QUOTE: My name is Kevin and I'm a Kataphatic

There are spiritual personalities, just like there are psychological personalities. Barbara Mujica of Georgetown University writes, "Apophatic or 'negative' spirituality stresses interiority, 'imageless-ness,' and 'wordlessness.' Kataphatic, or 'postive' spirituality is image-driven and uses analogies to speak of God."  Postmodernists tend to be apophatic; stressing difference, how God is "not like" things. This has caused great alarm from Reformed quarters. I think there is a place for both: it's not an either/or.  However,  my natural temperment is kataphatic. Kevin, I think you've got a point there!

"Yes, yes, a thousand times yes; we do see through a glass dimly; we do not fully understand; we don't know God as God knows Himself; our words can't capture the essence of God. God is greater than we can conceive- but what about the 1,189 chapters in the Bible? Don't they tell us lots of things about God that we are supposed to do more with than doubt and not understand? Aren't the Scriptures written so that we might believe and be sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see and even proclaim this faith to others?"


 -- Kevin DeYoung,  Why We're Not Emergent: By Two Guys Who Should Be  (p. 123-124)

 

Pioneers and Trail Blazers

Via Brad:

Glocalnet has a valuable discussion entitled "Pioneers: Building Blocks for the Future." Here's my two cents:

Not always-- but sometimes-- people are pioneers because constant movement and activity keeps them from facing deeper issues.(The Medievals recognized this as evidence of a spiritual condition called "acedia"). It is important for pioneers to understand their motiviations. Are they blazing trails because they are on a quest for something yet to be revealed, or are they running away from something? Are they being drawn by something up ahead or are they being chased by something from behind?

I live in the Northwest, where loggers come from pioneer stock. Sometimes when land is cleared it is prone to erosion and landslides, and valuable natural habitats are lost. Pioneers have to be careful where they swing their axes,so the spotted owls, salmon and steelhead aren't driven to extinction. They need to be sure there are some settlers who are following them to cultivate the land, so that it won't wash away.

The best trail blazers are conscious of their own souls, their environment, and those who might follow in their footsteps.

Advaita Ad on Facebook

Across my foundering deck (aka Facebook) has flashed this ad: 10 Week Course in Practical Philosophy. Sounds intriguing, I thought. Wonder what they mean by "practical" philosophy, I thought. Wonder if they need any online instructors, I thought. So I hit the icon. Then I read:

This course is for anyone who’s asked themselves ‘What am I doing here?’, who wants to expand their world, their thinking, and the view they have of themselves.

Discussions are underpinned by the philosophy of unity, or Advaita, a universal, non-denominational teaching literally meaning ‘not two’. This is Eastern in origin, but of universal application because it points to the unity underlying all things....

Advaita is a universal non-denominational teaching that points to the unity underlying all things. The key principle is that within each of us there is something that is common to all and is unchanging, pure and free.
Many people believe the concept of Advaita is implicit in Western teachings and philosophical works including the Bible, Plato, Shakespeare and Emerson.

The School believes this philosophy to be of real value in dealing with the problems that arise in our everyday lives, and also with the conflicts between communities and nations.

The approach to teaching philosophy is essentially practical, based on the notion that the only way we can really know something is to observe or experience it for ourselves. Participants are therefore asked neither to accept nor reject the ideas put forward for discussion, but instead to put them to the test in practical experience, and use what is found to be valid and helpful.

Does anybody know anything about these people? It sounds like quite a racket, if not something worse. Are they affiliated with these people?

(from the FAQ's:)

Who are the instructors?
Following the principle of learn and teach, instructors are appointed on the basis of having a firm understanding of the philosophic principles. They have attended the School for a number of years and demonstrated an appreciation of the practice of philosophy in their daily lives. All instructors remain students as well since the learning process never ends. No remuneration is received for tutoring in the School.

How much does it cost?
In New York City, the cost is $175 for the 10 sessions with a price of $85 for full-time students. If claiming a student discount, you will need to register in-person with your student-id. Check the Locations/Register page for details on other locations.

For distance learning:
The fee for this course, will be $100 for the ten sessions. In addition, we will schedule a one-on-one session prior to the first class to check out the technology and make sure you are comfortable with and capable of joining the web-conference.

Some final thoughts:

1) It's stuff like this that makes Christians suspicious of all philosophy, and interpret 1 Cor. 1:18-25 to be prohibiting it. But that is exactly what the Enemy wants. If he can't get us to hold a worldly philosophy, then he wants us to reject philosophy altogether. Anything but having the mind of Christ!

2) "Many people believe the concept of Advaita is implicit in Western teachings and philosophical works including the Bible, Plato, Shakespeare and Emerson." How many of us would be able to engage in a discussion with the instructors, to challenge the idea that the Bible is consistent with Advaita?

