Author: Tim Froehlich

gore

Years ago, I absorbed one belief about love – that love is a choice, and that true love is not a matter of planets aligning and stars colliding, but of mutual intention and desire. As such, love – real love – is less concerned with compatibility than it is with character. If the state of Western culture is any indication, this is not a common reality. Our culture’s dream of finding the right person is rarely realized, leaving most of us to settle for significantly less than what we had hoped for. While comparing happiness is a dangerous foundation for argument, our many social revolutions have not created a culture of happy marriages and happy families.

This kind of focus on counter-culture was (and continues to be) a source of great interest and admiration for me, when I look upon Christianity. I find much truth in examining our culture’s failures, and the basic tenet of questioning the nature of what is deemed acceptable is more than just a worthy ideal, but the only sure-fire path for fulfillment.

As I explore what a world-view without Christianity looks like, my desire to stand contrary to my society’s lifestyle has not waned, yet I find myself thrown into a maelstrom of un-identity. I have these convictions, yet I have no one to share them with, no group to identify with, no cause to believe in beyond this vague notion of betterment. As I look back at every moral juggernaut in history, I can readily see that every one of them was a piece of a greater movement, a portion of a greater identity that more than just a few participated in.

My fear compounds itself as I see that my convictions cannot stand on their own. My will alone is not enough to carry me through hardship and tribulation. My wisdom is not enough to understand what needs to be understood. If I depend upon myself, I cannot be selfless. To try would be self-deception, and it’s what many others do to assure themselves of their true ‘goodness’. Truth, beauty, and goodness cannot be realized alone, but are the fruit of strong community and living relationships.

Where, then, can I find this community, when I have forced myself to be so strictly alone? I’ve said often that my phoenix remains true regardless of my faith – Christianity will forever be ingrained in to me, belief or not. Christianity engendered my ideals. Am I not fooling myself when I attempt to find others of similar conviction so far away from the source of my own identity?

I have not forgotten my many frustrations with the faith – they remain as strong as ever, and I do not think I must abandon my critical eye to revive my faith. I see, however, that I have demanded perfection in a world that is incapable of producing it. Despite what strict rationalism purports to offer, there is no undamaged truth in the world, but everything is tainted by our limited humanity. The Bible is riddled with passages that I find unconscionable and utterly repulsive, yet it is steeped in truths I cannot deny. I can only conclude that there is understanding that I lack. My craving for understanding is matched only by my desire for companionship, and the world is not about to yield these to me willingly. As one old guy with dementia said many times at L’Abri: I believe in order that I might understand. If the past few months can serve as any evidence, I am far better off serving Christ, than not.

I started this post four days ago, and not with the intention of taking my faith up again. But as I dwelt on the nature of love, this is what came out. I’m interested to see where these next few days will take me.

legacy

In describing the fundamental differences between Eastern Orthodox Christianity and Roman Catholicism, one lecturer at L’Abri pointed to the core cultural roots that each tradition sprang from. The Greeks brought their tradition of philosophy to Christianity – a philosophy which greatly differed from what is practiced in modern times, focused much more on broad pictures rather than methodologies for precise understanding. When mixed with Christianity, a mystical framework for interpretation resulted, focusing on humanity’s relationship to the supernatural (God). Eastern Orthodoxy interpreted Scripture in such a way as to understand how humanity connects and ascends to God, emphasizing unity and relationship. By contrast, the Romans brought their tradition of law in their interpretation of basic tenets, and thus focused on the ideas of status, guilt, and forgiveness, the basis of any lawful society. They saw a need for justification in the face of divine wrath, and understood Scripture as they might a book of law.

I thought of this today, as my supervisor presented me with a few papers to sign as a part of his efforts to improve our quality of work. There were spaces for all of my co-worker’s names. It was a summary of our entire job in two pages, and my signature was to indicate that I understood this.

“So, you’re asking me to do my job.”
“Yes.”
“And you need my signature to know that I’m going to do my job.”
“Yes.”
“How does my signature ensure that I’m going to do my job, if I’m not currently doing my job?”
“It creates accountability. Your signature indicates you understand what your responsibilities are.”
“Am I not currently held accountable based simply on the fact that I’m being paid for my time here?”
“Yes, but this paper provides proof that you know what your job entails.”
“How does a signature prove that I actually understand that? My performance should be a far better indicator of that.”
“It doesn’t prove anything, but it means that when you break procedure in the future we have evidence that you actually know what you’re supposed to be doing.”
“This isn’t going to decrease the number of problems we’re having – it’s just a tool for punishment. Why don’t you just work with where each person is at, rather than trying to catch people on technicalities?”
“Because that isn’t working. We just took an $800 hit because someone forgot write some fucking notes, and we didn’t have enough evidence to stand up against the customer.”
“This won’t fix that.”
“Maybe not, but [our manager] wants something done.”

I’d love to live in a society where people are held accountable based on their actions, rather than what papers they’ve signed. On the other hand, maybe I wouldn’t – I’m sure that lack of false security would become terrifying.

filler

My grandparents like to spam their address books with terror-filled articles about gay marriage and such things. Here’s a choice quote from my grandfather:

“Is “liberal” your escape from reason, or just a license to create your own morality? We have seen it all before and it is a well trodden path that allows a person to run; but not to hide from Truth. Don’t be too hasty with your judgment of biblical morality.

When the liberals discovered smoking causes cancer they virtually outlawed smoking. When they discovered homosexuality caused aids they tried to outlaw what? Truth! More good sense from the liberals!”

One of my cousins lashed out, and was promptly trounced by generic blather about how godless liberals are. To teach them all a lesson, I wrote a goddamn essay.

This whole debacle was just forwarded to me last night, so I apologize for being oh-so fashionably late to this party. But if I might be heard for a moment or two, I’d be much obliged.

Arguing the roots of this nation is fruitless. We don’t regard other nations based on what they were two hundred years ago – we judge them on what they are now. Norse mythology is no longer relevant to Scandinavia, Druidism is no longer relevant to England and France, and likewise, America’s religious roots should have little say in the here-and-now. Even if America ever was a “Christian nation” (a debatable matter, at best), we are looking at nation that has been long divided, and we must deal with this reality. Thomas Jefferson said it best: “It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God.”

What does do injury, however, is the suggestion that somehow my vote for Obama is both Godless and amoral. I not only believe Obama to be a man of incredible moral quality, but but that he’s also a man of outstanding character seen only once in a lifetime. I see in him a true love for others and for his country, I see a strong desire to do the right thing, and I see the policies and the planning to back it up. I see those around me for the first time ever truly excited to be an American, hopeful that this country can for the first time in history be lead by someone else outside an arbitrarily chosen set of rich white men. I don’t expect you to be excited like me. I don’t expect you to agree with me. I respect your views and I see the validity in them.

