tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-204830252024-03-07T01:06:16.936-06:00Without AuthorityReflections on theological and church issues from "a person who is a kind of thinker, but <i>without authority</i>. The speaker makes no claims to be a teacher." -- SAKThomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.comBlogger133125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-38587668470337904462007-11-23T14:58:00.000-06:002007-11-23T16:36:56.168-06:00The Economist and a Defense of Christendom<div style="text-align: justify;">I recommend taking a look at the November 1st issue of the <a href="http://www.economist.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Economist</span></a>, which features a <a href="http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/display.cfm?id=7294978">number</a> of articles on the role of religion in the coming century. The magazine points out that <a href="http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/displaystory.cfm?subjectid=7294978&story_id=10089142">religious observance is rising</a> worldwide and that "<a href="http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/displaystory.cfm?subjectid=7294978&story_id=10063829">faith will unsettle politics everywhere</a> this century." The approach the <span style="font-style: italic;">Economist</span> takes towards religion is refreshingly fair and neutral - it is not blind to the dangers of fundamentalism but, at the same time, it understands the amazing complexity and vibrancy of the world's religions. It also understands that faith is flourishing, in part, because of globalization - something the <span style="font-style: italic;">Economist</span> vigorously supports:<br /><blockquote>"The idea that religion has re-emerged in public life is to some extent an illusion. It never really went away—certainly not to the extent that French politicians and American college professors imagined. Its new power is mostly the consequence of two changes. The first is the failure of secular creeds: religion's political comeback started during the 1970s, when faith in government everywhere was crumbling. Second, although some theocracies survive in the Islamic world, religion has returned to the stage as a much more democratic, individualistic affair: a bottom-up marketing success, surprisingly in tune with globalisation. Secularism was not as modern as many intellectuals imagined, but pluralism is. Free up religion and ardent believers and ardent atheists both do well... From a classical liberal point of view, this multiplicity of sects is a good thing."</blockquote>The issue also contains an <a href="http://www.economist.com/research/articlesBySubject/displaystory.cfm?subjectid=7294978&story_id=10015231">article</a> on the state of Christianity in Europe, which may not be as moribund as most people think. In many parts of Europe, smaller churches of evangelicals, charismatics and Pentecostals are growing rapidly. But the state churches are still hurting, with active church <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">attendance</span> reaching new, pathetic lows. But the empty pews should not necessarily be interpreted as a lack of faith. Grace Davie of the University of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Exeter</span> argues that many Europeans regard the state churches as a sort of "'public utility': there is one state-backed supplier, and most Christians follow their religion vicariously (in the sense that somebody else does your churchgoing for you). For instance, around 75% of Swedes are baptised as Lutherans, but only 5% regularly go to church. The church pockets a staggering $1.6 billion in membership fees, collected by the state through the tax system. It has been rare for Swedes to opt out, though that seems to be changing."<br /><br />This situation in Sweden (and other Scandinavian countries) is interesting because, while active religious participation is rare, the state church itself is not unpopular or discredited. It still plays a welcome, albeit small, role in the lives of the Swedish people. Most people still pay their church fees, baptize their children, get confirmed, and have a church funeral when they die. But otherwise they rarely set foot inside a church.<br /><br />Of course, the notion of "vicarious Christianity" is exactly what Kierkegaard was railing against in his <span style="font-style: italic;">Attack on Christendom</span>. And it would be tempting to say, with him, that the Church of Sweden (or Denmark) is a sham, no more than <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">kulturprotestantismus</span></span> at its worst. But that judgement might not be entirely correct. The fact that people still turn to the church in "life changing" moments - birth, marriage, death - is significant, I think. Indeed, it may be that the states churches, by encompassing the entire nation and not just a small group of "true believers", are a testament to the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">sovereignty</span> of God over all Creation. As the Swedish theologian Gustaf <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Wingren</span> writes in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Creation-Gospel-Situation-European-Theology/dp/1592446744/ref=sr_1_24?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195857278&sr=1-24"><span style="font-style: italic;">Creation and Gospel</span></a>:<br /><blockquote>"By their very existence the national churches of Europe represented a form of faith in Creation, even in those times when the Creation faith was neither theoretically articulated nor the subject of reflection in university theology. Parishes with geographical boundaries are purely external arrangements, it appears; but built into this arrangement is a profound faith in Creation: the place of work, birth, death, matrimony - everything is encircled by the church and therefore by the Father of Jesus Christ."</blockquote>Whether the state churches of Europe will be able to continue to play this role in the future remains to seen. It may be that they're merely "running on fumes"; after all, no church can survive for long on mere tradition and convention. Most damningly, the national churches may be serving as obstacles to a genuine revival of faith, since they encourage the complacency of "vicarious <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Christianity</span>." <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Christianity</span> on European soil might have to begin anew, and this would entail the demise of the national churches. But I'm not sure. Would Swedes miss the national church if it was gone? Would anything take its place?<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-61847718847189574132007-11-14T22:36:00.001-06:002007-11-14T22:36:31.106-06:00The Sacrament as Christ's Availability to Himself<div style="text-align: justify;">In case you missed it, <a href="http://www.firstthings.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">First Things</span></a> posted an interesting <a href="http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/?p=893">commentary</a> last week on Bill <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Bryson</span></span></span></span>’s science book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Short-History-Nearly-Everything/dp/076790818X/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1194816955&sr=8-2"><span style="font-style: italic;">A Short History of Nearly Everything</span></a>. The article, written by Frederica <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Mathewes</span></span></span></span>-Green, discussed the fact that our bodies are continually exchanging atoms with the environment, such that "every seven years all the cells in a human body are replaced." Moreover, as <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Bryson</span></span></span></span> writes, “every atom you possess has almost certainly passed through several stars and been part of millions of organisms on its way to becoming you. We are each so atomically numerous and so vigorously recycled at death that a significant number of our atoms—up to a billion for each of us, it has been suggested—probably once belonged to Shakespeare. A billion more each came from Buddha and Genghis Khan and Beethoven, and any other historical figure you care to name."<br /><br />This result certainly has theological implications, and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Mathewes</span></span></span></span>-Green explores some of them. For instance, the "resurrection of the body" cannot be understood as the simple reassembly of the same atoms that comprised our bodies at death, since these atoms are not essential to who we truly are. Our continuity over time lies in the <span style="font-style: italic;">pattern</span> of our bodies, not in the identity of their physical components. Thus, speaking of the resurrection of the dead, John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Polkinghorne</span></span></span></span> can write that "it is a perfectly coherent hope that the pattern that is me will be remembered by God and its instantiation will be recreated by Him when he reconstitutes me in a new environment of his choosing."<br /><br />This concept also raises interesting implications for the sacraments. Most of the controversy surrounding the Lord's Supper has focused on the meaning of "is" in Jesus' statement "This is my body", i.e. should "is" be taken literally or does it really mean <span style="font-style: italic;">signifies</span>. Comparatively little thought has been given to what "body" means in this context, perhaps because it is assumed that everyone knows what body means. But, as <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Bryson's</span></span></span></span> book makes clear, the body is a more dynamic concept than previously thought. So how are we supposed to understand the true presence of Christ's body in the Eucharist?<br /><br />Robert <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Jenson</span></span></span></span> gives a very compelling answer to this question in his <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Systematic-Theology-Triune-God/dp/0195145984/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195096315&sr=8-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Systematic Theology</span></a>. He writes that, according to Paul, "<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">someone's</span></span></span></span> 'body' is simply the person him or herself insofar as this person is <span style="font-style: italic;">available</span> to other persons and to him or herself, insofar as the person is an <span style="font-style: italic;">object</span> for other persons and him or herself. It is in that Paul is a body that persecutors can mark him as Christ's; it is in that Paul is a body that he can be seen and interrogated by one of his congregations, or be remote from this possibility; it is in that Paul is a body that he can discipline his own self. In Paul's ontology, such personal <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">availability</span> may or may not be constituted as the biological entity moderns first think of as 'a body'" (I, 205).<br /><br />The question then becomes: where is the risen Christ <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">available</span> to us, where is he an object <span style="font-style: italic;">for us</span>? Drawing on 1 <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Corinthians</span>, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Jenson's</span></span></span> answer is two-fold: "The body of that Christ that the Corinthians culpably fail to discern is at once the gathered congregation, which is the actual object of their misbehavior and to which Paul has just previous referred as the body of Christ, <span style="font-style: italic;">and</span> the loaf and cup, which are called Christ's body by the narrative of institution he cites in support of his rebuke." (II, 211) Thus, Christ is an object for us in church and sacrament, although in somewhat different ways. The Church is Christ's <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">availability</span> to the world at large, while the Eucharist is his availability within the congregation. "The object that is the church-assembly is the body of Christ, that is, Christ available to the world and to her members, just in that the church gathers around objects distinct from herself, the bread and cup, which are the availability<span style="font-style: italic;"> to her</span> of the same Christ." (II, 213).<br /><br />At first glance, it may appear that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Jenson</span></span> is endorsing a purely symbolic <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">interpretation</span> of the sacrament in which the Church regards the load and cup "as if" they were the body of Christ, although the remain mere bread and wine. However this is not the case, because <span style="font-style: italic;">Christ himself recognizes these objects as his body</span>. "The church with her sacraments is truly Christ's availability to us just because Christ takes her as his availability to himself. Where does the risen Christ turn to find himself? To the sacramental gathering of believers. To the question 'Who am I?' he answers, 'I am this community's head. I am the subject whose objectivity is this community... And again: 'I am the subject whose objectivity for this community is the bread and cup around which she gathers.'" (II, 214)<br /><br />To question of how this is possible, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Jenson</span></span> simply remarks: "All that is needed is that the risen Christ's personal self-understanding determine what is real, that is, that he be the <span style="font-style: italic;">Logos</span> of God... As he is the Word of God by which all things are created to be what they are, no further <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">explanation</span> is needed or possible." (II, 215). This is essentially the same explanation as provided by Luther in his defence of the Real Presence, which I described in an earlier <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/10/barth-on-luthers-doctrine-of-eucharist.html">post</a>. The Word of God effects what it says. The sacrament is <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">simultaneously</span> the body of Christ <span style="font-style: italic;">and</span> bread and wine, just as we are simultaneously sinful <span style="font-style: italic;">and</span> righteous in faith. In both cases, it is the mighty Word of God that holds the paradox together, that creates a new reality.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-44011150632302863842007-11-11T11:32:00.000-06:002007-11-11T13:23:47.526-06:00Hauerwas at the University of Minnesota<div style="text-align: justify;">Last Thursday I walked across the Mississippi river to hear Stanley <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Hauerwas</span> speak on the West Bank of the U of M campus. He was giving the 12<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">th</span> Annual <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Holmer</span> Memorial Lecture, sponsored by the <a href="http://www.maclaurin.org/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Maclaurin</span> Institute</a> (whose admirable mission is to <span class="subhead">"bring God into the marketplace of ideas" on the Minnesota campus).</span> The event was a rare opportunity for those of us at this public university to hear from an honest-to-goodness Christian theologian and, appropriately, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Hauerwas</span> spoke about the role of theology in the modern university, the subject of his most recent <a href="http://www.amazon.com/State-University-Knowledges-Knowledge-Illuminations/dp/1405162481/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1194805319&sr=1-3">book</a>.<br /><br />Since you can read a good summary of his remarks <a href="http://maclaurin.org/pressreleases.php?pr_id=164">here</a>, I won't try to recreate the lecture. I generally agree with his main point that we need to find a way to bring theology back into higher education. The university needs theology, and theology needs the university.<br /><br />I had never heard <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Hauerwas</span> speak before but I've read <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">plenty</span> of stories concerning his explosive and colorful personality. So I naturally went in with high expectations. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Hauerwas</span>, though, was surprisingly tame, using occasional profanity but never reaching a full boil. Despite this, he made a number of memorable comments, especially in the question-and-answer section. For instance, he said "I'm a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">theocrat</span> but I'm also a pacifist. And I don't know how to rule the world nonviolently, but I'd like to have the chance." Also, "For a Christian college to offer the same education as a public school but say that they're educating the 'whole person', that's bullshit. That's not Christianity, that's just hand-holding." In response to a question about Bob Jones University, he said "Bob Jones, they're just dumb, it needs to be said. It's sort of a learned ignorance, but they know nothing about Christianity, that's their problem."<br /><br />I enjoyed the lecture but it raised a question that perhaps some of my readers can answer: why do academics in the humanities read their lectures straight off the page? I've always found this strange and somewhat annoying. In the sciences, we speak freely in our lectures, with nothing prepared except our visual aids or a few notes. Such talks are more natural and pleasant to hear than someone monotonously reading. Thankfully, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Hauweras</span> often departed from his prepared text, and it was in those moments when he was most genuine and interesting. I wished the entire lecture was that way. If scientists and preachers can speak in public with only notes, why can't English or theology professors? Why do we expect so little from them with regards to presentation style?