Pilate's Great Truth?

“What is truth?” Pilate asks the prisoner Jesus according to John 18:38.

This nihilistic question often appears in attacks against relativism and post-modernism.  It’s quite useful for many Christian apologetics groups. 

But the dialogue between Pilate and Jesus is not about some abstract idea of “truth”.

Fast forward a bit in the story to John 19:10.

Pilate asks, “Don’t you know I have the authority to release you, and to crucify you?”

If a person hears this question, recognizes Pilate’s appeal to epistemological truth (“don’t you know”) and concludes that the big idea behind this conversation is that his purported relativism has been contradicted by his own words, they’ve missed the point.

Pilate believes in truth. 

He just doesn’t think it matters. 

In the end, the fundamental truth is death and the power to kill.  Specifically, the truth is that Pilate has the power to either kill Jesus or set him free.  And that’s all that matters.  This is the truth that Pilate announces to Jesus.  It is the truth of the power to kill.  What is “truth” in comparison to the sheer fact of Pilate’s power to kill or set free?  Whatever the “truth” is, it pales in comparison to Pilate’s power to crucify. 

What is “truth” in comparison to the “fire and fury” of sheer military force, ancient or modern?

Right?

Jesus does not debate Pilate’s ability to crucify him.  He acknowledges it.  He responds in John 19:11 with this:

“You would have no authority over me at all, unless it was given to you from above.”

He has authority.  But there is another "authority" too.

“From above”.  What is that?

Is Jesus alluding to the truth that Pilate is right about the nature of power, but that he possesses a power that is ultimately just bigger and better than Pilate’s? 

No, I don’t think so.

In John 18:36 Jesus says, “My kingdom is not from this world.  If my kingdom were from this world, my servants would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jewish authorities.  But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.”

That’s what servants do according to the tenets of power in this world.  They fight.  It is the way of things.  But his kingdom is not of this world, so truth is not subservient to or synonymous with the power to kill.  No, the truth that Jesus alludes to is found in relation to this power “from above”.  And this power does not fight to keep Jesus from being handed over.

It’s quite pious sounding.  And it’s absolutely scandalous. 

It’s not of this world.

What is this power, this truth?

You can say “the power of God”, sure.  But what does that mean?

It is the power that raises Jesus from the dead.  It is the power that forgives from the cross and speaks “Shalom” upon his resurrection.  It is the eternal power that stems from the truth of life over death.  It’s a power that confounds, overcomes, and finally envelops the power of Pilate. 

It’s not that Pilate’s power isn’t real.  Look around the world.  All the death, loss, and tragedy.  It is real.

But it’s not the last word.  It is not the power of the world only bigger.  God is not Pilate but with more firepower.

Christ, the Word and power of God, is the beginning and the end.  

A Tale of Two Tweets (On Violence and Forgiveness)

This past Sunday morning, I woke up to the following two tweets right next to one another in my feed:

The first relates directly to the prior day’s attack in London:

@rcallimachi

10. Chilling testimony from eyewitness who says he saw assailants stabbing a girl, while screaming, “This is for Allah.”

And this followed:

@brianzahnd

Violence breeds violence.

Only forgiveness offers an alternative.

I know must don’t believe this but…

It is what Jesus lived and taught.

And it is what God has vindicated in…

Resurrection

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The degree and nature of the dialogue between the content of these two tweets is, I think, of the utmost importance.  In an age where our world’s imagination for destruction and ever more deadly weapons seems to shape our vision of the future, I don’t think it an exaggeration to say that it determines our future.

How do we hear this 2^nd tweet?

• As irrelevant religious blather?  Or as pointing towards the most relevant speech of all?
• As fundamentally mistaken and flat-out theologically wrong?  Or as the truth at the heart of reality?
• As cowardly, destructive, and leading inexorably to the deaths of the innocent?  Or as the courageous means to new life?
• As weak?  Or as strong?
• As luxury?  Or as necessity?
• As perpetuating the cycle of violence?  Or as breaking the cycle of violence?
• As hopelessly naïve, the result of privilege and distance from the death and suffering?  Or as sober and costly solidarity with the death and suffering in the world?
• As indifference and “doing nothing”?  Or as the means whereby an active and potent moral imagination is ignited?
• Which one "takes terrorism seriously"?

Reflecting on ‘The Love That Matters’ by Charles Featherstone (6) The Journey Into Islam

This is the 6th in a series of posts reflecting on The Love That Matters by Charles Featherstone.  1st post here.

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Because Charles experiences within Islam were what first piqued my interest in reading his story, I’d like to spend the next several posts reflecting on how Charles characterizes those experiences. 

So what attracted Charles to Islam?

Perhaps it’s necessary to look at this question by way of contrast.  There are, of course, competing narratives about the “nature” of Islam in our world today.  A popular narrative in modern America is that Islam is “inherently violent” – that its teaching and ethics, its history, its founder, etc. necessarily lead a “true believer” towards a violence and hatred that’s expressed naturally and legitimately in the sort of ‘acts of terror’ that we see today.  Theirs is a “god of hate”, some would say.  This can be supported in any number of ways – through a careful proof-texting of Quranic texts, by pointing to the history of Muhammed and the development and spread of the religion, through the witness of the ex-faithful or of suicide bombers and their heavenly aspirations. 

