say is that in this context, I think it is necessary to distinguish the notion of transubstantiation from a particular denomination and its associated doctrines or traditions.

At this point it is perhaps appropriate for me to lay out my current position, however shaky or unfounded it may be, for the sake of feedback. Furthermore, I won't even attempt to organize the following into an organized series of points.

I do think that the nature of our faith is mysterious and not propositional, so I think that to some extent any beliefs about the Eucharist must reflect that. I believe that there is a miracle that takes place in the sacrament of Holy Communion; perhaps transubstantiation is part of it. However I think more importantly, we are recipients of grace in that any actions which are in accordance with God's commands draw us closer to him. Beyond that, I think the Eucharist is unique in that there are such obvious communal ramifications; not only do we draw nearer to God, but we also can sense his grace in our drawing near to one another unified in thankful remembrance of Christ whose body was broken and whose blood was poured out; our only means of salvation. I also think based on John 6 and Exodus 16 that if a transubstantiation takes place, the miracle is not because of a prayer or a priest, but because of God's drawing us deeper into a faith that can move mountains...

...or facilitate Christ's presence in the elements we receive at the Lord's table.

Thoughts From 'Dark Knight' (7/29/08)

2008-10-25T13:29:00.001-04:00

Two moments in the movie stood out to me and have remained stuck in my head since then, so I thought I'd share them here and see what everyone else thought. SPOILER ALERT!! If you haven't seen the movie yet, stop here if don't want to be told about some important scenes. Come back later and comment!

repeat: SPOILER ALERT!!

1. While visiting Harvey Dent at Gotham General, the Joker, clad in a nurse's uniform said something quite poignant, though in discussing it, I am aware of the subtle irony in discussing any of his quotes. "WHY SO SERIOUS??" I could be asked, but oh well. To paraphrase, the Joker made the observation that people don't panic as long as things go according to plan, even if the plan itself is horrifying. I wonder how many people, like me, have found that statement to be accurate and in what instances.

2. The most interesting part of the movie for me was the ulterior concept of the climax. Two ferry boats were placed in a situation which demanded immediate action and required them to make a choice between two options; or at least they were led to believe there were two options. You've seen the movie so there's no reason for me to explain all that went on, but what I found so intriguing was the tension between democracy and humanity. In our cultural context we generally see these two terms as synonymous; democracy is the greatest, most moral system and the best way to ensure the dignity of human life. Now, I know this was a fictional situation, but I do think it was very indicative of real-life human nature. In this situation, as far as I saw it, democracy succeeded in serving it's purpose. However, even while functioning properly and efficiently in a time of crisis, we still must say it failed in the end, while the goodness of human nature prevailed. The ruling of the democratic system demanded by virtue of the majority that one group take the lives of another. It was only when those involved overruled the process to make for themselves a new option that hundreds of lives were spared. I think we can apply this critique to other situations in our system that are perhaps less extreme. In the movie, democracy failed because the only choices it provided were supplied by a manipulative force, rather than by those choosing. Again I wonder if anyone else can think of similarities to current affairs, or has ideas of how to enhance the democratic system.

We can tie these two scenes together by pondering whether modernity's democracy can be the plan mentioned by the Joker, only functioning as a levy against an unwanted or uncomfortable political situation, and how can we prevent that.

A Hypothetical (7/20/08)

2008-10-25T13:25:00.002-04:00

You are in charge.
In a meeting with Secretary of Defense Gates and the joint chiefs of staff, you learn that a top-ranking Al-Qa'ida operative has been secretly plotting attacks world-wide from right under our noses here in the United States.
He is currently hiding out and coordinating with other terrorists from the basement of a small apartment building in, say, Atlanta.
A folder is pushed across the table to you.
The folder contains a plan to take out the Al-Qa'ida leader using tactics that have proved successful in similar situations in the mid-east.
In summary, the plan calls for a B-2 bomber to drop a precision-guided payload onto the building containing the terrorist.
Simple.
Of course, there will more than likely be civilian casualties which would mostly be those who live in the building, but also anyone in the immediate area would obviously be at great risk.
You are understandably concerned, but are informed that action must be taken now or never, and there is simply no other way.
What do you do? What would any leader past or present do? Why or why not?

I believe that the majority of you would not allow the plan to be carried out. The result would simply be too catastrophic, and for a variety of reasons you cannot find a way to ethically or morally justify such an action. Perhaps dozens of American citizens losing their lives for the sake of killing one man does not seem worth it or right. Or perhaps after the massive loss of life on 9/11 due to a terrorist attack, the idea of the American government itself taking the lives of civilians seems too outrageous.

That being said, how can the American government, or any government, justify the actions that have been, are currently, and will continue to be carried out in the 'War on Terror' and various other military operations. Hundreds of thousands of innocent lives have been lost in situations not unlike the hypothetical I described. The only difference is the location.