<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-68383093071891636542007-10-27T16:13:00.000-05:002007-10-27T18:12:43.540-05:00More Thoughts on Closed Communion<div style="text-align: justify;">I've been delving into Robert <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Jenson's</span> theology of the sacraments, as found both in his <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Systematic-Theology-Triune-God/dp/0195145984/ref=sr_1_1/105-0946601-1230829?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193526584&sr=1-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Systematic Theology</span></a> and in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Visible-words-interpretation-Christian-sacraments/dp/0800605071/ref=sr_1_1/105-0946601-1230829?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193526558&sr=8-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Visible Words</span></a> (1978). I hope to write a post outlining his overall <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">sacramentology</span> soon, but for now I will simply share his thoughts on the open vs. closed communion debate:<br /><blockquote>"Disagreement about the interpretation of Christ's presence has been a profound and continuing occasion of the church's disunity, especially at the table itself. There is a terrible irony in this; since in fact Christ's presence as the bread and cup is not <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">separable</span> from the unity it creates as those who share the meal.<br /><br />Many rationalizations have been attempted, all of them sophistical. The simple case is this: if I and my group celebrate the Supper, and do not admit you, this is excommunication; and if we indeed belong to the body of Christ, as we claim merely by our celebration, it is excommunication from the body of Christ. If you then otherwise celebrate the Supper with a group of your like, we are bound to maintain that this celebration is a mere attempt, in which Christ is not present. If we fail to maintain this, either we are merely being inconsequential, or we revoke our right to exclude you in the first place.<br /><br />There is no middle ground. If you acknowledge that I belong to the church, you must admit me to your Supper. If you will not admit me to your Supper, you should not then talk about my nevertheless being your 'fellow in Christ.'" (<span style="font-style: italic;">Visible Words</span>, 113)<br /></blockquote>It is worth noting that Luther held essentially the same position as <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Jenson</span>, although to much different effect. For Luther, the anti-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">sacramentalists</span>, whether Reformed or Anabaptist, were genuine heretics and not Christians in the least, as dramatically emphasized by his refusal to accept Zwingli's hand in Christian brotherhood at <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Marburg</span>. So Luther would have no problem with the logic of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Jenson's</span> thinking; that is, for Luther, the table was indeed open to all Christians, as he defined it. You can call him divisive and intolerant, but at least he was consistent.<br /><br />The same cannot be said of modern Lutherans who practice closed communion. They are guilty of what <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Jenson</span> calls "inconsequential" thinking - they forbid table fellowship with baptized Christians not in communion with their denomination, but they do not deny that such people may be Christians. That this is the case is amply evident in Missouri Synod documents that explain their stance on closed communion. For example, in response to the question whether the sacrament can be provided to "relatives who are very close to us but who are members of other church bodies", the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">LCMS</span> <a href="http://www.lcms.org/graphics/assets/media/CTCR/admisup.pdf">writes</a>: "This question is often a very difficult and sensitive one on an emotional level, because we feel united with those whom we love - <span style="font-style: italic;">especially when they are fellow Christians</span>!" (emphasis mine). In the same document, we find the following Q&A:<br /><blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">Question</span>: How can we possibly say that all those Christians from other church bodies are unworthy to receive the Lord’s Supper? <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Isn</span>’t that what we are saying?<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Answer</span>: Absolutely not! There are two reasons why people can be refused admission to the Lord’s Supper. The first has to do with faith and discerning the body. Those who do not have such faith and discernment would commune in an unworthy manner and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">thereby receive</span> God’s judgment. But the second reason has to do with the need for a fitting confessional unity among those who commune together. Roman Catholic Christians, for example, may be perfectly prepared to receive the Lord’s Supper in their own churches in a worthy manner and so to their own great blessing. But it would be unfitting for them, as confessors of their church body’s error, to receive the Sacrament in our churches.</blockquote>This is an interesting position. The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">LCMS</span> does not deny the validity of the Roman sacrament; quite the contrary, they call it a "great blessing". <span style="font-style: italic;">But this is only true for Catholics!</span> The same sacrament is presumably damaging for a Lutheran participant, hence the prohibition against <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">LCMS</span> members communing in other church bodies. But isn't the same body and blood of Christ present at both altars? And if so, must it not be acknowledged that some form of unity does indeed exist between the Lutheran and Catholic churches, even if there is disagreement on non-sacramental matters?<br /><br />I have <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/02/thoughts-on-open-communion.html">previously</a> expressed reservations about "wide-open" communion and I generally stand by those statements. But I also think there are serious theological problems with closed communion as practiced by the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">LCMS</span> and RC churches. For me, the decisive point is whether a given church group "recognizes the body of the Lord" (1 Cor. 11:29), that is, whether they acknowledge the Real Presence as generally understood by Luther. If they do, then I see no problem with permitting table fellowship, regardless of other differences. As <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Jenson</span> says, "The old question about whether fellowship is a means or consequence of fellowship in the faith is an entirely perverse question; fellowship at the Supper <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> fellowship in the faith."<br /><br />That said, it seems to me that where there is no agreement concerning the Lord's Real Presence, there can be no table or pulpit fellowship. So, as you can imagine, I am not a fan of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">ELCA's</span> full communion agreements with Reformed bodies like the Presbyterian Church (USA) and United Church of Christ. Does this mean that I regard members of these denominations as non-Christians? I won't go that far, but it may be true that by failing to recognize the body of Christ in the sacraments, these denominations forfeit their claim to be part of the body of Christ that is the Church (for <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Jenson</span>, it is axiomatic that the existence of these two "bodies of Christ" are interdependent. However, it is not my place (or nature) to make drastic statements. I will leave it to others to decide whether the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">ELCA's</span> agreements with the Reformed churches go too far and thus establish nothing but a false unity. But I don't think it's extreme to maintain that the celebration of the Lord's Supper in these churches is "a mere attempt, in which Christ is not present," and that this must have severe consequences for ecumenism.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-3299705300584554942007-10-22T20:07:00.000-05:002007-10-22T23:06:10.206-05:00Barth on Luther's Doctrine of the Eucharist<div style="text-align: justify;">In relation to my previous <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/10/augustine-and-sacraments.html">post</a>, I've been reading and enjoying Karl Barth's article "Luther's Doctrine of the Eucharist", written in 1923 and published in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Theology-Church-Karl-Barth/dp/B000B9V3H4/ref=sr_1_3/102-3053780-3366541?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1193107900&sr=1-3"><span style="font-style: italic;">Theology and Church</span></a>. Barth, of course, ultimately disagrees with the direction that Luther took regarding the Lord Supper's, but he remains astonished at the force and boldness of the Reformer's thought. At one point he writes, "It is possible to understand the step which Luther took [with regards to the Lord's Supper] as the act of pure Christian faith in revelation, or as an act manifesting truly demonic force... Actually it was both." Nevertheless, with his penetrating intellect, Barth is able to cut to the heart of the matter as few can. One might even say that he understands Luther better than Luther understood himself, even if he ultimately rejects the Reformer's position.<br /></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Barth rightly dismisses the notion (common among Reformed) that Luther's <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">insistence</span> on the Real Presence is an inconsistency in his overall thought, a lingering hangover from medieval Catholicism. "There can be no doubt that what we find here is not a slip in logic, but the purpose which manifests itself with compelling inner necessity... One can say confidently that he would not have been Luther if he had not taken this step."<br /><br />So what drove Luther <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">irresistibly</span></span> to the Real Presence? The answer, for Barth, is to be found in Luther's dynamic understanding of the <span style="font-style: italic;">Word</span>. But this insight is misunderstood if the Word is thought to refer only to Christ's words at the Last Supper, "This is my body,... this is my blood." Luther's doctrine of the Eucharist was not merely the product of simple-minded biblical literalism, although later generations of Lutherans have often understood it this way. No, the reason lies deeper. Luther can see Christ's bodily presence in the Eucharist because God's Word is a <span style="font-style: italic;">creative</span> word that establishes the reality it promises. "The word brings with it everything of which it speaks, namely, Christ with his flesh and blood and everything he is and has."<br /><br />Barth sees this as the truly original aspect of Luther's thought. It is the "predicate of identity", "the identification of the signifying with what is signified, of the sign with the signification." Whereas others played the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">signum</span></span></span></span></span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span> of the sacrament against each other, Luther held them tightly together. Another way to say this - citing my earlier <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/10/augustine-and-sacraments.html">post</a> - is that Luther emphasized the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">signum</span></span></span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">et</span></span></span></span> res</span> of the sacrament, although he never used this exact formulation. Take the following quote:<br /><blockquote>"So that this divine promise [of forgiveness] may be to us the most certain of all and render our faith most secure, he set upon it the token and seal which is the most trustworthy and precious of all, as he himself was the price of the promise, his own body and blood under the bread and wine. By this he guarantees that the riches of the promise are given to us; and this requires our acceptance of the promise."</blockquote>Here it is clear that Luther regards Christ's body as both <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">signum</span></span></span></span></span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span>: it is what is signified by the bread and wine <span style="font-style: italic;">and</span> it is a "token and seal" of the divine promise of forgiveness. This is not a trivial point for Luther, since it reflects the fact that it is only through Christ's humanity, his body and blood, that we have salvation and the forgiveness of sins. The connection between <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Christology</span></span></span></span> and the sacrament is clear here. As Luther says, "he himself was the price of the promise." This is the essence of his insistence on the "identification of signifying with what is signified", on the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">signum</span></span></span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">et</span></span></span></span> res</span>, and ultimately on the Real Presence itself. The "predicate of identity" is derived from the Incarnation, where the body of Christ both <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">signifies</span> our salvation. A disembodied, "spiritual" Christ does not save. Thus, Luther's belief in the Real Presence is nothing more than his belief in the saving power of the Incarnation, where the promise is true because it <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> "in, with, and under" the flesh.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-75958557115066625032007-10-20T09:13:00.001-05:002007-10-20T17:18:40.348-05:00Augustine and the Sacraments<div style="text-align: justify;">I've been reading and thinking a great deal about the sacraments lately, which has been interesting due to the sheer variety of positions that have been adopted by Christians through the centuries regarding what the sacraments <span style="font-style: italic;">are</span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">mean</span>. It seems that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">sacramentology</span></span> is an area of theology where confusion has generally trumped consensus, often because people can use the same language but mean something entirely different (just think, for example, of the various ways that the word "presence" can be (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">mis</span></span>)understood). Despite this diversity, no matter which book I turn to, I invariably encounter St. Augustine's definition of a sacrament: "The Word comes to the element; and so there is a sacrament, that is, a sort of visible word." That is, every sacrament has two components: the physical object(s) - the sign (<span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">signum</span></span></span>) - and the invisible reality (<span style="font-style: italic;">res</span>) that is thereby signified and proclaimed. Thus, in baptism, the element of water <span style="font-style: italic;">signifies</span> the <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span>, which in this case is the word of justification (or participation in the church of Christ).<br /><br />At first glance, Augustine's definition of sacraments as "visible words" seems admirably straightforward, until one realizes that every faction in the history of Western Christianity - regardless of their <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">sacramentology</span></span> - has claimed to be faithful to it. Of course, by the standards of modern ecumenism, this may be considered a good thing; after all, if everyone agrees with Augustine, then perhaps we can leave behind the divisive battles of the past. But, to my way of thinking, such universal consensus merely points to the inadequacy of Augustine's thinking on the sacraments. Any definition that can encompass both Luther's and Zwingli's positions on the Lord's Supper is dangerously vague.<br /><br />The medieval <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">scholastics</span></span> implicitly acknowledged this shortcoming when they introduced a third sacramental reality that is both sign and <span style="font-style: italic;">res (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">et</span></span> res)</span>. This <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">et</span></span> res</span> is most obvious in the case of the Lord's Supper, as concisely described by Robert <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Jenson</span></span> in his <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Systematic-Theology-Triune-God/dp/0195145984/ref=sr_1_1/105-1754538-6563628?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1192902652&sr=1-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Systematic Theology</span></a>:<br /><blockquote>"There are of course many sorts of signifier-signified relations, most of them involving nothing remarkable beyond the wonder of language itself. The relation between the bread and cup as <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">signum</span></span> </span>and Christ's mystical body as <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span> is exceptional in the way called sacramental in that there is a middle reality between what is simply sign and what is simply <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span>; this is the body and blood of Christ. The body and blood are at once <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">et</span></span> res</span>: they are the thing the bread and cup signify but in turn they are signs, the visible Word of God that promises our communion with God and with one another.