The implications of this narrative, the way it shapes cultural attitudes and perceptions, are numerous.

Relevant here are the corresponding ideas that (1) violent people are attracted to Islam precisely because their own violence and hatred finds expression and authorization in Islam as ideology and (2) that if it hasn’t already, “true Islam” will naturally cause people to become violent and hate-filled.  As the narrative goes, Islam both attracts and creates violence because of what it “inherently” is.  And because this inherent nature of Islam simply is what it is, this claim can be made apart from any economic, social or political factors.  These factors may accelerate or decelerate the process, but the underlying argument is that there is no real distinction between “Islam” and “radical Islam” (“radical” in the sense described here).

Now it’s not my intent to address any of that general narrative here.  The only thing that I’m concerned with for the purposes of this post has to do with Charles’ particular narrative and how it doesn’t fit that popular narrative.

A few or my earlier posts centered around Charles’ childhood – his anger, loneliness, his perceptions of power, etc.  Charles was angry before becoming Muslim.  So was his becoming Muslim borne of the desire to express this anger and rage without pretense?

I wasn’t drawn to reform.  I didn’t want to make America work better – I wanted to damn it and burn it down. (p 77)

What was I looking for?  What did I want?  Some kind of justification for the urge to do violence, some way to legitimize my rage at the world I lived in.  That’s what I wanted.  I had a nihilistic urge seeking a pretense, some sort of idea, some mess of words to cover the naked desire to simply burn everything down. (p 79)

But conflicting with this rage and nihilistic urge is the desire for a kinder world:

My nihilistic desires struggled mightily with this wanting a kinder world.  And lost.  And thank God.  Somehow, in the midst of all of this, I realized that I could do the kindness I sought in the world.  Islam, with its emphasis on good deeds, helped guide me to this place. (p 80)

Charles did not become Muslim because it was a natural fit for his nihilistic world view or gave him free reign to “burn everything down”.  Quite the opposite.  In his own words, he became Muslim because in it he perceived a way to “do the kindness I sought in the world”.  I suspect that his vision of what the world was – the nature of power – did not permit a vision interested in fundamentally “changing the world”.  But Islam was, perhaps, a means to protest the ways of the world.  A doing of kindness that was, if nothing else, a form of resistance.

So Charles’ narrative is the opposite of the popular narrative I outlined above.

That was my 1^st observation. 

The following series of quotes led me to a 2^nd observation:

In becoming Muslim, I had found that parts of the African American experience were useful in explaining both my life and my experience of living in America.  This is akin to what Norman Mailer wrote in his 1957 essay “The White Negro”.  Though Mailer is speaking of 1950’s hipsters, with their existential cynicism, I think what he says can also describe some white Americans who, like myself, found themselves growing up on the wrong side of America, in which whiteness conferred no social advantage because the people abusing us were also white. (p 76)

Rather, what spoke to me was the experience of social power and state power as a constant, almost existential threat that African Americans like Malcom X wrote about.  That a “life of constant humility and ever-threatening danger” – think Citrus Elementary School – could also lead to other responses – to separatism, because “if you don’t want me, then I don’t want you either. (p 77)

He’s careful not to characterize the connection here as one of race, but one of experience and understanding:

I am not pretending to be anything or anyone I am not – I am not claiming blackness.  But the story Malcom X told of how he experienced America made sense to me.  It made an awful lot of sense.  It was an America I experienced and understood. (p 77)

So this “life of constant humility and ever-threatening danger” is the backdrop for the allure of Islam.  We needn’t and shouldn’t suppose that Charles choice was driven primarily by rationale deliberation or theology – that would all come later.

For me, this series of quotes demonstrated the inability of the Christianity that he had been exposed to – the dispensationalist variety that I wrote about here – to speak to his situation.  It was not a fit for a person with Charles’ experience of America - for the lonely, marginalized outcast.  Tragic, but I have to confess that I’m not surprised.  Why is this?  

This is not to suggest that if the church were to “do it right”  - whatever that means, that anyone and everyone is just going join up with a traditional church the moment a representative comes knocking.  That hasn't been my experience.  That’s naïve, condescending, and sidesteps the complexity that is a human life.  

Still.  Who and what is the church for and what does it represent?  What does it bring to the world?  Is the church for “the least of these”?  Is it really?  How? 

This demands, I think, some serious soul searching for anyone who identifies as “Christian”.  Speaking to myself as much as anyone else.

continued

Reflecting on ‘The Love That Matters’ by Charles Featherstone (3) On Power & Endurance in an Unjust World

Charles early years, as you might expect, were formative in his perceptions of power, "power" being a way of saying "this is how the world really is."

