the church and postmodern culture: conversation

Race: Is the White Face of Christ the Proper Normative Standard?

2009-07-15T00:10:29-05:00

Over the next few months, I will be posting several entries investigating the relationship between Race, Continental thought, and Theology. My humble hope in writing these posts is to provoke thought in ways that allow for rethinking the/a Race issue(s). These entries, these vignettes, shall investigate Race through a variety of perspectives and approaches rather than in any systematic way. On the front end, let it be known that I think of Race as a social construction. At the same time, I acknowledge that Race does produce real effects for our lives. We have an experience of Race. In other words, even though Race is not biologically real (as discrete natural categories of human difference), it is real in so far as this idea helps shape the world in which we live and in the manner in which we live it. Race cannot be ignored. This vignette will focus on (racist) structures of power based on racial sameness rather than racial difference.

“White men consider themselves superior to black men.”[i] Following this, Fanon claims that, in return, black men try to prove themselves as equal. Equal to what, to whom? They prove themselves as equal to white men, equal according to the standard of whiteness. Whiteness becomes the apex of power and, as such, regulates our understanding of (racist) racial categories. The black man becomes equal to the white man but within the white man’s world and according to the white man’s rules. Speaking of power and the effects of colonization, Sartre claims that “racism is ingrained in actions, institutions, and in the nature of the colonist methods of production and exchange.”[ii] This ingrained racism remains today in so far as white privilege lingers on, allowing for the myth of the white standard to be perpetuated.

No doubt, the experience of Race and racism is much more complex than Fanon presents here. Even so, the structure of power keeps distinct whiteness on the one hand and all other races on the other. (This two-hand metaphor may need modification.) This is the racial binary that “transform[s] human populations into ‘white’ and ‘nonwhite’ men.”[iii] Deleuze and Guattari offer something unique to this understanding of the binary. The structure of power that normalizes whiteness does so by determining “degrees of deviance in relation to the White-Man face.”[iv] In other words, racial categories are not marked by excluding one race from another; rather, racial distinctiveness is understood in so far as one deviates from the white standard. Those who are nonwhite—this expression even perpetuates the white norm—exist on rays stretching away from the focal point of whiteness.

So, what are we to make of the “White-Man face” according to Deleuze and Guattari? Foucault once claimed in a lecture, “History is the discourse of power.”[v] Today, our history is marked the dominance of the white norm. The White-Man face permeates our “Western” world. Is this a particular face? Is it a paradigm? Perhaps the White-Man face is the face of Christ, “your average ordinary White Man." (Jamie alludes to this when he mentions kitsch in his last post.) Think of all the images of Christ, usually images of a blonde and blue-eyed carpenter, you have seen throughout your life. While Christians want to elevate Christ as the normative standard for humanity, they are forced to express the Son of God as a white man (not as a 1st c. Palestinian Jew). In order for the power structure of white dominance to remain stable, even Christ cannot deviate from the white norm. To have a Jewish Christ or a Black Christ or a Yellow Christ or a Red Christ would be to have a deviant Son of God.

Perhaps this deviance is productive. It may be the case that understanding Christ in nonwhite terms would be of benefit to “the Church.” Christians who express Christ in ways other than the standard might develop new approaches to orthodoxy and orthopraxis. How might “the Church” manifest itself differently if there was no standard of whiteness? It would help many sects of Christianity to relinquish their obsession for a homogeneous religion that plays to the advantage of white normativity. Likewise, many Christians may be challenged to let go of the myth of hegemony. How much would our religious practices change if we were to embrace Christ’s deviance?

[i] Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 10.

[ii] Jean-Paul Sartre, Introduction to Albert Memmi’s The Colonizer and the Colonized, xxiv.

[iii] Charles Mills, The Racial Contract, 13.

[iv] Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus, 178.

[v] Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended, 68.

What are we doing again? And why?

2009-07-14T16:19:39-05:00

As a new voice here on the “Church and Postmodern Culture” website, it is most prudent for my first post (or few, perhaps) simply to establish my personal starting points, commitments, limitations, aims and so forth. While admittedly a bit unorthodox or trite, I see this as a necessary first step into a “conversation” riddled with abstract and oftentimes challenging issues of philosophy, culture and theology—not all of which I agree with. In so doing, then, I hope not only to set some necessary groundwork for my future posts, but also to raise some crucial points of practical consideration so that this post can stand as an intellectual contribution in its own right. This, hopefully, will set an example for other persons to consider and recognize similar concerns in their own thinking and writing on whatever topic is at hand, including here on the Church and Postmodern Culture. For this post, to start, I will temporarily put aside much necessary groundwork (i.e. on my theological commitments, my cultural experiences, my intellectual limitations, etc.) and address just one point toward this end—our purpose or mission.

As professionals and as persons, we cannot overstate the value of occasionally stepping back from our workaday marathon lives (or in this case, blogging) and asking ourselves: “What are we doing again? And why?” Therefore, one of my aims for my authorship on this site is to remain true to [my own tweaked version of] its stated purpose. I see four places from which to sketch a holistic vision of what we are even doing here. First, the title of this website is: “the church and postmodern culture: conversation.” Second, the tagline reads: “contemporary philosophy...for the church...in the vernacular.” Third, the right sidebar states the purpose of this site as “offering discussions of high-profile theorists in postmodern theory and contemporary theology, for a non-specialist audience that is interested in the impact of postmodern theory for the faith and practice of the church.” Finally, the about page states our purpose as “to bring postmodern theory and contemporary theology into conversation with concrete faith and practice of the church.”

So what are we doing again? And why? It seems to me, based on the four quotations above, that through our participation and authorship on this website we intend to do several things that cohere into one holistic purpose: We intend to (1) write on the church, (2) postmodern culture, (3) contemporary theology, and (4) contemporary, especially postmodern, philosophy, in order to (5) have a [fruitful] conversation and discussion. In the process, we intend to (6) write in the vernacular, (7) so that we are understandable to a non-specialist audience, (8) and, in the end, contribute something of value to and for the Church, (9) expressed through concrete faith and practice. Your words, not mine. Sounds good. This is a purpose with which I am very sympathetic and to which I am excited to contribute. As a regular reader turned contributor to this website, however, it is evident to me that we can do far better than we are currently. In fact, it seems to me that both our authors and readers would do well to remind ourselves of what we are doing here, and why.

But who am I to come in and ruffle postmodern intellectual feathers? Maybe I am just a young, pompous, overly critical aspiring academic. Maybe not. My friend Eric will be a junior this fall at a large, public, highly selective university in a progressive city. He is majoring in political science with a minor in philosophy; he is twenty years old, kinda artsy, loves to think, ask questions and be cognizant of what is going on in the world. Every week we meet in a local coffee shop and he asks me probing questions about Christian theology, philosophy, church history, college, relationships, and the like. Eric is what Western evangelicals and professional developmental psychologists, albeit with different meanings, have called an emerging adult (see Arnett 2004). He is our demographic. He is an archetype of the person who is currently living out the questions and issues surrounding orthodox Christian faith, postmodern culture, and contemporary philosophy. Would my friend Eric gain something from this website? Would he even be able to understand our posts and engage with useful questions and topics regarding the Christian faith and the culture in which he lives?

Throughout my stay here, I will aim to provide critiques, commentary, reflections and insights on social theorists (or more accurately, their theories), postmodern or otherwise, as they apply to the local (visible) church and the global (invisible) Christian Church composed of all regenerated followers of Jesus throughout region and history. As a scholar and student of sociology more than philosophy, I will also speak regularly to the relationship between the local church, the Christian faith, and postmodern culture. And I will do so with Eric in mind. Again, this is for the church and for the Church. I am most favorable toward Driscoll’s recent definition of the local church as: “a community of regenerated believers who confess Jesus Christ as Lord. In obedience to Scripture they organize under qualified leadership, gather regularly for preaching and worship, observe the biblical sacraments of baptism and Communion, are unified by the Spirit, are disciplined for holiness, and scatter to fulfill the Great Commandment and the Great Commission as missionaries to the world for God’s glory and their joy” (2008:38).

