Out of the Depths

Have Always Known This

2009-12-14T06:43:00.002-05:00

Another quote from "A is for Abductive"

A change-resistant deacon board once said to their pastor. "The reason we don't want our church to change is that everywhere else in our lives, we are assaulted by change - at work, at home, in the culture at large. We want the church to be the one stable place in our world."

This is from the "K is for Kaleidoscopic Change" section.

The authors make the point that if one resists change, even that will cause them to change.

I say we can't stand still, even if we want to. Move or Die.

D is for Deconstruction

2009-12-09T05:47:00.003-05:00

Just a quick snippet from "A is for Abductive: The Language of the Emerging Church by Leonard Sweet, Brian McLaren, and J. Haselmayer. " These guys are on to something important.

When modern Protestants feel afraid of opening the door to this new approach to interpretation, when they feel that deconstruction is the first step on a slippery slide to nihilism and chaos, then at that moment modern Protestants probably understand how medieval Catholics felt 500 years ago when the Reformers argued for a then-new approach to biblical interpretation.

Now to work where, after an early meeting, I'm off to Vandy to sit in on a dissertation topic defense and then to have dinner with my senior-at-Lipscomb son.

The Practice of Encountering Others

2009-12-07T06:14:00.002-05:00

Another thought from the book:

"the wisdom of the Desert Fathers includes the wisdom that the hardest spiritual work in the world is to love the neighbor as the self - to encounter another human being not as someone you can use, change, fix help, save, enroll, convince or control, but simply as someone who can spring you from the prison of yourself, if you will allow it. All you have to do is recognize another you "out there" ......To become that person, even for a moment, is to understand what it means to die to your self. This can be as frightening as it is liberating. It may be the only real spiritual discipline there is."

Initial Thoughts on "An Altar in the World"

2009-11-30T07:44:00.006-05:00

Back from the Holidays. St. Louis, MO; Memphis, TN; and Jonesboro, AR.

A book I'm savoring right now is "An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith" by Barbara Taylor Brown. So many pithy thoughts and phrases jump off the page and into my head and mind. A few nights ago I started the first chapter. It was close to bedtime. I sat or rather lay too comfortably in my my recliner in my bedroom. Found the first chapter pleasant, though my drowsiness attenuated the experience. Took bite size pieces on successive evenings, not really having time for much more. Then, one night finally had time to read and let it sink in deeper into my psyche. What she is doing is becoming more apparent. Then next, it was a quiet time in the hotel lobby early last Tuesday morning and I re-read the first chapter. Amazing what I perceived that I hadn't earlier. The reason being more familiarity with her approach and how she was feeling it. There's lots of visual imagery. This is cool.

Touching the truth with our minds alone is not enough. We are made to touch it with our bodies.

One thing this book teaches is that the way to the spiritual life is through the sensual, physical world.

On Research - by Zora N. Hurston

2009-11-27T12:26:00.005-05:00

I was in St. Louis on Tuesday with my son who was interviewing for med school at St. Louis University. While there and waiting on him, I wandered down a hallway toward the downstairs bookstore and came across an administrative department concerned with their research program. They had this very interesting quote on their bulletin board. This caught my attention because research and development has been my calling.

Research is formalized curiosity.

It is poking and prying with a purpose.

It is a seeking that he who wishes may know the cosmic secrets of the world and that they dwell therein.

Zora Neale Hurston.

The Emergence of Canonical Theism

2009-11-20T07:09:00.003-05:00

The Emergence of Canonical Theism

Here's some heavy reading by a scholar who explains his thinking not with "cold-blooded, impersonal theses" but by telling his story. A fascinating one. His goal for the web site is the pursuit of something called "Canonical Theism". I'm still not sure what that is but he does cover some things of interest to me, the role of The Enlightenment in shaping the Protestant religion of my heritage and also the place of Postmodernism in critiquing it. He feels that the later while providing critique is not much of a help for proceeding further. He finds some inspiration in a Russian Orthodox writer. It seems to me he is working toward a definition of canon that extends well beyond the specific text of the Bible. I think what he is doing is worth exploring.

Naive Objectivism

2009-11-19T06:21:00.003-05:00

Over at The Church and Postmodern Culture, they are reviewing a new book titled Whose Community, Which Interpretation: Philosophical Hermeneutics for the Church by Merold Westphal. Here is a snippet from a review of ch 1 and 2 by Carl Rashke, author of Next Reformation.