3) Since the economic collapse, I'm noticing that people are more open, seeking answers to these perennial questions: "What can I trust?" "What is real?" "Is there some one thing which underlies and unites everything, or is what is real just a lot of diverse, individual things?" "Is everything changing, or is there anything that is unchanging?" "Is it spiritual or material?"

Christians are the only people who can give a both-and response to these questions, rather than take one side against the other. This is because we believe God is Trinity. We need to be able to communicate the Father, incarnate the Son and be led by the Spirit, so as to provide the waters of Life to those who are metaphysically thirsty.

4) I'm remembering Steve's sermon last Sunday, where he preached on this very passage, as he works his way through Corinthians:

"What Paul is trying to get across to us is that we must never expect Christian faith, especially the message of the Cross at the center of our faith, to be justified by popular practical wisdom. Whenever we think that our faith can be justified in terms of what the world wants and values, then we’ve abandoned real Christianity, abandoned the message that the world in all its seeming wisdom just can’t understand."

Our faith can be justified, though, in terms of Christ's power to transform us, to make us into the people we really ought to be. May we live out our faith in Him, not only with our minds, but in our hearts, souls, bodies and relationships with others.

The SLU Center for Liturgy

here is a wonderful resource courtesy of our brothers and sisters at St. Louis University.

I only spent one semester at SLU but it was fantastic.

Abiding is the secret of Fruitfulness

A wonderful meditation on John 15:1-8 is offered here by Dr. Eddie Gibbs. He is Director for the Institute for the Study of Emerging Churches at the Brehm Center for Worship, Theology, and the Arts, and is a senior professor in the School of Intercultural Studies at Fuller Theological Seminary.
"The two questions that all servants of Christ need to ask themselves are: “What do I want to be known for at the end of my life?” The second is, “How can I finish well?” The secret of finishing well is to abide in Christ, and to submit to his pruning, no matter how painful. Fruitfulness is not the result of what we do, but is the outcome of who we are.'

Dorothy Sayers on the Variety and Commonality of Saints

Via Dead Christians Society Friday, Mar.24,2006

"Saints come in all varieties. The only kind that seems to be rare in real life is the spineless and 'goody-goody' figure familiar to us in the feebler sort of pious fiction and stained-glass windows of the more regrettable periods. There are as many types of saint as of men and women, and most of them are people of great character. There are stormy and complex souls like Augustine of Hippo, with his burning sense of sin and his passionate love and dread of physical beauty, pouring out treatises, sermons, memoirs, apologetics, amide the distracting cares of a busy bishopric, travelling for ever between the city of the world and the City of God. There are anchorites, fleeing this world altogether, and devoting themselves to solitude and prayer: some, sweet and gentle like the desert Fathers; some, harsh and fanatical like Simeon Stylites, perched in austere discomfort upon his pillar. There is Francis, the 'troubadour of God', going barefoot among poor men and singing out his love to God and man and the whole creation: there is Albertus Magnus, toiling conscientiously at his vast commentaries upon Aristotle--certainly no singer, but the conspicuous glory of the Schools. There is Albertus's still greater pupil, Thomas Aquinas, a man to whom virtue seemed to come naturally, whose towering intellect completed his master's work and co-ordinated Greek learning and Christian revelation into a comprehensive system of Catholic doctrine. . . . There is little Theresa of Lisieux, meekly practising the Way amid the trivial duties of daily life and in the face of cramping family opposition: there is mighty Theresa of Avila, the eagle of contemplation, ruling her nuns with that fierce practical ability in which great mystics so often excel, and quite prepared to take God to task, with a tongue as vigorous as Job's and a good deal tarter, when He moved in ways more exasperatingly mysterious than usual. Stubborn martyrs, subtle theologians, ardent missionaries, cloistered contemplatives, homely pastors, brilliant administrators, obscure social workers, orators whose spell-binding eloquence could move multitudes and shake the thrones of princes, the saints seem to have little in common except a heroic love of God and a flaming single-mindedness of purpose.

Dorothy L. Sayers, "Introduction" to Richard of Chichester by C. M. Duncan-Jones (1953), excerpted in Dorothy L. Sayers: Spiritual Writings, selected and introduced by Ann Loades (Cambridge: Cowley, 1993).

Josef Pieper's Three Things to Remember

1. Things are TRUE because they are real.

2. Things can be KNOWN because they are created.

3. Things are UNFATHOMABLE (mysterious) because they are created.

(selections 33-35, from Josef Pieper: An Anthology (Forward by Hans Urs von Balthasar) San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1989.)

New Life: Victims and Water Sampling

I had a wonderful time with an old friend last night. We spoke about many things, but I especially want to remember these two:

1) VICTIMHOOD

It is part of our fallenness to presume that we are victims and so fixate on our own sacrifices. But salvation comes when we quit looking at ourselves, and focus on Christ, the Perfect Victim who gave the only sacrifice that really matters. This is the only way to escape the tomb of self, and receive His new life.

