Standard Three

1. I have stopped photographing for Xanga because my camera is not really good enough quality for such an intricate experiment. But I do hope to continue handwriting at some point.


2. Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are the meek, blessed are the peacemakers. Universal realities strike me poignantly in fresh particularities; human brokenness/fallenness, for instance, strikes in one particular instance and reminds me of Christian truth. It wasn't anything particularly (in itself) poignant, but I have been recently and poignantly reminded that most of us human beings are broken in some way or another - broken, screwed up, screwed over, insecure, selfish, however you want to put it. I'm simply speaking of what exists, of what I have observed in myself and most of those around me - this is definitely not a universal, catch-all statement, though I have suspicion that there is something vaguely universal to it. This knowledge does not (hopefully) diminish the capacity to love, because the expressed brokenness is simply something of human lack - the brokenness behind a bully's taunts. However, this knowledge sometimes encounters me in a poignant way as it strikes out at another person, shakes me up a bit, and saddens me.

It seems each of us is generally a mixture of what-will/should-be-a-saint and the fallen creature in what is to the human mind largely indistinguishable elements; here's a simple example: in many social settings, I observe genuine and beautiful acquaintance/friendship with healthy conversation, with true charity and goodwill shared. At the same time, in any given group setting, with little element of transition between any 'good' or 'ill', there is something of an incessant posturing, something of deep hunger for affirmation expressed in odd ways, something of steam-rolling, sometimes pent-up rage or jealousy, sometimes gossip, etc. The two 'sides' - the saint, the sinner - go hand-in-hand, as the person is a platform of all these liturgical works happening at the same time. Often, that is to say, behind an empty posture or destructive word is an anointed person who may even be trying to love in some way or another.

In acknowledging this, I am reminded of the broken persons that Jesus Christ our Lord encountered. By and large, from what I can tell, everyone that our Lord encountered was broken, screwed up, insecure, selfish, and so forth. Yet it was those who had nothing to hold but their brokenness - no complacent cushions of social stability or social status or wealth - who were most willing and able to be forgiven and to forgive. These fools and children are the realists of the human race. Blessed are the meek, blessed are the poor in spirit - they are blessed. And blessed are the merciful.


3. Roman Ibis and Mrs. von Bora: My silly drama was obscure. Edward Morgan Blake - the 'Comedian' - is a brutal and sadistic 'hero' from the graphic novel (and now upcoming movie) Watchmen. Jon Osterman is the casual modernist; Rorschach is a rough-edged hero similar to the Comedian. Blake intrigues me insofar as he took himself so lightly (or perhaps too seriously, in a masturbatory way) that he really was a moral-minded person attempting to make a parody of the nihilistic violence of American culture. He took on the persona of violence as a sort of attempt at a parable - though there is more to his complex character than this summation. Similar comparisons could be made to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, whom various Christian sects cite as an example of acceptable Christian violence; according to what I've read and have heard from persons who know much about Bonhoeffer, the truth of the matter is that Bonhoeffer knew exactly what he was doing, and his hope was exactly the opposite of what everyone (now) wants to make out of it. He knew he would pay a price for his choice of violence, and he didn't glorify his choice. The Comedian seemed to know he would pay a price for his vigilantism.

The point being this: Sometimes things are not what they seem; sometimes persons who make a 'serious' point are not communicating on the surface of the action. I 'hit' your obscure conversation from an odd angle, but I think there is room for dialogue between the two. Then again, this is all still very obscure.

-r

St. Agnes Smirks, St. Theodore Grabs a Torch. . .

In working on classwork, I stumbled upon a commentary of Church Fathers which pointed me to someone else which led me to read about this person, who . . . and so on. St. Theodore of Amasea makes me smile broadly, and I'm sad this little snippet couldn't have come in a timely manner (his feast-day is 9 November). This is from NewAdvent.org's article on the matter, - and I'm not sure which is richer, St. Theodore or NewAdvent's austere treatment: 'When the edict against the Christians was issued by the emperors, [St. Theodore] was brought before the Court at Amasea and asked to offer sacrifice to the gods. Theodore, however, denied their existence and made a noble profession of his belief in the Divinity of Jesus Christ. The judges, pretending pity for his youth, gave him time for reflection. This he employed in burning the Temple of Cybele. He was again taken prisoner, and after many cruel torments was burned at the stake.' What can be added? -r

Apocalypticism, cont'd

This is perhaps a better, while second-hand, synopsis/answer regarding this fellow Stringfellow's setting of the tone for the [post-]modern apocalyptic vision; and, again, I find it interesting that someone who is so relatively uncelebrated by apocalypticists has actually cast such an influence on those of us who would seek to 'borrow' and continue the apocalyptic voice.

