Brutally Honest

What's wrong with this video?

by guest blogger, BroKen

Gerard Vanderleun at American Digest put up a video called "This is Water". It is an edited version of a commencment address given by David Foster Wallace to the 2005 class of Kenyon College. It is fascinating. Take a look.

 

What do you think? Well, here is what I think...

There is a lot of very good stuff in there. Lots of great ideas and good advice. It is more and more the case that "the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are the hardest to see and talk about." But that is more because of how we have been taught to see and talk, than about the important realities themselves. Yes, the Water in which "we live and move and have our being" is there whether we see it or not. What that water is, is of vital importance. Unfortunately, this video leaves out what the water is.

Yes, there is a "default setting" based on our inherent selfishness; "everything is all about me". It is great that the video calls us to rise above it even though it is hard to rise and few, if any, of us do it very often. Yet what is the foundation of this call to rise above? "The only thing that's capital-T true is that you get to decide how you're going to try to see it.” Oh, so it really is about me, all about ME, after all. Hmmm.

Now, in the full speech from which this video is made, Foster does tell another "didactic story" which could point more to Reality. He tells of an atheist and theist arguing about God after a few beers in a remote Alaskan bar. The atheist says, "It's not like I haven't investigated the claims of God. Just last month when I was lost in the blizzard facing certain death, I prayed for God to help me and save my life." "Well, then you must believe. Here you are!" cries the theist. "No," replies the atheist. "That was just a couple of Eskimos that happened to be passing by and led me out." Foster says, "It is easy to run this story through a standard liberal arts analysis. The exact same experience can mean two totally different things to two different people, given those people's belief templates and two different ways of constructing meaning from experience. Because we prize tolerance and diversity of belief, nowhere in our liberal arts analysis do we want to claim the one guy's interpretation is true and the other guy's is false or bad. Which is fine, except we also never end up talking about just where these individual's templates and beliefs come from." (Emphasis mine) No, Mr. Foster, it is not fine. The fact that we don't talk about where beliefs come from and judge the reality of those beliefs is THE problem with modern education and this video. It is the foundational problem of modern liberal arts education which leads people to get it wrong every time. It is why you, Mr. Foster, fall right back into the "default setting" when you explain that freedom, education and right thinking is all about ME and MY CHOICE.

In the end, Mr. Foster cannot say with conviction, "GOD IS LOVE" and "In Him we live and move and have our being" for that is far too moralistic and judgmental. So, we are left with banal platitudes like, "Have a nice day". Just use your $100,000 education to dream up fanciful reasons to say "Have a nice day" even when, no, especially when you don't really mean it. Why? 'Cause if you don't you'll be miserable. (But don't think I'm moralizing like Dr. Laura!)

Come on, Mr. Foster! The "water" is God. Yes, He's hard to see and talk about nowadays. But it was not always so. May He help us lose this post-modern Liberal arts non-sense which is so fatal, and get back to learning and teaching what is really True and Good and Noble and Right. Yes, that means saying some things are wrong and bad and false. So be it.

"A certain man had two sons..."

by guest blogger, BroKen

Some religious people of his day complained about Jesus' habit of spending time with sinners, even eating with them, so he tells some stories to illustrate that “the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.” The last story begins, “A certain man had two sons.” One son leaves home and squanders his inheritance. When he finally decides to return home, his father throws a big party because “this son of mine was dead and is alive again.”

We call that story The Prodigal Son. I used to think the word meant wicked, but it doesn't. “Prodigal” means generous or reckless; a spendthrift. Although the story has been used to call wicked people back to God, that is not the point. All that matters for the story is that the son had made a mess of things by wasting what had been given him. He is less wicked than foolish.

A phrase that sticks out to me in the story is “he began to be in need.” That goes a long way to explaining his behavior. He took for granted that his needs had always been met by his father. Wouldn't they always be? Well, maybe not, outside the father's house. And then there is this phrase after the neediness sets in....“no one gave him anything.”