That said, there are more important issues than gay marriage to handle. Why is the issue of two men getting married more important than reforming our utterly broken education system? Why does it even compare to the fact that over half of Americans can’t afford health insurance? Why does it even hold a candle to the fact that America has within its borders 24% of all of the world’s prisoners, with only 5% of the world’s population? There are so many things wrong and broken within our society. So many of these problems don’t even exist outside of America, too – a semester in Europe taught me that much and a half. There are solutions to these problems, and other countries have already found them. America is way behind.

Don’t get me wrong: social issues are important. But if you’re going to argue that the godlessness of the blue states is going to finalize America’s demise, I would beg you to examine the current situation in our country. Red states currently sport higher teen pregnancy rates, higher high school drop out rates, higher crime rates, and higher divorce rates (I can provide sources, if necessary). Every red states reports significantly higher numbers of Christians. If the Bible belt is to be any example, America’s problems cannot be solved by fundamentalism or neoconservatism. Our problems can’t be solved by broad platitudes, or by gross generalizations, or by a simple belief in doing the right thing. Problems don’t get solved with harsh criticism and stern disapproval, they get solved by doing something. As Benjamin Disraeli said, “It is much easier to be critical than to be correct.”

I believe Obama went and did something – and in doing so, he revamped the American political system as we know it. His campaign registered millions of unreached voters. He opted of out of the public financing system – 80% of his donations were under 100 dollars. He’ll be the first president in 150 years to owe nothing to any corporate sponsor. He single-handedly renewed my hope in the American government, and I can safely say he did the same for others around the country. He renewed the world’s hope in America, too – for even as a waning superpower, our fate is tied to those of nearly every other nation on earth. Just look at Iceland.

All that’s to say: don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Obama’s stance on gay marriage should not be the deciding factor for any person’s vote. I happen to agree that I have no right to interfere with how my neighbor chooses his or her lovers – does this invalidate everything I’ve written thus far? Does it just further attest to the liberal taint within my soul, or my complete godlessness? Please think rationally about this. See beyond red and blue. Not everything is black and white.

Respect the validity in disagreement. Honor the fact that others can think rationally and critically about important issues, but come to different conclusions. Avoid these over-simplified anecdotes and sweeping generalizations. Not all liberals are the same. Not all Christians are the same. Just look at our family: we’re not the same.

I apologize for the essay-length, but throwing one-liners back and forth does little to accomplish much in the way of reaching agreement or understanding between one another. I hope I’ve contributed positively.

Love,

Timothy

PS

I thought I should add: please don’t insinuate that AIDS is somehow divine justice over gay people. It’s repugnant simply given the fact that AIDS is currently ravaging Africa sideways and a half, and is also universally common among America’s impoverished, particularly African-Americans – unless you have a sin you might wish to label across all of those demographics, as well.

EDIT: The responses have been amusing.

A distant relative that I don’t actually know:

“I know that at the end of this election my faith is not in government, but in Jesus Christ. He has a bigger plan for all of us and he will use anything to His glory. So we wake up another day just happy to be alive and well. I know the end of the story and I am on the winning team. We still love the world through His eyes and live for King Jesus until He takes us home.”

My 80-something year old grandfather:

“I appreciate Tim’s effort to marginalize what has been said but the wordy and inane comparisons fail miserably to explain why going down a road already proven to be a failed system could possibly prove to be “positive”. Throwing more money at education than everyone else on the globe has produced a deficient product in comparison. More will do even less. Judging history has proven to be the necessary and exact measure for current appraisals. “He who doesn’t learn from the past is doomed to repeat” is a paraphrase of several political philosophers – probably a bit wiser than our contemporary young people. Seeing Obama as a man of noble character means someone has ignored his judgment. It sees him also as NOT guilty of shitting on anyone and everyone he has looked to as mentors or helpers, in his political quest, whenever they became a hindrance to his search for power. It looks past his deceitfulness when his past record, by rhetoric or votes, is brought to bear on his judgment. A look at his oration to far left assemblies and how different it was stated in a broader spectrum audience is more than a little alarming. He lied about his intentions to accept public financial support for his campaign. His sources of support have been hidden for questionable reasons. And this represents character?

The argument about red states/blue states is not proven. Those statements are inaccurate and illegitimate .

The fact that Obama wishes to support gay marriage, and abortion, represents departure from a moral code of thousands of years existence. A wise person could not possibly see that CHANGE as absolutely positive.

Sorry Tim but your argument fails to reach the level of responsible debate.”

My uncle’s father:

“‘There are so many things wrong and broken within our society. So many of these problems don’t even exist outside of America, too – a semester in Europe taught me that much and a half. There are solutions to these problems, and other countries have already found them. America is way behind.’

Tim – – you don’t know me but I know your mom and dad – – the above is your quote – – and I don’t want to sound ugly – – or start any MORE controversy – – but if this is REALLY how you feel – – why don’t you move to Europe or some third world country and enjoy your life instead of being miserable in this backward country – – just an idea – “

bones

The word drama is so contextual. From one situation to the next, it invokes entirely separate visions: it can describe the superficial complexity of tensions between a group of sexually amoral co-workers, or the engagements of valiant men duty-driven to to battle one another, or the soul-piercing intensity of true romance intermingled with the conflict of circumstance. Yet they all share a comment element of urgency, falsely or otherwise. The sense of urgency that comes with a compelling circumstance is, for some, the only source of meaning (however hollow it might be) that can be found. They doom themselves to a restless cycle of increasingly meaningless conflicts that never see resolution, but serve only to perpetuate endlessly until distracted by catastrophe, or silenced by misery and death.

While drama is itself a fascinating and alluring occurrence, it is not an end to itself. It looks forward to its conclusion that its participants may find themselves better off than they began. If drama has a purpose, it is in its finality, in resolution, and in completion.

In this context, I wonder how it is that I love being as dramatic as I do. I am forever eager to draw lines in the sand, to paint things black and white, to make ultimatums and force absolutes on situations that were born in the gray, and will die in the grey. I’m sure it’s something to do with my imagination; I long for each encounter I’m in to, at it’s heart of hearts, be a glorious and epic battle where true virtue is borne out in its totality, where my humanity will be stretched out to its absolute brink, where I will be tested, and found worthy. I long to be validated in more than shades of gray: I want to be unequivocally white, and recognized as such. The irony is that within the lives of those few characters I can point to as possessing what I strive for, there exists very little drama. The persistent presence of drama is often a sign of poor discipline, of mixed morals, of a lack of focus.

Some mistake that lack of drama as boredom, a lack of creativity, or close-mindedness – but I disagree. It’s the fruit of a true wisdom that can only grow when left undisturbed by the chaos of unending drama, free to know what reality outside the distortions of conflict is. It’s a foresight that only comes when left in total darkness. It’s a sensitivity that only comes when left untouched.

