A Cultural Consciousness

A society without a cultural consciousness of the absolute, such as we are in the process of creating, is like a lawn laid on top of a concrete yard: it may briefly give the impression of health, but eventually, for obvious reasons, it withers away. What is called secularism, therefore, strikes not merely at specific religions, or even religions in general, but at the very capacity of humans to be human.

So says Irish Times columnist John Waters. Read the full piece here.

Terrible Films

The Agony Booth is a website dedicated to recapping terrible, terrible films. The writers wade through a movie scene by scene, picking it apart one appalling piece of direction/screenwriting/acting at a time. It may sound a tad excruciating, but based on the two recaps that I've read, it results in pieces that are really quite funny.

Consider this excerpt from the recap for Batman Forever, which I must admit had me chuckling for a good two minutes. (You had to be there):

Gordon introduces Batman to Dr. Chase Meridian, and it turns out Batman is already familiar with her work, because he cites it as naïve, but insightful. Some dreadful banter ensues between Batman and Chase that's too insipid to recount. The highlight, however, is when she calls Batman's own sanity into question by referring to him as "a grown man who dresses like a flying rodent."

BatVal gets a bit irritated by this. He responds by doing his very best scary eyes, and invading Chase's personal space, and offering the following reply.

Batman: Bats aren't rodents, Dr. Meridian!

Chase says she didn't know that. Honestly? Where did she get her PhD? I'm no zoologist, but even I could have told you that. Then Chase delivers the verbal coup de grace, and the most ridiculous line in the whole film.

Chase: By the way, do you have a first name, or do I just call you "Bats"?

What? Exactly what kind of response was she expecting there? "Oh, yeah, sure. I'm Melvyn. Melvyn Batman."

All Powerful and All Loving?

In a world not without its fill of pain and suffering, how can god be both all powerful and all loving?

This is the question that dominates a particular branch of theology known as Theodicy, which literally means “the justification of god” or something like that.

But more than that, it is a question most, if not all, of us grapple with it, be it often or be it when some kind of tragedy inevitably invades our small corner of the world.

Before I briefly share my thoughts on this question, let me say this: It is never wrong to cry out with a “How?” or a “Why?” The Psalms (and plenty of other books in the Bible) are filled with the outcries of anguished souls questioning their god. The reality of painful human experience is not glossed over in Scripture in favour of glib theological musings and formulae.

And on that note, allow me to present you with some glib theological musings and formulae.

First things first - the question in question once more: In a world with so much evil, how can god be both all powerful and all loving?

There are a number of presuppositions brought to the table when this question is raised, which I think I’m right to be dubious about.

1 - That there is a contradiction between an omnipotent, all loving god and a world where bad things happen. Why can’t the two co-exist? The question is often asked in the same way that someone might ask “How can a room with no windows have one of its windows wide open?” but clearly it is not in that category of obvious contradiction. So from where is the contradiction derived? From how we think such a god ought to operate within his world?

2 - That we know who the word “god” is referring to. Which god are we talking about when we ask this question? Where did we get our ideas about what he is like? Talk to Richard Dawkins, and he is a fictional character, and a really horrible one at that. Talk to N.T. Wright, and he is the world’s loving creator who is intimately involved in putting his creation to rights. Talk to a deist, and god is some being who created the world and then left it to run by itself as he resides in a far away place. In short, the unknown in this question is not simply the answer to the paradox it poses; the unknown is perhaps god himself.

3 - That we know what godly power and godly love would look like if we saw it. We come to this question with our own definitions of power and love, and we perhaps remain unwilling for those definitions to be altered.

There are I’m sure other presuppositions that we all have, but those are some of the main ones I can think of.

I approach this question as a Christian, which means that I think the unknown god in the paradox is known through Jesus of Nazareth. This, for me, is highly significant when it comes to wrestling with the tension posed by the question. If we look at the question through the three lenses Richard Hays uses in his book on New Testament Ethics -- community, cross, and new creation -- the significance of Jesus becomes clearer.

Community

Jesus did not come and eradicate all of the evil in the world through powerful love. He began something transformative, but he then left the power (so to speak) into the hands of his disciples. They were to be his community which would be a light to the world, empowered by the spirit of god to manifest the kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. God -- in what might be considered foolishness -- has chosen this community to continue on from where Jesus left off. Perhaps if the church of today was more willing to be god’s healing agent in a broken world, the apparent contradiction between god and his creation would be rather hollow.

