66.
The reason that football occupies such a dominant part of society is religious. The reason people enjoy playing is as much for the religious reasons as the social and physical ones. It offers experiences of grace and delight that result from the unity of the mind and the body, the physical and immaterial.
The meaning of the game and the meaning of one's actions within the game (decided by the socially determined rules) are immaterial and exist outside of (and above) the players of the game. The rewards offered when one adheres successfully to the rules of the game are attainable only by embodied participation.
This is a sacramental spirituality made possible by the unity between body and mind. Our kids are religious, but the immaterial religion found in most churches offers less spiritual experience than what they find on the football field.
We need to turn up the interplay between body and soul within our worship.
65.
Generally speaking women are looking for a partner who has proved themselves competent whereas men are looking for a woman who has made themselves beautiful.
Women, who's experience of life is much more affected by their bodies, seek men who have proved themselves capable of mastering the world external to their bodies. Men, who's experience of life is much more affected by what they can achieve external to themselves, are drawn to and want to be around near to a woman's body.
There is a fittedness here that makes sense of life. A woman seeks security in the capability of a man just as a man seeks security in the physical touch of a woman.
One is drawn away from their body whilst another is drawn toward the body.
64.
Salvation is the pursuit of every soul. By another name we call it validation or acceptance, or harmony and peace. Soul's quake since soul's know that they will die. A soul seeks deliverance. Salvation is the goal of the health conscious with their calorie counting and it is revealed to have been the goal of the performer in their disappointment after a show. To be saved is to be safe and in a world of vulnerability and change safety is always out of reach. We think we have it only for the new day to bring fresh trouble. An athlete achieves it with a gold medal, but four years later must reclaim it or else lose it forever. A football team strives to obtain it only to have it stripped of them a few weeks later.
Salvation takes many forms from unification (being one with another) to glorification (being elevated above another), and is sought after variously in sex, fame and wealth. Becoming one in body with someone removes the vulnerability caused by individuality, being esteemed by others removes the vulnerability caused by anonymity.
In all these things we seek the same thing: salvation.
63.
Learn the lesson of the candle. A long, slow, drawn out breath will cause the flame to flicker and wither but not go out. A short, sharp, burst of breath will extinguish it immediately. Heartache and suffering that is persistent and long lasting will restrict us and hem us in, but we are 'shatter-proof' and resilience will be cultivated. A sharp and sudden burst of bad news or disappointment can knock us much harder. It shatters our serenity and destroys whatever sense of order we'd created.
62.
Prioritising the body over the soul or the soul over the body is like prioritising breathing in, to breathing out. I am no more a spiritual being than I am an exhaler. A happy unity of the two is crucial for health and happiness.
61.
A woman's body seems to have written into it the narrative arc of God's plan and purpose for the world. From pre-pubescent innocence, to beauty and power with procreative abundance, to suffering and weakness in monthly menstruation on to the definitive alteration (and transformation) caused through turmoil of the menopause. So creation tells a similar story of childlike innocence, loss but abundance, suffering and beauty, and is heading (through turmoil) to a new state of being, a new creation devoid of death and with fruitfulness coming not from procreation but new life in Christ.
60.
The methodology that arrives at a young earth reading of Genesis is the same that's necessary for an egalitarian position on the sexes. It emphasises utility and function at the expense of meaning and message.
59.
Mindfulness, is depersonalised prayer and as such is a suppression of our deepest instinct toward love and relationship. It is what people do when they do not believe the Universe cares or feels.
For the Christian, we share even our attentive and watchful relaxations (our mindful moments) with our Lord, friend and brother and are invited to bring our fullest selves to the experience.
58.
Hot pants and stringy tops. If a man wears walks around in clothes that show off his muscles, if he swaggers and flaunts his physical power we call it 'toxic masculinity'. If a girl shows off her curves we call it 'body confidence' and 'freedom'. This is when you know your culture's tilting toward matriarchy.
57.
China is on the rise. As the looming presence of empires goes it has to be said that the oncoming Chinese one is a particularly disturbing one. But it is also a fact that there are more Christians in China than in Europe. So as the looming presence of empires goes, the Lord seems to have a gameplan in mind.
56.
Man quotes date to win an argument and expresses distress that his moral opinion isn't held by others.
This is something that happens frequently in moral discussions. Whenever I see it I can't help but wonder if someone in 1938 said the same thing in Germany: "I can't believe that in 1938 Jews are allowed to own property!"
55.
Our culture opts for dopamine hits that grab attention without regard for impact on others. Tilate to sell something and overlook the danger that an aroused man has now been triggered for action outside the confines of a consenting relationship.
54.
A woman demonstrating compassion for men in the way she dresses isn't a toxic 'purity culture', instead it demonstrates a recognition of her power and a refusal to abuse it.
53.
Adam was made from the Adamah and woman (issa) is built from the man (is). Perhaps this explains why men suffer so much when made redundant, and why so much of a woman's identity is formed in relationship to men. Men are rarely able to stand independent of their activity in the world, their working and taming the wild of the adamah (the ground), and women likewise are so shaped by the behaviour of the male and depend on their good behaviour for their flourishing just as men are dependent on the behaviour of the ground (or the markets) for theirs.
__
1.
2.
Sometimes it seems that one of the worst things that can happen to a man is that he is told in no uncertain terms that he is special. To believe of course that one matters isn't a bad thing but to be led to believe that one is a necessary man is tragic. Believed it can tend a man toward privilege refusing to work hard or join the herd but instead waiting for their own discovery by others. Destiny is not a guarantee but is an invitation and offer of what could be. But even this can tend a person toward self-reliance especially a person raised in the post-modern west.
3.
Reverence for God doesn't always need to look like fear and awe, careful speech and morals. Reverence for God is also unceasing gratitude and deep humility before God. To receive everything in life as the gift that it is and to enjoy everything in life without any sense of personal entitlement or pride at one's own accomplishments but instead in humility inspired by awe is reverent. It is flippancy that is the opposite of reverence not joyful carelessness.
4.
A people's ability to control its weather has a direct bearing on that same people's attitude toward God. Those who live in societies where the weather is kept at bay or under control, its people can decide to do without God, believing that he is tame and temperate. On the other hand for those who experience the catastrophic and unctrollable force of the weather there is, forced upon them, a humility and vulnerability that prevents them from disregarding the Almighty.
5.
Grace both propels and refreshes. It is the wind on our back that moves us onward into service of others, using our gifts for God's glory. But when tiredness prevails we turn into that same propelling wind and it becomes a cool and refreshing breeze. It is the reminder of God's love, of our adoption and acceptance that is all the rest and refreshment we need. Grace both propels and refreshes.
6.