At the core, this is an argument against the sole validity of experience – for what is experience, but participation in a great variety of dramas, a long line of conflicts both resolved and unfinished? I’d even be willing to suggest that at the core of every person there is one great drama that wholly dominates their life, but for each person, this drama is specific and unique. The commonality of human experience lies in that each of us are fighting through this drama towards resolution, that we all seek to know absolution, and that we are all a part of each other’s dramas.

Calling life a drama is, in some ways, a self-fulfilling prophecy. I instantly yearn for a glorious death, for men and women alike to endlessly wail at my passing, for my story to quicken the hearts of young men and flutter the hearts of young women. The vision within my head is so terribly grand! Then, I look upon myself, and I wonder: how the fuck can I accomplish this in the 21st century? The age of apathy, where honor lies dead next to the grave of chivalry, where integrity more commonly refers to bridges than to men?

Broad platitudes aside (though I do dearly enjoy them), I do wonder what kind of character will prove meaningful in this century. Though I believe morality to be absolute, meaningful expressions of morality change with every age. Every age has its drama: what is the drama of the 21st century, and what kind of character will it take to bring it to resolution?

fury and terror

It’s been a long time since I’ve dwelt on my loneliness.

Of all the fears I have in this mortal world, to be alone is the most fierce of them all. It’s a feeling that’s been present for as long as I’ve known time, stretching back into my earliest of days. I never got on the bandwagon of cooties as a child; girls never intimidated me like they did my friends, and as I grew older it was a feature I prided myself on for no particular reason. Of course, I found myself out of my element as soon as puberty hit, and I realized that I lacked every possible quality I might need to fulfill my heart’s desire of romantic companionship. I can’t exaggerate how intensely I felt that desire, even in middle school – I cried out to God on more than a few nights asking for one, and one thing only: a true love, a woman that I could love, and that would love me. It was a longing I oft confessed to my mentors, and I wonder how they managed to take a preteen so seriously on the issue, but I’m grateful that they did. My Christian companions tended to lob the canned answer that I should want what God wants – and that may or may not include a lover. I certainly attempted to do just that, but part of my slow distrust of God’s ability to hear or answer grew straight from the fact that no answer came, and year after year, I found myself alone.

As time marched on, I eventually realized what many self-proclaimed “nice guys” tend to ignore: that there are basic rules of the game that must be played, and that being virtuous doesn’t enable one to abandon the subtleties of romance and attraction. My first and most important conclusion was that before I could share my life with another person, I must have a life I feel is worth sharing. How can you love another if you do not even love yourself? How can you honestly believe that another loves you, when you cannot do so yourself? So I went about the business of learning to love myself, as well as making myself into the person I wanted to be, a self that I could love. It’s where my writing started, my running, my tattoo, my clothes. Much of that came simply with maturity and time, but I believe strongly that who I am is quite purposeful. Perhaps that’s just arrogance – and I would certainly be a fool to claim I am anywhere near self-made – but I do know that I set out to better myself, that I had a desire, and that desire was met.

So now as I look upon the death of my first, true relationship, I find myself asking myriad questions, while the chilling tendrils of that old loneliness takes its grip upon me once more. I’ve thought back to my childhood, and I wonder if God gave me what I asked for, and simply took it away, or if this were his way of reigning me in, as if to tell me “You can have a taste of what you seek, but you won’t have it until you kneel!”, or as a third possibility, “I will not grant you what you seek and you will live your life unfulfilled, but for your impatience your punishment will be to know how unfulfilled you truly are”.

It is ironic, to me, that I would consider God in any part of this equation, after I claim such control of myself. But the end of all this has brought me to the simple realization that I truly have no control over anything. I could try to claim that I brought her into my life, that it was my confidence and strength that brought it all to pass – and I think, for a time, I believed that – but correlation is not causation. When all is said and done, I did not decide her choices. I can only be grateful for what came to pass, and do my best to be deserving of what I receive. I celebrate the fact that I am not haunted by regret and that I can walk away with a handful of wisdom – but I find the path before me to be more daunting than I’d ever imagined. My fortune feels very far removed from my control, and waiting to see what these next months will hold for me is not an exciting prospect. I’m in a lonely place, with little to do but work and study, and not enough money to pursue the many hobbies I once had.

God continues to shower me in silence despite my simultaneous fury and terror, but as hard as I try, I cannot evict my pondering over his intentions and desires. Though I no longer believe Yahweh is this same as this silent God that seems to taunt me, my desire to do his will truly has not lessened, and I’m curious to see what opportunities he presents to me in the dull days ahead.

chronovore

I have, of late, felt driven to make some sort of decision about Christianity. I dislike standing on middle ground when people try to place where I am. When someone pegs me as a Christian, I feel cornered by stereotypes and misunderstandings, trapped with a group that I find less and less in common with. When another pegs me as an unbeliever, I feel undefined and vague, lacking in virtue and values, like a philosophizing windbag that thinks about deep things without coming to conclusions that positively change his life.

I know that whatever my choice is, I’ll never be rid of it all (and not just because I have a phoenix plastered to my chest). My parents, and my parents’ parents have forever been steeped in very core of America’s Christian culture. My whole way of thinking, my worldview, and my language have risen straight from that – a fact which I do not resent or regret, but that I cannot avoid due to its prominence, even if it sits only in the background of my life. I don’t mind this, because I can see that it gives me a set of experiences and a perspective that if I did not have, I would not understand a thing about, an ability which few looking from the outside in are very good at. It’s given me a drive to ask hard questions and seek hard answers – but it’s precisely there that I think the faith of my fathers does not satisfy.

I’m tired of trying to fit Christianity’s answers to the problems that the world presents. While an impressive many of those answers work and are fruitful, too many, for my tastes, do not. If I am to be expected to disbelieve my senses and to trust in an ancient dogma, I would demand answers that do not falter in the face of scrutiny. Primarily, the problem of God’s character is what troubles me.

I have rather high expectations of God – and while God is in no way bound by those expectations, if he expects me to recognize him for who he is and to honor him for that, then his character should be far more evident than I have yet found it to be, as the Bible presents it.

I see little consistency between the Old Testament and the New. I have heard dozens of scholars attempt to explain how the God of Abraham saw fit to enact genocide plural times or of his complete lack of forgiveness for deviance within his people, when the God of Paul claims to be so overwhelmingly full of love for his creations. I simply cannot reconcile the two: one is entirely similar to the gods of ancient Greece, or China, or Arabia: wholly vain, perhaps even whimsical and capricious in his judgment upon the world, while the other is suddenly willing to engage in a living relationship with people beyond an arbitrarily selected group of nomads. Yet, even this God is not willing to forget Hell, a place of judgment for those not lucky enough to be born of God-fearing parents, or (and this doctrine truly riles me) those pre-destined to know their Creator.