I am baffled at how so many Americans can say that the massive loss of life we see taking place on a daily basis as a result of US military action is simply "part of war" or "necessary to keep us safe" or "going to be worth it in the end." Some even say "they deserve it" or “they are evil, we are good.”

There are simply too many problems with any such reasoning to count. In the first place, philosophically speaking, the line drawn between rogue 'terrorist' and government sanctioned 'soldier' at this point in the failed project of the modern nation-state is, in my opinion, a thin one. And going back to my original track, why are you so inclined to let something happen in another country that you would be shocked and appalled and terrified at if it happened in your own?

There are those of course who jump immediately to claims of racism. I would say that this is true only to an extent. While there are obviously those who hate Arabs, Africans, and/or Jews, I feel that there is still an underlying philosophical groundwork and line of thinking, whether conscious or unconscious, at work here.

We all remember what watching the news was like during the weeks, months, and year or more following 9/11 and can imagine the media frenzy and public outcry that would take place if we learned that our own government had killed its own under the above hypothetical circumstance. So why is it that we are so complacent about this current war, its architects, and its allies who, in order to remove terrorist threats and political rivals, have claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians in Somalia, Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait among other places?

The following are what I believe to be a few but not all of the basic key underlying philosophical issues that I'm interested in here more than whether or not war is right or wrong, and I invite any relevant thoughts and discussion as there is much more to these than the short fragments I list.

Thinking along the lines of Zizek, the breakdown and/or inter-mingling of Virtual and Reality. Perhaps we do not really believe that the death we see on a television set, in the news paper, or in casualty reports is real or relevant.

A la Benhabib, what grounds does the state have to do to outsiders what it would not think of doing to its own people?

In considering Levinas, Derrida, et al., has the Other become so far removed from the Self, that we no longer see violent actions as such?

Based on the teachings of Christ, should military action which knowingly, albeit not for its own end, takes the lives of civilians, be justified or condemned?

candidates that "cut and run"...

2008-05-05T09:46:00.001-04:00

...don't exist.

contrary to what you might have gathered from listening to your favorite neo-conservative commentators and gad flies, hillary clinton and barack obama are not all that dissimilar to john mccain when it comes to foreign policy. and to be fair and honest, i could easily have said, "contrary to what you might have gathered from listening to you favorite pseudoliberal presidential candidate in his or her stump speeches..."

take a look at a quote from hillary clinton that i was not at all shocked to hear and even less shocked at how little outrage subsequently arose within the democratic party:

on april 22, she said, in reference to what would happen if iran were to launch an attack on israel, "i want the iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack iran. in the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them."

iran strongly condemned clinton for her remarks. iran's deputy UN ambassador, mehdi danesh-yazdi, called her comment "provocative, unwarranted and irresponsible" and "a flagrant violation" of the UN charter.

later, she had no regrets about her comment. "why would I have any regrets? i'm asked a question about what i would do if iran attacked our ally, a country that many of us have a great deal of connection with and feeling for, for all kinds of reasons. and, yes, we would have massive retaliation against iran."

and what about our friend, the peacenik, obama? on august 1 last year, he strongly warned pakistani leaders that if they failed to act against islamic extremists when he was president, he would not hesitate to send US troops into their country unilaterally:

"when I am president, we will wage the war that has to be won." he added, "the first step must be to get off the wrong battlefield in iraq and take the fight to the terrorists in afghanistan and pakistan."

so for those of you who consider yourselves peace-voters, and also those of you on the other end of the political spectrum who insist on spouting over-mileaged talking points, consider the facts.

hillary clinton and barack obama are in no bigger of a hurry than john mccain to put an end to this misguided foreign policy we have lived (and millions died) with for the past 40-odd years. furthermore, i see little difference between the violent, threatening, and extremely dangerous rhetoric of the two democratic candidates, and that of the current administration.

in either of their platforms on the subject opportunity for peace is minuscule, as there remains an over-arching arrogance and disregard for human life which requires that all in the international community behave to our liking if they don't want missiles accidentally falling through their roofs.

both candidates offer little HOPE, no BLUEPRINT FOR CHANGE, fear not STRENGTH, more destruction not RESTORATION.

obama and clinton are simply concerned with relocating the bloodshed.

September 10

2007-11-25T02:34:00.001-05:00

Hello from sunny (smoggy) Xiamen!

All is well so far. I’m getting to know new people, both American and Chinese, the courseload is heavy, but so far I haven’t dug myself into an incredibly deep hole. Yesterday I finished a project about the poetry of the Tang Dynasty. I have managed to avoid Chairman Mao’s revenge despite eating my share of local flavors. I’ve had several frog dishes. These are not your grandpa’s fried frog legs; I’m talking take a whole frog, chop it up, boil it and put it in some rice. It really doesn’t have a bad flavor, you just have to make sure you spit out all the bones. I also had an eel dish that was without a doubt the spiciest thing I have EVER put into my mouth. It was not good times for my tongue.