The world feels silent of God because I don't credit the natural world to God but instead see God only in the miraculous, supernatural and providential encounters. But noticing God only in moments where he appears to bend or break the laws of physics is problematic on several levels. First it narrows my vision to the point of being almost blind. Second it is often the case that a miracle is only a miracle until scepticism has tugged at it and reduced it something explainable. Not even Christians find it easy to live in a world of miracles. The joy over hearing of some miracle is counteracted by the presence of godly people who suffer silence in their prayers for healing and I become confused by or offended at God. Or else what happens is that my hopes of experiencing my own miracle are deferred long enough that I become sick and despise the testimonies of a few. I can tolerate only a world where miracles don't happen where nothing 'supernatural' happens at all but since I am not used to seeing God in the natural world I am left only with silence.
7.
The experiences of faith and the Christian are not unique to Christians. The subtle and still small whisper of God I know is called by others the 'deep subconscious', providential moments are experienced by believers and non-believers alike, ecstatic experiences of spiritual experience are found in the cults and mystical religions around the world, the mental health benefits of prayer are enjoyed under the label of mindfulness, the peace of God can be found in a worship service and rock concert all the same, inspirational sermons that move people to action are given by politicians, scientists, lecturers and preachers alike. Remarkable acts of generosity and kindness aren't confined to believers only, decency and good morals aren't the reserve of the saints either. There is very little 'unique' about the life of the Christian. What ought to be seen more and celebrated is the purity of the source all the Christian expressions and experiences come from.
8.
Why do archetypes exist at all? There is a true and better form of everything because there is an ultimate source of everything as well. The wellspring it all springs from is the memory harboured deep in our sub-consciences. Answering 'why' this exists there requires us to call on a worldview. For one person the answer 'because it is part of how our species learnt to survive' seems to settle the score. For others that stops a few stages too short of the source. For all things with a shadow we consider them to have a substance. Why not also with our archetypes.
9.
Communication initiated between people often takes the form of praise/wonder, complaint/concern, fact/observation. Some people, being predominantly external processors, express more ideas than others but what interests me is the percentage amount of expressions that are uttered within each category. I would imagine that 80% of verbal communication that happens between two people takes place within the benign world of fact or observation. Exchanges related to the events of the day that are neutral. What I'm thinking about is the final 20%. Of that 20% how much is given to the expression of positive wonders and how much to negative complaints? In part it depends on the amount of positive or negative experiences a person has, although these aren't easy to categorise since they're open to interpretation. My observation is that one person may marvel more at the wetness of water and the beauty of a sunrise and feel a great need to, in general, fulfil their joy by expressing and sharing it whereas another person may keep much of their joy to themselves, or perhaps wouldn't notice those things as wonderful. What is intriguing however is that those same peoples may behave differently toward negative experiences. The joy fulfiller may not feel the need to share every inconvenience they suffer whereas the more reserved person might. What's going on there? I wonder if it is linked in part to the ego states. Enthusiasm and praise is a primary child ego state expression. Does that mean that neutral observations are adult and that negative expressions 'parent'? Do people with a higher parent ego state than child express more negative experiences and viceversa?
10.
Sin. Simply put sin is missing a mark, a term from archery I'm told, different from transgression which requires a law/rule to be broken, sin exists even when there isn't a rule since it has to do with relationships and principles as well as rules. The apostle Paul makes this distinction when he says that sin existed before the law existed, and he points to the presence of human death in the world which is the consequence or payment for sin. We die because we sin, acknowledging that every person dies therefore every person sins, regardless of what laws they do or don't have. Laws do not prevent sin they merely expose its presence. Sin therefore includes transgression (as one of its 'types'). Missing the mark is both accidental and wilful and there are sins of commission and omission. That is, there is sin we commit by doing what we know we shouldn't and by not doing what we should have done.
A family tree of terms could look like:
Sin
Missing the mark Violating universal principles
Transgression
Commission Omission
Transgressions can be decided by a society can vary across societies. Cooking dinner for your familiar in a pair of dirty trousers may not be considered a transgression in the west but in many cultures it would be. Sin however remains the same even if doesn't break any societies transgression. Cannibalism is a sin even if a group of people don't have laws against it and in fact practise it.
My suggestion is that religion did not invent sin it but merely named it. What we call 'falling short' or 'breaking a law' the monotheistic religions call 'sin'. Where does this falling short occur?
Relationally: Between persons. across families, tribes/nations.
Principally: Against the laws of nature or a society or against our own principles
Mathematically: Breaking the laws of logic
Given that sin is a junk draw term, a catchall for falling short or missing the mark we must consider in what forms sin appears within our shared morality.
Jonathan Heidt's work on morality makes the case for morality being like taste sensors on our tongue. Universally there are five different categories of morality that people experience:
- Care/harm
- Purity
- Fair/unfair
- Freedom/oppression
- Loyalty
- Authority
Some people recognise the value of all six aspects of morality whereas others stress only a few. For a lot of modern westerners it would appear that the only question to be considered is ‘does it hurt anyone?’ (An example of the care/harm moral sense). His results from various studies showed that left-leaning liberal types are generally 'less moral' than right-leaning conservatives in that they only seem able to recognise categories of: care, fairness and freedom as moral terms whereas conservatives are generally able to appreciate the value of all six.
An example of why morality may be construed within the purity paradigm is that, since it is an extension of our disgust sensors, without it we can put ourselves in danger. In the days of closer community living we can perhaps understand how the decision to not adhere to standards and ceremonies of purity is an immoral decision on the basis that it endangers the whole.
Whether we are discussing our moral sense or the discovery of virtues in the ancient classical sense, sin is what we do when we fail to live up to a or our shared standards.
Timothy Keller defines sin as ‘anything that does not lead to human flourishing’ which moves on in its definition from ‘missing the mark’ which is amoral and could refer to anything, onto utility and value.
The question then follows ‘who decides what amounts to human flourishing?’ And rather than making a case empirically all human societies actually base their decisions on what sin is from shared values. All of these moral codes have always come from within a religious worldview (since the more fact based empirically assessed world is a late arriver on the human scene).
The Bible writers describe a world and society that has a clearly moral way of viewing the world. There is both an original blueprint (telos if you like), a problem and boundary markers to live within. Sin is not the ravings of a Being infatuated by ceremony and sacrifice but is the working against the Creators instructions.
The OT presents humanities original state in an archetypal story of our conception. In it we see the Creator’s commission to embody his activity in the world through work and creation and the proper functioning of the humans with one another and with God. Following the exile from our genesis instructions then come later (many hundreds of years later) in the form of the Mosaic law, an attempt to codify the life of the Israelites into laws concerning their corporate life and worship life. The laws are summarised into the famous Ten Commandments.
