Toward an Evangelical Mind

Theodicy and Suffering, Observations of an Exhausted Physician.

2006-08-01T08:39:00.000-05:00

I sit here in the aftermath of one of the hardest service months that I have experienced. Certainly, the rigors of providing ICU care play their role in this tiredness, but even more than that, my emotions have been drained. During my time, two children have died, their bodies diseased beyond the ability of medicine to correct. We tried every drug and machine that we thought would work, pulling out all of the stops to take control of the declining physiology before us. And in the end, we said that we did all we could, and comforted the grieving families through the process of letting go of a loved one. It is never easy, this work. For to be truly present to another human being facing the ultimate things of life is only possible in the end if you feel it as well. And in pondering this, I realized ( or re-realized actually) some important truths about God's way in this world.

Many would see these events as rime examples of the ruthless indifference of our universe. "There is no God," they say, "for how could God allow such suffering in those He claims to love. If He were truly real, then He would split the sky in anger, reacing into the world to alter these painful realities." But all to often the Christian does not understand the sentiment behind these thoughts. Seeing instead a threat to their worldview, great codices of abstract though spring up to logically defend the sovereignty of God in the face of this evil. Great treatises written on the sinfulness of man and its effectsd on the world, describing how the love of God could possibly coexist with the caprice of nature. Now don't get me wrong; these works are important, and provide a solid, logical foundation for much of what we believe. But as I sit and read works of this nature, seing them if just for a fleeting instant in the light of what these families have experieced, I notice that they are not so much incorrect as off the point. For in the end, those suffering do not wish for logic, but comfort; not information, but meaning. And all too often in the mids of this, we believers forget the crucial centerpiece of our faith, the Cross itself.

Too often we forget that most of the logical structures that past generations used in defense of these positions originated not with Christ, but with Plato, Socrates, and the Greeks. Again, I am a logician by nature as well, and truth is truth, no matter who speaks it. But the abstract reasonings and categories that we use so dispassionately in our defense of the truth oftentimes lose sight of what The Truth did. Hebrews tell us that our High Priest is not untouched by our infirmities, and in Phillipians, we learn that Christ, being God, dod not see Godhood as something to be held onto, but rather suffered death for us. In this trugh, the Infinite God who became man and died for our sins and sufferings, we see the truth. God is not in heaven as we suffer, benignly looking down on our struggles. No, he is there with us. His hands, pierced with iron spikes have felt the weight of a dying universe. His heart of love, riven through with a cold spearpoint, was broken for the suffering we experiece and the suffering we cause,. And tehre, in the dark hours during which the God-Man cried out to his Father, the festering sea of a wolrd's hatred, brutality, and victimhood was taken into the heart of the Godhead itself. There to be lost in the greater ocean of His unfailing love.

And in the end, it is us who live after the resurrection, after the ascention of the Son of Man to the right hand of the Father, who remain on earth to carry this message. We have been called the Body of Christ, and if this is so, then it is our hands that remain to be pierced, our hearts that now stand to be broken by the darkness of this world. If our Master, our Head, our Lord, was called to give everything for our salvation, who are we to do less? In the end, the answer to the great question of Theodicy is neither syllogism nor argument, it is the life of a member of His body, a life willing to take up its cross and pour out itself completely so that others might live. It is a life of sacrifice, lived in imitation of its master.

In the end, I may never know if I was able to do this for those grieving families, but I know that I tried. And in the future, when I again am called to stand at the edge of death with those I have been called to serve and they ask "Where is God in this?," I pray that I may answer them in faith and truth, "He is here, and His heart breaks as does your own."

Time and Timelessness

2006-06-23T13:25:00.000-05:00

As I read over the past several posts of our newly rescuscitated blogging effort, I was struck by the effect that one's view of the relationship between God and Time has on discussions of both creation and God's ongoing providence. Specifically, several comments in the last post related the possibility that the Universe was created with some degree (whether lesser or greater) of "Free will", able to develop and change in ways that the creator may not have foreseen. In short, God is (or at least has enabled himself to be) affected by time. It is a view that has grown in popularity, not least because it seems well supported by such OT passages as that where Moses succeeds in "changing God's Mind" regarding the His judgement on the children of Israel becasue of the golden calf incident. It also neatly resolves some longstanding questions regarding God's foreknowledge and free will, as well as emphasizing God's historical, real interaction with us, made complete in the person of Christ.

On the other side of the discussion, however stands a long and venerable traditions of thinkers, Christian and Pagan alike, stretching from Plato and Socrated, through Augustine and the Medieval Scholastics. In these writings God is logically and scripturally seen as timeless, above the mutability and changeability of the world. "Thou Changeth Not" says the hymn. Even the words of Paul contribute to this, "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever." From this understanding we gain the knowledge of God's sovereignty, His utter control and authority over all creation, past, present and future. In it's own way, it also resolves the foreknowledge and free will debate, this time casting on the side of forekonwledge.

This much many have already discussed, indeed for centuries, and only a man of greater chutzpah than myself could suggest that resolution could be accomplished in the next paragraphs. What I would like to do, however, is suggest that these debates may have less to do with God Himself and more to do with the nature of time. I will then suggest a third path, hoprefully to be followed by spirited discussion.

Philosophically (ie, at least according to Dr. William Lane Craig) there two ways of conceiving time, a tensed and a tenseless version. He calls these A time and B time. To make a long explanation short, A time theories postulate that the present is all that there is. In this model, the past does not physically exist, nor does the future, but only a series of present events. There are no time machines in this view, nor can their be, for there is nowhere for them to go. Time, therefore, is defined as a measure of change, what has changed no longer exists, what will be changed into has not yet occurred.

B Theory, on the other hand, regards time as a tenseless whole, a massive block of temporal duration in which all events exists like the notes on a musical score. In this view, the present is the thin slice of time in which we happen to be living, but aside from this inconvenient (albeit somewhat massive) fact, present, past, and future enjoy a peaceful coexistence. Change in this view is not in fact real, but merely apparent, an outworking of what always would have been into what now is.

Considering these it should take no vast leap of thought to discern which views of God are compatible with which views of time. But now I must ask the question, why should out view of God depend on our view of time? Should not, rather, our view of time revolve around our view of God? To this, the witty reader might reply. "Fine, so what does that look like. What do we know regarding God that could key us to the origin of time." To answer that, I refer to the entire pattern of revelation, culminating in the incarnation, death and resurrection of the Son and the Coming of the Spirit at the Father's behest. In short, I would refer us to the Trinity.

In many ways the Greek fathers exceeded the western church in their comprehension of the Trinity. While latin scholars debated philosophic terminology in an effort to categorize the Trinity's timeless eternity, the Greek scholars spoke of that marvelous doctrine in terms of Perichoresis. Perichoresis, meaning the endless dance of Love that the Father, Son and Spirit shared in perfect harmony and utter self-giving before the worlds were framed. In short, the Greek Fathers clearly saw that God as Triune meant God as Love (Not to completely knock the latins, Augustine knew this too). What does that mean to us? It means that relationship itself is a fundamental part (if not the fundamental part) of the identity of God. I've argued this before, so I will not elaborate at present.

Fine, so what does this have to do with time. Consider this: current physics appreciates the concepts of time and space as primarily relational. I'll explain. Imagine an electron sitting along in a dark void, with no other matter present, and then ask yourself the question, do time and space exist in that context. At first you might say yes, of course. But think about it. What can the electron interact with? What can change it? (there are no other particles) Where can it go? (because of the lack of particles, any movement it makes will be into an area identical to the one it left, and so it cannot even be said to have moved in any meaningful way.) In short, for time and space to even have meaning, there needs to be at least two things present. (You may here try to argue that you can indeed picture the eelctron moving and changing, but in fact, you can only do this by projecting yourself next to the electron and observing it, thereby creating the two things necessary by accident) But we as Christians, (as opposed to mere monotheists) say more than this when we recite the creed, because we, in fact are affirming that not one, not two, but three persons existed in a perfect union of being (perichoresis) before creation.

As I close this rambling, I wish merely to suggest the corollary to all I have said. If God is a Trinity, then time and space emerge as logically necessary outworkings of the love relationship between them. That is not to say that this space and time is the same as the one that we live in. No, indeed, for our world is sinful and broken, a far cry from the perfection of that dance. But it does suggest that a completely contained Timefulness is a secondary, but necessary, characteristic of who God has revealed himself to be. And it does hint at a possible relation between the two times, Our fallen, fractured world floating as a bubble in the great sea of His present; real, free to move where it will (good or bad), yet always and forever completely surrounded by the greater time of which it is shadow and ectype.

This is not a God who is bound by time, unable to see past the cusp of present reality, to affect a future from which he is absent, as an extreme A theorist might say. Nor is this a God who build a temporal universe of such crystalline rigidity that nothing can be other than it will and all freedom is an illusion. No, this is a God who contains within himself a perfect time and space, filled with the free love of the Father, Son and Spirit. It is a God who build, out of the overflow of that love, a contingent universe of free, though completely temporally encompassed, creatures that he desired to draw into that more perfect time that is Heaven for it is Himself. It is a God who, when that world went so horribly wrong, its very relational nature turned in rebellion against him, came down into it to restore it by his own act of utter self-sacrifice. And it is a World that, in the end, when all kingdom and dominion and authority have been given to Him, will consummate into the entrance into the eternal Dance of the Triune that is at once perfect rest and perfect activity, where we will know even as we are known, and where freedom and predestiny will finally be seen for what they truly are, the same thing.

Is God in a hurry?

2006-06-22T18:57:00.000-05:00

It goes without saying that the great debate of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries between science and faith in our culture has centered around the question of origins.

The origin accounts in the Hebrew Scriptures, which were embraced and adopted by the early Christians spoke of a powerful divine being who had called the cosmos to being out of chaos. The story speaks of His Spirit first brooding over the vast expanse of waste, and the the spark of divine power springs forth, calling forth his intention. Birds, plans, animals, all leap at His voice, created good.

The story is essentially recast in the next chapter. Here God gets his hands dirty, so to speak, the action is not focused on his voice, but on his work. he "fashions" man from the ground, breathes live, "plants" a garden.

The distinctive image is of an active, working, creative God, planning and executing His desire.

Wrightly, or wrongly, when our imaginations visualize the story, what springs to mind is something very different from the slow creation we see around us. We imagine giant forests pushing themsevles up in the span of an hour, fish suddenly teeming in the sea at the crackle of a word, popping from nothing...ex nihilo. It comes as no surprise, therefore that when science in the 19th century began to describe a different process of the development of life...well there was a bit of tension.

In the light or retrospection, however, it is fitting to ask ourselves - why do we bristle at a "slow" creation?

How could God, omnipotent, powerful, imaginative be content to sit and wait for random mutations to turn an amoeba into a man? Even if he was guiding the mutations himself, why couldn't He have just created man from the beginning just as He wanted? (Of course, this is the same brand of argument that tackles the question of evil by saying, "Well if God thinks evil is so evil, why doesn't he just get rid of it?")
I think it forgets several important points
1) There is a difference between growing vegetables yourself, and going to the store and picking up veggies mass grown for you. The process of growing, caring, nuturing the food contributes to its flavor in ways that can't be expressed. However, there is a certain satisfaction to "doing it yourself" that I believe is universal. Just because God COULD have created man in one "POOF" or "AB-RA! CADA-BRA!" does not mean that he necessarily would have wanted to. In fact I think our intuition tells us the oposite.

2) We tend to imagine God as a very stuffy know-it-all. Simply because God has the potential to know anything does not mean that he has to CHOOSE to know everything. Part of the act of creation was self-limiting - once he made the universe, He had made a decision - the universe WAS that way, by His choice, and by definition he had chosen the THAT option over any another. Similarly, we imagine that he necessarily planned every minute detail over creation, down to the shade of brown of the grass in my lawn on Friday, October 26th of the hyear 2018. Quite frankly, that seems a bit silly to me.

God can be soverign and omnipotent, and still give himself the opportunity to be surpised. Personally, I can't think of a more interesting thing to do with a universe than to set up a system by which an intricate structure of genes and proteins would self adapt and simultaneously solve the enormously complex problem of survival a billion different ways over billions of years. Put another way, when God looks at a Duck-billed Platypus, I think He has a good laugh, not because he planned it as a joke for humans, but because it's a beautifully ridiculous miracle, which he intended, but did not necessarily "design". I believe God left room for creation to surprise Him.

Ah, there's the rub. When we speak of "Intelligent Design", what comes to mind but God the great architect with blueprints, and a compass, and a measuring rod. Now, that's not to say that design wasn't involved in the universe, but the universe itself seems to testify to a degree of artistic interpretive freedom given back to the universe as a gift. I think there were indeed layers of the universe where God "measured twice and cut once", but I also beleive there were entire realms where he was more like Jackson Pollack, casting the paint upon the canvas in wild smatterings of color, and then stepped back to say..."Ah...It is good!"

3) To use software development terms, we too quickly mesh together the implementation phase and the instantiation phase of the universe. When I design a software program it does not execute during the time when I am writing the code. Put another way, in the lifetime of the program time does not go by until I command the program to RUN. However, that does not happen until the program is complete. Only when all of the code has been written beginning to end, does the first line of the program spring into "life".

J.R.R. Tolkein captures this separation of implementation and execution well in the Silmarillion. There, Illuvatar first gives the Ainur the music of his creation which they sing into being. During this singing, the creation is corrupted, in its deepest levels by the discord of Melkior. Illuvatar works to subvert the dark song of Melkior with a new strain, and when the song has been completed the Ainur are surprised to realize that Illuvatar was merely showing to him his intentions for the world. It still lay fallow and void. The execution of the plan was yet to take place though the design and marring was fully formed.

Incidentally, this nicely illustrates a way in which the marring of the creation could have prefigured even the Big Bang itself. It also changes the trajectory of our usual interpretation of Genesis, for here man is not necessarily viewed as arriving in a perfect world which he is responsible for marring. It rather points to God's intention that man, made in his image, will emerge as the hope for undoing the disaster done to world. He will be given the power to understand the world, and restore it. God intervenes, plants a garden, and puts the man in it, with the summons to fill the world, subdue it, take care of it, put it back to rights. Of course, in this scenario, evil invades Eden, man rebels, and joins forces with the evil already rampant in the world, until the second Adam comes and finally does what the first Adam was meant to do - set loose the project of setting the worlds to rights.

To make a further comment on this scheme, theologically it fits nicely into Tolkeins worldview. Illuvatar deigns not to destry the world planned through the music, despite it's marring, but to work to subvert the effects of the evil, and in the end glorify himself through the greater good that results through defeating the evil. In this scenario of evolving life on Earth, the darkness of "nature, red in tooth and claw" is countered by the emergence of rational man with a capacity to seek God from the bloody eons of death struggle for survival. When man himself rejects God and descends into pride, selfishness and fratricide, God again overcomes the evil by subversive action from the inside (the Incarnatin) rather than destroying his creation outright from the outside.

All of that is highly speculative, but it points to a proposition, that when we make quick assumptions about what timeline God lives in, or what the spiritual realm actually looks at, we are stepping beyond our ken. Even taking illustrations from our own fledgling attempts to create universes through fiction and software, we can at least understand the complexities involved with the interaction of creator and creation. Fundamentally, there is a barrier separating the two that can only be crossed by the creator. Hamlet can know nothing of Shakespeare. Mario can know nothing of Miyamoto unless the author and designer write themselves into their own stories. Which of course is exactly what Christians claim happened 2,000 years ago....

Evolution, A Much Misunderstood Word.

2006-06-14T11:06:00.000-05:00

Hello, it's certainly been quite some time before we last posted. Our apologies, as we both had numerous accelerating issues in our personal lives (i.e. Children) that rightly demanded out time and attention. But now, it is our hope that we will be able to get rolling again, and that more thoughtful and weighy posts will be forthcoming.

There has, over the past several years, been no end of disputed between those who believe in the special creation of the world (particularly those who would locate it temporally at around 4000-6000 BC), and those who believe that the world was formed over billions of years in a continuous process that many call evolution. While, as always, time and space constrain what I am able to speak of here, my goal as a scientist, a physician, and an evangelical Christian, is to clarify exactly what evolution can and cannot mean. This is not trivial, for whenever I discuss this issue with other believers, I am continually struck with the great variety of meaning that the word can contain. This is made even more an issue by the fact that some of those meaning are incompatible with Christian Belief, indeed with Theism in general, but the bulk are not.

That last sentence was a fairly big statement, and I'm sure there is a bevy of individuals out there who would accuse me of heresy. Let me say first then that as I go about defining this term, I am taking as my statement of faith regarding origins the first sentences of the Nicene Creed. I use this because i believe that the creed is Biblical, accurate, and a touchstone for Christians of all denominations.

We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen.

This is what I intend to use as the basic core belief of the Christian faith regarding creation. Of course one can speak of compatibility with the Genesis text, but I do not have time to address this today (I may later) Suffice it to say that, as far as I am concerned, there are many valid interpretations of what Genesis 1 is intending to convey (Day-Age, Young Earth, Framework hypothesis, Days or Proclamation, etc). But most of us are familiar with at least some of these. Where the unfamiliarity lies in the evangelical worls is with what evolution really means.

In fact, evolution means many different things to many different people. It can mean the process known as Microevolution, whereby species and populations of animals alter there genetic makeup over time as a response to a changing environment. Most everyone believes this, Christian and Non-Christian alike, and so I will not address it today. This is not under dispute. We now get into more murky territory, however.

The next definition I would propose is the far extreme, the concept that man, the animals, indeed the cosmos itself, developed from simple origins by a process of goal-less natural selection operating on essentially random materials. This is the Darwinian thesis taken to an incredible extreme, and is, in fact what most creationists refer to when they speak of evolution.

But consider that there may be some intermediates between these two. Consider that this extreme case may infact be a confusion between a process (continuous development of great complexity from simple origins) with a mechanism (Darwinian selection). Consider as well that the process itself is not in conflict with the first sentences of the Nicene creed. After all, how do we believe that the universe operates today. Do we, as Christian Theists, truly buy the idea that natural law is a separate entity operating above and beyond the universe, regulating it in clocklike fashion, and that all else is meaningless chaos unless God specifically steps in with a miracle? That kind of God is compatible with the deist position, the disinterested watchmaker, or perhaps even with the Gnostics, who divorced matter and spirit to the point where GOd was loath to touch the physical world, but that kind of God is not Christian.

No, our God is one whom, in the words of Lewis, "Likes matter because He invented it." He is the God who we read cares for each individual sparrow if it falls. He is a God who is at once trancendent and other, but also immanent, lovingly shaping each aspect of His world so that all is done in accordance with his plans. This can even be seen in the effects of human free will and sin, for does not the New Testament say that "All things work together for good to them that love God."

It seems to me that those that vigorously defend special creation (as opposed to creation in general) are threatened by the concept of a God who does not accomplish his greatest works by discontinuous miracle. But this threat is, in the end, for a God who is intimately involved with the continuing story of each separate part of his creation, giving it meaning and guiding it where he wishes it to be, is a far more sovereign and mighty God than one who sets up the universe at the beginning and then lets it go until a further discontinuous event is required to add some new component. I am not in this for a moment suggesting that creation is not a miracle, but I am saying that that miracle need not manifest itself as a discontinuity in nature to make it miraculous. Consider even the parting of the red sea, which Exodus says was accomplished by a mighty wind. The outcome was both miraculous and meaningful, but natural agency was used and there is no implied discontinuity.

That was a fairly long diatribe to make what is, in the end, a simple point. It is not evolution that is anti-christian, but the mechanism of evolution. With due regards to all Christian darwinists out there, I will go on record as saying that it is the darwininan mechanism in particular, which elevates combat, competition, and selfishness to the level of prime creative forces, which do offer opposition to a Christian worldview. The common descent of species, the age of the universe, the development (from a natural view) of complexity from simpleness do not, precisely because the Christian God is not limited to moments of discontinuity to do his work, but instead infuses all of the created order with His purpose as He endeavors to bring all things, even those that war against him in sinful pride, into submission to Christ.

Why is this important? Beause for too long discontinuous creationism has been used as a litmus test of Biblical Christianity. Remember this, "That if you will confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." That, and not interpretations of Genesis, is what unites us in the One Body.

Perhaps I'll get a chance to write more regarding Genesis later.

Aaron

Alive and kicking...

2006-06-07T20:05:00.000-05:00

The scandal of "Toward an Evangelical Mind" is there are no posts on "Toward an Evangelical Mind"... we're working on it actually, and we are planning to shake off the old blogging cobwebs and hopefully return to a sense of regularity with posting in the very near future.

Brand new parenthood will do that to you I guess!

At any rate, apologies for the long delay - why don't we call it a sabbatical?

Good stuff (we hope) coming soon.

War Of Words

2005-12-22T23:28:00.000-05:00

With the subways and buses on strike for the last three days, the sidewalks and streets have been unusually crowded here in New York. What normally took 20 minutes by subway, took over an hour and half by foot, in the cold. With so many people in so much of a rush the week before Christmas, words flew like arrows and were basically people horns.

People horns in the crowded street. Angry words between a husband a wife, father and daughter, brother and sister… people at work. Beyond this, and even louder- deafening silence. Words and their absence can and do either hurt or heal, promote or steal from God’s glory.

Below is a quote from Paul Tripp’s book, War of Words:

“What moves and motivates everything we do [and say] is not a submission to God’s will and a burning desire for his glory, but our own set of personal desires and dreams. We are excited about the king because we see Him as the most efficient delivery system for those dreams. You can tell what really excites us when we fall into discouragement…”

In this book, Tripp discusses how our words are a reflection of our hearts. In Galations 5:13-18, we see that there is a war for our hearts:
13You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. 14The entire law is summed up in a single command: "Love your neighbor as yourself." 15If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other. 16So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. 17For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want. 18But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.
Based on this he surmises that winning the war involves recognizing the destructive power of words. It means exporing our freedom in Christ, saying no to the sinful nature, speaking to serve others in love, speaking in step with the spirit (ie. speaking in a way that reflects His work in me and encourages his work in you), and speaking with a goal to restore (ie. having a restoration agenda shape our relationships, see Gal.6:1-12)

We fail to win the war and don’t speak in gentleness and humility because we forget who we are and our dependence on His grace. Tripp reasons that our words always express the worship of something or someone. Through this book, light on my communication in that great caldron of all spirits- marriage, has been cast. The coldness and apathy of my heart (whose default is to shrivel in to a selfish clod of ‘me’) is revealed through an observation of it’s words, or the lack thereof.

In fighting the war of words, the battle in my heart has revealed to me it’s loyalty. When I meditate on why I love God, I see the shallowness therein. Do I follow him because of what he can do for me? If so, do I really even love Him? Would I be content to just be in His presence for eternity? This Christmas season, on the crowded streets, at work, in cramped stores, and in my young marriage, the war will continue. What a privilege it is to fight to glorify Him in my heart and enjoy Him forever.

Symbol and Reality

2005-12-04T07:08:00.000-05:00

Recently, out church has begun a study of Richard Foster's Celebration of Discipline. For those of you out there who have never read it, it is a book that deserves every ounce of the praise that has been heaped upon it over the years. Having read very few of Foster's other books, this study immediately inspired me to purchase another, simply titled Prayer, which is every bit as good as the other. Amidst the wealth of insights provided by these works, one single point seems to jump out at me time and time again, an insight into one of the prime downfalls of my spiritual life. It is this: Often I spend too much time getting to know things about God rather than actually getting to know Him. I write this in the belief that I am not alone in this failing.

By nature, I am a man of words and thoughts. I enjoy few things more than a good idea properly defenced, and take an almost visceral pleasure in friendly discourse and reasoned debate especially as it applies to Theology and Scripture. "What's wrong with that?" you might ask, and the obvious answer is nothing. It is good to care about the nature of God, the Universe and Mankind. It is good to discuss spiritual things in an intellectually rigorous fashion. And yet there is a danger here, for it is far too easy to stop at the level of the discussion itself, and to confuse the concept with the reality.

As we humans think, we construct words to serve as pictures for what we are discussing. The word "bread" represents a oblong chunk of baked wheat and yeast. The word "chicken" represents a common barnyard fowl used as food. This becomes even more necessary in the sciences, for here many of the realities are so small or so far away that direct experiential knowledge is impossible. After all, who is able to see a "quark," or "neutrino", who is able to look up from beneath the rings of Saturn or swim in the fiery surface of the Sun? For these, the symbol itself may be the closest we can draw to the reality. When we reach the realm of Theology, however, this progression quickly becomes dangerous, for as the hymn says God is "Immortal," and "Invisible," and this invisibility can induce us to unconsiously place him in the same category as subatomic particles. We reason that because his attributes make him unperceivable by our own efforts, then the best we can do is discuss him in the symbolic abstract. This is a lie.

Our Creator is not an inanimate thing, nor a mere concept; He is a person. (Three Persons in One Being to be precise) Even more than this, he wants to communicate with and relate to us. In the words of Francis Sheaffer, "He is there and He is not silent." Beyond all of our symbols is a Reality that wishes us to be filled with himself in a present commmunion, and all of our discussions about God, all of our long treatises on the Incarnation and the Trinity avail us nothing if they do not assist us, or pave the way for others, to enter this present experiential relationship of intimate communion. It is this truth that Foster's works have reimpressed on me, for in the realm of experiential Christianity, he stands as a giant in the faith.