There is no justice or mercy in either God of the Bible. I am willing to admit that humanity is plagued by sin, and that we are in need of salvation from that sin – no one need look far to confirm that. Yet the fact remains that God is responsible, yes, responsible for his creation. I do not deny responsibility for my own actions, yet I cannot, in good conscience, worship a God that claims to be just and merciful, yet would knowingly craft billions (billions!) of people only to condemn them to Hell. It is folly to say that every person has had their chance at redemption – ill cultures raise ill families, and ill families raise ill children; sociology has taught us that much, at least, and it would be ignorant to claim that every person has had proper exposure. One lecturer at L’Abri put it roughly like this:

The Bible is not in every language. Even for those, not every person can read. Even for those, not all of them have access. Even for those, not all of them have a church to go to. Even for those, not all of them have a good church to go to. The simple reality is that most people will never hear the message of salvation.

For the longest time, I have refused to separate the many great Christians I’ve met from Christianity. Yet perhaps, like others that I have met, they were simply great people, that just so happened to be Christians. They would most certainly deny this notion, but I have yet to see anything truly miraculous in another person’s life, or my own. The change (so often attributed to God) I see looks quite human. Perhaps faith was the key to unlocking that change, but to claim that true change can only come through Jesus is to ignore the many examples that speak to the contrary throughout the world.

Even still, however, I recognize many of the truths that Christianity speaks towards. The men that wrote the Bible were geniuses – the wisdom therein is timeless and wonderful, but this does not mean it is ultimate truth, the final truth, the only truth. The Bible carries a powerful story, and is itself an astounding piece of literature – but for now, I do not believe it is more than that.

If God wishes me to be a Christian, then he’d best speak up. I would love nothing more than to be proven wrong: to have some form of definite answer about the nature of the world around me would be a wonderful gift. To have a Creator I could recognize and share with and to love, would be even greater. Yet God has made no such attempt. If my experience is all I have to go on, I could conclude just as easily that he hates me rather than loves me, but of course this conclusion would merely change based on how well my day was going.

Until then, I’ve stopped wearing that good old coconut bead necklace. I’m not sure what to replace it with, though.

anger

Watching the political tides has been intensely painful, these past weeks, not just because I’m a supporter of Obama, but because I simply cannot fathom what brings my former brethren to rally under such a wicked woman as Palin. Alone, McCain was cute – he was the best the republicans had to offer, and yet he was still strictly inferior to Obama in every regard. Here we are, with a man of unfathomable proportions, that for once inspires the people to be more and do more with the record to prove it, and he is being forsaken for a woman of blatant hypocrisy and corruption, the very traits that have pushed so many away from politics in these past few decades. Her nomination, some have said, restarted the culture wars, and will lead to an increasingly bitter and divided America if she is allowed to take such a high profile place.

As one writer from the Guardian put it:

If Sarah Palin defies the conventional wisdom that says elections are determined by the top of the ticket, and somehow wins this for McCain, what will be the reaction? Yes, blue-state America will go into mourning once again, feeling estranged in its own country. A generation of young Americans – who back Obama in big numbers – will turn cynical, concluding that politics doesn’t work after all. And, most depressing, many African-Americans will decide that if even Barack Obama – with all his conspicuous gifts – could not win, then no black man can ever be elected president.

Palin represents to me all that is ill about neoconservatism, that if you want a WASP America, if you want an America that caters to the privileged, an America that fears change and scorns its responsibility to the rest of the world, if you want an America that has no room for dissent, you must vote for her. Oh, and John McCain, too, though he’s just an accessory, at this point.

I would pray that America doesn’t go down this path, but I don’t believe God’s listening.

EDIT:

ABC interviews Palin.
more, and some really juicy more.

stretched

In an attempt to teach myself how to immerse myself in a book again, I’ve been re-reading Lord of the Rings, and as I’ve progressed through it, I’ve had a growing desire to make my speech and writing more beautiful. The first aspect of my words that comes to mind is my cursing.

Thus far I’ve felt that cursing is merely a fashion of words that polite society drowns upon. Not being much a fan of catering to the easily offended, I’ve taken pride in my choice to utilize the entire English language as I see fit. That logic continues to appeal to me quite a lot, but when I consider it in the context of beauty, it’s immediately apparent how harsh cursing is in comparison to the rest of our language. Even the most jaded ears can spot the difference it makes upon one’s message.

I don’t buy the argument that swearing is uncreative or lazy. The strength of a word such as fuck doesn’t come from its power to offend or its ability to displace other, more proper words. Its strength, as I see it, lies solely in the fact that it’s unbeautiful in its motive and in its result. The unbeauty of its sound and structure seems totally contextual, in regards to the surrounding culture or situation, and is irrelevant in a discussion that seeks timeless, absolute answers.

Considering it in this manner seems more in sync with our speech as a whole. To curse another’s name, is (in this age, anyways), to speak unbeautiful words about another. To be cursed, is to be unbeautiful, and whether that unbeauty is seen or unseen, is irrelevant. The relationship between polite society and cursing, then, becomes more logical; polite society has long thrived on its desire for beauty, to surround itself with beautiful people, beautiful things, beautiful words. Yet, the wise will see the skin-deep nature of this beauty, and thus the absence of something like cursing doesn’t make their illusion of beauty any more real.

Simply, I don’t know what to do with my favorite four-letter words. In many cases, my speech feels wholly neutered or too aloof when I abstain from it, but I often myself being too cavalier about its use. Indeed, I make a point about cursing on this blog so as to set myself apart from my past associations, and I do the same in conversation. Among Christians, I tend to enjoy being seen as a non-Christian: not in an uncouth manner, but I enjoy playing devil’s advocate, and I especially delight in challenging the common assumption in Christian groups that everyone here is of like mind and heart. In non-Christian settings, I prefer to make my mark elsewhere, as I find no moral high ground in declining to swear.

I suppose it might seem obvious that if I wish to make my speech more beautiful, and cursing is by nature unbeautiful, that I would abandon it; but a large portion of me regrets the though of parting from it, and I don’t really know why.

hrm

Edith,

Unfortunately, I won’t be able to attend for the fall term, due to financial problems. I hope to get back to L’Abri sooner or later, but this fall will not be possible. I should have my debt repaid soon, however.

Thanks for everything.
Tim

For whatever reason, it was very hard to send this email.

God, I miss it.

humanism

I’m slowly approaching a full year under the employment of my employer, and my feelings towards the corporation are ever-changing. Some of you may recall my utter disgust with which I regarded Office Depot, and I went into this store with equally strong feelings. For the greater part of my employment, I responded by simply being a poor employee. I purposefully didn’t give a shit about my job, I did my best to avoid earning money towards our daily budget, I avoided opening up to or trusting my co-workers, and I convinced myself that I was the only competent person on the staff.

With time, however, I realized that I was consumed with a false idealism. I was determined to hate my surroundings because of how far it falls from what reality should be. I saw the depravity of my surroundings to be somehow unreal, or less real than what I might experience anywhere else in life. Furthermore, I was convinced that I was alone in my hatred of the system, and therefore ahead of the game, smarter than my foolish colleagues.