"I understand that evangelical Christians especially need to understand hermeneutics, because of their intractable legacy of naive objectivism (their own kind of "dogmatic slumber" at la Kant) and their fear of "relativism". But "relativism" is a phoney type of bete noire. Postmodernism doesn't solve the problem of relativism; it strategically ignores it, because it is, as Wittgenstein might say, a pseudo-problem indicated, relativism is a fact that requires interpretation masquerading as an interpretation, which it's not.

Ultimately, it all comes down to "how we do hear the very voice of God in our finite and fallen interpretations," and if that now be called a postmodern problem, I welcome it. "

Naive Objectivism .... that is us alright. I've wrestled with it all my life, I beginning to understand it only now.

Patrol Magazine - Young Post-Evangelical Writers

2009-11-15T07:15:00.004-05:00

Came across this through surfing around. It is Patrol Magazine. This is lifted from their About page

Patrol is an independent daily magazine where young post-evangelical writers explore their interactions with art, culture, politics, and technology. We're based in New York City, but you'll find our contributors and readers all across the globe. Patrol began in 2006 as a blog covering Christian and independent music in Washington, D.C. We relocated to New York in 2008, where we expanded our scope to include broad swaths of arts and politics.

Patrol comes to life amid the angst of being a believer in the modern world: the conflicts between faith and science, religion and politics, the church and the arts, humanity and technology. Those are huge topics with vast implications—implications we think it's important that Christian writers wrestle through, publicly and without reservation, for the good of both our own and the good of the culture we're a part of. But let's face it: there aren't many places in Christian media where a writer has complete freedom to follow his search wherever it leads. That's what we're about. Patrol aims to be a "salon" for young writers to work out their ideas and chronicle their encounters with culture. And we hope all kinds of people drop in on the conversation.

Thought Spurred by Website of Unknowing

2009-11-10T05:35:00.004-05:00

From Why Myticism Matters.

"Likewise, the shift from modernity to postmodernity has resulted in many Christians questioning the propositional, authoritarian nature of faith grounded in obedience to the church (Catholic) or the Bible (Protestant), and instead are looking for a more experiential expression of the faith, where their “obedience” is situated internally, toward a personal experience of God, Christ and/or the Holy Spirit."

I repudiate the propositional, authoritarian style of faith but I have always attended churches that affirm it. I have always thought that my fellow church goers would change. But they haven't. It is clear that a vast gulf exists between us. They keep getting more entrenched and holding on tighter. Why? It must have to do with what it is we desire to experience?

the Lost Symbol: Believe or Trust

2009-11-04T05:54:00.002-05:00

Am half-way through Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. Would have read it through last night but needed the sleep. Here's a thought from one of the characters to the hero, Langdon. He relates that one of Langdon's greatest strengths is his skepticism and at the same time it is one of his greatest weaknesses. And then he says:

"I know you well enough to know you're not a man I can ask to believe . . . only to trust."

There is a difference isn't there. I wish it would be the practice of those speaking and writing about our religion if they would emphasise trust more as opposed to belief.

Back from Bonn and Darmstadt

2009-10-28T07:36:00.003-04:00

Was in Bonn Germany last week for a meeting related to Test Cell Instrumentation for turbine engines. On Friday gave a talk at the Technicshe Universitat Darmstadt at the Center for Smart Interfaces on "Experiences with Phosphor Thermometry". The hilites of that day for me included having lunch with two professors (my hosts) hearing a description of their work, and touring their lab. On the previous Sunday, I stumbled upon Beethoven's birthplace. It is now a museum. I was alone and so could stay as long as I wanted. Was there three and a half hours. Had a wonderful time. What would music be like now if there had never been a Beethoven?

The Liturgical Turn and the YMCA

2009-10-15T05:26:00.003-04:00

Great article over at The Church and Postmodern Culture titled The Liturgical Turn: Church and Public of Worship. The article author's thoughts were spurred by the fact that his church now meets in a YMCA gymnasium. That fact attracted me to the article because our group has likewise been meeting in a school gym for 3 and 1/2 years now.

And also, there was a pithy comment at the beginning:

It’s easy to become overly connected to place. It seems better to stay in Egypt instead of making the journey to the Promise Land because there’s a desert in between. It’s easier because it’s comfortable, familiar, and controlled.

Then there was also this:

Reflecting on the fact that we now worship in a community gymnasium is pretty exciting to me because it’s a great way to be missional and to let certain aspects of the nature of worship flourish which have a tendency to be forgotten.

I would like to say more but I've got to get to work. Yes, its only 5:30 am but so many things on the list to do.