It is easy to fall back. It is easy to leave that place of divine presence and power and settle again for the concepts we have made to speak of Him. It is easy, in short, to "have a form of godliness, but deny the power thereof." And yet the results are worth the effort. What Physicist would not give anything to be able to directly perceive the subatomic world he has so long studied? What astronomer would not sell all her goods to stand for one hour on an alien world, basking in the light of a star that until then she has only seen as a faint dot of light? These may be impossible wishes for the scientists, but the Christian is in a different position. He has been invited to taste and see the Divine Subject of his studies, invited to a real mystical communion with the life of the Trinity that he has so painstakingly defined. In the end, this is why we were created, this is what our life is for and about, yet so often we stand in our own way.

The Unquiet Grave of Metaphysics: Reading the Bible for the Love of God

2005-11-17T19:35:00.000-05:00

Reading the Bible for the Love of God is not a book one might immediately associate with philosophic controversy. Indeed, it seems more the title that one would give to a devotional or short study guide. But that is exactly what it is not. Another thing it is not is a book that I would recommend.

The theme of the book seems inocuous enough; that it is not adequate to treat the Bible as the "Words of God", rather it should be treated as the "Word of God." This may seem a confusing statement, and trust me, it definitely gets more confusing, but initially I interpreted it as an attempt to guide us away from a "bibliolatry", where the individual words and statements of scripture are worshipped rather than the God who inspired it. To state it simply, if the Bible is a window on the mind of God, Bibliolatry focuses on the window to the exclusion of the light on the other side. Another name for it is legalism. If the book left it here, it would have functioned as a needed corrective, and all would be well. But this is not the case.

To illustrate, I will take as an example the story of Adam and Eve. The book initially discussed how we should be reading this story as God's message to us, talking about how we each are an Adam or an Eve, and of how his account mirrors the manner in which we each fall into sin. So far, so good. But the book takes a definite turn for the worse, for the author then proceeds to state that because of this application, it is therefore unnecessary to deal with the actual accound. According to him, if we wish to view it as complete myth, derived from Babylonian sources with only its moral structures altered, it is irrelevant to the purpose of the Bible. This is where his understanding of the Bible as the "Word" rather than "Words" of God comes in, for if treating it as the Words of God means ascribing some factual content to it's narrative, treating it as the Word of God means "what does it mean to me." Don't get me wrong. The message that the Bible speaks to each one of us individually is vital. But to reason from this to the irrelevance of its factual contents seems more than a little hasty. In fact, it seems a move based more on the prevailing spirit of the age rather than any logical sequence. I refer, of course, to the spirit of Postmodernism

Philosophers (at least current philosophers) generally divide human thought into three periods that correspond to how Truth is understood. In the Premodern period, both physics (the study of the natural world) and metaphysics (the study of the that which is above nature) were given footing. It seemed self-evident then that a heirarchical supernatural order must lie behind nature. During this time, Theology was regarded as the king of the sciences, for how could nature be understood unless the invisible reality on which it depended were understood as well. But then came the Enlightenment, and as it swept through Europe a new dream for mankind was established, the dream of a completely rational (read physical) explanation for everything. Thus, with the dethronement and death of metaphysics was the Modern age born.

The modernist experiment was a huge success in many ways, leading to great advances in science, technology, and medicine. But scientists have long known that the claims of modernism cannot in the end be entirely correct, for ever since Einstein replaced Newton, ever since quantum physics replaced determinism, the fact that the physical universe is not as explicable on its own terms as we wanted it to be has become increasingly, if grudginly accepted. Even at the popular level there is a sense that knowing that the How of things as revealed by Modernism cannot replace the desire to know Why. It was thus that the Postmodern era was born.

The Postmodern era is an era of confusion. It is an era where irrationality is accepted as the underlying state of things, an era where each man and woman, if he or she would find meaning in a meaningless cosmos, must create that meaning for themselves. To the postmodern, there is no ultimate truth. Physics has been seen to be ultimately incomplete, and metaphysics is long dead, therefore the universe is accepted to be in a state of purposeless flux in which rationality is in the mind of the beholder. That was a rather long diatribe to get to my point, but necessary if the true problem with this book is to be appreciated, for Reading the Bible for the Love of God takes this confusion for granted. Based on this as an underlying assumption, it offers the Bible as a means to find that personal Why and then leaves it there, ignoring the fact that the Bible claims to be so much more than that.

Indeed, the Bible claims to be more than just a story, it claims to be THE story. It is the story of the Triune God, the Uncreated One who stands beyond all time and space. It is the story of the Universe, the handiwork of that magnificent being. it is the story of humanity written large, our fall into darkness and our failed attempts to climb out of the pit on our own. It is the story of Christ the Son and his appalling act of sacrifice by the hands of his creatures, bearing of the darkness that was ours and rising again in glory. Yes, the Bible is a window not to be worshipped in its own right, but the One whose face shines through that clear pane is as real, or perhaps moreso, than the sun on a cloudless day. It his He who wrote the grand story of our universe, not us.

Ultimately, Reading the Bible for the Love of God is a victim of its desire to be relevant. It attempts to be meaningful to the postmodern individual, but ultimately misses everything else in the process. Such is often the result when one tries to meld the zeitgeist with that which avowedly stands against it. The simple fact is that the reports of the death of metaphysics were grossly exaggerated, and like that of Another, its tomb also stands empty.

Identity Crisis

2005-10-29T11:30:00.000-05:00

Last week I gave a talk at the Graduate Christian Fellowship group that my wife and I attend. The topic was the challenge to Christianity that “The DaVinci Code” presents. Now the sticky thing with “The Da Vinci Code” is not its egregious historical fallacies. Those can and have been proven by many authors, Christian, and secular historian alike, to be at best extremely sloppy historical reconstructions, and at worst made up gibberish.

The pull of the book is not in its historical details but in its redefinition of Christianity, and what it purports to offer in its place – a self focused inner divinity movement. The hijacking of ancient Gnosticism and the fusing of it with modern relativism and neo paganism is a scratch that fits our cultural itch perfectly. The ascetic Gnostics, consumed as they were with metaphysical hierarchies of aeons and demiurges, seem to bear little resemblance to the neo-Gnosticism running rampant in our culture. Namely the Gnostics cared a great deal about what you believed, in fact, correct belief was the way to true spiritual liberation – only by appropriating and understanding the right mystery could you find life.

The modern rage is very different. As Elaine Pagels aptly puts it in her book “Beyond Belief”, it is not about what you hold to be intellectually true, but what you experience. The experience of God, detached from creed, is what drives the neo-Gnostic movement (though calling it a movement seems a little silly since movements tend to be defined by their creed and their leaders, while this mode of thought denies both and appeals to experience.)

I think the draw of neo-Gnosticism for the modern seeker has nothing to do with an authentic search for the real Gnostics. Rather, I think it finds in Gnosticism a movement (which in the ancient context it certainly was a movement with leaders and creeds) that Christianity soundly rejected, and therefore seems appealing to a culture which desires to throw off the shackles of Christianity. But only some shackles. Neo Gnosticism thought retains vestiges, subversions of the most appealing Christian principles. The canonical New Testament locates our worth by the sacrifice of Christ, the price by which we were redeemed, and the status conferred upon us as the new Covenant people of God. Modern neo-Gnostic thought finds our worth located on the inside, something we carry with us, but are unaware of until we find it. Our worth is in our identity, with us all along until we realize it.

Of course, this kind of thinking makes the Christian focus on “sins” and “repentance” all the more unbearable to modern sensibilities. After all if our default setting is “valuable”, then the only barrier to realizing that worth in our failure to comprehend it, our failure to get in touch with that inner nature buried inside of us. The only sin is to constrain ourselves from full self expression. And thus the spirit of the old Gnostic thought comes to life – while they old Gnostics would have said, “The world is evil, but secret wisdom can set you free”, the new Gnostics will say, “You are good, and by experiencing your own goodness you will be free.”

Subtle, appealing to a consumer culture eager for validation, for quick fixes, for self-justification, it is an anti-Gospel if there ever was one. The yearning for self knowledge is a common one, and yet, when elevated to the status of the primary search, it becomes the most dangerous idol ever erected. After all, the story of Genesis recounts a tree in the garden, a tree of knowledge from which, after eating you can become like a god. If there were ever a Gnostic story in the Bible that would be it. And yet, the agony of death lies in its fruit. To solely search for identity within is the old search, the search of death, by which we become joined in futility with our ancestors Adam and Eve.

It is not that the Gospels deny a desire for self knowledge – they just point it in a radically different direction. The one who saves his life, who “finds” it will lose it. The one who loses his life with find it. Take up your cross and follow. Die to self, to the futile self-search. Die to your self expression, to your actualization. Die to anything that seeks to control you and to find you. Die to your desire to find your own agenda. Lay down your arms, lay down your anxieties, lay down your desire for power, lay down your desire to put your life in “order”. Follow me. Follow me. Follow me. The call runs throughout the pages of the gospel, echoing deeper and deeper as the path grows steeper. When we throw open the door to the one who knocks, and the eternal light shines into the dusty chambers of our souls, we find not self-validation of our goodness, but reason for self-abasement. Like the apostle Paul all we counted to our credit truly seems rubbish, and we cry like Peter in the boat, “Away from me Lord, for I am a sinner.” It is not a statement of how well we have been following arbitrary rule which cramp our style. It is a recognition of our state, of our dirty hands, specked with murderous spots that do not come clean even with the deepest scrubbing. It is the recognition of frailty, or weakness, of loneliness, of deep need that cannot be sated by whistling in the dark, or telling stories about how deep down we are special. For in heart of hearts, we know that we are not.

It is a hard message for this generation. For any generation. And yet, in the ruined wrecks of our lives, there is one who would enter that dusty room, and eat, even as the room is unveiled for the wreck that it is. And as he breaks our moldy break, and eats it with us, we realize that from him the light was emanating all along. And we recognize him, for he still eats with sinners today as in time gone by. And he calls the things that are not, as though they are.

Indeed there is light inside, and that light is the life of men. Yet it must be invited in. Having believed the lies of the serpent along with Adam, we are desperate to believe that the capacity for the light is within ourselves, and yet, if that light inside is darkness, how great is the darkness. We do have an identity – we are children of God. It is an identity that all the soul searching of a lifetime cannot truly fathom, till we exclaim how high and wide are the depths of the love that has called us its own, and made us its own.
The message of the Gospel is a scandal – a scandal that resonates most strongly in the places where it is most familiar. But the validation our culture craves so much cannot be bought by merely following rules, and it cannot be bought by throwing off rules and searching within. It can only be found by coming to our sense, and seeing that it would be better to be a servant in our master’s house than to continue to grouse among the pods for those the pigs have not spoiled. And so we return, humble, meek, broken by life, and in the midst of the tears pouring down our face, we can dimly make out the image of a figure running towards us with arms outstretched…

The Goodness of God, Righteousness as Relationship.

2005-10-12T18:18:00.000-05:00

When I was a boy, my parents hung a simple scripture plaque on the basement wall over my childhood bookshelf. It was a simple black background with two scriptural phrases in white italics. The first was "God is Love," but just below that ran the quote "God is Light." Quite simple in design, this plaque nevertheless uniquely conveyed two of the most vital attributes of God. In a previous post I spoke of God as Love, and hence, as relationship, with the eternal dance of the Trinity serving as both source and object of that divine affection. Now I wish to attempt the same for light, or, to interpret the metaphor, I wish to do the same for the Goodness, the Righteousness of God.

Before I begin, it is important to state my views on an important facet to this discussion. Goodness is a fundamental attribute of God. While few would take issue with this statement, I have nonetheless run into a peculiar explanation of how that comes to be that I think needs to ne stated before I can continue. Some view the Goodness of God as secondary to his sovereigty, conceptualizing God is Good as God defines what is good by holy decree. Now, on the surface this is true, of course God's decrees are just, but beneath it lurks a subtle misconception, the idea that God is arbitrarily good, that He chooses and decrees what is good from many alternatives, as we might choose a pair of pants or our dinner. Nothing could be further from the truth. God's goodness is an intrinsic part of His character.

I first realized what this meant as I read C.S. Lewis's conversion account. In it, he speaks of his childhood fascination with the Norse myths, and in particular their account of the end of the world. Unlike our more upbeat notions, the Norse were depressingly morose, believing that in the end Odin (their king of the gods) would fall, and al creation be plunged into darkness. But rather instilling a need for psychotherapy, Lewis claimed that thid story taught him about the Goodness of God, for he realized as he read it that even if the darkness won, it was still right (in that context at least) to follow Odin to the end of the world. In short, he was good even if he wasn't all powerful. Thankfully this won't be an issue with us, as God is certainly Omnipotent, but even if he weren't, even if the adversary would win in the end, it is still right, still just, to follow Him. His Goodness does not depend on his power. It just is. With that prelude, I can begin.

To get back to the plaque. As I pondered it the other night, a question that I had never dreamed of floated through my mind. The question was this, Can Goodness exist in a vacuum? Or, in other words, is it possible to be truly Good without anyone or anything to be truly good to or with? And so I looked for what Goodness meant in the Bible, to see what light it could shed on this question.

The Ten Commandments are often regarded as a keystone of morality, and if each one is looked at, it is easy to see that each involves two persons, the one committing the infraction and the one infracted, so to speak. Now, that other person isn't always human. In fact, the first tablet is largely about our actions toward God. Either way, it seems clear that the Goodness they describe (or closer to the mark, the badness they prohibit) always involves a relationship.
The New Testament drives this point further home, for when Christ is asked about what the centerpoint of the Law is, he replies "Thou shalt love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind, and love your neighbor as yourself." I can add nothing to this.

It should be obvious now where I am going, for if Goodness is, in the final analysis, relational, then a God of intrinsic Goodness must contain relationship as a fundamental part of his being. In short, He must be Triune. God is Good because within Himself he fully defines the statement made by Christ. He in fact loves the Lord with all his Heart, Soul and Mind, for the Father ever loved the Son, and the Son likewise the Father, with that Love ever manifest in the person of the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, he loves his neighbor as himself, for his Neighbor is Himself. In fact, if this is a true idea, then it may be that all the personal attributes of God proceed from his triune nature. This has far reaching apologetic implications. Think about it. If this idea bears scrutiny and turns out to be correct, then it is not possible to speak of a Unitarian God who is intrinsically Love and Light, you might as well speak of a square circle or claim that two plus two equals eight.

If, as I said, the idea bears scrutiny. As I look back voer this pos, I realize that I have been writing in a very definitive tone. The truth is, these ideas have greatly advanced my appreciation of who God is and what He has done. They have only served to increase my desire to worship the One who made all things, and in whom perfect Love and Righteousness meet and embrace. But I could be wrong. And so I invite comment and discussion. Read this, think about it, tell me if you agree or disagree and why. My desire in this, as in all things, is to be sharpened by the words of other believers as iron sharpens iron.

Science and Philosophy: Which is Which and Who is Who?

2005-10-04T20:00:00.000-05:00

We’ve mentioned Intelligent Design and Evolution several times, but the recent events in Dover make me thing that the time has come to dedicate more space to this topic.

The Dover, PA school board’s policy on the teaching of Intelligent Design is under fire. Now mandated by the curriculum, preceding the teaching of evolutionary theory, students are informed that Darwin’s theory is a theory has some gaps in it, and there is an alternative theory (“ID”) which they can read about on their own time. Specifically, students are pointed to the book “Of Pandas and People” which is somewhat of a “textbook” for intelligent design which they can find in the school library.

Most scientists are calling foul, that the “Theory of Intelligent Design” has no scientific merit and should not be endorsed or taught in a science class in any way shape or form (though perhaps in a philosophy or religion class.)

Now, how are we to decide whether or not “Intelligent Design” is science or philosophy/religion. The main goal of Phillip Johnson, William Dembski, Micheal Behe, and others in the ID crowd is to challenge the materialistic naturalism that often goes hand in hand with teaching Darwin’s theory. They claim a “religion” is already smuggled through the backdoor by the atheistic presumptions that are often coupled with the teaching of Evolution. A primary goal is to oppose those like evolution proponent Richard Dawkins. who insists that evolution allows him to be an “intellectually satisfied atheist”, and that teaching of religion to children is akin to “mental child abuse”.

I agree wholeheartedly that voices such as Dawkins’ need to be opposed by brilliant minds who can make a credible defense for faith, and that the philosophical presumptions behind a scientist’s work need to be revealed. This is not the same as “proving” God, merely proving that God has not been disproved. Such philosophical overlay needs to be stripped from any public school teaching of the theory of evolution. Such a presentation needs to explain the limits of science, what it can do, and what it cannot do.

This brings up a good point: what exactly can Science do? And is modern scientific education doing a good job at distinguishing Science from Philosophy as things currently stand?

Science can observe data, create hypotheses, test those hypotheses, and construct theories based on whether the data matches the hypothesis. It can make proclamations such as “Since we see Y follow X here and here, Y should follow X here.” These predictions, if confirmed, become the basis of other predictions. If the propositions are study, then the subsequent propositions will be sturdier, leader to more complex predictions. Conversely, taking the results of science, engineers can construct technological applications of the science, using the propositions

I propose that one’s beliefs of almost any sort (with an exception noted below) should in principle have no impact on whether one can be a good scientist or engineer, since the best theories should match the evidence that is built up step by step in the laboratory by experimentation, not be based on what the scientist brings to the experiment. Science has a very efficient way of knocking down false beliefs, due to the unequivocal results of reproducible experiments. In other words, if you came into the laboratory with a belief that rocks fly upward when drop from a height, even if you persisted in that belief, the experiments of your colleagues would not validate your belief (and no one would accept your theory). Again, as Aaron can testify, he would not last long as a doctor by prescribing anti-fungal cream to treat cancer patients, even if he had a strong belief that it was effective. The results of a case study would be enough to debunk his claim. (Now, if Aaron was able to prove that he in fact COULD cure cancer with fungal cream, despite the inability of his peers to do so, this would raise questions not about science per se, but about Aaron.)

The point is that the work of science is very systematic, and not very dogmatic. Dogma doesn’t last long in science, because even closely held dogmas tend to get rooted out by the ruthless process of data/theory/experimentation/new data/revised theory/experimentation. If a dogma does not match the data, it must be thrown out, unless it is replaced by a theory that makes better use of the data. Science is a process, and a constantly reshaped framework that is a tool for making sense of the universe as it is lived in the present.

Of course the great beauty of science is that it is prone to revolution, as new assumptions of the previous group of scientists are shown to have colored their work, and blinded them to the possibilities of new and better theories. This sparks a war unless it can be shown that the new theory better explains the data. Hence the beginning of the 20th century was characterized by a huge war among scientists as they challenged the framework of Quantum Mechanics. Some, like Einstein, refused to let go of the “old way” of doing science, and fought against the rising tide of the new science the rest of their lives, not because it did not explain the laboratory results, but because they disagreed with the kind of universe Quantum Mechanics represented – Einstein’s famous statement “God does not play dice” was in direct reference to his opposition to the new Quantum worldview.

So, one of the great challenges of doing good science is to do so with as few presumptions as possible. Of course, back to the point I alluded to above, one might argue that the scientist needs a presumption that science is possible, before science can be attempted. Namely that the universe is an ordered enough place such that experimental results taken one day are valid the next. Theories of planetary motion and gravitation would not be possible, if the moon really did appear one day as a ball of green cheese in the sky, or one day rocks did not fall. So in this instance, the Judeo-Christian worldview actually paved the way for Science in the Middle Ages. It asserted that the forces of nature were not chaotic events, the whims of distant and powerful gods wrecking havoc on mortals whenever they needed to be appeased by bringing calamity, nor that the universe was random and meaningless, nor that all reality was a dream in the mind of Bhrama. Rather, the worldview said that the universe was good and ordered, brought into being by a benevolent creator, who put into motion the universe, and watches over it. Granted, the Bible contains stories of miracles, but these are miraculous precisely because they are not the normal course of things – they were specific interventions at specific points in time for specific purposes. Jesus’ resurrection was not significant because the Jews did not understand that when people die they usually stay dead. It was significant because of exactly the opposite - people ALWAYS stay dead, therefore, this must have meant something unique.

So, some worldview IS important for science, but the worldview’s need to be transparent, and visible, and part of the discussion of any scientific enterprise. The problem is that often the worldview is “baked” in, making science not systematic but dogmatic. By saying that science explains things that are repeatable and observable, and can be used to predict future repeatable and observable things, one is speaking in good stead. By saying that science can give us clues about the past by showing us what things are happing now, and by which we can logically extrapolate with good reason back to past events, one is also speaking in good stead. (A good example here is the theory of the Big Bang. By observing that all objects are currently moving away from each other faster and faster, it is a logical deduction to assume that at some point in the past they were all very close together – hence one can present a theory that explains this, namely that the universe began from one point and has been expanding outward since – until someone comes up with a better reason why the objects are moving away from each other that theory has to hold the high ground.) But here is the important point - if you were to say that "the things that science has the power to observer are the only things, and the only possible things" you are on very bad ground indeed. Science by definition has a limited purview – to say that the limited purview is the limit for everyone, is to make science a dogma more constricting than that of the most rigid Bible-thumping fundamentalist who starts his cosmic clock at 4004 BC.

So, taking the view that science tells us what might happen, or what might have happened (with more or less certainty based on the reliability of the data collected), it tell us absolutely, positively, nothing whatsoever in any way shape or form, WHY whatever happened happened. There is no "why" in science nor could there ever be. No “intelligent designer”, no “first cause”, no “blind watchmaker” can ever be found by the scientific method. We assign causality to pattern. “Event A follows Event B” becomes in our minds “Event B because of Event A”. However, we know nothing of the sort, and can say nothing of the sort. B might be because of A, but we don’t know for sure. It might be because B has an affinity for following A without A’s knowledge. It might be because B and A are intrinsicly bound by a set of laws (made by who/what/when?) It might be because someone (thing? Person? Computer?) always knows that once Event A happens Event B happens. Or perhaps there is a great cosmic child with a love of repetition banging out B after A like and endless round of chopsticks on the keyboard. There could be a million more reaons “why” B followed A, and the point is this. We have no way of deducing the why, since to our vantage point, they ALL LOOK THE SAME.

An “Intelligently Designed” world – a “Random Meaningless” world – to a creature inside the world using the scientific method they are indistinguishable. “Evidence of design” could be evidence of chaos, the splotchy fingerprints of a child, the 20th generation of the great cosmic computer simulator churning out universe upon universe with infinite variation and no end. Nobody can tell the difference. “Evidence of Randomness” could be the laughter or a divine being (is s/he/it good, evil sadistic?), the accidental slop of coffee on the cosmic keyboard, the finger painting of the cosmic child, a hiccup in the mind of Bhrama… again, it all looks the same to science. Science has no way of even proving that it exists in a world where science is possible - for in fact science might just be a deluded memory we all woke up with in fairyland.

So please, let’s not reduce this debate to simplistic terms. I cry foul on both sides. One of advocating the teaching of “non-science”, the other for attempting to level the playing field by adding more “non-science”. If we really call it “science” class, then lets teach science, it’s glories and it’s limitations. Be frank with the controversies, inspire children to fill in the gaps, not with "evidence of design", but new ideas that will help us understand the marvellous world we live in better, all without asking (or more likely presupposing) "why" in the middle of our science books. If we’re going to mix in philosophy and “why” questions, then for heaven’s sake bring in the “ID”ers, the creationists, the Darwinists, and the Brahmans – they all deserve a place at the table to bring out the answers to “why” with equal time in the debate of ideas (though one might add, this is what libraries, pastors, mystics, monks, politicians, and parents are for.)

If this seems a bit unsettling, please remember this. As Christians we claim to know “why” for one reason, and one reason along. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. But that is not something science can say much about…

Freedom, Choice, and the Imago Dei

2005-10-03T20:17:00.000-05:00

This morning I finally finished Truth and Tolerance, a work of Theology and Philosophy by the now Pope Benedict XVI. The book itself is actually a collection of smaller essays, most of which deal with how a religion that claims to possess Truth can possibly make sense in this postmodern, pluralistic age that we find ourselves in. While each of these essays deserves a separate review, that is something clearly beyond my current allotted time, and so I will focus on the last entry, a short paper dealing with the idea of Freedom that I found particularly profound.

Freedom, and its logical corollary choice, have quickly become the moral lodestones of our age. All political actions are conceptually centered around them. All modern philosophies extol and exalt their virtue. Benedict takes this as a foundational observation, and then, in his essay, attempts to dig beneath the surface, asking the question 'What are we becoming free of?" After examining such contemporary issues as abortion rights and euthanasia, he arrives at a startling observation. We are attempting to be free of each other, of humanity. In short, each one of us, as we follow the north star of utter choice, is attempting to become as self-determining as God Himself.

You see, we humans are embeddded in a network of relationships. We are born from the passion of our parents, we live with and love our friends and spouses, we then bring into being radically dependent young that we then lead and nurture. But we would be free from this. We would c,aim the crown of self-existence, the prerogative of God alone. We would sit alone on the throne of our lives, directing them not by necessity, but by whim. And well we might ask, why shouldn't we. After all, isn't this our birthright as Imago Dei, beings created in the likeness of God?