He had lived as if there were a boundless supply, giving freely to all. That is how it was at home. But now in his need, people won't reciprocate. Isn't that the world we know? People take. They don't give.

When he finally does get back home, his older brother won't celebrate the return of this reprobate. That is the point of the whole story. Jesus is prodding the religious folks who look down on sinners to join in the celebration when sinners repent. The refusal to accept the Prodigal brother is the real wickedness. The story exposes that wickedness to anyone who has ears to hear.

I've been wondering if we couldn't rename the story, The Liberal Son. Liberals tend to be generous (at least with other people's money) to point of recklessness. They seem to take for granted the wealth and social structures in America which produce the wealth we've inherited from our ancestors But if the name is changed to Liberal Son, then we'd have to call the other brother, the conservative son, wouldn't we?

It seems likely that liberal policies in the nation will lead to a social train-wreck like it has in, say, Detroit. When they begin to be in need, we'll have to see if those who voted for such policies will come to their senses and decide to come home to the wisdom of the founding fathers. Or will they just blame it all on their older brother?

It is my hope and prayer that there will be many, many conservative sons who know Jesus' story and have developed the heart of their Father in Heaven. Then, if the liberals come home, we can party.

Pagan is as pagan does

by guest blogger, BroKen

Last week I made the statement that we are rapidly becoming, if we haven't already become one, a pagan culture. Here is why I said that.

I defined a pagan as one who worships an experience or the object of an experience. I should explain that worship of an experience need not be a formal worship. In ancient times a pagan farmer might have sex with a temple prostitute in order to magically ensure that his crops would grow. He planted seed in the field, so he plants seed in the temple as well. That would be a kind of formal worship arrangement. Yet many pagans are driven by sexual experience without any temple involved. It is the elevation of an experience to a highest value, not a temple, which makes a pagan.

Similarly, a pagan isn't necessarily a primitive, superstitious person who believes in the reality of beings like the Olympian gods. Even today a sailor might be said to worship the sea. The sea gives him his livelihood demonstrating awesome power which paradoxically can even threaten his life. The sailor need not believe in Poseidon or Neptune to be pagan.

A pagan culture worships experience and countless experiences qualify for worship. Pagan gods multiply as experience after experience adds god upon god. One person's god is just as good as any other. “Add to the pantheon,” is the pagan way. 

Even religious experience can be worshiped apart from the gods involved. The bumper sticker “COEXIST” formed out of major religious symbols; Islamic crescent for the C and Christian cross for the T, is essentially pagan. Pagans don't care if any of those religions are true. Pagan religion merely seeks an experience which we should all accept and enjoy and let others enjoy. Experience is the thing for a pagan.

The sexual revolution and proliferation of drugs clearly have pagan roots. From Playboy bunnies to professor Timothy Leary's advocating drugs to achieve spiritual enlightenment, the experience is the thing. Traditional warnings about dire consequences of such hedonism are seen as the jealous cries of old folks who are shackled by outmoded moralities. Hugh Hefner is now mainstream and the influence of advocates for drug legalization continues to grow.

There is worship of Mother Earth or Gaia as she is often called nowadays. Certainly an element  of worship empowers much of the environmental movement. There may not be a temple to humpback whales or panda bears, but there is an awful lot of money sacrificially given on their behalf.

Then there is money itself, too. How many business leaders are driven to work and sacrifice in pursuit of piles of cash? The experience of wealth is one many people would die or even kill for. You might say they worship green paper! 

Yes, we are becoming, if we haven't already become, a pagan culture. “Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.” Philippians 3:19

Followed by a Moonshadow

by guest blogger, BroKen

Many years ago now, I was driving home from work when the moon appeared to me in a gap between trees. It was a full moon, huge on the horizon and extremely bright. There was a layer of cloud along the bottom of the moon which, as the light shone through, became as bright as the moon itself. It looked as if the moon was rising up out of a pool of cloud, and clouds were flowing off the moon back down into the pool. Or perhaps it was that some invisible hands were forming the moon out of the glowing band of cloud stretched across the horizon. The vision jumped out from behind the trees for only a few seconds and then it hid itself again.

