Quote from Love Wins and Insurrection

Ah.  With a Kindle one can read several books at the same time.  I was comparing clippings from Love Wins and from a book I just started, Insurrection.  They present similar thoughts and I agree.  This is what religion is all about.

From Love Wins

Religions should not surprise us. We crave meaning and order and explanation. We’re desperate for connection with something or somebody greater than ourselves. This is not new.

And something similar from Peter Rollins' Insurrection

This story presents to us the psychological reality that our pleasure is intimately interwoven with the pleasure (or pain) of those around us. Understanding this can help us unlock something fundamental about the nature of human desire—namely, that the most sought after material in the universe is not some precious metal or limited resource but rather the attention of those whom we desire. We long to be seen by the other and acknowledged by them in some way.

More From Love Wins

Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived (Rob Bell) 

Rob's approach involves an investigation of what the Hebrew scriptures say about where history is going.  This must be taken into consideration in addition to the explicit passages in the New Testament regarding hell, it seems to me.  The first snippet here is a passage he builds on which is famous and inspiring and which has been used and cited in peacemaking and efforts to convert war technology to peaceful uses.

Direct quotes from his book are in dark blue italics.

The prophet Isaiah said that in that new day “the nations will stream to” Jerusalem, and God will “settle disputes for many peoples”; people will “beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks” (chap. 2).

 --

But that is not all.  There is a continuing optimistic theme expressed by the Hebrew prophets.

Isaiah said that everybody will walk “in the light of the LORD” and “they will neither harm nor destroy” in that day. The earth, Isaiah said, will be “filled with the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea” (chap. 11). He described “a feast of rich food for all peoples” because God will “destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations, he will swallow up death forever.” God “will wipe away the tears from all faces”; and “remove his people’s disgrace from all the earth” (chap. 25). The prophet Ezekiel said that people will be given grain and fruit and crops and new hearts and new spirits (chap. 36). The prophet Amos promised that everything will be repaired and restored and rebuilt and “new wine will drip from the mountains” (chap. 9). Life in the age to come. If this sounds like heaven on earth, that’s because it is. Literally.

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First, they spoke about “all the nations.” That’s everybody. That’s all those different skin colors, languages, dialects, and accents; all those kinds of food and music; all those customs, habits, patterns, clothing, traditions, and ways of celebrating— multiethnic, multisensory, multieverything.

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That’s an extraordinarily complex, interconnected, and diverse reality, a reality in which individual identities aren’t lost or repressed, but embraced and celebrated. An expansive unity that goes beyond and yet fully embraces staggering levels of diversity.

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So, overall, there is a definite optimism for the end of history on the part of the Hebrew prophets in these places.  And Rob places an encouraging interpretation on them.  There are a few places in the Hebrew scriptures that might be interpreted as supporting the traditional concept of Hell, but they are not so explicit nor obvious without traditional assumptions.  (Exception:  One reference in Daniel which I think was written very late.)

Today's Quote from "Love Wins"

This from early in the book Love Wins by Rob Bell. This expresses my feelings as well.  When I discovered that many years ago, it removed a barrier to my spiritual life.

Often times when I meet atheists and we talk about the god they don’t believe in, we quickly discover that I don’t believe in that god either.

Reunion for the descendants of Bill Ed and Zonie Allison

The gathering was at the home of Earl and Doris Highfield which is near Powhatan, AR. It was held on Saturday, Sept 3, 2011. Bill Ed and Zonie were my great grandparents. Their son, Cleo, was my grandfather. Bill Ed died before my Dad was born but I remember my grandfather and great grandmother. We had a great time at the reunion. By the time I was born and was growing up, most everyone from this family had left Northeast Arkansas and I never had the opportunity to meet them. It was great meeting everyone.

Surprized by Kuyper

Somehow I found myself at the blog of John Stackhouse one morning six weeks ago.  He is Professor of Theology and Culture at Regent College.  I had enjoyed his thoughtful comments from time to time but had been out of the habit of visiting there lately.  He is a Canadian evangelical and he wrote a short note recommending Richard J. Mouw's new book regarding the progenitor of Neo-Calvinism -  Abraham Kuyper: A Short and Personal Introduction.  Richard is president and professor of Christian philosophy at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California.