To work against or miss the mark of either our archetypal state in Genesis 1 or the 10 commandments is to sin.
As the Bible’s story unfolds it is shown time and again through story, history and prophetic injunction that the people of Israel (who are meant to be for us typical and representative of humanity in general) are unable to avoid sinning. This leads to reflections on the nature of sin and our nature. Human beings, it is concluded, are unable to avoid sin. We are sinners, those who are unable to keep the law of God and restore the blueprint of Genesis 1. We are inconsistent, short-sighted, stubborn and unsubmissive creatures who can see that the ideals of Christian virtue and the Ten Commandments are good and even beautiful and yet we are unable to live up to them on a consistent level.
Further reflections in scripture show that the issue is one of worship. It is taken for granted that we are creatures prone to devotion and worship but it is also acknowledged that the things we worship have a huge influence on us and the lesser the object of our worship is the more destructive it can be for us. To be devoted to addictive substances destroys us (that much is obvious), but to be devoted to the accumulation of wealth or to social standing can also have a destructive influence on us. A person devoted to their own beauty (who worships Aphrodite) is vulnerable to abusing their body and becoming distorted.
11.
Safety but for what. Safe spaces, health and safety, dieting and healthy living. Safety belts, better glasses to keep one safe. Safety safety everywhere, but for what I ask? For fruitful development and full flowering as children. But the world does not know this and indeed is not a safe place, nature will not play by those rules and does not know what is expected of it. In fact one cannot mature until accepting and mastering the world as it is risks and dangers and all. Safety to choose the risks we want, but we won't will we? Why step outside the warm and into the cold?
Our emphasis on safety and health and safety is, ultimately, safety from death. Our drive to create healthy and safe lives is born out of our drive to live forever; but aware as we are that God isn't to us as he once was we cannot count on a welcome reception. And so we stress safety to prolong our lives. But then what our our lives for? Riches and comfort? Are the richer and more affluent more significant than the rest, or are they not just cashing in on the hard work of previous generations? Knowing that our lives are short we can expend effort trying to preserve our lives, but at the risk of never really living; or we can peruse a riskier path of exploration to tame the unknown and discover the reason God made us for.
12.
Standing on the shoulder's of giants. All of us are, but only those faithful to the spirit of the giants before us stand on tiptoes. It is one thing to recognise the enormous debt that we owe to those who came before us, but it is another thing entirely to try and continue their work by pressing further on.
And what is that further on? Is it only procreation and greater taming of nature still? But when at last we tame nature fully we will have tamed ourselves since we are part of nature and so we will once again be trapped. There is a line that the human soul crosses that marks it out from the animals and puts it in a different category, that of salient being, conscious and fully alive - representative of the divine life on the earth.
13.
On a Christian doctrine that doesn't close down and narrow the world but allows an exploration within the worldview Christ opens up. For many people are tuned out to the Christianity of their religion and tradition but stray into dangerous fields because they refused to think Christianly about the world.
14.
We all end daily pills to pop.
15.
When we're young we pop pills to escape life's monotony. When we're old we pop them to restore and preserve it.
16.
On theophanies.
Questions. Could it be that many of our struggles with life's pain stems from the fact that we don't ask enough questions? We ask a few; the 'whys' and the 'what fors' but we stop at the point we ought to press forward and ask many more: why should I expect life to be anything other than hard? Why have I enjoyed ease and comfort until now? Why do I presume to know life's purpose and my outcome? Why am I so confident that this pain is for no purpose? What makes me think I am entitled to anything other or better than this chaos?
17.
On self and theophany.
All ages and all people have fought life's apparent contradictions. It seems peculiar that Jesus said so little on the subject of pain. He doesn't address in much detail at all what is surely one of the oldest and most heartfelt questions: why does God permit such brutality and where is he when it hurts?
Could it be that his day was different from ours in respect to their own assessment of human nature and therefore the expectations they placed upon life?
"If you, though you are evil know how to give good gifts..." he says and no one bats an eyelid.
"But Jesus didn't entrust himself to them for he knew what was in a man." John 2:24
Jesus and the people of his day were familiar with human depravity. Kings massacred infants, enemies pulled the skins off their victims backs and criminals were often dismembered. The human race was a race of savages that occasionally displayed moments of exalted goodness. They were fallen but carried a latent divinity, an origin and a destiny in God.
In their day to day living they lived in fear; of starvation, of being attacked by bandits, of being assaulted by soldiers of having their property robbed and the exaction of their wealth. No one bat an eyelid when Jesus casually called them evil because everyone knew they were. They knew that every one of us is capable of wickedness without much persuasion, that we'd betray our family members for personal safety or a loaf of bread.
Could it be then that he didn't address it in the way we would have thought he would because he didn't have the same problem we do?
Could it be that the reason we struggle to reconcile suffering so much is because we think too highly of ourselves? This is true on the level that we are surprised by another persons poor behaviour and supremely confident in our ability to understand the world. Suffering hurts us so much and the questions of pain are so acute since we cannot entertain a world where we are not good and where we are not capable of solving the problems presented to us.
Jesus instead did teach that God is good and willing to forgive and that by his Spirit would give us the strength to bear up under the weight of our own existence. This was the answer to the theophanies of his day and if we're able to handle its premise (that we are evil and fallen and deserve only death) it is enough to comfort us as well.
18.
11.
Safety but for what. Safe spaces, health and safety, dieting and healthy living. Safety belts, better glasses to keep one safe. Safety safety everywhere, but for what I ask? For fruitful development and full flowering as children. But the world does not know this and indeed is not a safe place, nature will not play by those rules and does not know what is expected of it. In fact one cannot mature until accepting and mastering the world as it is risks and dangers and all. Safety to choose the risks we want, but we won't will we? Why step outside the warm and into the cold?
Our emphasis on safety and health and safety is, ultimately, safety from death. Our drive to create healthy and safe lives is born out of our drive to live forever; but aware as we are that God isn't to us as he once was we cannot count on a welcome reception. And so we stress safety to prolong our lives. But then what our our lives for? Riches and comfort? Are the richer and more affluent more significant than the rest, or are they not just cashing in on the hard work of previous generations? Knowing that our lives are short we can expend effort trying to preserve our lives, but at the risk of never really living; or we can peruse a riskier path of exploration to tame the unknown and discover the reason God made us for.
12.
Standing on the shoulder's of giants. All of us are, but only those faithful to the spirit of the giants before us stand on tiptoes. It is one thing to recognise the enormous debt that we owe to those who came before us, but it is another thing entirely to try and continue their work by pressing further on.
And what is that further on? Is it only procreation and greater taming of nature still? But when at last we tame nature fully we will have tamed ourselves since we are part of nature and so we will once again be trapped. There is a line that the human soul crosses that marks it out from the animals and puts it in a different category, that of salient being, conscious and fully alive - representative of the divine life on the earth.