Between school and home, I began to understand power in a very simple and brutal way: as the ability to inflict pain and suffering with impunity.  The key word here is impunity – if there were consequences, if there were a check, someone of something that could or would step in to prevent or even punish, then there would be no power.  There may be cruelty and violence, but real, raw, brutal power needs to be able to say, “You are at my mercy.  No help is coming, because there is no one who can or will help you.”  It needs law.  It needs righteousness.  I have come, over time, to appreciate and even understand there are other kinds of power (I have to in the vocation to which I have been called), but even now, this really is fundamentally what I believe. And I grew increasingly angry.  Angry at the world.  (p 39)

This is not mere "belief".  This is personal experience:

Suffering is rarely, if ever, deserved.  But once you are target by power, it will not let go.  Because it is not in the nature of power to let go of those it has grasped hold of and swallowed. (p 56)

And with poignant clarity:

Because I never lived, as a child, as a young person, with any sense that the world could be changed.  Little would work in my favor.  There was no cavalry, no knight in shining armor, no guardian angel waiting to save me.  That never happened.  There was no justice.  Just loneliness, shame, fear, and violance.  The world was a fundamentally unjust place, and it had to be endured. (p 57)

Charles recalls his childhood perceptions of ‘power’ with striking clarity.  One senses the wounds beneath his words, a characterization of power and existence that remains fresh and vivid decades later.  He admits as much.

“..even now, this really is fundamentally what I believe.”

One does not choose to understand power in this way.  It just happens, the result of thousands of tiny interactions, observations, failures, successes, torments.  One does not “choose” to see power as “no help is coming.”  No, one experiences it, a reality in which “no help is coming” in a way that it can’t be unseen or unexperienced.

He recounts his anger, his hunger to see others hurt the way that he had hurt, the imagined satisfaction at the prospect of annihilative nuclear war that would render all power and suffering as meaningless.  Power made meaningless becomes the ultimate good.

Importantly, the battle for Charles is either to fight this fundamental reality, to survive within it, or to succumb to it.  There was no alternative worldview to bear witness to.

Yet.

As the story develops, a new narrative takes form:

To forgive those kids at Citrus Elementary, to forgive Ms. Johnson, it all felt like weakness to me.  I held them tight because I felt that if I didn’t, they would win.  To forgive felt like powerlessness.  And more than anything, I wanted what they did to me undone.  I knew that was impossible, but the ten-year-old boy was not reasonable.  He wanted to have the last world.  To be powerful.  He wanted impunity. But that isn’t how it works at all.  By holding them tight, I gave them – these ghosts long gone – the power to tell me who I was.  And I finally understood, not in some intellectual way, but in a deep true, emotional and spiritual way, the truth of forgiveness.  Forgiveness is power, the power to say “you do not get to tell me who I am.”  (p 217)

Note the page #'s of each of these citations.  The earliest is page 39 and the last is page 217.  There are 178 pages between them.  That's several decades of living.  Then a sudden change.

"And then it came to me.  All at once.  Forgiveness suddenly made sense."

On the one hand, this realization came "all at once" for Charles - a moment of clarity, an interruption.  The thought was not there one moment and the next it was.  On the other hand, our lives are not a series of disconnected and unrelated moments.  So it seems impossible to fully separate one particular moment from the moments contained in the 178 pages in between these two citations.

Now I'm certainly not saying that Charles needed his life to go exactly the way that it did so that he could learn a spiritual lesson about the power of forgiveness.  I don't believe that.  Honestly, I think that's a potentially abusive hermeneutic.  But even if I did, I'm not comfortable talking about lessons learned from struggle in anyone's life other than my own.

Still, it's the hope that the arc of our lives bends and moves towards something that sometimes keeps me going.  Often the bend seems to be towards darkness and loss.  An abyss.  But the light appears, surprising us, awakening our imaginations to a different way of being.  And I don't think that the light and the darkness are evenly matched.  The light is stronger.  It endures.

And yet in the world as it is, there's the haunting "even now, this really is fundamentally what I believe."  We want to believe otherwise but we cannot.  Our moments of clarity, those moments when the sky is pealed back and we something of reality, simply don't stay with us in that irresistible revelatory way in which we often first experience them.  Against our wishes they fade.  We live in the tension of hope and tragedy.

Refer back to the earlier quote:

Suffering is rarely, if ever, deserved.  But once you are target by power, it will not let go.  Because it is not in the nature of power to let go of those it has grasped hold of and swallowed. (p 56)

How different would it read if this "power" that "will not let go" is perceived as irrevocably redemptive, if the power that "swallows" us wills our good!


continued

War Fatigue and the Patriotic Imagination (Kurt Vonnegut)

That was an ordinary way for a patriotic American to talk back then.  It’s hard to believe how sick of war we used to be.  We used to boast of how small our Army and Navy were, and how little influence generals and admirals had in Washington.  We used to call armaments manufacturers “Merchants of Death.”

Can you imagine that?