If our thinking and writing fail to advance the global Church, and its tangible expression in the local church, then we ought to “commit it then to the flames, for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.” My intention here is not to be harsh or overly critical. Instead, my intention is to “consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds” [Hebrews 10:24]. Included in “love and good deeds,” I believe, is to “love the Lord your God…with all your mind” [Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27]—as we are pursuing here. But our purpose is not to use unnecessarily big words, engage in fruitless abstraction, impress readers with one’s knowledge of “high-profile theorists,” or mere intellectual masturbation. We have been called to a much greater mission—the Missio Dei. I urge you, then, to live, think, and write in a manner “worthy of the calling you have received” [Ephesians 4:1]. Please come alongside me as I pursue this divine purpose.

God in the Gallery: A Symposium

2009-07-13T12:29:54-05:00

[I'm very happy to open our engagement with Dan Siedell's book, God in the Gallery: A Christian Embrace of Modern Art. Over the next several weeks, we'll have different folks engaging the book, chapter-by-chapter. Consider joining us by reading along!]

Overture: In Praise of Elitism

My city of residence, Grand Rapids, is currently abuzz about ArtPrize, a public art competition open to artists from around the world. Artists team up with local venues downtown who will host installations this fall. Viewers then vote for the "best" work of art, and the winner takes home $250,000.

Dan Siedell's "overture" to God in the Gallery helps to explain why this is a horrible idea.

But I should back up a bit first. Siedell frames his task as Pauline, in terms of Paul's engagement with the philosophers at the Areopagus (Acts 17): Just as Paul was willing and able to "see through" the altar to an unknown God, so Siedell is pressing Christians to "read" contemporary art with new eyes. This is an uphill battle, for at least a couple of reasons: First, given that Siedell is especially trying to reach evangelicals, he has to counter both its iconoclasm and the popular evangelical preference for kitsch (and Thomas Kinkade). But second, for those evangelicals who appreciate art, he has to counter a certain romanticism that regards 1900 as the beginning of the end in the arts. Thus he's particularly out to engage and appreciate contemporary art.

But unlike kitsch and Thomas Kinkade, contemporary art is not (to adopt Heideggerian categories) just "present-at-hand;" it's not sitting there "available" for easy appropriation. In short, contemporary art is not trying to be "popular;" rather, there are historical and philosophical conditions which are necessary for its appreciation. Contemporary visual art is part of a century-long conversation within the "tradition" of art, but also with philosophical (and, at times, theological) concepts. What Siedell describes as "museum art" is inherently "insider." It is "a profoundly historical practice with a developed tradition" (p. 23). Thus he cautions that "[v]iewing and understanding art, as much as practicing it, requires hard work and discipline" (p. 22).

One of the upshots of Siedell's account, I think, is to affirm this "elitism." He explains how and why contemporary art assumes a familiarity with an ongoing philosophical conversation, and then grants absolution for that. What contemporary art is doing, he emphasizes, requires and is enriched by this "background" conversation. And that's OK! Indeed, far from just being acceptable, it is something to be affirmed and celebrated. If one is not willing to put in the work of becoming part of this conversation, then one forfeits the right to complain "I don't get it!" when making a touristic pilgrimmage to MoMA. (The same principle should hold for the naive rantings of congressmen who love to grandstand about NEA project funding.)

I appreciate this framing of the issue precisely because Siedell is willing to take "the risk of being considered an elitist." Indeed, his argument runs counter to the democratic populism of both pragmatic evangelicalism and American civil religion. (It also runs counter to trends in my own Reformed tradition, where aestheticians like Wolterstorff and Seerveld often spend a lot of time making a case for valuing craft and are generally uncomfortable with an emphasis on "high" art--in fact, they're uncomfortable with the low/high distinction. I've expressed some discomfort with this trend elsewhere.)

You can see how this also helps us to appreciate just what's wrong with ArtPrize. The (perhaps brutal) fact is that most of the people who will be "judging" these works of art through their votes lack an understanding of the tradition and background conversation of contemporary art. As a result, the works of art that are most likely to win a majority vote will be, not surprisingly, "popular"--that is, easily accesible, "available," present-at-hand.

But at the end of the day, Siedell's argument is not elitist. Or we might see it as a kind of "democratization" of elitism. While he risks "appearing" elitist by requiring that we pay the price for being rightly attuned to contemporary art, at the same time he's written a clear, accessible, inviting book trying to help non-specialists appreciate this state of affairs. God in the Gallery is a kind of invitation to join the "elite"--which is not something that an exclusive elitist would ever do. Siedell is inviting us to join the conversation. And in doing so, I think he illustrates a vocation of the church to be an "enculturating" institution--making 'democratically' available, irrespective of class or wealth, the riches of the conversation that is contemporary art, to find there "anonymous icons" amidst the idols.

Speculative Grace: The Principle of Irreduction

2009-07-10T12:40:23-05:00

A. Stage Setting

In previous posts, I've worked to set the stage for the following question: if we were to port the notion of "grace" into the context of a non-theistic ontology, what modifications would the concept need to undergo?

In the first post, I laid out the nature of the experiment. In the second post, I addressed at least one reason why we might want to conduct such an experiment. In the third post, I offered an initial (though admittedly abstract) formulation of a non-theistic conception of grace. In this post, I'd like to look more carefully at some of the details of a non-theistic ontology and the implications of these details for a non-theistic understanding of grace.

B. The Principle of Irreduction

It is not my aim here to work out all the details of an ontology of multiplicity. But I do want to be able to say enough about what such an ontology would entail to undertake a trial insertion of grace into such a platform. To this end, allow me to propose one basic principle that, at least roughly, would need to characterize an ontology of the multiple. Borrowing from the work of Bruno Latour, let’s refer to this principle as the “principle of irreduction.”

(For additional information, one might consult the related work of my colleague Levi Bryant on these questions. This post in particular may be helpful. Graham Harman's recently released book on the philosophical implications of Latour's work, Prince of Networks, is also an excellent introduction.)

As I formulate it, the principle of irreduction has two parts:

Given an original multiplicity, (1) no multiple can be entirely reduced (without remainder) to any other multiple or set of multiples, and (2) no multiple is a priori exempt from being reducible in part to any other multiple or set of multiples.

The first part of this principle ensures multiplicity (and, thus, a non-theistic ontology) because it prevents a complete unification of multiples under any given heading. Every relation will always entail an unsubsumed remainder. The One as a totality is banned.

The second part of the principle guarantees the general flatness or immanence of this multiplicity because it ensures the possibility of overlap and communicability. No multiple is exempt from being reducible in part to other multiples. Here, the One as a sovereign exception exempt from co-conditioning is banned.

In general, then, the principle of irreduction renders co-conditioned multiplicity unconditional and absolute. In order to avoid the unconditioned exception of a founding One, it unconditionally imposes conditioning. In this sense, the principle simply describes the parameters of a non-supernatural or immanent “transcendence.” Such transcendences must be neither entirely reducible nor entirely exempt from reduction.

C. Initial Implications

For our purposes, two implications worth noting follow from the principle of irreduction.

First, the principle enjoins us to understand multiplicity in terms of “assemblages.” An assemblage is a multiple that is distinguishable from but also composed of other multiples. Such assemblages are not reducible to their constituent parts and they are not totalizable into wholes without remainder. Thus, assemblages are organized around both an external difference or tension that distinguishes them from other assemblages and a set of irreducible differences or tensions that are internal to their composition.

Second, the principle of irreduction imposes an absolute requirement of “work.”

Because an assemblage cannot be exempt from the possibility of reduction to other multiples, it is characterized by an unavoidable availability. However, because it can also never be entirely reduced to other multiples (even those that compose it), it is also characterized by an unavoidable resistance. Let’s use the term work to designate this double-bind of resistant availability.

Work: the double-bind of a multiple’s being necessarily available for but resistant (and irreducible) to relation.

In light of ontological multiplicity, “to be” is “to be an assemblage” that is (1) in working relation with other, external assemblages, and (2) composed of working relations with the assemblages that are internal to it.

D. Grace and Irreduction

This returns us, then, to the question of grace. Let’s preserve the traditional idea that grace ought to be associated with transcendence. However, if transcendence is no longer defined as a unique, sovereign exception to the rest of reality, than grace itself will be associated with the distributed plurality of non-supernatural transcendences that characterize the differential multiplicity of the world. In other words, grace will be defined by the ubiquity of work.

Let’s offer this preliminary definition of grace. Grace: the double-bind of a multiple’s resistant availability.