Then Benedict plays his trump. Even God, he states, is not free in this way. HIs argument is simple. Classifying human relationships into three categories, Being-From, Being-With, and Being-For, he then identifies these with the three Persons of the Trinity. God the Father, ever begetting and loving the Son (Being-For), God the Son, ever begotten, the One and Only (Being-From), And the Holy Spirit, the Comforter (Being-With). As He expounds on this, the dazzling truth becomes clear. Human freedom does not exist as we separate ourself from relationship with others, it is embodied in them, for that very ntework of relationships is the crux of the Image of God in Man. To be separate, arelational if I might coin a term, is not like God at all.

No... It is a flight from God, an endless fall from the heights. A never-ending exile into the outer darkness. In short, it is Hell, a personal reenactment of Lucifer's rebellion.

So is freedom then an evil? It is not, answers Benedict, only false freedom is evil. True freedom, he concludes lies in freedom to be what we were made to be, Children of God, pure reflections of the Triune Creator's life, love and unutterable joy. All choices that detract from that only imprison us in walls of our own selfishness. Freedom, he concludes finally, may in the end be only tangentially related to choice, and perhaps it is in the relinquishing of our right to ourselves that we become most free.

To that, I can add nothing but Amen.

What You May Not Know You Believe...

2005-10-02T07:16:00.000-05:00

Theology matters in every day life, especially if you don't read any.

To many evangelicals, theology is a dry discipline, concerned with esoteric definitions and complex doctrines, a field of study where ponderous words such as "supralapsarianism", "hermeneutic", and "dispensation" are thrown about with terrible casualness. And for many, this is an a priori reason to shun the discipline altogether. "After all", one might say, "those words are not found in the Bible, and I go straight to the Bible for my understanding of things."
In many ways this attitude is right, good and admirable. God has indeed given us His word in readable form, and has promised that He will come to us through its pages if we but approach with a believing heart. But such an approach, if taken in exclusion, has a catch.

We are creatures who live in time and space, but more than that, we are creatures who live in a particular time and space, and this particularity can play subtle tricks with our thought processes. In each place, in each age of the world, there are certain things that are assumed, and there are certain things that, if seen from the vantage point of any other age, are perhaps excessively emphasized. This happens in theological circles as well.

(One caveat, before any philosophically savvy readers attempt to attack me as a semi-postmodernist, I must add that admitting this in no way detracts from the existence of absolute transcendental truth. All this represents is an acknowledgement of our blindness as humans to what is going on around us. To borrow an example from the recent Touchstone, a fish is likely unaware moment to moment of the quality of water in which he swims. That is all I mean to say.)

To illustrate this principle, let us take the example of the doctrine of Christ's return. If you were to ask the average evangelical about the particulars surrounding this event, you would likely get the following reply. "Christ will come to the air to take away believers, after which a seven year tribulation will occur, followed by Christ's return to earth in power to set up his millennial Kingdom." You might even be shown a chart graphically depicting this sequence. But if you were to ask a individual raised in a classically reformed church the same question, you might hear the following. "The Church will continue to evangelize until all nations have heard the Gospel. When this occurs, Christ will return in glory to set up His eternal Kingdom." You might then hear some heated attacks on those who make charts of the type I mentioned above. The point of this is that both statements affirm the classic doctrine (Christ will return), but give radically different scenarios.

Now imagine that these individuals were placed in a room to discuss. My guess is that you would hear them both claiming the Bible as their sole authority for making the statements that they do. This is where theology comes in, for the standard evangelical is following, probably without knowing it, a means of interpretation called "Dispensationalism," developed by the ex-anglican priest J.N.Darby about 200 years ago. On the other hand, the reformed individual would be arguing, again possibly without knowing it, from the "Coventantal" perspective, an approach defined in the years following the Reformation by such individuals as Luther and Calvin.

One still might ask why this matters, as the individuals affirm the same doctrine, just in different forms. But on closer analysis, this simplistic approach breaks down. The Dispensationalist, focusing on a rapture-style second coming, will typically see the Return of Christ as an escape form this evil world. They will typically be very active in evangelism around this point, and less concerned with such things as stewardship of creation, social issues, etc. as such effort are perceived to be a vain attempt to jumpstart a dying planet. The Reformed individual, however, would likely have a reversed perspective. In summary, the first theology carries a mesage of rescuing the faithful, the second of protecting God's creation until he comes for it. Devout followers of both systems might take issue with these descriptions, and of necessity they have been foreshortened. As with most subjects, I cannot convey all nuances in this space. Nor am I trying to support one or the other in this article, though I do have my preference. What I am saying is that the theological framework you hold, whether consciously or unconsciously, affects both your reading of the Bible, and the actions that you deem most appropriate based on what you read. That can hardly be considered unimportant.

Our lives and actions are affected by our underlying theology. Those who claim to have no theological system but what is written in the Bible have a high vision, a vision we all would do well to share, but the truth is that most if not all of them do have an underlying theology. They simply don't know what it is. This ignorance that be dangerous. After all, theologies are the product of theologians, and theologians are, in the final analysis, humans who are attempting,with the best tools they have, to plumb the nature of God and of His World. So how can we, then, negate this effects of this, or even more importantly, how can we make sure that we actually believe the truth? On these matters I have several suggestions.

1. Know what you believe and why. If you are a dispensationalist in outlook, be honest and call yourself a dispensationalist, if reformed, call yourself reformed. Then investigate why you place yourself in that camp and make sure that your reasons for staying are based on conviction from the word of God and not just heredity.

2. Listen to those from other camps. Those individuals are attempting, with all the grace God has placed in their hearts but with all human frailty intact, to read, understand, and proclaim His Word just as you are. If these individuals agree with you, fine. But if not, I suggest our first thought should not be "They are wrong because...," but rather "Have I made an error here?" This will preserve us in both Christian humility and brotherhood, plus we might just learn a thing or two in the process.

3. Recognize that all theological systems are, in the end, incomplete. This is not because, as some postmoderns might suggest, they are mere human inventions. No, it is because the God they attempt to fathom is in the end infinite, immortal, and much wiser than we. We should not be shocked when a system of logic put in place to help us understand God's plan (for that is what a theology is) breaks down at some point. Even our theories on how our finite universe operates do that. If this did not happen, I would consider the faith suspect, for if God can, in the end, be fully comprehended by Man, then Man must be greater than God.

4. Most important of all, recognize the "Mere Christianity" that exists above and independent of these systems. The confession of Christ as Lord, the power and sacrificial character of His death, the rock-solid conviction that He has been raised from the dead as exalted head of the created order, the firm knowledge that in Christ, God himself was dying for Man so that man could be brought back to God; this is the true center. For amidst all the theorizing and logic, all the debate and deliberation, these things stand as the fiery core of our faith. There the divine heart beats with resurrection life, waiting to send it into the least of men who approach Him with faith in a surge of cleansing blood and fire that can purify the foulest sinner and restore the effaced Imago Dei in his heart. That is truth of the Gospel, and that is something that all who name Christ as Savior can affirm, and in its light, theology willing takes a back seat as the presence of the One it loves draws near.

As always, there is more than could be written about this. In the end, I leave you with this plea: Know what you think, know why you think it, be able to acknowledge that you might be wrong, and never lose sight of the One who has called us to bring all thoughts into captivity for His Name's sake.

Intelligent Falling: Help from the Most Unlikely of Sources

2005-09-19T18:11:00.000-05:00

Several days ago, as I was perusing the critically acclaimed news source known as The Onion, I happened across an intriguing article on its science page. (For those unfamiliar with The Onion, that last sentence is meant to drip with sarcasm) Its title was Intelligent Falling, and it was quite obviously written as a parody to the current debate over Intelligent Design. As such, I expected it to be filled with the good-natured jibes so characteristic of The Onion, and was not disappointed, but as I read it immediately became apparent that there was more to it than that, much more. Simply put, in attempting to guffaw at the ideas behind ID, The Onion inadvertently exposed a fatal flaw in the thinking of most Americans, and of most Christians. To read the complete "article," click on the title of this post.

The truth, hard as it is to admit, is that we Americans are all closet Deists. The majority of us believe that the Universe functions much like a clock, with various mechanical pieces that interlock and turn, producing the orderly world that we see. Even Christians, believing as we do in a personal God, a miracle working God who is sovereign over the natural order, still seem to harbor the concept that God created the world at some point, set it in motion, and now it runs by obeying impersonal, natural laws that are only infrequently suspended when God needs to tweak something within the system. The fact that we define a “Miracle” as a suspension of natural law lends proof to this.

But in its attempts at sarcasm, Intelligent Falling actually manages to hit upon a long hidden assumption of the modern worldview that for all its force may not be correct. What is a natural law? Is it, like a civil law, recorded somewhere, so that falling bodies can refer to it? A law of physics is a relationship, laid down on paper after repeated observations, so that events can be predicted. It is a mathematical statement that embodies, in logical language, the concept that in a given situation, the same thing happens every time provided the event is set up to take place. C.S. Lewis, in his paper titled The Laws of Nature, wrote,

“The Laws are the pattern to which events conform: the source of events must be
sought elsewhere.”

And later in the same essay,

“The laws, in one sense, cover the whole of reality except- well, except that
continuous cataract of real events which makes up the actual Universe.”

Moreover, a law of nature, however formulated, is never more than an elaborate description of how (how much, how often, how many, etc.) but it cannot answer the more fundamental question, Why?

Why do rocks fall? Is it, as quantum physics would explain, a flux of virtual gravitons? Is it, as relativity states, a shifting of the geometry of Time and Space? It is all those and more, but with either of those descriptions the teleologic question still stands: alone, aloof, and ultimately opaque to the scientific method. This is not a fault of science, any more than it is the fault of a telescope that it cannot pick up sound waves; it simply wasn’t built for it. Perhaps in the end law is not the best way to model the behavior of the universe. We may already be getting hints of this through quantum mechanics, a bizarre realm where chance and chaos reins. Perhaps the fact that we see any orderly universe at all is one continuous miracle, the eternal weaving of time from the threads of chaos, spun moment to moment on God’s Loom. This perspective has the added benefit of acknowledging the true depths of God’s immanent interest in our cosmos. (It is also one aspect of a fairly well developed philosophic system called Occasionalism, a point of view that, in my estimation, has a lot going for it)

So as we return to the question of Intelligent Falling, and to the meaning of natural law, I find myself agreeing more and more with the statement of a fictitious Dr. Ellen Carson, leading Intelligent Falling expert.

“Traditional scientists admit that they cannot explain how gravitation is
supposed to work," Carson said. "What the gravity-agenda scientists need to
realize is that 'gravity waves' and 'gravitons' are just secular words for 'God
can do whatever He wants.”

Sometimes even parody can yield nuggets of enlightenment.

The Tri-Uniform World: Creation as Relationship

2005-09-10T16:21:00.000-05:00

We live in a world where the most fundamental thing is not matter, nor energy, but information, relationship if you will.

That's a fairly weighty assertion, and may send those of you with a more nineteenth century, Newtonian understanding of science and faith to your intellectual battlements, alert for any intrusion of New Age All-Is-Oneness into an otherwise sane and thoughtful (we hope) weblog. And yet this statement, though seemingly outlandish, bears the growing support of the physics community, and has the capacity to illuminate a doctrine at the very heart of the Christian faith, the Trinity's ongoing involvement with the creation and maintenance of the universe.

A brief disclaimer before I begin: time and time again, it has proved ultimately dangerous when the final defense of a Christian doctrine has been built on the "assured results of modern scholarship" (To quote C.S. Lewis), and those who do so will invariably find themselves disappointed an disillusioned simply because human knowledge is a continuously moving target. Nevertheless, as one who has spent most of my adult life in the community of those attempting to move that knowledge, I can state that the desire of most is to move it in the direction of the truth. And, to paraphrase St. Jerome, "All truth is God's truth," and this no matter the source. With that in mind let us delve into a small fraction of the evidence on which such a statement can be made, and perhaps learn something about God in the process.

The Creation:

Many of you may have taken chemistry in some form or another in high school, and so almost everyone is familiar with the concept of the atom, the smallest particle of an element. For a brief review, atoms are composed of protons, electrons, and neutrons, held together by electromagnetic (and, for the more knowledgeable on these matters, strong and weak nuclear forces). Most people, on learning this, automatically begin to think of these particles as tiny balls floating in an endless void, tethered by invisible strings. It is a familiar and comforting picture, but unfortunately utterly false. The reality is much stranger, consisting of particles that, far from being solid, act like smeared out waves of data, only occupying a position when someone looks at them. It is a world where "virtual matter", particles that spontaneously pop into and out of existence, form the basis for the forces that hold objects together. It is a world where, by a strange mathematical procedure known as "supersymmetry" (A procedure as yet physically undiscovered, but nonetheless mathematically consistent and compelling) particles of "matter" and particles of "energy" such as photons, can exchange properties. It is this that I'd like to touch on at greater length.

Basically, all particles (that we know now are smeared waves as much as anything else) can be classified as either "fermions" or "bosons" (I won't describe how this is done, as it is largely irrelevant to the discussion, but if any want to know, I'll be happy to explain it in the comments). Fermions are regarded as "matter" particles, solid things like protons and neutrons, that cannot occupy the same space at the same time. Bosons are bit weirder, for their very nature is to embody the forces, the communicatory relationships if you will, between the matter particles. Accordingly there is a least one boson for each physical force, photons (the units of light) are a primary example. So far we still have matter, but if supersymmetry is correct, then a overarching level exists at which fermions can transform into bosons and vice verse, a process whereby what is regarded as matter can be transformed into relationship, and relationship into matter. This is but one line of evidence out of many, the presentation of which would take far too long, but it seems as if the most successful way of understanding our universe is to regard it as a continual exchange of pure information. This, if true, is fortunate for Christians, for we have a God who, far from being a featureless, opaque unity, has revealed Himself as a continual relational exchange.

The Creator:

"God is Love." Penned by St. John, this is , perhaps, the most fundamental and groundbreaking statement of the whole Bible, the entire nature of God summed up in a single syllogism. It's profundity lies in its implications, for if Love is a fundamental attribute of God, perhaps The Fundamental Attribute, then one believe that God has therefore loved even before the universe had been formed. But love is not just merely a property, something that can be possessed in a vacuum. Love is a relationship, and to be possessed by the Eternal God before thr foundations fo the world, He must have loved something, or someone, during that timeless expanse before the Fiat Lux. But at that point, only God existed. God is love implies that within His very nature there is an Eternal Lover, an Eternal Beloved, and the Eternal Love that exists between them both, and that, as the life of Christ was examined, as his relationship with His God was mulled over, was what the Pre-Nicene Fathers codified as the Doctrine of the Trinity: One God, existing eternally as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In short, God is not a thing, nor a principle. He is an eternal, endlessly personal relationship. And now, it appears that we are finally understanding scientifically what the Church has always taught. Our world, as created by such a God, bears his indelible stamp, as do we.

There is certainly much more that could be written here: the broken relationships caused by sin and how that affects the cosmos, the absorption of that brokenness into the heart of the Godhead, there to be finally healed during the darkness of Calvary, the restoration of the Kingdom, and the New Creation that finally awaits. Indeed, one could construct a new model of fall and redemption based on these concepts, although I'm not entirely sure that another one is needed. Either way, there is not time to address this now. Instead I will leave you with the words of the Church fathers in which the relationality of God is most completely expressed.

The Nicene Creed
We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the
giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come.
Amen.

God: A Good Father, A Small Yet Weighty Tome.

2005-08-26T12:14:00.000-05:00

It is no secret that, for the past years, the Christian markets have been saturated by a peculiar genre of biblically tinted self-help books. This, in fact, is the main reason why I have chosen to reach further and further back into the past in my quest to deepen and understand my faith, and in the process I have discovered such treasures as On The Incarnation, by St. Athanasius, and The Dark Night of the Soul, by St. John of the Cross. While I do not question that such works are being produced now as well, the signal to noise ratio is so poor that I often despair of finding them amidst the welter.

It was thus with immediate and unmitigated delight that I read the first pages of God: A Good Father, by Michael Phillips, quickly finding that its brevity belied the richness and depth of its contents. Simply put, this thin volume is a gem, now to be forever shelved with the likes of Richard Foster and Pascal.

The problem as Phillips’ sees it is simple. We have no practical understanding of God as Father. We know him sell as Son, and are getting to know him better as Spirit, but the infinite heights of his Fatherhood are mountains we have yet to climb. Two thirds of the book is preparatory in nature, carefully yet simply laying out each of our preconceived notions on how we get to know God, how we grow in Him, and how we are to respond to Him as our Father. Not much new is mentioned here, but it is necessary nonetheless if we are to be prepared for where he takes us next. Then we are off on a short but amazingly rich journey into the Father’s house, with Christ as guide.

Here The images are simply described, but all the more wondrous for it: The emerald fountain of life, its waters flowing in an endless stream down the mountain of God’s love, the fogbound valleys of the lost. In what is perhaps the most convicting chapter, he describes the many cities and towns that surround the mountain. Each is named after a virtue such as Holiness, Justice, or Grace, and each filled with believers who love Christ but fear the Father, unable to leave their theologic comfort zones, unwilling to take their eyes off of their own favorite virtue and look above. He even addresses hell; describing how the unquenchable flame of love that burns with such passion in the Fathers eyes becomes the infinite inferno that rages against sin in that place while still remaining love. Those that have read George MacDonald’s sermons and fiction will feel as if they are in familiar company, and this should not come as a surprise, as Phillips is one of the foremost authorities on MacDonald’s works alive today.

If given a chance, I have little doubt that this book will become a long-respected classic of devotional literature. Its vision is both bracing and comforting, and is one that will stay with me for some time. Those who are firmly entrenched in a particular denomination, with not much consideration for what lies beyond, will find this books perspective an uncomfortable one. But this is good, for it is the discomfort of a wound being sutured, of a surgery meant to allow greater freedom of movement. Above all, this book offers an unimpeded glimpse of the intimacy we can have with the God that Christ called, and taught us to call Abba, Father, Daddy.

A Rose by any other Name

2005-08-20T07:27:00.000-05:00

Recently, when reading at Wittingshire. I came across this post about name calling, and name shortening. I have of late run into this issue myself - even though I have a initialized nickname "J.R.", which is used by friends and family, in professional settings I have chosen to go by my full name, Jonathan. However, I have invariably run into people's tendency to shorten my name even though I have ever, only, and always introduced, signed my name, and referred to myself as Jonathan. However, down deep in my soul, I am most assuredly a Jonathan, and not a "Jon". The very name grates on my actually, not that it's a bad name, but that it is not me.

Names also play an important role in fantasy literature. In the Wheel of Time series, the peasant Rand al'Thor, discovering his destiny, becomes known to all as "The Dragon", or "He Who Comes With the Dawn" as he steps into a new life as the warrior of the light to oppose the Dark One. Rand is not the only character who has a significant name, as throughout the series, "Naming the Dark One" (Shaitan for the uninitiated) brings his gaze upon you and invites misfortune.

In the Harry Potter series, the names of Harry and his friends do not change; neither do the names of the teachers. Instead, it is the character of Tom Riddle, as he becomes more powerful and evil, who takes on a new moniker, Lord Voldemort. The name is so fraught with evil and power, he is only referred to as "You know who" and "He who must not be named" by those he terrorizes. Only Harry, and those few around him who have controlled their fear are able to call him by his true name, Lord Voldemort, and only Dumbledore calls him simply "Tom".

The two most interesting name changers in The Lord of the Rings are Aragorn and Gandalf. Gandalf was originally named Olorin, a sprit of the Maia dwelling in the eternal west with the Valar. After coming to Middle Earth, he was named "Mithrandir" by the elves meaning "The Grey Pilgrim", and this was changed to Gandalf the Grey by the men of the West (and the only name the Hobbits knew him by). In The Two Towers, after his rebirth, Gandalf acknowledges Legolas' hail "Mithrandir!", but when Aragorn cries out Gandalf.

"Gandalf", the old man repeated, as if recalling from old memory a long disused word, "Yes, that was the name. I was Gandalf...I am in white now, said Gandalf. "Indeed, I am Sauruman, one might almost say, Suruman as he should have been."

Aragorn is introduced to the reader as Strider, a ranger of the North, keeping watch over the shire with the Dunedain, the last of the noble race of men. The name is coarse, but it fits his life, and Sam always refers to him throughout the story by that name. When the fellowship is assembled, he is revealed as Aragorn, son of Arathorn, the true heir to the throne of Gondor, and yet much must happen before he can ascend the throne. And when he does, he becomes the King Elessar.

Ursula LeGuin’s Earthsea series perhaps does the most with names. The entire magic system used by the wizards is based on being able to know the “true name” of an item. Much of Wizarding instruction is not memorizing incantations, but memorizing names, for true power can only be exerted over an object or a person by knowing their true name. One of the great social issues in this world is of course, who to share your “true” name with, for that itself is an act which gives submits power to the recipient. Of course, the best wizards know how to find out a name from other means as well…

I recently finished reading Umberto Eco's classic, the Name of the Rose, and though the meaning of the title is somewhat oblique, Eco gives some hints at it origins in the postscript by referring to a poem written by Bernard of Morlay.

Bernard adds that all these departed things leave (only, or at least) pure names behind them..language can speak of both the nonexistent and the destroyed.

My own interpretation of the meaning of this somewhat dark book, where action is futile, and the things most treasured show themselves to be fragile and transient, is that there is something in a name which is greater and more permanent than the thing itself, as if the particular bearer of the name were merely a pointer to something else standing behind it. Whether the something actually exists or not is one of the questions of the book as it deals with conspiratorial monks, and councils investigating heresy. Put differently, the question is whether something truly is standing behind the name, and if so, how can that intransient thing be seen when all life is chaos and corruption.

With all that as backdrop, names are also important in Christian thinking, and given the deep cultural roots our culture owes Christianity, this should not be a surprise. The first man renamed was Abram, who became “Father of Many Nations” long before he could claim a single heir. When the pages turn to the New Testament, the first issue brought up in Matthew is the naming of the children who are produced by the miracle births, John and Jesus. Both are names outside of the immediate family, both names are delivered by angels, and both parents obey. The two most important early followers of Jesus also undergo a renaming, as Simon becomes Cephas, and Saul becomes Paul. The early Christian tradition was to assign a new name at Baptism, a Christian name which would remind the new owner of a saint or martyr to emulate. And in fact, we recently saw something akin to this practice with the choosing of the new Pope, who immediately took on a new name. Much of the commentary at the time was focused on what the new name meant, and which of the earlier “Benedict”’s the Holy Father was attempting to emulate.

Over all this is perhaps my favorite use of names in the New Testament.

“To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives” Rev 2:17

I’ve always thought it wonderful to know that somewhere I have another name, not J.R., not Jon, and not even Jonathan. And this name is that of my true self, found and seen by One, even despite the wreckages of my own life, and when one day I am called by my true name, I will indeed answer, and finally and truly live up to it.

"Almighty God, who hast given thy only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin and also an example of Godly life: Give us grace that we may always most thankfully receive that his inestimable benefit, and also daily endeavor ourselves to follow the blessed steps of his most holy life; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen."

Mohawks, Birth Control, and Eternal Perdition

2005-08-09T17:05:00.000-05:00

My wife asked me the other day what I would do if my son ever wanted a mohawk. Evidently she had observed a Christian couple in church who's child had recently obtained this hairstyle, and she was displeased. Being that my son is only 6 months old, I had to admit that I had never considered this before.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm no fan of the mohawk, but my wife's concerns were far from stylistic, centering instead about the idea of preventing him from hanging out with the wrong crowd (presumably those who also want Mohawks), and the real possibility of becoming the butt of jokes.

"Hanging out with an unsavory crowd," I thought, "that is a problem." But as I considered the second objection, I had to stop and ask myself, do I really want to prevent my child from experiencing the negative consequences of his actions.

We live in a society that seems bent on uncoupling cause and effect, one of the many gifts that have been bestowed on humanity as a result of our status as Imago Dei. Pascal said, to paraphrase, "Prayer was instituted by God to give his creatures the dignity of causation," and the same can be said about any physical act we perform, whether moral, immoral, or neutral. Like it or not, we have been given limited power to shape our physical universe, and nearly unlimited power to shape our own moral destiny. Yet modernity is trying hard to negate this.

Take birth control. I would be the last to say that it is absolutely wrong (although of late I have been leaning that way. It's difficult to read Touchstone and not begin to see things in that light), but one has to admit that it does uncouple two previously joined acts (having intercourse and having a child). This may or may not have increased the rate of immoral behavior among young adults, I do not know the numbers, but I would argue that for some it likely did. This is but one example, and if I had more time I would outline others. But what is perhaps more concerning is the subtle ways that this may have influenced Evangelical Christianity. I am referring, of course, to the doctrine of Eternal Punishment.

There are many views on Hell (actual physical fire, Separation from God, etc) but the common factor is that they are all unpleasant, and all result from the natural course of a human life without Christ. It is, on all counts, a place to be avoided. Yet many churches choose not to discuss it, preferring to focus on the positive benefits of faith in Christ (purpose for living, Hope, etc). All of these are real, and I am not trying to advocate a return to a salvation that is purely escapist. But I still must ask if the reason we get so few balanced discussions of this in Evangelical Christendom is due to a fundamental uncomfortability with the eternal and ultimately permanent nature of human causality, for if one thing is clear from the Scriptures it is that God wants no man to go there, having sacrificed himself to keep us out, and if any die and find themselves in that location, it was, in the end, their choice, though they might not have understood the ramifications of it here on Earth. All acts have consequences, this is the reality, and though we are excellent nowadays at negating the temporal effects of our choices, the eternal aspect remains inviolate, erasable only by the Cross.