<br /><br />To be signs Christ's body and blood must be <span style="font-style: italic;">there</span>, available to our apprehension. Yet they are no more apparently present than is the mystical body they signify; they are visible only as the bread and cup that signify them. It is this identify between being visible only as signified and being visibly present so as to signify that makes the peculiar sacramental reality."</blockquote><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Jenson</span></span> thus locates the essence of sacrament in the "middle reality" of the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">et</span></span> res</span>, and he goes on to show how it applies to all traditional sacraments.<br /><br />Of course, this raises the question: why is it necessary to invoke this middle term, the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">et</span></span> res</span>? Why isn't Augustine's definition sufficient? The complete answer to these questions, which I hope to provide in a latter post, is grounded in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Christology</span></span> and our understanding of the incarnation. But suffice it to say, the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">et</span></span> res</span> is essential for any doctrine of the sacraments that affirms the real presence of Christ's body. As <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">Jenson</span></span> puts it, the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">et</span></span> res</span> is the sacrament's true "character," its "potentiality." It is that <span style="font-style: italic;">thing</span> "in, with, and under" the element that makes it an <span style="font-style: italic;">effective</span> sign, and not just a sign. It thus allows the elements to actually "<span style="font-style: italic;">contain </span>the grace they signify" (a formulation from the Council of Trent that Lutherans can also affirm).<br /><br />From this, we can conclude that any account of the sacraments that takes Augustine's definition as exhaustive is bound to end-up with a non-realist (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">Zwinglian</span></span>) <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">sacramentology</span></span>. The common feature of all such teachings is that they dismiss the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">signum</span></span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">et</span></span> res</span>, leaving only the <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">signum</span></span></span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span> of Augustine's <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">formulation</span>. But this <span class="me">vitiates the sacrament.</span> The <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">signum</span></span></span> is inevitably regarded as secondary to the <span style="font-style: italic;">res</span> and eventually the element is trivialized or discarded altogether. It is no wonder, then, that Hermann <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">Sasse</span></span> in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/This-My-Body-Contention-Sacrament/dp/1579107664/ref=sr_1_8/105-1754538-6563628?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1192902705&sr=1-8"><span style="font-style: italic;">This is My Body</span></a> blames Augustine for the anti-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">sacramentalism</span></span> that has been so prevalent in the Reformed tradition from Zwingli to Barth.<br /><br />Much more needs to be said, particularly concerning the intimate connection between the sacraments and the incarnation. But this post is already too long, so it will have to wait.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-17070428919081344852007-10-14T15:59:00.000-05:002007-10-14T18:27:52.013-05:00Jüngel: God's Being is Realized in Contradiction<div style="text-align: justify;">For those of you wondering what I've been doing lately in my free time, I've been working my way through Eberhard Jüngel's <span style="font-style: italic;">Theological Essays II</span>. That partially explains my lack of posting, since, among modern theologians, Jüngel is perhaps the most difficult to blog about. This is due to the depth and rigor of this thought, which is impossible to summarize in short posts, combined with his lackluster prose. Simply put, he's not quotable! Regardless, I would like to discuss some concerns regarding the most thought-provoking essay in the collection: "The Revelation of the Hiddenness of God."<br /><br />Jüngel's goal is to rectify misconceptions regarding the <span style="font-style: italic;">deus absconditus</span> that have historically appeared in Lutheran theology (those familiar with this blog will know that this has also been a concern of mine; see <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/08/god-against-god-in-luthers-theology.html">here </a>and <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/01/luthers-two-theodicies.html">here</a>). Jüngel begins by saying that if God is hidden and dark to us, "it cannot imply that <span style="font-style: italic;">God himself</span> is dark." Instead, God is concealed because he "dwells in unapproachable light" (1 Tim 6.15).<br /><blockquote>"The absolute invisibility of God is, therefore, the expression of the excess of light that God essentially is. This light, one might say, is unbearably intense and blinding in its pure illuminating power. In this light, in the light of his own being, God is not visible, he is hidden. If there is in him an inaccessible depth, it is in no way a dark depth or a murky abyss, but rather the depth of his glory, the unfathomableness of primal light. It is the majesty of God that lets him be hidden for us."</blockquote>Here, Jüngel discredits the notion, which can be traced to Luther, that there exists a terrible and wrathful God behind (or separate from) the God we encounter in Christ. For Jüngel, it is of the utmost importance that the God we meet in Jesus Christ be fully and truly God, such that there is no <span style="font-style: italic;">deus absconditus</span> contrary to this revelation. But, in agreement with Luther, Jüngel argues that it is proper to speak the <span style="font-style: italic;">hidden </span><span style="font-style: italic;">works</span><span style="font-style: italic;"> of God</span>. These alien works of God (<span style="font-style: italic;">opus dei alienum</span>), manifested as wrath, serve the purpose of God's proper works (<span style="font-style: italic;">opus proprium</span>). "The work of God's left hand is always related to the work of God's right hand. God kills so that he can bring to life. Luther can also say: God annihilates, so that he can create the new out of nothingness."<br /><br />It seems to me that Jüngel is walking a thin line here. Is it so easy to separate God's nature from his works? Is it not a contradiction for God to act in a manner "alien" to his being? Jüngel doesn't say, but the issue becomes even more problematic when, drawing on Barth, he writes:<br /><blockquote>"God does not contradict himself... Even in the greatest of all imaginable contradictions, even in the <span style="font-style: italic;">contradiction</span> of eternal life and earthly death [in the crucifixion], God <span style="font-style: italic;">corresponds</span> to himself. The <span style="font-style: italic;">being </span>of God is capable of this contradiction. Indeed, God's being is realized in this contradiction without being destroyed by it. God endures it. And this endurance of the contradiction of life and death is God himself, it is the <span style="font-style: italic;">depth</span> of God's glory."</blockquote>Jüngel seems to be saying that contradictions cannot contradict God because he <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> contradiction. But how is this consistent with the statement of 1 John that "God is light; in him there is no darkness at all", which Jüngel himself cites in the essay? Moreover, how is it compatible with his earlier remark that "if there is in him an inaccessible depth, it is in no way a dark depth or a murky abyss, but rather the depth of his glory, the unfathomableness of primal light"?<br /><br />I'm not convinced that Jüngel's efforts have resulted in a gain over Luther's original position. Luther understood the hiddenness of God under its opposite (the essence of his "theology of the cross") as an inscrutable paradox that could not be resolved dogmatically. But Jüngel, who shares Barth's distrust of paradox, attempts just this. In the end, he merely succeeds in moving Luther's paradox into the very heart of God's being.<br /><br />Interestingly, towards the end of the essay, Jüngel appears to circle back to something akin to Luther's anti-speculative position. He writes:<br /><blockquote>"The ancient need for an <span style="font-style: italic;">explanation</span> of evil and so for a justification of God in the face of evil, the ancient human need not only to pose, but also to solve, the question of theodicy, does not in fact stop outside the sacred halls of dogmatics. Dogmatics cannot ignore this ancient need. But neither can dogmatics satisfy it. And dogmatics should not act as if it could do so. Dogmatics must not even <span style="font-style: italic;">want</span> to satisfy this ancient need."</blockquote>Exactly! But Jüngel then goes on to say :<br /><blockquote>One can only speak of God as the uncompromising enemy of evil. There is only one, but one decisive, connection of God and evil. And that is the cross of Jesus Christ, the fundamental fact of Christian faith: that God <span style="font-style: italic;">conquers</span> evil in that he <span style="font-style: italic;">suffers</span> it himself."</blockquote>Which raises my final question: does God really conquer evil (and death) if evil (and death) become part of the very being of God, even in such a way that they lose their power over humanity? Would it not be better to say that God remains free of contradiction even in the horror of the cross, although this statement involves a seeming paradox?<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-63662095303586905772007-09-29T11:32:00.001-05:002007-09-29T13:05:59.043-05:00A Bitter Brew<div style="text-align: justify;">The Brewers' quest to reach the post-season for the first time since 1982 <a href="http://www.madison.com/tct/sports/248508">is over</a>. Their 6-3 loss to the Padres last night, combined with the Cubs' victory, has eliminated them from contention. Thus ends a season of high hopes that started strong but ended with a series of maddening breakdowns. Now the goal, however pathetic, is to win at least one of their final two games in order to finish with a winning record, something the Brewers franchise hasn't done since 1992.<br /><br />Perhaps I shouldn't feel so disgusted. The future remains bright - they're a young team that will certainly contend for the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">NL</span> Central title next year. But let's review the events of the past 11 days, and maybe you will better understand my smoldering rage:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Sept. 18</span>: The Brewers win their fourth game in the row, a 9-1 trouncing of Houston, and move into a first-place tie with the Cubs. But Ben Sheets, Milwaukee's perpetually injured "ace", leaves the game with tightness in his hamstring. His season is over.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Sept. 22</span>: Against John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Smoltz</span> and the Braves, the Brewers tie the game on J.J. Hardy's two-run homer. In extra innings, Corey Hart leads off the top of the 10<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">th</span> with a solo shot but the Brewers can't get any more, leaving the bases loaded. Then, with two outs in the bottom of the 10<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">th</span>, Brewer's closer Francisco <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Cordero</span> gives up a home run to Scott <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Thorman</span> (average .221!). In the bottom of the 11<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">th</span>, the Braves win thanks to a fielding error by Rickie Weeks. <span style="font-style: italic;"><br /><br />Sept. 23</span>: The Brewer's bullpen suffers another meltdown, surrendering a 4-1 lead by giving up six runs in the 7<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">th</span> and 8<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">th</span> innings. Milwaukee manger Ned <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Yost</span> is thrown out of the game for arguing with the umpires. He would be ejected from two of the next three games, and is currently serving a suspension (<span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">vide</span> infra</span>). The Brewers are now 3.5 games behind of the Cubs.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><br />Sept. 24-25</span>: Milwaukee takes two from the Cardinals in dominating fashion, while the Cubs lose. The gap is closed to 2 games. Do they still have a chance?!<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Sept. 26</span>: No, they do not. Even though the Cubs lose again, the Brewers suffer the most aggravating loss of all. Trailing the Cards 3-2 in the 7<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">th</span> and with one out, idiot manager <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Yost</span> sends in pitcher Seth <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">McClung</span> with orders to drill Albert <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Pujols</span> in the ribs (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">McClung</span> gets this done with one pitch) in retaliation for St. Louis hitting Prince Fielder earlier in the game. Both <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Yost</span> and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">McClung</span> are ejected, and later suspended. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Turnbow</span> relieves <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">McClung</span>, strikes out the first batter, and then forgets where the strike zone is located, eventually walking in a run. The Cards go on to get four runs in the inning, thanks in large part to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">Yost's</span> macho posturing.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Sept. 27-28</span>: Brewers lose badly to the Padres, twice. In the first game, they somehow manage to commit five errors! It's over.... Now all of America gets to cheer for those lovable Cubies (excuse me while I swallow my own vomit).<br /><br />Where do we go from here? Like I said above, this is a team with a bright future, but it's a future that needs to be actualized <span style="font-style: italic;">now</span>. Given the meager size of Milwaukee's payroll, we're not going to be able to keep all these players together for very long. So time is crucial. Hopefully, GM Doug <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">Melvin</span> will acquire some much-needed pitching in the off-season. And another question needs to be answered: is Ned <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">Yost</span> up to the task of leading the Brewers to the post-season? His performance down the stretch has been miserable - clearly, the pressure got to him. So perhaps it's time to make a change. Regardless, it will take a good deal of winter to get this bitter taste out of my mouth.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-43058976765445712462007-09-16T15:17:00.000-05:002007-09-16T15:22:29.022-05:00God's Word in Filthy Language<div style="text-align: justify;">In a previous <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/09/luther-man-between-god-and-devil.html">post</a>, I quoted from <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Heiko</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Oberman's</span> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Luther-Man-Between-God-Devil/dp/0300103131/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-5708575-4409765?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188762661&sr=8-1">biography</a> of Luther to illustrate how the Reformer's frequent talk of the Devil, while often extreme, usually served evangelical purposes. It turns out the same can be said for another of Luther's embarrassing traits: his penchant for <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">scatological</span> language. Indeed, talk of Satan and talk of crap often went hand-in-hand, usually as a way of expressing contempt for the adversary. Once, after professing his faith in Christ, Luther added: "But if that is not enough for you, you Devil, I have also shit and pissed; wipe your mouth on that and take a hearty bite." As <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Oberman</span> writes, "Luther's language is so physical and earthy that in his wrathful scorn he can give the Devil 'a fart for a staff': You, Satan, Antichrist, or pope, can lean on it, a stinking nothing... A figure of respect, be he Devil or pope, is effectively unmasked if he can be shown with his pants down."<br /><br />Luther's filthy language undoubtedly had something to do with his physical ailments. He suffered frequently from constipation, hemorrhoids and perhaps anal fissures. He once wrote to a friend that "after five days of constipation his bowel movement had caused him such pain 'that I nearly gave up the ghost - and now, bathed in blood, can find no peace. What took four days to heal immediately tears open again."