2) WATER SAMPLING

My friend has had it up to here with what she calls "water samplers," those who stand on the edge of the Water of Life and refuse to drink it, or dive in, but instead are content merely to analyze it.

She has a point. Following Christ is not just an act of ratio, of discursive reason; God has created us to be creatures with intellectus. Our intuition is a gift to be received and celebrated, and not supressed. The Christian life is not meant to be lived in the third person, but first person. And first person plural.

But Satan is pleased whenever we miss the Mark, and fasten to the extremes. Just like we need to actually take the plunge, so we need to be doing regular checks to make sure the lake we are jumping into isn't a pool of toxic waste. So it is just as dangerous to be a daredevil as to be a water sampler.

In our fallenness we are fascinated with these extremes, and the Enemy delights in tricking us into mistaking them for faithfulness. Lord, as we rebel against the deficiencies of modernism, let us not overshoot your Mark and land in the excesses of postmodernism.

It happened yet again...

Occasionally, Steve preaches a sermon that God must hear and immediately say, "Okay, walk your talk."

Yesterday, November 19, 2007, the Twenty-fifth Sunday after Pentecost, he spoke from the lectionary text, Luke 21:5-19 and preached a sermon entitled “No Worries?” The gist of it was that in this world we will have worries, but that one way of standing firm against them is to find things to be thankful for.

Steve always gets up way before me on Sunday mornings, and wakes me with a kiss and the flutter of the pages his finished sermon, dropped on the comforter. Now yesterday, because the annual VCC Thanksgiving Dinner was occuring after worship, and we were bringing a turkey, he got up a half-hour earlier than usual, at 4:30 am, to pop it in the oven.

Things were proceeding smoothly, as usual-- kiss, sermon, showers, breakfast along with the delicious aroma of roasting turkey--when suddenly there was a POP! a crackling, a continuous blue strobe of light, a fireworks display of sparks shooting out the sides of the oven door, with flames dancing within, and the overpowering smell of ozone. Our electric oven's element had decided to die at that very moment, in a spectacular self-immolation scene worthy of a Wagnerian opera!

I scrambled for the baking soda but Steve had already jumped out the door and had turned off the power before my ministrations were possible. The bird still had another hour to go! His sermon seemed to mock me:

"Going on in Luke 12 we find the Lord telling His disciples “do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body what you will wear.” Three times in verses 22-31 He asks them not to worry. Consider the ravens, consider the lilies, forget your anxieties about food and clothing. Hakuna Matata!"

My immediate response was: "Grrr!!! 'Don't worry about what you will eat?' Honestly, Lord, its one thing for our family to do without but if this turkey is ruined that will mean lots of mouths will go empty this afternoon!"

But then I realized what was happening. It was another one of those chances to Practice What Was Being Preached, and my personal Screwtape was clearly proud of his morning's efforts. Honestly, it was laughable. As the smoke cleared and we peered into the depths of the inferno, we realized that just minutes before, we had covered the turkey with aluminum foil, and that it had been protected.

Thank you Lord, for that turkey.

Thank you that it was so far along, so that we could safely wrap it up and finish roasting it at church.

Thanks that it's flavor didn't suffer at all from the ozone censing.

Thanks that so many people were at the dinner who were able to enjoy it.

Thank you that our house didn't burn down.

Thank you for reinforcing the lesson about worrying, and helping me to stand firm, and even laugh at this calamity.

Now please help Steve to be able to fix our oven, and so that we won't need to buy a whole new one. (Yes, Lord, I admit it...I am worried about that hole burned in the back wall...)

Somehow I don't think it was coincidence that we sang "Day by Day and with each passing Moment" yesterday. Please help me to keep singing it today.
And tomorrow.
And the day after that.
Now and in the hour of our death.
Amen.

Note to self: Check out this book: The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook: Holidays

Just Wondering: Is denominational leadership no longer important?

Donn asks: (Saturday, Nov. 3, 2007: "President Denominationless")

"What focus should denominational leadership take when their role is not longer assumed to be important by a growing majority of church-goers?"

Well, if a church is congregational in polity, and if it is indeed the case that the majority doesn't think that denominational leadership is important anymore, then the whole question is moot. These people should graciously fade away into memory, accepting the fact that things change and that their time has passed. Or perhaps they should be retained as figureheads (much like the British royalty): objects fit for scandal, amusement, and building dedications.

No?

Okay, then let's give it another try:

"What focus should denominational leadership take when their role is not longer assumed to be important by a growing majority of church-goers?"

I hold that the answer depends on why churchgoers no longer assume denominational leadership is important.