Cross

If I have made Jesus sound like simply the founder of some new human movement, then the cross will surely correct this. Christians see this as -- amongst many things -- god’s definitive solution to the problem of evil. It is the place where “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself”.

Moreover, the cross also redefines what we mean when we talk of power and love. It is the ultimate revelation of both. As Paul says in Corinthians, god’s power looks like weakness. Actually, it is weakness; it is power in weakness. When we talk of an all powerful god, this usually triggers images in our mind of some glorious being floating around on a cloud and zapping things in order to fix them (or perhaps smite them); rarely does it trigger the image of a man dying on a Roman cross.

Love also gets a make-over, seen now not to be a pain-free, happy-clappy thing, but something costly, something which feels hurt as well as joy. God’s love revealed on the cross is a love that runs deeper than him wishing us well, with his power then the power to make us well. It is a love that enters into the depths of human need and suffering; a love which can cry out “My god, my god, why have you forsaken me?” The real paradox is that god has experienced the feeling of god-forsakenness.

New Creation

Finally, the Christian knows that what we see now is not the way things will always be. There is hope. God has raised Jesus from the dead, and so though we suffer now, we can be confident that it does not and will not have the last word over our lives. This does not mean that suffering is to be ignored or trivialised. It is real and tragic. New creation has burst into life, but the old order of being lingers on, and we continue to feel its harrowing effects, and we continue to cry out to god “Why?” and “How long?” The tension of the question “how god can co-exist with evil?” is felt by the Christian, and is not supposed to be explained away. I hope I haven’t done that.

I only hope to have shown that god has not remained silent on the issue. As the Psalm which begins with “My god, my god, why have you forsaken me?” goes on to say,

You have answered me

Indeed, god has not hidden his face from us. He has heard our cries. Through Jesus of Nazareth he has dealt a devastating blow to evil, triumphing over it through the cross. Through his community of believers he intends to point back to what Jesus has accomplished, and to point forward to the consummation of his new creation. The present remains a time of tension and toil, but there also remains faith, hope, and love in the midst of it all, and the greatest of these is love. We are to re-enact in the present the powerful love of god that was made known on the cross, doing so by faith in Jesus, and in the hope that one day all wrongs will be made right.

The X-Factor

I’ve yet to watch an entire episode of The X-Factor. Tonight I intend to change that, and to walk you -- the misfortunate reader -- through my experience into uncharted waters.

The acts have to perform a song by George Michael (either during his days with Wham! or as a solo artist). If this isn’t a set-up for Jedward then I don’t know what is.

By the way, how many George Michael songs can you name? Once you get past “Wake Me Up” and “Last Christmas”, I’m very much struggling.

Here we go…

It starts with the most over-the-top introduction in televisual history. It is a flashy recap of what happened last week, with a voice-over by the guy who does those second-chance Sunday adverts for E4 [!?] This makes even the opening credits for Batman & Robin look understated. No easy task.

The Judges have just been presented before us in a fashion not unfamiliar to Triple H or The Rock. Cheryl is wearing, er, something. That’s a start anyway. We’re only five minutes into proceedings, and I’m already overwhelmed to the point of epilepsy. Not good.

As an aside, Cheryl Cole: the most beautiful woman in the world, or a decent looking girl with loads of make-up and hair extensions? You decide.

Lloyd is getting ready to kick things off, with what Cheryl calls George Michael’s most “recognisable” song. If this isn’t either “Last Christmas” or “Wake Me Up” then I’ll be extremely disappointed. Simon muses that if Lloyd was a cat, he’d have used up 8 of his lives by now. (Lloyd is not a cat, incidentally). In other words, Lloyd needs to produce the goods tonight. Will he?