So what about my son's potential mohawk? I still have to think about that one, after all, it is my job to make sure that he is raised in the right environment, gets the best chance to make the best choices, and this is probably unlikely to occur if he starts hanging around with the type of individuals who frequently sport mohawks. But in the end his choices must be his own, for he will stand or fall by them, he must understand the consequences of his acts, for they are unavoidable, and he must ultimately realize the futility of running from what he is, an image of the Creator now cracked and broken by sin, mendable only with the blood of Christ. If letting him get a mohawk teaches him this, then so be it.

Denominations and Church Picking

2005-08-07T16:36:00.000-05:00

With the previous post that touched on Evangelicism and its definition, it brings a pretty obvious point to light: what about Denominations? Some denominations are full of Evangelicals, and some in some denominations they are a small minority? What is the role of Evangelicals in a Denomination, and why do we have Denominations in the first place? Should they all just go away, and everyone just join one big mega-church?

I personally have been a member or attended a wide spectrum on denominations within Christendom. I have worshipped with Baptists, non-denominationals, Charismatics, Bible Churches, Presbyterians, and Episcopalians. By the age of 16 I had been Baptized three times, made public professions of faith, and had been prayed for to receive the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

My journey through denominationalism has partly been brought about through decisions of my parents (early in life) of where to attend church, and later in life by my own frequent regional moves, and the strengths and weaknesses of different churches within those regions. Presbyterian Churches in Florida, on the whole, are quite different from those in Illinois, Mississippi, and New Jersey. So all of my moving around can't be just chalked up to being overly picky. Though, some of my myriad of experience could have been disillusioning to a young Christian, for me, it did not have that effect. Somehow (thanks be to God) though the different rites and dress codes, sermon lengths, and worship types, I managed to meet Jesus, and see the churches as different entry points to the same Lord. The common denominator in my experiences has been Evangelicism and I have carried that with me even to churches where Evangelicals are a minority, and on the other side of the coin, my Evangelical foundation has been enriched by the different emphases found in other churches. (For example, an emphasis on sacraments, namely the Eucharist is not a primary focus on Evangelicism, but it has become so in my personal experience and expectation for church)

But how picky should one be anyway when it comes to a denomination or a church within that denomination?

Each denomination has different emphases, structures of church governance, liturgical resources (or lack thereof), historical precedence, and statements of theology. Churches within a denomination differ in what points of theology they choose to emphasize, how they worship, and how they adhere to general denominational guidelines. There are churches that skew conservative (or orthodox) in theology and liberal (or radical) within a denomination, and even within a denomination in the same town. (In fact, that’s one of the reasons WHY there are multiple churches of one denomination in a town. I find that individual churches are influenced primarily by their history, and the leadership of their pastor, and when deciding on whether to join a church it is good to understand both.

Generally speaking, I am more willing to visit multiple denominations than to attend a church in my denomination that I feel is compromising essential tenants of the faith. Given the current liberal leanings of the Protestant mainline denominations, this requires some degree of flexibility in finding a church, and in fact is the reason I found the Episcopal Church in the first place, as I could not find a suitable Presbyterian Church after my last move.

But theology aside, what about personal tastes, such as music, ministry opportunities, the ethnic diversity of the congregation, the cadence of the pastor, the size of the church nursery? I think the long list that could be made of these factors is important, though I believe it is a list that is secondary in importance to the question of whether God is calling you to a particular church, irrespective of the things that might annoy you. There are no perfect church communities, and the sooner you recognize that, the sooner you can begin to be content with the community where you are. I think when first looking for a church in a new community, you should begin with several choices, narrow them down after visits, and then give a church a couple of months of solid attendance to “get to know” it. Most important, I believe, is the question “Is this a place where I encounter the Risen Lord?” If the answer is “Yes”, then many of the secondary issues will work themselves out. Places where you might see the church as being “deficient” might also be places where the church needs contributors (to start ministry opportunities, expand the nursery, join the choir, etc…)

Generally speaking, however, I think it is important to realize that many of our “issues” with a church are really issues with us, long buried and unresolved selfish impulses and prejudices, and are not issues with the actual church where we are uncomfortable. There are many churches where I would not be comfortable worshiping, and while I could probably give you theological rationales for why it’s not the right place for me, they would belie issues that I don’t want to deal with. I believe the holier we become, the more humble we become, and the less inclined to view issues of annoyance, boredom, or frustration as deciding factors on joining a community. At least that is the case with me. When we are all in glory, I do not believe any of these issues that determine “who” we worship with on earth will be present. As such, I think the more open we become to different worship styles, and the different communities, we will come closer to understanding what is really going on in the “invisible Church” which is one Body, serving one Lord.

In the end, I joined my current church, because in some way, it felt like home, even though it was a different faith tradition, and almost the other end of Christendom from where I grew up. But it is where I feel called to be now, and despite the fact that it has “issues”, I encounter the risen Christ there, and that is sufficient. For I have “issues” too, and that is why I came to church in the first place.

Grant to us, Lord, we bessech thee, the spirit to think and do always such things as are right, that we, who cannot exist without thee, may by thee be enabled to live according to thy will; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reineth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Evangelicism and The Book of Common Prayer

2005-07-30T11:21:00.000-05:00

One of the undertakings I believe is necessary for the formulation of an Evangelical Mind is to understand the historical traditions of Christianity, both in their original contexts and also in how they relate to the specific Evangelical tradition. As Evangelicals span a range of denominations, traditions, and religious practices this requires assimilating a diverse spectrum of writers, thinkers, and practitioners. It's always best to begin where one has first hand knowledge, and as we share our experiences and frustrations as believers with one another, hopefully the resulting conversations can show us where each tradition is both strong and in need of reform.

The previous paragraph begs the question: what exactly is an Evangelical. I reject the popular media's notion that Evangelicals are conservative Republicans who take the Bible "literally" (as Peter Jennings defined them on election night). Evangelicism is very well defined by Mark Noll in his book "The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind".

"[T]he British historian David Bebbinton has identified the key ingredients of evangelicalism as conversionism (and emphasis on the "new birth" as a life-changing religious experience), biblicism (a reliance on the Bible as ultimate religious authority), activism ( a concern for sharing the faith), and crucicentrism ( a focus on Christ's redeeming work on the cross). But these evangelical impulses have never by themselves yielded cohesive, institutionally compact, easily definable, well-coordinated, or clearly demarcated groups of Christians."

With these emphases so defined it is clear that many forms of Christian practice can be evangelical in nature, whether "contemporary", or "liturgical" and many areas of disagreement about church organization can still be held by those with strong evangelical beliefs. In fact, I would say there is much greater similarity between two groups who disagree about a specific Biblical interpretation, (and therefore decide they can no longer worship together), than between two groups, on of whom looks to the Bible for guidance, and one who feels it's a waste of time because the Bible is not terribly relevant to their situation. Regardless of interpretation, Biblical centrality is a key unifying factor in the church, across all denominations, while the "liberal/consevative" divide (as it addresses the above points of the Bible, the Cross, evangelism, and conversion) is a divide not in individual denominations, but one that cuts across all Christendom. Hence, in the stronger the tensions of the divide, the strong will be cross denomination ecumenical movements such as the afore-mentioned "Evangelicals and Catholics Together."

All of this is a lead up to a few points I wanted to make about the Anglican prayer book which is now my own, having earlier this year become Confirmed in the Episcopal Church. (I consider myself somewhat of a Reformed/Evangelical/Anglican, but that's a story for another day.) Here is a wikipedia article on the History of the Prayer book, which began as an English translation of the Latin Mass in 1548. It went through many changes as the Church of England grew and formed into what it is today, but primarily it is a liturgical resource, giving the prayers and forms of the Eucharistic service which is performed in all of the Churches of the Anglican Communion. (A large set of changes were approved after the Revolutionary War, to remove all of the prayers for the King, etc…) It is Protestant in nature, but holds strongly to the importance of form and beauty in the worship of God. Its prayers are deep in theology and beauty, and it establishes a rhythm and a timelessness to worship that unites all members of the Communion to one another each week as we hear the Word, say the prayers, and partake in the Eucharistic feast.

Personally I use the Daily Office in the Prayer Book for my Devotions – the Office includes a reading from the Old and New Testaments along with Psalms and a Gospel reading for every day of the year. Interleaved are prayers of worship, supplication, and thanksgiving. Each week of the year, and each day of the week has it’s own prayer called the “Collect of the Day”. In the Liturgical calendar, this is the 12th week of Pentecost, and the prayer for the week is as follows:

Oh God, the protector of all that trust in thee, without whom nothing is strong,nothing is holy: Increase and multiply upon us thy mercy, that, thou being our ruler and guide, we may so pass throug things temporal, that we finally lose not the things eternal; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and
reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Christian unity is important, but I do not believe it involves assimilating into a common tradition, and a common set of practices. Within a unity of belief, there is a great range of latitude, and as we come to know one another better, I think we will see how we need not all worship the same way, and even have the same answers to hard questions, to still be one church following one Lord. I have been a part of many churches and many denominations, and while home for me is currently the Episcopal Church, that might not always be the case. Yet I follow the same Lord, and wherever I am in the next twenty years, it will be the same Lord, "one God, forever and ever. Amen"

What of the Deep?

2005-07-30T07:03:00.000-05:00

No lengthy musings on the nature of the universe today. (actually there are a few knocking about in my head, but they are too nascent, too embryonic to be put into words for the time being) Instead, I thought that I would share a poem written in the 19th century that has provided much fuel for my meditation and much laughter to my 6 month old when I read it to him in a gruff seamanlike voice. (Don't worry, I read him Good night Moon as well.)

Deep-sea Soundings
By Sarah Williams (1841–1868)

MARINER, what of the deep?
This of the deep:

Twilight is there, and solemn, changeless calm;
Beauty is there, and tender healing balm—
Balm with no root in earth, or air, or sea,
Poised by the finger of God, it floateth free,
And, as it threads the waves, the sound doth rise,—
Hither shall come no further sacrifice;
Never again the anguished clutch at life,
Never again great Love and Death in strife;
He who hath suffered all, need fear no more,
Quiet his portion now, for evermore.

Mariner, what of the deep?
This of the deep:

Solitude dwells not there, though silence reign;
Mighty the brotherhood of loss and pain;
There is communion past the need of speech,
There is a love no words of love can reach;
Heavy the waves that superincumbent press,
But as we labour here with constant stress,
Hand doth hold out to hand not help alone,
But the deep bliss of being fully known.
There are no kindred like the kin of sorrow,
There is no hope like theirs who fear no morrow.

Mariner, what of the deep?
This of the deep:

Though we have travelled past the line of day,
Glory of night doth light us on our way,
Radiance that comes we know not how nor whence,
Rainbows without the rain, past duller sense,
Music of hidden reefs and waves long past,
Thunderous organ tones from far-off blast,
Harmony, victrix, throned in state sublime,
Couched on the wrecks be-gemmed with pearls of time;
Never a wreck but brings some beauty here;
Down where the waves are stilled the sea shines clear;
Deeper than life the plan of life doth lie,
He who knows all, fears naught. Great Death shall die.

May this provide you with as much food for thought as it did me. Until next time.

The Cruciform World

2005-07-23T06:30:00.000-05:00

I was pondering Darwinian theory again as I was driving home from work yesterday. You might be surprised at how often this occurs, usually due to the recent ingestion of one of the mood-altering fluid purveyed at Starbucks. Now, I am not a Creation Scientist; that is to say, although I believe with all that is in me in God as Maker of Heaven and Earth (to paraphrase the Creed), I do not hold with those who stress a recent creation in seven actual days, or even those who would claim long epochs punctuated by opaque moments of miraculous activity. Believing as I do that physical law does not exist, and is simply an expression of what God does most of the time, I have no trouble conceptualizing a succession of forms as God's physical way of enacting the commands spoken in Genesis. (More on this at a later time perhaps). In short, I have no beef with Evolution, if by one means only plants and animals turning into other plants and animals.

I do, however, have a bone to pick with Darwinism, both as applied to evolution, and philosophicalls as applied to the universe.

What does that mean, you might ask. Well, simply put, a Darwinian mechanism proposes that animals and plants turn into others by means of natural selection ( I know that there are other methods of selection, but as you'll see when I'm done, my point still holds). To translate further, animals that are stronger will better propagate themselves than weaker ones. It proposes, in fact, a universe founded on selfishness. Granted we live in a fallen world, this certainly is part of the picture, but what many do not think about is that it cannot have been created this way, for to do so would give a characteristic that all regard as sinful true creative power.

I would like to propose an alternative.

What if... What if the true underlying principle, the true unifying force behind the cosmos is not selfishness, but Sacrificial love. What if we live in a Cruciform world. I do not mean this as an idle speculation. Christians in the natural sciences deal with an unbelievable burden, to explore God's world using tools that many times enshrine the wrong ideals. I do not question the immense explanatory power of natural selection, yet if what I propose is true, then that will prove to be a subset of the greater, cruciform principle, the relation between them as seen over the entirety of time similar to that between sin and redemption.

I do not know what this would look like in practicality. I do not know what shape scientific theory would take from this philosophical bent. I do believe that it is necessary to make the attempt. And so I leave it here, inviting all who read this to liberally brainstorm. What would be the defining features of a cruciform understansing of creation. Or if you believe me wrong, why? Either way, the process would be invaluable to the generation of an Evangelical mind.

Aaron

Back In Action

2005-07-23T06:10:00.000-05:00

Greetings to all to have diligently checked this blog over the past month despite the conspicuous lack of new material (likely only Jonathan). I has been quite a while indeed since I have posted anything. The reason will likely not surprise you.

I too am an aspiring author.

I too wish to join the ranks of those who produce thoughtful Christian fiction for the world at large, and in my push over the past two months to complete the revisions on my manuscript, the blog was neglected. This reminds me of a post I saw over on Brandywine Books several months ago regarding the difficult task of juggling authorship and blogging, as they often seem mutually exclusive. Anyway, now it is complete, a single box of white printed sheets half a foot thick all I have to show for a year and a half of labor. Titled The Tower and The Tree, it is a work of Christian science fantasy. If any are interested, Here is the first three paragraphs of the prologue.

The woman wandered in the Desert of Dry Souls, her sword rusty, her armor cracked and dull. The sandy wastes stretched out around her, vast and empty. Only a few worn stones stood out against the endless monotony. She knew that eventually even these would fall, ground to featureless dust by the sand-laden winds. Yet even this bleak expanse failed to deter her, for the path she trod had been set before her by the Bridegroom Himself. He beckoned still, calling her to the end of her journey, the Cathedral at the Edge of Time.
She closed her eyes, directing her vision inward. The temple was dark. Stones that had once been alight with life and power now stood dull in the eternal twilight. Occasionally new stones were added, rising from the black abyss beneath in a whirlwind of light, but these were few. Greater was the number of those who had darkened and grown silent. A faint sigh escaped her lips, and she turned again toward the outside world.
She walked on, her gaze fixed on the dark smudge of twisted forest that lined the far horizon. It was closer now. She did not know if the wilderness would prove more hospitable than the wastes, but at least it would be a change, and for that she was thankful. Above the dark line of forest stood an even fainter band of jagged shadow, the storm crowned peaks of the far mountains. The mere sight of them sent a chill through her flesh. She knew the Dark Man was there. But there was little to be done about it. If her path crossed his, then so be it. There was no other road.

Anyway, that is where I have been. I hope it proves t be fruitful. In the meantime, you can expect many more thoughtful posts to be appearing on this website in the future. And if any of you know what's best to do with a manuscript so it can see the light of day, I'd love to hear from you.

In Christ,
Aaron

Potter and the Pope

2005-07-18T19:19:00.000-05:00

Well I have finally emerged from a week deep in the world of Harry Pottere. I ended up re-reading Episodes 4 and 5 in the Harry Potter saga last week in order to prepare for the latest installment Episode 6 … wait, I have my fantasy saga titles wrong. Ahem… Year 6 of the Harry Potter Series, which is mercifully in chronological order.

As I greatly enjoyed my week at Hogwarts, it also led to some reflection on the place of these stories in our culture. This was brought even more to bear by the report that Pope Benedict XVI had written letters commenting on the “subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly.” This was of course headlined in the media as “Pope Opposes Harry Potter Novels”, which I guess he does, but seems to rather miss the point of his comments. It seems he thinks the books not so much evil, as dangerous, particularly to those who are not strongly grounded in faith.

I grew up in a religious environment, where I was given similar cautions about The Lord of the Rings, with warnings that many had turned to sorcery, or given up the faith due to the content of the books. Having not really encountered many witches or warlocks who converted due to the influence of fantasy novels, I can’t really comment on how tempting a device these might be. However, I do know and understand how fantasy, any fantasy, can provide a great temptation for escapism, a temptation that I feel very strongly, and which I also feel can lead to good or evil.

Fantasy provides an entry into another world – other worlds are not bad in themselves, I would firmly argue. The danger lies in two places – what you learn in the other world, and whether you can come back. I imagine that everyone struggles with escapism to some degree – it manifests itself in different forms. The gothic, long-haired, “rebellious” teenager playing Dungeons and Dragons was the stereotype in my childhood who we were encouraged to avoid, for such was the path to drugs and Satan worship. However, fishing or watching football for twelve hours on Sunday afternoon, or even living your life exclusively through your children could be just as, or even more escapist. In retrospect, having wrestled with my own escapist tendencies, I think the danger lies more in getting trapped inside a selfish world of your own making, where you are king, and the world lies open for satisfying all your cravings. For such a world surely can have more appeal than a world of misunderstanding, of fighting parents, failing test scores, rejection by the popular kids, and the many other hazards of adolescence (and adulthood!). Escapism needs a motive to escape.

So the first danger is loving the fantasy world more than the real world, and here, I think the degree to which the fantasy world reflects the real world can play a great part. C.S. Lewis famously responded to a mother concerned that her daughter loved Aslan more than Jesus, and gave the gentle reminder that the very things the girl loved in Aslan would be the things that would draw her to Jesus when she was older.

So, that brings us to the question of what do we learn in the world of Harry Potter?

The first (and I would say easiest) issue to address is magic. Many criticisms about the series focus on it, and yet I would say it is the least dangerous. Half of the magic is tongue-in-cheek, playing on stereotypes of cartoonish witches and wizards. Harry hauling around a cauldron, sending notes via owls, dressing in robes. None of this is particularly required for power – it’s just the odd stuff that Merlin-esque wizards stereotypically do, along with having long beards and absent minded looks. If I were a real wizard, I think I would be insulted that anyone would consider Harry Potter to be a recruiting tool. In the universe of Harry Potter, magic is part of the environment, just like the air. Free for anyone with the gift to use it. What matters, in the sense of morality, is how you use it. (This is a very different universe than the Christian understanding of magic, in which all magic power must be diabolically seized from the One who controls the universe in order to be used.) In the Potter world there are good wizards and bad wizards, and the difference is in their motives. And here we have the first connection with our world; the magic is merely the context under which the real story comes to life (and is made more imaginative, funny and interesting). The interesting stuff is not that they can do magic, but what use they put it to – that is where we find the proof in the putting.

The great moment in the first book is Hagrids declaration to the poor orphaned wretch, “You’re a wizard Harry!” For what child does not dream that there is a universe beyond their vision, which they cannot see, and in which they are special? It is the first step to any story of wonder, from the ugly step-daughter who discovers she is beautiful and marries the handsome prince, to the restless farm boy, who learns he is the son of the great-galactic murderer, and saves the universe from him.

And yet the temptation for evil is there, at every step. What to do with the power, with the knowledge, with the new duty that becomes painfully clearer at every step. How do I treat my friends, my enemies, my authorities? And who is who?

And so here we have the world in which Harry grows up, a complicated moral world of choices to be made. There are rules at the school (don’t go out after bedtime, do your homework), and rules that reflect moral law (don’t lie, cheat and steal), and Harry breaks both kinds with impunity. He is caught and punished (and sometimes gets away); he lies to students and teachers, sneaks around the school, pokes his nose where it doesn’t belong, talks back, snapps off, hurts the feelings of friends, and fights with enemies, nurses grudges. This all makes the defense I heard on NBC News to the accusation that the world of Harry Potter is moralistically relative rather laughable. According to some Christian defenders of the series: “Harry is a Christ figure.” This couldn't be further from the mark; Harry is the everyman in the story, the Peter, not the Christ. Full of potential that is unrealized, full of ruggedness that must be smoothed away.

Harry does live in a world of murky greys. Sometimes his bending of the rules lands him in such hot water it seems like he would never dream of straying off the beaten. And then before you know it, he’s out breaking more rules, and this time, rather than getting detention, he is saving the world. In all of this, what’s the message?

Well, unfortunately, if you are looking for clear guidance about following the rules, Harry Potter isn’t the place to look. He is a selfish boy, with pride, arrogance, revenge, a temper, and a mean streak. He does break all the rules he can get away with and then some. He is also fiercely loyal to his friends, courageous to a fault, oddly honest at unexpected times, and full of love, with eyes that see past the appearance, and rightly judge the quality of the heart. He succeeds, often in spite of his shortcomings, shortcomings, which sometimes remind us of our own. Because Harry is not yet there, he does things he is ashamed of later, he apologizes to those he hurts, recognizes his errors, even as he is tempting into laziness, or obsession into his curiosities (which often end up saving the day.) He is good at heart, yet in Book 2 it become obvious that he could easily be evil in heart. But he made the important choices, and that makes all the difference.

What we see in the end, is a process of maturity, (an exciting process to be sure – for the books would be much less interesting without the Maurader’s Map and the Invisibility Cloak), of learning who you are, where you came from, and who you might be. Harry learns valuable lessons in each book, lessons potentially more valuable than following the rules to the letter, for Harry learns through his failures, and through his growing knowledge of the failures of those surrounding him.

So, might it be a dangerous series of books for a young child? Perhaps. The universe of Hogwarts is much like our own, full of difficult moral decisions, terrible images, and no certainty of waking up in the morning. Growing up is a dangerous thing, and Harry’s coming of age is the grand theme of the books, murky though the outlook might be at times. I certainly think that children should start with simpler stories, and I myself am planning to do everything I can to have my children fall in love with Aslan before they are introduced to Harry, Ron, and Hermione, as the lines in Narnia are not so gray. But there are powerful lessons to be learned at Hogwarts that do not become so clear in an environment not so fantastic and brutal. That there are things worse than death, and things that are more important than merely saving your skin. That evil is real, not as random chance or the accidental actions of well intentioned, but misguided souls, but as a real force, seeking to devour everything that is good and noble, and it must be fought against with all your might. That love is stronger than evil, and stronger than death. That in the end, people disappoint you, and make mistakes, but that love covers over a multitude of wrongs. That your best friends, your most loyal ones, aren’t the most popular, but the ones who genuinely care about you, and they can be found in the oddest of places, and in the oddest of shapes and sizes. That Growing up is hard, but choosing the right friends and mentors can make all the difference.

These are hard lessons to teach, but sometimes, disguised in magic and wonder and imagination, they ring the most true.

A Canticle for Thursday

2005-06-22T08:24:00.000-05:00

Following is a canticle from the Daily Office of the Book of Common Prayer, (these are said between the Old and New Testament readings.) As a side note, I have been using the Book of Common Prayer in my devotionals for the last six months and have found it to be very powerful. I'll post on "Liturgy as a Rut Buster" later, but for now:

You are God (Te Deum laudamus)

You are God: we praise you;
You are the Lord: we acclaim you;
You are the eternal Father:
All creation worships you.
To you all angels, all the powers of heaven,
Chuerubim aned Seraphim, sing in endless praise:
Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might,
heaven and erth are full of your glory.
The glorious company of apostles praise you.
The noble fellowship of prophets prasie you.
The white-robed army of martyrs praise you.
Throughout the world the holy Church acclaims you;
Father, of majesty unbounded,
your true and only Son, worthy of all worship,
and the Holy Spirit, adnocate and guide.
You, Christ , are the king of glory,
the eternal Son of the Father.
When you became man to set us free
you did not shun the Virgin's womb
You overcame the string of death
and opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers.
You are seated at God's right hand in glory.
We believe that you will come and be our judge.
Come then, Lord, and help your people,
bought with the price of your own blood,
and bring us with your saints
to glory everlasting.

A Collect for Purity

2005-06-19T18:35:00.000-05:00

In the spirit of the Christian Intellectual, I present the prayer that should be always on the lips of one (in my opinion at least), which is said during the weekly celebration of the Holy Eucharist at churches who use the Book of Common Prayer:

Almight God, unto whom all hearts are open,
All desires known,
And from whom no secrets are hid:
Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts
By the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit
That we may perfectly love thee,
And worthily magnify thy holy Name;
Through Christ our Lord.
Amen

Habits of the Mind: An Essential Book for the Budding Christian Thinker.

