I wanted to take a moment and respond to the service that we had yesterday. I realize that I have not blogged about anything for about a month. I am sorry for that. The reason is that I have been spending a lot of my time and creative energy working on something else. I offer this not in the way of an excuse, but an explanation, and maybe a lesson. We all have much to offer but it is not infinite. We need to take time to re-center and recharge (even Jesus did this by the way). We also need to accept that it takes time and energy to give ourselves in worthwhile ways.
Having said that, I do want to take time out of my present project and celebrate something.
Yesterday, I mentioned a couple of films in my sermon. I am always a little reluctant about this. For even though many people resonate, others find it confusing and have told me as much. Because of this, I try to be fair in my illustrations. However, yesterday was something of an exception. I made two fairly lengthy references to parables in cinema. The first was a recent film called, "In Time." The second was a somewhat older movie called, "Serenity." Both are science fiction stories.
Following the service, a number of people shared with me that they had seen "Serenity," and/or the short television production that the film was based on. It was clear to me that these people really connected with that story-line and, consequently, with the sermon. It is always nice to get an affirmation like that; however, in this case, it was especially cool. It was cool not only because these people appreciated something that I connected with--but because, I think, my sermon helped to affirm something in them that they may not have yet understood.
You see, I think that the narrative (the characters, plot, setting, etc) of "Serenity" had already blessed them in some way. But because of the nature of our world (television and movies are just entertainment), they may not have been able to embrace it as fully as they might. By hearing a representative of the Gospel speak favorable about the film, allowed them to accept what they had sensed all along. Namely, that there is a lot to that story.
What I am talking about hear is generally called intuition. Intuition is something that we all have, but many of us have lost our capacity to access it--or trust it, really.
I do not need to go on about this, because if you are reading this, then you already have an idea of what I am saying here. Moreover, the nature of intuition is that it is actually undermined by too much analysis. So I will leave it at that.
In any case, if this blog rings true, then good luck on your journey. I believe that you have tapped into something that is a great gift for you, and it will continue to be exceedingly important in the time ahead.
Monday, February 27, 2012
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Digital Protesting
Have you noticed that you cannot access some sites today? It is not your browser or ISP. The shutdown is a statement on behalf of some of these companies. They are resisting the SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and the PIPA (Protest IP ACT). Now why in the world would successful and even very large Internet-based companies be against something called the "Stop Online Privacy Act?"
Could it be the the name of the bill does not really reveal what the legislation is actually about? Some time ago, I preached a sermon in which I said that when you begin to hear that they want to "regulate" the Internet, it might be a good time to start praying.
The fundamental issue behind these bills represents a concerted effort to control the world in which we live. Of course, there is pirating taking place on the Internet. And, of course, there are some people who are going to benefit from a lack of regulation. However, the real issue is not piracy. It is control. And who exactly gets to regulate all this? Is it a specific nation-state or will there be some kind of world-internet-police agency that will be in charge of keeping and eye on things? "
The Internet has historically been a fairly open-forum of information and communication. It is trans-national, trans-cultural, and trans-economic. Regulatory interests are going to change this. The only question is how will it change?
Are we awake yet? Is this once again the same old choice? Can it be that it all really comes down to love or fear?
Could it be the the name of the bill does not really reveal what the legislation is actually about? Some time ago, I preached a sermon in which I said that when you begin to hear that they want to "regulate" the Internet, it might be a good time to start praying.
The fundamental issue behind these bills represents a concerted effort to control the world in which we live. Of course, there is pirating taking place on the Internet. And, of course, there are some people who are going to benefit from a lack of regulation. However, the real issue is not piracy. It is control. And who exactly gets to regulate all this? Is it a specific nation-state or will there be some kind of world-internet-police agency that will be in charge of keeping and eye on things? "
The Internet has historically been a fairly open-forum of information and communication. It is trans-national, trans-cultural, and trans-economic. Regulatory interests are going to change this. The only question is how will it change?
Are we awake yet? Is this once again the same old choice? Can it be that it all really comes down to love or fear?
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
The short and long of it
The title should might read, "the big and small of it." Because what I am actually referring to here are decisions. Decisions are more often defined by size rather than distance but, at the same time, they also have ramifications that move forward in time and space. We might even say that the decisions we make have a history or, perhaps better, that they create a journey that can be short or long lived.
I have always been skeptical of choice. I am speaking here not so much about the individual choices that we make but rather the grandiose claims about choice itself. Some say that choice is the end all of human experience--the most important characteristic of being human. I have historically disagreed rather strongly.