I had heard words like “slack-jawed” or the phrase “their mouth fell open” used to describe awe, but it had never happened to me before, or since. It happened then. My face muscles involuntarily relaxed as I kept driving home and my mind began to process what I had just seen. Words like those in the paragraph above came to me and then I noticed that there were tears in my eyes. That shocked me. What kind of man cries at the moon? I began to analyze what I was experiencing. Dissecting an emotion, even an intense one, usually kills it. That is what my analysis did here.

When I got home I sat on the front porch and looked at the moon. It was still full and bright but no longer quite as large, and the clouds had moved on. I told myself, “I understand the pagans. If I didn't know the Creator; the Artist who made the image I had seen, I think I would worship the Moon.”

Do you know pagans? They are all around us. We are rapidly becoming, if we haven't already become one, a pagan culture. Do you know what a pagan is? A pagan is one who worships an experience like I describe above, or worships the object in that experience.

There are many awe-inducing sources. Mountains, Rivers, Animals, Trees, Sex and Drugs, Money and Power are just a few. Even Human Beings themselves, as individuals or a whole Tribe, can captivate and transfix our Mind, Soul and Body.

Those awe-inducing sources are, well, awesome gifts. But an awesome gift can be dangerous. Since we are so starved for the Divine in our fallen world and unable to experience God directly, those transcendent experiences threaten to replace Him in the minds, hearts and lives of many. That is why one of the first commandments is to make no image of God. God is Holy, that is, wholly other; different from anything experienced.

Even in church more and more people ignore the still small voice following instead the noisy pagan “gods”. It helps to know what they are doing in order to remind them that the Giver is even more awesome than the gift.

One old sitcom please, hold the wisdom...

by guest blogger, BroKen

When I was a teenager I was a fan of the Mary Tyler Moore Show. I even followed her friend Rhoda Morgenstern when she moved to New York from Minneapolis to start her own show called, well, Rhoda. Rhoda, played by Valerie Harper, was always looking for a man. In New York she found him.

Joe, played by David Groh, was divorced with a ten year old son, but he and Rhoda hit it off. Before the first season was over, Rhoda and Joe got married. I'm told that the episode of the wedding was one of the highest rated television shows of its time. Apparently, I wasn't alone in following Rhoda's adventure.

Joe, having experienced the pain of divorce, is reluctant to enter into another marriage. But Rhoda is looking for a commitment. Joe suggests that they can move in together. That sets up a sit-com discussion of the relative merits of marriage and shacking up.

There was a lot of hype around the show and especially the wedding. I remember seeing Valerie Harper in an interview describing a bit of how the decision to marry was to take place on her show. She explained that the script had Joe suggesting that they move in together but Rhoda is reluctant to do so. Joe pleads, “Come on, Rhoda. It's no big deal.” And Rhoda responds, according to Ms. Harper, “Joe, if it's no big deal, then I don't want it!”

That struck this teenager as a pretty wise response. Marriage is a big deal. I knew it then. I know it even better now. Two people becoming one flesh, raising children and making a life together, is a big deal that requires a big commitment. Shacking up is a temporary arrangement of convenience; no strings attached, no real commitment. Since love is a commitment; no commitment, no love. And Love is a big deal.

I remember the interview because I was shocked when I saw the actual episode she described. I was anticipating hearing Rhoda school Joe on commitment and love. But she never said that line on the air. Instead, Rhoda actually moves in with Joe and then whines.... “Joe, I want married!” There is no explanation. No wisdom. Just quid pro quo. “I did what you wanted. Now, you'd better do what I want.” So, Joe reluctantly agrees and they plan their wedding.

It isn't surprising that the show didn't survive in people's hearts and minds or even very long on TV. It isn't surprising that the marriage of Rhoda and Joe didn't survive either. They were separated and divorced in the third season of the show. I think most of us had stopped watching long before then.