His performance is short and, well, average. Louis compliments Lloyd on his new hair cut, which is a classic case of damning with faint praise, given that Lloyd probably didn’t even cut his own hair. In other words, having just heard someone sing a tune in order to be judged, Louis decides to give some kudos to Lloyd's barber. Non sequitur much? Simon is much more positive, but you know he’s probably just being so merely to disagree with Louis (oh those two!). Cheryl says that Lloyd is turning into a man right before her eyes, and then undoes all of that by calling him “adorable”. Adorable!? Babies and cats are adorable, Cheryl, and as has been made perfectly clear already, Lloyd is not a baby, nor a cat. He’s a man, and men are not adorable. Cheryl couldn’t have been more patronising if she walked up to Lloyd on stage, spat on a tissue, and started cleaning around his mouth so that he’d “look nice for all the girls”. Danni said things before anyone else did, but she (like Cheryl earlier) doesn’t seem to understand that when the audience is screaming, the judges can’t be heard.

I wish the audience screamed more.

My verdict? If Lloyd was a cat, he wouldn’t be allowed to enter the X-Factor, which I think is grossly unfair. I say all felines rise as one and put the producers of this anti-cat show in their place! As Jedward are proving week by week, it is not a singing competition, so I’m sure there’s something the cat community can do to win over the public. May I suggest getting milked?

Dermot O’Leary welcomes us back, and next up is the only girl left - Stacey. Danni simply calls her “the voice”, which might be a ploy to take the attention away from Stacey’s face. I’m sorry. That was mean and uncalled for.

Stacey seems like a nice girl. Down to earth and all that. Seriously. She’s just not very attractive, but since when has that mattered when it comes to being a huge popstar [?].

The performance starts shakily, and continues on in that manner. Oh dear. “The voice” isn’t working tonight. She seems to be okay on the big notes, but there is a notable lack of consistency. Over to the judges.

Louis doesn’t mention anything about tonight’s performance, and neither does Cheryl. Criticism by omission? Simon finally talks about stuff that actually happened tonight, and says much the same things as I did. I’m not sure how that makes me feel. Not good, is my gut reaction. Danni finishes things off this time, but she fails to mention anything relevant. If I were to turn the tables and judge the judges right now, Danni would be gone. She serves no discernible purpose.

Stacey is obviously liked by all, which seems to be clouding the judgement of at least the judges, and probably the voters. She is a good singer, but nothing special. In a sort of backwards way, her not-very attractiveness seems to be working in her favour. Because she doesn’t have “the look”, people are almost assuming that she has “the voice”. On the evidence of tonight, she doesn’t. She is better than that cat Lloyd, though.

So far, the performances are as underwhelming as the production is overwhelming. Let’s see if John and Edward can change that. Shock horror, they will be doing a Wham! song.

They’re dancing on top of a table with a couple of girls. Good start. They’re also singing in tune, which is more than what can be said for some of Stacey’s performance. It is all very circus-ish, however, with a man at the front of the stage just spinning on his head…for no particular reason. I’m not sure who this campness appeals to, but clearly people are being won over. What is it with these two? What do they have that others don't? They seem to have this special gift, almost a factor, that is mysterious and undefinable. But whatever it is, they have no business on a show like The X-Factor. None at all.

Once again, Danni talks while the audience is screaming. Simon says that Jedward are like Louis’s own little action men dolls, but not in a creepy way (I think, though I hesitate to jump to a definite conclusion). More in a “using them to make millions of pounds” kind of way, I imagine.

Next up is Arsenal’s Eduardo. I was thinking that he wasn’t all there against Sunderland this afternoon.

Actually, it’s DanYl, and he is singing one of George Michael’s most famous songs. If this isn’t either “Last Christmas” or “Wake Me Up”…

After a verse of it, I still don’t know what song it is, but he’s doing okay. Probably the best singing performance yet, which really isn’t saying much. But you can only beat what’s put in front of you, right?

Danni talks while the audience...ah, you know the drill at this stage. Louis sticks the knife into Simon, and Cheryl goes after Danyl by dubbing the performance "flat". After judging which has mostly consisted of ignoring everything about the performances on the night, these comments are a little out of the blue. Sure Danyl wasn’t fantastic, but he was certainly better than the rest. Perhaps he’s just not very likable? Or perhaps, unlike David Brent, Louis and Cheryl don’t like people of mixed race. What about the melting pot, guys? Simon says Danyl exhibited what is known in the business as “respecting the song”, which is something Simon can’t quite define, which makes you wonder if he just made that term up there and then in order to appear knowledgeable and clever. If I know Simon Cowell like I think I do, however, that clearly isn't the case.