Bluebeard by Kurt Vonnegut, Ch. 8

“The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil”, Memorials, and the Eucharist (3) - Violent Ways

This is the 3rd post in this series of reflections on the satirical novella The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil by George Saunders.

The 1st post reflected on the final pages of the story, the intervention of the creator, the creation of a new people, the placement of the statue of Phil, and that statue's subsequent disappearance from the collective memory of the New Hornerites.

The 2nd post reflected on memorials and how, seemingly by definition, they don't address the shameful parts of a collective's history.  Is that a good thing?

In this 3rd post, I'd like to make some connections to the Eucharist in light of the 1st two posts.

To do this, I'm going to pull some thoughts from a series of meditations on the Eucharist written by Michael Hardin.  I encourage you to read this before going any further.

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It's impossible to proceed through Hardin's meditations about the Eucharist and the events of The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil without, in clear-eyed clarity, saying what it is that happened at the end of the story.

In short, through clever rhetoric, demagoguery, twisted "truth", and a fundamental malice, Phil was able to scapegoat a neighboring group of people - a people not very unlike themselves - as the reasons for their problems.  The Inner Hornerites were rounded up, stripped naked and humiliated, taxed until they had nothing, imprisoned, and then killed because their death was thought to be the means by which prosperity and fundamental order could be restored to the land.  Ultimately, Phil accomplished this at the intersection of the power of the state, the approval of it's people, and with the supposed blessing of Almighty God.

So let me just say again, this remembrance that the memorial might activate within the collective consciousness isn't something that any of them would likely feel good about remembering.

For Hardin, the same thing is true about the Eucharist.  Even as we recognize that it's not the end, we should not bypass the darkness of the thing:

"In breaking the bread we confess we are all persecutors, that had we been there, we would have crucified Jesus. We do not come to this meal with clean hands and pure hearts. We come to it frothing at the mouth, demanding a sacrifice that will take away our personal and social angst, violence and fear. We break bread, we confess we are murderers. This is the point. We are the mob, or in religious language, we are all sinners."

"We are God’s persecutors. None of us can escape this. We must acknowledge that had we been there we would have joined the angry mob, or we would have sought to force Jesus to act with violence (Judas) or we would have denied having ever known Jesus for fear of reprisal (Peter). We would have been the ones to stand in judgment, righteous judgment against Jesus, the law breaker."

"This meal breaks down all illusions of good and bad, sin and holiness. In this meal we are all going to get our hands bloody. We are those who would scapegoat the “other“ who is different, we seek our differentiation in the “other.“ The process of “removing“ sin is antithetical to this meal for this meal is all about sin, in fact one might be so bold to say that it is the ultimate act of sin in which we shall ever participate for in this meal we are standing there as the mob that rejects Jesus, that falsely accuses him, that blasphemes against him and we are the ones who drive the nails into his hands and feet. The old spiritual “Were you there when they crucified my Lord?” must be answered in the positive when we come forward to share in this meal for that is exactly what we are doing by participating in it. The Eucharist is Good Friday over and over again, a ritual repetition intended to drive something home, to drive something so deep into our the fabric of our being that we cannot remain unchanged. That something is all the blood on our hands from those relationships we have destroyed with our thoughts, our actions and our words. The Eucharist is not just about breaking bread, it is the complete and total recognition that in harming the “other,“ we are breaking bad."

First is a revealing.  As we reflect on the narrative behind it, the Eucharist exposes what we have done.  It recounts how the principalities and powers, the combination of church and state, conspired to kill Jesus as the crowds looked on.  It is a revealing of the violence that is at the heart of our culture.  It is we who imagined the cross, and we demand it's violence.

So this isn't just a sort of pious and reluctant "I'm a sinner, having broken the rules."  Rather:

"It meets us in the darkest places in our souls, the place where we would consign “the other“ to an eternal hellfire or a life of hell."

We need to dwell here for a moment, but not for too long because it is not the end.  We move through it to a message that speaks a better word.

continued

“The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil”, Memorials, and the Eucharist (2) - Memorials of Shame

The 1^st post in this series recounted and reflected on the story of the Inner and Outer Hornerites of George Saunders’ satirical novella, The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil.  I concluded the post in the same way that the book itself concludes; by pondering both the purpose of the statue of Phil and it’s disappearance from the collective conscience of New Horner.

Now, I don’t want to overanalyze the story as written or to read into it things that are not really there, but I think the following question is worth asking.  Why did the Creator – whose literal hands came down out of the heavens to “redeem” the Inner and Outer Hornerites from the mess of their division - leave the citizens with a statue of PHIL. MONSTER??  It certainly isn’t an arbitrarily chosen narrative device.

I'd like to reflect on this by way of a bold and courageous blog post by Richard Beck entitled America's Holocaust over at his blog, Experimental Theology.  I highly recommend giving it a slow, meditative read.

It's a post about national shame.  More specifically, it's about the ways that countries deal or don’t deal with the shameful parts of their history.