It is so easy given the wonderful resources of the internet to spend all of one's spare time only engaging sites and books that support one's interests and viewpoints.  But I was moved by the recommendation and decided to download the book to my Kindle.  It was good that I did.  Abraham Kuyper (1838-1920) was a Dutch Reformed theologian who, very briefly, became active in politics, founded a university and eventually became Prime Minister of the Netherlands. 

Had heard of the guy before, having encountered a snippet of his thought here and there.  I was prepared to encounter a stern 19th century Biblical literalist with a slightly different set of rules to follow and some possibly good insights here and there but another version of why my form of the Christian religion is better than yours. 

Was surprized and happy to be jolted out of such dogmatic slumber on the part of myself.  Below in italics are direct quotes from Richard Mouw's book which is a short well presented summation of Kuyper's thought.

The fact is, Kuyper insisted, that the true church "can reveal  itself in many forms, in different countries; nay, even in  the same country, in a multiplicity of institutions." He saw it  as a major contribution of the sixteenth-century Reformation  that it had "ruptured the unity of the Church," breaking "that  one Church into fragments," in order to encourage "a rich variety  of all manner of church formations."   Kuyper wanted us  to see the "differences of climate and of nation, of historical  past, and of disposition of mind" in a positive light - thus acknowledging   a reality that "annihilates the absolute character  of every visible church, and places them all side by side, as differing   in degrees of purity, but always remaining in some way  or other a manifestation of one holy and catholic Church of  Christ in Heaven.


I come from a tradition that values unity.  But the above helps me to see that there is a difference between unity and uniformity.  So often uniformity has been the goal.  It has been confused with or substituted for unity.
...
Kuyper's fondness for pluriformity ran deep. He was convinced   that God himself loves many-ness. Indeed, on his reading   of the biblical account, the Creator had deliberately woven   many-ness into the very fabric of creation. Kuyper even
wrote an essay on the subject to which he gave the telling title  "Uniformity: The Curse of Modern Life."  Many-ness, Kuyper argued, was necessary for created life  to flourish in a "fresh and vigorous" manner.'   Referring to the  Genesis creation story, Kuyper noted that the Lord willed  "[t]hat all life should multiply `after its kind."' That the concept   of "kind" in that context applied specifically to animal  life did not deter Kuyper from making a more general application.   "[E]very domain of nature," he says, displays an "infinite  diversity, an inexhaustible profusion of variations." And this  many-ness also rules the world of humanity, which "undulates   and teems" with the same sort of diversity, bestowed  upon our collective existence by a "generous God who from  the riches of his glory distributed gifts, powers, aptitude, and  talents to each according to his divine will."'

Reality Isn't What It Used To Be

Reality Isn't What It Used To Be by Walter Truet Anderson has been on my list for many years.  One reason I had not read it sooner was because it dates way back to 1992.  So I thought it might be out of date.  Well, it pretty much was not out of date but described well the last twenty years, in my opinion.  The main theme is that we humans socially construct reality, have always done so, but in the postmodern era we are now in, we recognize that fact (or it seems to me we should).  

One habit that I have acquired with using my Kindle is to highlight various passages that jump out at me.  It commonly takes two or three weeks for me to read some of the Kindle books.  So I do not remember what all I've underscored.  Then, when I get the chance, I upload to my computer and read them all.  There were quite a few such passages in this book.  Here is my favourite.

But religions are living entities, and they live in human minds. And they change as the times change and as human consciousness changes. There is little similarity between the worldview of the fourth-century Nicene Fathers and that of the twentieth-century conservatives who try to keep their faith intact by using the Nicene Creed—no more than there is between the California Indians of a thousand years ago and the people who play the Carlos Castaneda game in the Big Sur mountains. Some kinds of religious change are visible and easily documented, others relatively invisible. We know that Christianity has gone through tumultuous events in recent centuries—the Reformation, the increased power of secular constructors of social reality, the institutionalization of freedom to choose other religions or none at all—and such changes inevitably bring modifications in the actual beliefs of those who still keep the faith. The ancient faith that is advancing into the postmodern world is not quite the faith of our fathers.