Some will disagree with that, saying that what matters are facts, not causes. This is tempting, because facts are typically obvious and uncontroversial, whereas "causes" are not. But in my opinion, that is like saying, "My roof is leaking, so I need a bucket" rather than saying, "My roof is leaking because the builder used shoddy materials. I will use this bucket for now, but what I really need are some new shingles."

In the end, if we don't address "causes," and only focus on "facts," we will be at the mercy of events, and not necessarily the Spirit. Transformation will be haphazard and half-baked ("blown about by every wind of doctrine") and we will risk failing to fully image God in terms of our discernment and stewardship.

Let's brainstorm here, assuming that the "why" question is relevant, and ask, "Why do chuchgoers no longer assume denominational leadership is important? Here are some possible answers:

1) Churchgoers are no longer are organized according to denominations. Instead, leadership occurs some other way. (For example, everyone becomes Catholic and assents to the authority of the pope; everyone becomes Orthodox and follows the church fathers; everyone reverts to an ancient Hebrew model and is led by a High Priest, or a Judge, or a King.)

Hmmm. This doesn't seem to be the direction toward which things are moving. So let's try again.

2) Churchgoers are so filled with the Spirit, they so mature, that they have at last attained the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Therefore they no longer need apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors or teachers, muchless popes, kings, priests or denominational leaders to prepare them for works of service and build up the Body. (Sort of the spiritual equivalent of the Marxist vision of the withering away of the state, this is the withering away of the denominations/institutional church. cf. Ephesians 4:11-13)

Somehow I don't think we're there yet, either. But I may be mistaken. At least I'm not there yet!
:-)

3) They are so filled with themselves that they do not see that they need help to attain the the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Thus they reject any authority beyond themselves (cf. Judges 21:24-25)

Perhaps this may be true of some, but I don't think that this is a fair characterization of the majority of churchgoers.

4) They are blinded by the gods/philosophies of this age, so that they cannot see that they need help to attain the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Thus they reject any leadership beyond themselves.

Of all the possibilities so far, this is the one I think is most likely, and so I've written elsewhere about the nominalist mindset that I believe undergirds that blindness. If this is an accurate answer, then what responsibility does the church leadership and the church fellowship have to recognize and repent of that mindset?

Hmm. Could this be a possible answer to Donn's question? The focus denominational leadership should take when their role is no longer seen as important by churchgoers is to remind them of the following, and to model it, kinda like what another church leader named Paul did, long ago:

Romans 12:1-8

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.

We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man's gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

4) other possibilities. What do you think?
4a) Donn says: "Are our plates so full of cultural offerings that anything more than the local church starts a yawn?" (see comments)
4b) Ted says: "what I guess you could call my alternative #5, can be summed up in one word: cynicism." (see comments)

Square Circles and Nominalist Christians

This recent article appeared on ABET from the Christian Post:

"A Gallup Poll in June found that Americans have less confidence in organized religion. Only 46 percent said they have a "great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in church/organized religion which was one percentage short of being the lowest in Gallup's history since 1973.

"I would say that [the drop is] because organized religion is organized and it’s religious,” Batterson said.

Among teens, many are not as interested in learning the traditions of their faith or listening to religious teachings as much as they are in making a connection with God and seeking a better understanding of what they believe, a recent Barna study showed. Most teens prefer a church that teaches how their faith should influence everyday decisions and lifestyle rather than one that teaches the traditions and background of their faith.

And as churches begin to break institutional walls and increasingly reflect the body of Jesus Christ, Schuller sees the Church becoming a 24-hour experience.

"[Church] is going to be experiential and lived out in daily lives,” he stated. “If people ask me ‘Where’s your church?’ I’ll often say ‘What time of the day is it?’ This is a good illustration of my point. So, okay it’s 9:00 Wednesday. Elder John is over at his store selling suits. So part of the church is over there. Sister Mary’s just getting back from dropping her kids off at school, so that part of the church is over there.

"I can go with every member of the church and say that’s where the church is," Schuller said.

"I’m talking about where the church of Jesus Christ is recognized not as an institution, not as a building, but is recognized as the individuals that make up the body of Jesus Christ, living by faith and caring for one another and loving one another," he stressed.

(I tried to reply to ABET but as usual, my messages mysteriously disappear into the ether, so I'm posting my response here:)

This is the apotheosis of nominalism, the idea that universals are not real, that the only things that are real are individuals. (The Wikipedia article isn't a bad place to start if you need clarification.) Institutions are universals, so automatically they are taken to be unreal and unecessary.

If we follow this metaphysic to its logical conclusion, there is no such thing as the Body, only the collection of individuals that make up the body. There is no Whole, only the sum of the parts. There is no United States, only the census of its individual citizens. There is no Church, only the individuals.