In answer to various previous questions here in previous years, this is something of what the 'apocalyptic perspective and voice' is about:



'. . . Stringfellow saw God's creation caught in a dramatic and final battle. Apocalyptic is but the name we give for the struggle to live in accordance with God's good creation as those who no longer have to fear death, baptized as we are into Christ's death and resurrection. We believe that is why Stringfellow was able to challenge our liberal idealism which assumed that if we could just get people of goodwill to work together, somehow we could solve our social problems. He knew that any such "solution" would be far too pale a response to the powers [and principalities] we confront. Yet exactly because he knew we were part of an apocalyptic drama, he never gave up hope despite his clear-eyed vision of the terrors of the struggle. The question was not whether as Christians we were going to accomplish much, but whether we were going to live faithfully.'
-From 'Creation as Apocalyptic' in Stanley Hauerwas's Dispatches from the Front

-r

Apocalyptic Vision

In what little I've read of this fellow, he is intriguing to me. Like T.S. Eliot, he is apparently one of those persons who so participated in apocalyptic vision (and, particularly, re-embodied it in a modern context, set the present tone for it) that I already owe a great deal to him without even knowing him. It's always odd to find the persons who were dreaming something of what you thought were your dreams, and dreaming them in such vivid colours long before you were born - to the point that you can only assume your vision somehow, in some small way, exists only insofar as it participates in theirs.



'The problem of America as a nation, in biblical perspective, remains the elementary issue of repentance. . . . Topically, repentance is not about forswearing wickedness as such; repentance concerns the confession of vanity. For America - for any nation at any time - repentance means confessing blasphemy.'[1]


'From the point of view of either biblical religion, the monstrous American heresy is in thinking that the whole drama of history takes place between God and human beings. The truth, biblically and theologically and empirically, is quite otherwise: the drama of this history takes place amongst God and human beings and the principalities and powers, the great institutions and ideologies active in the world. It's the corruption and shallowness of humanism which beguiles Jew or Christian into believing that human beings are masters of institutions or ideology. Or to put it a bit differently, racism is not an evil in human hearts or minds: racism is a principality, a demonic power, a representative image, an embodiment of death over which human beings have little or no control, but which works its awful influence over human life.'[2]


'Rejecting the suggestion that Christ's "resistance and renunciation of temptation to political authority" on Palm Sunday counsels political quietism, Stringfellow wrote:
["]Quite the contrary, it is the example of utter and radical involvement in the existence of the world, an involvement which does not retreat even in the face of the awful power of death. The counsel of Palm Sunday is that Christians are free to enter into the depths of the world's existence with nothing to offer the world but their own lives. And this is to be taken literally. What the Christian has to give to the world is his very life.["]'[3]


'"The truly apocalyptic view of the world is that things do not repeat themselves. It isn't absurd, e.g., to believe that the age of science and technology is the beginning of the end for humanity; that the idea of great progress is a delusion, along with the idea that the truth will ultimately be known; that there is nothing good or desirable about scientific knowledge and that mankind, in seeking it, is falling into a trap. It is by no means obvious that this is not how things are.'[4]

-r

[1]From p.230 of Politics and Spirituality [1984] by William Stringfellow
[2]From William Stringfellow's 1963 address to the Religion and Race Conference, as quoted by Bill Wylie-Kellermann in the article 'In One Another's Light: Reading King and Stringfellow'
[3]From p.113 of Dispatches from the Front [1994] by Stanley Hauerwas
[4]From Culture and Value by Ludwig Wittgenstein

Autumn at Trevecca (photos from 3 November)

In racing around campus in a cart, fixing machinery and holding tools, I couldn't help but notice Trevecca's participation in Autumn. I was able to get these pictures before the landscaping brigades swept through with their leaf-blowers.

...

-r

Against the Fashionable Heresies

I'm currently working full-steam ahead on a seminar that a partner and I will be teaching on Stanley Hauerwas. In the course of reading loads of his stuff, the pieces finally came together for me in how to explain why it is that I'm growing weary of reading protestant theological writing, particularly (for reasons that will be explained) the writing of the 'emergent' church and neo-protestant variety.

To put it in a nutshell, a synopsis, it's the same old protestant writing, only dressed up in different clothing. It's like protestant churches that strap on an image of liturgy without embodying the theology that organically created those beautiful churches and liturgies. The only difference I've found, ultimately, is that several of those writing neo-protestant theology have more hubris than the average protestant in being able to 'out-protest' their peers - that is, in being able to distinguish themselves not only from the Catholic Church but now also from the other protestant ecclesial communities. Yet what is it about [neo-]protestant theological writing that bugs me now? why did this sort of theology seem so rich to me in the past?



'If the LORD Does not Build the House. . .'
Protestant theology isolates Jesus unto Himself and comes close to succumbing (if it does not eventually succumb to) a sort of Docetism and Gnosticism - diminishing-to-nonexistent Jesus' humanity and treating physicality/particularity as evil. Neo-protestant theology ends up unknowingly effecting the same Docetic/Gnostic outcome but sometimes manages to throw in a little more pride as well. As Karl Barth correctly suggests in his Church Dogmatics, Jesus should be acknowledged as the undisputed centre of salvation and the Gospel. The 'emergent' church and other neo-protestant theological flavours have embraced Jesus' humanity, often to the point of even emphasising the importance of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Yet these movements continue to slice Jesus apart from His human context as it extends through the particular Church. The problem with this, as I will gradually explain, is more than just this framing, but the framing is evidence of and contributor to the heretical picture within it.