13.
On a Christian doctrine that doesn't close down and narrow the world but allows an exploration within the worldview Christ opens up. For many people are tuned out to the Christianity of their religion and tradition but stray into dangerous fields because they refused to think Christianly about the world.
14.
We all end daily pills to pop.
15.
When we're young we pop pills to escape life's monotony. When we're old we pop them to restore and preserve it.
16.
On theophanies.
Questions. Could it be that many of our struggles with life's pain stems from the fact that we don't ask enough questions? We ask a few; the 'whys' and the 'what fors' but we stop at the point we ought to press forward and ask many more: why should I expect life to be anything other than hard? Why have I enjoyed ease and comfort until now? Why do I presume to know life's purpose and my outcome? Why am I so confident that this pain is for no purpose? What makes me think I am entitled to anything other or better than this chaos?
17.
On self and theophany.
All ages and all people have fought life's apparent contradictions. It seems peculiar that Jesus said so little on the subject of pain. He doesn't address in much detail at all what is surely one of the oldest and most heartfelt questions: why does God permit such brutality and where is he when it hurts?
Could it be that his day was different from ours in respect to their own assessment of human nature and therefore the expectations they placed upon life?
"If you, though you are evil know how to give good gifts..." he says and no one bats an eyelid.
"But Jesus didn't entrust himself to them for he knew what was in a man." John 2:24
Jesus and the people of his day were familiar with human depravity. Kings massacred infants, enemies pulled the skins off their victims backs and criminals were often dismembered. The human race was a race of savages that occasionally displayed moments of exalted goodness. They were fallen but carried a latent divinity, an origin and a destiny in God.
In their day to day living they lived in fear; of starvation, of being attacked by bandits, of being assaulted by soldiers of having their property robbed and the exaction of their wealth. No one bat an eyelid when Jesus casually called them evil because everyone knew they were. They knew that every one of us is capable of wickedness without much persuasion, that we'd betray our family members for personal safety or a loaf of bread.
Could it be then that he didn't address it in the way we would have thought he would because he didn't have the same problem we do?
Could it be that the reason we struggle to reconcile suffering so much is because we think too highly of ourselves? This is true on the level that we are surprised by another persons poor behaviour and supremely confident in our ability to understand the world. Suffering hurts us so much and the questions of pain are so acute since we cannot entertain a world where we are not good and where we are not capable of solving the problems presented to us.
Jesus instead did teach that God is good and willing to forgive and that by his Spirit would give us the strength to bear up under the weight of our own existence. This was the answer to the theophanies of his day and if we're able to handle its premise (that we are evil and fallen and deserve only death) it is enough to comfort us as well.
18.
When an intellectual says that since there is no objective moral truth, that disasters such as the holocaust are not morally wrong they prove that intellect alone will not lead us to truth.
19.
Asking 'why then and not before?' leads me to ponder the development of ideas and social movements in the last 150 years.
Consequences for various aspects of society based on the Industrial Revolution:
Invention: Factories
Consequence: Mass migration from country to city
Social consequence: Individuals become 'cut off' from extended families.
Invention: Motor car
Consequence: Greater mobility resulting in much greater relocation
Social consequence: Individuals become less accountable and more autonomous, more able to choose who they see and where they live and go.
Development: Factory becomes centre of production
Consequence: The home and household loses some of its social significance
Development: The home becomes a place of rest and leisure
Consequence: Those who work in the home become providers of leisure and entertainment.
Development: Men left the home to work in the factory
Consequence: Women remain in a new household stripped of much of its social and community significance.
Consequence: Women demand equal voting rights and access to education.
Consequences for various aspects of society due to rise of expressive Individualism:
Event: Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection
Consequence: Human beings, put under the scientific microscope, are uncoupled from beliefs about their being sacred or semi-divine.
Event: Emergence of modern psychology & Freud's writings
Consequence: The animal instincts of the human are exposed more fully
Social consequence: Reduced degree of accountability for actions and decreased expectations for moral or civilised behaviour.
Event: WWI
Consequence: Emergence of the industry of PR, developed by Edward Bernais (nephew of Freud)
Social consequence: People are manipulated into buying certain products and aspiring to certain ways of living and become much more consumer oriented.
20.
Observation. Due to the radical reorientation of the home caused by, among others things, the Industrial Revolution it now feels and seems strange to 'work from home'. Indeed even for myself as a pastor I feel an 'office' is more official and makes me feel more official and professional, less amateur. Two hundred years ago of course, the home was the place of work, the centre of a family's work life. The home of the pastor was always on display to the church and the community, the church could watch how the children were raised and how the Christian life was lived out in the home. Now, since the home is a place of leisure and pleasure, to visit the pastor in his home is to learn about his private hobbies, his golf handicap or favourite box sets.
And yet, given the prominence of church-as-household in the NT ought we not as pastors but much more content to see our home as our office? The strangeness we feel about 'working from home' is a culturally conditioned one, and yet for the church to visit us at home rather than the office reinforces the central value that as a church we are a household and a family. To quote John Piper's popular book: Brothers, we are not professionals - so avoid offices more and embrace the fireside chat or the kitchen table coffee more.
Just a thought.
21.
Suffering and pain are self-evident. Living at any other place and at any other time in history 'comfortable' would not be a word a child would use to describe their expectations for life.
Our day and our age prepare us so poorly for suffering. We don't have the emotional or spiritual resources to deal with it. Even within the church with our sentimentalising of the Father's love for us we overlook the self-evident reality that pain is ever-present. The longer we live the more we will suffer until we eventually die. Why does it rock our confidence so much and cause us to question God as deeply as we do? Is it because atheism is so instantly accessible to us and a constant temptation? Is it because we expect too much of the kingdom now and aren't prepared to wait for the 'yet to come' aspects of it?
From the perspective of any of the writers of scripture we are living in much more of the fullness of the kingdom now than they ever dreamt possible, and yet we want more. We want more life, more health, more comfort, more peace. We shall never rest until we live in paradise.
But the paradise of the kingdom, the life of the kingdom and the peace of the kingdom cannot be entered without first submitting to the king of the kingdom. To submit to the king of the kingdom requires a willingness to accept the world the king has created for us; the world we have made following the fall.
22.
Safety, but for what? Safety, safety, safety I hear talk of safety and non-offence everywhere. But safety is a terrible goal to live for. Risks and the rewards attached to them is a much more satisfying and full life to live, but risks require a lack of safety.
If we are not careful we will be so safe that we never truly live before we die.
23.