The first change of heart came simply in humbleness. I’m not actually as good at what I do as I think I am, and that my ego serves nothing but myself. I came also to recognize that people don’t submit to this system out of love or ignorance, but out of necessity. We’re all in this shit together, and it is more loving to work along side one another for something better than to try and sabotage the system. Additionally, I’ve also begun to understand that giant corporations aren’t necessarily large, faceless entities. Every store is not the same, because (at least for now) individuals are still running things. I’m not a machine, or a part of a machine, or any other lifeless metaphor. I’m a person, working for other people, to provide a service for people.

It is interesting to me, then, that I would make such a colossal mistake as to hand a person a laptop without asking for their identification first, the consequences of which I haven’t yet heard. Now, in my defense:

1) We probably process at least forty computers a week between the four or five of us. In the year I’ve worked there, hundreds and hundreds of computers come in and out.
2) This is a busy store. When people are waiting in line and the phone is ringing, people expect me to get shit done fast, and it’s not hard to forget the really important little things.
3) The woman walked up and asked for the specific computer by the name of the owner and the model, and she told me what work had been done on it. There was no mix-up – hers was the only computer of that brand we had.

So, I was pretty thunderstruck when another woman walks in an hour later asking for the same computer, and a phone call to her husband reveals no details about who might have just been in to pick the thing up. Thankfully, no personal information was on this thing (we’d restored it after replacing a bad hard drive). Had there been, I would almost certainly have been fired (although, like I said, my fate is still uncertain). The reason I find all this interesting is because I’ve finally come to a point where I can appreciate my job and the effort I put into it, and feel like I have come to a place where I can work my way up the promotion ladder and start building my resume. I don’t relish the thought of losing my job. I also don’t relish the ass-reaming I will most certainly experience tomorrow.

echo

The phone at work has an awful, awful ring. It’s loud, metallic, and it bounces around my head for hours after I’ve left the store. It’s the sort of sound that nightmares are made of, the sound that I might wake up to, screaming because I thought I was being disemboweled, but in fact, I would merely be remembering the quarter-second tone that blasts through my few square feet of workspace whenever a lost soul comes to me (or my colleagues) for guidance. Indeed, if hell’s phones are ringing, I bet they sound like this.

Perhaps the most jarring feature of the all the phones at work, however, are simply their instantaneous ability to command attention, a power that existed even before these hell-born tones were introduced into my day. Whatever I’m doing is secondary to picking it up, and if what I’m doing precludes me from using a phone, part of my job description is to 1) feel guilty about my inability to reach the phone, and 2) silently will one of my co-workers to answering it, if only to stave off that demonic ringtone.

Ultimately, I’ve never been a fan of phones. They’re a strong contender in my rather short list of pet peeves, valiantly wrestling for the top position against my mother’s desire to hide the pots I use as ashtrays. It’s probably something I inherited from my family. Since the dawn of caller-ID, we stopped answering our phones except to those wise enough to call at least twice, yet my father insists on keeping a phone in every room of the house, that we might more efficiently ignore them.

It’s nice to be working again, though.

windows

The three people in the street across from my house look suspiciously like zombies. No, seriously. They’re waddling and wafting their hands around willy-nilly. They’re out for brains.

I’ve always wondered what I’d do if I encountered a zombie. I tend to nurse a strong amount of internal bravado about such circumstances in my head, but I realize that given my quality of response to situations which involved rather zombie-like foes, I probably wouldn’t live up to my imagination.

I bet you thought I was going to write an essay comparing modern America to zombies. HA.

knock

Although I’m usually self-conscious anyways, being outside my house with my shirt off enhances that tendency quite a bit. I’ve been cleaning out my garage (as well as mowing the lawn, trimming the edges, installing a compost bin, and such) this week, so I figured I might as well fetch a tan while I do it. A lot of questions and thoughts keep running through my head.

I wonder if someone could complain because I don’t have a shirt on.

I wonder if my phoenix is visible from across the street.

I doubt people could tell it’s a phoenix from that far away.

I wonder if people think it’s a fake tattoo.

I wonder how many years it will be before I need to get it redone because of the fading.

I wonder what people think when they see a guy with no shirt and biking gloves standing on the sidewalk.

Hell, what do I think when I see that? Have I ever seen that? Why haven’t I seen that? It can’t be that uncommon.

Why should guys have to wear shirts? It’s not like our nipples are that fascinating or distracting. Shirts are so lame.

I love not wearing a shirt.

method

I’ve decided not to rebuild my computer for the time being.

My relationship with computers has always been a problematic one. The phrase computer addiction has been tossed around by a handful of people in my life, and while I am loathe to concede to such a suggestion, I am beginning to wonder if my existence is really any better off with the presence of a computer in my bedroom. While the internet’s most zealous proponents insist that the internet is totally different from TV because of its user-oriented, participatory nature, I am starting to think that perhaps, perhaps, the end results are ultimately the same for much of the internet’s usage. Particularly, when Wired starts claiming that the scientific method has been debunked in the face of the plethora of data provided by Google, I wonder if the internet has ultimately enabled nothing but glorified, slack-jawed navel-gazing, much the same as what happens when one watches television for a lengthy period of time.

Admittedly, this is also sparked by having seen Wall-E, a rather glorious film that unabashedly criticizes the focus of American culture. The human characters in the film live on a ship devoted to endless entertainment and ultimate convenience, and as a result, they’re all completely obese and self-absorbed. While this isn’t directly stated, they’re also immortal – they’ve survived for over seven-hundred years, but they haven’t done anything in that time except bitch at each other over matters of spilled milk.

This brought me back to one of the lectures I listened to at L’Abri, which had a rather unique analysis of different systems of culture. I can’t remember all of them, but here’s a few.

Communism: man’s greatest end is to produce.
Capitalism: man’s greatest end is to consume.
Materialism: man’s greatest end is to be entertained.

The more I think about it in these terms, the more convinced I become that Jesus was right in stating that man’s greatest end is to serve. I recently watched 12 Angry Men, and just tonight, Forrest Gump. While Henry Ford’s character and Tom Hanks’ character are quite different, their commonality is in their service. The remarkable thing about service is that it does not require one to be a genius, to be rich, or to have anything at all. We can serve at every moment and every point in our lives, and it seems to me that we are creatures made for serving.

Which brings me back to the start. Where does service enter in to the internet? How can a one serve anything but pwnage inside of WoW? How can one serve on facebook, youtube, or myspace? These are entities devoted to self-service. It would be like attempting to serve by watching Comedy Central.

My point is this: entertainment has its place, and I enjoy much of what popular media has to offer. But these cannot be the center of my life, if I’m to be a fulfilled human being.