Beck talks about a recent trip to Germany and how "a national reckoning with the Holocaust had been and is being attempted."  He points to the memorial to Holocaust victims that's situated right smack in the middle of Berlin, the Topography of Terror Museum, and guided tours through the Buchenwald Concentration Camp.

Why not tear that Concentration Camp down?  Why does it still stand?  Why is it illegal to fly the Nazi flag in Germany?  Unlike the Confederate Flag, why is consideration of the Nazi flag as a "cultural artifact" an impossibility?

What sort of things had to happen in the world at large and, perhaps more importantly, in the minds and hearts of the German people themselves in order to take the steps to memorialize their shame?

Nearly all of the time, Beck observes, our memorials are about pride.  They celebrate our successes, generosity, exceptionalism, and sacrifice but never our failures, theft, or those who we've sacrificed on the alters of “progress”.

It's interesting, he points out, that the United States has memorials to the Holocaust in nearly every major US city - memorials to the crimes committed by another country and to which the United States played a role in stopping - but not to any of our own Holocausts.

"What American Holocausts?!" you say.  

Where is the memorial to Transatlantic Slave Trade?  Where is the memorial to the lives lost in the Middle Passage?  How many within our borders even know what either of these are?  We memorialize their bravery and courage via our sports mascots, but where is the memorial to Native American genocide?

Our memorials to the slave trade and to the middle passage best take form in Black History Month or the Martin Luther King Jr memorial.  That is, we've managed to turn these things into symbols of national pride and progress.  They console us.

But we don't like memorials to our shame.  Those sorts of memorials "give us the creeps".

We need to hear this, even if it's uncomfortable.  Maybe it's worth hearing precisely because it’s uncomfortable.

To bring it back to our story, perhaps the very thing that could keep New Horner from once again becoming Inner and Outer Horner (or some mutation of it) is the statue of PHIL.  MONSTER.  In it, the New Hornerites might remember what had happened, what they were capable of, and what they might be capable of again.

And as Phil's story goes, this was all divinely blessed.  Phil invoked the will of this divine being confidently and liberally throughout his rise to power.  Invoking the approval of the divine certainly tickled the ears of his audience, but Phil had this god all wrong.  So just as importantly, the statue might serve as a reminder of the One who put it there – “creepy” as the statue may be.  It might provide a reminder of the One who broke down the boundaries of string that divided Inner and Outer Hornerites, made one man out of the two, and told them that they are enough.  It might remind them of their story, their telos.  

Here’s the thing.  The New Hornerites have the statue, but their memories were wiped clean and they don't know actually why they have it.  They'd need it to be told to them by their "invading" neighbors.  You'd think they'd want to know.  But do they?

In the next post, I'd like to look at some of these themes as they relate to the Eucharist.

continued

“The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil”, Memorials, and the Eucharist (1) - The Narrative

I happened upon this interesting tweet by David Congdon.  Check it out.

So I picked the book up from my local library - The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil by George Saunders.

It’s a short book.  130 small pages with big, double-spaced print, readable in 2 hours or less.  I’ve summarized the plot below, so if you don’t want spoilers you should read the book before reading any further.  This isn’t a book, however, in which the surprises are negated by knowing the story.

It’s a scifi-ish story of moral/political satire.  The main characters in this story are Hornerites - strange creatures comprised of any variety of earthly items sort of strewn together to create a living being.  Each Hornerite is either an Inner or Outer Hornerite, and Inner Horner is within the borders of Outer Horner.  Inner Horner is so small, however, that only one of it’s citizens can be within it’s borders at a time.  The remaining handful of Inner Hornerites live in the Short Term Residency Zone, a tiny overflow area that falls within the borders of Outer Horner.  The Inner Hornerites rotate in and out of Inner Horner, where exists a stream with some fish, some dirt, and an apple tree.  These things keep them alive independent of anything provided by Outer Horner.

How did things come to be arranged this way?  We don’t know.

But this is really the story of Phil, his methods and rhetoric, his rise to and fall from power.

He’s a bad hombre.  Believe me.

Having fallen in love with an Inner Hornerite who had loved and started a family with another Inner Hornerite, Phil, in his existential dissatisfaction and feelings of not living up to his potential, begins to despise the current arrangement with Inner Horner.  He accuses the Inner Hornerites of ingratitude of the “generosity” of the Outer Hornerites.  They attack Outer Hornerite values.  He questions the patriotism of his Inner Hornerites in accepting this.  He asks his fellow Outer Hornerites if they are not the greatest and biggest country - given to them by God Almighty - and if their prosperity could not be even greater.  Through some clever rhetorical manipulation, Phil “legislates” taxation of the Inner Hornerites and annexation of their land and possessions.  Phil is able to characterize the Inner Hornerites as thieves and aggressors, and places them in a concentration camp like “Peace-Encouraging Enclosure”.  Finally, in the name of safety and prosperity, Phil resorts to “disassembling” (executing) the Inner Hornerites.

It is at that point that the nation surrounding Outer Horner invades, it’s citizens being larger than those of Inner Horner and being concerned for their own future existence in light of Outer Horner’s newfound imperialism.