Traditional and quote 'boring' church services are merely modes of Christian expression that either became lazy in their contextualisation or disgusted in the state of society, so disgusted in fact that it refused to charitably adapt for them and speak in new words and in new ways. In so doing they behave nothing like the saviour they represent and claim to speak about. There is much about modern society that requires patience to communicate the gospel effectively to, many layers of worldview and ways of thinking that need to be tackled, but to not go on this journey with people is to show a casual disdain toward the people Christ died for.
24.
I am grateful for gratitude. For whatever reason my mind has a natural bend toward thankfulness and exultation over life's 'simple' wonders. This is a source of rest, refreshing, humility and perspective that I experience as inner health. Gratitude then is not only appropriate but also good for me.
25.
Female vicars. Sexless, masculinised women in gowns. Churches led by women and not men are churches that fit into what wider society wants them to be. Benign, anaemic, toothless and harmless institutions. Men will put up with one and listen politely and afterwards carry on as they did before. Rarely do grown men listen to challenges from their mothers.
Young worship idols. Churches with big stages and bright lights, tv personalities, white teethy smiles and polished presentation. Churches that are as noisy and hurried as the world is; suggest no place for calm reflection, and the promise that all mystery and uncertainty in God's dealings with us can be solved by an upbeat melody and the occasional key change. In the long run they'll create attitudes of easy believism, superficiality and frustrated shallow Christians.
26.
A church's life is in its unspoken acts of service. A church's future is in the potency of its prayer life. A church's health is in the clarity and fire of its preaching.
27.
Thin. Thin is the word that best sums up the experience of regular online Bible studies, prayer meetings and church services. It is a two dimensional experience of fellowship that never leaves a person feeling like they have had fellowship, but only the appearance of the thing. Comparable perhaps to how we 'see as through a mirror dimly'.
28.
Relationships require courage. Forming a new relationship always requires courage on at least one person's part. With existing relationships it is easy to forget this since the friend's presence is an obvious reality. There can be no new relationships without some act of courage however small to initiate contact with another.
29.
Healthy and safe, but for what? In our society we are all drilled from a young age and in our workplaces on the importance of staying safe, preserving our lives for as long as we can. I can't help but wonder however what all the emphasis on getting and staying healthy is meant to be for. It occurs to me that some of the most life fulfilling and enriching experiences and activities in life are ones that require us to not stay 100% safe. It strikes me that a person could live their whole life staying safe and die at a ripe age and yet not experience what it is to truly live.
30.
19.
Asking 'why then and not before?' leads me to ponder the development of ideas and social movements in the last 150 years.
Consequences for various aspects of society based on the Industrial Revolution:
Invention: Factories
Consequence: Mass migration from country to city
Social consequence: Individuals become 'cut off' from extended families.
Invention: Motor car
Consequence: Greater mobility resulting in much greater relocation
Social consequence: Individuals become less accountable and more autonomous, more able to choose who they see and where they live and go.
Development: Factory becomes centre of production
Consequence: The home and household loses some of its social significance
Development: The home becomes a place of rest and leisure
Consequence: Those who work in the home become providers of leisure and entertainment.
Development: Men left the home to work in the factory
Consequence: Women remain in a new household stripped of much of its social and community significance.
Consequence: Women demand equal voting rights and access to education.
Consequences for various aspects of society due to rise of expressive Individualism:
Event: Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection
Consequence: Human beings, put under the scientific microscope, are uncoupled from beliefs about their being sacred or semi-divine.
Event: Emergence of modern psychology & Freud's writings
Consequence: The animal instincts of the human are exposed more fully
Social consequence: Reduced degree of accountability for actions and decreased expectations for moral or civilised behaviour.
Event: WWI
Consequence: Emergence of the industry of PR, developed by Edward Bernais (nephew of Freud)
Social consequence: People are manipulated into buying certain products and aspiring to certain ways of living and become much more consumer oriented.
Observation. Due to the radical reorientation of the home caused by, among others things, the Industrial Revolution it now feels and seems strange to 'work from home'. Indeed even for myself as a pastor I feel an 'office' is more official and makes me feel more official and professional, less amateur. Two hundred years ago of course, the home was the place of work, the centre of a family's work life. The home of the pastor was always on display to the church and the community, the church could watch how the children were raised and how the Christian life was lived out in the home. Now, since the home is a place of leisure and pleasure, to visit the pastor in his home is to learn about his private hobbies, his golf handicap or favourite box sets.
And yet, given the prominence of church-as-household in the NT ought we not as pastors but much more content to see our home as our office? The strangeness we feel about 'working from home' is a culturally conditioned one, and yet for the church to visit us at home rather than the office reinforces the central value that as a church we are a household and a family. To quote John Piper's popular book: Brothers, we are not professionals - so avoid offices more and embrace the fireside chat or the kitchen table coffee more.
Just a thought.
21.
Suffering and pain are self-evident. Living at any other place and at any other time in history 'comfortable' would not be a word a child would use to describe their expectations for life.
Our day and our age prepare us so poorly for suffering. We don't have the emotional or spiritual resources to deal with it. Even within the church with our sentimentalising of the Father's love for us we overlook the self-evident reality that pain is ever-present. The longer we live the more we will suffer until we eventually die. Why does it rock our confidence so much and cause us to question God as deeply as we do? Is it because atheism is so instantly accessible to us and a constant temptation? Is it because we expect too much of the kingdom now and aren't prepared to wait for the 'yet to come' aspects of it?
From the perspective of any of the writers of scripture we are living in much more of the fullness of the kingdom now than they ever dreamt possible, and yet we want more. We want more life, more health, more comfort, more peace. We shall never rest until we live in paradise.
But the paradise of the kingdom, the life of the kingdom and the peace of the kingdom cannot be entered without first submitting to the king of the kingdom. To submit to the king of the kingdom requires a willingness to accept the world the king has created for us; the world we have made following the fall.
22.
Safety, but for what? Safety, safety, safety I hear talk of safety and non-offence everywhere. But safety is a terrible goal to live for. Risks and the rewards attached to them is a much more satisfying and full life to live, but risks require a lack of safety.
If we are not careful we will be so safe that we never truly live before we die.
23.
Traditional and quote 'boring' church services are merely modes of Christian expression that either became lazy in their contextualisation or disgusted in the state of society, so disgusted in fact that it refused to charitably adapt for them and speak in new words and in new ways. In so doing they behave nothing like the saviour they represent and claim to speak about. There is much about modern society that requires patience to communicate the gospel effectively to, many layers of worldview and ways of thinking that need to be tackled, but to not go on this journey with people is to show a casual disdain toward the people Christ died for.
24.
I am grateful for gratitude. For whatever reason my mind has a natural bend toward thankfulness and exultation over life's 'simple' wonders. This is a source of rest, refreshing, humility and perspective that I experience as inner health. Gratitude then is not only appropriate but also good for me.