Micah 6:8
He has showed you, O man, what is good.
And what does the LORD require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.

becoming

I often tell myself that I should write a book, but no sooner than I pursue the idea do I get stuck on what kind of book I would write, or what the book would be about. If I wrote a fiction book within my current trend, it would be laden with metaphor, held down by some message I wished to share through the voice of my characters. If I wrote something non-fiction, it would be abstract, too disconnected from reality, yet likely uneducated in its performance and unaware of existing material of its kind.

Thus, my laziness would no doubt propel me towards fiction. Fiction is a very enabling genre. It has a readership that may or may not be looking for what is being offered, and may go through the entire story unaware of what’s really being said, but core ideas live on in the form of the characters and plot. Vocabulary and etymology need not be recalled to retain the truth that is being conveyed. Then again, thinking like this makes me feel as though I’m speaking only to be heard, for the love of the sound of my own voice.

Which is the problem with a lot of my current writing. Many of these blog posts are fueled simply by the fact that I like the way they sound, and I can’t really determine if they hold water until they sit in public space for a while. I don’t like quite a lot of what I write, but that disdain generally comes after the fact, and I generally press the submit button with a somewhat satisfied, occasionally smug feeling of accomplishment. Over time, I’ve learned a lot about what I don’t like and what’s worth saying, even without the sparse commentary that comes by here anymore. Blogging, however, doesn’t push me to finish or perfect anything. A post will almost always remain untouched once it’s been up for a day. It will rarely ever be added on to, slimmed down, or altered, so as to preserve its purity (or lack thereof). The power of blogging is in its chronology, really. A post sits at a place in time, starting out new and becoming stale very rapidly. Books, on the other hand, are meant to be timeless. Which is why the thought of writing one is so appealing.

There is great irony, however, in my impatience. I can barely sit down and read more than twenty pages at a time. I read some Flannery O’Conner earlier, and I keep looking at The Brothers Karamazov with guilt, as well as a collection of Greek and Roman literature. With a dead computer, I have plenty of time to tackle all of these, but my patience is the limiting factor.

ascendence

Greatness is a thing I have craved for as long as I can recall. I remember the first video game character I saw, and immediately thought “I wish I were like him”. I remember the first TV character I saw, and immediately thought “I want to be like him”. I remember the first man I met that I thought “I would give anything to be like him”. As a child, it was easy to believe in my own potential.

There has been a continuing correlation between my age and my growing disillusionment with my ideal. As time rolls on, the more estranged I feel from that possibility, yet the greater I feel the need to become that elusive man that wanders the halls of my memory, and my imagination.

I have lost him.

I must find him, and become him, before I myself am lost.

salvation

Does purpose come from meaning?

Or does meaning come from purpose?

Meaning: the personal force that encompasses that which we love and hate. A meaningful event is such because it holds power to influence that which we care about. Meaning is an attribute of external objects.

Purpose: the intended direction of personal action. The driving force behind everything we do. Purpose is an attribute of internal choices.

My gut wants to say that the reality could be both – but I am having trouble reconciling the problems. I do, however, see clearly the conundrum of my faith, in this context.

God gives me purpose, but not meaning. The world gives me meaning, but not purpose.

I love dearly that purpose that God has shown me, but I fail to see how it is worthy with how meaningless it feels so far. The world, likewise, is showing me what it is to be human, what it means to be this incredible structure that I am – but the world has yet to show me anything beyond self-destruction in its ways, defeating the very purpose of life.

Watching Iron Man made me think a bit about what modern guys idealize. Tony Stark achieved his lifestyle through intellectual mastery – with his mental faculties, he obtained fame, fortune, and sex, the pinnacle of what the world considers valuable goals. But these forces are so fleeting – so ultimately meaningless. They are their own meaning. Pleasure for the sake of pleasure.

Which brings me to question the power of purpose in faith. Is it all just purpose for the sake of purpose, just as the world is meaning for the sake of meaning?

I crave, I crave, I crave!

doctor, heal thyself

Once upon a time, stories of demons, angels, and miracles excited me. They spoke to the reality that I was taught of, but had never seen. They hinted at something beyond my own experience, a plane of nature that I would be forced to regard with fear and reverence. A shard of that remains, but it lies defeated after little nourishment over these past few years.

On my last day at L’Abri, my Swedish tutor asked me if I ever prayed. I told him no – it feels a useless activity. I have yet to see a tangible response. I might as well talk to a wall, and in fact, that is what I used to do, from a literal standpoint. He scoffed and asked if I believe in God – which I do. What kind of God do I believe in, then, that I do not pray to him, my perfectly good and all-powerful creator?

Sources are everything. Many, I believe, find their source of faith in anecdotes of old women rising from the firm grip of death. That shard within me yearns to have my belief confirmed by a lovely story such as this. But I cannot escape the fact that leaping for miracles is a wholly useless activity. It defies logic, progress, rationality – if we were so impatient as to pass off our ignorance as miraculous, we would be nowhere and a half. Praying for miracles is, I believe, a mostly foolish activity. Miracles are, by nature, the exception. To expect the exception is poor faith, to say the least.

All that to say, I wonder what my source of faith is. My faith is tremendously weak – I know, I understand, but my belief sees a paltry level of realization. Having walked away from anecdotal evidence and hand-me-down stories, I am left with frustratingly little – a handful of people I admire, and a book of eerily accurate wisdom about human nature and the surrounding world. The moments where I can only say “I don’t know how I know this to be true” are becoming more frequent, and this endlessly vexes me. I’m tired of uncertainty. I’m tired of being unsure. Yeah, Crede, ut intelligas, but that whole belief part isn’t just a choice. It has to come from somewhere.

Where the fuck am I supposed to derive my beliefs, with so little to trust?

supermodels

In my first week at L’Abri, I became consumed with developing a model for human interaction with supernature. This was a result of being introduced to the transcendentals (truth, beauty, goodness), and my fascination has since not waned.

The model, as I last touched it, was as follows:

RATIONAL: Father – Truth – Faith – Mind
EMOTIONAL: Son – Goodness – Hope – Heart
SPIRITUAL: Spirit – Beauty – Love – Soul

supernaturenature

1) Truth: that which is worthy of faith.
2) Goodness: that which is worthy of hope.
3) Beauty: that which is worthy of love.

4) Faith: our mind’s attempt to interact with truth.
5) Hope: our heart’s attempt to interact with goodness.
6) Love: our soul’s attempt to interact with beauty.

7) Mind: our best tool for understanding truth.
8) Heart: our best tool for understanding goodness.
9) Soul: our best tool for understanding beauty.

To test the accuracy of this model, I also attempted to switch out the transcendentals and their corresponding verbs with their opposites.

Truth :: Falseness
Goodness :: Evil
Beauty :: Corruption

Faith :: Distrust
Hope :: Despair
Love :: Hate

Falseness – Distrust
Evil – Despair
Corruption – Hate

There are a few more dimensions to this model that I can’t do with text, so if I have any luck at resurrecting my skills of an artist, I’ll finish my explanation with that.

strength

For the first time in seventeen years, Russia paraded its ICBMs through Red Square.