Phil, through the invasion and some comical physical limitations, is effectively removed from power.  The country is left wondering: “How could this have happened?”

There is much that could be said about the book, but my reason for writing today has to do with the way that the book ends.  I quote it here at length:

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The two hands, working together, gently disassembled the Outer Hornerites.
Then they gently disassembled the Inner Hornerites.
Using the Inner and Outer Horner parts, they rapidly constructed fifteen entirely new little people.
The only parts they didn’t use were Phil’s parts.  Phil’s brain (retrieved from under his couch, covered in chip-crumbs and lint, giving off the hissing noise a Type C brain makes when off-gassing) they dropped into the stream, where several of the new fish, mistaking it for Phil’s body, they mounted on a platform, after first spray-painting it black and mounting a plaque beneath it.
“PHIL,” the plaque read.  “MONSTER.”

Then the massive hands lifted the new people up to a pair of giant indescribable lips and whispered, in a fundamentally untranslatable Creator-language, something that mean approximately: THIS TIME, BE KIND TO ONE ANOTHER.  REMEMBER: EACH OF YOU WANTS TO BE HAPPY.  AND I WANT YOU TO.  EACH OF YOU WANTS TO LIVE FREE FROM FEAR.  AND I WANT YOU TO.  EACH OF YOU ARE SECRETLY AFRAID THAT YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH.  BUT YOU ARE GOOD ENOUGH, TRUST ME, YOU ARE.

Then the left hand picked up the green string that constituted the boundary of the Short-Term Residency Zone, and the right hand picked up the red string that constituted the Inner Hornerite border, and the left had took away the remnants of the Peace-Encouraging Enclosure, while the right hand planted a sign reading: “Welcome to New Horner.”
Then the hands did that dusting-off thing hands do when they’ve finished a difficult piece of work, and withdrew majestically, through a large white cloud.

Soon the fifteen new people woke up, stretching and yawning.  Where the heck were they?  And who the heck were they?  They felt sort of sore?  Apparently, the concluded, by looking at the sign , they were New Hornerites, and lived in New Horner.  Apparently, they concluded, reading the little name-tags around their necks, they each had a name.
They were, they all agreed, just amazingly hungry.

On the way to a nearby apple tree, they passed a hulking black mess on a platform.
“What is that thing?” said Gil.
“It’s a Phil,” said Sally.
“What is a Phil?” said Sally.
“A monster,” said Leona.  “Apparently,” said Fritz.
“Or maybe Monster was his last name?” said Gil.
“You know: Phil Monster.  Like: Hi, I’m Phil Monster?  It’s not entirely clear from the syntax.”
“Whatever,” said Sally.  “Let’s go eat.”

Leona looked at Gil.  Syntax?  What the heck kind of word was that?  What was Gil, some kind of big-shot?  She hated big-shots, she suddenly realized.  She’d have to watch Gil.  She’d talk to Sally about it.  Sally didn’t seem like a big-shot.  Sally seemed sensible and moral and down to earth.  Sally, like Leona, was compressed and ball-shaped, unlike the freakishly elongated Gil.

As the months went by, the new Hornerites took to avoiding The Phil.  Although nobody could exactly say why, The Phil gave them the creeps.  Soon the oath bowed out around it, weeds overtook it, and all that could be seen of the The Phil was the tip of Phil’s rack, which stuck out of the weeds like a bad flagpole.  Animals burrowed in on The Phil, birds nester there, balls accumulated there because the New Horner kids were too scared to retrieve them.

And that is where Phil is today: hidden in a thicket of weeds not loved, not hated, just forgotten, rusting/rotting, with even the sign that proclaims his name fading away.
Excepts sometimes Leona comes to visit.  She does no find The Phil monstrous, but strangely beautiful, and sometimes sits in the thicket for hours, dreaming, for reasons she can’t quite explain of a better world, run by humble, compressed, ball-shaped people, like her and Sally, who speak, when they speak at all, in short sentences, of their simple heroic dreams.

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As literally as possible, The Creator intervenes.  He/She disassembles both the Inner Hornerites and Outer Hornerites, removes the flimsy string border that divides them, and creates New Hornerites.  The Creator then disappears.

When the New Hornerites wake up, they don’t know who they are.  Not really.  They have no memory of how they came to be.  They just have names and a sign that says NEW Horner.  NEW.  (There is an "old"?)  And they have a strange memorial, one that gives them the creeps.

PHIL.  MONSTER.

“What’s a Phil?”

Whatever reasons there might be for it's presence, they take to avoiding it.  As the mere existence of the statue of Phil gradually fades from the collective memory (the notable exception being one New Hornerite who finds it “strangely beautiful”) the reader is left realizing that the cycle is bound to repeat itself.

As the story is written, how could it not?  Seriously.  That's not rhetorical.

What IS New Horner?

I’ll leave it at that for the moment.  It's worth thinking about.