Next up is Olly. “Late” by Ben Folds plays in the background as he hugs his parents during a video montage, which finally gives me something musical to enjoy. By the way, Olly looks like Gary Barlow’s love child. Also, Olly plans on being more “sexy, and modern, and current” tonight. Has he been performing as a medieval minstrel thus far, or something?

Well if wearing black and sitting down is considered sexy and modern, then Ollie is on fire tonight! It also doesn’t hurt that he has half a dozen female dancers wearing catsuits gyrating around him. He could be wearing a Brian Cowen mask while singing a Richie Kavanagh song right now and it would still be sexy, thanks to his environs.

Ignoring Danni, Louis says that he likes how “not fake” Olly is. That’s probably as much a dig at some other contestant, more than likely Danyl (I say that purely because of the ‘y’ in his name. How fake is that!?). Much like Stacey, Olly is well liked. Niceness seems to be taking ordinary people a long way in this competition, which is no bad thing. I missed Simon and Cheryl’s comments, but if their previous is anything to go by, they talked about anything but the stuff happening right in front of us.

Finally, we have Joe. Not Jo. Not Joh. Not Joye. Just Joe. I like him already. Let’s see if he can sing.

Simon nods during the performance as if to say “Yes, he can”. I agree. Allow me to indulge in some hyperbole before the judges do - “Best singing performance in the history of music”. “You will not only win this competition, Joe, but you may well become president of world”. “You make me want to be a better man, Joe”.

To the judges, then.

Danni lauds Joe for his honesty of voice. Louis calls it the best performance of the night, but points out that the song was penned by Elton John, which is slightly bending the rules. Simon and Louis engage in some light-hearted banter over Louis’ throwing of the rule book, which is of course hilarious. You just know those two are sleeping with each other outside of the show, don’t you?

Well, as the adage goes, the show must come to an end sooner or later, and so we close with a quick recap of the performances. All pretty average, with Joe just about rising above the rest. If any of these people hit the big time, then I promise to buy Michelle McManus’ latest album, which, rumour has it, is simply a recording of her eating different types of food. Track number four -- tentatively entitled “Apple” -- is supposed to be a classic in the making by all accounts.

I can’t say I enjoyed my X-Factor experience, but I’d be lying if I said I’ll never watch it again. Is it necessary that I watch it? Well, is it necessary that I drink my own urine? No, but I do it anyway, because it’s sterile and I like the taste.

Did I just liken watching The X-Factor to drinking your own urine? Yeah, that sounds about right. Oh the wisdom of Patches O’Houlihan. It knows no bounds.

Take A Look

Mildly interesting piece of information: Jeremiah is the second longest book in the Bible, surpassed only by the book of Psalms (which has sort of cheated its way to the top if you ask me).

A related piece of information: I know very little about the book of Jeremiah.

Finally: Jesus was likened to Jeremiah by his public.

I know there's some sort of conclusion to be drawn from all of this, but I just can't find it. Anyway, back to the Pauline epistles I go. All those other books are too "strawy" for my taste.

Speaking of books, I've just finished reading one of those that in years to come you mark down as being "formative" or "life-changing" or what have you. If you only read one book before year's end, make it The Prophetic Imagination by Walter Brueggemann. It was written in 1978, but its message is oh so timely. It's a little over 100 pages, and so not a jot of ink is wasted.

And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets...

- Paul

Prophecy -- that much misunderstood vocation -- is a vital (in the literal sense of the word) part of the church. We who desperately need to hear the perspective of God ignore it at our peril. Brueggemann's book helps us to see this ministry with fresh eyes and restores it to its rightful place. I strongly encourage you to take a look.

Everlasting Trousers

The other day a scientific summary of the state of a prehistoric tribe began confidently with the words 'They wore no clothes.' Not one reader in a hundred probably stopped to ask himself how we should come to know whether clothes had once been worn by people of whom everything has perished except a few chips of bone and stone. It was doubtless hoped that we should find a stone hat as well as a stone hatchet. It was evidently anticipated that we might discover an everlasting pair of trousers of the same substance as the everlasting rock. But to persons of a less sanguine temperament it will be immediately apparent that people might wear simple garments, or even highly ornamental garments, without leaving any more traces of them than these people have left. The plaiting of rushes and grasses, for instance, might have become more and more elaborate without in the least becoming more eternal. One civilisation might specialise in things that happened to be perishable, like weaving and embroidery, and not in things that happen to be more permanent, like architecture and sculpture. There have been plenty of examples of such specialist societies. A man of the future finding the ruins of our factory machinery might as fairly say that we were acquainted with iron and with no other substance; and announce the discovery that the proprietor and manager of the factory undoubtedly walked about naked-- or possibly wore iron hats and trousers.