<br /><br />Most shocking of all, perhaps, is Luther's claim that he had his Reformation breakthrough while sitting on the toilet: "The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Spiritus</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Sanctus</span> gave me this realization in the <a href="http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cloaca">cloaca</a>." Catholic polemicists have seized on this comment as proof of Luther's depravity, and Protestant apologists have tried to explain it by saying he didn't mean the actual toilet, merely the study in the tower above it. But <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Oberman</span> insists that we take Luther at his word:<br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><blockquote>"The cloaca is not just a privy, it is the most degrading place for man and the Devil's favorite habitat. Medieval monks already knew this, but the Reformer knows even more now: it is right here that we have Christ; the mighty helper, on our side. No spot is unholy for the Holy Ghost; this is the very place to express contempt for the adversary through trust in Christ crucified... Luther attests to the birth of Christ in the filth of this world. The Son of God was truly born into the flesh, into the blood and sweat of man. He understood men because He experienced - to the bitter end - what it meant to be human."</blockquote></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Luther was not some 16<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">th</span>-century Lyndon Johnson, using crude language to humiliate and intimidate. Instead, his goal was to express the profound earthiness of Christianity, the supreme <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">condescension</span> of God Incarnate who is "with us in mud and in work, so that his skin smokes." As Hamann understood well, God's Word often appears in filthy and vulgar language: "How the Holy Spirit humbled himself when he recorded the most trivial, and the most contemptible events on earth, revealing to man in his own language, in his own transactions, in his own ways, the mysteries and the ways of the deity."</div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-68550994059768322782007-09-08T11:56:00.000-05:002007-09-08T16:17:32.352-05:00Denominations: What are they good for?<div style="text-align: justify;">This is a bit belated, but D.W. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Congdon</span> has a must-read <a href="http://fireandrose.blogspot.com/2007/09/pet-de-catholicization-of-church.html">post</a> at <a href="http://fireandrose.blogspot.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Fire and the Rose</span></a> on the future of Protestant denominations. It is no secret that the Protestant churches are in crisis, both here in America and abroad. D.W. cites Bruce <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">McCormack</span>, who has written that "if current rates of decline in membership continue, all that will be left by mid-century will be Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and non-denominational evangelical churches... The churches of the Reformation will have passed from the scene – and with their demise, there will be no obvious institutional bearers of the message of the Reformation." A chilling thought!!<br /><br />What I find so valuable about D.W.'s post is that he locates the problem in worship and tradition, not theology (although he admits that the two issues are not unrelated). Simply put, the established Protestant churches have failed to "inculcate an <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">ecclesial</span> tradition." I couldn't agree more. What's missing from many Protestant churches is anything distinctive, anything to give their members a unique identity. Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, and others have all merged into a bland, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">homogeneous</span> soup. These denominations have different histories and theologies, but most members aren't aware of these differences since they rarely manifest themselves on Sundays.<br /><br />D.W. helpfully identifies five means by which traditions have historically been preserved in Protestant churches: sacraments, liturgies, catechisms, confessions, and hymns. All five have been <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">marginalized</span> in recent decades - the sacraments ignored or trivialized, liturgies radically <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">revised</span> or discarded, catechisms not used for the young, confessions unread and unknown, and hymns replaced by contemporary praise songs. To borrow Tillich's terms, gone is both "Protestant principle" (in the form of catechisms and confessions) and "Catholic substance" (in the form of sacraments and liturgies). It's no wonder that the churches are emptying. Of course, it's possible that this decline can be reversed but I'm not sure the leaders of mainline churches are up to the task. In their urge to be relevant, they keep repeating the same mistakes. They don't understand that the way forward requires going back to the past and reclaiming the traditions that have been lost.<br /><br />In the end, it may prove impossible to save the "denomination" precisely because it's not worth saving. It's an artificial concept that emerged fairly recently and only in the American context. Moreover, it's profoundly uninspiring - who wants to be a member of a mere denomination when they can be part of <span>The Church</span>. That's why I've always been attracted to Robert <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Jenson's</span> notion of Lutheranism as "a confessing movement within the church catholic." This movement transcends the boundaries of any particular denomination and has no existence apart from the universal church. Denominations are at most emergency institutions with penultimate significance. So perhaps we should shed no tears at their demise. But the question remains: can the confessing movement known as Lutheranism survive in America without them?<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-8320917641673106552007-09-02T13:51:00.000-05:002007-09-02T15:38:45.453-05:00Luther: Man Between God and the Devil<div style="text-align: justify;">On <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><a href="http://derevth.blogspot.com/">WTM</a>'s</span> recommendation, I've been reading <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Heiko</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Oberman's</span> impressive biography <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Luther-Man-Between-God-Devil/dp/0300103131/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-5708575-4409765?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188762661&sr=8-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Luther: Man Between God and the Devil</span>.</a> As the title implies, Luther's vivid conception of the Devil figures prominently in the book, perhaps because one of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Oberman's</span> goals is to present Luther in all of his glorious strangeness. Here we do not encounter the tame and enlightened Luther of latter Protestant hagiography, but the bold, brilliant, shocking, and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">apocalyptic</span> monk who turned Christendom upside-down. Regarding Luther and the Devil, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Oberman</span> writes:<br /><blockquote>"Luther's world of thought is wholly distorted and apologetically misconstrued if his conception of the Devil is dismissed as a medieval phenomenon and only his faith in Christ retained as relevant or as the only decisive factor. Christ and the Devil were equally real to him: one was the perpetual intercessor for Christianity, the other a menace to mankind till the end. To argue that Luther never overcame the medieval belief in the Devil says far too little; he even <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">intensified</span> it and lent to it additional urgency: Christ and Satan wage a cosmic war for mastery over Church and world. No one can evade involvement in this struggle...<br /><br />"There is no way to grasp Luther's milieu of experience and faith unless one has an acute sense of his view of Christian existence between God and the Devil: without a recognition of Satan's power, belief in Christ is reduced to an idea about Christ - and Luther's faith becomes a confused delusion in keeping with the tenor of the time."</blockquote> It's not surprising that latter generations of Lutherans have often been <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">embarrassed</span> by Luther's apparent obsession with the Devil. He sometimes sounds like one of those paranoid street-corner preachers who see the Devil everywhere. For modern folks, the Devil is either <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">nonexistent</span> or understood in a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">thoroughly</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">demythologized</span> way. Thus, Luther's worldview is bound to regarded as strange at best and dangerous at worst. After all, wasn't fear of the Devil behind all of those gory <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">witchhunts</span>? But <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Oberman</span> is quite sympathetic towards Luther on this point. He stresses that Luther's talk of the Devil was usually done, not to terrify, but to comfort; i<span>t served evangelical and pastoral purposes</span>. Take the following passage from Luther's <span style="font-style: italic;">Table Talk</span>:<br /><blockquote>"[Luther said:] When I awoke last night, the Devil came and wanted to debate with me; he rebuked and reproached me, arguing that I was a sinner. To this I replied: Tell me something new, Devil! I already know that perfectly well; I have committed many a solid and real sin. Indeed there must be good honest sins - not fabricated and invented ones - for God to forgive for God's beloved Son's sake, who took all of my sins upon Him so that now the sins I have committed are no longer mine but belong to Christ. This wonderful gift of God I am not prepared to deny, but want to acknowledge and confess."</blockquote>To which <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Oberman</span> writes: "Luther's purpose is not to spread fear but to strengthen the resistance of the faithful.... As a rule [these stories of the Devil] have a point to make: the reporting of battles past is to instruct and prepare the younger generation for the prospect of the fierce opposition which will always threaten the preaching of Gospel... They are not meant as horror stories to keep the overly audacious in line but as consolation and strength to timid and tired souls."<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Oberman</span> assumes that modern people are no longer capable of taking the Devil seriously, at least not to same extent as Luther. Satan's gone and he's not coming back. Which raises an interesting question for Lutheranism today: given the centrality of the Devil to Luther's thinking, are we really capable of understanding this man? More importantly, is <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Oberman</span> right is saying that "without a recognition of Satan's power, belief in Christ is reduced to an idea about Christ"? Is there any way to reclaim Luther's understanding of the Devil for the present age that isn't unbearably offensive?<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-37138607267610569302007-08-27T17:07:00.000-05:002007-09-02T17:48:34.088-05:00Evangelicals Head East<div style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">A recent <a href="http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20070827&s=zengerle082707">article</a> in the <a href="http://www.tnr.com/"><i>New Republic</i></a> - strangely entitled “The Iconoclasts” - discusses the growing number of American evangelicals who have converted to Eastern Orthodoxy. While the author of the piece, <span class="author">Jason <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Zengerle</span>, expects us to be amazed by his findings, </span>nothing in the article will come as a shock to those who pay attention to the religious scene in America.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>The Orthodox Church has gained a number of high-profile converts from Protestantism over the past few decades and it appears that the trend is only accelerating.<span style="font-size:0;"> </span>Not surprisingly, when asked to explain their decisions, most of the coverts in the article cited their dissatisfaction with the insipid liturgies and anti-intellectualism of American <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">evangelical</span> churches, as well as their belief that the Orthodox Church comes closest to replicating the early church.</div><p class="MsoNormal" style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">The article is most interesting when it discusses the trend towards Orthodoxy from a political angle:</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"></p><blockquote><p class="MsoNormal" style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Although the culture wars seem like a staple of evangelical life, the converts suggest that there is a growing fatigue with this worldly fight. One of the more striking things about the Orthodox Church is that it's not very political. That's not to say it isn't conservative. "As Orthodox, we don't believe that being gay is a legitimate alternative lifestyle, we believe it's an aberration. We also say abortion is murder," says <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Gillquist</span>. But, unlike in many evangelical churches, these views--while strongly held--tend not to come up in the course of worship. As Daniel <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Larison</span>, a conservative writer and Orthodox convert who attends a Russian Orthodox Church in Chicago, says, "As a general rule, the sermons are going to be related to the gospel and that's about it. Political themes and political ideas don't come into sermons directly. That's not why people are there. They want to keep that as far away as possible."</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">And, by keeping it far away, the Orthodox Church has been immune to the social and political conflicts that frequently flare up in the Anglican and Catholic Churches, where disaffected evangelicals once typically sought refuge. "In the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant Church, there's a lot of dialogue with the culture: For instance, what do we do with the whole creation versus evolution thing? Where does science play in?" says Andrew Henderson, an evangelical-turned-Anglican who recently converted to Orthodox Christianity and worships at Holy Transfiguration. "In the Orthodox Church, with that Eastern mindset that's just so ancient, those questions haven't really arisen. It just isn't a concern."</p></blockquote><p class="MsoNormal" style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">I’m intrigued by that last statement – “<i>those questions haven't really arisen</i>.” Does he mean to say that things move so slowly in the Orthodox Church that issues like homosexuality, evolution, and women’s ordination just haven’t come up? If this is the case, I can understand the appeal of a church that is so isolated and so consumed with the gospel that it hasn't gotten around to fighting the culture wars. But with so many outsiders moving in, I wonder how long this "splendid isolation" will last.Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-25523271755104326572007-08-24T11:29:00.000-05:002007-08-24T17:43:20.464-05:00Mother Theresa and Doubt<div style="text-align: justify;">As the <span style="font-style: italic;">Guardian</span> regularly makes sport of religion (and Christianity, in <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">particular</span>), I guess I <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">shouldn</span>’t be surprised by the inane <a href="http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/andrew_brown/2007/08/was_mother_teresa_an_atheist.html">column</a> that appeared today, where Andrew Brown <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">asks</span> the question, “Was Mother Theresa an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Atheist</span>?”.<span style=""> </span><span style=""> </span>The basis for this <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">provocative</span> title are some <a href="http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1655415,00.html">recently publicized letters</a> in which the saint describes her crisis of faith.<span style=""> </span>Brown writes: “Even as she was receiving the Nobel prize, she asked her confessor to pray for her because she could feel nothing when she prayed herself and no longer had any experience of God.” He cites the following letter, written at her confessor's request, in which he claims that Mother Theresa “sounds like an adolescent <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Dawkins</span>”:</div><p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><strong><span style="font-weight: normal;"></span></strong></p><blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;"><strong><span style="font-weight: normal;">‘I call, I cling, I want ... and there is no One to answer ... no One on Whom I can cling ... no, No One. Alone ... Where is my Faith ... even deep down right in there is nothing, but emptiness & darkness ... My God ... how painful is this unknown pain ... I have no Faith ... I dare not utter the words & thoughts that crowd in my heart ... & make me suffer untold agony.</span></strong><strong><span style="font-weight: normal;"><br /><br />'So many unanswered questions live within me afraid to uncover them ... because of the blasphemy ... If there be God ... please forgive me ... When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives & hurt my very soul. I am told God loves me ... and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul.’"</span></strong></div></blockquote><strong><span style="font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></strong><p></p><div style="text-align: justify;"> (How does this sound like <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Dawkins</span> at all?