In my initial post, I identified four baseline features of grace. I said that grace must be: prodigal, enabling, absolute, and unmasterable. As the double-bind of resistant availability, grace fits this bill.

(1) Grace is prodigal because its resistance to complete reduction entails a remainder that is both in excess of every relation (or commensurable set of relations) and immune to any one kind of rational transparency.

(2) Grace is enabling because it marks every assemblage’s unavoidable and excessive availability for working relation.

(3) Grace is absolute because the double-bind of resistant availability applies absolutely, universally, unconditionally, and without exception to everything that is.

(4) Grace is unmasterable because every relation requires work and work unfolds only in terms of more or less effective uses of influence. Characterized by the ubiquity of both external and internal resistance, there is no leverage point for any claim (even any limited claim) to mastery or control.

A number of productive consequences follow from this non-theistic understanding of grace.

E. Productive Consequences

First, a non-theistic understanding of grace does not oppose grace and work. Rather, here, grace, as the double-bind of resistant availability, is work. The unconditional and exceptionless imposition of work is the gift given by grace.

Also, a non-theistic understanding of grace links grace with passibility. Roughly, to be passible means that one is susceptible to feeling, suffering, or external impression. Passibility, at root, belongs to that same cluster of words as passivity, passion, patience.

Classically, theism defines God as the giver of grace because he is a founding exception to passibility. That is, classically, God is impassible: he is not available for feeling, suffering, or external impression. In a non-theistic ontology, however, grace unfolds as the exceptionless universality of passibility. Here, to be is to be passible. And God would be no exception to this rule. God would be one being, one particularly complex multiple, among many others: available, passible, resistant, and graced by the unavoidability of hard work.

Further, to say, then, that grace unfolds as the exceptionless universality of passibility is to say that grace guarantees the universality of suffering.

To be is to suffer, and this in two senses. Outside of theism, suffering characterizes both activity and passivity. Unavoidably available for relation, every assemblage passively suffers its passibility to being enlisted, entrained, or re-distributed by other assemblages. Even in actively influencing other multiples, an assemblage suffers their irreducible and unmasterable resistance. Further, composed of assemblages, every assemblage (God included) must also suffer itself.

But this universality is not (simply) bad news because suffering, as we’ve just pointed out, is itself the universal mark of grace: without exception, and with an absolute and unmasterable excess, grace comes, enabling us to act, think, feel, love, and be.

Finally, as the double-bind of resistant availability, grace is the mark of the real. Grace gives us the gift of what is real as real.

Grace marks what is real as real because reality is itself essentially characterized by this same double-bind.

In what way? In order to be real, something must be at least potentially available. It must suffer the rule of passibility. That which is not available and cannot in principle be either reduced in part to some other multiple or enlisted as part of some other assemblage is not real. Further, however, that which is available without also manifesting resistance likewise fails to be real. Our fantasies, for instance, are preeminently available to us, but, because they do not resist us, those fantasies fail to be real (or, at least, they fail to be real as something other than “real” fantasies). To be real, a multiple must be both available and resistant — and these are the gifts of grace.

As a side note, an interesting additional consequence follows from this convergence of grace with the real: to be committed to ontological multiplicity is to be committed to realism.

By “realism” I mean that, in the absence of any original unity, the world’s multiplicity is characterized as such by the fact that (1) it is available for relation (it is accessible, at least in part, to our epistemic investigation of its history, qualities, composition, etc.), and (2) the world’s multiplicity cannot be reduced to the horizon (be it transcendental, linguistic, or cultural) imposed upon it by our relationship to it. In this sense, unlike many postmodern epistemologies of multiplicity that are, in essence, anti-realist, an ontology of multiplicity is, as a result of the principle of irreduction, by definition realist. Where many postmodern epistemologies of multiplicity draw the conclusion that nothing is knowable in itself in the absence of an original, founding unity, an ontology of multiplicity must conclude, by virtue of what constitutes it as such, that there are no a priori exceptions to what may be knowable because there can be no exceptions to the rule of resistant availability.

This is likely more than sufficient for the moment. Next week I'll elaborate on the kind of soteriology this approach may entail.

The Liturgical Turn: Worship and the Between

2009-07-08T10:54:00-05:00

I was reminded recently of one of my loves – really big words. I know it can be a little pretentious to use certain terms in dialog or writing when there are perfectly good colloquial words that say the same thing. But let’s face it philosophers and theologians aren’t the only ones who do this. Every field, whether professional or academic, has terms that are specific to them and stand in need of clarification to the rest of us. When I’m working on the car with my dad, there are plenty of terms that he uses which need to be defined for me (such as ‘flux capacitor’ – ok, I wish). Of course my dad can simply point to the part of the engine in question or my doctor can simply describe the surgical procedure in order to clarify my confusion.

But maybe that gets to part of my point. I find it rather interesting that there seems to be less reaction to, say, a doctor using a technical term than to a theologian. Could it be that technical terms used in auto mechanics or medicine seem to have more practicality attached to them as opposed to theological or philosophical terms? I would be one to argue that every idea has practical (as in praxis) outworkings, but, if not, at least I’ve given a disclaimer for the use of a philosophical term that rather fond of – metaxological.

You’re impressed, I’m sure. The metaxological, besides being a beautiful term that just rolls off the tongue, is a metaphysical understanding associated with the philosopher William Desmond. In an essay entitled “Neither Servility nor Sovereignty: Between Metaphysics and Politics,” in Theology and the Political: The New Debate he describes a metaxological metaphysical perspective as one in which “there is more to be said” (p. 160). He derives this understanding from the double meaning of the Greek meta as ‘beyond’ and also as ‘in the midst’ allowing him to locate reality in the metaxu or ‘the between’. This allows us not to get trapped in the ontological violence of radical immanence or univocity because it affords the experience of objects, people, and communal entities as more than the experience of raw materiality. Instead it allows us to perceive materiality with an opening up to the ‘something more’ that is beyond it. Moreover it causes us to find ourselves needing to traverse the porous boundaries, not only between transcendence and immanence, but between others as other. In other words it gives us an understanding of trees, rocks, humans, etc. as more than they naturally are but also reveals the fact that immanent reality exists within transcendence thereby acknowledging boundaries that we believe to be solid are really rather porous (a word he likes to use).

The metaxological gives him a way to envision politics not bound by univocity and its attendant will to power. Desmond notes that in the between, there are diverse forms of community that serve as intermediations of the transcendent good. He specifically details four different communities. The first is the family, which forms intimacy, the second is the network of utility, which focuses on economic values, the third he calls the community of erotic sovereignty whose goal is social and political power, and finally the community of agapeic service whose main service is to the neighbor and other humans. Each intermediates a form of the good and relativizes the communities underneath it. What he means is this: the community of agapeic service will mediate the good of service to the neighbor in itself, but also calls the community of erotic sovereignty forth to rightly distribute and exercise power and justice in such a way that it avoids its temptation to tyranny. The boundaries between the communities are necessarily open to the others otherwise we would find ourselves reverting to univocity.

Desmond describes the agapeic community as the community on the boundary of the ethical and religious, which “deals with transcendent good. It is most released to ethical care for the other as other. It releases something of the promise of universal love of being, both in respect for the value of nature as other, and for other human beings with whom one shares the gifts of the between” (p. 169). For Desmond this community can rightly perceive the transcendence within all humans and nature. As such it is not tempted to objectify nature for its own self-asserting utility. It can truly show love to others and seek to do them good since it sees them as more than objects that need to be governed by power.

But what does all this have to do with liturgy and worship? Desmond himself near the end of his essay describes this agapeic community as one that is lived out in between the human and divine (p.177). This plays itself out in prayer, liturgical rituals, praise, and care for others. The agapeic community (as I read it) can become a descriptor for the Church and metaxological becomes a great term to describe the Church’s understanding of reality. It is the understanding that is or should be formed by the continual worship of the Trinue God – the one who is wholly Other and perfect relationship.

There is much more to be said and I’m going to pick up here with my next post in which I want to bring Desmond into conversation with specific liturgical theologians. But here, I want to make a bit of turn and ask what are we doing to facilitate this kind of vision. If in worship we are ‘gathered’ to encounter God and ‘sent forth’ into the service of God’s kingdom, what are some things that are happening within our churches that are forming us into “seeing the world” rightly?