If we follow this line of thinking, we will be forced to conclude that there is no God, only three Persons. Are we prepared to go there? Furthermore, we will have to rewrite John 15, to eliminate all that talk about a "True Vine" and "remaining in me," and just celebrate the collection of the many various branches. Are we ready to do that?

Certainly, a Christianity without universals and their corresponding institutional incarnations will be increasingly appealing for postmoderns, who prize their individual freedom above all else. But we need to do some serious reflection: Is this a place for the Church to be truly countercultural, and display the mind of Christ, rather than the mind of Modernism and Postmodernism? Is there something greater than individual autonomy? Participation is a limiting concept, for it requires accomodating ourselves to something greater than ourselves, something universal. Can there be church and body without participation in Church and Body?

In my old Covnet days, I used to be known as "Gnostic-buster." Maybe it is time for me to put that mantle aside and assume the title, "Nominalist Buster?"

yours in Christ,

Beth

GKC: St. Thomas and St. Francis

Here is G.K. Chesterton's masterful chapter comparing these two saints, courtesty of Ignatius Press. An extract:

"The Saint is a medicine because he is an antidote. Indeed that is why the saint is often a martyr; he is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote. He will generally be found restoring the world to sanity by exaggerating whatever the world neglects, which is by no means always the same element in every age. Yet each generation seeks its saint by instinct; and he is not what the people want, but rather what the people need. This is surely the very much mistaken meaning of those words to the first saints, "Ye are the salt of the earth," which caused the Ex-Kaiser to remark with all solemnity that his beefy Germans were the salt of the earth; meaning thereby merely that they were the earth's beefiest and therefore best. But salt seasons and preserves beef, not because it is like beef; but because it is very unlike it. Christ did not tell his apostles that they were only the excellent people, or the only excellent people, but that they were the exceptional people; the permanently incongruous and incompatible people; and the text about the salt of the earth is really as sharp and shrewd and tart as the taste of salt. It is because they were the exceptional people, that they must not lose their exceptional quality. "If salt lose its savour, wherewith shall it be salted?" is a much more pointed question than any mere lament over the price of the best beef. If the world grows too worldly, it can be rebuked by the Church; but if the Church grows too worldly, it cannot be adequately rebuked for worldliness by the world.

Therefore it is the paradox of history that each generation is converted by the saint who contradicts it most. St. Francis had a curious and almost uncanny attraction for the Victorians; for the nineteenth century English who seemed superficially to be most complacent about their commerce and their common sense. Not only a rather complacent Englishman like Matthew Arnold, but even the English Liberals whom he criticised for their complacency, began slowly to discover the mystery of the Middle Ages through the strange story told in feathers and flames in the hagiographical pictures of Giotto. There was something in the story of St. Francis that pierced through all those English qualities which are most famous and fatuous, to all those English qualities which are most hidden and human: the secret softness of heart; the poetical vagueness of mind; the love of landscape and of animals. St. Francis of Assisi was the only medieval Catholic who really became popular in England on his own merits. It was largely because of a subconscious feeling that the modern world had neglected those particular merits. The English middle classes found their only missionary in the figure, which of all types in the world they most despised; an Italian beggar.

So, as the nineteenth century clutched at the Franciscan romance, precisely because it had neglected romance, so the twentieth century is already clutching at the Thomist rational theology, because it has neglected reason. In a world that was too stolid, Christianity returned in the form of a vagabond; in a world that has grown a great deal too wild, Christianity has returned in the form of a teacher of logic. In the world of Herbert Spencer men wanted a cure for indigestion; in the world of Einstein they want a cure for vertigo. In the first case, they dimly perceived the fact that it was after a long fast that St. Francis sang the Song of the Sun and the praise of the fruitful earth. In the second case, they already dimly perceived that, even if they only want to understand Einstein, it is necessary first to understand the use of the understanding. They begin to see that, as the eighteenth century thought itself the age of reason, and the nineteenth century thought itself the age of common sense, the twentieth century cannot as yet even manage to think itself anything but the age of uncommon nonsense.

....Yes; in spite of the contrasts that are as conspicuous and even comic as the comparison between the fat man and the thin man, the tall man and the short: in spite of the contrast between the vagabond and the student, between the apprentice and the aristocrat, between the book-hater and the book-lover, between the wildest of all missionaries and the mildest of all professors, the great fact of medieval history is that these two great men were doing the same great work; one in the study and the other in the street. They were not bringing something new into Christianity; in the sense of something heathen or heretical into Christianity; on the contrary, they were bringing Christianity into Christendom. But they were bringing it back against the pressure of certain historic tendencies, which had hardened into habits in many great schools and authorities in the Christian Church; and they were using tools and weapons which seemed to many people to be associated with heresy or heathenry. St. Francis used Nature much as St. Thomas used Aristotle; and to some they seemed to be using a Pagan goddess and a Pagan sage. What they were really doing, and especially what St. Thomas was really doing, will form the main matter of these pages; but it is convenient to be able to compare him from the first with a more popular saint; because we may thus sum up the substance of it in the most popular way. Perhaps it would sound too paradoxical to say that these two saints saved us from Spirituality; a dreadful doom. Perhaps it may be misunderstood if I say that St. Francis, for all his love of animals, saved us from being Buddhists; and that St. Thomas, for all his love of Greek philosophy, saved us from being Platonists. But it is best to say the truth in its simplest form; that they both reaffirmed the Incarnation, by bringing God back to earth.