I don't know why the editors cut the wisdom originally given Rhoda. Maybe they thought it would be funnier. Foolishness is sometimes comical. More often though, it is just sad. Seeking love without commitment is as foolish as drinking from an empty glass. It's not funny at all.

Four inches from the top of the sidewalk to the gutter

By guest blogger, BroKen

On our anniversary, I took my wife to see Les Miserables. To describe the experience, I told a friend that it is a wonderful story; we cried. He said, "You cried because you had to go to the opera, right?” No, it was the story. I guess I'm an old softie.

I understand the reason why my friend joked about the opera. Practically every line is sung and personally, I do find those recitatives a bit tedious. But the songs like, I Dreamed a Dream, Bring Him Home, Master of the House, are beautiful expressions of the emotions of the characters revealing their hearts, sometimes pleading, sometimes devastated, sometimes raucous, even bawdy.

I had heard about “Lay Miz”, as the abbreviation is pronounced, for about thirty years, but I had never been that interested in it. I knew that it was French and that it was revolutionary and that was enough to turn me off. I knew it involved a repentant thief and a persistent policeman and that seemed a bit contrived and unrealistic. Now, having seen the movie, it still seems a bit contrived and unrealistic. But that is OK. It is a wonderful story. It is wonderful, not because of the characters themselves, but what the characters represent.

Valjean, the thief, is transformed by an extravagant gift of grace, an undeserved blessing of freedom and wealth. Javert, the policeman, is honorable, stalwart, determined and hard-working. He believes that if everyone were like that, like him, the world would be a wonderful place. The genius of the story is in how these two lives intertwine just like the themes of Law and Grace mingle in every human life.

Around these two central characters are a host of others. There is Pantine, whose dreams are cruelly and and unjustly dragged to the gutter. There is the conniving innkeeper and his wife who live happily in the gutter and use it. There are the angry and idealistic youth who are literally willing to die for people in the gutter, even though those people are unwilling to rise up with them when bullets put them down.

The pivotal moment comes when Valjean(Grace) holds the life of Javert(Law) in his hands and lets him go free. The honorable Javert believes that Valjean expects to go free in exchange. Javert will not take part in a bargain to thwart the law. Valjean replys, “You are wrong. You have always been wrong. If I survive tonight, you can pick me up tomorrow at home.”

Tragically, this act of grace is so offensive to Javert and yet so powerful, he can't handle it. His whole life was spent looking down on others and teaching others to look down as well. He could not imagine anything good happening if he humbled himself, stepped back to the gutter, and looked up.

Similarly, every human life pivots at the intersection of Law and Grace; the Cross of Jesus Christ. Don't take offense. Humble yourself and look up.

An open letter to my atheist friends, V

by guest blogger, BroKen

Dear Unbeliever,

It has seemed to me that there are two possible reasons a person becomes an atheist. One was that they were uncomfortable with the idea of an authority in their life and choose to deny it exists. That is the psychological source for atheism that I asked you to consider at the end of the last letter.

The other possibility was difficulty reconciling an all-loving and all-powerful God with the evil around us. They say if God were loving and powerful, He would not allow such evil to continue. Philosophers call this issue the Problem of Evil. It is very deep and very wide. I won't wade in here except to say this is only an argument against an all-powerful and all-loving God. In these letters I am merely asking you to consider the possibility of something, not a specific deity. I listed some other possibilities at the beginning of that last letter. So, the Problem of Evil, since it is limited to one specific deity, still allows for some kind of God. Human experience of Love, Beauty, Reason, Justice, Consciousness, etc. all point to something beyond us. Can you admit that there must be something more than matter and energy?

I see now that there is at least a third possible reason people become atheist. This third reason involves confusion about what it means to know something.

Religious people say we know God exists. Even without direct experience, religious people express confidence. “I never spoke with God, nor visited in heaven; yet certain am I of the spot as if the chart were given.” --Emily Dickinson.