I can think a three things specifically from my own experience. One this the “opening acclamation’ from the Book of Common Prayer – “Blessed be God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit / And Blessed be His Kingdom now and forever, Amen” We acknowledge that we are coming into the presence of the God who has been self-revealed as the Trinity, the second person of which become incarnate in order to bring us into union with the life of the Trinity. What better example of transversing porous boundaries non-violently could there be?

The next thing is directed prayer. My church is beginning to incorporate prayer evenings into our life together. The basic structure of which includes songs and extended times of prayer in which a leader – usually myself – gives specific topics to pray about. I typically structure the prayer so that it starts with pure praise of God and moves progressively towards praying for those in need around us as well as vision and willingness to go and serve.

Lastly – song selection. As a song leader, I try to be very conscience of the songs that I present to my community. Two that I’m rather fond of that I think help to aid in this kind of formation would be “God of Justice” and “Everlasting God”. The first calls us to service of the poor and the second gives us a vision of the everlasting faithfulness of our God who is the ‘defender of the weak’ and who ‘comforts those in need.’

So there are some of my examples. I know should have mentioned the obvious – Word and Table, but I’m curious as to what else within the gathered time of worship seeks to form the church into a community of agapeic service?

Derrida, Kandinsky, and the Force of Art

2009-07-04T17:11:55-05:00

By Carl Raschke

Deconstruction and the Force of Language

Ever since I finished with my graduate seminar on Derrida this past spring I've been looking quite differently at what was always at stake in "post-structuralism" - what years ago we called postmodernism in philosophy before the latter word took hold. The term "postmodernism" gained currency after Lyotard published The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge in the mid-1980s.. In this particular seminar I had some of the best and the brightest, and a few of them in their innocent enthusiasm for exploring the giddy vastness of "Derrida-world" called my attention to some important misuses of the evolving Derridean canon that became necessary in their own right to deconstruct.

What my students showed me toward the end of the term is that we have misappropriated the fashion of "deconstructively" reading texts as some new kind of critical theory, which we regularly, and sometimes ruthlessly, apply to structures of meaning and authority as well as forms of organization. That would of course include the church, and the ongoing effort to "deconstruct" Christianity, or "churchianity", is one of the things I have in mind.

We have developed the bad habit of regarding deconstruction as an active intervention, when in fact Derrida seems to use the word all along in the intransitive sense. We confuse deconstruction with the Marxist or Freudian critique of ideology, when in fact something quite different is involved. Deconstruction is not any kind of "work" itself, like a work of art, literature, philosophy, or theology. It is always a "working through" of some thread within the text (which is what Derrida is always doing in each of his "books"), or of an indeterminate yet potentially fruitful insight. If I may paraphrase Derrida as closely as I can to one of his well-known remarks, the "work" of deconstruction is always, and has always been, at work within the work itself.

What does this mean? Put simply, deconstruction is not a methodology, or unmasking, of those ideas and assumptions which we hold dear, or by which a quotidian reverence for the "tradition" of theology and philosophy has kept us from seeing the the underlying truth. Deconstruction is no "hermeneutics of suspicion," as Paul Ricoeur once referred to critical theory. Deconstruction, insofar as it is always "at work" within the work, amounts to what in German is called a Wirkung, one common translation of which is the English word "force".

Derrida makes a lot out of the concept of "force" in his early writings, particularly those authored in the 1960s, but not translated into English until the mid-1970s. He also revived the phrase when he launched into the question of the "religious" around 1990. In many respects one can derive a sense of Derrida's whole life project from a careful reading of the very early essay "Force and Signification" (force et signification), published in 1963 and contained along with other essays in English translation under the title of Writing and Difference, which appeared under a University of Chicago Press imprint in 1978..

"Force and Signification" is a gold mine when it comes to unearthing the "roots" of deconstruction. But what is even more interesting is the way Derrida, in "inventing" deconstruction, appears early on to be re-inventing Hegel. Now that is not at all suprising since Derrida (like most of his generation in Paris) was considerably impacted by the neo-Marxian Alexandre Kojève's seminars on Hegel.

Deconstruction is often considered radically un-Hegelian, which in its outworkings it of course is. But if we inspect scrupulously what Derrida is saying in this very early article we find that deconstruction seems to be curiously birthed by, though driven in an entirely different direction from, the Hegelian dialectic itself. We can glimpse the parthenogenesis of deconstruction in the highly obscure early section of Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit on the concept of force. We can also find it in Hegel's discussion of language in the Encyclopedia of Philosophy, on which Derrida comments extensively in the various essays he published in the 1960s.

I am developing this argument in the first chapter of a new book manuscript which I began this summer, and will not venture to lay it out in all its philosophical arcana and complexity on this blog. But the upshot is that deconstruction should not be viewed as any kind of "taking apart" of the idols of language so much as it is an ongoing, mobile disclosure of the force of language. Every moment of deconstruction is a force-event, a reading of Derrida of course that puts him closer to Deleuze than we might be accustomed to acknowledging.

Kandinsky and the Force of Art

But the purpose of this post is not to pursue some highly technical roadmap for revisionism regarding Derrida. I have realized that something even more significant might be afoot in the Hegelian/Derridean/Deleuzean concept of force after reading of the French philosopher Michel Henry's Seeing the Invisible: On Kandinsky, just recently translated, though it was published in French much earlier.

I acquired an interest in Kandinsky's art, and theories of art, long ago. Kandinsky, by the way, was the artist who not only set in motion the imperatives of so much of modern art, but whose radical "abstractionism" was aimed at painting the power of creativity itself. According to Henry, in Kandinsky "'abstract' no longer refers to what is derived from the world at the end of a process of simplification or complication or at the end of the history of modern painting: instead, it refers to what was prior to the world and does not need the world in order to exist." (p. 16) According to Kandinsky, the painter paints art's "inner necessity".

Kandinsky's well-known On the Spiritual in Art, which came out on the eve of the First World War, lays out the theory of painting according to the composition principles of inner necessity. The representational and reflective character of the painting, which compels us to see the visible world as it is, or as we have so far missed seeing it, must give way to the invisible force of the painting per se.

According to Henry, Kandinsky's radical abstractionism regretably failed to outlive him. So-called "abstraction" in modern and post-modern painting does not really focus on the inner necessity of the painting, but flits around the myriad pragmatic, programmatic, ideological, material, and compositional problems the artist in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries has encountered - the so-called "painterly" challenges. Even if it is neither representational or figurative, art remains "pictorial", Henry tells us.

Kandinsky, however, wanted painting to "disclose the pictoriality" of the picture, as Henry expresses it, in its pure and dynamic interiority. Kandinsky was a theosophist, influenced by the writings of the Russian mystic Helena Blavatsky, as were many avante-garde artists at the turn of the century and up through World War II. Yet his project for art has stunning implications for Christian theological thinking today, especially after Derrida. It also has outsize consequences for Christian spirituality in the arts, though I like many others are reluctant to talk about "Christian art" as a whole, since the locution is really quite vapid and often connotes nothing more than the fact that certain styles, subject matters, and aesthetic methodologies find a ready audience among people who consider themselves Christians (Unfortunately, such an audience often is drawn to the uninspired, the hackneyed, or the downright kitschy).

What perhaps would a new Christian abstractionism look like? Or at least a Christian "abstract expressionism" (since Kandinsky's abstractionism and Jackson Pollock's abstract expressionism follow similar logic of the force of the painting on to the canvas)?

In the Derrida seminar one of my students, who was an art history and philosophy double major, asked me why "deconstructionism" seemed so unlike philosophy. I answered that Derrida might be compared to Pollock in some ways, whose paintings were so unlike what people took to be painting. She liked that answer, because I guess it made sense to her. Pollock called his work "gestural." The same may be said of Derrida, who even used such a word from time to time. The gestural is the revelation of the process by which the textual or the aesthetic "construct" comes to be, something akin perhaps to what Nietzsche really meant by Wille zur Macht, the "will to power", which manifests eminently in art.

Many in the abstract expressionist movement of the 1940s and 1950s were fans of Nietzsche. Deleuze derived his own "expressionist" philosophy from his youthful engagement with the sage of Sils Maria, which came forward in his ground-breaking 1962 book Nietzsche and Philosophy.

A Christian Abstractionism?