25.
Female vicars. Sexless, masculinised women in gowns. Churches led by women and not men are churches that fit into what wider society wants them to be. Benign, anaemic, toothless and harmless institutions. Men will put up with one and listen politely and afterwards carry on as they did before. Rarely do grown men listen to challenges from their mothers.
Young worship idols. Churches with big stages and bright lights, tv personalities, white teethy smiles and polished presentation. Churches that are as noisy and hurried as the world is; suggest no place for calm reflection, and the promise that all mystery and uncertainty in God's dealings with us can be solved by an upbeat melody and the occasional key change. In the long run they'll create attitudes of easy believism, superficiality and frustrated shallow Christians.
26.
A church's life is in its unspoken acts of service. A church's future is in the potency of its prayer life. A church's health is in the clarity and fire of its preaching.
27.
Thin. Thin is the word that best sums up the experience of regular online Bible studies, prayer meetings and church services. It is a two dimensional experience of fellowship that never leaves a person feeling like they have had fellowship, but only the appearance of the thing. Comparable perhaps to how we 'see as through a mirror dimly'.
28.
Relationships require courage. Forming a new relationship always requires courage on at least one person's part. With existing relationships it is easy to forget this since the friend's presence is an obvious reality. There can be no new relationships without some act of courage however small to initiate contact with another.
29.
Healthy and safe, but for what? In our society we are all drilled from a young age and in our workplaces on the importance of staying safe, preserving our lives for as long as we can. I can't help but wonder however what all the emphasis on getting and staying healthy is meant to be for. It occurs to me that some of the most life fulfilling and enriching experiences and activities in life are ones that require us to not stay 100% safe. It strikes me that a person could live their whole life staying safe and die at a ripe age and yet not experience what it is to truly live.
30.
"As the Spirit was active at the world's foundation, so it was expected that the Spirit would be active as well at the world's renewal." - Dale Bruner, Matthew Commentary
If it may be permitted that the natural understanding of the universe's age as old is true then it is worth considering how 'long' the Spirit was involved orchestrating and delivering the foundations of the world. A mere two thousand years since Jesus' incarnation doesn't even register on the Holy Spirit's timeline of activity in comparison. Given the Holy Spirit's preoccupation with glorifying the Son it can be understood that his involvement in Creation was to create a world suited as a gift for the Son and in the Renewal in creating a people as a bride for the Son.
31.
There are two kinds of new normal. There is the one that arrives in fanfare and is announced by all; often ushered in by a crisis no one can miss this new normal. As with the Coronavirus pandemic all eyes are fully open to the changes we must now get used to; perspex screens, masks and social distancing. There is another kind of new normal however that is much more subtle, it happens gradually like the boiling of a pot or the flavouring of a dinner. No one announces its arrival and once it is here no one really notices it as 'new' but only what 'is' since we cannot imagine or conceive of a world in which this normal doesn't exist.
These new normals are deadly and without canaries to warn us will end up killing us and dismantling our social structures.
This thought occurred to me recently when reading Glynn Harrison's excellent book 'A Better Story' in it he points to many of the effects of the Sexual Revolution on society. The promise of the revolution was 'better sex and more freedom' and whilst it has certainly made us more free (if freedom is taken to mean only the throwing off of restraints) it hasn't brought us much that is better. I have grown up in the post-revolution world and so have known nothing else but its dogmas.
It was only when a new friend I made several years ago commented with surprise at the amount of divorced or remarried couples he knew of in the church that I began to consider whether this normal wasn't always around; I had no idea that it was new at at all.
Here's some normals we're familiar with, normals that we might never have considered 'new' since no one announced them with the same fanfare we've become used to in the past few months:
- Common acceptance of the validity (thought of course emotional painful reality) of abortion. There were 209, 519 abortions in England and Wales last year (it increases year on year and is the highest its ever been since the passing of the Abortion act in 1967 - 18 out of every 1000 women aged 15-44 had an abortion last year)
- Living together before being married (>66% of couples)
- High divorce rates (42%)
- Addiction to or regular use of porn. I have long assumed (from experience in youth work) that every boy (and increasingly a lot of girls) struggle with being addicted to or a regular user of porn. And the stats show that children are accessing it younger than ever before.
- Sexually
- 48% of all children born today will not be found living with both natural parents by their sixteenth birthday
- Father absences in homes: In 1972 1 in 14 households in the UK were fatherless, now it is 1 in 4. In more than 236 local authorities in England and Wales more than 50% of
- Mental health disorders.Common. Expected even. One
- In 2015 one in five teenage girls had experienced a major depressive episode in the last year.
- Suicide: The biggest killer of all men under the age of 50, and increasingly among the young. 46% more 15-19yr olds committed suicide in 2015 than in 2007.
- Loneliness. We're familiar with the commonplace loneliness among our
I'm sure there are
Mental health disorders are treated by many as being as inevitable as the common cold or as genetically predisposed as cancer and yet there is plenty of evidence to suggest that for the most part (though of course not in every case) it is more a symptom of something else, resulting from other factors at work in a person's life.
Whereas in our current crisis we're going to great lengths to protect the elderly and vulnerable from Covid-19, many of the new normals listed above are simple accepted (or in some cases celebrated); and yet it is our young that are most at risk from them all.
"Family insecurity and insecurity are bad for kids in terms of almost any outcome that you care to mention" (Harrison) and whereas we all accepted that divorce would harm our kids (although in many cases even that is done 'for the sake of the kids') cohabitation (the new normal) poses a much greater threat to the stability and security of our kids:
In a study from the UK Marriage Foundation the author found that, independent of mothers’ age or education, more than half of couples who only get married after the birth of their first child have split up ten years later, compared with only one quarter or couples who marry before having children.’
There are two kinds of new normal, one that gets noticed as 'new' and one that gets accepted simply as what 'is', but if it hasn't always been this way shouldn't we be more concerned that it's new and start to question whether we're all happy with it?
32.
Do we lose faith or just stop it? I think that using faith is a constant process of losing it; I lose what I previously held onto in favour of something better and truer. It is when I stop the process of losing and growing that I die.
Despite going through periods of stopping my faith or trying to switch it off, I have learnt to try and run the tape forward and skip the wandering meander of indecision, unfulfilment and restlessness that always eventually leads back to losing and using my faith. In practical terms 'running the tape forward' means pursuing God in private and quiet, by bringing my angst and doubt before him.
33.
Secular
Sek-u-lerrr are we sure?
Sek-u-learnt?
34.
Be Kind.
There is something of the uncanny about the site of million pound houses on the beach front with moral encouragements like this one plastered across a flag on its boundary line. It reminded me of the luxurious lifestyle of the inhabitants of The Capital in Suzanne Collins' books The Hunger Games.