Part of this is simply my education. My formal training both philosophical and theological has been decidedly anti-modern. Modern philosophy is generally traced back to Renee Descartes who gave us the famous (or infamous from where I come from) phrase, "I think therefore I am."
It is said that Descartes, perhaps unknowingly, literally moved the center locus of reality from the external to the internal. Specifically, as the father of what is commonly called "Critical Philosophy," Descartes saw an enormous problem with knowledge. In his quest for what he called "clear and distinct" knowledge, Descartes found that he could really know nothing for sure--except that he was thinking about it. The discovery caught on and, over time, we inherited a world that is completely uncertain. We now come to know and understand this world not be accepting it as it appears to us but by abstracting it--by pulling it in to our minds.
The key point here is that we now naturally do this. If we live in the West, Critical philosophy or approaching the world through abstraction is what we learn. It is the prevailing educational model and essentially the air that we breathe. So, in terms of the current discussion, there is no choice as to whether or not we think this way.
Now imagine being told that this basic tenet is actually wrong--that Descartes apparent revelation was, in fact, a misstep. That the modern world's embrace of the critical method did reveal knowledge but instead distanced us from it--perhaps so far that we can no longer even see it--even though it is right there in front of us. Imagine that and you have a basic picture of my formal education. (Makes me think of Paul Simon, "It's a wonder I can think at all.")
Despite whatever suffering I may have endured in all of this, I cannot deny that I have been blessed as well. For I have been able to see things that others do not. For example, I can see how the modern world's unrelenting emphasis upon choice has gone a long way to casting the world as a vast marketplace in which truth is largely relative. We simply traverse the universe picking and choosing our way... what to do, what to believe--what to buy--as though we might be merely working our way through a supermarket.
So anyway--choice. In a world that is so enamored with the wonder and power of the human mind, I have always had this nagging resistance to it. Right--because Descartes is the villain? So choice, is just a trap. It is the illusion that we gods of some kind and that our thought processes are more important, or even more real than the external world...
That's the formal reason for my skepticism about choice, but there is another, probably more relevant reason. I am also not especially bullish on commitment. I am much better at thinking about options than I am about living with choices. This is a confession BTW. The entire entry here might be. For despite my suspicion of thought--the fact is, it might be one of the few things that I actually do well. So if you're still following, the confession is hypocrisy or maybe just futility.
So what you have here is the anti-thinker thinking... And today I am thinking about the lasting impact of the choices that we make.
And what I am thinking about specifically is which are the more important. Is it those decisions that we imagine to be the big ones? You know, the handful that we can identify in a lifetime that appear to make those substantial differences in our journeys? Or, is it the smaller ones that we make every day? I suppose these would be likened to the tiniest edges of the fractal?
I am curious about this because I am curious about change. I mentioned in my last blog that I have been reading Carlos Castenada and listening to the philosophical musings of Don Juan. He seems to believe that change is not only possible but necessary--at least for those of us who care enough to live something other than a boring life. A Christian equivalent here might be Jesus' statement to Nicodemus that in order to see the Kingdom, "ye must be born again." Though I am not sure it is exactly the same thing.
There are certainly worse things than a boring life. However, Jesus seems to invite us to something remarkable. So the point, or rather the urgency, here is that we might well miss the kingdom if we do not change or become reborn in some way.
Of course, the modern world as well as many practicing Christians are quite sure that they see just fine. But I am curious today how choice fits into all of this? Does there come a point at which it is simply too late? That we are so far down the wrong road that we simply no longer have the capacity to reconsider some of the choices that we have made along the way?
Don Juan suggests that the issue (or the problem) is not simply the choices themselves. It is rather the attitude or posture with which we make them. He notes that most people live their life as though they are going to live forever. And because of this, there is a certain sloppiness (my word) about the way that we act. He suggests to Carlos Castenada that we should act as though our next action might well be our last. His suggestion is that we imagine ourselves the hunter but we are more rightly the prey.
As I mentioned in my prior blog. I am not sure what to make of don Juan's philosophy but I appreciate his candor and his intentionality. As a man who has made it a point of avoiding both choices and the responsibility that comes with them, I find myself feeling a bit like Carlos Castenada--exposed and vulnerable.
I have always been skeptical of choice. I am speaking here not so much about the individual choices that we make but rather the grandiose claims about choice itself. Some say that choice is the end all of human experience--the most important characteristic of being human. I have historically disagreed rather strongly.
Part of this is simply my education. My formal training both philosophical and theological has been decidedly anti-modern. Modern philosophy is generally traced back to Renee Descartes who gave us the famous (or infamous from where I come from) phrase, "I think therefore I am."