I have a personal muse as well that I might share with you, as I push forward this somewhat complex analysis, hopefully to culminate in a book for which I have already churned out almost 20,000 words entitled Force of God. The tentative title of the book, as an aside, takes off from Derrida's seminal essay "Force of Law," which inaugurated in many respects his so-called "religious turn." The muse is my own wife Sunny Raschke, an artist of considerable gifts who revived a long dormant professional art career about five years ago after a hiatus of several decades.

Sunny has taught me to "see" the inner necessity of what might be termed the "force of Christ" in the creative expression of a painting. The one shown here, entitled Origin I, is currently showing in a gallery in Denison, Texas. The painting is actually three-dimensional with a kind of relief map effect that can be achieved through the use of a novel fabric hardener, invented in the Netherlands and known as Paverpol®. The cross-like, "gestural" form in the center of the painting was inspired by the Louis Giglio YouTube message on the protein molecule "laminin", which holds the structures of life together.

One is reminded of the opening hymn of Colossians, where Christ is proclaimed as "the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together". (Col. 1:15-17). The force of creation is expressed in the "image" of Christ, which "holds all things together", serves to connect the myriad puzzle pieces that are singular human lives as well as the quest for God, the Infinite Origin himself, overflowing the boundaries of "two-dimensional" sight, thinking, and imagination.

Derrida discerned the messianic, the avenir, the "to come", of divine justice in the "force of law." Can we discern the truly "originary", the protological, which is also the eschatological, the true "alpha and omega", in the force of art? Derrida suggests early on that there is a force of art in the sense of a "force of truth" in his work of 1978 The Truth in Painting.

In The Truth in Painting Derrida does his own deconstructive reading of Heidegger's famous essay "The Origin of the Work of Art," which binds aesthetics to ontology rather than to the "responsibility" (Derrida's term) of the artist to the force that urges him, or her, into expressive action. For Derrida, the religious is the responsible response to the force of God in our lives, the force of response we name the "force of faith." That is one way which we can cogently read Derrida's The Gift of Death, which serves as a memorial re-reading of Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling. In both religion and art we confront the Kierkegaardian/Derridean "secret" of the faith response, the "inner necessity" that harbors a subtle working of what is both creative and a redemptive force - Geist, the Spirit!

As the French novelist Andre Gide once wrote, "art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better." That perhaps is "deconstruction in a nutshell."

Notes on Paintings. (1) Top: Wassily Kandinsky, On White 2. (2) Middle: Jackson Pollock, The Key. (3) Sunny Raschke, Origins 1.

On "Analytic Theology"

2009-07-02T07:42:44-05:00

I have absolutely no investment in maintaing a rigorous analytic/continental divide in philosophy or philosophical theology. Indeed, since arriving at Calvin College--a historically "analytic" department--I have received a remedial education in analytic philosophy and have found colleagues who are very interested in philosophical exploration that crosses these contingent boundaries. No one, of course, can master everything so we'll all have our particular universe of discourses with which we're familiar. But I am constantly encouraging graduate students to learn a second philosophical language, as it were, as soon as possible. It seems clear to me that philosophical reflection on faith will be best served by a "big tent" approach. (For an example, I would point to D. Stephen Long's brilliant new book, Speaking of God.)

With that in mind, readers might be interested in Gordon Graham's honest, forthright review of Oliver D. Crisp and Michael C. Rea (eds.), Analytic Theology: New Essays in the Philosophy of Theology (Oxford UP, 2009). Graham persistently asks: "Just what is 'analytic theology?'" He's not sure we ever really get an answer--though that's not a reason to avoid the collection. Here's a snippet:

What is analytic theology? Rea offers us a succinct characterization:

analytic theology is just the activity of approaching theological topics with the ambitions of an analytic philosopher and in a style that conforms to the prescriptions that are distinctive of analytic philosophical discourse. (p. 7)

This brief statement, of course, only becomes fully informative if we are told what the 'ambitions' and 'style' distinctive of analytic philosophy are. Rea has things to say about this. Indeed he sets out two ambitions and five points of style. Even before we consider this further explanation, however, perplexities arise that, in my judgment, the ensuing essays intensify rather than dispel. They do so not because of disagreements between the authors, but because of their uncertainty as to how this new terminology is to be used, and what its significance is exactly.

Here is one example. In his essay "How Philosophical Theology Became Possible", Nicholas Wolterstorff seeks to explain the remarkable change in status that philosophy of religion underwent in the 20th century. Having had virtually no place in the intellectual world of logical positivism, fifty years later it had become one of the most vibrant areas of Anglo-American philosophy. Part of the explanation (in my view) must lie with the influential work of a few highly gifted philosophers who took religion seriously (including Wolterstorff himself, of course). Wolterstorff's own explanation, however, lends special weight to the collapse of 'classical foundationalism' in epistemology. Once the long held belief in a single epistemological litmus test was abandoned, the way opened up for philosophers trained in the style and methods of logical empiricism and conceptual analysis to take religious beliefs as properly basic, and explore the implications and possibilities of doing so. For my own part I find this explanation very convincing, but how does the possibility of philosophical theology relate to the project of analytic theology? In the concluding paragraphs Wolterstorff addresses this issue briefly. Having noted that contemporary philosophical theology is now no less concerned with traditional questions in the doctrine of God than it is with the arguments of natural theology, Wolterstorff says "Is it philosophy or is it theology? What difference does it make. . ? Call it what you will" (p. 168). But it does make a very great difference from the point of this volume. If philosophical theology of the kind that the collapse of foundationalism made possible is indistinguishable from analytic theology, then the theme of the essays in Part I is empty, because analytic theology is nothing new, and has been carried on with vigor for the last four decades or more.

Continue reading Gordon Graham's review of Analytic Theology.

"The Devil Reads Derrida"

2009-06-30T04:49:00-05:00

I thought some of you might like to know that James K.A. Smith has just come out with a small collection of essays aimed at a more general audience called The Devil Reads Derrida: and Other Essays on the University, the Church, Politics, and the Arts.

It brings together some of Smith's most significant forays into the public arena, focusing especially on discipleship, the university, and politics and the church. It also provides a selection of his criticism, including essays on Harry Potter, A History of Violence, the poetry of Franz Wright. So check it out for a little summer reading.

Report from CIVA

2009-06-29T09:09:58-05:00

by Dan Siedell

For most of us who participate in this blog we share a commitment that art plays or should play some role in the church and postmodern culture conversation. Yet I am sure that for most art remains a vague generality. However, art does not exist in general; it is neither a philosophical nor a theological construct. It exists only in concrete manifestations, specific embodiments in practice.

One such concrete manifestation and specific embodiment is Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA). An international organization founded in 1979 and consisting of 1,300 members, it exists, according to its website (www.civa.org) "to explore and nurture the relationship between the visual arts and the Christian faith." And since 2002 it has been located on the campus of Gordon College, Wenham, Mass. CIVA celebrated its thirty-year anniversary just last week (18-21 June) at Bethel University, in St. Paul, Minnesota, which is one of the stronger and more innovative art departments among Christian colleges and universities.

The conference theme was "culture?" and it offered a means to reflect on art's participation in and responsibility to contemporary culture and, by implication, the church. The keynote speaker was theologian Miroslav Volf, whose 1994 essay, "Soft Difference: Theological Reflections on the Relation Between Church and Culture in 1 Peter," was distributed to a number of pre-conference seminar participants for discussion and which also served as the basis for his keynote address. Volf's focus on developing a strong center from which to move toward the fuzzy and porous edges encouraged artists to celebrate and push toward those edges, confident in a Christological center and the artist's prophetic role in culture.

The conference also included a handful of plenary speakers, such as artists Makoto Fujimura (New York), Kris Larson (St. Paul) and Kevin Hamilton (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign); art historians Linda Stratford (Asbury College), Wayne Roosa and James Romaine (Bethel), and Rachel Smith (Taylor); aesthetician Adrienne Chaplin (Adjunct, Institute for Christian Studies and Toronto School of Theology) and Charles Taliaferro (St. Olaf); and Debbie Blue, author of Sensual Orthodoxy (Cathedral Hill Press, 2003) and founding pastor of House of Mercy in St. Paul, among several others, including me. In addition to these plenary sessions, the conference also featured a number of subject tracks, including Art and Design; Art and Worship; Art Educators; Gallery and Museum Professionals; Scholars and Critics; and the Spiritual Formation of the Artist.

