sometimes you wonder

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
— Wendell Berry

Our world, our environment , where we live and what we eat affect us. A recent US study found autism rates were higher among children who experienced higher rainfall in their first three years of life. This research is based on child health and weather records from three US states, California, Oregon and Washington State, but British autism experts are quite condemning of the conclusions. This seems a strange correlation to put it mildly. Does this mean that everyone in the UK has a very high risk of autism? or people from the rain forests are more likely to be autistic? Perhaps its less about rain and more about West Coast life and environmental quality!

A more interesting piece of correlation research suggests that though there are significant differences in health related to income and social deprivation, when you live near a park, woodland or other open green spaces the differences are reduced. Sometimes you wonder what really makes sense and what doesn't. Rain and clouds make you emotionally depressed however autism is not an emotional condition. But an authentic association might be that green spaces have far reaching effects environmentally and emotionally.

I do believe increasingly that studying has its limitations and studying indoors at a desk or table has a deep implication. Philosophers and theologians have spoken of God's "two books." Bonaventura called them the liber naturae and the liber scripturae. Later Francis Bacon called them "the book of God's Words" and "the book of God's Works." The primary lesson of the book of nature is to convince us that God exists. God's second book, the Bible, then gets the picture of God into a greater sense of focus. However both are about thinking with the mind, lived lives and a sense of peace rooted in trust and divine relationship. A healthy way of living is to look at both, to experience both, and know that God created both.

When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what are mere mortals that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them? Psalm 8:3-4

Green and green

One way to put the question that I want to answer here is this: why was it virtually impossible not to believe in God in, say, 1500 in our Western society, while in 2000 many of us find this not only easy, but even inescapable? Charles Taylor A Secular Age

Side effects isn't only a problem with drugs and pharmaceuticals. Being green has its side effects for example the new fluorescent energy saving bulbs contain heavy metals and require alternative disposal. The targets for the development of biofuels means diverting food and in particular grains and especially corn from human consumption to fuel production. This supposed trust in technology continues to frustrate me and is a residue of a human aspiration that human progress and technology will ultimately solve all problems. or perhaps even worse maybe humans are ostriches hiding their heads in the sand of denial of a problem.

Something a little more base has come up in our attempt to green things, fungi. In particular a Patagonian rainforest tree fungus naturally produces a mixture of chemicals that is remarkably similar to diesel. Not only that it doesn't use the valuable sugars and starches but cellulose which is that fibrous part of plants such as stalks and sawdust which we throw away. Strange it was more about going and finding than creating and having science or technology being involved. I suppose it is part of the older scientific tradition of collecting, observing and sampling - which is associated with wandering and wondering about the the world. I am reminded of the quotation attributed to Johannes Kepler.

"I was merely thinking God's thoughts after him. Since we astronomers are priests of the highest God in regard to the book of nature, it benefits us to be thoughtful, not of the glory of our minds, but rather, above all else, of the glory of God."

Perhaps what we have essentially lost is our wonder. That the natural world can actually give a sense of awe and wonder. What went wrong? Why can't people find motivation to change their attitudes and lifestyles? Charles Taylor continues in A Secular Age:-

…the salient feature of the modern cosmic imaginary is not that it has fostered materialism, or enabled people to recover a spiritual outlook beyond materialism, to return as it were to religion, though it has done both these things. …it has opened a space in which people can wander between and around all these options without having to land clearly and definitively in any one.

We're in real trouble, aren't we? The side effect of losing God and recovering a new spirituality is a new space and a new freedom. The trouble is we lost the freedom to think and the freedom to choose. Taylor see this as the Age of Authenticity where “each one of us has his/her own way of realizing our humanity, and that it is important to find and live out one’s own, as against surrendering to conformity with a model imposed on us from outside, by society, or the previous generation, or religious or political authority.” The rise of a new individualism and a new spirituality which is reactionary against traditional religion. Being true to oneself and authentically oneself in style and practice.

I'm left with wondering even my own spiritual practices are actually an expression of this movement in culture. Perhaps even yours or the abandonment of them? What can happen in our search for authenticity in this age of the individual self is lostness and the inability to truly commit. perhaps this is the source of my own acedia?

And now, O Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, Deut 10:12

All Saints and All Souls Days

[Word Studies are ] “to try to understand as precisely as possible what the author was trying to convey by his use of this word in this context.” Gordon Fee

Having been explaining what Halloween is (All Hallows Eve) for a few days - I've become sensitized to the difference between All Saints and All Souls. Strangely Sunday one service celebrated both All Saints on All Souls. It felt strange though I understand some churches have merged the two. So you don't understand? All Saints' Day (also known as All Hallows' Day) is a feast day on November 1st to remember all the saints (literally Holy Ones) and martyrs throughout history. All Souls remembers all the faithfully departed this life especially those who have passed a way recently, while All Saints looks to those who inspire and model the faithful life to us. Therefore the two events are contrasted by mourning and living life fully. We ought to understand the words and events in their contexts.