2005-06-19T14:01:00.000-05:00

An Intellectual is one who loves ideas, is dedicated to clarifying them, developing them, criticizing them, turning them over and over, seeing their implications, stacking them atop one another, arranging them, sitting silent while new ideas pop up and old ones seem to rearrange themselves, playing with them, punning with their terminology, laughing at them, watching them clash, picking up the pieces, starting over, judging them, withholding judgement about them, changing them, bringing them into contact with their counterparts in other systems of thought, inviting them to dine and have a ball but also suiting them for service in workaday life.

A Christian Intellectual is all of the above to the glory of God.

-James W. Sire; Habits of the Mind

If The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind clearly defines the problem, one has to regard Habits of the Mind, by James Sire, as a major step toward a solution. The goal of the book is a simple one, to define what a Christian Intellectual is, but the ramifications of the answer that it gives are far reaching, and I do not feel that I exaggerate in any way when I write the following statement.

If you are a Christian who has been called to pursue the Life of the Mind, you must read this book. The guidance it provides is little short of essential.

This is a weighty claim to make, and, constrained by the medium of the Blog, I cannot hope to do it justice in the space I have available. But in the next paragraphs I will try, at least in part, to give its flavor.

Upon opening it and reading the first two chapters, one is initially struck by the breadth of the author's prior reading. Each page is festooned with quotations from individuals as diverse as Vaclav Havel and Os Guiness, with John Henry Newman and A.G. Sertillanges (a Dominican monk) as clear favorites. At first, I was uncertain as to the wisdom of that. Would it detract from the work? Could all these disparate individuals truly have something to contribute to Sire's argument? But as I progressed through the book their value became clear. Sire is not trying to do something new, nor is he trying to rebuild a foundation that has already been layed by great thinkers of the past. No, he is trying to recall our attention to what has already been done, to provide us with a link to that past heritage, far richer in the intellectual fields then than it is now, and provide us with the knowledge and tools to begin a new building on what has already been achieved.

For example, the first chapters deal primarily with the intellectual heritage of John Henry Newman, a convert to Catholicism who had great influence in the Christian (Particularly Catholic) Universities of Great Britain in the 1800's . But it is clear that the author sees him as more than a that. To Sire, Newman is a model of intellectual rigor among believers, a man with a great passion to know the truth, no matter what the cost. This passion for the truth, not just in the Biblical disciplines, but in every aspect of life and creation, is what Sire believes should characterize the Christian thinker.

To desire truth simply isn't enough, however, for the same can be said for intellectuals of every bent. Sire goes on to suggest that what should characterize a Christian intellectual in a unique and profound sense is rooted in the Biblical relationship between Faith and Works as conceptualized in the Book of James. Beginning with the statement that "faith without works is dead," the argument is made that Truth, once apprehended, should, must in fact, be obeyed. To refuse to do so is tantamount to denying it. Thus, for the believer, the life of the Mind cannot be divided from the life of the Soul and the life of the Body. Truth leadt to Virtue, both lead to action, and from the obedience inherent in those acts, more truth will come. In this way, Sire bridges the gap between the armchair theorist and the missionary, the theologian and the deacon. Here I must add that this concept has particular resonance with me, for as a physician I see daily the results of knowledge (read truth) put into action, and the difference it can make in the physical life of a man or woman. How much more difference mingt this principle make in the spiritual realm?

The book goes on to discuss the idea of intellectual virtue, proposes at length what those might be, and finishes with an exegetical analysis of the life of Christ as reasoner, or as Sire puts it, "the smartest man who ever lived." To treat these chapters in the depth necessary to convey their contents would of necessity involve reproducing them completely.

This book is a vital contribution toward the reconstruction of an Evangelical mind in our culture. It is lucid, clear and compelling, and does what few others who have written on this subject matter have done, provide a positive theory, complete with historical underpinnings, that explains how this reconstruction could take place. In fact, I would go so far as to say that another book dealing with similar themes might well be redundant. Certainly there may be better means of increasing thoughtful activity among Christians, but surely this could be much better delineated during the process of actually engaging in that activity. Mark Noll has shown us the problem in all its awful depths, now James Sire has constructed a framework with which to address it. Now it is time to get to work, and may the fruits of our intellectual labors be such that, when we stand before the Throne, we may hear the words "Well done, my good and faithful servant," not just in regard to out actions, not just in regard to our faith, but regarding our thoughts and our stewardship of the minds that God has given us.

Aaron W. Calhoun

Thoughts on Trial

2005-06-18T19:23:00.000-05:00

I recently caught the last half of one of my favorite movies on TV: Twelve Angry Men. The movie is done in essentially one scene, a jury room after closing arguments of a trial. Twelve men (angry at times) debate the fate of a Puerto Rican boy from the tenements charged with the murder of his father. The case seems pretty clear cut, and an initial vote shows eleven of the twelve jurors are ready to vote the defendant guilty. The one who is not sure wants more time to think, and as he asks questions about the case, the case begins to look more complex. Each member of the jury confronts his own bias and preconceived notions which influencing his initial decision. It works very well as a drama, and is a fascinating look at how tenuous the line between guilt and innocence can be in the eyes of the law. It is also a good reminder that what we see as "obvious" in a situation can end up being exactly what we wanted to see, and might not hold up from another point of view. The deliberations did not touch, in the end, on the boy's guilt or innocence - they recognized they would never know what really happened. All they could debate was whether or not there was enough "reasonable doubt" based on the items of evidence presented at trial, and their perception of the reliability of the witnesses, to convict or not to convict.

It was also interesting to see this movie juxtaposed with the Michael Jackson case. I'm not sure many people, including those on the jury, would bet their farm that he was free of all reprehensibility in his actions toward children. In fact, even if he is truly innocent of any malicious action, almost everyone would agree that he does some pretty strange things with his free time. However, in the eyes of the law there was "reasonable doubt" about the charges, and in our country, one is innocent until proven guilty. Hence, in many celebrity trials, though popular polls has weighed in a "guilty", the evidence has not been able to stand up to the "reasonable doubt" test, and thus O.J. Simpson, Robert Blake, and Michael Jackson are all free men, a jury of their peers having decided that there was insufficient evidence to say without a reasonable doubt that they are guilty.

Innocent until proven guilty... when you stop to think about it, it is quite a remarkable idea. (Note: I have never studied law, and the following observations come from a layman in the fullest since of the term. Heck I don't even watch Court TV, I just have opinions. So take them for what they are.) It certainly does not seem like a normal mode of justice. Left to their own devices, I think many would invent a system where people perceived as dangerous were locked away until it could be absolutely proven that they were no danger to society. After all what better way to protect society than to leave no hint of evil lurking around the corners. This is in fact the government’s policy toward prisoners of war and "enemy combatants". The distinction between these dangerous men who are guilty until proven innocent (with no benefit of legal counsel) and those who are innocent until proven guilty (with access to as good a legal service as they can afford) is quite a contrast, and attempting to understand that contrast fuels the current tension over Guantanamo Bay. Now, I would certainly agree that we don't need Johnny Cochran look-a-likes defending Al Qaeda terrorists. However, I also believe there is something sacred about "innocent until proven guilty". It speaks to the best in mankind, the part of him willing to give his fellow man the benefit of the doubt, rather than the fearful, defensive part of him, which wishes to prize his own safety above all else.

So where did we get "innocent until proven guilty"? I'm sure a student of law could trace its development through the judicial history of the nations. I am inclined to think that there exists in that mantra something of the divine. Something of Christ. Because as Aaron was talking about different models of redemption below, I thought of the judicial model again, and realized that perhaps therein lies the glory of our legal system. For washed in the blood of the lamb, we transition in a way from enemy combatants to citizens, and as I just described, when you are in the dock the difference betwen the two is great. For while the citizen is free until proven guilty, the combatant must prove his innocence. It is a case that cannot be won, for the guilt is obvious, and yet, in the light of glory, with the white robes of Christ's righteousness around the shoulders, and Christ's blood on the forehead... might enough "reasonable doubt" exist to let the citizen go free?

Models of Redemption

2005-06-05T06:11:00.000-05:00

Just recently, I completed reading Evangelicals and Catholics Together, a collection of essays based on the document of the same name. It was an intriguing book, written by, as one might surmise, both Evangelicals and Catholics. It's intent, to outline the developments in Church history that led to the document, defend the document against would be detractors, and to outline a further plan of action. While I find this document an exciting prospect, it is not that which I intend to discuss today. Rather, I wish to elaborate on a concept brought up by the last two articles in the book (by, J.I. Packer and Richard John Neuhaus respectively), the idea of models of redemption.

Humans are visual creatures, with about a quarter of our cerebral mass devoted to the reception and processing of the information gathered by our eyes. Visual metaphors are inextricably woven through our literature, poetry, and songs. It is, therefore, unsurprising that when we wish to represent a concept or phenomenon, it it through the use of pictures. This usually works for most everyday concepts. Where the trouble begins, however, is when this technique is used for ideas or things clearly beyond visual access, or human understanding.

Consider the atom. These tiny components of matter have been around since the beginning (or at least close to it, depending on your cosmology), and have basically functioned the same way dependably throughout human history. Our mental picture of them, however, has changed a great deal. Dalton, in the 1800's pictured them as billiard ball shaped hunks of positively charged stuff, liberally studded with negatively charged electrons like some sort of microscopic sphere of raisin bread (his metaphor, not mine, although liberally paraphased). Niels Bohr, on the other hand, saw them as miniature solar systems (a view still taught in elementary schools), electron planets orbiting a nucleus-sun. Since Werner Heisenberg, quantum physicists have seen them as the nexus of suprimposed fields of mass-energy, electrons manifesting in a sort-of smeared out cloud around an only slightly better defined nucleus. These pictures, these models, are as different as night and day, but there, behind all this flurry of visual activity, are the atoms themselves, doing what they've always done.

The truth is that atoms cannot be pictured. This has nothing to do, by the way, with building bigger microscopes, as if a lense as big as the Earth might potentially resolve an image of the atom's contents. You see, a wave of light is simply larger that an atom, and so light literally cannot give us a picture. They are beyond sight. But, and this is the important piece, they work anyway. We can still build computers, televisions, MRI scanners, all of which require detailed knowledge of atomic manipulation, and we can do this without a perfect picture.

So to with our redemption.

The Love of God, his incarnation, His sacrificial death and resurrection, His ascension into Glory, these truly are concepts too great for the human mind to see in their entirety, but throughout the history of the Church, models have been proposed to make better sense of it. Here are some examples. A legal transaction involving the imputation of righteousness from a perfect man to a sinful man, Co-Death and C0-resurrection with Christ, resulting in the implantation of an objective Divine life, A conferring of Christ's ability to perfectly surrender to God, all of these have been proposed by theologians at one point or another. The point is, these are pictures of the unpicturable, visions of the unvisualizable. The pictures do not save, Christ does. C.S. Lewis, in mere Christianity writes

A man can accept what Christ has done without knowing how it works: indeed, he cetainly would not know how it works until he has accepted it.

We are told that Christ was killed for us, that His death has washed out our sins, and that by dying, he disabled death itself. That is our formula. That is Christianity. That is what has to be believed. Any theories we build up as to how Christ's death did all this are, in my view, quite secondary: mere plans or diagrams to be left alone if they do not help us, and, even if they do help us, not to be confused with the thing itself.

(Note: As I searched for that quote, I came across a passage in Mere Christianity using basically the same argument as above. Oh well. Can I be so bold as to say that great minds think alike?)

The problem with these models, as discussed by Richard John Neuhaus in Evangelicals and Catholics Together, is that often one is selected preferentially by some denominational body, and then used as a gauge of the relative "Christianity" of other believers. To push the atomic model, this would be akin to physicists dividing themselves into Bohrists and Heisenbergians, with perhaps a contingent of reactionary Daltonites that wish to turn back the clock. They would then participate in a series of bitter struggles with each group effectively trying to excommunicate the other, anathematizing the opposing models as corrosive to the human mind. And behind it all, the atoms would be doing what they always did, irregardless of the misguided wars fought in their defense.

So works our Lord. Behind and between denominational lines, within the Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant bodies He works, spreading a message of simple faith in a Crucified Christ and confession of his resurrection and power over death. Within each heart who will listen He works, implanting the Christ life (If I could be given the latitude of invoking the model that makes most sense to me), forgiving, healing. It is the sheer fact of the cross that matters, not our theological parsing down of its function. It is the truth of the resurrection that renews us, not our understanding of its place in the Covenantal (or Dispensational. Again, Models.) structures of history.

Don't get me wrong, the model is important, I have one too. Theology, attempting to love God with all our minds, is a necessary and vital discipline. But Theology and Christianity are not one and the same. To make them so gnosticizes the Gospel, opening the gates of heaven only to those with the appropriate conceptualization of redemption. At the end of his article, Richard John Neuhaus was asked the question of what he, in the end, believed in for his salvation. He answered, in paraphrase (I no longer have the book), that when he met God at the judgement throne, he would claim the Blood of Christ as his sole stand. Not his understanding of it, not his adherence to a particular model of its efficacy, just the Blood.

"That if you confess with your mouth,"Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." (Rom 10:9, NIV)

That is what it means to be a Christian.

A Finale with no Finality

2005-05-30T10:48:00.000-05:00

I mentioned in a previous post that I was a big fan of ABC's series "Lost." The much-anticipated (at least by me) season finale was this week. First I will say this: the quality of the 2 hour episode was high, there were twists aplenty, and many more mysterious tidbits were dropped. This, however, unlike the previous 24 similar installments, left with with a great deal of disappointment.

Mystery and creepiness; enigma and possibility; being a stranger in a strange land. All of these are fascinating.

Provided they have a resolution.

In the end the stranger must find a place of connection. The mystery must be revealed (not necessarily Scoobie Doo style), the enigma must at least suggest a key.

It takes a great talent to create a puzzle. An even greater talent to create a puzzle within a puzzle. It takes no talent to create mindless puzzles withing puzzles ad infinitum. There is a word for that: it is chaos. The wonder of mystery is NOT the intruiging possibly that a world of chaos might exist instead of our world of order. The intrigue is that our world of order is not ordered the way we think, and it must be re-ordered in order to make sense of the new mystery.

Hence, the impact of the Christian resurrection mystery is not that sporatically atoms might rearrange themselves such that a dead being can animately converse and eat fish and honey. It is that the structure of the universe must be re-written to accomodate the fact that death is not the necessary end to life. True mystery is not explained away, but everything else explained into it. Everything must be re-written to accomodate the new understanding. Hence, Paul, having re-written the classical framework of human existance in light of the new evidence proclaims, "Death where is thy sting!"

All that being said, my disappointment at Lost stemmed from a let down of any explanation. For the first time, I had the slight suspicion that the writers were making it up as the went along. At the very least I wanted more hits as to the nature of the reality where the castaways were trapped. The human heart craves satisfaction. The satisfaction can come slowly, but it must come in the end, or else we lose interest. If the tomb is empty, if the body is never found, and there is no appearance of Jesus, the apostles do not start a church. They do not give their lives for martyrdom. The merely say to each other "That was weird" and return to their nets in Galilee.

I guess my choice this Fall will be much less dramatic.

A bit of poetry

2005-05-28T09:04:00.000-05:00

I have never been as great of a fan or connoisseur of poetry as I should be. I tend to be too impatient to read (and re-read) slowly enough to let the language wash over me, to dig into the depths of words, senses and voices necessary to get at the meat of what the poet wants me to hear. Prose works better for the lazy/fast ready, and I can be that at times. However, it does appear that as I grow older, I am becoming a better reader, and I hope that my ability to read and appreciate poetry will continue to grow over time.

With all that being said, my favorite poem from high school, which I recently re-discovered, is Ulysses, written by Lord Alfred Tennyson.
The full text can be found here, but I have excerpted below:

The poem is set during the end of the life of the great King Ulysses, long since returned from his adventures at Troy and his long Odyssey home. His reflections and musings are captured as he deals with his restlessness at spending the end of an epic life in normalcy. He yearns for the great adventures of his youth:

I am a part of all that I have met;
Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough
Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades
For ever and forever when I move.
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!
As though to breathe were life. Life piled on life
Were all too little, and of one to me
Little remains: but every hour is saved
From that eternal silence, something more,
A bringer of new things; and vile it were
For some three suns to store and hoard myself,
And this grey spirit yearning in desire
To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

Deciding that his kingdom will be well served by his son, he resolves to once more set out on adventure:

Some work of noble note, may yet be done,
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods.
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks:
The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.

Now, at first glace, the poem seems to be stacked with humanism: a glorification of the powers of man to defy death and decay until the last, to not go down gently into the good night. That is undeniable. And yet, even in my youth, this poem has always touched and inspired me.

I believe that on a deeper reading, this poem speaks of the eternal yearning we have to be of use. “Is the best over?” “Does it get any better than this?” The voice is always at the door, saying, “You are too old, you are too frail, you are too dumb. Your prime has passed, the opportunity has been lost, all that is good has been tasted, and nothing remains but the dregs.” It is the voice of despair, which haunts the young and the old, which denies the Imagio Dei, the God-given spark in us which is eternal and will live forever, but can so easily be smoldered in the wrecks of mortality.

To all of this Ulysses says “No”:

I will drink
Life to the lees: all times I have enjoyed
Greatly, have suffered greatly, both with those
That loved me, and alone

And concludes:

Though much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield

“That which we are, we are.” He does not think himself, in the sunset of his life, to be any less or more than what he is. He is full of all of his experiences which have shaped his life: joys and sorrow. And yet from this position, rather than surrender what time he has left to despair, he seizes that time, to make with it whatever he can, knowing that it might not shine in comparison to what has already been done, for “much is taken.” And yet, he will strive, seek, find, and not yield.

There is a secret here: God is never “through” with any of us.

Whatever our own accomplishments, viewed through our own distorted lenses of what we define to be success: He is not yet done.

As long as you take breath upon the earth, He is not yet done.

Whatever wreck you find yourself in, whatever restlessness, whatever despair, whatever drudgery, do not say to yourself, “It is finished”. There is only one Man who can make that claim.

Because even though much is taken, much still abides. He has brought you to where you are, and has made you to be who you are. And we must never give in to the despair of relinquishing out hope. For his mercies are new every morning.

What do I take from this? Do not be afraid to do something new, to try a new direction, to learn a new language, to read a new book, to go to a different country. To visit the neighbor you have never spoken with, to worship in a new way, to not get stuck in a rut. For the Holy Spirit blows where it will, and if you open your windows, you might feel a rush of wind with new intoxicating smells you never thought you would experience. For “that which we are, we are”, but that which we will be may be something altogether different. But above all, whether you are called to new novelty, or new faithfulness, do not despair. For the last page of your life has not been written, and God’s work is not yet done.

Aren't we too old for this?

2005-05-25T08:33:00.000-05:00

The question of whether one can "outgrow" a good story was recently posed to me, when overhearing an exchange about the new Star Wars movie. One fan, around my age, was attempting to bring in an observation from the new Star Wars movie into another conversation.

The replay from a rather perturbed friend of his was along the lines of "Come on, I know we liked those movies when we were growing up, but it's just a movie! Get on with life."

In reflecting on this, I found myself frustrated.

The fact, is I haven't grown up. I don't plan to, if growing up means treating good stories as "just stories" and setting myself down to the "real" business of life. One immediately thinks of Susan who "outgrows" Narnia in her fascination with the wonders of adolescent womanhood, with telephones and makeup and schoolfriends.

Of course, now I am using story to justify my love of story, thus firmly establishing that I am a hopeless story lover.

I believe stories are important. I believe they are more important than most of the things that fill our days. The funny thing about stories is that their power is more than their words, more than their facts. The power is in how they resonate.

Hence the power of the Da Vinci Code. Honestly, it's not a terribly well written book. The pacing is uneven, the puzzles are simplistic, the characters are frightfully one-dimensional. The "facts" of the book have been simultaneously debunked by dozens of scholars. Yet the book retains remarkable appeal. Why? Because it resonates...it contains a story of spritual searching, and discovery of self-centered enlightenment that is exactly what so many in our culture are searching for. Hence, all the debunking you like won't matter a whit to those that find truth in the book.

Stories are wonderful, and they are dangerous. They are windows into our soul, and windows in the infinite.

The question is not "Why do you like story?", but "What story do you like?". There you will learn much about yourself.

Why do I like Star Wars?

Great poential for good. Great potential for evil. The fate universe tipping on the choices of two men. That choice resting in overcoming fear, hatred, generational baggage, to stand naked before evil and denounce it, and to redeem your lost family.

And the lightsabers are cool, too.

"You don't know the power of the dark side..."

2005-05-24T12:45:00.000-05:00

I saw "Revenge of the Sith" on Thursday night, and want to give a hearty recommendation to any Star Wars fan who might be sitting on the fence with this one. I thought it was good...very good. Probably the most theologically insightful of the series as well, which I will blog more about in several weeks, once I can feel more free to divulge spoilers. Even more interesting than the question "How did Anakin turn to the dark side", I thought it did a very good job of answering the question "How can truth be twisted so that light and dark both become lost in a sea of murky gray which finally results in warriors for the light attempting to destroy the light itself in the name of good." That is the issue I think we would do well to attend to in these dark times...

Fighting the Good Fight

2005-05-22T08:02:00.000-05:00

I sit here at my computer awaiting a response from the Metro, likely one of Boston's most liberal sources of newsmedia. For any who mightbe reading this post in that fair city, and who has picked up one of these feww papers on the T or another mode of public transportation, it may already be clear what I plan of writing about. For the past month, a flurry of letters have been generated in the Op-Ed section alternatively arguing for and against Christianity, and, as the letter that I recently contributed to this banter suggests, all of them have completely missed the point.

The letters of a more liberal bent (I hate that word, by the way, it implies that Christianity and Liberalism are opposite ends of a spectrum, that Christianity is synonymous with "Conservatism", republican politics, and big business) focused on the ususal suspects, the Christian "intolerance" of points of view other than theirs, the suppose conservative plot to roll back the freedoms offered in the Bill of Rights, and so on. What botheres me is the way in which the Christian responses did not do much to counteract this, insetad offering such thoughts as "Jesus was God's enforcer", based on his statement that he had come to fulfill the law, not to negate it. Others supported the above dichotomy by stating in exceedingly clear terms that "Christians, by definition, cannot be liberal." None actually focused on the core of the Christian message. none mentioned the Cross.

Perhaps the responses were selected for their potential inflammatory nature, as it certainly seems that anti-Christian stereotypes were alive and well as of last friday's edition. I hope not. Either way, as a thinking believer, exposed to week after week of relative misinformation about a God I love and a Faith I profess, and probably uder the influence of one too much cup of coffee from work, I initally hammered out a response that then sat in my papers for two weeks.

Why did I hold back?

There were several reasons, when it came down to it. I certainly feared that I would not get a response.(Not so much of a big deal, but as an aspiring writer, in addition to all my other commitments, that is not a blow that my Ego would easily take.) I feared that it would do no good. But to dig deeper, I now realize that I feared publication. What if my other "liberal" olleagues read this? What might it do to our relationships? Would work become a more hostile place? Maybe, but it shouldn't matter. As I talked this over with our Church's youth pastor over a sausage and pepperoni pizza the other night, he made a telling comment. He sad that it didn't in fact matter if the comment was well received, or even "won" the debate, all that would matter is if one man or woman searching, truly searching, for reality read it, and by it found Christ. He was right!

"I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation..."

And so, I sit here at my Dell, furtively checking my email in hopes that my letter was received and perhaps published. I did not write of liberalism and conservatism. I did not write of tolerance and acceptance. I write of a Go who allowed his own creatures to crucify Him, giving His divine life in an act of incalculable sacrifice so that his broken creation would be restored. That is the heart of Christianity. That is the message we have been called upon to preach. It may not be "edgy" enough, not inflammatory enough, to warrant publication. That doesn't matter now. It's in God's hands. But maybe... Maybe Metro will see fit to print it. And maybe someone will read it and come to believe in the God I love. Or maybe not.

We walk by faith, not sight. Such is the life of a disciple of Jesus Christ.

Until then, I'll keep checking my Email, and pray.

Aaron W. Calhoun

More Kuyper

2005-05-10T20:05:00.000-05:00

Here are some more thoughts from Kuyper as I promised. One of the interesting things Kuyper says in the first lecture is that Calvinism is essentially pure Protestantism. He views all of the non-pure Calvinistic sects as essentially Calvinists who have used their freedom of conscience to disagree with a plank of Calvinism here or there. However, he views all of them within a Calvinistic framework, and claims that their very freedom of conscience which allows them to dissent from Calvinism is Calvinistic in nature. So in these lectures, when he says “Calvinist” below, he is contrasting with “Romanist”, “Materialist”, or “Pagan”, not with Lutheran, Baptist, etc…

With the hearings on the science curriculum going on in Kansas I thought these passages from the fourth lecture “Science and Calvinism” were especially appropriate:

“Wherever two elements appear, as in this case the sinner and the saint, the temporal and the eternal, the terrestrial and the heavenly life, there is always danger of losing sight of their interconnectedness and of falsifying both by error or one-sidedness. Christendom it must be confessed did not escape this error. A dualistic conception of regeneration was the cause of the rupture between the life of nature and the life of grace. It has, on account of its too intense contemplation of celestial things, neglected to give due attention to the world of God’s creation. It has on account of its exclusive love of things eternal been backward in the fulfillment of its temporal duties. It has neglected the care of the body because it cared to exclusively for the soul. And this one-sided, inharmonious conception in the course of time has led more than one sect to a mystic worshipping of Christ alone, to the exclusion of God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. Christ was conceived exclusively as the Savior, and His cosmological significance was lost out of sight.”