I believe there is value in renewal and restoration.  In fact my religious heritage identifies itself as part of the Restoration Movement.  But, Christianity and religion should grow, adapt, and change.  It always has and it always will. 

Struggle, Striving, and Happiness

Haven't posted much this summer. That is about to change. Since buying a Kindle about a year ago, my new reading habit has been to download more books than I can possibly read. A lot them are free or only $0.99 and they arrive few seconds after a click. So, I'm reading several of them in parallel and it sometimes takes months to finish some of them. When I encounter the same thought in two different books within a few days, it seems significant.

Have been reading Arthur Zajonc's "Meditation As Contemplative Inquiry: When Knowing Becomes Love" for two reasons. One, his book "Catching the Light" was marvelous. (Blogged about that earlier here). The other reason is that I'm wanting to explore meditation. Here is a quotation from a section:

Arthur Zajonc

I have long been attracted to the line by Einstein,“I have never looked upon ease and happiness as ends in themselves...."  Happiness is really not the goal of life. Einstein’s life was not a commitment to happiness but a long commitment to inquiry. Goethe’s Faust seals his bargain with the devil Mephistopheles promising to go with him if he, Faust, would ever say to the passing moment, “Tarry, thou art so fair!” In other words, Goethe saw striving, not bliss, as the central core of our humanity. Citing Augustine, Thomas Merton described human development as proceeding not in steps but via a sequence of “yearnings.”66
And later, Zajonc says:

Of course, I am not advocating suffering, but it is intrinsic to a life rightly lived. Struggle and suffering are inevitably associated with aspiration and compassionate concern. After all, compassion literally means “to suffer with.”

 A few days later, was reading one of Brian McLaren's more recent books,

"Naked Spirituality: A Life with God in 12 Simple Words." And, his thoughts follow the above and expand.  

Brian McLaren

Sooner or later we need to accept two truths that both the book of Genesis and the theory of evolution teach us: life isn’t supposed to be easy, and struggle can lead to growth. In Genesis, God creates a universe characterized neither by fully ordered stasis nor complete chaos, but rather by order and chaos in dynamic tension. In that matrix, we experience the stresses of struggle, change, and competition that challenge us to evolve, to grow, to become.

.................

The apostle Paul says that we celebrate our sufferings, because they produce in us endurance, which in turn produces character, which in turn produces hope, which in turn makes us receptive to the outpouring of God’s love in our hearts (Rom. 5:3–5).

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The apostle James, as we have seen already, says we should receive trials into our lives with joy, because, again, trials work like a fertilizer for the growth of character (1:2–4). Without trials, we would be morally sterile, lacking qualities like endurance, maturity, and wisdom.

.............

There are days, of course, when we wish there could be some other system. We wish there could be a way of developing patience without delay, courage without danger, forgiveness without offense, generosity without need, skill without discipline, endurance without fatigue, persistence without obstacles, strength without resistance, virtue without temptation, and strong love without hard-to-love people. But it turns out that there is no other way. The Creator has created the right kind of universe to produce these beautiful qualities in us creatures. And among these beautiful qualities is interdependence—the ability to reach out beyond ourselves, to ask for help from others and from God, and to offer help as we are able. The whole shebang is rigged for mutuality, for vital connection. The theory of evolution teaches the same lesson. If survival were easy, species wouldn’t develop new adaptive features. If survival were stress-free, there wouldn’t be 20,000 species of butterflies, 300 species of turtles, or 18,937 species of birds (at last count). In fact, there would be no butterflies, turtles, or birds at all, because it was stress, struggle, challenge, and change that prompted the first living things—slimy blobs in a tide pool somewhere—to diversify, specialize, adapt, and develop into the wonders that surround us and include us now. Seen in this light, evolution isn’t a grim theory of “nature red in tooth and claw” it depicts the planet as a veritable laboratory for innovations in beauty and diversity, fitness and adaptability, complexity and harmony.2 It renders the earth a studio for the creative development of interdependence in ecosystems or societies of life. Put beauty, diversity, complexity, and harmonious interdependence together and you have something very close to the biblical concepts of “glory” and shalom.