<span style=""> </span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Dawkins</span> has never experienced the “dark night of the soul” – his faith in Reason is far too strong for that. Who could ever imagine him saying, “If there be God ... please forgive me”?). <span style=""> </span>Regardless, from this quote Brown concludes that Theresa was a full-blown atheist, and thus nothing but a hypocrite and a fraud (although he admires her determination to stick with an institution that she no longer believed in).<span style=""> </span>He even mocks her earlier professions of faith, saying that her talk of a “union” with Christ “seems to have come from a bodice-ripper.”<span style=""> </span>Clearly, Brown is aroused by his <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">irreverent</span> tone and shocking language; he perhaps imagines himself brave, although he is merely engaging in adolescent iconoclasm.<br /><br />Brown is most surprised that “the letters have not been revealed by one of her avowed enemies, like Christopher <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Hitchens</span>, but by the man who is responsible for promoting her canonization, the Rev Brian <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Kolodiejchuk</span>.”<span style=""> </span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Shouldn</span>’t the Catholic Church be scandalized by these professions of doubt?<span style=""> </span>After all, it turns out that one of their star players was really a double-agent, working for the other side.<span style=""> </span>But apparently the Church is taking it <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">all in</span> stride; indeed, some in the Church say that "it will give a whole new dimension to the way that people understand her<span style="">." </span>Brown concludes:<span style=""> </span>“Only the most hardened atheists will not be shocked by the ease with which the Catholic church has assimilated the news that its most famous saint thought of herself as a hypocrite when she talked about the love of God.”<br /><br />But this goes to show that Brown understands nothing about the nature of real faith.<span style=""> </span>For him, any <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">expression</span> of doubt indicates that the so-called believer is really just an atheist who is lying to themselves.<span style=""> </span>The <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">slightest</span> wavering and your faith is a lie, as true faith necessarily excludes doubt.<span style=""> </span>But Christians have always understood doubt to be a integral part of faith (see my previous post on this topic <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/03/doubt-ignorance-and-faith.html">here</a>).<span style=""> </span>Mother Theresa continued to trust Christ even when she <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">couldn</span>’t trust herself.<span style=""> </span>This is not so unusual. God’s <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">hiddenness</span> has been experienced by nearly all “great” Christians through history (just think of Luther, to name one), and, most significantly, Christ himself felt forsaken by God on the Cross.<span style=""> </span>So why should it be any surprise that this saint was granted the opportunity to follow Him into the darkness of faith? <span style=""> </span><span style=""> </span><strong><span style="font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></strong></div><span style=""> </span>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-23237628995834226952007-08-19T15:33:00.000-05:002007-08-21T10:04:52.218-05:00Oswald Bayer: Faith and Lamentation<div style="text-align: justify;">In my last post, I mentioned that for Luther faith means "against God to force its way through to God and call upon God, ... to break through to God through his wrath, through his punishment, and through his disfavor." I take this to mean that one must <span style="font-style: italic;">strive</span> with God, wrestling with him until he gives us a blessing. As the Lutheran theologian Oswald Bayer writes in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Living-Faith-Justification-Sanctification-Quarterly/dp/0802839878/ref=sr_1_1/105-9234944-6422840?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187559748&sr=8-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Living by Faith</span></a>: "Faith does not conduct a debate <span style="font-style: italic;">about</span> God and God's righteousness, as does the natural, the redeemed, or the presumably already glorified reason before its own forum. It conducts a dispute <span style="font-style: italic;">with</span> God in prayer and lament." Indeed, Bayer understands lament against God as one of the most profound expressions of faith. This is because the foundation of lament is belief in the essential goodness of God and his creation:<br /><blockquote>"Lament is only possible because of the promise that it will be heard. Without promise there is no cause for lamentation... Lament is an eminent way of perceiving and experiencing the world. For it never surrenders the faith that the creation is 'very good,' nor does it make evil and suffering harmless, regarding them as nothing. In lament pain is felt in all its profundity. Our most profound testing is that God, who has promised us life and external communion, who has guaranteed them, is still the God who does not lament death or destroy it, but who is at work in life and death and all things."</blockquote>Faith allows space for lamentation, but comprehensive systems do not. Here, Bayer contrasts the theodicies of Hegel and Luther. Hegel's "contemplative theodicy" tries to rationalize evil, to locate its place in the larger picture in such a way that it serves the greater good. In the System, "the misery and suffering of this world are ultimately regarded as irrelevant. This contemplative theodicy supposes the painful difference between the promise of life and all that contradicts it to be already resolved. The passion of lament, which perceives this difference, dissolves and gives way to 'the passionless stillness of knowledge that only thinks'." Suffering is not real or serious for Hegel - it's merely a principle. By contrast,<br /><blockquote>"Luther never downplays or treats as harmless the situation of temptation and testing when God withdraws and conceals himself. He confronts it in all its depth and sharpness. He does not ignore experiences of suffering. Yet he refuses to accept their finality. He flees from the hidden God to the revealed and incarnate God. He presses on 'toward God and even against him calls upon him.'"</blockquote>It seems to me that the spirit of striving and lamentation are sorely lacking today. Not that there is no suffering in the world -there surely is, often on an unprecedented scale. It's just that most people, whether they believe in God or not, have their preferred method of explaining away evil and suffering. Even in the church, there is a sense that we should never protest against God, that God is our friend and he only wants the best for us. Like Hegel's system, our theologies absolve God and try to erase the pain by explaining that "it's all for the best." But this is simply not biblical (just read the book of Job!).<br /><br />Bayer's book reminds us that "Luther's Reformation theology does not mean to justify the world as it is." Honest Christians are compelled to admit that "we cannot demonstrate the goodness and the love of God... The nexus of the world [is] no nexus at all, but foremost an embattled and lacerated world in which creation is 'rent and torn from top to bottom.' There is no agreement, no harmony in the world. It rings out like 'cracked bells.'" Such a world requires faith <span style="font-style: italic;">and</span> lamentation. It requires that we strive with God, holding fast to existence and remaining in the flux, accepting both joy and suffering from his hand, and trusting his promises in Christ.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-37630125081696269312007-08-18T13:31:00.000-05:002007-08-18T16:42:57.172-05:00"God Against God" in Luther's Theology<div style="text-align: justify;">In an effort to get back to basics, I'm currently reading Paul <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Althaus's</span></span> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Theology-Martin-Luther-Paul-Althaus/dp/0800618556/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/105-9234944-6422840?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187462042&sr=8-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Theology of Martin Luther</span></a>. I would recommend this book for two reasons. First, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Althaus</span></span> was a Luther scholar of the first rank and he presents the various facets of Luther's theology in a clear and comprehensive manner - no easy task given the notoriously complex and unwieldy nature of Luther's thought. Secondly, he always supports his statements with extensive quotations from the Reformer's writings and sermons, both in the main text and in footnotes. Thus, the book serves as a sort of condensed version of the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Weimar</span></span> Edition, and is a handy reference for anyone (like me) who is always saying, "I know that Luther said such and such, but I'm not exactly sure how or where...".<br /><br />Reading this book has certainly heightened my admiration for Luther's theology, but it has also reminded me of some of its problematic aspects. I found the chapter "Man Between God and Satan" particularly difficult, not because my modern mind has trouble believing that the devil exists, but because of what it implies for Luther's doctrine of God. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Althaus</span></span> stresses that Luther took the devil seriously in a way that exceeded the medieval tradition: "Luther's devil has, one might say, more hellish majesty than the medieval devil; he has become more serious, more powerful, and more terrible." This was borne out of his personal experience; Luther once remarked that "by the grace of God, I have learned to know a great deal about Satan." <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Althaus</span></span> makes it clear that Luther conceived of the world as a battlefield between God and Satan, with humanity as the prize: "God and the devil are fighting for men, for humanity and for the lordship. Here there is no neutrality, no buffer state."<br /><br />Thus "the devil stands in opposition to God." But this isn't the end of the story. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Althaus</span></span> continues:<br /><blockquote>"Although [Satan's] power and his claim are so great that he can be called the 'god of this world,' there is never any doubt that only the true God is God. Luther holds dualism within the boundaries set by God's omnipotence, which works all in all. This means that the devil must still serve God's will for men and for the world - in spite of the fact that his will and activity are directed against God. God keeps him in his service and uses him for his own work. He uses him primarily as the tool of his wrath. As Luther wrote, "God indeed uses the devil to afflict and kill us. But the devil cannot do this if God does not want sin to be punished in this way." What God's wrath does and what Satan does frequently appear to be one and the same. The devil is 'God's devil.' And yet at the same time he remains the devil, the enemy of God, who wants the opposite of what God wants."<br /></blockquote>It's passages like these that set my head spinning. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Althaus</span></span> himself admits that this aspect of Luther's thought is highly contradictory. Yet we dare not back away from the implications of God being God. "It is God himself who lets us die: 'Thou <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">causest</span></span> men to die.' In death man has to do with God. Under no circumstances may he attribute misfortune and death to some other demonic power. To do that would be to deny the unity of God."<br /><br />But it is precisely the unity of God that seems to be compromised by this line of thought. Luther seems to require a dualism in the nature of God. This is evident is his distinction between the "alien" and "proper" work of God: "God uses Satan for his 'alien work' (<span style="font-style: italic;">opus <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">alienum</span></span></span>) but in so doing is always aiming at his proper work (<span style="font-style: italic;">opus <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">proprium</span></span></span>)... God uses misfortune, suffering of body and soul, and death in order to humble those who belong to him and to lead them from trust in something earthly to trust in him alone." Thus, God often acts in a manner contrary to his own nature. Indeed, although "wrath is the undeniable <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">reality</span> between God and [man], it is false to speak of God's wrath as though it were an essential part of God's true being." But this begs the question: how can God act in manner contrary to his own being? Is his wrath real, or is his love only perceived as wrath by a sinful humanity?<br /><br />This is the "God against God" motif in Luther's thought. And like all aspect of Luther's theology, it is situated in a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">christological</span> framework. It is Christ who reconciles the division within God: "Christ acts in the name and in the power of God in such a way that he not only deals with humanity and the powers to which it has succumbed but also with God himself. He acts also in relationship to God; he 'reconciles' God, or we may also say, he reconciles humanity with God (Luther uses the expression interchangeably). God in Christ deals also with himself, in himself, and in an inner <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">trinitarian</span> relationship." Luther makes this very clear in a dramatic passage from <span style="font-style: italic;">Bondage of the Will</span>. Reflecting on Christ's weeping over the lost in Jerusalem (Matt 23:37: 'O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together and thou wouldst not'), Luther writes:<br /><blockquote>"Here, God Incarnate says: 'I would, and thou wouldst not.' God Incarnate, I repeat, was sent for this purpose, to will, say, do, suffer, and offer to all men, all that is necessary for salvation; albeit He offends many who, being abandoned or hardened by God's secret will of Majesty, do not receive Him thus willing, speaking, doing, and offering.... It belongs to the same God Incarnate to weep, lament, and groan over the perdition of the ungodly, though that will of Majesty purposely leaves and reprobates some to perish. Nor is it for us to ask why He does so, but to stand in awe of God Who can do, and wills to do, such things."<br /></blockquote>Here, Luther seems to be teaching that the will of God Incarnate is opposed to the will of God in his Majesty; or, said another way, that the revealed God and the hidden God are not necessarily the same thing. God the Son wants to save all, while God the Father condemns many. Such comments, if understood metaphysically (that is, as objective statements about the nature of God), would be highly unorthodox.* But it would be wrong to construe Luther this way. As I have discussed <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/01/luthers-two-theodicies.html">elsewhere</a>, Luther is (usually) not interested in providing a comprehensive doctrine of God or a system that nicely resolves the thorny problems of free-will, evil, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">predestination</span>, etc. Instead, he gives us a theology "from below", one that, through faith, is able to live with the paradoxes. Luther writes in <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">BotW</span></span> that "God in His own nature and majesty is to be left alone; in this regard, we have nothing to do with Him, nor does He wish us to deal with him. We have to do with him as clothed and displayed in his Word, by which He presents himself to us." Faith means "against God to force its way through to God and call upon God, ... to break through to God through his wrath, through his punishment, and through his disfavor." The God that is against God and humanity is ultimately the God "for us" in Christ. Only faith in Christ is able to perceive this.<br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><br />* With regards to this matter, I recommend an old <a href="http://threehierarchies.blogspot.com/2005/08/tulip-and-gods-universal-salvific-will.html">post</a> by Chris Atwood at <a href="http://threehierarchies.blogspot.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Three Hierarchies</span></a> in which he defends Luther's position against a Calvinist critic. </span><br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-14429132249149171482007-08-12T21:27:00.000-05:002007-08-13T22:41:14.135-05:00The Lutheran Canon<div style="text-align: justify;">Last week, Edward T. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Oakes</span> wrote an interesting <a href="http://www.firstthings.com/onthesquare/?p=818">article</a> for <span style="font-style: italic;">First Things</span> about the nature and role of <span style="font-style: italic;">canons</span>. He made the valid point that canons are <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">indispensable</span> in any field, despite efforts by <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">postmodernists</span> to dismiss the very idea of the canon as hegemonic and imperialist. He also mentioned his candidates for various canons - theological, philosophical, and literary - and remarked on their differing criterion for admittance (style is crucial for the literary canon, whereas orthodoxy is decisive for the theological). It's a fascinating subject, one that appeals to my need to classify and delimit, to formulate my "best of" list.