My remarks, which you can read here, addressed the sacrifice of producing great culture as part of living a self-sacrificial Christian: it is the pursuit of great art and a great Christian life, I argue, that is truly counter-cultural. I also participated in the Art and Design track, led by Kevin Hamilton, who approached ethical responsibilities of the artist through Walter Brueggman's categories of "orientation," "disorientation," and "reorientation" that he utilized in his book, The Spirituality of the Psalms (Augsburg, 2001). Hamilton forced us to reflect on how we orient, disorient, and reorient ourselves to culture through our work as artists, critics, and art historians. Hamilton's sessions modeled aggressive theological reflection as a means to work through the most pressing issues in the contemporary artworld.

In addition to my plenary remarks, participation in the Art and Design track, and an hour-long Q & A about my book, God in the Gallery: A Christian Embrace of Modern Art (Baker Academic, 2008), I also served as the juror for the conference exhibition. (Read my curatorial statement here.) This was not an insignificant activity because I have been suspicious of the idea of the "Christian artist" or, as it is often rephrased, "artist of faith," which to my mind allows artists either to rely on their spiritual stories to do the heavy lifting that their art should do or merely use or illustrate "Christian" subject matter and themes. Both approaches are a recipe for mediocre art, at best. And I feared I would get a heavy dose of both. I was pleasantly surprised. The exhibition I presented featured fourteen artists whose work represented the best of what contemporary artistic practice can look like with Christ as the engine that drives it. There are a number of artists that you should pay close attention to, such as Kevin Hamilton (see his blog, complexfields.org), Dayton Castleman (Trinity Christian College), Amanda Hamilton (Northwest Nazarene University), Jonathan Anderson (Biola), Duncan Simcoe (California Baptist), Jim Bockelman (Concordia University Nebraska), Joe Cory (Judson University), Karen Brummund, and Wayne Adams (New York).

Despite the many signs of Christians playing important roles in contemporary artistic practice, the conference revealed that there is still much work to be done to help artists (and art writers) understand the importance of developing more nuanced and sophisticated theological and philosophical frameworks. Usually referred to merely as "theory," there remains the assumption that artists make objects and it is the job of the critics and art historians to talk about them, using "theory" (i.e., philosophy and theology) and other "abstractions" to assign value or market the work. Artists (and critics) need to be reminded that, at their best, philosophy and theology are no more "abstract" than paintings. They are merely different embodiments of the mystery of being and that that the insights provided by theological and philosophical reflection can be helpful in artistic and critical practice.

An important part of my work is to show how and in what ways philosophy and theology can inform and shape studio practice from the inside, as it were. An artist who can develop a theological and philosophical mindfulness will make stronger, richer, deeper works of art.

Yet I would encourage theologians and philosophers who read and participate in this blog to engage in artistic practice more deeply, not to be content to refer to art in its broadest and most general way, but to engage it in specific, concrete ways with particular artists. In order to participate more actively and productively in the conversation around the church and postmodern culture, it is imperative that theologians and philosophers develop an aesthetic mindfulness hewn not by reading aesthetics but from experiencing works of art. Join CIVA, follow one or several of the artists mentioned in this blog, or pay closer attention to what is going on in the art departments of the institutions in which you work or study. Looking at the art produced by artists involved in this organization and participating in discussions with them will nourish and strengthen the aesthetic dimension of your work as philosophers and theologians. And the artists and art writers associated with CIVA need your conversations to strengthen our own work.

Illustrations:

Installation photograph of CIVA exhibition, Bethel University. Artists represented in photograph are Jim Bockelman and Duncan Simcoe.

Speculative Grace: A Local Plurality

2009-06-26T13:14:33-05:00

In previous posts, I've set the stage for the following question: if we were to port grace into the context of a non-theistic ontology, what modifications would the concept need to undergo?

In the first post, I attempted to lay out in broad terms the nature of the experiment. In the second post, I tried to articulate at least one reason why we might want to conduct such an experiment. With this post, I'd like to turn my attention to offering an initial (though admittedly abstract) formulation of a non-theistic conception of grace.

First issue: what would be required for a non-theistic ontology?

A non-theistic ontology would depend minimally on the axiom that reality is fundamentally multiple.

As an axiom, this claim – like, I think, its counterpart that reality is fundamentally One – must be assumed rather than proven. But this does not prevent us from investigating and comparing the relative merits of the consequences of these axioms or their consonance with the facts at our disposal.

Back, though, to the axiom itself. If an ontology holds that God, as the Creator, is the original, single unifying source of reality, then it is theistic. Further, I want to claim that any ontology founded on the axiom that reality is ultimately “One” (whether this basic unity shows up as a governing principle, a macro-totality, a micro-uniformity, a transcendental horizon, an eschatological unification, etc.) remains essentially theistic. Such ontologies have simply substituted a philosophical avatar of original unity for “God.”

To be clearly and decisively non-theistic, our proposed ontology will need to break fundamentally with this traditional assumption of basic, original unity. Rather than accounting for how localized multiplicity comes from an original unity, it would have to account for how various localized unities emerge from an original multiplicity.

An important consequence immediately follows from this axiom of multiplicity for our conception of “transcendence” and, thus, for our conception of grace.

Traditionally, grace is defined in relation to God’s supernatural transcendence and, traditionally, this transcendence itself depends on God’s being an unconditioned and absolute One. Transcendence names that supernatural, ontological gap between an unconditioned and original One and the created, contingent multiplicity of everything else.

Here, grace is understood as a manifestation of God’s being an excessive, enabling, and unconditioned exception to the rest of reality.

However, if there is no such original One, if reality is fundamentally multiple, then God cannot be described as an ontologically and supernaturally transcendent exception and, in turn, grace cannot be defined in terms of such a transcendence or confined to what originates from that single point of origin.

In the absence of a single, transcendent anchor point for all of reality, a generalized immanence is the rule. However, in order to avoid being Spinozists, it is essential to characterize this immanence in terms of multiplicity. I will say more about the nature of this immanence in next week's post, but for now the following point will suffice.

In order to be immanent and fundamentally multiple, reality must be characterized by a multiplicity of differences that are fundamental and irreducible. These differences in turn necessarily entail a multiplicity of diffuse, localized, non-supernatural “transcendences” that mark the ontological discontinuities that are constitutive of reality. This diffusion of a single, universal transcendence into plural, local transcendences functions as a confirmation of the ubiquity of immanence.

It is this dislocation — a dislocation of transcendence from its status as a founding and singular ontological exception to its immanent dispersal as what characterizes the multiplicity of reality — that simultaneously marks the dislocation and distribution of grace. Grace, rather than stemming from a distant, founding exception, is embedded in the localized plurality of an immanent multiplicity. Or, to paraphrase Stephen Gould on the subject of Darwin's insight about natural selection: rather than being an unavailable, “unknowable, large-scale cosmic force,” grace would instead be given as a ubiquitous, “testable, small-scale force.”

In a non-theistic ontology, grace would be operationalized as the immanently given multiplicity of what is actually at hand.

AND SO IT GOES: CONFESSION AND REGULAR TIME

2009-06-24T11:53:07-05:00

Like some reverse Billy Pilgrim, I find myself re-stuck in time.

Once again, we have entered regular liturgical time. There is green on the altar and the rite of absolution has been restored to its usual place in the service after its Easter and Pentecost hiatus. While it would be an exaggeration to say that I find confession enjoyable, I do find it comforting.

To begin with, I like that we perform confession as a congregation: in whole and in unison. In practicing confession as a congregation, I am reminded of the plural pronouns present in the Lord’s Prayer. We recite “forgive us our trespasses” just as we ask for “our bread.” In this way, confession mirrors Eucharist and is performed with the same assurance: if we ask in one voice, we will indeed receive together.

I especially love that contrition, practiced as a congregation, finds a place in regular time. Confession is not just performed during times of solemn preparation like Advent or Lent, but is a regular part of the life of the church. Confession is a normal part of the Christian life. Its regular practice assigns confession to the same category as housekeeping, puts it on the same order as laundry.

Recently, I have found myself again in need of the laundromat. I had not engaged in this weekly ritual since college. There is something a little vulnerable about doing your laundry in public. There is a reason people use the phrase “airing of dirty laundry” to indicate an indiscretion. Apart from the actual washing and drying, one of the main components of doing laundry is the preliminary sorting.