Joey whose blog I follow has been posting about the meaning of Biblical words with particular emphasis on context. He comments about Duvall and Hays comment that "we should always keep in mind the distinction between determining the meaning and discovering the meaning." He notes key issues from Duvall and Hays' book. Namely English-Only Fallacy - languages do not translate exactly on a one to one basis, Root Fallacy - dismantling a word doesn't give its meaning rather its context does (just think about aweful), Time-Frame Fallacy - the modern word doesn't really point to the original word (thus the greek word dynamis doesn't mean dynamite), Overload Fallacy - over using other usages to determine the meaning rather than firstly studying the context of use (different human writers were involved) , Word Count Fallacy - assuming studying word is a complete understanding of the subject, Selective-Evidence Fallacy - only using verses that support our position instead of recognizing verses that challenge or present an opposite (Paradox and tension are integral to faith).

But there is more when using a Christian author's particular point of view. Thinking changes positions over a life time and we may adopt an understanding which the author has altered or even recanted. One only has to realize that Rick Warren, the writer of The Purpose Driven Life has publicly confessed a major omission in his understanding of the church, i.e. that of justice and poverty. Also Bill Hybel of Willow Creek noting their lack of attention to discipleship. Probably most interesting change is the ultimate individualist philosopher Jean Paul Sartre not only became a convinced socialist but there remain rumors he became a Roman Catholic (But never proven).

It seems to me we necessarily are called to think and continue to think. To judge and weigh things and make decisions that lead to actions. People of faith need to study and think and to be constantly open to discovering meaning in the divine human relationship.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 1 John 1:1

Please check your translation

"We must shift America from a needs - to a desires-culture. People must be trained to desire, to want new things, even before the old have been entirely consumed. [...] Man's desires must overshadow his needs." Adam Curtis quoting a US banker

Welsh is a difficult language in a country dominated by English however it is important to make sure your translation actually says what you think it says. Some local government officials in Wales wanted this notice translated as all signs have to be bilingual so sent an email request to the translation department and got this reply. "I am not in the office at the moment. Please send any work to be translated." They assumed that that what they got was No Entry .. etc. No-one checked.

In many situations we just don't check the translation. Whether it is spirituality, faith, studying the Biblical text, or what is our fundamental understanding of what exactly is the church and its purpose.

I having watched and thought about Adam Curtis' documentary series The Century of the Self has made this challenge even more focuses my thinking. Business and Politics use public relations to read and fulfill our desires to make products or speeches as attractive as possible to us. Curtis links this to Freud and the introduction of psychoanalysis to North American culture. Freud's identification of deep human desires have been developed into an out of control individualism. This is translated at its most dangerous into North American church culture in the meeting of people's need's (Here we should read human desires but not deepest.) Immediately we head towards advertising and programming and all the stuff that goes with individual wants. It is an externally imposed reinforcement of selfishness and self-centredness.

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.

We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. - Edward Bernays

Edward Bernays, Freud's nephew saw happiness was more than just a way of selling stuff but it was also political way of control the people. By satisfying particular inner irrational desires people could be made happy and thus docile and controlled. In any case people have to consent to make democracy work and maintain a stable society. Therefore engineering consent is a good thing. The US government, big business, and the CIA developed ways to manage and create this consent. But then Wilhelm Reich, a pupil of Freud's, came to influence believing that the self did not need control but should be free for self expression. The freedom of the 60's was born except that this was hijacked and people now were encouraged to feel unique individuals and they needs things to express their uniqueness. Curtis contends that those with the power , whether Thatcherites or followers of Blair, felt they were creating a new and better form of democracy which responded to individual opinions. However these techniques were not developed to liberate people but a way of controlling them. The new left's appropriation nor translation does not remove the original issues. Curtis demonstrates this in both the rise to power of Bill Clinton and Tony Blair. In the documentary we are left with the real question of who is in charge. It seems like it is the power brokers. (first episode is here)

Israel was never meant to be monarchy. It should have been a theocracy but the people wanted to be like other peoples. They wanted security and political structures like the other countries around instead of living out an alternative counter-cultural position. The church as new Israel should not really be a democracy, nor an autocracy rather a people seeking the will of God as a theocracy.

When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, and the LORD will not answer you in that day. But the people refused to listen to Samuel. "No!" they said. "We want a king over us. Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles." 1 Sam 8:18-20