After Foundationalism

2009-10-09T05:50:00.002-04:00

Am reading and attempting to understand The Postfoundationalist Task of Theology: Wolfhart Pannenberg and the New Theological Rationality by LeRon Shults. One of the things he is trying to do is describe the options between two extremes. On the one hand, there is Foundationalism. It received its initiation by Descartes, Locke, and the ensuing Enlightenment and it viewed that certainty could be achieved by their reasoning from obvious foundational truths (I'm simplifying of course). On the other hand, there is the extreme postmodernism of complete relativism. There is no context-independent truth. Am wrestling with the second chapter where LeRon is describing various "middle ground" approaches of various theologian/philosophers who acknowledge that we have moved beyond the Age of Reason but don't want to go the full distance to the other extreme. The term "postmodernism" often refers to this extreme end and "postfoundationalism" may perhaps capture the idea that there are a range of options being investigated and that perhaps "truth is still in", as he quotes Dutch Theologian Andy Sanders as wanting to believe.

Impact of "A New Kind of Christian" on Me

2009-10-08T08:04:00.003-04:00

Jimmy Adcox, minister of the Southwest Church of Christ in Jonesboro, AR asked me what impacted me most about Brian McLaren's A New Kind of Christian. I responded on Facebook with this message and am reproducing it here.

You asked what impacted me most. It is difficult for me to explain. It pointed me to a new view of things where I could hope to reconcile Christianity and Science. This had been a dilemma for me all my adult life and an obstacle to faith and confidence. It set me on a new path to explore and showed me the importance of Story. It shed light on earlier things I'd read by CofC scholars about the role of the Enlightenment in forming Alex Campbell and our particular heritage. As I write this I want to say it gave me better reasons for things, and it did. But, though reasoning is important and plays a critical role, it has its limitations. In addition to that, it also gave me a coherent story of how we arrived at this point and where we are now and a basis for Hope that I can believe in.

Evangelical and Evolutionist 2

2009-10-05T06:00:00.002-04:00

Here I go again on one of my favorite things to gripe about.

This is what some thoughtful evangelicals, in my opinion, have to say about the dogged attachment of evangelicals, generally, to anti-evolutionism.

Niki made her Choice by Internet Monk

Evangelicals and Science by Tim Stafford

and a quote from the last one:

A large number of evangelical Christians in America (not Europe) are stuck in an intellectual trap. They live and breathe in a world built on science, but they are fundamentally suspicious of science and think of it as an alien force. Surely this is a problem for evangelicals. They are excluding themselves from our era’s prime intellectual force. It is also a problem for scientists because they are excluded from the resources of a robust, biblical faith, and left to an arid materialism.

I say yes, materialism is dry and arid, as Ken Wilber says, a flatland. I never wanted to believe in materialism. But, when I was younger, I was propelled in that direction by the honest and sincere teaching of Christian teachers, really fine people all of them, who made Christianity and Evolution an either/or choice and by a faith heritage rooted in the rationalism of Locke and Bacon with no role for emotion and spirit and mystery.

Realism - Attachment to the Past

2009-09-24T05:00:00.005-04:00

Realism has for most of my life held a positive meaning for me. But that has changed over the last decade. I came across this through Thomas Barnett's blog which points to an article he wrote for World Politics Review. The insight is offered as a result of the interplay between his two main activities, working in the national security realm and investigating new business opportunities in emerging/frontier economies

I find the perspective it offers invaluable, because it reveals how often what we call "realism" tends to be hopelessly trapped in centuries past.

Hyper-Realism?

2009-09-29T06:23:00.004-04:00

The religious heart or frame of mind is not "realist" because it is not satisfied with the reality that is all around it. Nor is it antirealist, because it is not trying to substitute fabrications for reality; rather, it is what I would call "hyper-realist," in search of the real beyond the real, the hyper, the uber or au-dela, the beyond, in search of the event that stirs within things that will exceed our present horizons.

From What Would Jesus Deconstruct Chapter 2 Spiritual Journeys , Postmodern Paths

Ran across this while eating breakfast at a local truckstop yesterday morning and it is in keeping with the topic of the previous post on "realism". I'm not sure I know what John Caputo means here by the hyper-real. But I think we want to move beyond our everyday notions and prejudices of what we think that the "real" is.

Jesus and Deconstruction

2009-09-23T04:58:00.004-04:00

"deconstruction is a theory of truth, in which truth spells trouble. As does Jesus. That is what they have in common."

"so I am employing the word in a rigorous sense here, not proposing to stretch it just to produce a shock or pander to a biblical audience. I am proposing that what happens in deconstruction has an inner sympathy with the very "kingdom of God" that Jesus calls for ..."

from What Would Jesus Deconstruct? The Good News of Post-modernism for the Church by John D. Caputo.