In sorting through my dirty laundry it occurred to me that, while I was doing the laundry because my clothes were unarguably soiled, I sorted them according to the manufacture’s requirements, according to fabric color and type. The purpose of going through the laundry was not so much to get it cleaner as much as to ensure that the garments were well cared for. Darks in cold to protect their color, whites are washed hot to restore their brightness. Delicates need a gentle cycle. I don’t usually sort by soil level. I sort primarily to care, not to clean.

Performing confession in public in regular time encourages us to think about contrition as a duty performed primarily to care, as opposed to clean. It is certainly not unconnected from the idea of dirt and the necessity to wash, but practiced regularly, the emphasis falls on the care of the soul as opposed to the offensiveness of the soil. We identify those places where our souls need special care, to be cleaned certainly, but primarily to be restored. Wrongs we have done. Good we have left undone. Trespasses forgiven others and trespasses we need to be forgiven. There is the sense that this is a matter of regular housekeeping, not a crisis event. There is no lapse or failure in having to regularly wash ourselves clean. Dirt and wear are a part of living in the world.

Julian of Norwich had this view of the human condition. In contrast to the dualism of many of her contemporaries, she had a vision of the human being as a whole person: body and soul. In her Showings she writes, “A man walks upright, and the food in his body is shut as if in a well-made purse. When the time of his necessity comes, the purse is opened and then shut again, in the most seemly fashion. And it is God who does this… For [God] does not despise what he has made.” (Long Text, 6)[1]

Julian’s attitude toward human fallenness is similar. According to Julian, sin is a normal part of spiritual progress. Furthermore, human stumblings are an opportunity for God’s grace to become apparent. She writes, “For our courteous Lord does not want his servants to despair because they fall often and grievously; for our falling does not hinder him in loving us.” (LT, 39) God has extended his love toward humanity because God created humanity in God’s own image. This love assures us of God’s grace toward our failings as demonstrated through Christ’s joining our human suffering. Therefore, we sort through our spiritual dirty laundry in order to experience God’s grace more fully. We identify our failings in order to provide the best care for a soul created in the image of a loving God. In this way, God’s founding love makes the trials of the human condition endurable. We can fail without fear, falling back on God’s founding love.

When we regularly join together to air our dirty laundry, we acknowledge that confession is a part of the normal care of our human souls. The same gracious God who meets us in Eucharist also restores and cares for our falls. As Julian writes, “For [God] regards sin as sorrow and pains for his lovers, to whom for love he assigns no blame. The reward which we shall receive will not be small, but it will be great, glorious and honorable, and so all shame will be turned into honor and joy.” (LT, 39) In this way, we can regularly enjoy the graciousness of God’s table and God’s forgiveness until the time when our journey through this human life comes to an end. Until then, our spiritual progress through life is marked by regular ups and downs, falls and restorations, wear, care and repair.

As Billy Pilgrim might remark, And so it goes.

[1] Julian of Norwich, Showings, translated by Edmund Colledge and James Walsh, (NY: Paulist Press, 1978). All quotes from Julian’s Showings are taken from this volume.

Is Slavoj iek a Theologian?

2009-06-23T08:59:09-05:00

Perhaps even asking the question renders meaningless the idea of a post-secular age. Now it is no longer the theologians versus the secular liberals, nor is it merely a question of secularist making room for religion. We can't merely designate current theory as post-secular without farther distinguishing how and to way purpose religion has made a return. But I degress...

Now, of course it goes without saying that Slavoj Žižek has much to say about theology, and even uses theological concepts and codes. But does that make him a theologian?

My question springs from something Pete Rollins said while describing a reading group he is pulling together which would be "dedicated to introducing and exploring the work of key theorists who are contributing important insights into Christianity." Now, framed this way, of course I would recommend reading Žižek. But Rollins introduces Žižek as "a dialectical materialist theologian." Really? For me, riffing on the title of this installation piece, I would have to say, "Slavoj Žižek (the theologian) Does not Exist".

Now I'm sure that many will jump on my intolerant exclusion, my hubristic tendency to police borders and draw lines, my pitiable need for creating Others, Monsters, and Enemies, all of which, they will say, Žižek help us to recognize and overcome. Well, perhaps.

But I would counter that by calling Žižek a theologian is to make a huge mistake in either one or two ways. The first would be to misunderstand Žižek's project, the other would be to misunderstand theology. Žižek has been, and it seems always will be, a "fighting atheist" who really does believe that religion in its actual forms, its lived realities (which I hope this site would be about, even if tangentially) is fundamentalist and violent (see he his "Defenders of the Faith" where argues that atheists are the only true practitioners of religion). For me, Žižek is at his best as a political theorist of ideology practicing a critique of capitalism, and for the most part I choose to walk a great distance with him. But in this way he is functioning as a provocative philosopher (and I'm not saying that while looking down my snobby theological nose).

But the only way to understand Žižek as a theologian is to serious downgrade theology itself, which is the second mistake. If theology is merely the sociology or anthropology of religion run through the Lacanian registers of the Imaginary, the Symbolic, and the Real, then I might as well become a stock broker. If theology is merely explication of the immanent infinitude of human subjectivity, the void of the cosmos, the height and depth of reality, then let's own up to that (which I believe Žižek has). But if theology is truly about something, someone, transcending reality as we know/perceive/construct it, something, someone, that, yes, stands beyond/above/outside what we can conceive, then it is plain that Žižek is not a theologian, and clearly states as much. Some version of the latter is what I hope theology is, even in all its apophatic, kataphaic relations, even in all its discursive permutations through the Imaginary, Symbolic, and Real.

For these reasons, for me, Žižek is not a theologian.

What have I missed? What do you think?

Speculative Grace: The Weakness of Theism?

2009-06-19T16:22:44-05:00

I. Overture

What if the theological concept of grace were ported into a non-theistic context? What would it look it? What modifications would it need to undergo?

In a previous post, I outlined the nature of this experiment and suggested that there are at least two reasons for taking an interest in it:

First, that in light of contemporary science, we have good reason to take seriously the claim that non-directed self-organization is fundamental (rather than incidental) to the nature of reality.

But, second, I also suggested that we may have good reason to be suspicious about the spiritual viability of some of the theoretical, ontological, and political baggage that is woven deep into the fabric of theistic ontologies. This post will explore an issue directly related to this second point.

II. Epictetus

I often teach Epictetus' Handbook in my Introduction to Philosophy classes and I think that he's on to something (setting aside for a moment the question of a Stoic metaphysics).

Why does this interest me here? Because Epictetus understands happiness in a way that tends to undermine many theistic conceptions of grace.

Epictetus' core claim is that human beings are unhappy because they do not correctly distinguish what is in their control from what is not in their control. We treat things that we can't control (like our bodies, our reputations, our possessions, etc.) as if we can control them and then, when we fail to control them, we're miserable. Or we act as if things we can control (like our desires, aversions, opinions, etc.) are not in our control and then throw up our hands in disgust when they push us around.

Unhappiness results (1) from failing to control what is in our power, and (2) from trying to control what is not in our power.

(An important note here: Epictetus' core claim depends on a drawing a strict distinction between [complete] control and [partial] influence. For example, we can influence our bodies and reputations, but we can't control them. Though, in one respect, it's precisely this limited degree of influence that often supports the painful delusion of control: “I seem to be able to influence some things some of the time, why can’t I control all things all of the time?!” )

In this vein, allow me to propose a Stoic definition of sin.

Sin: failing to control what is in our power + trying to control what is not in our power.

I think that this definition has broad applicability.

From an alternate angle, we might describe the Stoic project in the following way. Happiness results when desire equals reality (D = R). The difficulty is that desire, as such, exceeds reality (D > R).

III. Happiness as Satisfaction

Given this problematic, there are two ways of pursuing happiness - though as (sinful) human beings we almost universally pursue only the first.

1. First approach to happiness: you can try to get reality to be what you desire it to be.

There are two problems with this. First, reality is not in your control. Good luck getting things to turn out the way you want. Second, even if you were able, with spectacular luck, to get reality to be the way you wanted, you'd shortly (immediately?) want something else.

This first approach to happiness is a classic example of trying to control what is not in your control. Happiness, on this model, is (as Epictetus argues) demonstrably impossible . . . unless you claim, as theism does, that there is one person, one exception, for whom this is possible.