Can those within the system, who benefit from the beauty and luxury of social inequality tell the rest of us to behave better? Marie Antoinette's 'let them eat cake' comes to mind.
35.
Everyone is happy with a certain degree of social inequality, but then everyone also has their tolerance limit. I have no problem with the fact that I am grotesquely wealthy compared with over 90% of the planet, that sort of inequality doesn't cause me any problems. But I'll campaign and complain about the wealthy politicians and Etonians of the upper middle-classes.
36.
I don't have a problem with death until someone I care about is affected by it. The fact that people die doesn't trouble my faith, I have reconciled it philosophically with the fact of a loving God. But then my child dies and I'm up-in-arms about it, protesting in God's face and threatening to 'stop my faith' altogether.
37.
Auschwitz affects us all, but those who believe in the goodness of God and the goodness of man most of all.
I cannot move past this into easy-believism and faith speech pentecostalism. Not only Auschwitz affects this, but history in general. God, what does active faith and expectancy look like in the face of your passivity at Auschwitz; and the African slave trade; and the Rwandan genocide; and the 27million enslaved at present. Oh God I find myself reaching for alternatively to either the 'eject' or 'self-destruct' button when I consider these things; choosing one over the other seems hard to do since in my case they're so closely linked.
38.
Data is neutral and always requires interpretation. Critical and negative, cynical interpretations have the effect of both making one feel wise and also protecting oneself from disappointment. Positive people inspire confidence and make the world a better place to be in. Choose therefore to interpret the data positively.
39.
If a male brain is more prone to hijacking through super-normal imagery, the impression of curves and flesh, how we respond to that inputted date is shaped by the storylines we've been formed by. Those storylines take the form of how we're taught to think about our humanity and another's, and what value is placed on self-restraint and how society values self-control.
40.
In classical Greek and Roman society the 'sin' of homosexuality lay in whether a man was the passive or active partner. Being dominated by another was a clear sign of being of a lower status. In heterosexual sex the active partner is always the man, this will inevitably shape the way a man thinks about his masculinity and by consequence how he perceives women. A narrative and value structure that inspires men toward self-sacrifice and self-denial is needed to better protect and serve women.
41.
Freud said that genital pleasure is the highest happiness for human beings and that we are are therefore primarily beings driven by desire for sexual satisfaction.
Their is difference recognisable (brain chemical and lasting impact] in the increasing levels of satisfaction from:
[low end] viewing pornography, to masturbation, to sex without to intimacy to, to sex with intimacy, to sex within the secure bonds of marriage [fullest end]
This all points beyond Freud's reductionism. We are intimacy craving creatures first.
42.
Blindspots. Every generation and culture has its own blindspots to the truth. As the wider culture's values and beliefs change so the blindspots of the members of those culture's change. This results in church's (made up of members drawn from wider culture) with different blindspots than before. In the 17th-19th Century many Christians believed that capturing and enslaving other human beings was not a sin, and their consciences didn't convict them of it; it was, even if some couldn't see it as we do now. With human sexuality, society's beliefs has changed the way some in the church now feel; their consciences are not disturbed within them. They have been deceived by the prevailing ideas of the day. The appropriate response toward such ones isn't revulsion or repulsion or even rejection, but compassion and conviction with patience.
43.
In this world people are desperate to be seen, truly seen by another person. Sit with someone for an hour who sees and hears you and you'll remember them for the rest of your life saying 'XX is such a lovely person' whenever someone asks you about them.
44.
A spiritual guru is an expert able to offer practical wisdom and advice for ordering one's inner life helping them to make sense of the apparently senseless and reveal meaning out of chaos. Their gift is their ability to see patterns within reality and to grasp the grain of the universe.
45.
An elder is one entrusted with the responsibility of considering everything the guru says in light of the appearing of the Son of God. When Christ entered the world all previously held ideas about the world became false subject to their cohering with the Creator's appearing. Elders protect the people from making absolute charming therapy that doesn't require Christ to have come and died for it to be true.
46.
Spirituality as the modern west defines it has nothing to do with the Spirit. It is therefore not worthy of the term spirituality since it neither believes in nor knows the Spirit who is truth and life.
47.
Metanoia.
Noia - nous - mind.
Meta - change.
48.
Christ has come. Meta Noia. Re-evaluate everything in its light. It is not spiritual unless it acknowledges this. This is what St. John meant when he said 'test the spirits' and St Paul: 'no one speaking by the spirit can say Christ is accursed.' This is the message of the Spirit. This, is spiritual.
49.
From Watching Women's Football:
1. The fans respond in a much more paternal and kind manner toward the women whenever one of them is injured on the pitch. The undercurrent in the stadium felt encouraging toward a less developed and lower profile form of the game, played be people we traditionally have felt very caring and protective over. Every brother is taught to protect his sister, and so it is to be expected that watching sisters kick each other evokes instincts of concern.
2. The fact that the players on the pitch aren't superstars and aren't millionaires also made the crowd like them more and despise them less when they screwed up.
3. Women and women's football have an opportunity to create a culture that is distinct from the culture around men's football, but it seems unlikely they will seize this. In part this seems to be because the culture around male leadership being the dominant one is so often mimicked by women as being 'the culture of what leadership is and looks like.' Fans sat behind me were shouting at the players and seemed, to me at least, to be playing a role they felt was appropriate but which didn't come naturally. Women shouting abuse at other women in the context of play isn't naturally a way that women relate to one another. This is different for men who use teasing and derision a lot more generally in their interactions.
4. The fact that the players on the pitch were women had a different impact on me as a male spectator than when watching men's football. The female form, the pony tails, the visible flesh of legs or the occasional glimpse of a stomach or sports bra added for my brain an extra degree of intrigue since a woman's body is always a mystical and sacred thing. It is unlikely that women feel the same about watching men's sport since the relationship between women and the male body is altogether different in my experience.
5. Cultural femininity is shifting/has shifted. The ideal feminine in western society, conditioned perhaps by Christianity, conservative values and the upper classes emphasised and played upon the mystique of the female body and the sacredness of women. Men believed that women were worth fighting for since they were 'other' - holy and pure. A woman's petiteness and less muscular frame meant that she needed the protection and labour of men, and out of this was created the vision of femininity common in western society. A good man worked hard for and sacrificed a lot for a woman and almost the sign that a man was doing his job was a woman who didn't need to do muscular work and so stayed sleight in frame.