Some of us even say that we know God personally, that we've talked to Him, that He has made His presence known to us. Almost always that knowledge, while it might involve some sights or sounds, does not come through our senses but some other way. An atheist would likely respond that we might as well be talking about a six foot tall white rabbit. If they don't see it, it doesn't exist. For many atheists, it seems, there is no other way to know something besides their senses.

Religions are nearly unanimous that God is outside of the physical universe. He transcends what we experience through our senses. Do you see how the decision to limit knowledge to empirical sense data eliminates the possibility of finding God before the search even starts? It is like the man looking for his keys under a street lamp even though he dropped them a block away in a dark alley.

Science shines a very bright light. But consider how the most important things in human experience; things like Love, always resist scientific explanation. Science, when applied to them, reduces them to mere mental states; or practically nothing. Yet, we know that things like Love exist even when we aren't sure exactly what they are.

So, Dear Unbeliever, will you consider the possibility that there might be more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your empirical philosophy?

An open letter to my atheist friends, IV

by guest blogger, BroKen

Dear Unbeliever,

I hope you realize that in these letters I have not been arguing for my God or any other specific religious deity. There are many possible explanations for the ideals of morality, love, beauty, reason, etc. besides the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Some possibilities include Deism; the idea that God got the universe going and has since left it, and us, on our own. There is Pantheism; the idea that some spiritual reality permeates all physical nature. There is Dualism; its fundamental reality is an eternal struggle between equally matched Good and Evil which can never be resolved. There is even Pantheistic Dualism popularized in the Star Wars saga; “You cannot imagine the power of the Dark Side, Luke!” The list goes on and on.

These letters are merely trying to get you to re-examine what is obvious to the vast majority of human beings, past and present. We have rationally concluded that “atoms and void” are not an adequate explanation for human existence. The things we think are most important all point to something outside ourselves. Therefore, I have been asking you to consider a baby step away from atheism. The whole giant leap of faith probably would be too much.

Many people, especially atheists, are convinced that religion is a deeply, if not purely, emotional affair. They imagine people who are gripped by fear of dying and overwhelmed by grief over lost loved ones, who then create a comforting fantasy. They imagine people frustrated by the lack of justice in the world who then dream up a celestial cavalry coming in the nick of time. These imaginings are a caricature of religion. Like all caricatures there is truth mixed with some key distortions.

Yet I am struck by how often some (thanks, Zoe) atheists themselves resist rational explanations of phenomena. There is order in the universe. “So what! It just happened that way.” DNA molecules carry information. “Yeah, that means nothing!” Humans have deep mystical experiences. “Well, alcohol and LSD do that, too.” Such consistent and powerful resistance makes me wonder if there isn't some emotional blockage.

Could it be that some (thanks, Zoe) atheists have been wounded by a religious authority and therefore reject both the religious and the Authority it represents? It wouldn't have to be a religious authority. Any authority is a fitting stand in for God. Might, at least, some atheists be saying in effect, “To hell with you and the horse you rode in on!”? The horse, of course, is God.

Or could it be that some (thanks, Zoe) atheists, like the rest of us, have done something for which they are deeply ashamed? Now they cannot bear the thought of something, or, so much worse, some One was watching them to hold them accountable. Might there be some emotional component to the atheists' lack of faith?

Have you, Dear Unbeliever, considered at least the possibility of that source for your rejection of what seems to most rational human beings, a reasonable faith?

An open letter to my atheist friends, III

by guest blogger, BroKen

Dear Unbeliever,

The last two letters sparked an interesting discussion, so I thought I would lay out some more questions that came to my mind.

You remember that the first letter was a response to a video, “Dear Believer”, which asked believers like me to think deeply about what we believe. I still think that is a very good plan. My response, after answering some questions from the video, was to ask atheists like you to think deeply about your position. I asked you to consider why there are so few atheist organizations that do good works. I suggested the reason is that atheism has no unifying principle to bring diverse peoples together for good works. Am I wrong?