Nationalism is not an ideal I’ve ever adhered to, nor do I think it common among my peers. As far as America goes, for the past twenty-or-so years it’s been out of date. Unnecessary. Ignorant. A symbol of insecurity and misplaced values.

For America, this can be partially attributed to the over-use of national symbols; the flag and the anthem have lost any real meaning as they get waved and sung at every chance. The pledge is so pervasive that it’s nothing but tired phrases. In fact, it would be safe to say that many Americans really just don’t like America. Between inferior social services, a recessive economy, a president we can’t feel proud of, a war we can’t support, there isn’t much to feel good about. At best, it’s home, and many people spend their time admiring other countries, where the grass is obviously greener.

I’ve struggled with how to think about America. Nationality not a part of an American’s identity. It seems nothing more than arbitrary. Why should I care about “my” country, just because I was born here? Why should I serve a country that has not served me, and shows no such potential? At the same time, I recognize that a nation cannot be successful without people that do care about these questions.

As I think about China and Russia, I sort of start to understand why they’ve gone with the military/authoritarian state model. A nation full of critics and complainers produces nothing. They solely consume, and live off the production of others. Silencing the critics frees up a lot of wasted time and resources, even if it means running over a few innocent students with a tank. In a nation fighting tooth and nail to climb up the world ladder, freedom of speech is a small price to pay. Lincoln certainly thought so.

I think often about the state of other people in other countries, and in the past. Modernists love to praise how advanced we are and how far we have come, but I find it hard to believe that on the whole, people are significantly happier than they were 100 years ago or 1000 years ago. Although I don’t think happiness is purely relative, I do wonder at how happy I think I am, or how happy the people around me think they are. On the whole, people don’t seem to know what makes them happy, and I cannot see a long future in store for a nation that is so self-absorbed, trying to figure out what new forms of consumption will make them happier.

Yet still, I value the choice to determine my happiness. Action finds its value through choice. I can’t say there is no meaning in actions we do not choose, though – which is what confuses me about all this. Are Russians as happy as Americans? Do Russians think they are happier than Americans, despite the oppression of the Kremlin? Are the Chinese happy despite the censorship of their government, knowing that their military is invading an innocent and defenseless country?

Looking at it like this, I find it hard to complain about the problems of my own country, but it doesn’t induce pride or security; more like a relief that the problem of unhappy realities is universal. Ignorance of those realities is, of course, bliss – which is what censorship in Russia and China is all about. But if ignorance is what is required to be happy, then I don’t think I want that.

Ultimately, I can only come to the conclusion that happiness is not an end worth pursuing. That is not to say I shouldn’t do what makes me happy, but I don’t think my life should be finding its value in happiness. I can only see that as leading me down a path of ignorance, or a path of futility.

Thus, it makes sense to me that nowhere in Truth, Beauty and Goodness is happiness guaranteed.

supernature

These are two forum posts I made recently as an attempt to answer the question “Is God good?”.

March 23:

Before we can answer the question at hand, there must be some definition of terms, as it were. Particularly, God, and goodness.

Who is God?

These might seem obvious or repulsive, but these are the assumptions that allow us to begin to answer this question:

– God exists. If God does not exist, then he is nothing but a psycho-social phenomonon. A figment of history’s imagination cannot be good.
– God is the creator of the universe. What point would there be in investigating, questioning, or worshipping a god that was not responsible for the world he presides over? Within this assumption, there are hidden two more points – particularly, God’s omniscience and omnipotence. If God is the sole creator, then he knows his creation perfectly, and has perfect control over it. I should insert a note that I see absolutely no reason why God couldn’t have crafted the world within its own mechanisms – those being the Big Bang and Evolution.
– God is knowable. This is what Agnosticism and Deism deny, as well as to a lesser extent, Islam – that God avails himself in certain ways to enable his creation to have relationship with him. He must be knowable, if there is to be an answer to who he is. Otherwise, we’re just making guesses and assumptions.

The catch is that God’s existence and his knowability, in and of themselves, say absolutely nothing about his character. But before we talk about God’s goodness, we have to define goodness, as well.

What is goodness?

The trouble with defining a term like goodness is the presence of its polarity, evil. Humanity has the consistent problem of mixing the two up, whether purposefully for personal gain, or accidentally via the human tendency towards imperfection and mistakes. If we say a human is good, we do not mean that he/she is incapable of evil, but that on the whole, they seem to prefer goodness. If God is good, it has to be in a higher sense, because of God’s aforementioned nature.

In order for goodness to have any meaning, it must be more than a cultural/sociological concept. That is to say, goodness must be absolute, regardless of race, gender, socio-economic status, culture, and so on. I should backdrop this by noting that this is not an attempt to give meaning to morality – I believe that meaning is self-evident and intrinsic for all human beings. How that is expressed and altered varies between people-groups, but the absolutes never change.

I can’t really imagine defining goodness without invoking the other two transcendentals – truth and beauty. The three are inexorably linked to each other – where one appears, the other two are also present, whether apparent or not. That which is true and beautiful, is most definitively good. Now, the whole of human history has been spent waxing and waning over trying to pin down what truth, beauty, and goodness really are, and dare I say that nobody’s made a whole lot of definitive progress. That doesn’t mean that it’s useless to try to find out, but I think that the problem lies in separating them out. They belong together, they thrive together, they enhance one another, they define one another.

What, then, is God’s relationship to goodness?

Christianity’s answer to this question is that he is perfectly good – incapable of evil, and therefore the penultimate embodiment of goodness. The same can be said of beauty and truth, I believe. But there’s problems that immediately come to mind, just by looking out the window and seeing the world that God has created. This world is not perfectly good, and a perfectly good creator would not make an imperfect creation. This, quite distinctly, is the problem of evil, or of suffering (since that is evil’s most direct result).

Yet still, alongside Christianity’s answer is the claim of exclusivity. That is, that our souls are immortal (persisting beyond death), and that we will be judged for our choices and actions (or lack thereof) upon earth by God. The most universally popular conception of the consequences therein is heaven and hell. Heaven being the reward, hell being the punishment. But therein lies many problems:

– Why would a good god demand the loyalty of his creations, under threat of eternal damnation?
– Why would a good god demand loyalty but never reveal himself to so many of his creations?
– Why would a good god create people just to damn a shitload of them to hell?

And all the while, God has created a world chock full of suffering and pain, an imperfect world, created by a supposedly perfect creator.

Even if you acknowledge the existence of God, why would you want to worship a god like this?

I have my answer, but I’d like to hear other thoughts first.

Today:

“Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other.” – John Calvin

God’s goodness demands that he be knowable – if his goodness cannot be seen, then what use is it? Morality is a concept of movement, of action. That which does not move cannot be moral. That which has no will, cannot be moral. Indeed, morality can be applied only to creatures of choice. If God is good, that means he is choosing, he is acting, and he is acting out that goodness in an active way. If he is good, then that goodness can be known.