- G.K. Chesterton

The Job Will Not Save You

If the status updates of my Facebook friends is representative of Ireland’s collective psyche, then we were a nation in mourning last night. The word “gutted” was used by not a few, as the general air of gloom and doom loomed large. My initial -- and rather cynical -- reaction to all of this was, “These people obviously haven’t seen Ireland’s other qualification games, otherwise they’d be used to the post-match depression that inevitably follows”. The away fixture against Cyprus springs to mind. There’s an old saying in football - When Cyprus have more possession than you, then WHAT THE HELL IS UP WITH THAT!?

But I digress. Last night’s match was no Nicosian nightmare. For large swathes of the game, Ireland were the better football team. Our goal was one of real quality; and one of the utmost rarity, with Zinedine Kilbane providing the penetrating through-ball which unlocked the French defense. It was a pass that the onlooking (and let’s face it, cool looking) Zinedine Zidane would have been proud of.

And there were chances after that. Oh there were chances. Damien Duff managed to make a horlicks of a one-on-one. You could argue that he is not a right-footer, but that is no excuse. You’re a professional football player who gets paid thousands of pounds per week to kick a ball. The least you can do is be able to kick it with both of your feet. Robbie Keane managed to out-do Duff by missing an even more glorious opportunity to bury the French once and for all. With only the keeper to beat, he decided the best way to do so was to take it around him. What he didn’t seem to factor in was that he had almost no space in which to accomplish said task, and he simply ran the ball over the end line. What Robbie attempted -- taking it ‘round the keeper -- was indeed possible, but he needed to shift the ball onto his left foot quickly rather then merely let the ball run and hope to catch up with it. If you want to see how it should have been done, click here.

With those two chances spurned, you couldn’t help but feel that it “wasn’t our night”. The circumstances surrounding France’s winner confirmed as much. It could have been disallowed on roughly three accounts, but it wasn’t. Our sense of injustice was tingled. We became the righteous sufferers who bore the wrath of FIFA. We were its sacrificial lamb, who took the punishment of no World Cup trip upon itself. We were the scape-goat the was banished to the wilderness of a quiet summer outside of South Africa. And we were not one bit happy about it.

Thierry Henry has been branded a cheat. Go 6 minutes 41 seconds into this clip, and you’ll hear the sentiments of a million Irish people. I’ve never been a fan of the former Gooner, and so as with Rawls and McNulty, if Henry was a big cheat then I’d be the first to say it. But what he did was simply act human. It was instinctive, and something I wouldn’t put past any of the Irish players.

Cast your mind back to Ireland’s ridiculous penalty to equalise against Georgia. Nobody knew what it was for, and yet Kevin Doyle had his hand up appealing for it. Why? Because he’s a big cheat? Maybe, but there’s also the possibility that he was so desperate for Ireland to score that he would instinctively brand something legitimate “illegitimate” in order to influence the referee. There was no handball, or whatever, by any Georgian player, and yet Ireland got a penalty and secured a much needed result.

Henry handled the ball, but it was not deemed a foul. A Georgian player didn’t handle the ball, and yet Kevin Doyle got the penalty he so badly craved. I wonder what the Georgian reaction to that was on Facebook. Something about FIFA favouring the more established nations, perhaps.

Of course it’s perfectly okay to be upset about this injustice (we wouldn't be human if we weren't), but I think that taking our anger out on Henry for his handball is misguided, as is branding him a “cheat”. There are plenty of other reasons to dislike the Barcelona forward -- he’s arrogant, he’s French (there’s two to get the ball rolling) -- but to call him a cheat is to go too far. It is to misunderstand the game of football. Think of Eduardo of Arsenal getting booed for his dive against Celtic. Is he a big cheat? Not exactly. He simply did what almost most all footballers do in that situation. If you want to boo him then you are free to do so, but on that principle you had better be prepared to boo almost every football player that walks out onto a pitch. And while you’re at it, remember to boo those people who surf the internet during work hours, or who take an extra fifteen minutes for their lunch break.