Reading things like this help me leave and refresh, however briefly, from the many mental and physical chores that take up my time.

Update

2009-09-15T04:37:00.002-04:00

Been so busy lately. Was in DC over Labor Day. Working 10-11 hour days. Physically exhausting since I work in so many places and do a lot of walking and carrying: laptop, briefcase, pulse generators, oscilloscopes, etc. Re-reading What Would Jesus Deconstruct by John Caputo and The Left Hand of God by Adof Holl. The latter has to be the most entertaining book ever written about the Holy Spirit. Wry humor and an exhaustive knowledge of Christian history shine forth.

The Word, Idol or Icon?

2009-09-01T04:26:00.005-04:00

It has been a while since I stopped by the Website of Unknowing. Always good and interesting things there. Carl shows respect for everyone across the theological spectrum. I particularly liked these thoughts which educated me on the difference between an idol and an icon and that the Word should be received as the latter: The Word As Icon. The concept of an icon is not really part of my Southern Bible Belt spiritual roots so it is not part of my religious instincts. From reading this maybe it should be. He says:

"an icon functions as a luminous “window onto heaven,” directing our gaze and our love through and beyond itself to that which can never be contained by anything of human design."

Kierkegaard and Christianity - Belief or a Means to Change Existence?

2009-08-26T06:38:00.006-04:00

Have not been able to do any sustained reading these past few weeks. A couple of nights ago I picked up John Caputo's book on How to Read Kierkegaard. Forty years ago when they talked about him in school, I had absolutely no interest and no regard for him as he was emotional, subjective, and mushy. But I've changed. I'm fighting to get out of the robot rationalism of my younger days of , say, before age 50.

Caputo in one place has this pithy thing to say. He says that K, and these are Caputo's words

"had written that Christianity is not a doctrine supported by evidence but a command to transform existence that can only be witnessed."

Back from New Hampshire

2009-08-21T06:29:00.005-04:00

Back from a conference held in New Hampshire. We were nestled in a valley surrounded by a national park. The terrain reminded my of how it is at the TN/NC border on I-40. An enthusiastic crowd of researchers from all over the world who use lasers to study combustion processes were there. It was noted that we get, at present, 85% of our energy from combustion. The food was great and plentiful and the meal times turned into impromptu seminars. I took "What Would Jesus Decontruct" with me for my plane reading.

Memories of Woodstock

2009-08-15T09:11:00.004-04:00

NADA. Nothing. Nothing except coming home one evening and from the news first learning about it while in progress. I was 18. There was a slight disappointment knowing something cool was happening far (~1000 miles) away that I could not experience. Not sure if the fall term of my sophomore year had started yet. If not, then I had probably been working at my job that day on the campus grounds of mowing, weeding, hauling furniture, etc. But it was an exciting time to be alive. Wonderful music in the air. A new school term starting up. Maybe I'd meet some interesting girls. Any time you are 18, I believe, you should think it is an exciting time to be alive. That goes for 58 too.

Utterly Humbled by Mystery

2009-08-12T06:46:00.002-04:00

This is from a beautiful "This I Believe" segment on NPR. The author/narrator is Richard Rohr, the founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, N.M.

"When I was young, I couldn't tolerate such ambiguity. My education had trained me to have a lust for answers and explanations. Now, at age 63, it's all quite different. I no longer believe this is a quid pro quo universe -- I've counseled too many prisoners, worked with too many failed marriages, faced my own dilemmas too many times and been loved gratuitously after too many failures."

The rest is HERE.

The Scientism of our So-Called Common Sense

2009-08-11T01:01:00.003-04:00

And here's something else from the book of the last several posts that I like.

"Awakening to the original seed of one's soul and hearing it speak may not be easy. How do we recognize its voice; what signals does it give?"

From my vantage point in life I now understand better the signals I have missed. Signals that were there but which I ignored or looked for in the wrong places. Continuing. . .

"Before we can address these questions, we need to notice our own deafness, the obstructions that make us hard of hearing: the reductionism, the literalism, the scientism of our so-called common sense." (emphasis mine).

He goes on to say that there are "meanings that don't slide in fast, free, and easy, but are encoded particularly in the painful pathologized events that perhaps are the only ways the gods can wake us up."

I wrestle with this because this literalism is my nature. And such nature has been supported and amplified by my choice of occupation as an R&D engineer/scientist. Also, it is how I've been nurtured in what has to be one of the most rationalist of Protestant groups. Will continue to struggle with this because that's how one learns.