"Calvinism called Christendom back to the order of creation: ‘Replenish the earth, subdue it and have dominion over everything that lives upon it.’ Christian life as a pilgrimage was not changed, but the Calvinist became a pilgrim, who, while on his way to our eternal home, had yet to perform on earth an important task.”

"Notice that I do not speak of a conflict between faith and science. Such a conflict does not exist. Every science in a certain degree starts from faith and, on the contrary, faith which does not lead to science, is mistaken faith or superstition, but real, genuine faith it is not. Every science presupposes faith in self, in our self-consciousness; presupposes faith in the accurate working of our senses; presupposes faith in the correctness of the laws of thought; presupposes faith in something universal hidden behind the special phenomena; presupposes faith in life; and especially presupposes faith in the principles, from which we proceed; which signifies that all these indispensable axioms, needed in a productive scientific investigation, do not come to us by proof, but are established in our judgment by our inner conception and given with our self-consciousness. On the other hand every kind of faith has in itself an impulse to speak out. In order to do this it needs words, terms, expressions. These words must be the embodiment of thoughts. Those thoughts must be connected reciprocally not only with themselves but also with our surroundings, with time and eternity, and as soon as faith thus beams forth in our consciousness, the need of science and demonstration is born. Hence is follows that the conflict is not between faith and science, but between the assertion that the cosmos, as it exists today, is either in a normal or abnormal condition. If it is normal, then it moves by means of an eternal evolution from its potencies to the ideal. But if the cosmos in its present condition is abnormal then a disturbance has taken place in the past, and only a regenerating power can warrant it the final attainment of its goal. This, and no other is the principal antithesis, which separates the thinking minds in the domain of Science into two opposite battle-arrays.”

The Path to Holiness: Life as it is Lived.

2005-05-08T06:32:00.000-05:00

Like Jonathan, I must apologize for the relative infrequency of my posts. It can be a difficult thing to juggle physicianhood and parenthood and still find time to blog that doesn't infringe on both or either. Still, bear with us, as I hope the quality of our posts at least somewhat makes up for their infrequency. So keep checking.

I sit here writing this holding my nearly four month old son in my lap. He's a meaty child, prone to smiling and fits of giggles, as well as to tears and wet diapers. In short, he's pretty much a normal specimen for kid his age. It's difficult to hold your own child without thinking about life, yours, his, that of your parents. That can include the family pet as well, such as early this morning, before the sun had even started to rise when he required a bottle, and my attention seeking cat decided that he wanted one two. A brief period followed when I struggled to hold a feeding infant, and a maniacally purring cat trying desperately to rub my face while I fought of the urge to sleep. Such are the trials of domestic life.

Back to the subject at hand. As these thoughts have percolated and steeped in my consciousness these past months I have been struck with a singular revelation. Our lives are practically booby-trapped with moments designed to make us holy people! These moments are not difficult to spot, indeed, they practically jump out and hit us in the face as if the Lord himself were mugging us. And if we miss them, its no ones fault but our own.

Consider this. Adolescents are likely the most selfish individuals in the world. No doubt, specific specimens break this rule, but taken as a whole, the teenage mind is uniquely suited to consider self the center of the universe. We should not be surprised. Afer all, the human mind is uniquely suited (some wouold say corrupted) to consider selfe the center of the universe. Without this, we would not sin, for pride is the root of all wrongdoing. So in one sense, although less than ideal from an individual spiritual standpoint, this tendency toward self in the teenager is, in actuality, a brutally honest portrait of what is really within. But let us follow one individual teenage christian boy as he grows as a "ideal" case.

Note: the life pathway I am about to discuss seems to me to be the most common one (most people seem to marry and have kids), and is also the one I have followed thus far, but I do not mean to suggest that other paths cannot therefore be from God and lead to holiness. Everything from His hand, whether paucity or abundance, famine or feast, is for our good. Some have been called to have no children. I understand that, and also understand that God has a special place for the single individual who can serve Him wholeheartedly withouth earthly tie. But I can only comment on what I know. The path from their standpoint must come from them, not me.

That teenager boy has now grown and is in his mid 20's. He knows and loves Christ, but still sees himself as the center of the world. His life, their career, their preferences are top in their minds. Then, they fall in love... This is no one night stand, but a true relationship, and this halpess youth has finally found someone to whom "Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for her" has taken on a reality beyond that of a sermon subject. And so, he follows that in the covenant and sacrament of marriage, choosing to place his wofe's interests above his own, choosing and promising to give all, even to the point of sacrificial death, for the one he loves. Just as Christ did.

Years pass and the first baby arrives, perhaps after years of trying ( a not uncommon problem in or stress-laden existence). Suddenly a new vista of sacrifice opens. Not merely a couple, this once selfish teenage boy has a family now, and has been called to love and to give to them as the Father loves and gives glory and honor to the Son, and as the Son died for the Church. Slowly, under the glorious weight of that awesome responsibility, the selfishness in that man's heart is starved, and it begins to wither and die. His heart is open now, room has been made for others, and as they fill that spot where the weed of selfishness had grown with God, wife and child, they begin to entere into the life of the Trinity. Each in the other, each giving wholly to the other in an eternal dance of joy.

Beyond this point I speculate based on observation of other holy men I have known before me. If any reader who has been through what I describe next disagrees, please let me know.

The children are grown now, and the man and his wife are on their own again. But unlike many, who through the trials of child-rearing have lost touch with each other, this pair has maintained a loving, vibrant relationship, and have experienced the Joy of surendering their children to God as they left their home, learning to give them in faith daily to the Father who once had to yield his Son to the Cross. As life continues, the unthinkable happens and the wife dies. The man is shaken to the heart of his being. But he knows, he knows more than life itself, that she is with her Lord, and in the resurrection life no relationships are lost. The void that is created in his heart by this loss is filled by the presence of Christ, and he goes on serving Him in the world even as his heart begins to find it's home in another.

As this now older man ages, he grows infirm, and in his illness is helped by his family. Now the provider must let himself be provided for. This is not new to him, since Christ has already provided so much that he has accepted freely without hint of pride, yet now he must accept it from his children. As the last years of earthly life wear away, his infirmity progresses, and one by one his attachments to earth are severed, old friends going on before, times changing, the world moving on. But as earth retreats, heaven draws near, and the losses in one realmy are more than compensated for by the closeness of the next.

Then finally, it happens, this man, who has since his youth, surrendered his heart in ever increasing measure to the love of his Lord, his Father, his Friend, and his Saviour, opens the final door, surrendering the last of his life on earth. Here, his family mourn the loss of a holy man, but he himself is in the Presence, enfolded in the embrace of the one who loved him so long ago. The shell of his body is empty, but his life is now hid with Christ in God completely, the shock of the transition all but erased by the sheer fact that his heart was already there and his life could, in the end, do nothing else but follow it home.

At least, this is what can happen. In reality each one of the transitions above is fraught with peril. Each contains a choice between increasing surrender and increasing pride, between Christ and Self. And at each juncture, the entire structure is open to assault. But consider that the events above are, in a sense, what we would call the "usual events" of a man's life. There is noting unexpected or rare in the sequence. But it is in these "usual events" that a man or woman's holiness stands or falls.

I hope that I can live up to what I have just written. I know full well that I have fallen at many of those steps in the past. But I also know that in Christ our falls are not fatal, and our sins, though red as crimson, can be made white as snow again and again. And in the end, it is His resurrection life, not ours, that makes us fit for His Presence.
Aaron W. Calhoun

Kuyper on Calvinism

2005-05-04T20:45:00.000-05:00

First things first: I want to apologize for such a large gap between posts. Both Aaron and I have been busy the last couple weeks, and we've evidently had either nothing to say, or no time to say it. We tend to let our posts get on the longish side, so perhaps, trying to produce shorter articles would increase our frequency.

It is time for a reading list update. I recently finished a book Abraham Kuyper's famous "Lectures on Calvinism" which he gave at Princeton in 1898. Kuyper was a remarkable man, who was a politician, (Prime Minister of the Netherlands from 1901-1905), educator, pastor, journal editor, and author. The topic of these lectures is Calvinism as a "life-system", which he proposed was the only viable Christian world view which could stand against Modernism. He took the Calvinistic doctrine God’s sovereignty, and applied it to God’s providential hand over all of the cosmos, and sought to demonstrate how in every realm of life, Christ is supreme and must be glorified. There are six lectures which touch on religion, science, art, and politics among other things. While I am not a strict Calvinist, I am at home with a great deal of reformed theology. In fact, the book served as a very useful tool to position myself theologically: I am not quite a Calvinist, and not a Catholic. In Kuyper’s vigorous argument for Calvinism (which often was set against “Romanism”) he gave me sufficient evidence why both systems are somewhat too “nailed down” for my taste. That probably explains why I have felt at home as an Episcopalian the last two years. I like my reformed theology sprinkled with a bit of mystery and a bit of ritual, but not taking the ritual too literally, as a substitute for the spiritual reality.

With all that being said, I found the majority of the book to be full of rich theological insight into how to approach the world in all of its arenas holding out Christ as Lord. I will probably not do it justice prattling on about it, so I’ll let Dr. Kuyper speak for himself:

From lecture 3: Calvinism and Religion

“Accordingly no child of God should imagine that the real Church is here on earth, and that behind the curtain there is only an ideal product of our imagination; but on the contrary, he has to confess that Christ in human form, in our flesh, has entered into the invisible behind the curtain; and that, with Him, around Him, and in Him, our Head, is the real Church, the real and essential sanctuary of our salvation ... The real heavenly, invisible Church must manifest itself in the early Church”

“But it remained the special trait of Calvinism that it placed the believer before the face of God, not only in His church, but also in his personal, family, social and political life. The majesty of God, and the authority of God press upon the Calvinist in the whole of his human existence. He is a pilgrim, not in the sense that he is marching through a world with which he has no concern, but in the sense that at every step of the long way he must remember his responsibility to that God so full of majesty, who awaits him at his journeys end….[where there] shall be one broad and comprehensive test, to ascertain whether the long pilgrimage has been accomplished with a heart that aimed at God’s glory, and in accordance with the ordinances of the Most High.”

“It is not true that there are two worlds, a bad one and a good, which are fitted into earth other… it is one and the same world which once exhibited all the glory of Paradise, which was afterwards smitten with the curse, and which has now been redeemed and saved by Christ, in its center, and which shall pass through the horror of the judgment into the state of glory. For this very reason the Calvinist cannot shut himself up in his church and abandon the world to its fate. He feels, rather, his high calling to push the development of this world to an even higher stage, and to do this in constant accordance with God’s ordinance, for the sake of God, upholding, in the midst of so much painful corruption, everything that is honorable, lovely, and of good report among men.”

I’ll post some more quotes later.

A Story about Story

2005-04-23T19:03:00.000-05:00

I recently finished reading “The Life of Pi” by Yann Martel, and would give it a hearty recommendation for anyone looking for a good book to bring with them over summer vacation. It is well written, has interesting story, and also leaves you much food for thought when you finally put it down. I found it doubly interesting, given our recent postings, that it is a story primarily about story. What is a “true” story? Is the one which best represents the facts? Are some stories better than others? These are all issues dealt with by the book, and which I will briefly cover, hopefully without giving away too much of the plot. (If you really want to approach the book fresh, then you should probably not read any further, and come back once you finish the book!)

The main character is Pi Patel, an Indian boy who is the son of a zookeeper, and is a practicing Hindu, Christian and Muslim. There is a very funny scene where the local imam, priest and pandit all meet and attempt to convince him he cannot be all three at once. There is also a very powerful chapter where he describes his fascination with Jesus, in light of his Hindu background.

“This Son, on the other hand, who goes hungry, who suffers from thirst, who gets tired, who is sad, who is anxious, who is heckled and harassed, who has put up with followers who don’t get it and opponents who don’t respect Him—what kind of God is that? … He bothered me this Son. Every day I burned with greater indignation against Him, found more flaws to Him … The more he bothered me, the less I could forget Him. And the more I learned about Him, the less I wanted to leave Him.”

The meat of the book comes in the middle section when Pi is left adrift after a shipwreck on a lifeboat full of a menagerie of animals, including a massive Bengal Tiger. Most of the remaining narrative describes Pi’s attempts to survive until rescue. Some of this can be quite gruesome at times, so I would preface my recommendation to include those who have strong stomachs. Survival can be a messy job on a lifeboat …

There are several surprises once the book draws to its conclusion. In essence, more than a conflict between man and nature, the heart of the book is between belief and unbelief, between the believer and the agnostic. For the book, notes, even the atheist at least believes in something “..every word they speak speaks of faith. Like me, they go as far as the legs of reason will carry them—and then they leap”. As for the agnostic: “..surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.”

The place where the conflict between belief and doubt is brought into focus is Story. The book takes a postmodern view of story, asserting that every story which is told bears a degree of invention, based on the teller of the story. “The world isn’t just the way it is. It is how were understand it…in understanding something, we bring something to it…doesn’t that make life a story?” And yet, the author also asserts that some stories are better than others. Those who do not look through the eyes of faith “want a story that won’t surprise you. That will confirm what you already know. That won’t make you see higher or further or differently. You want a flat story. An immobile story. You want dry yeastless factuality.”

And so, therein lies the power of story. To see through different lenses, to view the world in a way that might not look like what a video camera would capture, or might not look like the world we think we remember, but one that allows us to see further, to see more deeply, to understand what we miss when we settle for “just the facts.”

I found the book to offer a powerful corrective to the “dry, yeastless factuality” that is often read into the Bible by those who believe it to be true, but cannot see how truth can be other than a collection of facts which must be defended at all costs. The Bible was written by multiple authors over a period of a thousand or more years. I believe they were inspired, yet the mechanism by which God’s truth was brought into writing left the imprint of their lives, their passions, their fears, and their experiences on the texts. Understanding the human element of their composition does not make them less authoritative, less inspired, less true. In places they contain all the color and richness of humanity, all the poetry and allusion and depth of the best literature, all the horrific imagery and beautiful vision which our imaginations can stand. The gospels are imprinted by the agendas of the gospel writers, to proclaim the story of the God-man, who made his home among them, and offered them new life. The Word is alive, not less, but more than any other story. Any reading of scripture which does not do justice to this life is missing something.

So next time you open your Bible, try to capture the wonder of the stories which it contains. Capture the truth behind the stories, that is more than just argument over whether the Flood was local or global, or whether the plagues in Exodus were caused by a volcanic eruption, where Cain found his wife. Apologetics, while useful, can get bogged down in details and miss the story for the tree pulp it is written on. Listen for the hum of the Spirit brooding over the waters, hear the “Let there be light” crack the darkness, feel the dark irony of the one tree in the garden which was not allowed calling to the man and woman. Taste the honeyed-sweetness of manna on your tongue. Sit at the shore and pass the fish from the basket that never runs out. And then hear the echoes of the same story as you sit in your desk during another seemingly meaningless day at work, for His story is your story. And the telling has not finished.

Yann Martel’s book offered a powerful vision of the power of story, and the power of belief. While he broke from the standard dryness of postmodern thought to claim “some stories are better than others” and points to faith as the maker of better stories, he still seems to claim that faith in anything will create a better story (even faith that faith is meaningless). Where I would go one step further is to say that truly knowing Jesus is not only a better story, but it is the Story through which all others are shadows. As Pi remarks: “Their religion had one Story, and to it they came back again and again, over and over. It was story enough for them.” Amen.

People of the Book

2005-04-22T20:07:00.000-05:00

O gracious Light,
pure brightness of the everliving Father in heaven,
O Jesus Christ, holy and blessed!

Now as we come to the setting of the sun,
and our eyes behold the vesper light,
we sing thy praises, O God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

Thou art worthy at all times to be praised by happy voices,
O Son of God, O Giver of life,
and to be glorified through all the worlds.

The Phos hilaron is one of the beautiful prayers thath I have discovered along with the Anglican Prayer book. I grew up in non-liturgical traditions, so the last two years of attending an Episcopal church have been full of similar rich finds.

If you have never picked up a Common Book of Prayer, it would be worth your time to give it a look some day. In addition to the liturgy used at the Sunday worship service (The Holy Eucharist, in Rite I - more traditional and Rite II - more contemporary), it contains Prayers for all church seasons, the entire Psalter, the Anglican catechism, an order of worship for all special services, and the Daily Office, which is a set of prayers and scripture readings for each day of the calendar year. I have been using the Office for my devotional for about six months, and it has been a rich resource for me. Despite the current theological turmoil of the Anglican and Episcopal churches, the prayer book that they use is a rich resource of Orthodoxy and tradition. While I still have issues with what it means to "be Episcopalian" (and there are things I like, and things about which I cringe), calling myself a "Prayer Book Anglican" is something I can definitely be at peace about. (As long as they don’t go and change the book!)

Concerning Story...

2005-04-21T14:14:00.000-05:00

In my last post I set up a definition of Story. What should set this definition of Story apart is that it should be viewed as a fundamental property of the universe, not a human construct.

One of the greatest triumphs of modernism is the scientific method, and it is this amazing tool that has enabled us to break down the physical universe in such a way that it becomes explicable and therefore controllable. We are all, right now, using one of the fruits fo that effort.
But I think that in doing that we have lost far more than we have gained, for the very criteria of that method involve divorcing all meta-narrative from the event studied. A rock falling has to be a generalizable event in order to be analyzed, it cannot remain a specific falling rock, perhaps oin the head of the next evil world dictator and hence a miraculous intervention that saves a countery from tyranny. etc. That may be the case, but to the scientific method it is one of many rocks that all fall the same way. Its story has been violated. (I realize that this must sound odd coming from a Physician/Scientist, but I am not devaluing the scientific method, I just fear that it has become near-divine to too many)

Now, to fill this void, we have postmodernism. Each man and woman has their own story, we are told. And it does not matter whether they conflict, it does not matter if what they're telling themselves is true or not, because in the end they are mere interpolations, projected narratives from individual human minds thrust out on an ultimately random and meaningless cosmos that can supports all of them and none of them at the same time.

But if the cosmos has a story... Ah, what then! Now each individual story takes on new meaning as it contributes to the True (in all senses of the word) meta-narrative that governs all.

This is (or should be) the Christian view. For as I have said, what we claim as followers of Christ is not just to have A Story, but The Story. We claim that we were given a world that we have since destroyed and corrupted, and we claim that our creator has died, was buried and rose again the third day, and is someday coming back to set right that which we have marred. Yet this story, for the reasons above, is seen as less and less relevant to the life of the common man, even though at its heart it is and should be his life.

Nowhere can this worldview be better seen than in the Bible. As Jonathan has mentioned, much has been written about how to interpret this text, whether allegorically or literally. Yet with a command of Story, this need not be dichotomous, for all the physical universe is an allegory of heaven, and all of out lives are, or should be, the story of God's attempt to make us holy. (That subject deserves a post of it's own at some future date.) Allegory may actually to weak a word, for I think that shadow is a much more accurate term, as an allegory can be arbitrary, but a shadow bears a necessary causal resemblance to the object that casts it.

But I grow verbose. Hopefully this discussion can be continued.
Until then...
Aaron

A Brief Review of the Everness Books.

2005-04-18T07:47:00.000-05:00

Like many who post on (and hopefully like many who read) this website, I have a perticular affection for fantastic fiction. I'm not completely sure why. Perhaps I prefer this Genre because it deals with realitites beyond my own, far from the everyday world in which I live and work. But I believe that the main reason is that it, as distinct from other types of fiction, deals with Story.

My definition of Story is perhaps peculiar to me and my close friends. To me, Story is a fundamental component of the universe, it is the truth and meaning behind what exists, and is something denied by modernism and postmodernism. There is only one central Story, the tale of the God who sacrificed himself for the life of his creation. All other "true" (in the sense of possessing true meaning, not in the sense of necessarily having physical expression in our universe, although the central story by definition has both) stories either feed into or grow out of this, like the roots and branches of the Tree of Life. Many others have called this Myth (C.S. Lewis being one of them in his essay "Myth became Fact"), but I have chosen not to use this term in as it carries the connotation of untruthfulness in current language.

I certainly do not mean to imply by this definition that other books that deal with the world as it actually is do not possess good stories, or even Story in the sense that I describe. The best ones do; that is why they are as excellent as they are. But I find that Story resonates best with me in terms of the fantastic. With this backdrop in mind, I would like to evaluate the recent series of books by John C. Wright, titled "The Last Guardian of Everness" and "The Mists of Everness."

Let me begin by saying that these are good books containing well written plots and memorable characters that are well worth any money spent on them. For that reason I do not wish to reveal too much of the plot for fear of spoiling an enjoyable two days of reading for others. That said, here is a quick summary.

The books revolve around the House of Everness, an ancient edifice constructed in medieval Europe by command of Oberon, King of Fairies and chief spokesman for the forces of Good, as a wall and barrier between the World of Dreams and the Waking World. Its guardians have, for centuries, borne the burden of sleeping beneath it's roof each night to keep watch on over the Dark sea of dreams. They have been commanded to listen for the great warning bell to sound in the elven city of Vindyamar across the ocean, a signal that an assault by the forces of evil is underway. If the bell rings nine times, the guardians have been instructed to sound the ancient Horn of Everness, thereby calling upon Oberon's army of divine knights who will come to earth, find the hidden fairy weapons secreted there, and end the world, ushering in an edenic paradise.

To summarize what Wright develops from this premise in a few sentences is impossible, a mark of all good books, and little can be left out without making a complete mess of the plot. Suffice it to say that such an event occurs, but uncetainty prevails with the Guardians as to what exactly to do. It is thus that the the last guardian, Galen Waylock, sallies forth into faery to investigate what is transpiring there, and is subsequently imprisoned in a black fortress on the moon. A complex tale then ensues involving murderous Selkie (shapeshifting Seal-Monsters from Inuit mythology), a reincarnated wizard, mind-controlled marines, and various gods and goddesses drawn liberally from world mythology. A key plot point is the eventual decision by the remaining guardians not to sound the horn. Instead, they choose to find the weapons and defend Earth themselves, for none wish the world to end despite the promised paradise to come.

First, I would like to comment on the writing style, for I believe that several styles of fantasy writing exist today. The most popular is a simple descriptive format of the same type used in contemporary thrillers such as Jurassic Park. It is functional, efficient, and gets the job done, but rarely soars into the mythopoeic. The second type is that used by J.R.R. Tolkien, and relies on the development of a complete and detailed secondary world (see his essay "On Fairy Stories") complete with soaring grandeur and blackest evil. This world exists for its own sake, and in the best examples of this style was not crafted for the purposes of book writing. The author then crafts the story by slicing, as it were, into this handcrafted history, and removing a sample to be later fleshed out as a full book. The effect produced by this is one of immense depth and profundity, and a sense of vast events that move behind the immediate prose. In fact, such events do exist in the larger context of the created subworld. It is this subsistent reality that gives the book its internal consistency and detail.

The third style is perhaps the most difficult to pull off successfully. It involves little subcreation, but instead relies on the ability to produce flowing prose sentences containing obscure references to places that may or may not exist, combining them in a near mythic way. This style does not convey as much depth as the last, but more than makes up for it by generating a near overwhelming sense of mystery and wonder. There are few that have attempted this style, and fewer still that have mastered it. Those that have succeeded in some respects include Lord Dunsany (who I think invented it), H.P Lovecaft, and to some extent C.S. Lewis in the last two Space Trilogy Books. This is the style that John C. Wright uses, and he does it on a level that surpasses many of his predecessors. As I said before, he draws quite liberally from world literature to do this, combining figures from Paradise Lost, the Norse Eddas, and even Perelandra and Lovecraft's Dream Quest of Ancient Kadath. This mixing of myth may annoy some, but I feel he does it deftly and by it does manage to produce the desired effect.

As the books are read in depth, it becomes clear that his use of that description is somewhat lopsided in that Evil is often described in greater detail than Good. The chief leader of darkness in these works is the fallen angel Morningstar. This black Seraph dwells in the sunken city of Acheron where he rules with a diamond scepter (literally). Far from ugly, Morningstar is described as incredibly beautiful, to the extent that those who hate his cruetly and injustice nevertheless succumb to the urge to admire him when placed in his presence. I have not seen a character where such loveliness and intolerable evil coexisted in a work of fantastic fiction before, but Wright pulls it off. I this, I believe, he well approximates the biblical truth about the fall of Satan, and thus seems to get a handle on the real power behind what we call Evil. This is consistent with the One True Story, at least in part.

Oberon, on the other hand, does not fare so well, and this is my chief reservation. He is portrayed as an exalted, but ultimately petty and mean spirited king. This is fairly consistent with his trickster-like origin as the prince of fairies in Spencer's The Faery Queen, but is, unsuited for Wright's use of him as the prime supernatural proponent of the Good. Even the paradise he offers, as described in the second book, is one where Mankind would be bereft of much that makes it unique, offering an innocence that is devoid of truth and fulfillment, a sterile paradise as far from the true Christian concept of heaven as Acheron itself is. Therefore it is not surprising that Man, in the end, rebels as much against Good as it does against Evil. No, the true rescuer of mankind in these books is not Oberon, but rather the titan Prometheus, who reveals a weapon potent enough to destroy Acheron and save the world.