<br /><br />Of course, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Oakes's</span> piece got me thinking about the Lutheran canon. What theologians (other than Luther) and books (other than the <span style="font-style: italic;">Book of Concord)</span> are central to Lutheran self-understanding? Who is on the Lutheran All-Star team? At first I thought it would be easy to answer such questions, but I soon realized that it was no easy task. Indeed, it became apparent that the composition of the Lutheran canon would be a contentious issue, one that would easily divide along denominational lines. We can all agree, of course, that Luther is the standard-bearer of our theology, but who are Luther's true successors? Questions like these have divided Lutherans from the very beginning.<br /><br />After <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">writing</span> down a few names, I concluded that "canonical Lutherans" can essentially be divided into two lineages, with Luther as their common ancestor. Here's my preliminary list,* which includes Lutherans from every century except our current one (the verdict is still out on living theologians). Please feel free to suggest additions and/or subtractions:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Group 1</span>: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Melanchthon</span> (1497-1560), Martin <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Chemnitz</span> (1522-1586), C.F.W. Walther (1811-1887), Werner <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Elert</span> (1885-1954).<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Group 2</span>: Philip Jacob <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Spener</span> (1635-1705), Johann Georg <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Hamann</span> (1730-1788), <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Soren</span> Kierkegaard (1813-1855), Paul Tillich (1886-1965), Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945).<br /><br />The two groups can perhaps be labeled "insiders" and "outsiders", although some may call the latter group "confessional". Another distinction might be "<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">pietist</span>" (or "existential") versus "orthodox", although this is also imperfect. Regardless, members of Group 2 were typically devout Christians raised in Lutheran countries who often clashed with the established church of their day (Kierkegaard is the classic example). These thinkers were unmistakably Lutheran in their theological orientation, but they were in no sense trying to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">repristinate</span> Luther's theology. They admired Luther but did not feel beholden to him. In contrast, those in Group 1 were determined to preserve the "pure doctrine" of the Reformation. They viewed their task as principally one of expounding upon what had already been perfectly revealed in Scripture and the confessions - style was less important than a clear and forceful exposition of the faith.<br /><br />Readers of this blog should not be <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">surprised</span> to learn that I am most drawn to the "outsiders" wing of the Lutheran canon - Kierkegaard and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Hamann</span> are particular favorites of mine. It is also this group that has received the most attention from non-Lutherans, perhaps because they better capture the boldness and excitement of Luther's theology, if not always the exact content. But I really believe that the two groups need each other, since they represent the tension that is always present in Lutheran theology between radicalism and conservatism. As I've mentioned <a href="http://woauthority.blogspot.com/2007/02/our-perpetual-identity-crisis.html">before</a>, this tension can be traced back to Luther himself, who led a very conservative Reformation with one foot in the Catholic Church and one foot outside. But it's my belief that this incongruity has contributed to the incredible richness of Lutheran theology.<br /><br />* I have deliberately left Lutheran church historians and biblical scholars off the list, although Bultmann and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Harnack</span> would probably make many people's list of most influential Lutherans. I also omitted philosophers that had been heavily influenced by Lutheran theology, such as Hegel and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Nietzsche</span>. Finally, I did not include <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">musicians</span>, although some would say that J.S. Bach is the greatest Lutheran to have ever graced our planet.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-17388323986890075402007-07-23T14:45:00.000-05:002007-07-23T17:10:15.366-05:00Tunnel of Love: An Appreciation<div style="text-align: justify;">Sorry for the lack of posts, but I've been in Vienna for the past 11 days attending a scientific conference. I could write about my trip, but since I generally find peoples' travel stories quite boring, it would be hypocritical of me to do so. Suffice it to say that Vienna is lovely town, albeit somewhat staid - almost like a fine museum.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1gG8BIZoLSaAaM3mYnwsaT5Ikan1XBJQtr1UEfCoKTV5RuUZZGhm-K8-6cxbP8ONQC4QTpWYVtV3_wXs_uiUi4ukfU9o5fVrVzJnfipEDtuI-Ho_rHCW9ZLZxuSPvvGpw9RWdWw/s1600-h/tunneloflove.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1gG8BIZoLSaAaM3mYnwsaT5Ikan1XBJQtr1UEfCoKTV5RuUZZGhm-K8-6cxbP8ONQC4QTpWYVtV3_wXs_uiUi4ukfU9o5fVrVzJnfipEDtuI-Ho_rHCW9ZLZxuSPvvGpw9RWdWw/s320/tunneloflove.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5090501165912925682" border="0" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Instead, I'll write about something completely different. Before heading off to Europe, I loaded Bruce Springsteen's <span style="font-style: italic;">Tunnel of Love</span> onto my mp3 player and I listened to it repeatedly during the trip. I've owned this album for a long time, but it had been awhile since I'd given it close attention. Simply put, I had forgotten how masterful this album is, and I feel compelled now to sing its praises. Released a few years after the mega-success of <span style="font-style: italic;">Born in the USA</span>, <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">ToL</span></span> was greeted with coolness from critics and disappointment from fans. The songs were too inward, too stripped-down. Where were the rock anthems? But the album has aged well. If nothing else, <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">ToL</span></span> proves that <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Springsteen</span> is not only a great singer and artist, but a great human being. No other album so clearly displays his compassion and sincerity, his depth of feeling, his desire to do good.<br /><br />It's important to remember that the album was written during Springsteen's falling-out with his first wife. Yet we hear none of the angry rants so typical of break-up albums. Instead, Springsteen puts the blame squarely on himself. He thought he knew himself, he thought he knew what committed love was all about. But it has all turned into a hall of mirrors, where "the house is haunted and the ride gets rough" ("Tunnel of Love"). In "Brilliant Disguise" he sings:<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><blockquote>Now look at me baby, struggling to do everything right<br />And then it all falls apart, when out go the lights<br />I'm just a lonely pilgrim, I walk this world in wealth<br />I want to know if it's you I don't trust,<br />'cause I damn sure don't trust myself...<br /><br />Tonight our bed is cold, I'm lost in the darkness of our love<br />God have mercy on the man, who doubts what he's sure of</blockquote></div>The last verse is simply heartbreaking, and the same theme is repeated in "One Step Up" (the highpoint of the album, in my opinion):<br /><blockquote>I'm <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">sittin</span>' here in this bar tonight, but all I'm <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">thinkin</span>' is<br />I'm the same old story same old act, One step up and two steps back<br /><br />It's the same thing night on night, who's wrong baby who's right<br />Another fight and I slam the door on,<br />another battle in our dirty little war<br />When I look at myself I don't see the man I wanted to be<br />Somewhere along the line I slipped off track<br />I'm caught <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">movin</span>' one step up and two steps back<br /><br />There's a girl across the bar, I get the message she's <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">sendin</span>'<br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Mmm</span> she ain't <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">lookin</span>' to married, And me well honey I'm pretending<br />Last night I dreamed I held you in my arms, the music was never-ending<br />We danced as the evening sky faded to black<br />One step up and two steps back</blockquote>Notice the abrupt transition in the last verse from the temptation of the "girl across the bar" to the longing for a fading love. This is real despair from a man who is not sure if he can find his way back to the man he wanted to be. Indeed, the pervasive emotion expressed by Springsteen in <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">ToL</span></span> is existential fear - fear of losing his marriage, fear of losing himself. His psyche is fractured and confused (see "Two Faces") and he prays for "the strength to walk like a man." Given all this, it's not surprising that the album is filled with religious overtones. In "Valentine's Day", for example, Springsteen has an experience of God's light that grants a rebirth from darkness to new life: <blockquote>They say if you die in your dreams you really die in your bed<br />But honey last night I dreamed my eyes rolled straight back in my head<br />And God's light came <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">shinin</span>' on through<br />I woke up in the darkness scared and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">breathin</span>' and born anew<br />It wasn't the cold river bottom I felt rushing over me<br />It wasn't the bitterness of a dream that didn't come true<br />It wasn't the wind in the grey fields I felt rushing through my arms<br />No no baby it was you<br />So hold me close honey say you're forever mine<br />And tell me you'll be my lonely valentine<br /></blockquote>In my humble opinion, <span style="font-style: italic;">ToL</span> conveys the grief of a lost marriage in a way surpassed only by Dylan's <span style="font-style: italic;">Blood on the Tracks</span> (which also contains plenty of Christian/religious imagery). Given that few albums treat love and marriage with such maturity and insight, I'm amazed that it remains somewhat overlooked in the Springsteen <span style="font-style: italic;">corpus</span>.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-4624141284549055902007-07-04T00:16:00.000-05:002007-07-04T00:25:56.202-05:00Fourth of July<div style="text-align: justify;">In Garrison Keillor's book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/We-Are-Still-Married-Stories/dp/0140131566/ref=pd_bbs_2/102-6148983-1437737?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1183525726&sr=1-2"><span style="font-style: italic;">We Are Still Married</span></a>, there is a short essay that has always been a special favorite of mine. It's entitled "Laying on Our Backs Looking Up at the Stars" and I try to read it every Fourth of July. Given our current <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">situation</span>, I think it's especially important to do so this year.<br /><br />The story recounts a Fourth of July that Garrison spent with friends and family at his rented farmhouse in central Minnesota:<br /><blockquote>On the Fourth of July, 1971, we had twenty people come for a picnic in the yard, an Olympic egg toss and gunnysack race, a softball game with the side of the barn for a right-field fence, and that night we sat around the kitchen and made pizza and talked about the dismal future.<br /><br />America was trapped in Vietnam, a tragedy, and how could it end if not in holocaust? We were pessimists; we needed fear to make us feel truly alive. We talked about death. We put on loud music and made lavish pizzas with fresh mushrooms and onions, zucchini, eggplant, garlic, green pepper, and drank beer and talked about the end of life on earth with a morbid piety that made a person sick, about racial hatred, pesticides, radiation, television, the stupidity of politicians, and whether Vietnam was the result of strategic mistakes or a reflection of evil in American culture. It was a conversation with concrete shoes.<br /></blockquote>No doubt similar conversations will be taking place all across America this Fourth of July. But Garrison did not indulge his "morbid piety". Instead, he <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">snuck</span> outside with his son and a few friends to lie in the grass and look at the stars:<br /><blockquote>The sight of the sky was so stunning it make us drunk. I felt as if I could put one foot forward and walk away from the wall of ground at my back and hike out toward Andromeda. I didn't feel <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">particularly</span> American. Out there in the Milky Way and the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">world</span> without end Amen, America was a tiny speck of a country, a nickel tossed into the Grand <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Canyon</span>, and American culture the amount of the Pacific Ocean you bring home in your <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">swimsuit</span>. The President wasn't the President out there, the Constitution was only a paper, and what the newspapers wrote about was sawdust and coffee grounds. The light I saw was from fires burning before America existed, when my ancestor John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Crandall</span> lived in the colony of Rhode Island. Looking out there, my son lying on my chest, I could imagine my grandchildren, and they were more real to me than Congress.<br /><br />I imagined them strong and free, curious, sensual, indelibly cheerful and affectionate, open-handed - sympathetic to pain and misery and quick in charity, proud when insulted and modest if praised, fiercely loyal to friends, loving God and the beautiful world including our land, from the California coast to the North Dakota prairie to faraway Manhattan, loving music and our American language - when you look at the stars you don't think small. You don't hope your descendants will enjoy your mutual fund portfolio, you imagine them as giants of the earth.</blockquote>Looking into the great beyond, Garrison gains perspective, and his attitude towards America passes from ambivalence to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">deep</span> affection. Yes, in the grand scheme of things America does not matter much, and it certainly has its sins, but it's the only land that he can imagine for his grandchildren. For their sake, he will not abandon hope.<br /><blockquote>Perhaps in 1776 our ancestors, too, were rattled by current events and the unbeatable logic of despair and had to go out and lie in the weeks for a while and think: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">unalienable</span> Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.<br /><br />Indoors, the news is second-hand, mostly bad, and even good people are drawn into a dreadful fascination with doom and demise; their faith in extinction gets stronger; they sit and tell stories that begin with The End. Outdoors, the news is usually miraculous. A fly flew into my mouth and went deep, forcing me to swallow, inducing a major life change for him, from fly to simple protein, and so shall we all be changed someday, but here under heaven our spirits are immense, we are so blessed. The stars in the sky, my friends in the grass, my son asleep on my chest, his hands clutching my shirt.</blockquote>These days, it's tough to avoid the "unbeatable logic of despair". Iraq, Guantanamo, global warming, our broken politics and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">coarsening</span> culture - the list is almost endless. But tonight my wife and I will sit in a field with a few thousand of our fellow Americans and watch the fireworks overhead. We will sing that corny Lee Greenwood song ("From the lakes of Minnesota to the hills of Tennessee") and eat some greasy cheese curds. And we will count our blessings.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-74159536290358155842007-06-02T12:33:00.000-05:002007-06-03T10:07:56.125-05:00The Death of Adam<div style="text-align: justify;">Lee at <a href="http://thinkingreed.wordpress.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Thinking Reed</span></a> has an interesting <a href="http://thinkingreed.wordpress.com/2007/06/01/brownback-vs-darwin/">post</a> regarding presidential-candidate Sam <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Brownback's</span></span> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/31/opinion/31brownback.html?_r=3&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin">op-ed piece </a>in the <span style="font-style: italic;">NY Times</span> where he clarifies his position on evolution. As Lee points out, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Brownback's</span></span> opposition to Darwinism has more to do with safe-guarding the dignity of human beings than with defending the literal truth of the Bible, which mirrors my own concerns regarding Darwinist philosophy. Too often the evolution debate is portrayed as God vs. Darwin, when really the issue is Adam vs. Darwin (Adam being humanity as created in the <span style="font-style: italic;">imago <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Dei</span></span></span>, possessing intrinsic worth and occupying a unique place in the cosmos). This point was driven home to me as I read <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Marilynne</span></span> Robinson's* essay "Darwinism", which appears in her collection <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Death-Adam-Essays-Modern-Thought/dp/0312425325/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3/105-9536570-6990059?