A Paragraph For the Soul

The key to the obedience of God's people is not their effectiveness but their patience. The triumph of the right is assured not by the might that comes to the aid of the right, which is of course the justification of the use of violence and other kinds of power in every human conflict. The triumph of the right, although it is assured, is sure because of the power of the resurrection and not because of any calculation of causes and effects, nor because of the inherently greater strength of the good guys. The relationship between the obedience of God's people and the triumph of God's cause is not a relationship of cause and effect but one of cross and resurrection.

This is vintage Yoder; a paragraph that sums up his work as good as any other.

I just spent a week at a junior teens camp, during which I gave three what might be loosely called "theological talks". Afterwards I would ask myself questions like "Did that have any effect?" and "Did I just make up some new words?" and "Their eyes were closed because they were in deep thought, right?"

But if Yoder is right, then I am asking the wrong questions. If I was obedient to the task that was given me, if I was faithful to the gospel, then efficacy is irrelevant. I must only be patient.

If It's A Lie...

I've watched The Wire three times now. That's 60 episodes, each averaging an hour, multiplied by 3. That's over a week of my life devoted solely to watching a television show.

And what a television show.

Every time I watch The Wire, I get some new perspective on what it's all about.

"It's about who the real targets are."

"It's about the hierarchy within institutions."

"It's about the machine that is the modern polis."

"It's about the futility of the war on drugs."

"It's about the possibility and impossibility of reform."

"I've been reading way too much into things. It's just about cops and gangsters and stuff."

Right now, my perspective is that it's about the politics and power of the lie. Without giving too much away [though you may want to cease reading just in case], in season 5 McNulty fabricates a story, a lie that eventually becomes known to the highest powers in the city. What started out small, barely worthy of a few inches in the newspaper, becomes a national story that everyone buys into. When it is revealed to the powers that be as a hoax, what happens? Does the lie get exposed? Does the truth set them free? Is McNulty, the originator of the lie, punished?

In McNulty's words, the lie is to big for them to live with it. To expose it would be to expose themselves. Campaigns, promotions, promises, policies - all of these were based on a lie. Even those who want the right thing to be done are content to keep schtum, because any whisteblowing would have devastating effects for the careers of their loved ones. The lie is built into the fabric of society, and so the truth cannot be made known without serious repercussions, without serious cost. And no one who matters is willing to pay.

The Wire is a tragedy of Greek proportions, but it does not leave us without glimmers of hope. There are still those few who are committed to the truth, and who will tell it even if it hurts. The Wire itself is an act of such telling, and as you may have guessed, I can't recommend strongly enough that you listen.

The horror...the horror

After taking over a village in Vietnam, the Unites States Army decided to demonstrate its humanitarian intentions by employing its medics to inoculate the children of the village for polio. The military occupation didn't last, however, with the village re-captured by the Vietcong soon after. Upon reclaiming the territory, the Vietcong amputated the left arm of all the children who received the vaccination. One medial procedure counteracted by another.

Slavoj Zizek and Colonel Kurtz tell this story that is probably distasteful and inhumane to those of us of a particular conscience. What might seem more inhumane, however, is that both Zizek and Kurtz tell the story in admiration of the Vietcong. In Kurtz's words:

"...the genius of that! The genius! The will to do that! Perfect, genuine, complete, crystalline, pure."

Zizek is not as gushing with his praise as the fictional colonel, but nevertheless sees in this act of the Vietcong the purity of genuine revolution:

"Although difficult to sustain as a literal model to follow, this thorough rejection of the Enemy precisely in its helping ‘humanitarian' aspect, no matter what the costs, has to be endorsed in its basic intention."

To compromise, so the thinking goes, is to be already dead. Better to enter village life with only one arm than to keep both at the cost of sacrificing your soul. The wisdom of this should be quite clear to those of us of a particular conscience.

By way of pigeon-holing, this story creates three types of Christians:

1) Christians who reject the vaccinations of the Empire

2) Christians who accept the vaccinations of the Empire

3) Christians who see it as their duty to administer the vaccinations of the Empire

Historically, has Christianity moved from (1) to (2) to (3), or has there been, from the beginning, a mixture of the three?

And for those of you who want to help me with my dissertation next year, what role does second-century apologetics have in this history? If you could keep your comment just below 9,000 words that would be particularly helpful.

The Insider

I'll leave it to ol' blind Buchie to sum up the story of truth-telling told by The Insider:

Conscience do cost.

The Insider may not have the repeat-viewing capacity of Heat, but this Michael Mann film is easily a top 20, possibly even a top 10. That it lost out to the utterly vacuous American Beauty for the Best Picture Oscar is a crying shame. I mean, that's like Shakespeare in Love getting the nod over The Thin Red Line, which would of course have been complete nonsense if it ha [gets word in ear that that in fact did happen the previous year].

These are end times, people. End times.

Like Crazy

Plato pitted rationality against desire and passion, with the latter needing to be harnessed by the former. Pascal said that "the heart has reasons that Reason cannot know", elevating love to a higher epistemological plane than rationality. Brokeback Mountain advertised love as a "force of nature" - uncontrollable, like a hurricane, impartial with regard to who it comes upon and apathetic to the suffering it may cause. Damned if you deny it. Just as damned if you don't.