Update

2007-09-10T04:31:00.001-04:00

September 6

I just wanted to quickly let everyone know that I didn't mean for my last post to sound so depressing, haha. I was severely jet-lagged and such, so I'll try to fill you in on some new info.

I have recently found out that there are occasionally times where the tide is super special or something and it's safe to get into the water. The way to tell when those times are, is if you look outside and there are thousands of Asians in the sea.

There is a saying around these parts that "the mountains are high and the emperor is far away." Curfew is not as bad as we were led to believe. Supposedly the doors are locked at curfew and if you're late you have to wake up the guard who will be very displeased. So says the emperor. But out here behind the mountains at Nan Guang Wu (my dorm), the guards are up until midnight throughout the week and even later on the weekends sitting outside, smoking and talking. And I heard from other students that drunk people stumble in at 3am on a regular basis, so if i do happen to be exceptionally late, he'll be pleasantly surprised that I'm even coherent. So, it's nice not to have the burden of a strict curfew looming over my head.

I’m getting used to my, shall we say, extremely firm bed. As my roommate said, “I’m not going to be able to sleep when I get home; I’ll be too comfortable!”

The heat never stops getting to you, but we have all learned, as the locals have, to take advantage of every speck of shade possible while walking to or from anywhere.

Well, there’s an update, I’m feeling optimistic and trying to have some fun and stay on top of my courseload!

Never Been So Glad to Take a Shower

2007-09-04T04:46:00.000-04:00

August 29

Well here I am. All unpacked in my dorm in Xiamen. All of my flights were good, without any major problems. All my luggage made it, which is always a treat. The plane rides over were kind of surreal in a way. I was sitting there trying to realize that I’m actually going somewhere and it’s not someplace familiar in any way. The other students in my group all seem nice and first impressions have been formed. Some I like and some I’d rather not carry on any particularly long conversations with.

Although my travel over here couldn’t have been more smooth, I would not say it was at all relaxing. I’m not even sure how long I’ve been up at this point, but until about 20 minutes ago, it had been that same amount of time since I’d had a shower. Have I mentioned that it’s absurdly, heinously hot? So, it was absurdly hot and we were all jet-lagged and we had to do a sort of scavenger hunt around the city/campus which reminds me of a Chinese version of OSU the way the city and campus intertwine. Anyway, all I can say is, after hours upon hours of travel immediately followed by hauling 100 pounds of luggage up 5 flights of stairs (which, might I add, I am looking forward to scaling multiple times a day), followed by hours upon hours of wandering around shops and random places in Xiamen in the overwhelming tropical heat, I have never felt so disgusting and nasty and tired in my life (well, I’ve probably been more tired, but definitely not as gross).

I kept thinking to myself as we walked through the streets, “At least after sweating all day walking to and from class we’ll be able to chill out and swim in the ocean.” This leads me to bomb shell number one: yeah, um, China pollutes their water so badly that you pretty much don’t want to get in it…ever…unless you want poop and herpes water running all over you. But, I do hear there’s a swimming pool somewhere.

So, after wandering the streets and all that, we made our first 15 minute walk to where I believe the majority, if not all, of my classes are going to be. Oh, and it was ridiculously hot outside. We had a Chinese dinner and talked about some introductory stuff for the semester and headed back to unpack, shower, and rest; shower in a European-style shower (which I don’t mind at all, you just have to get used to stooping over a toilet when you’re showering), and sleep on box springs since the Chinese don’t use mattresses. My hope was that I would also be able to get online and in contact with friends and family. Bomb shell number 2: oh yeah, those computer labs and internet cafes we told you about? Yeah, those are about a 15 minute walk away and you have to pay to use them. And the internet in your room, you have to pay for that too if you want it, but it will take a while get set up. Great. So to all of you who have been wondering where the H I have been, I’ve been wallowing in self-pity.

Bomb shell number 3: right, yeah, um, by the way, in case you were wondering, you know how the Chinese take school really seriously? Well, Xiamen University has a 10:00pm curfew Sunday through Thursday and 12:00am Friday and Saturday. ..oh, and you have class on Saturday.

Mother of Pearl.

So, I’m trying to take this all in and focus on the positives. The campus is gorgeous; I’ll put pictures up as I get them, since the photography hike I was going to do is definitely not happening in the sick heat. I’ll have internet in my room at some point, in which case I’ll be able to Skype everyone and all that. And, I am in China, which most people don’t get to do. So I’m hoping by the time 10:00 rolls around tomorrow night I’ll be too tired to be pissed off and I’ll sail away to dreamland on my non-bed.

Love you all.

Intro

2007-08-09T11:36:00.000-04:00

So, this is the site I will be using in China to do (what I plan on being) a daily blog. I'll jot some things down about what's happening and how I'm doing, as well as thoughts about any other random thing I feel like talking about. If you want to send me personal messages and things like that, go to my facebook or myspace. But, please feel free to leave lots and lots of comments about the blogs and stay in touch!

-Ben