Where is that goodness?

My greatest vexation at this juncture is that the objectivity of goodness versus the subjectivity of experience. No person experiences everything in the same way, nor are the experiences we face exactly similar. This is, in essence, the problem of epistemology. Knowledge is not equal, nor is our understanding of that knowledge. Many philosophers have spent their whole lives seeking to find the solution to what knowledge really is, and Plato probably got about as far as anyone else might have hoped. His theory of “Justified True Beliefs” is what tends to dominate current thought, most visible in the realm of hard sciences.

Modern society has more or less reduced knowledge to facts – only that which can be proven and observed. Yet that does not match our reality. Very little of what we do in our daily life has much of anything to do with this kind of knowledge. We do not love our parents (insert loving relationship of your choice here) because of any knowledge we have gathered, and we do not know they love us. These are not objectively provable aspects of our reality, but that does not make them any less real. That knowledge is, in the end, is up to us.

The verb I’m hinting at here is faith. No, I am not saying that the answer to the question of “Is God good” is “If you have faith in him”. That’s a foolish and self-righteous answer with no reasonable justification. One rather famous Christian paraplegic, Joni Eareckson Tada, has shared letters from other Christians telling her that “If her faith was strong enough, she could walk again”. Please do not interpret me in that way. What I mean here is more in line with something St. Augustine once wrote: Crede, ut intelligas – I believe, in order that I may understand.

Hebrews 11:1 – 1Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
James 2:14-19 – 14What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

18But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”
Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.

19You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.

Faith is not a rebellion against rationality. It is not the enemy of thought, nor the denial of experience. It’s not sticking my fingers in my ears and humming a mantra. It’s an action. It’s a response. It is, I believe, the supreme way of understanding our world. When faced with the goodness of the world, I can only understand that goodness through faith. Goodness, Beauty and Truth lose all meaning without faith. They become nothing but shells of a concept, a mystical feeling that comes and goes. The more faith I hold, the more I experience these things within my life. No, it is not because God is rewarding me for being a good little boy – it’s because they were already there. It doesn’t make the presence of evil, corruption and falseness disappear, either – those are forces greater than myself, and to think I could stop them is foolish.

Goodness is not something we can find from an armchair. It will not jump out at us from the television, nor will it consume is as we play video games. If you wish to see the goodness of the world, then you must first believe it is there to be experienced.

As for heaven and hell?

If there is Goodness, there is Justice. In a world where evil exists, that evil must be brought to justice, if goodness is real. Unfortunately, I believe there to be a large amount of misinterpretation as to how this justice will be played out. I do not believe in a heaven of such mystical proportions, of streets made of gold. I do not believe in a hell of fire and flames; in fact, with the exception of Revelation (a book rife with bizarre metaphor and symbolism, fitting given the similar nature of Genesis), the Bible makes very little allusion to such a place. Jesus does indeed say the life comes only through him – and I cannot disagree. The only afterlife that makes sense to me is an afterlife with God. If, indeed, the problem with our reality is separation from God and disobedience towards him, the solution is union and obedience. If that is the reward, then the punishment could only be complete separation from God. Annihilation, oblivion, nothingness. If God is good, and he is just, then the punishment for failing to follow him will be just.

I cannot know the answers for what life lies beyond this one, or who will be where. Simply put, that doesn’t matter. If God is good, and he does indeed love us, then I need not worry about the eternal fate of those who might never have heard of Jesus. Any implication otherwise – that God is most certainly damning billions to hell – is nothing but a self-righteous and pompous claim made to spawn guilt and fear. Yet, I do believe that our actions have eternal meaning, that what we do matters both in this life, and the next. Evil cannot happily coincide with good.

Faith in God’s goodness resolves the anxiety of, well, his goodness. If he is good, then he will be good, and that is the truth of the matter. I can only understand myself. My fate is my responsibility, not anyone else’s.

And the problem of pain?

I will be blunt and honest: I don’t know. I don’t understand how a good God could allow a father to rape his daughter in a cellar for 24 years. I don’t understand how a good God could allow 15,000 people to die at the hands of a cyclone. I really do not understand why God would allow his creation to cause such incredible levels of malevolence against one another. I cannot see the reasoning behind it, I cannot understand it. It just doesn’t make sense to me.

However, I am faced with terrific accuracy with which the Bible explains the problems of this world, and where they started. I cannot escape the truth of Jesus’ message, nor can I ignore the power of that truth in my life and the lives of others. Faith does not make pain go away, and I despair over those that seem to believe it could. Faith is a response to truth. It is not a means by which we improve our lives, but a reaction to both the good and the bad of life.

Is God good?

I believe he is. I don’t believe it every day – my faith is as imperfect as I am, and it truly is a constant struggle. Fortunately, God’s goodness does not depend upon my faith. Rediscovering my faith is something I do quite often, and it usually does not take long before I’m faced with something awesome and terrible to behold, a truth which demands my response.

absolutely not

“Yeah, I was at a study center for philosophy, basically.”
“Philosophy? I love philosophy. Just the other day, a couple guys were talking about string theory – man, that stuff is fascinating, all those dimensions and stuff? Really intrigues me.”

Sometimes I get the feeling that people just don’t want to know any more than they already do.

about time

A collection of American evangelicals have drafted what’s being called an ‘Evangelical Manifesto’, condemning the divisive politics of faith among the Christian right and left.

“The declaration, scheduled to be released Wednesday in Washington, encourages Christians to be politically engaged and uphold teachings such as traditional marriage. But the drafters say evangelicals have often expressed “truth without love,” helping create a backlash against religion during a “generation of culture warring.”

role models

Some day, I hope to drag myself home.

When I get there, I want to be hunched over. I want my arms to move with a heaviness that treats the air is if it were water, yet bound by the full wrath of gravity. I want my shredded clothes to reveal the countless wounds I’ve sustained. I want my skin to be hidden behind layers of blood, of dirt, of burns, and of frostbite. I want my joints to wobble like I’m just learning to walk, and I want them to creak like rusty hinges, as a constant reminder of the miles I’ve put on them. I want to look at people as if I were unaware of their presence, as if I might walk straight through them. I want my eyes to speak determination, but my eyelids to blink in the slow, heavy manner that says I am on the cusp of a dream. I want to be at the point where I couldn’t take another step, because my legs just wouldn’t have the strength to put me that far. My journey will have gone exactly as far as it was meant to have taken me.

When I get there, I don’t want anyone to speak. I want my appearance to speak more volumes my tongue could, and I want their curiosity to be satiated in the visual presentation of my journey, and I want them to draw their own thoughts and conclusions. I want them to understand, without being made to. I want there to be no mistake in their minds about the truth of what is presented before them.

Do you understand?