.............

So both science and faith tell us that we find ourselves in a universe whose preset conditions challenge us to ongoing growth, development, and connection.

 

Back from Wedding and Vacation

Been a while since posting.  Two weeks ago we were in New Albany, MS for Marcus' wedding.  Had a wonderful time.  Afterwards, Dorothy and I stayed in their house, watching the dogs and doing chores, while they honeymoon-cruised to Cozumel.

Had a chance to get a few pictures myself but not as many as I wanted as I didn't get the settings right on my new camera.  Here's the wedding party.  My dad officiated.  His first service since back surgery 6-weeks earlier and he did fine.  Dorothy spent many weeks planning and working with Suzy for the wedding. 

Suzy's family.

Before the wedding in the Church of the Nazarene.

Nice BW pic that Derek took.

After the ceremony, Marcus and Suzy enter the reception area.

Crowd shots at reception.

The couple with two groomsmen in the foreground.

Dorothy, seen here talking with my Dad, was indefagitable.  It's taken two weeks for her to wind down.

Below is the very fine video that Derek's wife, Catherine, made of this wonderful event.  For more on the wedding go to our Facebook pages.

Marcus and Suzy's Wedding Video by Catherine

We Must Do What is Difficult

It seems I've followed this advice to an extreme in my life.  Just came across an interesting article by Jocelyn K. Glei of the "99%" web site. It is about something that wonderful poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, had written.   In Letters to a Young Poet he wrote:

from letter 7:

We know little, but that we must trust in what is difficult is a certainty that will never abandon us; it is good to be solitary, for solitude is difficult; that something is difficult must be one more reason for us to do it.  

From letter 8 re: embracing difficulty

If we only arrange our life in accordance with the principle which tells us that we must always trust in the difficult, then what now appears to us as the most alien will become our most intimate and trusted experience. How could we forget those ancient myths that stand at the beginning of all races, the myths about dragons that at the last moment are transformed into princesses? Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act, just once, with beauty and courage.

Looking back on my life of now 60 years I can see that I did this, sometimes to a fault, actually.  Sometimes taking more on that I could handle.  But it is the way I've lived.  One reason, beside my love for the subject, that I majored in Physics was because it was perceived as being very difficult.  Didn't have to go to the U of Va, either, to continue my studies.  My Memphis State advisor said it was out of my league.  I  made it through, however.  And so on. Just got back from a nine day business trip, wondering if I've taken on too much.   Sometimes now I feel I'm ready to get off the treadmill.    Glad to have read this for the pick me up.

On the Nature of Emergent Reality

Have been glancing at "The Re-Emergence of Emergence: The Emergentist Hypothesis from Science to Religion" edited by Philip Clayton and Paul Davies.   A chapter titled On the Nature of Emergent Reality is authored by George F. R. Ellis and closes with: 

Strong reductionist claims, usually characterized by the phrase 'nothing but' and focusing only on physical existence, simply do not take into account the depth of causation in the real world as indicated above, nor the inability of physics on its own to comprehend these interactions and effects.  Reductionist claims represent a typical fundamentalist position, claiming a partial truth (based on some subset of causation) to be the whole truth and ignoring the overall rich causal matrix while usually focusing on purely physical elements of causation.  They do not  and cannot be an adequate basis of explanation or understanding in the real world. 

I believe the evidence he gives in the chapter backs up this conclusion.  At one time it seemed to me that Laplace's statement about all reality being reducible to points and forces on them was, depressingly, true.  I wanted a way of escape from that but couldn't see logically how to get out of it.  I had  no knowledge of the principal of emergence and the possibility of top-down causality.  Now I do have a little knowledge of it and hope to learn more.

I’m particularly adept at making mistakes — Dyson Vacuum Inventor

I’m particularly adept at making mistakes—it’s a necessity as an engineer. . . . I love mistakes. 