This, in turn meant that her otherness was emphasised and the parts of her body that enchanted the male retained their distinct, feminine form. Women and society by and large responded to the reverence men held them in by emphasising their otherness and by aspiring to a more noble, purer and less animal presentation of their sex. For men the first god in their lives is the feminine, and like all gods devotion and blasphemy often flow in equal measure. Nevertheless the dominant vision of femininity in the west was created by a reverence for and appreciation of the power the female body has over a man.
This was not without its problems and abuses, and as I mentioned not only do we worship gods with devotion but we rage against them with rebellion.
The positives of the original vision of femininity meant that men were willing to fight, protect and provide for them which gave them more security and stability since it tamed the darker male instincts as well as protecting women. The negatives were that it repressed the full humanity of women by placing unrealistic expectations on them and it infantilised them.
The early and dominant vision of femininity in the west is and has shifted. By and large young women no longer seem to value this vision. Young women are being raised on a revisionist and reductionistic form of history that attaches the status of victimhood and repression to that earlier position. Therefore the holy, restrained, pure and petite form of femininity from the past is seen as a corrupted and corrupting male fantasy that hinders rather than helps women.
Watching women's football was an revealing experience since, as mentioned in point 3, there isn't an established culture set for women's football as distinct from the men's game. This leads to a freedom of expression not entirely based on male expectations (though as mentioned since the working model is male culture, this is often the 'go to'). Therefore women feel freer to express their own vision of femininity rather than society's one. It's possible then that the spectators and attenders of women's football are part of the vanguard of the culture's redefinition of femininity.
This redefinition seems less linked to nature (their naturally smaller and weaker frame) and more a reflection of the expressive individualism of our age more generally; this is perhaps to be expected. The lack of restraint showed by women with their verbal abuse, bad language and offensive attitudes directed toward the women on the pitch felt unholy (it's the best word I can find for it).
I appreciate that many of my attitudes are prehistoric but I always find it jarring when women seem to embrace the bad behaviour of men. I/we expect carnal displays of bad attitudes from men, but I always hold women in a higher state of revery. They are not fighters and offenders, rude and disgusting, they are holy. As I said, outdated and unrealistic - but not entirely. My belief and experience as a man has taught me that the female body and female allure holds an enchanting and ensnaring power over me and men. They are gods in the sense that they are the most naturally beautiful items of our highest pursuit and endeavour - there's a reason why all our fairy tales have men risking their lives to win/rescue a woman and her love.
What I noticed at the football was a culture among women that said 'no' we don't want to be those gods for you any more and 'no' we're not going to do what we can to play by those rules - we reject them. That's a change and I'm not saying it's a good or bad change, only that I saw it yesterday in clear display.
6. Lesbians and butch women. There were a lot of lesbians (women clearly displaying romantic affection to other women) and butch women. This may be an extension of the earlier point but I also think it's distinct. Lesbianism isn't only a same-sex attraction but misandry (a prejudice toward men). A small minority of women are only attracted to other women and among gay women a tiny percentage of those are solely and unchangeably gay. A rise in lesbianism (and there does seem to be a rise in it) is also a sign of increasing misandry. Women are more deeply social creatures and are also therefore more susceptible to social epidemics and trends. The more women reject male love for female, the more that trend will increase and not because of some 'gay gene' but rather because of social conditioning and ideological infection.
Talking of 'butch' in this observation isn't to make an observation about muscular women but to speak of the deliberate rejection of traditional femininity in favour of a masculine femininity. This could also be a sign of misandry when a woman rejects the petite and sleight femininity that relies on a male to protect it, in favour of a self-protective body structure.
7. Lastly. We're a fatter nation than we were 10 years ago. The opulence and indulgence of the west is clearly visible in our body shapes. That is all.
50.
On social manipulation and epidemics. Men are more easily seduced by an authoritative father figure (Driscoll, Peterson... Hitler), women by social groups and social epidemics (self harm, bulimia, transgender).
51.
Reading about the inhumanity and horrors of lynchings in America I find a familiar channel of thought quickly forming: how can there possibly be a god in heaven who cares and acts on the earth if he permits such atrocities to take place?
What I find interesting about this train of thought is that it is in response to MAN's inhumanity to man that I tend to quickly doubt and dismiss God's loving care and existence. Why, I wonder, is my first thought not to doubt the goodness of man?
Tonight I read about white Americans flocking to the ritual humiliation and massacre of thousands of black Americans for decades. I read of white children being encouraged to mutilate body parts, burn with fire and keep body parts as 'souvenirs' of the lynchings. But I didn't first think 'how can I believe in the goodness of humanity?' I didn't wonder 'Is man a moral monster?' Why not?
I can only answer: experience
I have experienced loving kindness at the hands of other people, and I believe myself to be a not wholly evil person (though I confess I see dark instincts in me as well).
And so the Christian, whose heart has experienced the saving goodness and mercy and favour and beauty of God in Christ, stacks this piece of evidence against God's apparent indifference and wilful disdain toward the human cause. And for all my excursions down atheism's lane, I always come upon at one time or another - God in Christ and I'm turned around.
But the question still sits as an important parallel: are human beings evil?
And instantly I wonder at this strange impulse in me to call anything 'evil' in the first place, and again the excursion and again the u-turn. Evil exists, and we are capable of it; we've even been known to revel in it, mechanise it, institutionalise it.
I request 'special pleading' for humans who are blinded by evil lusts. I claim ideological possession and deception and social conditioning and ignorance. I say that they are less-enlightened than we chronological snobs, we progressive types.
My reflection is that in times of drunkenness, behaviours we're capable of whilst sober cannot be expected, that the rules are somehow different. When evil consumes a man, like when my kids are flooded with fury and the madness of tantrums, reason disappears and all I can hope for is damage limitation. In times of war, the rules of a peaceful and civil time are gone.
When evil, like a cloud, consumes does God fight and interact differently than in normal times?
If calvary is how he fought the prince of darkness, might that be how he always fights in the dark?
For the blacks of America, they found strength and joy and solidarity and hope in the cross of calvary. Whilst some clung to Blues and juke boxes, others pressed hard into the cross of Christ and the spirituals.
One brought a temporary release from the agony of their day, the other produced the civil rights movement, the Pentecostal revival and eventually a black President.
There is, maybe some kind of answer in this to my questions. For now, however let's acknowledge - it's strange that we first doubt God's goodness than man's.
52.
Religion is as alive as ever, only now it's not sin against a holy God we're concerned about, but offsetting our carbon and ensuring we're as green as can be. The science is still out as to whether or not this'll make any noticeable difference to the future health and stability of our planet but what is clear is that the mass of human opinion and the herd of populism is a much harder god to appease than Yahweh. There is no acquittal, no outline for atonement, no consistency, only fleeting moments of peace and self-righteousness before the crushing weight of the task and the impossibility of ever knowing for certain if we've done enough returns. This is our religion now. The old gods rush back in.