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1180811129&sr=1-3"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Death of Adam: Essays in Modern Thought</span></a>. As the title implies, Robinson is not happy with the state of modern thought, which she perceives as impoverished and dark, lacking any sense of the grandeur of humanity that fostered civilization through the ages. Indeed, "Darwinism" ends with this heartbreaking eulogy to the old Adam:<br /><blockquote>"There is no place left for the soul, or even the self... Our <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">hypertrophic</span></span> brain, that prodigal indulgence, that house of many mansions, with its stores, and competences, and all its deep terrors and very rich pleasures, which was so long believed to be the essence of our lives, and a claim on one <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">another's</span></span> sympathy and courtesy and attention, is going the way of every part of collective life that was addressed to it - religion, art, dignity, graciousness. Philosophy, ethics, politics, properly so called. It is a thing that bears reflecting upon, how much was destroyed, when modern thought declared the death of Adam."</blockquote>Robinson makes it very clear that her target is not evolution as a scientific theory. Neither she nor I are anti-science, and neither of us has anything at stake in a literal reading of Genesis. As Robinson points out, "[Darwin's] theory, as science, is irrelevant to the question of the truth of religion. It is only as an inversion of Christian <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">ethicalism</span></span> that it truly engages religion. And in those terms it is appropriately the subject of challenge from any humane perspective, religious or otherwise." It is in the realm of ethics where Darwinism makes its most serious assault upon humanity, as its vision of nature is one where the weak are discarded and the only ethical imperative is to preserve our "selfish genes." Robinson sees it as no coincidence that Darwin's theory arouse at a time when the European aristocracy was tiring of "the irksome burden of extending charity to [the poor] - a burden laid on the back of Europe by Christianity." Robinson provides a great deal of evidence that a form of Social Darwinism was already widespread in 19<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">th</span></span>-century Europe even before Darwin's advent. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Malthus</span></span>, after all, had paved the way by demonstrating "the harmful consequences of intervening between the poor and their death by starvation." Thus, "Darwin's work was rightly seized by <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">antireligionist</span></span>s who had other fish to fry than the mere demystification of cosmology. I am speaking, as I know it is rude to do, of the Social Darwinists, the eugenicists, the Imperialists, the Scientific Socialists... and, yes, of the Nazis."<br /><br />Of course, reputable Darwinists have long since disavowed the ugly ways in which Darwin's theory has been employed in the past, but Robinson wonders if they're being intellectually consistent. Daniel <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Dennett</span></span>, for example, has argued that a distinction must be drawn between Darwinism as applied to nature and its implications for politics, economics, social programs, etc. But "if, as Darwin argues, the human and nonhuman worlds are continuous and of a kind, then <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Dennett</span></span> implies a distinction that is in fact meaningless." That is, if culling is beneficial for animals in the wild, or for a herd of cattle, then it must be beneficial for the human race. There is no way to escape this implication without invoking a radical discontinuity been humans and other species, which is the one thing that Darwinists will never do. Moreover, Darwinists at all times have never been shy about extending their theory to humans (Darwin himself did it frequently), and "Darwinism is still offered routinely as a source of objective scientific insight on questions like the nature of human motivation and the possibility of altruism." It is only when Darwinism is taken to its logical conclusion (that is, eugenics) that its adherents claim that it's not meant to be applied to humans.<br /><br />Robinson is aware that many proponents of Darwinism have tried to soften its hard edges by showing how altruism and social behavior could have arisen by natural selection. But she is very skeptical of this band-aid, since selfishness and survival remain the supreme virtues. Here, Robinson quotes an article by Robert Wright published in <span style="font-style: italic;">Time</span> magazine: "Wright says, 'Such impulses as compassion, empathy, generosity, gratitude and remorse are genetically based. Strange as it may sound, these impulses, with their checks on raw selfishness, helped our ancestors survive and pass their genes to future generations.'" To which Robinson mockingly replies:<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><blockquote>"To whom on earth would this sound strange except to other Darwinists? Most humans beings live collaboratively and have done so for <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">millennia</span></span>. But Darwinists insist that 'selfishness' is uniquely the trait rewarded by genetic survival. So while Wright does concede a biological basis to the traits we call humane and civilized, he puts them in a different category from the more primary traits (in his view) of selfishness and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">competition</span>... This kind of thinking makes all experience that contradicts its assumptions into the product of illusion and self-deception. A splendid way to win every argument. The idea of illusion is very important to Darwinian thinking... It is often used to reinterpret behavior to make it consistent with the assumptions of the observer."</blockquote></div>As long as selfishness is considered the most fundamental trait of life, all of our human virtues will only be interpreted as masked aggression. Such a position is an "expression of the belief - for which no proof is imaginable - that human goodness is not natural, and therefore is neither beneficial, nor, if the truth were known, even truly good." Robinson wonders how we got to this point, where our scientists "to this day watch for murder in baboon colonies" and hope to find it!<br /><blockquote>"For the old Adam, that near-angel whose name means Earth, Darwinists have substituted a creature who shares essential attributes with whatever beast has been recently observed behaving shabbily in the state of nature. Genesis tries to describe human <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">exceptionalism</span></span>, and Darwinism tries to discount it. Since Malthus, to go back no further, the impulse has been vigorously present to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">desacralize</span></span> humankind by making it appropriately the prey of unmitigated struggle. This <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">desacralization</span></span> - fully as absolute with respect to predator as to prey - has required the disengagement of conscience, among other things. It has required the grand-scale disparagement of the traits that distinguish us from the animals - and the Darwinists take the darkest possible view of the animals."</blockquote>Even Adam in his fallen state is infinitely grander that the vision of our species offered up by <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Darwin, Dennett</span></span>, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Dawkins</span></span>, and Gould. The Darwinian human represents the death of Adam, and this is what Robinson makes so clear. Unfortunately, this post cannot do justice to the scope and power of her essay, and I encourage anyone interested to read it themselves. There are few works with which I agree on such a visceral level.<br /><br />* Most of you are probably familiar with Robinson from her award-winning novels, <span style="font-style: italic;">Gilead</span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">Housekeeping</span>.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-17235581998712086342007-06-01T07:40:00.000-05:002007-06-02T09:32:20.635-05:00Do Lutherans Have Bad Karma?<div style="text-align: justify;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Thursday's</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Star-Tribune</span> carried a <a href="http://www.startribune.com/456/story/1214679.html">review</a> of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Broders</span>' Pasta Bar, a restaurant in south Minneapolis that my wife and I have enjoyed on several occasions. The review is generally positive, with the critic (Rick Nelson) praising the owners for "the giving communal dining a shot... For taking pasta seriously. And for accomplishing the near-impossible and creating a casual neighborhood restaurant that genuinely merits the cross-town drive." But while I agree with his assessment of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Broders</span>', one paragraph in Nelson's review struck me as strange:<br /><blockquote>"Watching all the animated conversation bubbling around my perch at the bar - where, trust me, each seat is as premium a piece of real estate as a potential Lake of the Isles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">teardown</span> - one thought raced through my cortex: Can all this conviviality really exist in buttoned-up Minneapolis? OK, closer observation revealed that the social interaction was running true to form, with conversation obviously reserved to parties with a prior connection. God forbid a Minnesotan -- present company included -- would actually spark up a spontaneous chat with the stranger to their right. Maybe it's karmic: After all, the restaurant lives in the shadow of the city's Protestant epicenter, Mount <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Olivet</span> Lutheran Church." [<span style="font-style: italic;">For those of you who don't know, </span><a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.mtolivet.org/">Mount <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Olivet</span></a><span style="font-style: italic;"> is a (very) large Lutheran Church in south Minneapolis, with two campuses, nine pastors, and about 13,600 members.</span>] </blockquote>What is Nelson trying to say here? Is he implying that Lutherans (or Protestants in general) are so dull and pleasure-hating that simply locating a restaurant near one of their churches poisons the atmosphere? It appears that Nelson is blaming Lutheranism for what he perceives as the "buttoned-up" nature of Minneapolis residents. And why the reference to karma? Karma is not a Christian concept, but perhaps it's well known in certain circles that Lutherans have the bad <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">variety</span> of karma, and therefore those looking for conviviality had better avoid even the ominous "shadow" of a Lutheran church.<br /><br />Although I may be wrong, I suspect that Nelson's comments can be <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">attributed</span> (at least indirectly) to the massive influence of Garrison Keillor, who has convinced much of the nation that Lutherans are dark, bland, and guilt-ridden, incapable of enjoying the good things of life. Of course, there is much truth, and a great deal of humor, in Keillor's depiction of Midwestern Lutherans. But it is obviously a caricature, ideal for getting easy laughs from any audience. So it's not surprising to see others in media pick-up on this theme, since the term "Lutheran" has now become short-hand for a whole set of cultural and psychological <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">attributes</span>. Thus, a restaurant critic can contrast "conviviality" with "Lutheran church" and assume that everyone will get his meaning immediately.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-54736702778500108592007-05-31T20:33:00.001-05:002007-06-01T09:16:52.181-05:00The Brewers and the Suffering Servant<div style="text-align: justify;">Well, it has been a month since my last post. I'm not sure why, but I haven't felt like saying much lately. There are times when I want to share all of my thoughts with the world, and other times when I just want to live inside my own head. This past month has fallen under the latter category. Regardless, I'm going to try to post more often. If only I could master the art of the short post instead of always writing essays, then it wouldn't be so darn hard to muster the energy.<br /><br />Along with all the usual stuff, I've spent a good deal of the past month following baseball - listening to it on the radio, reading about it in the paper, and going to games.* Unlike football, which comes around only once a week, baseball is a daily companion. It's a steady presence, without the hype, and that's one of the reasons why I love it so much. Also, the baseball season is in full blossom right now. Gone are the early days of spring, when every team is equal; now is the time for differentiation. My team, the Milwaukee Brewers, started the season hot (at one point, their record was an unbelievable 24-10), but they have cooled-off considerably, losing 14 of their last 19 games. Thankfully, they are playing in the weak <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">NL</span></span> central, where 85 wins might be enough to take the division. But given that the BrewCrew hasn't finished above .500 since 1992 and hasn't been to the playoffs since 1982, we Brewers fans are trying to keep our expectations low.<br /><br />On a related note, I highly recommend Kim <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Fabricius's</span></span> recent <a href="http://faith-theology.blogspot.com/2007/05/ten-reasons-why-baseball-is-gods-game.html">post</a> at <span style="font-style: italic;">Faith and Theology</span> "Ten Reasons why Baseball is God's game." However, I must quibble with his claim (in #8) that baseball's "Suffering Servant" is the Chicago Cubs. While the Cubs certainly have a long history of losing, they play in gorgeous Wrigley field and have a large, nation-wide fan base (thanks in part to season-long coverage on <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">WGN</span></span>). On the contrary, the pathetic Brewers - who are just as adept at losing as the Cubs - play in almost total obscurity, followed by Wisconsinites only until the beginning of Packer season, after which they are ignored by everyone. Like the suffering servant, the Brewers have "no beauty or majesty to attract us to [them], nothing in [their] appearance that we should desire [them]." They are a team "despised and rejected by men", full of "sorrows", and "familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces [they are] despised, and we esteemed [them] not." Clearly, these words are more applicable to the Brewers than the Cubs.<br /><br />* Unfortunately, now that I live in Minnesota I'm forced to attend games at the sterile, soul-sucking bubble called the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Metrodome</span>, perhaps the worst stadium in all of major league baseball (only Tropicana Field in Tampa Bay can rival its bleakness). I miss Miller Park - hell, I even miss the old County Stadium. And I certainly miss tailgating and those crazy <a href="http://milwaukee.brewers.mlb.com/mil/fan_forum/racing_sausages.jsp">racing sausages</a>!<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-49789147510380190002007-04-29T13:22:00.000-05:002007-04-29T18:10:02.830-05:00Neurobiologists "Find" Religion (and then lose it)<div style="text-align: justify;">When I saw the stupid headline - "This Is Your Brain on God" - at <a href="http://www.slate.com/">Slate.com</a>, I thought <i>here we go again</i>. Another ridiculous article purporting to "explain" religion as the by-product of Darwinian evolution or neurobiology. We've been here before (both <i>Slate</i> and the <i><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">NYTimes</span></span></i> seem to have soft-spots for such articles - just recall "<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/04/magazine/04evolution.t.html?ex=1177992000&en=7288fe8e9821b7d9&ei=5070">Darwin's God</a>"**). But George Johnson's <a href="http://www.slate.com/id/2165026/">article</a> on the emerging field of "<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">neurotheology</span></span>" is a refreshing rarity: an article in the popular press that actually expresses skepticism about the ability of science (in this case, neurobiology) to explain every facet of human existence. Thank heavens!!<br /><br />Johnson makes it clear that the findings of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">neurotheology</span></span> will never satisfy either believers or atheists - in the end, the results will always conform to one's metaphysical presuppositions:<br /><blockquote>In the neurological search for the spiritual, there is no shortage of data. But pile it as high as you like, and you're left staring across the same divide. Depending on your predisposition, you can interpret all these experiments in two different ways. The believers take them as scientific evidence for the reality of their visions, while the atheists claim more proof that God is all in your head.</blockquote>Johnson isn't afraid to say that many of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">neurotheological</span></span> findings - which are often hyped by the popular scientific media - are actually rather banal and "reductive". This isn't surprising, since much of modern <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">neurobiology</span> simply involves hooking patients up to brain-scanning devices and then observing which parts of their brains "light up" when they do something unusual or interesting (like play ping-pong, pray, look at naked women, etc.). As Johnson remarks, such "high-tech imagery has a way of stating the obvious." For instance, a study at <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">UPenn</span></span> "found that praying Franciscan nuns and meditating Buddhist monks generate similar brain scans: The frontal lobe, associated with focus and concentration, lights up. At the same time, the parietal lobe, which integrates sensory information, goes dim... As you fix your thoughts on the otherworldly, you lose contact with your immediate surroundings." Surprise, surprise!!