In the next post, I’d like to talk about this memorial of Phil, what role it might be intended to play within the life of New Horner, and some ways that this matters.

continued

Hacksaw Ridge and The God Who Does Not Grow Weary (3)

Prior posts here and here.

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The connection between Isaiah 40 and the narrative of Desmond Doss is a carefully chosen one.  It is not on accident or arbitrary that the movie opens with those words.  The connection is essential, I think, to understanding the story.

So what is the connection?  I’d suggest that in this particular case, we should use Doss’s story to inform how and why Isaiah 40 is being used.  Only then can we say what it is that God “does not grow weary in doing” as was originally asked.

There is little doubt that the verses from Isaiah could be used as a sort of war cry, an enchantment designed to provide comfort that one’s cause is righteous and will prevail in the end through military might.  If you “wait for him”, God will strengthen your arms for war.  Your bullets will fly straighter.  Your bombs will land with greater precision and effect.  And perhaps the aim of the enemy will be just a bit off.  The conquest narratives of the Old Testament provide just the sort of “biblical” backdrop that we’d be looking for as support.

And perhaps we could find a way to squeeze Desmond Doss into that narrative.  We, those observing the movie from our comfortable chairs with popcorn in hand, notice that he’s doing a pretty good job as a medic.  So maybe he doesn’t need a gun to be a medic.  His convictions can, perhaps, exist as an interesting subplot within the war narrative.  Cool.  It’s sort of inspiring.  But that Desmond Doss is nothing more than an oddity.

And while Doss is certainly an “oddity” in one sense, the narrative centers around HIS actions.  We need to look at HIS narrative as THE narrative, regardless of how “odd” it might be.

When does Doss “now grow weary?”  When does he have strength when others do not?

The answer to me is obvious.  It’s when, out of fear, weariness, and death, the battlefield clears of all but Doss.  It is then that his particular narrative sets itself part as the one that reflects “not growing weary”.

And the implication of this is also obvious.

Doss does not “not grow weary” in killing.  Or in vengeance.  No.  He doesn’t grow weary in saving.  Even his enemies, those mindless enemies (here the portrayal as merciless zombies running into bullets is all the more relevant).  He sees something deeper than an enemy.  “Please Lord, help me get one more.”  This is the power given to the faint.

So this is the connection made to Isaiah 40.  These are not verses that can applied to any and all circumstances without respect to an end.  God, the everlasting God, Creator of all things, is one who does not grow weary in saving.  This is God’s “understanding”.  These are God’s “ways”.  This is God’s strength.  And so this is, in the end, what His strength is given for.

Many things about our life in this world would seek to label this as foolishness.  The Hebrew Scriptures, after all, are NOT foreign to violence as retribution and hatred - even divine violence.  That is a separate issue, but a closely connected and important one.  Here I simply ask: Do we possess an imagination that can see this connection between Doss and Isaiah 40?  What gets in the way of this?  Can we find a way to live in which this sort of “weakness” is actually “strength”?

return to 1st post

Hacksaw Ridge and The God Who Does Not Grow Weary (2)

1st post in the series is here.

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Hacksaw Ridge is a war movie.

In many ways, Hacksaw Ridge is like any other war movie.  Utilizing varying degrees of action and graphic brutality, war movies explore the tension between life and death, the loss of life and innocence, the internal conflict and compromises, the darkest parts of the human heart.  There are two clearly identified sides - the good guys and the bad guys - who are trying to and succeeding in killing one another.  One side - “our” side - is portrayed as faithful, honorable and life revering.  And then there are the Japanese - the “others” - the godless, merciless, cowardly “others”.  More often than not, these guys don’t even try to duck below the cascades of bullets. They just run right into them, indifferent.  Like zombies.  Taking the “demonization of the enemy” quite literally, the enemy is characterized as “Satan himself”, a characterization with which the movie's protagonist agrees.

While the same themes are often repeated in war movies, they each tell their story through a unique and heroic protagonist who possesses a unique perspective and exists in a unique (and usually dire) set of circumstances.

My point is NOT to assess the rightness or wrongness of this characterization or circumstances, but  simply to acknowledge that the movie itself portrays things in this light.  We must see Desmond Doss, the protagonist, within this context.

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Desmond Doss, as is well known, refuses to carry a weapon because he refuses to kill another human being.  He does this because of his Christian faith.  Thou shalt not kill.  Love your enemies.  Love your neighbor as yourself.  Doss strives to live by these ideals even in war.

This is a problem.  A big one.  Ideas such as these are just fine, even admirable, when it comes to private piety, of course.  But are such beliefs a luxury that have no place in the “real world”?  At one point or another, this refusal to carry a weapon is a problem for virtually everyone in the movie - him, his father, his fiancee, the courts, his commanding officers, and each man in his combat unit.  All the problems - directly or indirectly - relate back to the fact that successfully waging war depends on people being willing to kill other people because they’ve become convinced that it is righteously necessary to do so.

Necessary.  There’s no church in the wild.

When all is said and done, what sort of a man refuses to pick up a gun and kill Satan himself?