This is a quote from a Newsweek article ( June 6, 2011, page 61) from James Dyson, the inventor and developer of a famous vacuum cleaner.  We have one and we like it very much.  Looking back, I see that in both my domestic and professional lives, fear of making mistakes has prevented me from being as productive and fruitful as I could have been.  Thanks for this fine sermon, James.

What if I Were Romeo in Black Jeans

The year 1990 was not a good one in rock music. Reading a list of music titles from that year I remember only a few. But Sunday morning, unbidden, one tune from the era popped into my head. It was the year I was on a leave of absence from Oak Ridge and we lived in Charlottesville, VA where I was doing medical research at UVA. (It is a long story but it was great to be at least a small part of an initial effort that eventually led to the formation of the medical company Stereotaxis). I worked out regularly that year, running and lifting weights.  Only one song I recall from the endless cycles of music played in the gyms.  It is No Myth by Michael Penn.  So that morning I went to You Tube and refamiliarized myself with it.  Memorable lines:

She hopes we can be friends

We said goodbye before hello

What if I were Romeo in Black Jeans 

She's just looking for someone to Dance with.  

Then surfed the net for commentary.  Here are some interesting thoughts from the web site titled Stylist.  They state that everyone has some special pieces of music in their head that strike a special chord inside of them.  The reviewer is Alfred Soto:

Penn’s whiney pipes suit lyrics whose wisdom is encapsulated in the declarative simplicity of the admission, “She hopes we can be friends” and in the useful “We said goodbye before hello.” Handling bass, all guitars, and a galloping drum program that’s the song’s most striking element, the auteur palliates his Dylan-esque sneer with a demo-style directness. That’s the best that can be said about “No Myth”—it’s a demo unsullied by additional tinkering ...

Like all the best rock songs, “No Myth” asks questions it refuses to answer; its creator’s sullenness dovetails with the song’s mystery. We know (and he knows we know) that Penn isn’t Romeo in black jeans; he’s a guy with long bangs and a rather lugubrious self-possession, brother of one of Hollywood’s more masochistically naturalistic actors, too anonymous to be the subject of any myths, be they romantic or aesthetic. The most telling moment occurs during the bridge, in which Penn slings polysyllabic rhymes like Ted Nugent doing scales. It’s lovely, plaintive; bravado replaces snark. . . 

After not hearing or thinking of this song for twenty years, I know it will be bouncing around in my head for the next several weeks.

Music as the Language of God

Marvelous Quote from the movie Copying Beethoven. Been on my tab for so long I forgot where I first saw it.

"The vibrations on the air are the breath of God speaking to man's soul. Music is the language of God. We musicians are as close to God as man can be. We hear his voice, we read his lips, we give birth to the children of God, who sing his praise. That's what musicians are."
— Stephen J. Rivele

Doubts/Community

I happened across the blog Everyday Liturgy while looking for something Peter Rollins said.  EL lists a number of pithy things heard from Peter at a 2009 event.  It actually describes how I've lived my life, i think.

-we all have doubts—the important point is not to always have total belief but to participate in the tradition and belong to community

From Raptitude: Why Your Fears Won't Come True

I'm suddenly realising that fear has characterised my life more than I thought it had.  Why do I procrastinate making that call or doing that chore or planning that meeting?  As I was coming to this notion, it was my good fortune to read a wonderful antidote from the blog Raptitude.  Here's a snippet.  But you should read the entire post here. 

...

What you fear can’t really happen

What I’ve come to realize is that all my fears of the future are actually fears of the past.  

Each of us has a whole bank of awful moments in our memories, each of which are so painful that we can’t accept that we could experience the same pain again.  

If the thought of something you want to do rouses fear in you, think: what is the experience — the feeling — I’m actually fearing here? You don’t have to psychoanalyze yourself and try to figure out the childhood memory it comes from, but it doesn’t take much thought to identify the precise experience you can’t bear to risk happening.

By obeying our fears from arm’s length, we end up cordoning off enormous areas of possibility. Life is inescapably risky and painful, not to mention 100% fatal. So don’t think you can dodge pain, awkwardness or by backing down from something a bit scary.

The real bad stuff isn’t going to be something you had the foresight to worry about anyway. From Baz Luhrmann’s famous speech: “The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday.”

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