Obedience, the scandalous virtue

[Second in a series of three articles reflecting on Benedictine spirituality. For the first, look here.]

The second Benedictine vow is obedience. This is probably the most outrageous virtue of all three, at best conjuring up images of dogs at obedience school and at worst, Nazis "just obeying orders."
But I wonder why those are the images that first pop to mind?

Fr. Longnecker writes:

"Obedience!!?? we howl. But we're grown ups. We're supposed to take responsibility for ourselves. We're supposed to be pro active. We're supposed to make our own moral decisions. Yadda yadda yadda.

Yes, no doubt true up to a point. We don't want a church made up of doormats and robots. However, the vices of any age are best corrected by the virtues we find most repellent. Our age is the age of the dictatorship of relativism. It is the age of individualism run rampant, the age of personal freedom (code for personal pleasure as the sole guiding principle) and tolerance (code for "leave me alone willya?")"

If Longnecker is right in his assessment of our age, then it is no wonder that obedience should be a scandal to us. But once again we are faced with the delicate matter of finding the mean, and avoiding the extremes. There is both the extreme of deficiency (postmodern antinomianism) and the extreme of excess (the Nazi nightmare mentioned above.) Obedience can become a sin when we fail to recognize and act according to that which is the real/true authority in our lives.

The False Authority of the World

In previous ages the greatest temptations to miss the mark came from from worldly and pagan sources outside the self: Astartes of sexual desire; Molechs of power, Baals of prosperity; kings, emperors, feudal lords and clergy who abused their offices.

Whenever we elevate outside authorities over the place of the Lord in our lives, we miss the mark, and end up obeying idols. There is nothing greater outside of us than our Creator; anything else is mere creature. God operates through his creation, and has established certain relationships in that creation to image the divine relationships of love and mutual submission within the life of the Trinity. (cf. Ephesians 5-6 and Colossians 3). We try to live peacefully with spouses, parents, children, employers and employees, but there may come occasions like that in Acts 5:29, when, like Peter, we have to say, "We must obey God rather than men!" In these instances we must be careful that our obedience is a response to God's authority, and not our own, or some other lesser authority.

The people of Le Chambon refused to obey men rather than God. The Cictercian Martyrs of Atlas in 1996 refused to obey men rather than God. In the niches above the west gate of Westminster Abbey stand statues of 10 contemporary Christian martyrs . They include Martin Luther King, Oscar Romero, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. These people chose to lose their lives rather than submit to forces contrary to Christ their King; people for whom faithfulness meant obedience unto death.


The False Authority of Self

We miss the mark when we substitute other authorities for the Lord. Sometimes those authorities are within us.Just as there is nothing greater outside of us than our Creator, so there cannot be anything greater within us than our Saviour. In an age when subjectivity reigns, we will be tempted to miss the mark by mistaking self for Saviour as the true authority in our lives.

Ever since Eden, our default authority has been Self.Like Pharoah in Exodus 5:2, we declare, "Who is the LORD, that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the LORD and I will not let Israel go." Like the Israelites in Judges 21, we have no king; everyone does as he sees fit. It will be difficult not to heed the culture's siren song,"Follow your heart." Odysseus had himself lashed to his ships's mast to avoid succumbing, but we lash ourselves to the cross.

Discerning Genuine Authority

Okay, so there are false authorities out there and even within us aiming to rule our hearts, minds, souls and strength. So, how do we know when an authority is genuine (true) and when it is not?

1) When that authority is the very Word of God:

I can quickly end up begging the question here, but if the authority is established to be God Himself, and not something lesser, it seems to follow that it should be worthy of our respect and service.

Psalm 119 repeatedly celebrates God's law/word as our trustworthy authority, demanding our obedience.

In Matt. 22:29, Jesus chides the Sadducees, "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God." Knowing the Bible--hearing what God is saying to us-- is necessary if we are to be obedient. What kind of honor can we give to that we do not know? How can we be faithful if we don't know what we should be like?

2 Timothy 3:16-17 affirms that God's word is our reliable authority: "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."

But I admit it is not always that simple for everyone. Some of us need more epistemological reassurance, if we are to trust and obey a given authority. (Others of us, like Saul, need to fall off our mules and be blinded for a while! But that's another story.) Thus, I offer a few more ways to discern genuine authority, which are by no means exhaustive of all possible ways.