In all True Stories, Christ is foreshadowed. This element is present in many legends from around the world, and even moreso in the Biblical account of those people he chose to be His ancestors. In Everness, however, there is no Christ, and here the books break away from the One True Story, wandering in shadow and half-light. This in not just implied but explicitely stated. In one pivotal scene, Wendy (a chief protagonist) discusses the offered paradise with Oberon, who then goes on to say that the even the best hopes and dreams of man as they currently exist must be sacrificed to make the race innocent and place it again under Oberon's "just" rule, and she is horrified to learn that to do such would mean the death of her father. As she ponders this. she asks Oberon the following question.

"Would you give up your own life?" Oberon he replies,

"Certainly not! Don't be absurd. But among men it is the great who must be sacrificed to the weak..." and thus the scene continues.

Here is the antigospel, for in the True Story the Good did sacrifice Himself for Man, both great and small. A reader of this book must be aware that he will see much of the True Story in it, much of the struggle between Good and Evil, and in particular between what good remains in mankind and those forces of darkness that would subjugate him to a fate worse than annihilation. But of supernatural Good, nothing is present save the powerful figure of Uriel, archangel of the Sun, who nevertheless falls to Morningstar's icy mace in the end.

And yet there is hope, for rumor has it that several years after this story was written the author was struck by a heart attack, and during his time of convalescence experienced a religious awakening. He now defines himself as a practicing Christian, and has also hinted about a desire to further explore the worlds of Everness. And so I await the next book, hoping and believing that some of this newfound faith will spill over into the world that Wright has built, and that the true Good, the Lord of All, the One that must exist in any work, however fantastic, if the implied connection to story within it would be fulfilled, will appear to set aright the evils of Morningstar and Oberon both. Until then, I can advise all to read these books both with enjoyment, discerment, and anticipation of where the next installment will lead.
Aaron W. Calhoun

A Self Consistent Judicial Philosophy

2005-04-17T12:35:00.000-05:00

I have been struck in recent days by an apparent inconsistency in two of the recent political movements related to the judiciary.

- There has been a great conservative outcry of recent years against the "activist" judiciary. The claim is that because the judiciary is "making" laws rather than "interpreting" them, and because they are not accountable to the will of the people, they are over-stepping their constitutional bounds. Rulings against prayer in school, for homosexual marriage, and for removing the Ten Commandments from government property, as well as the consistent rulings in the Schiavo case for Micheal Schiavo are usually the instance where such judicial "activism" is most apparent and has been denounced. The consensus by such conservatives is that because in many of these cases the judges have voted against the popular will (reflected in a poll of some sort), they should be more accountable in our democracy.

I believe this is a valid political philosophy and should promote good discussion about the roles and accountability of the judiciary. While I do not advocate "sola Constitution" in American politics, it is also important to understand how the branches should work together, and separately in their checks and balances. In my own understanding of how our government works, the judiciary is the chief voice of the minority interest, with lifetime appointments, and no future elections for which to curry favor. While the other two branches are popularly elected, it seems that the judicial branch does have a special role to ensure that the will of the majority does not trample the rights of the minority. He powers were separated and balanced for a reason, and we must continually strive to understand how that balance can help us all to live together peaceably, in spite of our diversity.

That makes the second news story all the more perplexing to me. The congress is apparently poised to vote on removing the right of filibuster from the Senatorial confirmation of judicial nominees. While this will serve to pass through Bush’s 10 remaining nominees who have not yet been confirmed, it seems dangerously short-sighted to me. If the goal of conservatives is to make sure judges respect the will of the majority, the removing the number of popularly elected officials required to appoint a judge is exactly the opposite way to go about it. Or, put in another way, it will only be an effective strategy as long as they have the ability to collect 51 votes in the Senate chamber. Should the keys of power change hands in 3 years, then they will have to submit to the appointment of whoever the next president chooses, powerless to oppose the nomination by the one tool given to the minority to ensure that justices unfavorable to their cause are blocked.

Again, if what you want are judges more accountable to the majority, it doesn’t make sense to reduce the number of popularly elected officials who are required to vote for their appointment. Else, as soon as one group collects a bare majority, they can flood the benches with whatever extreme ideologues they choose. The filibuster is the tool that prevents that from happening, requiring a consensus to be reached before an appointment.

It should simply be a reminder that it is important to think long term, regardless of your political views, and to think beyond the issues of the moment. Do not remove the last resort of the minority, else you might find yourself in the minority with no resort sooner that you might imagine. As Christians, we have no guarantees that we will hold political power in the long term; history would point to the opposite.

“Lost”…but Found?

2005-04-09T21:04:00.000-05:00

I don’t watch much TV, especially in the “reality” show era. I like a good story, I like good acting, and I like finding nuggets of transcendent truth especially in unexpected places. But I usually get much more of that from film or books than television programs. So it was quite a pleasant surprise for me when I got hooked on ABC’s “Lost.” The show has become quite a success, drawing 15-20 million viewers per week, all waiting for the next twist ending or secret from a character’s past to be revealed.

So what explains the appeal of the show? Is it just good escapist fiction? What can we learn about ourselves based on what we keep coming back for week after week?

Mystery
Part of the appeal of “Lost” is the deep sense of mystery which surrounds every event on the island. Much of what happens is shocking, even bordering on the absurd. In 20 weeks they have encountered mysterious strangers, reclusive survivors of previous crashes, a monster polar bear, a murderous (but sometimes not murderous beast), a strange un-openable hatch, and a crashed drug smuggling plane. Yet, the very implausibility keeps it plausible. There is no way to predict what will come next, whether it will be good or bad, and who might be “in charge” of the island. They characters have done their best to live day to day, (with the exception of Locke, who has some apparent connection with “the island”), and think as little about the mystery as they can, choosing rather to address their immediate physical and social needs. This of course leads to a series of erratic jolts as reality (or un-reality) crashes in during the climaxes of the episodes. However, for the most part, the islanders seem to spend as little time as possible caught up with the bizarre paradoxes of their island home.

The characters also seem to operate in a spiritual pantheon. In all seriousness, we have seen a psychic who seemingly “knew” the plane was going to crash (and purchased a ticket for one of the passengers), “cursed” numbers that are deeply connected to the island, which have brought disaster on one group of people after another, a positive portrayal of the Catholic church and a sincere prayer by one of the islanders to Jesus Christ for comfort and protection, an empty coffin on the island and an apparition of the man inside it, a boar which seems to be carrying the spirit of the man who was unjustly killed by Sawyer, and Locke’s miraculous healing, visions, and “mission” from the island, apparently given to him by the beast which two episodes before ate the pilot of the plane.

Haunted by the Past
One of the brilliant moves by the show’s producers and writers is the intricate weave of one character’s “back story” with the plot of each episode. These have provided multiple dimensions to the characters and opportunities for many surprise revelations. However, after seeing a significant amount of these, it has become obvious that in one sense, each character was more “Lost” before the crash than after. Drug addiction, an unwanted child, discrimination of the handicapped, a dead father, the wrong man murdered in a revenge killing, a lottery win that results in misfortune for everyone but the winner, a fugitive on the run from the law, a marriage on the rocks: all of the characters were desperately trying to find their way before the crash, and were all on the brink.

As a result, one of the surprising effects of the island has been a legitimate “New Birth”. Locke says this almost verbatim in one episode as he encourages fellow strandees to look at this as a second life where they do not have to repeat the mistakes and patterns of the old life. “We all died in that plane crash.” As such, the regeneration has started to take effect, as characters genuinely decide that they no longer want to be who they were. Charlie ditches his drugs. Sawyer and Shannon begin to develop healthy relationships. Boone begins a life not dominated by his sister. Locke becomes the adventurer he always dreamed of with a mission and a purpose.

On the other hand, it is clear that these results are based on choices the characters have made and must continue to make. Any moment the situation hovers dangerously close to devolving into “Lord of the Flies”, as the base instincts for revenge and self-preservation rear their ugly head. Suspicion and mistrust surfaced from the beginning, and have led to numerous brawls, a ill-advised torturing of Sawyer, and the killing of the mysterious kidnapper “Ethan” after he was subdued. Even the character’s initial moral victories are in no way certain, as the discovery of tons of smuggled drugs in a plane crash will certainly become an issue in the life of the now-clean Charlie, and the two de-facto leaders of the group appear on a collision course.

Not so Different After All
All in all, I believe the shows success stems not just from its very intelligent writing, solid acting, and high production values, but also from its deep connection to the state of our society. What we see on Lost (thus far) is a mysterious spiritual force which has manifested itself in many ways. It is very difficult (and can be painful) to try and understand, so the best solution for most is to keep on doing what you need to do to survive, and not get too involved. Those who do get too involved, end up as fanatics. Perhaps it will all become clear soon, but for now, keep your head down, and help where you can.

As we have entered a postmodern age, each person is said to carry with them a “meta-narrative” which shapes their present experiences (in essence, each plot of the show has its own lens of the past through which the events of the present are viewed and experienced by the main character.) Few in our world would quibble with the statement that we are all “broken” – the brokenness is strewn all around our world, just as it is in the show. The hope of a “new life”, a chance to start over is surely appealing, shown vividly in this show by the wreck on an island. And yet there are monsters, both in the island and in us, which we must be on our guard against, lest we either become the monster or are devoured by it.

Far from escapist fiction, I think Lost resonates, because in many ways the viewers feel themselves on the island.

Where to from here?
So, what will the ending be? Who IS in charge of the island? Are the characters atoning for their sins? Are they being sanctified or damned? In many ways, the questions about the show could well be asked of us. Thus far, the show has been wonderfully complex with no easy answers, and I hope it continues as quality drama, in a thought provoking and challenging way, (rather sinking into trite soap opera, as so many well begun shows do.). However, it also should also point us to the realization that we live in a society that longs for mystery and longs for new birth. It is ironic that in giving up on the church as an outdated institution full of old rules, they have in fact given up on the one true source of mystery and new life. Cursed numbers, psychic foretelling of a child’s future, polar bears from a comic book, and a paralyzed man walking again after a crash cannot compete with the wonder of the incarnation, the love of a God who would put on flesh to redeem his creation, and Lazarus bursting from the tomb wrapped in his grave clothes. The Biblical narrative is full of just this sort of surprise (stories so implausible they might just be true), a God who is forever creatively interrupting. (There’s even a donkey who talks to a psychic, and lions that play favorites with their dinner.)

When we see what stories inspire and thrill us most, I believe that we will realize that they are in fact the one true story, told in many different guises, even by those who consciously have rejected it as rubbish. Even if the wrong ending gets stitched on, or if the final chapter is failed to be told, when we look around us, all over we see the universe itself ringing with the pulse of the divine logos, the word through which all things were created. That creation cannot help but bear its image.

Unity: Cultural Construct or Spiritual Reality.

2005-04-09T10:07:00.000-05:00

A relative of mine, while recently exploring the subjects and topics offered in our blog, posed some very insightful questions while contemplating what Christian Unity would actually look like in the real world. He questioned whether churches would act or appear the same, using the same hymns, worshipping according to the same pattern. Would a liturgy be used, and if so whose? This question has special meaning for the two of us, as we both grew up in a little known denomination that prized unity in doctrine and pattern as a key virtue, and has managed to achieve and sustain a remarkable uniformity of practice in congregations scattered across the globe, despite a lack of centralized leadership. Yet despite this, or perhaps because of this, as the larger context of evangelical christianity became apparent to us we could not help but wonder whether this was the type of unity our Lord had in mind, as this approach inevitably led to a lower regard for congregations that did not to things like us. This is not a trivial problem, and faces many denominations, both in their interactions with other Christians and as they face the reality of Christ's mandate to be one with each other.

A key understanding of the real issues involved in the above question came to me during, of all times, my honeymoon. It was Easter sunday, 2001, and my wife and I had awoken early to attend an Easter Sunrise gathering of the Big Island's evangelical christians in the shadow of Mauna Loa for a sunrise service. We began the worship with traditional singing and prayer, but just as I began to fall into the familiar rhythms of church, a group of hula dancers came into view. My initial reaction was one of surprise and not a little amusement, but one of the leading pastors, a native hawaiian, came forward to offer an explanation. He told us (paraphrased), that hula dancing was actually an ancient hawaiian form of prayer, not entertainment, and had traditionally been performed as an offering to their gods. Today, he said, they wanted to redeem that, to sanctify one of their cultural means of addressing the supernatural by offering it to the service of the risen Christ. That is when I understood, perhaps for the first time, that Christ did not send us into the world to spread western european culture, but rather to spread the gospel, which has the power to redeem and fulfill all that is good and right in the nations of the world.

As Christians, we believe that mankind was formed by the creative act of God, and although we have fallen, the Imago Dei is still in us and in everything we do albeit in corrupted form. Fundamentally, a nation's culture is the expression of what they think it means to be a human, and despite the many differences, that common inheritance still exists. We see it in holidays, in morality, even in myths and legends. C.S. Lewis (what would a blog be without invoking him) saw evidence in those ancient stories of what he called "good dreams," pre-christian intimations of the truth of the gospel. True, the Word of God came to us through the Hebrew nation, and it is here that such prophecies find their clearest expression, but that does not mean that the coming One originally promised in the garden was not anticipated by the rest of Adam's children.

So how does this address the question above? To me the connection is simple, if all cultures still possess aspects of the Good, and still bear reflections of the image of God, those things will not be suppressed by the introduction of the gospel. Rather, they will be uplifted and augmented. Scripture itself mentions that the leaves of the Tree of Life will be used for the healing of the nations, and the glory and honor of the nations being brought into the New Jerusalem. I always try to be careful in my interpretation of the Book of Revelation, but this idea certainly seems implied within its final chapters. Despite how it has been treated in the past, the gospel is acultural, gift that transforms, not homogenizes, and I believe that this applies to the cultural differences between churches as well, whether Catholic or Charismatic, Presbyterian or Pentecostal.

The final unity of the church will likely not be in the form of an all-encompassing cultural construct to which each believer adheres, but rather will be found in the spiritual reality which stands at the foot of the cross. The reality of a God who allowed Man to nail him to an instrument of torture, who suffered death and made it through to the other side, arising in power, carrying the resurrection life to all those who will identify themselves with Him. The reality of a daily walk with that Risen One, ever refreshed by the sustaining life conferred in his Body and Blood. The reality of his promised return to set the world right, to restore both men and Man, to rule with perfect justice and perfect mercy. It is in this that the spiritual reality of Christian Unity lies, all else is peripheral.

Acknowledging the “So Called Chaos” of Relationships

2005-04-08T17:27:00.000-05:00

While this blog is devoted to developing the evangelical mind, let us not forget about the connection between mind and heart. And let us also not forget that while we mourn the fragmented nature of Christ’s Church today, the problem goes much deeper. For the Church is made up of people experiencing the deep pain of broken relationships.

I think as evangelicals we often forget that we are living “in between the times” of Christ’s resurrection and second coming. As a result, we fail to explore the brokenness that still remains in the world today. One severe casualty is human relationships. I think we sometimes expect them to be perfect, when they are all so much less. We can also come across as too optimistic that pain will pass quickly, and the silver lining will immediately unveil itself in the rain cloud. We are surprised when relationships break down, shocked when significant others confess dissatisfaction or anger, children express resentment, friends describe bitterness and jealousy.

But should we be? The Psalmists and Prophets had few qualms in expressing their anguish toward God, while still keeping the light at the end of the tunnel in sight (deliverance and judgement). Many of them remain downright depressing to read.

Many in the world are trying to struggle through this pain without the benefit of seeing an end. They remain caught in a pendulum swing from ecstasy, to perseverance, to apathy, to utter despair.

One of the secular, postmodern prophets* of my generation is the brilliant lyricist and musician, Alanis Morissette. Her most recent album, So Called Chaos, does an amazing job of capturing the schizophrenic nature of relationships in a Fallen world. Her songs trace the ups and downs of human relationships:

from the experience of unconditional love…

You see everything, you see every part
You see all my light and you love my dark
You dig everything of which I'm ashamed
There's not anything to which you can’t relate
And you’re still here (Everything)

to conflict and the desire for reconciliation…

Every time you raise your voice I see the greener grass
Every time you run for cover I see this pasture
Every time we're in a funk I picture a different choice
Every time we're in a rut This distant grandeur…
The only way out is through
The faster we're in the better
The only way out is through ultimately…
(Out is Through)

to the unforgiven grudge…

But who's still aching now?
Who's tired of her own voice?
Who is it weighing down
With no gift from time of said healing?
I want to be big and let go
Of this grudge that's grown old.
All this time I've not known
How to rest this bygone.
I wanna be soft and resolved,
Clean of slate and released.
I wanna forgive for the both of us.
(This Grudge)

and finally, the silent protestations of a broken heart…

I'm not depressed
I don't get down that much
I'm not despondent
I am not dark as such I'm never sad
Keep Chin Up, Stays in touch
And Doth I protest too much?
(Doth I Protest Too Much)

Perhaps we have something to learn from her. Ignoring brokenness does not make it go away. Expression can be good and healing. "Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." It also gives us our connection with the rest of the hurting world in need of Messiah, helps us understand their pain, and offer Christ's hope rather than blind optimism. And, just maybe, we will enter into a deeper reconciliation with God, with those we love, and within the Church.

Cori

*I use “prophet” here to mean “spokesperson.” I use “postmodern” to counter our natural association of prophets with foretelling the future. Postmodernity concerns itself more with the present state of affairs, and avoids prescriptive predictions.

Christian Unity in a Postmodern Age of Difference

2005-04-07T20:45:00.000-05:00

I study a lot about geographically-based communities and the creation of social capital. Social capital, by Robert Putnams’s (“Bowling Alone”) definition, is the networks, norms, and trust that develop within a community that can be mobilized for everyone’s shared benefit. There is a lot of tension in the literature between the postmodern pursuit of individual identity and multiple publics, and those who recognize the value of (and power in) deepening connections with others through groups.

I was reminded of this tension by Aaron’s discussion of Martin Luther below in his well-stated tribute to Pope John Paul II below. Luther’s goal was unity of the Church, as was Christ’s. The problem is that the Church has fallen victim to the temptations that postmodernism provides, namely the drive to seek individual identity in difference rather than strive towards a collective unity. Postmodernism provides a cop-out of sorts to conflict resolution. Rather than put in the intense work required to find common ground and seek a common good, it is easier to declare that I am different from you.

Just think. If the Body of Christ cannot work toward the reconciliation that Aaron, Jonathan, myself and others so desperately long for, how do we expect the rest of the world to pan out? Is it really surprising that I don’t know much about my neighbors, their dreams, their needs? Is it that shocking that suburbs have isolated themselves (supposedly) from the diversity (social, racial, economic, etc.) of the city, that the wealthy have withdrawn to separate, gated enclaves? Should it even phase me that social policies are regularly categorized as targeting the “deserving” versus “undeserving” poor?

The New Testament Church was born out of a spirit of unity. We are all bearers of Christ’s image. Let’s shake off the shackles of postmodern (in)difference and remember that they will know us by our love for one another.

Cori

“You have quieted those which were in confusion. Praise to your calmness! O Lord make quiet in your churches; and blend and unite, O Lord, the contentious sects; and still, and rule also the conflicting parties, and may there be at every time one true church, and may her righteous children gather themselves together to confess your graciousness. Praise to your reconciliation, O Lord God.”

-St. Ephraem the Syrian, 4th century

Intelligent Design Super Blog

2005-04-04T17:14:00.000-05:00

There is a new "Super Blog" on intelligent design, with an impressive array of contributors. With all of the straw men and misrepresentations that fly around when discussing ID, hopefully getting quick responses from it's most prominent spokesmen will aid in clarifying what ID is and is not.

Who is Ooboo anyway?

2005-04-03T15:50:00.000-05:00

The URL (and original title) of this blog is "Think, Ooboo, think", which was our first shot at hacking out a name of our own in Cyberspace that was neither taken nor copyrighted. It is a phrase I have been using for some time, actually, inspired by the tagline of producer Gary David Goldberg's shows. The simple command for a dog to obey somehow became a good-natured reminder to myself to use my brain before opening my mouth, or walking out the door without my keys. (Note: the actual dog in the TV tagline was "Ubu" not "Ooboo", but we'll stick with the phonetically equivalent Ooboo, and hopefully will not get sued.)

As such, it was and is a good reminder for us, as we spend our lives attempting to engage all of life with Christ's gospel where he has placed each one of us, not to neglect the great grey organ he has placed on top of our necks. If we take a position reflexively and haven't thought through it, then "Think, ooboo, think". If we instinctively digest mass media's perspective on an issue without a sifting through the biases and carefully selected facts, then "Think, ooboo, think." And if we out of hand discount the positions of others which have been taken through much pain and sorrow, then "Think, ooboo, think."

And if we stretch this metaphor too far, then "Think, Ooboo, think".

Why the Pope Matters to an Evangelical

2005-04-02T09:20:00.000-05:00

You might think that the likely imminent death of John Paul II would be little more than a footnote to me. After all, most Evangelicals see themselves as heirs of the reformation, bearers of the of the torch of faith rescued from the medieval church by Martin Luther. I would once have counted myself among their number, but over the past several years I have found my position changing. Here is why.

First, I have become more acquainted with Martin Luther, his thoughts and his writings, and through it all one thing about this man has become clear. He did not want to start a separate church! It was his hope that trough him the medieval Catholic Church couls be purged of its late attitudes and return to the purity of its simpler years. This was not to be, and the Church he so passionately longed to help eventually excommunicated him. This is important to understand. Martin Luther became what would later be called a Protestant not in anger, not in indifference to what he left behind, but in tears. And those who are in some sense his spiritual descendants should feel his pain also.

Frankly, I think that many of the issues within the Catholic Church that led to the reformation have changed, but some have not. And while those unchanged issues may be enough to prevent myself and other Evangelicals from effecting a complete reconciliation, this does not mean that we should enjoy it. Rather, we should weep, weep for the division that has been caused in Christ's body, viewing it not as a separation of what is good and pure from what is profane and corrupted, but rather a regrettable though necessary (at least at one point) wound, much like a surgery. And we should always be looking for the end of the case, as it were, when the patient can be closed up and healing bandages applied so that She might go forth into the world whole again. This also applies to the myriad divisions that have sprung up since then among those who call themselves Protestants, divisions often not about doctrine, but about factors so peripheral that many cannot even explain them. Whatever denomination you call yourselve a member of, you should pass the congrgations of other Christian groups with pain in your hearts, ever searching for reconciliation at the foot of the cross (the only place where it can be real and not a mere compromise). Remember, Christ himself prayed that we should all be one, and why it is that the mandate given to us His followers in that cry to the father should be ignored in faver of others is beyond me.

But my admiration for the current Pope goes far beyond that which I have discussed above, for in him I see evidence of the highest virtues of the Christian walk: humility, faithfulness, and complete consistency. In his stance on the end of life, on euthanasia, on bioethics (all issues that strike at the heart of what I do daily), I see a man whose beilefs were shaped by the Gospel, by the love that God has for those whom he has made out of the dust, creatures impressed with the Imago Dei. Even at the end of his life, as the world clamored for him to step down, likening his job to that of a CEO who was too sick to lead his corporation, he hung in there, doing everything he could to live out the truth that a human life is meaningful and important right up to the very end.

Even if, over the past months, John Paul II could not lead by word, he has lead by example, showing a world fixated on utilitarian principles at the end of life, how a Christian should approach his Lord when his time comes. Catholics believe that the Pope is the vicar of Christ on earth, solely charged with adminstering His kingdom. I don't necessarily see it in that way, though, as always, I welcome new information and thoughts, and am always willing to change in service to the Way, the Truth and the Life. But beside this, surely we can all agree that this man was a powerful servant of God, a man who knew his Savior and Lord, and who was detemined to let Christ shape his life for His glory. Of course John Paul II has made his mistakes, and if he and I were to sit across a table I'm sure there would be some potentially spirited debate, but the thoughtful Evangelical can and should admire this man's commitment.

At this time that I am posting this I do not know his condition, whether he has died or whether he yet lives, but if he has passed on, I have little question that he has received that accolade longed for by all of Christs redeemed, "Well done, My good and faithful servant. Enter the glory," and may even now be sitting down at the table of Christ with those Christians who may have bitterly disagreed with many of his beliefs on earth, but now find such issues suddenly irrelevant as they stand in the presence of the Pierced One, the Lamb slain for each of their redemption, the one whose mere presence can heal all divisions in His Body.
At least, I hope this is the case. But here on earth, all we can do is strive to live a consistent Spirit-filled life that is worthy of our Lord, and pray ceaselessly with great tears and groanings that his Body would be healed and so fulfill it's mission here on Earth.

Aaron W. Calhoun MD.

Justice, religion and politics

2005-03-29T23:00:00.000-05:00

As you can probably tell by now, the three of us have a wide array of interests, but a common purpose: to engage the Gospel of Christ with our minds, given the unique passions God has given us (medicine, computers, social science), and the ever-changing life circumstances in which he places us.