Ireland lost, and we can all be upset about the way it happened. We can even be “gutted”, because our group of hard-working players deserved to be rewarded for their noble efforts. But right after the game, my brother put all of our collective misery into perspective. Four young women died in a car on their way to do some Christmas shopping a couple of days ago. There are greater injustices in the world than Henry’s illegal use of his left arm. Think also of Robert Enke, the German goalkeeper who recently took his own life after a long battle with depression. How did we let this happen? Could anything have been done to prevent it?

Football is not a matter of life and death, but it tells us a lot about ourselves that we often act like it -- or something similar to it -- is. Life goes on, people. Listen to the wise words of Lester Freamon and pay heed to what he says: the job will not save you.

[Dismounts from high horse.]

There is light at the end of the tunnel, however. The Premier League starts back on Saturday, with Liverpool playing Man City in what could be a pivotal fixture for both clubs. International football was always just a nuisance anyway, wasn’t it?

Killing In The Name Of - #6

“You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you.

“You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

- Jesus of Nazareth

Recall the six ways to interpret the above passage which aim at diminishing its countercultural, counterintuitive, and counter-Christendom claim on our lives today:

- It doesn’t apply yet.
- It only applied for a limited amount of time.
- It only deals with self-defense.
- It’s only for the select few.
- It’s a moral diagnosis to expose our sinfulness.
- It’s highly contextualised.

The argument of Professor Richard Hays is that the setting of this passage within the context of the entire Sermon and within the wider context of Matthew’s Gospel taken as a whole (both of which are outlined in the previous post) lays to rest five of the six interpretative strategies listed above. (I won’t go into Hays’s laying to rest of the sixth, which is too long-winded and complicated for present purposes.)

It doesn’t apply yet

It actually does. Through his own suffering in the face of enemy hostility, Jesus practiced what he preached. It was on an unknown hill that he spoke these words, and it was on the hill of Calvary that he definitively brought them to life. Moreover, his final message to his disciples is a call to teach all nations to obey his commandments, which includes the command to enemy-love. They (and we) are to continue on from where he left off, acting in the knowledge that he is with us always, empowering us to embody his sacrificial love.

It only applied for a limited amount of time

Matthew’s vision for radical discipleship is not short-term. Jesus is present with the church “until the end of the age”, and so the call to nonviolent enemy-love has not been revoked. As long as Jesus is alive, it still stands.

It only deals with self-defense

There is nothing in Matthew’s Gospel which limits the words of Jesus at the end of Matthew 5 to self-defense alone. Consider the events in Gethsemane, when Peter acts out of violence in defense not of himself, but of Jesus - the most righteous of sufferers. Jesus does not condone Peter’s “violence in defense of justice”, but warns him that “all who take the sword will perish by the sword” (Matt. 26:52).

It’s only for the select few

The Great Commission (Matt. 28:18-20) discredits this claim. As Hays notes, “All baptized believers are to be taught to observe all that Jesus commanded.”

It’s a moral diagnosis to expose our sinfulness

That it does this is beyond doubt, but that this is its primary function is refuted by the concluding words of the discourse. Jesus intends not only for us to hear these words and be convicted by them, but to hear these words and do them. “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on a rock.” (Matt. 7:24)

******

With these hermeneutical escape hatches closed shut, we’re back to where we usually are when we first read the passage plainly: left scratching our heads at the impossible idealism of Jesus’ words, and despairing at the thought of having to take him seriously.

We can concede that he meant exactly what he said, but doing so leaves us hopeless…until we remember who said these things, and what happened next in Matthew’s story. Jesus is one who not simply has the authority to command, but the authority to bring into being what he commands. His words come with power - power to heal, power to restore, power to transform.

If relentless enemy-love is idealism, it is an idealism that was really realised in the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth. His actions have re-defined reality, and he really intends for his disciples to enter into that new reality, where suffering for righteousness’ sake is not a tragic end, but the beginning of something beautiful that will last forever.

Out of Context

A concrete example of what it means to take something out of context:

Skinner and Baddiel

Poor Pele. He really was rubbish, wasn't he?