The second letter asked a similar question spurred by a song from Steve Martin. That is, where is the atheist art? I did not mean to imply that there are no artists who are atheists. That would be silly. I meant to ask where is the atheist art that expresses atheism like Handel's Messiah expresses Christianity. I asked, Why is the best art made by people who are trying to express the beauty and wonder of things much, much greater than themselves? I think the question answers itself. Am I wrong?

In a discussion of these letters an atheist, or perhaps an agnostic, said, “I personally do not believe in a moral compass...” That, I think, gets to the heart of the matter. My friend, please do not think that I think you live as if there is no moral compass. It is unlikely that you would be my friend if that were so. You see, people who live as if there is no moral compass are sociopaths. Not many atheists are sociopaths. Yet the statement that there is no moral compass flows out of atheism. So, how does an atheist maintain morality (and again, I believe you do, my friend) without a moral compass or something like a star, an objective reference, to give bearings and headings?

Consider how in the last century alone, overtly atheist regimes have directly and indirectly killed tens of millions of people. Atrocities committed in the name of religion over millennia are amateurish in comparison. The atheist leaders of these regimes died, so far as we can tell, still believing they had done well. The problem is that without a moral compass you cannot say that Stalin was wrong. Without an objective reference you can only say that from your perspective you don't like what he did. Now, you probably DO say that Stalin was wrong. But atheism doesn't, because to do so it has to refer to a moral compass. Where does an atheist find a pole star, the objective reference? Isn't a system of thought which cannot declare that Stalin was wrong, isn't that system itself morally suspect?

Good works, good art, and good morals all point to something outside human nature. Please, think deeply about what that something might be.

 

The spirit of the age

by guest blogger, BroKen

I want to punch McDonalds in the nose! That may not be an appropriate expression for a pastor to make, but I feel it. Let me explain.

Several years ago, as a merchandizer for Coca-Cola, I filled the shelves, built displays, and cleaned up the back rooms of large grocery stores which bought semi-loads of Coke products. One year Krogers decided to be open on Thanksgiving day. Since they were open, we would have to work.

I was naive and thought, “No one will come shopping on Thanksgiving. They will all be home with their families.” Well... the place was packed! I wanted to run through the aisles crying out, “GO HOME! GO HOME! DON'T YOU REALIZE YOU ARE KILLING THANKSGIVING!?” I didn't, of course. I just did my job and went home, tired but grateful for the work.

Now, I just found out that McDonalds restaurants will be open on Christmas day. It makes me want to pull out my hair and scream, “WHY KILL CHRISTMAS!?”

I've told some local managers that I think it is a terrible policy. They agree with me, but orders are orders. One employee told me that they used to say, “If you can get enough volunteers, you can open on Christmas.” Apparently, they don't say that anymore. If you are scheduled, you have to work. You see how it progresses.

I called McDonalds to complain. I was told that 85% of their stores are franchises that can do what they want. Sure, they pass the buck. They don't want to take responsibility but they have it. If they told those owners that McDonalds will not be open, they would not be open on Christmas.

Of course, they will make a lot of money. But a main point of any holiday is that there are some things that are more important than making money. McDonalds and the people who go there on Christmas are saying, “No, there is nothing more important!”

It isn't the franchise owners or the McDonalds executives who make financial calculations that really make me angry. They are just as deluded as the poor souls who think a Big Mac is a fitting substitute for turkey and dressing or ham will all the fixings. No, it is the spirit behind those decisions; the spirit of Scrooge. Well, it is probably an even more slimy spirit than that old crank. The spirit is what I really want to punch.

I think I will go to McDonalds, order a cup of water (which they will give me for free, though it costs them a few cents for the cup and ice), give the person who waits on me a tip (a quarter would be enough, but a dollar would make an impact), and explain why. “That's for you. I won't buy from Scrooge. Sorry you have to work for him.” It's not much of a punch, but if enough people did it, they might feel a pinch.