To keep the reader guessing about what might come next, I shift from Aaron’s thought-provoking discussion of intelligent design and miracles (in the spirit of G.K. Chesterton’s famous statement that God may still bid the sun to rise each morning, regardless of natural law) to some thoughts on philosophy. Specifically, I’ll briefly reflect on several ideas from the exchange between Jurgen Habermas and John Rawls that I just finished reading (see “Greetings and Readings” below for complete citations).

I do not claim to be an advanced scholar in either social or political theory, but any discussion focusing on concepts of justice should be of interest to any Christian. Both Habermas and Rawls are political democratic theorists who have constructed different methods of developing what they believe to be a just political society. Habermas is most known for his theory of communicative action, based on creating an ideal discourse situation through which just decisions can be formulated intersubjectively. Rawls is best known for his theory of justice, further revised in his Political Liberalism, based on the individual and collective reflections of reasonable citizens in an “original position” deliberating behind a “veil of ignorance” based on normative principles of what is just and good. This is a horribly condensed explanation, and political theorists will have to forgive me for cutting corners, I’m sure.

An interesting difference between the two is that Rawls accepts a role for what he calls “reasonable comprehensive doctrines” in defining justice, while Habermas does not. According to Rawls, Habermas “rejects what he calls an essentialist Platonic idea of reason and asserts that such an idea must be replaced by a procedural reason that puts itself on trial and is the judge of its own critique” (136). Rawls himself adopts the notion that everyone is rooted in multiple “comprehensive doctrines” (which he says need not be metaphysical or religious, by the way), and believes that “reasonable overlapping consensuses” can be achieved where political conceptions “can be sincerely defended before others without criticizing or rejecting their deepest religious and philosophical commitments” (146). This, in fact, brings about social unity and stability within a society.

I found one point by Rawls particularly interesting to reflect upon, given today’s raging debates over the intersection of religion and politics. He discusses a true dilemma within political liberalism: “no moral law can be externally imposed on a sovereign democratic people; and…the sovereign people may not justly (but it may legitimately) enact any law violating those rights” (166). He goes on to say that “there is no human institution—political or social, judicial or ecclesiastical—that can guarantee that legitimate (or just) laws are always enacted and just rights always respected” (166).

This poses a critical challenge to Christians who believe that God’s moral order can be imposed on a democratic society through political means. Rawls’ comment also (unknowingly?) picks up on the fact that even the Church is not free from sin, limited as a human institution to fallible conceptions and guarantees of justice. This does not mean that Christ’s Church is not to be engaged in discussions of justice—to the contrary!—but that it does not hold a monopoly on the political realm.

Whew. That’s all I have brain power for tonight. Maybe I’ll pick up some of these issues in my next post. I invite comments from my co-contributors as well.

Theodicy or not Theodicy?

2005-03-29T13:52:00.000-05:00

I was rather surprised to see today that in a CNN article on the devastating earthquake that hit Indonesia, that the articles claims ", luck helped spare Indonesia and the Indian Ocean region from widespread devastation."
Now, first of all, they were only spared in comparison to the last disaster. Second, if you are run over by a car, and then hit again by a second car a few minutes later, (but not as bad) few would call you lucky or spared. Third, after the Tsunami, many clergymen, columnists, and citizens joined a very interesting discussion of Theodicy - whether a just God can allow things like Tsunamis to happen. Now, that was a very useful, and important discussion. However I found it interesting that in this article, luck is given credit for sparing Indonesia, not divine mercy, in spite of the puzzlement by seismologists over why there was no Tsunami.
Now, I am not claiming the lack of a Tsunami was a miracle (again, it is possible that more people have died in the earthquake than in all of 9-11). However, it does point to the fact that we are much more likely to blame God for things going wrong, than to thank him for the many things that do not go wrong during the course of a day. Perhaps if we learned this skill, it would be easier to come to grips with the disasters when they do happen.

Creation, Represented and Misrepresented

2005-03-28T19:24:00.000-05:00

Greetings. One of the purposes of this group is to foster discussions of issues important to the formation of a consistent Christian worldview, and on such issue is the theory of intelligent design. Now I am not completely sold on ID theory myself, if only because it seems to give too much ground to the modernist way of understanding nature right at the outset, and I am far from convinced that the "scientific method", powerful tool that it is (Heck, I use it every day at work) can be used as a means of discerning ultimate meaning. This is not because, as some would say, there is no ultimate meaning to things, but rather due to an understanding that the scientific method was specifically designed to investigate recurring events.

Now, most events in this world do, in fact, recur. The sun rises daily. Electrons always attract or repel with the same negative charge. But this way of understanding things, by its very structure, marginalizes events that, by their own nature, might only occur once. The creation of the universe itself is a prime example, as is the Old Testament parting of the Red Sea. This worldview tends to split events into those that occur according to the laws of nature, and those that occur miraculously (that is for those that believe that things indeed can happen outside the framework of nature's laws, and that the supernatural is more than just an imaginative way to fill the gaps in our knowledge.) I would suggest that any theory or argument, no matter how helpful, that attempts to use this understanding is flawed from the outset. Perhaps we would have more success as we try to form a truly Christian way of understanding the world, if we tossed out the concept of natural law (as some theoretical independent entity governing things that God does not directly intervene in) entirely. All is miracle, from the fact that the sun rises and sets each day, to the Resurrection, and what we call natural law simply refers to how God does things most of the time.

That was a somewhat long introduction to what I am about to present, and I may well attempt to expand it at some time in the future. But the fact is, in our current society, no-one actually seems to care. Most don't even want to consider such things. Is is a flaw in our educational system? Is it a byproduct of too much television? I don't know. One thing seems certain, people seem apt to dismiss the idea of divine creation without any real investigation. The same arguments are used against God from one generation to the next with little alteration, despite the numerous logical and reasonable answers that have been provided. Now, anyone can dispute with the answers given. That's OK. That's how both sides learn, get better and hopefully move toward the truth. But most don't even take the time to see if reasonable answers have ever been proposed. A case in point is found in the following link. It is a recent article published by the Boston Globe called Who Created Us, Don't Ask. As I have said, there are legitimate reasons to ask if Intelligent Design is truly the last word from both sides of the fence, but none are to be found in here. Unfortunately it costs a nominal fee to read this article in the Boston Globe Archives (www.bostonglobe.com), but if you are at all interested in the state of rational thought and in particular rational thought about Christianity in America, it's worth it.

I mailed in a rebuttal article in response, but I never heard from them. It may have been poorly written, it may have been to antithetical to their worldview, it definitely was too long. Anyway, it never saw the light of day... Until now... Following is a complete text of my rebuttal. I await your thoughts as well.
Aaron.

Who Created Us? A Question Worth Asking.
Aaron W. Calhoun, MD.

One of the criteria of a well-crafted argument is the degree in which it addresses the actual beliefs and logic of the opposing position. Unfortunately many do not take this approach, but rather set up a group of propositions that bear little resemblance to what their opponents actually believe and tackle that instead, presumably because it is easier. This approach is frequent enough that is has even earned its own name, the straw man. I bring this up because David Holahan has erected a veritable colossus of a scarecrow in his piece, Who Created Us? Don’t Ask. When something like this occurs it greatly concerns me, as articles like this may actually be the only exposure some have to the claims of Intelligent Design.

I am not an ID theorist, and so I am not qualified to give a detailed explanation of its current state. I would rather leave that for one who could do it far more justice than I could. But what I am is a physician, with training in biology as well as an interest in the other physical scientists. I am also a Christian. No one is without bias on these matters, and it is important to let readers know up front what those biases are so that the information presented can be critically assessed. That said, there are some glaring inconsistencies in the evidence presented in the Holahan article.

The vast distances of interplanetary space, coupled with what seems to be our unique position as the only known life in that space intelligent enough to think on such matters (or write about them), is put forth as a major area of concern. It seems that a creator (I prefer that to “Mr. ID”), should be considered wasteful if such a gargantuan void is not filled to the brim with life forms. I do not disagree with the validity of this question, what I do take issue with is the fact that it is presented as new. Many believe that it was Copernicus who put us in our place as a species, so to speak, but in fact size of the universe was known to be near infinite long before.
During the middle ages, Ptolemy’s Almagest functioned in much the same capacity as Carl Sagan’s work does now. By our standards it was filled with inaccuracies, not the least of which was the sun’s central position, but in the midst of these anachronisms we read the statement “the earth, in relation to the distance of the fixed stars, has no appreciable size, and must be treated as a mathematical point.” (Book I, Chapter 5) And that is not all, for thousands of years earlier the words,” When I consider the heavens, the work of your fingers, what is man that Thou art mindful of him,” were penned by a Hebrew king. The truth is, the size of the universe was understood long ago, and was not considered an issue. Why should it be one now?

To complicate matters even more, I have heard the opposite argument also used to cast doubt on the concepts behind ID, for if the Universe is exploding with living things, then doesn’t that prove life’s relative commonality, suggesting that it can arise almost anywhere, under any conditions? Or might it not simply be an artifact of the writer’s bias, for it seems that Mr. Holahan may well find reason to question the existence of a creator in both situations, whereas I would have no difficulty in believing if either proved to be true. No, the question of the existence of a creator cannot be decided on these grounds.

So what of the second example? I often feel bad for the appendix, as it seems to be a greatly maligned organ, a posterchild for any part of the body that would be considered useless. This, unfortunately, ignores the relatively large quantities of lymphatic tissue present in the organ and the resulting theory that it may function in a fashion similar to the tonsils, regulating potentially dangerous bacterial growth in the GI tract. The gallbladder as well is certainly not a vital organ, but anyone who loves deep-fried foods and has had it removed might feel differently about its presence. In reality the examples cited do not prove what they were intended to, but by saying that I do not mean to suggest that his argument here is without merit. Rather, it does not go deep enough, for at the most fundamental level of our physical structure are features whose apparent uselessness far outstrips the appendix.

A basic tenet of molecular biology deals with how information flows in the cells of our body. DNA functions as the hard drive, storing the genetic information that is later extracted and used to make the proteins that give our cells structure and the enzyme machines that do the work. What many do not realize is that vast tracts of DNA have no discernable purpose. Other areas resemble genes that are well known and necessary to life, but make no useful protein or functioning enzyme machine. If anything, they look like accidental copies made by the cell that did not work, and so were shuffled into some genetic wasteland, where they could not bother the more productive citizens of the genome. At this point you might ask why I would bring this up, as it certainly does not seem, on the surface, to support my case. After all, isn’t that wasteful? How could a creator design a system with such imperfect elements?

Yes, they are imperfect by our standards, and therein lies the truth. We live in a society that has long enjoyed the fruits of the enlightenment: the seemingly effortless mastery over nature that science offers, the powerful tools present in the scientific method for probing and understanding our world, the machines that make our every task so much quicker and easier to perform than even our parents could have imagined. The scientific method has taught us priceless truths about the functioning of our body, the dance of the atoms and electrons, and the light of stars billions of miles away. We have learned to regard our universe, our bodies, and to some extent our minds, as exquisitely complex machines. And if that is the case, then we have every right to judge the universe, to sort out the parts that are most efficient from those that seem pointless and extraneous. But what if we are wrong.

What if the creator is not a mechanic, engineer, or even a designer? What if he is exactly what I have said he is, a creator, in the deepest sense of the word. Then a wealth of possibilities is laid before us. The world could then be seen as a symphony or a painting, rather than a machine, and humanity could be understood as works of art, created in the image of God. No-one questions the placement of the water lilies in a Monet, nor the individual notes of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy, yet isn’t that what we are doing when we use the gallbladder or the distance to the edge of the visible universe as a means to deny the possibility of a creator? In the end there are no arguments, however advanced and scientific they may sound, that can prove or disprove the existence of God. Instead I would ask that each of you get up early tomorrow morning, drive to Revere Beach, and wait as the sky lightens to the east and the clouds are shot through with hues of rose and gold, only to be dispersed in the end by the brilliant burst of fire that we call sunrise, and then ask yourself if a divine artist might not just be present after all.

Aaron W. Calhoun MD

Greetings from the mysterious third contributor

2005-03-27T07:41:00.000-05:00

Hello, I'd first like to introduce myself in what I intend to be the first of many posts. My name is Aaron William Calhoun. By profession I am a physician who has chosen (although many think me mad) to specialize in the field of pediatric intensive care. I am currently completing my fellowship in this area at the Children's Hospital of Boston. Despite the fact that a significant chunk of my time is consumed by pursuing this, I have managed to keep a healthy interest alive in theology, particle physics, and what I call mythopoeic fiction (Others would term it sci-fi/fantasy). Above all else I am a Christian, husband and father.

One might wonder how these disparate interests cohere. After all, I can hear someone asking, isn't the Christian faith of a somewhat different tone than the hard sciences? It is a question that needs to be asked, for the whole thrust of higher education in this day and age does seem to suggest that the scientific method is the ideal way of aquiring new, testable knowledge about the world. Althought at present I do not have the time to address this question with the lengthy response that it deserves, suffice it to say that the answer, as far as I am concerned, is a resounding no. I believe it was Jerome (or at least one of the church fathers, please correct me if I'm wrong) who said, roughly paraphrased, that "all truth is God's truth." The universe does function in a consistent way, from the smallest particle to the highest star, from the heart of the feeblest man to the God who was slain on this earth 2000 years ago Friday in order to make that man holy. But enough for now on this topic, there will be more later.

One of the purposes of this Blog is to offer book reviews, and I have just finished an excellent one about a month ago. It's called The Descent of the Dove, written by Charles Williams.
Charles Williams is an interesting figure. A close (although admittedly wierd) friend of Tolkien and Lewis, he wrote many books, few of which are read today. Simply put, the Decent of the Dove is a history of the church and, in particular, a history of the actions of the Holy Spirit in the Church's inception and growth. This is not a dull text. Rather, all the events in the life of the One Body from Pentecost through the Reformation are seen as though from behind the scenes, through eyes that can discern the movements of God, not just the outward events. One of the most notable features is it's lack of a partisan spirit. Both Catholics and Protestants receive equal praise and equal blame for the divisions that have scarred the People of God. But above that, there is a singular concept put forth by the author that I wish to emphasize, the idea of Co-Inherence.

Co-Inherence refers first to the action of Christ's whereby we are brought "into" him. By the power of his death and resurrection, by the infusion of His life and grace given in response to faith. Not only does this make us part of Christ, but because the same divine life has been given to all His people, we therefore are all a part of each other. This is not metaphor, it is an almost organic fact. The church fathers saw the implications of this concept, referring to it in the ecumenical creeds as the Communion of the Saints. We are all one in Christ, whether dead or alive, in heaven or on earth. Co-Inherence is also something we have been commanded to participate in on behalf of others. "Bear ye one another's burdens," had special meaning to Williams, and it has begun to take on special meaning for me because of this book.

Each day I go to the ICU in which I work, and from the first step across the threshold I am assaulted by a barrage of tragedy: the child dying of cancer, the near fatal automobile crash, the mysterious infection that no-one can seem to cure. Many of these can be saved with the gifts of knowledge that God has given to modern medicine, but many are not. What is it I can do for these? Well, I can and do pray for miracles, and have occasionally seen them, but often the answerto a prayer for miraculous healing is no. No matter what the outcome, however, I have realized that I can help to bear the burdens of the family: I can sit with them, I can listen to them, and I can pray with them. As a physician I have been granted the almost unbearable privilage of being a representative of Christ in some small measure to his suffering creatures. And, with His grace and at His command, I have been given the responsibility to bear their burdens to whatever extent I am able, to help shoulder their crosses as the walk their own Via Dolorosa. Although I am not Him (I am not even close), if the nails of their pain can pierce me instead then so be it, and who knows, even if no word of witness can be spoken, perhaps the sight of one which is willing to go that far with them in their time of need will invoke memories of another sacrifice, one that stands above and beyond the stars of Heaven and nearer than their own hearts.

But enough of this, just read the book. As for me, I must leave these sadder meditations behind, for today is not Good Friday, but Easter Sunday. The darkness is over, the burden borne. Christ has descended into hell and come back again. The grave is empty, the tomb is open, and with John, with Mary Magdalene, and with all those throughout time who have let their lives be nailed with God's Son to a Roman cross I proclaim "Rejoice, He is Risen indeed!" So if you happen to be reading this Easter Morning I encourage you to shut off your computer, put some clothes on, find the nearest church where Christ is honored, and join in the ancient celebration of victory over death. Perhaps I'll see you there as well.

Aaron W. Calhoun, MD.

Greetings and Readings

2005-03-23T22:16:00.000-05:00

Greetings! My name is Cori and I’m currently a Ph.D. student in the social sciences. My comps are coming up this Fall term so my reading list is quite packed. Let me reflect on a couple of books I’ve recently finished, and mention what’s next in line.

Books recently completed:

The Rise of the Network Society – Manuel Castells

In the first book of a three volume series, Castells describes the birth of informational capitalism as the new mode of production in our society. Within a growing “space of flows” capital has lost its fixed status and taken on a life of its own. This life expands across a global network increasing the connections between people and places, yet ironically results in the breakdown of collective identity, replacing it with a fragmented individuality. The other two books in the series focus on the shaping of identity and the changing nature of the State in the Information Age. I’d like to read these, too, but I probably won’t have time for to do so in the near future.

The Condition of Postmodernity – David Harvey

Harvey offers a lively discussion of modernism v. postmodernism, showing how some things have changed while others have not. His most significant contribution in this book, perhaps, is his argument regarding increasing time-space compression. As he sees it, “[e]verything, from novel writing and philosophizing to the experience of labouring or making a home, has to face the challenge of accelerating turnover time and the rapid write-off of traditional and historically acquired values” (291). An interesting side effect of the postmodern phenomenon is a corresponding rise in the “need to discover or manufacture some kind of eternal truth…” , as evidenced by religious revival over the last four decades and “the search for authenticity and authority in politics” (292). He claims there are four different responses to the time-space compression: (1) to be overwhelmed by futility of individual or collective action, (2) “a free-wheeling denial of the complexity of the world, and a penchant for the representation of it in terms of highly simplified rhetorical propositions,” (3) a happy progressive medium between metanarratives and individual/collective agency, or (4) to go along with it, and embrace the language and images of the time (350-1). An interesting question to pose to Christ’s Church: What should our response be? (See Jonathan’s discussion of Mark Noll’s book below)

While I am not a Marxist, these theorists have interesting perspectives, some of which can be quite compelling, most of which should at least be acknowledged.

Books I am in the middle of:

Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire – Brian J. Walsh and Sylvia C. Keesmaat

This husband and wife team takes on reinterpreting Paul’s letter to the Church at Colossae into today’s postmodern world. They place the letter into the context of the Roman Empire and translate it into today’s imperial age. It’s a very conversational book with important insights. I’ll let you know more when I’m done.

Next on my list:

Reconciliation Through the Public Use of Reason: Remarks on John Rawls’ Political Liberalism – Jurgen Habermas

Response to Habermas – John Rawls

These two tremendous social theorists have a jovial back-and-forth over John Rawls’ liberal democratic theory of justice in the Journal of Philosophy, vol.92, iss.3

My Reading List:

2005-03-23T20:51:00.000-05:00

In what I hope will be a regular contribution by my associates, I hereby list the books that are on my reading list for the next weeks and months:

The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind – Mark Noll
Evangelicals tend to have a reputation for anti-intellectualism, particularly in the 20th and 21st centuries. Noll’s book chronicles the development of evangelical thought, which began with a very strong view perspective of allowing Christ to permeate all of life, and to develop a distinctly Christian perspective on art, politics, culture, entertainment, literature, etc… This means a distinctly Christian viewpoint that doesn’t entail wholesale Manicheist dualism, dividing all of earth into light and dark, God and Satan, or a docetist/Gnostic philosophy which makes sharp divides between the spiritual and the fleshly, (with the former being all good, and the latter all evil.) These heresies were rejected by the church, and yet according to Noll, the Charismatic, Fundamentalist, and Dispensational offshoots of Evangelicism, have veered dangerously close to these errant perspectives. Noll’s book (which I have almost finished) shows why these trends developed, what they sought to preserve, and what they also lost, and is a strong encouragement for Evangelical intellectuals to think hard and revive the mind of their distinct Christian perspective, without losing the focus which has made Evangelicism such a strong force in modern Christianity. I heartily recommend it.

Les Miserables – Victor Hugo
I am determined to start and finish this book this summer; the musical contains what I consider one of greatest stories of redemption ever to be told, and it is high time that I read the full treatment.

"If I speak, I am condemned. If I stay silent, I am damned!
Who am I? Can I condemn this man to slavery pretend I do not feel his agony
This innocent who bears my face, who goes to judgement in my place, Who am I?
Can I conceal myself for evermore? Pretend I'm not the man I was before?
And must my name until I die be no more than an alibi?
Must I lie? How can I ever face my fellow men? How can I ever face myself again?
My soul belongs to God, I know I made that bargain long ago
He gave me hope when hope was gone,he gave me strength to journey on
Who am I? Who am I? I am Jean Valjean!"

What Saint Paul Really Said – N.T. Wright

Wright has quickly become on of my favorite theologians, combining tremendous respect for scripture, deep knowledge of the context, and a tremendous creativity for unpacking what it was written to mean to those it was written to, and what we can take from it today. I have read some of his work on Jesus, but this will be my first foray into his views of Paul, so I greatly look forward to it.

Life of Pi – Yann Martel

I don’t know much about this book, other than it involves a Boy who wants to be Hindu, Muslim and Christian at the same time, and who ends up stranded on a life raft with a Tiger, and must talk his way out of being eaten. Sounded to interesting to pass up.

Greetings!

2005-03-22T22:50:00.000-05:00

Welcome to "Think, ooboo, think" a collaborative blog effort between several good friends, who desire to share our until-now private musings with all human-kind...well, at least those who have internet access, free time to surf the web, and the fortuitousness to stumble upon this blog.

With those criteria, the audience may only be the 3 or so of us, and if that is so, then that’s okay. But welcome to whoever you are – we pray that you will find our discussions though provoking, insightful, and if you are annoyed/flabbergasted/confounded by our opinions, then we hope you are challenged to think through where we have gone amiss, in route to better understanding your own world view.

Who are we?
As for my collaborative colleagues, I will let them introduce themselves. My name is Jonathan – I am a Software Engineer by training, a theologian by hobby, and an avid book worm. I grew up in the Evangelical tradition, and have bounced around over most of Protestant-dom before currently settling in strange mold of Reformed-Anglicanism. I tend to have a conservative outlook on morality, a liberal outlook on political formations (which makes it very frustrating to vote), and a deep skepticism of easy answers and “intuitive” arguments that don’t think long and hard about the many disparate sides of a situation.

I hope to be an “official” academic someday, however, I am content for the time being to do so in my off hours as I work in the “real world” (which can be quite phony at times). I have taken up the study of ancient Greek in the past year, after a repetitive stress injury banned me from my former hobby of video games, and for the most part I am content with the trade off. I have worked all across the software world, from business application development, video game programming, and am now an IT Consultant working in transportation software. I like to build things, and fix broken stuff.

A good deal of my interest which I hope to blog about are insights from my time in software development, which I hope to bring to bear on the emerging “field”’ (some would not give it such dignity) of “Intelligent Design”. While I appreciate the efforts and contributions of Biologists, I fear that not enough voice is given to those who are actually doing design work on Intelligent Systems which they have created, namely researchers in Artificial Intelligence. There the problem is attacked from the other side of the coin, and I think can give some fresh insights that could potentially lead to falsifiable scenarios.

I love movies which challenging questions about reality, existence and consciousness. “AI”, “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”, and “The Matrix” are high on my list; I’m also a sucker for any epic historical drama, with lots of angst, pathos, and heroes willing to die for a cause. As mentioned above, I like reading fantasy, both classic (Tolkein, Lewis, et all) and modern (Robert Jordan, Harry Potter). Recently, I have been cutting my teeth on writings of great theologians of the past (Chesterton, Augustine) (or chipping as the case might sometimes be), as well as more modern New Testament scholars(N.T. Wright, Ben Witherington.)

As the blog-o-sphere has developed, I have taken a great deal of insight and satisfaction from reading the contributions of many significant nodes. Hopefully I will have a list on the side-bars of my “must reads”, and so the question naturally arises – what can we contribute. I will lay out a few general goals.
Goals
1) Avoid the echo chamber. It is so easy for blog communities to become shrill, self-fulfilling narratives that only serve to polarize a community, rather than challenging it with diverse opinions and a thoughtful multi-faceted commentary. The goal of this site is not to find unanimity – if we do we have failed. It is to provide a thought-provoking multi-sided discussion, hopefully with controversy, differing opinions, and eventually changed minds. I hope at some point, the community will grow, but for right now, commenting is only limited to the members of the blog. This might change at some point, but as our readership is so low at the moment, it will stay “in house” for now.

2) Provoke change. I believe that Orson Scott Card was predicting the rise of the Blog-o-sphere is “Ender’s Game” when he spoke of “The Nets”, and Peter Wiggin’s rise to the Hegemony largely through Anonymous postings of written manifestos which inspired great discussion, controversy, and eventually polarization. While we do not seek world domination, we do seek to join the greater conversations about difficult issues, and perhaps provide a unique and (hopefully) well thought out position that will seek to bridge some of the implacable polarizations our culture seems to gravitate towards.

3) Or not. This post comes off awfully pretentious. We love to talk about interesting and esoteric things, and we decided to make a written record of some of the discussion. I hope you enjoy!