These writers and thinkers - these people - do not let our Lord Jesus Christ, His works, and His actions make literal statement for themselves as the true and complete Gospel - particularly God's selecting of a certain Virgin, Jesus' selecting twelve particular apostles, and Jesus' living among the Church He was establishing and His talking again and again (especially toward the end) about the Holy Spirit and Christ's ministry through the Church as it would take shape. Instead, disappointed in the massive failure of protestant theology to manifest anything, these writers seek to reform protestantism; they read from their own idealisms and concepts and search for the words in His mouth. Hence, Jesus taught a certain ideal community that transcends particularities, and we are to be the Church by being the ecclesial community of Christ that attaches ourselves to the ideals of Christ and lives by these ideals and principles. It's protestantism realising that works are important in the life of the Christian, but somehow (and some of the writers grow frustrated with this) it's not enough.

The reader may wonder: what is so heretical about these teachings of ideals and transcendence? What are we to say of Jesus as the centre of the Church? What about His call to follow Him and obey what He taught? What are we to say of the Kingdom of God which transcends earthly kingdoms? What are we to say of His disciples' and even apostles' oblivious and contradictory attitudes toward Christ? Jesus is the centre of the Church, let us agree, if we are saying that He is in Himself the fulfillment and full embodiment of the Kingdom of God, the nexus and indwelling of God's Will/Word as the very God and very Man. Let us also agree that He called us to live as citizens of a transcendent Kingdom, and that we are called to something beyond earthly kingdoms. Let us finally acknowledge that the disciples and apostles took every opportunity they seemed to be able to take in order to miss Jesus' boat. Yet, all this said, we are still citizens who are living on earth and in a particular physicality. We are also not saved simply by our adherence to ideals, nor saved on the power of our good works. Jesus did not set out to establish a jingoistic motto but a Church, and He who had all authority in heaven and earth exercised all authority in the commissioning of His apostles and disciples to carry out Himself to the world.



John 6: An Ikon, within which We Find an All-too-familiar Drama
The mistake of the 'emergent' church and neo-protestant gnostics and arians is the same as that of the idealists in our Lord Jesus' ranks as spoken of in John 6. When Jesus the Lord of us teaches a very startling, very particular, and somewhat quaint notion - a little piece of doggerel about eating His flesh and drinking His blood in order to live - many of the Jews in the synagogue seek clarification. But Jesus the Lord of us does not clarify what must have been elaborate and figurative and idealistic proposition that deserves volumes of theological writing to explain away and yet only receives a few words in such protestant volumes. Our Lord Jesus simply teaches it again in His stark, literal, and embodied way, and consequently many of His disciples decide to leave His Presence. His words did not have the idealistic, figurative vestments they would have preferred in such radical teaching. In the same way, protestants and neo-protestants leave His Presence and walk at a distance due to the difficult teaching.

Here is where we come to the crux of the matter. Jesus Christ turns to the Twelve and asks, 'You do not also want to go away, do you?' And St. Peter answers, 'Lord, to whom else would we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.'

Many of the Twelve, if not all of them, were idealists; I find a bit of comfort in this, as an idealist, that there is room in the Kingdom even for us and our visions. A quick look around within the Holy Church (particularly in America) will reveal a serious need for major reforms - but reform in the Chestertonian sense and not 'reform' of neo-protestantism's boring, dull, violent, incongruous, and merely idealistic flavour. As T.S. Eliot writes in his 'Choruses from "The Rock"', 'And if the Temple is to be cast down / We must first build the Temple.' I would say that we need to live in the Temple and know the God of the Temple before we start tearing down the Temple.

And there is the joke and tragedy of protestant and neo-protestant theology. I suspect many of these writers would rather Christ not have come in the flesh, they would rather He not have established the particular Church - and all of this is done for the love of Him. But He did exactly this, came and established and sent the Spirit, and it is ultimately no love to sigh and pine and do violence to Him in order to 'save' Him from the snickering caricatures of Constantine and Gregory the Great. Neo-protestant theological writers wax lengthily about the Church as an 'ecclesial space for peace' or 'the community of breaking bread' and so forth - endless sterile constructions within which the Church is supposedly supposed to find its meaning. But why 'the community of breaking bread'? what's so great about bread, divorced to itself? These people have historically left the Real Presence and the very particular and singular Church that Christ sent forth, and are henceforth out in the wilderness of their self-appointed exile sending us dispatches in smoke-signals and notes written in handfuls of dust.

Meanwhile, the organic Growth that Jesus established has (as His parable mysteriously suggested) grown and filled the world. There is a rich history of theological meditations to thrive in and do novel work within; theological writing is good so long as it finds root in the organic reality of Christ and His Bride. It's these disembodied abstractions and shots in the dark that are driving me crazy.

-r