2) When that authority doesn't contradict itself.

This is a coherence criterion. How can we obey any authority that says to do A and not do A, at the same time, in the same respect? Contradictions are the basis of all lies. Satan is called the father of all lies; but God does not lie. We may find mystery, we may find paradox, but we will never find contradictions in God. He is the only perfect authority.

Titus 1: 1-2: "God, who does not lie"
Hebrews 6:18: "God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged."

3) When that authority doesn't cause us to be involved in contradictions.

This is a correspondence criterion. How can we respect, muchless obey, anything or anyone that violates our integrity? A contradiction pits something against itself. Any genuine authority will lead to more virtue/righteousness/unity/perfection/life rather than less.

1 John 5 assures us that "This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands. This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, for everyone born of God overcomes the world."

4) When that authority is able to "walk its talk."



This is a pragmatic criterion. Genuine authority reveals itself not only through words, but actions. How can we possibly obey an authority that cannot itself do what it is requiring us to do? A genuine authority will model attitudes, ideas, and behaviors it wishes us to embody.

Isaiah 53:9 says "He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth." Jesus was the Prince of Peace, and he showed us how to be peaceful people. We can obey Him knowing that He has not preached anything that He hasn't already practiced. This is a mark of genuine authority.

Stability

Jan Bros has pointed us to a wonderful blog describing the Benedictine Way of stability, obedience, and conversion of life. Over the next few days I want to offer some highlights from Fr. Longenecker's blog and my reflections on them. So here goes.

On stability, (Thursday, June 28, 2007)

"The vow of stability means the monk promises to remain in one community for life. He commits himself to one family of monks, one place, one set of buildings, one way of life. The whole point is to stop him doing 'a geographical'. He's not allowed to run away. Stability teaches us that God is not elsewhere. We'll find him here. We'll find him now, or we won't find him anyhow...Stability is serious, quiet, humble and serene. Stability eschews the remarkable, the phantasmagoical, the stupendous and the charismatic. Stability says, 'Stop, Look and Listen.' God is here. Christ is knocking at the door. "

Eugene Peterson must be a closet Benedictine, because this reminds me of him. Peterson pastored Christ Our King Presbyterian church for 29 years. 29 years! According to three different research groups, the average American pastor only lasts five years at a church!

If emergents can overcome their prenatal exposure to a culture of consumption, this statistic may change. What would happen if we looked at churches not as malls catering to spiritual consumers but as Family farms? I'm thinking here of a parallel to Gerald O'Hara's admonition to his daughter:

"Do you mean to tell me, Katie Scarlett O'Hara, that Tara, that land doesn't mean anything to you? Why, land is the only thing in the world worth workin' for, worth fightin' for, worth dyin' for, because it's the only thing that lasts."

Replace "land" with Church, understood incarnationally as Christ's Body, and Body of Christ understood concretely as "community... one family...one place, one set of buildings, one way of life."

Of course, the Benedictine way is not the only way to follow the Way. Its success depends upon a community of believers who vow to incarnate or (at least) mutually value stability as a cynosure for Jesus.

I took the Myers-Briggs personality inventory last week, and I am definitely not a person who is enchanted by the "remarkable, the phantasmagoical, the stupendous and the charismatic." No doubt such persons have an important place in the Kingdom; but theirs is a different way from mine. And Peterson's. And St. Benedict's.

Lord, you have made me what You wanted me to be. Help me to acept that and be able to live it out faithfully for You.

Formation: spiritual, or materialistic?

Is this the basis for spiritual formation in contemporary American culture?

producing
purchasing
pampering
and
pitching

Quote

Whether we fall by ambition, blood, or lust,
like diamonds we are cut with our own dust.

--John Webster

Reflections on Psalm 139

A while back Chad invited us to reflect with him on Psalm 139, as he prepared to preach. Apparantly his sermon went well-- the Lord gave him some good things to share! (See his June 27, 2007 blog entry).

Meanwhile I have been chewing on it, and I've come to the conclusion that while this psalm has often been used by pro-lifers in the abortion controversy, I think it also speaks about our spiritual formation.

Verses 1-6: Cozy Confines

In a culture where all boundaries exist only to be broken, this psalm presents us a powerful and currently controversial image: just as a fetus develops physically inside the womb, so we develop spiritually in this world. Just as the Lord watches over the fetus, so He watches over us.

What a different perspective the psalmist has from ours! He doesn't seem the least bit panicked that God should know him so completely or "hem him in." If anything, he seems grateful and in awe that God should be so intimately involved in his life. (Imagine how a Nietzsche or a Sartre or a Paris Hilton would write these verses, if they would even be written at all!)