<br /><br />A major limitation of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">neurotheology</span></span>, which Johnson doesn't really address, is that it's forced to study religious <i>behaviors</i> (like deep praying, mediation, or ecstatic visions) since it can't really probe religious <i>thought</i> or <i>belief</i> as such. But such behaviors are merely one aspect of the religious life, and are in no way determinative of religious practice as a whole. I, for one, have never experienced an ecstatic vision, and while I do pray, I doubt that it moves my brain into a dramatically altered mental state. For me, praying is not that different than ordinary thinking. So why do I still believe? The emphasis on religious <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">ecstasy</span> also ignores the fact that such experiences have historically been regarded with suspicion by religious authorities themselves. Even in biblical times, it was widely understood that not every vision or prophecy was legitimate; such experiences had to be verified with other criteria. Thus, the basis for <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">religious</span> faith does not lie in such altered mental states, although these can complement previously held beliefs.<br /><br />So it matters not one bit that "Michael <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Persinger</span></span> of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Laurentian</span></span> University can induce [mystical experiences] by scrambling the brain with magnetic fields." Humans have known since prehistoric times that various substances and foods can cause visions. So who cares that they can also be caused by magnetic fields? Regardless, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Persinger's</span></span> device serves as the occasion for my favorite paragraph in the article:<br /><blockquote>After donning [<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Persinger's</span></span>] helmet wired with electromagnets, some subjects reported experiences they described as mystical, or at least misty. When Richard <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Dawkins</span></span>, author of <em>The God Delusion</em>, put on the hood, it only made him a little dizzy. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Persinger</span></span> was quick to note that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Dawkins</span></span> had scored way below average on a psychological questionnaire measuring temporal lobe sensitivity—<i>hints of a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">neurobiological</span></span> correlate for atheism</i>. </blockquote>Johnson's last line here is brilliant. After all, if theism is simply a product of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">neurochemistry</span></span>, then so is atheism - something that the "<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">explainers</span></span> of religion" all too often forget. Perhaps, in the end, the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">neurotheologians</span></span> will show that it is atheism, not theism, which is caused by a mental defect (this would be the logical conclusion, of course, since the vast majority of the world's current and past inhabitants have been theists). If so, will Slate.com then treat us to articles that attempt to explain the "atheism meme" and the "agnostic delusion"?<br /><br />** Remember that silly "Darwin's God" article? Hopefully not. But if you're still interested, and still annoyed, the blog <span style="font-style: italic;" class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Adventus</span> has a brilliant <a href="http://rmadisonj.blogspot.com/2007/03/what-hath-got-wrot.html"><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">response</span></a>.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-71787734535038290772007-04-29T09:32:00.000-05:002007-04-29T10:27:18.139-05:00Kierkegaard on the Imago Dei<div style="text-align: justify;">The perfect passage for a beautiful Sunday in Spring:<br /><br />"<i>How glorious it is to be a Human Being!</i>... Now how should we speak about this glory? We could go on speaking for a long time without ever finishing, but this is not the place for that. Let us therefore speak briefly instead and concentrate everything on that one single verse that Scripture itself uses with authority: <i>God created the human being in his image</i>, but again for the sake of brevity let us understand this verse with regard to only one thing.<br /><br />God created the human being in his image. Must it not be glorious to be clothed in this way! In praise of the lily, the Gospel declares that it surpasses Solomon in glory. Must it not be infinitely more glorious to resemble God! The lily does not resemble God - no, it does not do that. It bears a little mark by which it reminds one of God; it has a witness, since God has not let himself be without witness in anything created, although the lily does not resemble him...<br /><br />To be spirit, that is the human being's invisible glory. Thus when the worried human out in the field stands surrounded by all these witnesses, when every single flower says to him, "Remember God!" he replies, "I will indeed do that, my children - I will worship him, and you poor little ones cannot do that." Consequently the erect, upright one is a worshiper. The upright gait of the human is the sign of distinction, but to be able to prostrate oneself in adoration and worship is even more glorious; and all nature is like the great staff of servants who remind the human, the ruler, about worshiping God. This is what is expected, not that the human being is to come and assume the command, which is also glorious and assigned to him, but that worshiping he shall praise the Creator, something nature cannot do, since it can only remind the human being about doing that. It is glorious to be clothed as the lily, even more glorious to be the erect and upright ruler, but most glorious to be nothing by worshiping!<br /><br />To worship is not to rule, and yet worship is what makes the human being resemble God, and to be able truly to worship is the excellence of the invisible glory above all creation. The pagan was not aware of God and therefore sought likeness in ruling. But the resemblance is not like that - no, then instead it is taken in vain... <i>The human being and God do not resemble each other directly but inversely; only when God has infinitely become the eternal and omnipotent object of worship and the human being always a worshiper, only then do they resemble each other</i>... The ability to worship is no visible glory, it cannot be seen, and yet nature's visible glory sighs; it pleads with the ruler, it incessantly reminds the human that whatever he does he absolutely must not forget - to worship. Oh, how glorious to be a human being!"<br /><br />- From <i>Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits</i>, "What we learn from the lilies in the field and from the birds of the air", pg. 192-193.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-86103043858193796702007-04-15T17:40:00.000-05:002007-04-15T20:12:33.782-05:00David Hart: Arrogant or Brilliant?<div style="text-align: justify;">Due to frequent travel and general busyness, I've haven't had much time to post lately. It's strange, but I often feel guilty when I go for long periods of time without posting, as if I had neglected to call my mom or ignored a letter from a close friend. I wonder if any other bloggers feel the same way....<br /><br />Regardless, my travels have given me the chance to really dig into David Hart's much-discussed<i> The Beauty of the Infinite</i>. This book has attracted considerable praise from bloggers and real theologians alike, as well as some criticisms. I, for one, am thoroughly impressed. Hart's prose is fantastic, and his theological insights have given me a new appreciation of the importance of Christian aesthetics (something that my reading of Kierkegaard had taught me to distrust). The book has also clarified my understanding of the Trinity, for which I am grateful.<br /><br />That said, I agree with <a href="http://shrinkinguni.blogspot.com/2007/03/agressive-peacemaker-peaceful-aggressor.html">Patrik</a> that Hart's harsh treatment of modern theologians and philosophers is somewhat at odds with his frequent assertion that the Christian proclamation is one of "peace" (although I wouldn't claim, like Patrik, that his rhetoric is the equivalent of American foreign policy!). There's little doubt that <i>Beauty of the Infinite</i> would have been better without Hart's snarky dismissals of almost every major Protestant theologian from Luther and Calvin up to Tillich and Jüngel. Indeed, it's hard to disagree with Halden's <a href="http://shrinkinguni.blogspot.com/2007/03/hart-on-tillich.html">comment</a> that Hart has an irrational prejudice against anything German and Protestant (he seems to subscribe to the popular notion that there has been a "German captivity of theology").<br /><br />It's worth noting, though, that there are two German Lutherans that Hart cannot praise highly enough: J.S. Bach and Johann Hamann. He refers to Bach as "the greatest of Christian theologians", saying that "Bach's is the ultimate Christian music; it reflects as no other human artifact ever has or could the Christian vision of creation" (282-3). By comparison, Hart's adoration of Hamann is more restrained, but not by much. He writes that "for [Hamann], to a degree perhaps unparalleled in Christian thought, the true knowledge of God in creation - the true analogy - lay in a childlike rapture before the concrete and poetic creativity of God" (254) <a href="http://www.firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=141">Elsewhere</a>, Hart employs all of his rhetorical gifts to hail Hamann as "most amusing philosopher" of all time, possessing "a truly Christian mirthfulness".<br /><br />The connection between Hart and Hamann in interesting for me, since I have been reading them somewhat in tandem. While I consider Hamann to be superior both aesthetically and theologically, there is undoubtedly a close affinity between the two authors. In fact, it has proven beneficial to read Hart in light of Hamann, since the latter provides a corrective to the excesses and omissions of the former (call it a "Lutheran corrective"). It seems to me that Hamann might serve as useful mediator between Hart and the Protestant theologians he so often criticizes. After all, given that both Hamann and Bach understood themselves as no more than orthodox Lutherans, Hart's praise of these two men may signify a closer affinity to Lutheran theology than he realizes. If nothing else, it gives me hope that Hart's theological insights can be separated from his brash rhetoric and employed for truly evangelical purposes.<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20483025.post-59777366904948323072007-03-28T21:42:00.000-05:002007-03-28T22:43:20.633-05:00Pope Benedict and the European Intelligentsia<div style="text-align: justify;">The German magazine <a href="http://www.spiegel.de/international"><span style="font-style: italic;">Der <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Spiegel</span></span></a> has an interesting special <a href="http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,k-7054,00.html">issue</a> devoted to the "Power of Faith" - an acknowledgment that religion remains a major force in the world, if not in Western Europe. Particularly interesting is the article "<a href="http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,463793,00.html">Sexy for the Intellectuals</a>", which examines the strange attraction between Pope Benedict XVI and Europe's secular intellectuals. According to the article, "The secular intelligentsia's curiosity is piqued; it is flirting with the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">una</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">sancta</span>, the 'One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.'" Benedict has struck a chord because he does not use piety to shield religion from scrutiny, but instead understands that faith and reason must walk together:<br /><blockquote>Pope John Paul was into images; Benedict is a man of words. He sympathizes with the nonbelievers. He does not say, as his predecessor did: Kneel down and say the rosary. He says: Enlightenment must be enlightened. He is an intellectual who does not replace reason with mysticism, but instead deploys it in the service of God...<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Ratzinger</span> has mulled all his life over these unequal siblings, faith and reason, which explains the leniency and interest with which German cultural critics have received this pope. He is one of us. He refuses to be defined in terms of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">laical</span> trinity, i.e. the triple threat of condoms, women priests and abortion...<br /><br />Man encounters the self at the level of thought. That is why believers can communicate with non-believers. That is why the Frankfurt philosopher <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Jürgen</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Habermas</span> and Joseph <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Ratzinger</span> harmonized so perfectly when they discussed the "Dialectics of Secularization" at the Catholic Academy in Munich. If the Word is a gift from God, then the theorist who champions communicative action can but nod agreement.</blockquote>As the article points out, Benedict's academic style has allowed him to make some of the Church's controversial teachings intellectually respectable:<br /><blockquote>Benedict XVI knows how to maintain a level of abstraction so far removed from earthly toils that it has all the appearances of compassion. <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Deus</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">caritas</span> est</span>, Benedict's first encyclical in January 2006, was a meditation on love - and not the widely anticipated reactionary harangue against homosexual unions, unmarried cohabitation, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">inchastity</span> and other works of the Devil.<br /><br />Mum was the word on all of these issues. The encyclical was a eulogy, extolling love, eroticism in marriage, and social work. He simply switched the level of abstraction and made himself more unassailable. This pope doesn't talk about condoms; he talks about exploiting people (even if it's only for a one-night stand). This pope gets to the bottom of things. This pope is a radical - another trait that makes him sexy to the intellectuals.</blockquote>The intellectuals also like style, his undramatic <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">demeanor</span> during public appearances. "He prays with a fixed stare and barely moves his lips, like an altar boy whose thoughts are somewhere else entirely." He's a nerd, and intellectuals love their fellow nerds:<br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><blockquote>The library is the Holiest of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Holies</span>. The professor pope pens page after page: letters, sermons, speeches, epistles, books. Several hundred theological works already make him the most published pontiff in church history. He seizes every opportunity to put systematic theology into practice and into print. Benedict XVI is even capable of working a reference to fundamental theology into a letter of accreditation to the Andorran ambassador.</blockquote></div>Importantly, the article ends on a hopeful note for those us who long to see a Christian revival in the heart of Christendom:<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>In October 2006, a star-studded colloquium at the University of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Münster</span> discussed "The Return of the Religions" - and identified an "ego weariness" in Germany, a post-modernist upward valuation of the concept of truth: "Man cannot survive on doubt, irony and deconstruction alone." What is left for us to believe in, if everything is open to discussion? And who is going to take us seriously? This is the fundamental question addressed in Germany by numerous bestsellers and talk-show debates on "values," "the new <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Kulturkampf</span>," "the parenting challenge" and so on.</p> <p>In the post-modern age, everything was somehow OK; values were relative, and we believed that was a good thing. By September 2001 at the latest, this belief was called into question. There was no more room for irony.</p> <p>How can truth exist in a pluralist society? Joseph <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Ratzinger</span> has pondered this question all his life. And it has never been more relevant than today.</p> <p>A today that is perhaps not the hour for prayer, not the age for ritual, but rather a time for introspection, for self-examination, for thought. And in that context, the man in the Papal Palace is right for his role. Benedict XVI is not a comfortable pontiff, because he can communicate <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">eye-to</span>-eye with the secular world. He already sees eye-to-eye with the spiritual one.</p></blockquote><p></p> (<span style="font-style: italic;">Final Note</span>: While I found the article very well written, one sentence struck me as odd: "Something has happened: The country of Luther, Marx and Nietzsche has lost faith in godlessness." Why is Luther included here alongside Marx and Nietzsche? Is he "godless" simply because he disagreed with the Catholic Church of his day? Perhaps this sentence reflects the habit - common in Germany - of viewing Luther not as a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">religious</span> figure but as a liberator and revolutionary. Regardless, Luther should not be blamed for the current state of godlessness in Germany).<br /></div>Thomas Adamshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16168017369500841150noreply@blogger.com6