Here I’m not interested in talking about pacifism, just war theory, whether Doss would be dead if his fellow American soldiers who did carry guns hadn’t first killed the Japanese soldiers that wanted to kill him, or any of that.

I’m interested in why the movie starts with a reading from Isaiah 40.

If the idea is just to explore the ethics of war using the Bible, why not read from the 10 commandments?  Why not grab a few words of Jesus about loving your neighbor?  Or that those who live by the sword will die by the sword?

Why Isaiah 40?

So let us ask these questions of Isaiah 40 once again.  Not grow faint or weary doing what?  Renew their strength to do what?  What do these words mean?

continued

Hacksaw Ridge and The God Who Does Not Grow Weary (1)

The previews end.  The lights dim and the moviegoers settle a bit deeper into their seats.  Hacksaw Ridge begins.

A voice speaks the words of Isaiah 40:28-41

28 Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
    the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
    his understanding is unsearchable.
29 He gives power to the faint,
    and strengthens the powerless.
30 Even youths will faint and be weary,
    and the young will fall exhausted;
31 but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,
    they shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they shall run and not be weary,
    they shall walk and not faint.
—NRSV

These are soaring words.  But what do they mean?  And how do these words both give meaning to and find their meaning within Hacksaw Ridge?

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The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.  He does not grow faint or weary,

He does not grow faint or weary?  What does this mean?  Is this a mere statement of power independent of whatever ends are wrought by this power?  A straight forward (and what many may take to be obvious) affirmation that the God who creates, sustains, and transcends all things is more powerful than human beings and not subject to human limitations?  Or can words such as these only be given proper meaning in terms of God’s character?  In other words, He does not grow faint or weary in doing what?

His understanding is unsearchable.

The same sorts of questions as above.  Is this mere poetic language that the good theologian should convert into the propositional language of divine omniscience?  As in, God knows more facts than human beings?  Actually, what is “understanding”?  In what ways does this understanding reveal itself?  How does this “unsearchable understanding” relate to not growing faint or weary?  How does understanding relate to love and goodness?  Does it?  All the time?  Some of the time?

He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless.

The same sort of questions once again.  What is this power that he gives to the faint?  Power to do what?  What is this strength that he gives?  Strength to do what?

Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles.

Are we just talking about physical weariness here?  And a renewal of strength for the purpose of whatever the one who is strengthened desires - a sort of force that the worshipper can tap into and control?  Is this an if/then statement - a math equation?  We shall pray before our battle, and the strength to destroy our flesh and blood enemy in our great fury shall be the reward of “waiting for the Lord”?  Who is my enemy?  What does it mean to “wait for the Lord”?  Wait for the Lord to do what?  Yet again, renew their strength to do what?  For the Lord, of course, can only renew “strength” in a way that is consistent with his own “strength”.

They shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not be faint.

Run and not be weary while doing what?  Walk and not be faint in order to do what?

continued

"Peace Through Strength" and the Propaganda of the Death Star as an Instrument of "Peace"

Saw Rogue One last night.  I'm not one of these big Star Wars guys who knows facts about the characters and storylines that don't actually appear in the movies.  But in light of recent political events, it got me thinking about the meta-narrative of Star Wars.

It was very striking to me that, amongst the Imperial Army, the Death Star is regularly spoken of as an instrument of "peace".  Whatever "peace" is in the minds of the Imperial Army, a vision which is ultimately formed by the Emperor and the Dark Side of the Force, it is best (and perhaps ultimately achievable only) through military strength.

Where have I heard this sort of thing before?

 

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A strong military will stop wars. Peace through Strength! Let’s Make America Great Again! https://www.donaldjtrump.com/ 

In Star Wars, the Imperial perception is that the ultimate power exists with the Death Star.  For them,  it is the truth of the way things are.  It is written into the fabric of the universe.

"This station is now the ultimate power in the universe!  I suggest we use it."
-General Motti

Doesn't "peace through strength" have a certain ring to it?  And a certain sober realism about human nature and the human condition?

"Love won't save you, Padme. Only my new powers can do that!  I won't lose you the way I lost my mother. I am becoming more powerful than any Jedi has ever dreamed of, and I'm doing it for you. To protect you."
-Anakin Skywalker

But make no mistake.  Peace through (military) strength is really just a way to say peace as submission.  Peace through submission to a military will.  Peace through fear.  Which is to say there is no such thing as peace at all, only power.

"Fear will keep the local systems in line. Fear of this battle station."
-Grand Moff Tarkin

"Once more the Sith will rule the galaxy. And... we shall have... peace."
-Chancellor Palpatine

**********
The Sith Code

Peace is a lie, there is only passion.
Through passion, I gain strength.
Through strength, I gain power.
Through power, I gain victory.
Through victory, my chains are broken.
The Force shall free me.

**********

The stories we create have something to tell us.  As we see in the movie, Chancellor Palpatine's "peace" is anything but.  Haven't we tried this already?  It will not work.  And it isn't the "ultimate power in the universe".