Verses 7-12: The Psalmist's Thought Experiment

These verses challenge the prevailing (worldly) wisdom that freedom is an absolute value (freedom being understood as the ability to break through all boundaries in order to have one's way.) We may like to think we can be God, carving out our own reality, but we are mistaken. The psalmist acknowledges that this notion of freedom is ultimately an inconceivable absurdity.

Verses 13-16a: The image of physical development in the womb

In premodern times, when children were taken as gifts from God and signs of His blessing, the womb was most often viewed as a mysterious but secure place, a place of life. The existence of the fetus depended on God's mind and will. In our own day, when children are no longer viewed as gifts but as projects for our own production, the womb is a dangerous place. Pregnancy is even treated as a disease. The existence of the fetus now credited to human choice and human technology.

How to span the difference in world views here? That will essential if contemporary listeners are to be able to hear it. Underlying the Psalmist's worldview is the narrative order of Genesis: "In the beginning God;" then the world, then finally humanity. Today's narratives profoundly reverse the order or dispense with God entirely, so that self alone reigns supreme. If we are to be formed spiritually by this Psalm, we cannot read it using the lenses of our time.

Verse 16b-24: Our spiritual development in the world

Life is growth.

Physically, we develop from zygote to blastocyst to embryo to fetus to child to adolescent to adult.
Jean Piaget described four stages of intellectual development : sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, formal operational.
Erickson described eight stages of psychosocial development and Kohlberg describedsix stages of moral development .

The Psalmist understands this, and celebrates the fact that the Lord who is so painstaking regarding our physical development is also intimately involved in our spiritual development. Just as the fetus floats in the waters of the womb, so the psalmist is bouyed by God's revelation, through nature and through His word. Though God's thoughts are inexhaustable and deep, He graciously permits the psalmist to trace them-- enough so that the psalmist knows how precious they are. But the more he searches them out, the more he realizes he can never fully fathom them. (As Josef Pieper has written, reality is mysterious because it is intelligible.)

Then another moment in our spiritual development is described, in verses 19-22. Just as little boys sometimes imitate their fathers by pretending to shave, and little girls sometimes imitate their mothers by playing with lipstick, so the psalmist imitates God by identifying with His rejection of evil. In a mirroring of Ruth's confession, "Your people will be my people, your God will be my God," the psalmist cries "Do I not hate those who hate you O Lord?" God's enemies will be the psalmist's enemies.

Finally the psalmist moves to the ultimate stages of spiritual development: what if Pogo is right? What if we have met the enemy, and he is us? Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn put it this way: "The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties, but right through every human heart---and through all human hearts."

If the image of God is to grow in the psalmist, he cannot avoid permitting the Lord to scour his soul.

Only then will he be spiritually mature; only then will he/we find the path of life that leads to the vision of God.

Only then will we be all God means us to be.

Only then will Thy will, and not my will, be done.

Jean Vanier: A Guarantee

Quotation from Jan Bros, June 17, 2007:
http://sacredthreshold.typepad.com/sacred_threshold/

"The Covenant of Community, profound as it is, can never guarantee that a certain person will always stay physically close to another. It guarantees only that there will always be someone there, inspired by the same Spirit."

--Jean Vanier, Man and Woman He Made Them as read in Celtic Daily Prayer
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Interview with Mary Hynes, CBC Radio One

http://www.cbc.ca/tapestry/archives/2005/041705.html

Jean Vanier talks with Mary Hynes about the danger of craving a spirituality without religion, and the importance of commitment rather than comfort in the life of the spirit.

Jean Vanier is the son of the late Georges P. Vanier, a former Governor General of Canada, and his wife Pauline. He was educated in England and Canada; for several years, he was with the navy. He resigned in 1950 and went to France to complete a doctorate in philosophy on Aristotle.

In 1964, with the support of his spiritual advisor, Père Thomas, he invited two men with a developmental disability, Raphael Simi and Phillippe Seux, to live with him in an old house in the French village of Trosly-Breuil.

He named the house L’Arche, after Noah’s Ark, and gradually welcomed not only more men and women with developmental disabilities but also the assistants who would live and work with them.

Since then, L’Arche has grown into an international federation of more than 100 communities in nearly 30 countries.
Vanier later also founded Faith and Light, an international network of support, which brings together the families of the disabled.

Jean Vanier has dedicated his life to working with physically and developmentally disabled adults. His philosophy is reflected in the guiding principle of L’Arche, which is that the weak and the disabled - indeed, all who are lonely and excluded from society - have much to teach us. Vanier believes true spirituality comes from our relationships with the less fortunate. Spirituality then becomes not an expression of self-indulgence, but of love for one another and for God. Vanier led the international L’Arche federation until 1981, when he stepped down.

He still makes his home in Trosly-Breuil, sharing his life with the members of the community there. He travels a great deal, visiting L’Arche homes around the world and speaking at conferences and retreats.