It is said that Descartes, perhaps unknowingly, literally moved the center locus of reality from the external to the internal. Specifically, as the father of what is commonly called "Critical Philosophy," Descartes saw an enormous problem with knowledge. In his quest for what he called "clear and distinct" knowledge, Descartes found that he could really know nothing for sure--except that he was thinking about it. The discovery caught on and, over time, we inherited a world that is completely uncertain. We now come to know and understand this world not be accepting it as it appears to us but by abstracting it--by pulling it in to our minds.
The key point here is that we now naturally do this. If we live in the West, Critical philosophy or approaching the world through abstraction is what we learn. It is the prevailing educational model and essentially the air that we breathe. So, in terms of the current discussion, there is no choice as to whether or not we think this way.
Now imagine being told that this basic tenet is actually wrong--that Descartes apparent revelation was, in fact, a misstep. That the modern world's embrace of the critical method did reveal knowledge but instead distanced us from it--perhaps so far that we can no longer even see it--even though it is right there in front of us. Imagine that and you have a basic picture of my formal education. (Makes me think of Paul Simon, "It's a wonder I can think at all.")
Despite whatever suffering I may have endured in all of this, I cannot deny that I have been blessed as well. For I have been able to see things that others do not. For example, I can see how the modern world's unrelenting emphasis upon choice has gone a long way to casting the world as a vast marketplace in which truth is largely relative. We simply traverse the universe picking and choosing our way... what to do, what to believe--what to buy--as though we might be merely working our way through a supermarket.
So anyway--choice. In a world that is so enamored with the wonder and power of the human mind, I have always had this nagging resistance to it. Right--because Descartes is the villain? So choice, is just a trap. It is the illusion that we gods of some kind and that our thought processes are more important, or even more real than the external world...
That's the formal reason for my skepticism about choice, but there is another, probably more relevant reason. I am also not especially bullish on commitment. I am much better at thinking about options than I am about living with choices. This is a confession BTW. The entire entry here might be. For despite my suspicion of thought--the fact is, it might be one of the few things that I actually do well. So if you're still following, the confession is hypocrisy or maybe just futility.
So what you have here is the anti-thinker thinking... And today I am thinking about the lasting impact of the choices that we make.
And what I am thinking about specifically is which are the more important. Is it those decisions that we imagine to be the big ones? You know, the handful that we can identify in a lifetime that appear to make those substantial differences in our journeys? Or, is it the smaller ones that we make every day? I suppose these would be likened to the tiniest edges of the fractal?
I am curious about this because I am curious about change. I mentioned in my last blog that I have been reading Carlos Castenada and listening to the philosophical musings of Don Juan. He seems to believe that change is not only possible but necessary--at least for those of us who care enough to live something other than a boring life. A Christian equivalent here might be Jesus' statement to Nicodemus that in order to see the Kingdom, "ye must be born again." Though I am not sure it is exactly the same thing.
There are certainly worse things than a boring life. However, Jesus seems to invite us to something remarkable. So the point, or rather the urgency, here is that we might well miss the kingdom if we do not change or become reborn in some way.
Of course, the modern world as well as many practicing Christians are quite sure that they see just fine. But I am curious today how choice fits into all of this? Does there come a point at which it is simply too late? That we are so far down the wrong road that we simply no longer have the capacity to reconsider some of the choices that we have made along the way?
Don Juan suggests that the issue (or the problem) is not simply the choices themselves. It is rather the attitude or posture with which we make them. He notes that most people live their life as though they are going to live forever. And because of this, there is a certain sloppiness (my word) about the way that we act. He suggests to Carlos Castenada that we should act as though our next action might well be our last. His suggestion is that we imagine ourselves the hunter but we are more rightly the prey.
"..if you are going to die there is no time for timidity, simply because timidity makes you cling to something that exists only in your thoughts. It soothes you while everything is at a lull, but then the awesome, mysterious world will open its mouth for you, as it will open for every one of us, and then you will realize that your sure ways were not sure at all..."
"It is not natural to live with the constant idea of our death, don Juan." [Castendad protests]
"Our death is waiting and this very act we're performing now may well be our last battle on earth," he replied in a solemn voice. "I call it a battle because it is a struggle. Most people move from act to act without any struggle or thought..." (p.85)
As I mentioned in my prior blog. I am not sure what to make of don Juan's philosophy but I appreciate his candor and his intentionality. As a man who has made it a point of avoiding both choices and the responsibility that comes with them, I find myself feeling a bit like Carlos Castenada--exposed and vulnerable.
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