Into this ongoing story of love stepped Like Crazy, a film about transatlanticism that would never leave the two lovers alone. But rather than absence making the heart grow fonder, their repeated absences only makes them needier, less trusting and trustworthy. What began as a source of vitality degenerates into a deadly disease eating away at their souls. The love portrayed cannot be lived without and cannot be lived with. It is at once keeping alive and killing.

The film does a reasonable job of telling this canonical trope, with love not so much being care for another as it is addiction to another, the love story resembling the efforts of two junkies desperately chasing that same high that made them who they are. It doesn't hurt that one of those junkies is the beautiful Felicity Jones, who also played the love interest in Cemetery Junction. Jennifer Lawrence is in this film too - a fact definitely worth mentioning. I also like that the man's job in this film is furniture making. It's a nice reminder that it's okay for a man not to have to wear a suit to work.

I can't say I was emotionally moved by the film, however. I'm not averse to crying in front of moving pictures, but this one elicited no tears, no strong desire for how the story should end. I never quite entered the lovers' solipsistic world. How could I?

One final note: the actors apparently improvised much of the dialogue to give the film an air of realism. I wonder if it works like that? As Ian McKellen explained in Extras, acting is pretending to be something you are not. Improvising could be described as pretending not to be an actor, which amounts to a double pretence. Does that make things more real or less? I suppose the proof is in the pudding, so you'll just have to see for yourself.

Countercultural Cult

The Westboro Baptist Church has been a source of discomfort for me for the last number of years. It’s not because I’m a target of their hatred, at least not directly. It’s not even because I’m deeply troubled by what they do – picketing the funerals of dead soldiers, spreading a message of God’s impending judgement on a sinful people. Of course I agree with neither their message nor their methods, but that’s not where the tension lies. The tension lies in the fact that in an age when the church strives to be countercultural, I can think of few "churches" more countercultural than the Westboro Baptist Church. Their apocalyptic worldview, millenarian ethics and communal life together strike me as far closer to the form of the early church than most others in the West today. 

It is my judgement that they are not “the most hated family in America” because the content of their message deeply upsets us. We don’t care all that much for the feelings of Jews, gays, or the families of dead soldiers, and are certainly not overly concerned with what a crazy fundamentalist family from the States thinks about them. Rather, we hate the Westboro Baptist Church because they refuse to play by the unwritten rules of free speech, which say that you are free to speak provided what you speak is in accordance with what we’d like you to speak about. We hate them because their voices are free, whereas ours are so enslaved to a form of tolerance that has been imposed on us.

Slavoj Zizek had this to say in a lecture: “If you take the ruling ideology seriously you are one step from being a dissident.” This is precisely what the Westboro Baptist Church have done, and so it is little wonder that they are hated. They are so cultural that they are countercultural. They have taken “freedom of speech” too seriously, and are thus as much liberal democratic heretics as they are Christian heretics. 

To be an enemy of the liberal democratic state is not necessarily a bad thing. Indeed the problem with the countercultural movement in contemporary churches is that people too often try to make the church countercultural within the limits set by the culture, which amounts to nothing countercultural at all. And any voice that would seek to introduce a new set of co-ordinates is labelled as “prophetic”, which usually means that what you’re saying is good, but unrealistic.

The Westboro Baptist Church is wrong on so many levels, but they are right on one very crucial matter: they take their god seriously. More than anything else, it is this that discomforts me.

The Fountain: A Different View

An alternative perspective on The Fountain written by Daniel Saunders, - a friend , a student of theology and sociology, and, most importantly, a bloody good football player.

****   ****

Firstly, I must clarify by viewing The Fountain with a Christian theological lens you must first realise that the writer was not writing this from a Christian perspective. There is milieu of religious influences, from Buddhism to Mayan philosophy. Therefore, it seems a little harsh to be critical of the fact that it had no explicit reference to the resurrection. With this in mind, perhaps the better question is: From a Christian theological perspective where can we find agreement, even if there is still some tension, and even if there isn’t a complete answer? From this perspective, I believe the film poses a good question that can be framed in Christian thought.

Before I begin to state this question, here is a very brief synopsis of the film.

Apart from being a simple love story, the Fountain's main theme is “fear of death”, often depicted in the film as a movement from darkness to light. The film follows Jackman’s character, Tommy, who is unable to come to terms with the very real prospect of his wife’s terminal illness. Tommy even states at one point that death “is a disease” needing to be stopped. However, his wife, Izzi (played by Weisz) responds in a different manner. She views death as not the end, but rather as the “road to awe” or “as an act of creation”. Although the film does not explicitly state what this actually means, perhaps that is to allow the viewer to determine this for themselves – a reader response if you will. I will come back to this later. Lastly, here are some quotes in the film that I feel stand out, and from which a Christian theological perspective can be applied and built upon. 

“Lord of Xibalba: “Death is the road to awe.”

“Izzi: So what do you think? Izzi: About? Izzi: That idea. Death as an act of creation.”

One of the major questions the film poses is: ‘People in society do not like talking about or facing up to the reality of death?’ Even as Christians, we often give precedence to life on earth, rather than viewing it from the perspective of eternity. This fallen world is temporary, just a speck in comparison to eternity. Like Tommy, people are far too preoccupied with trying to remain in this world, and holding onto all that it offers. Through objects (consider the rich young man) and relationships people are relentlessly filling their lives as though this life is it, and so we make the best of it. Perhaps, one of the biggest graces from God was not allowing humanity to live forever (Genesis 3: 22-24). Imagine living endlessly in a world of perpetual sin, with no escape. Thus, death forces us to make a choice: to live in eternity with or without God. Paradoxically, Death holds in tension its power and powerlessness. In the one hand Death has power to make us consider our eternity and acts as a gate all must pass through, but on the other hand, for those in Christ, Death has no power at all (see 1 Corinthians 15:55 & Hebrews 2:14). For Tommy, he saw Death’s power and his inability to stop it. For Izzi, she saw Death as point in time rather than an end. Yes, the film fails to explain what was next, but why not bring the Christian message in here? Therefore, as Christ brought new life in his death and resurrection, those who are in Christ, also find new life in death – In a sense, for those who are in Christ “death is the road to awe”. As 1 Corinthians 13: 12 states:

“For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”

Considering God made us in his image; the most fulfilling and joyful thing, the very purpose of our lives, the fabric of our true nature is to be in perfect communion with God. As Christians we have a sense of this, but it is only a partially understood, there is still much that is a mystery whilst we live on this earth. Therefore, as God’s children, we should be eager to get back to Eden! Before the fall, this was a place and time where Adam and Even were in the full intimate presence of God. To be in God’s presence, in all his fullness; to see Him and experience Him in all of his glory and splendour; this is what we as Christians should eagerly wait and look forward too! As Paul stated, 

‘…to live is Christ and to die is gain.’

We could write an endless theology on what Paul meant by gain. Suffice to say; perhaps words cannot do justice to describe what eternity with Christ will look like. It should certainly leave one in “awe” at that thought.

The Fountain has gaps, but that can be said of any film. It’s not meant to be theologically sound. However, I would rather emphasize the positive reflections this film can bring, especially when talking to a society who rarely consider or want to face up to the reality of death. 

I conclude with a quote from the film: “Every shadow no matter how deep is threatened by morning light.” Why not talk about that light as being the personification of Christ? I see an opportunity to share the gospel out of this film, to bring to the forefront of people’s mind questions on death and what lies beyond. In my mind, people today, try to stay away from such thoughts. So, I applaud a film that is willing to begin a dialogue on death. As Christians, we must ask ourselves what we then do with this. See it as another chance to be critical, or an opportunity to speak of, “the mysteries God has revealed” (1 Corinthians 4: 1).

The Fountain

I watched The Fountain last night, at just the right time. Or just the wrong time. Leaving aside the fact that Hugh Jackman is the Australian Orloondo Bland (a nickname which represents Mark Kermode's finest contribution to the world of cinema), I found the film philosophically and theologically unconvincing in its portrayal of death.

Earlier that day I had read this from Robert Jenson:

It is illegitimate within Christian theology to think death without thinking resurrection.

The Fountain as a quite explicit work of theology in the form of art is thus illegitimate. It does not deal with death properly, because it has not first of all understood death in the only light that it can now be understood - the light of resurrection. To compare this film with The Tree Of Life is to see its theological faults exposed. Where The Fountain finds meaning and purpose -- even being -- in death, The Tree of Life offers us a vision of the glory of God as a gift given, and then given again.

David Bentley Hart is scathing with regard to what he calls "tragic theology". Thinking within the logic of resurrection, he has this to say:

Rather than seeing the resurrection as a speculative (that is, dialectical) tension that eternalizes the cross, theology must recognize it as a reversal of the narrative of violence that makes crucifixion seem meaningful. In the self-oblation of Christ (which is the entire motion of his life) God indeed comprehends suffering and death, but only as a finite darkness exceeded - and conquered - by an infinite light; God's infinity embraces death by passing it by as though it is nothing at all and by making it henceforth a place of broken limits.

Hart's criticism is that tragic theology (and tragic storytelling) does not in fact take death seriously enough because it has not comprehended the comedy of resurrection which works against death.

Finally, film critic Peter Bradshaw delivers the coup de grâce:

Dying young is a painful, horrible business, full of agony and rage and indignity. For Aronofsky to imply that it can be brought off looking all floaty and snowy and ethereal like a pale L'Oréal model, and that there is a spiritual superiority and sacrificial redemption in death from brain cancer - well, that is naive. And slightly creepy.

In all honesty, I am not convinced that I've understood Robert Jenson's reflection on death, nor am I convinced that David Hart is right to reject any and all theology of a "suffering God". And more importantly, what do I know about death anyway? All I can say is that The Fountain left me rather blasé at the thought of it, and that didn't feel right.

Adam and Steve

Philadelphia could have been better. It could have been a masterpiece. But any film bookended by the music of Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young and containing a scene as haunting and beautiful as the one below below deserves to be watched.