In a theistic ontology, God is defined by this exceptionality. God is God because that which he desires immediately comes to be. In fact, in this model, everything that exists exists precisely because (and only because) God wished it to be so. Creation ex nihilo is the key theistic claim: God is the single, original source from which all things come.

Further, we might describe this understanding of God - and its correlative understanding of happiness - as a "gospel of the gaps."

In a “gospel of the gaps,” happiness can only be achieved when we transcend the way things presently (and deficiently) are and then definitively close the gap between desire and reality by finally getting reality to measure up.

In this model, grace is precisely that which closes the gap: "I cannot do it, I am unable to get what I want, but grace will make a gift of precisely this to me."

Grace: a kind of transcendent supplement to the deficiency of the way things are.

Typically, the debate about whether this supplement comes as a result of “grace” or “works” (or some combination of the two) plays out on this theistic field: both positions understand the key to happiness to be finding that one perfect object (i.e., God) that can fill the gap between desire and reality and thus allow us to experience that same infinite satisfaction that God enjoys. In this way, God’s own (theistic?) satisfaction models the satisfaction that his grace in turn makes possible for us.

Let’s call this model in which happiness is achieved by getting reality to measure up to desire: the satisfaction model of happiness.

IV. Happiness as Givenness

The other option in pursuing happiness is the following:

2. The second approach to happiness: you can get your desires to fit the way things actually are.

For Epictetus, this approach is much more promising. Rather than getting reality to fit our desires (impossible!), we instead get our desires to fit reality.

The good news is that our desires are (at least potentially) in our power.

(Note: Epictetus’ claim that our desires are in fact in our control is likely a bit too strong. I’ll return to this in a later post, but for the moment we might simply gloss his claim as being consonant with the Christian axiom that human beings do, in fact, possess something like free will.)

For Epictetus, happiness is available at any given moment because what is is always enough.

This second approach accomplishes the same thing that the first approach aims at (it gets D = R) but it avoids sin by abandoning any attempt to transcend reality and control what it cannot control. Further, this approach also abandons any attempt to get God, via some supernatural supplement of grace, to control for us what we cannot control.

But what, then, of grace? Does it disappear in a non-theistic ontology? Is grace a mirage unless God is an exception to the rule that reality is, in some important respects, not in our control?

I don’t think that grace disappears without theism. But I do think that it ceases to appear as a supplement or gap-filler.

In this second model of happiness, life abandons itself to the immanence of the way things are. In short, life abandons itself to what is given. The key, here, is to hear in the word “given” both “gift” and “grace.”

What is given? Grace.

(There is in all of this more than an allusion to the work of Jean-Luc Marion. I will return explicitly to Marion in the near future.)

Let's call this model of happiness: the givenness model of happiness.

Happiness results from affirmatively receiving whatever is given (good or bad, pleasant or unpleasant) as whatever kind of grace it is.

Misery results from: (1) the consistency of our selective rejection of what is real, and (2) the dependence of desire on the hope for a miraculous supplementation.

For Epictetus, the gap between desire and reality is closed only by abandoning the idea that there is (or was) any gap in the first place. For Epictetus, the very notion that there is a gap is the product of a sinful orientation.

In this sense, the satisfaction model of happiness - a model that is deeply intertwined with theistic claims - is problematic because it sublates (in the image of God himself) rather than reverses the “Stoic” logic of sin. If sin is trying to get reality to measure up to desire, then I believe that Epictetus' point may have some bite.

In the givenness model of happiness, happiness is achieved not because God finally gives me what I want, but because I finally choose to want whatever has been given. Thus, the conditions for happiness are always already present, always already immanent, always already given, and this without precondition or expectation. We're free to refuse it, but that doesn't retract its givenness.

And our refusal certainly cannot affect its graciousness as an unconditional gift.

A nontheistic conception of grace – if such a thing is possible or desirable – will, I think, have to tread a humble, immanent path such as this.

The Liturgical Turn

2009-06-17T15:21:50-05:00

One of the most exciting things, to me, about the postmodern and emergent conversations is the turn towards worship. Not that the Church hasn’t always thought about its worship, but these days, worship is all the rage. Even the word ‘worship’ has become a buzzword. It seems that every time I open some Christian magazine there’s another ad for a newly opened school of worship studies and new resources for reinventing or recreating your church’s worship. To me this turn towards worship is exciting because it opens up space for creative evaluation and rethinking of the theory and practice of Christian worship.

It also creates space for tradition. And for a tradition-starved evangelical like myself, this conversation has been like a feast fit for a glutton. Particularly because of the main course – this really cool thing called Liturgy! I’m convinced that that the reason for the turn towards liturgy (or at least the incorporation of liturgical elements within the Sunday morning gatherings) is the renewed sense of community and that our worship really is a “work of the people” standing together before our God. But more on that later.

In the days ahead, I will offer up a series of posts that discuss the interaction of liturgy with postmodernity. I’m a philosopher / theologian by degree and a church musician (some people prefer the term worship-leader) by trade who serves in a missional Anglican church in North Carolina. As such, I’m continually evaluating whether our worship is, first and foremost, creating space for people to encounter God while also being faithful to our inherited liturgical traditions, yet adapting them to the context in which we find ourselves. Not that there’s a dichotomy there. If it is to be incarnational and even pentecostal then liturgy will adapt in order to embrace and speak to various cultural contexts. If it doesn’t then it erects barriers to encountering God.

If God is not encountered then worship is mute. Everything that a worshipping community is, does, thinks, etc. flows from its continued encounter with the living, Trinitarian God. This is why liturgical theologians such as Aiden Kavanagh understand worship to be “primary theology”. Theological discourse is then “secondary theology”, which is discourse on the experience of God and everything else that flows from out of that encounter. In a sense, worship must be prior to prolegomena.

Perhaps this is why liturgy and postmodernism make great conversation partners. Many of the issues that are raised within continental philosophy of religion such as language, alterity, hermeneutics, human subjectivity and aesthetics can all begin to be answered by a consideration of Christian worship.

Take for example the father of liturgical theology, Alexander Schmemann who once clamed that in contrast to modernity’s understanding of the human subject as an autonomous interior entity, the human person actually exists as “homo adorans” – a worshipping subject whose humanity is both constituted and fulfilled in the act of worship. In the language of Catherine Pickstock, the subject participates in the object of its praise and is defined by it. The subject, therefore, is always defined by its relation to the Other, in this case God who is wholly Other. It is an identity which is always received from the outside and cannot lay claim to self-possession. Worship teaches us that subjectivity is received and we are “defined by doxology”.

Anyway, these are some of the topics that I hope to discuss with you all in the days ahead. I also want to create conversations around concrete liturgical practices that involve music, art, dance, symbolism as well as liturgical rites from within various contexts.

God, Geert and the Kingdom (part II)

2009-06-16T11:59:53-05:00

Yesterday I shared a bit about the conflicting developments in the Dutch society, today I will introduce the missional/emerging churchplanting context. This post will be mainly about the churchplantingcontext (I ignore the church revitalisation for the moment) I will give my own reading of it and spend some thoughts on its engagement with continental philosophy as a requirement for the future.

The missional/emerging context is as diverse as the Dutch society. Some community builders create safe places for existential doubt while others preach a straightforward message of grace by Jesus. Some intend te build big attractional churches while others work towards local networks of organic churches. Some know very well the meaning of Gods message of salvation and others keep wondering what the good news means for their specific context. Some buy buildings while others build virtual communities. Theologicaly almost every preference is present; baptist, reformed, (very)charismatic, pentacostal, evangelical and liberal.

The missional/emerging context in the Netherlands is small, just a few hunderd people are involved in any form of churchplanting or community formation, it is quite possible to know all leaders personally. This missional/emerging context is just a fraction of the christian subculture with its own dreams, dialoque and dynamics on missionality. The missional/emerging context is not only small it is also rhizomic, since Carl Raschke gave a seminar earlier this year we have a fancy word for something that just happend. It just happend probably because there are bothe very few of us and we are all very diverse and because of Wordpress, Blogger, Typepad and Twitter.

There is a theme that unites all things missional and emerging in the Netherlands: The focus on both Jesus and the Kingdom of God. This theme is like the centered set of all churchplanting in NL. The focus on the Kingdom of God is fairly strong, for a growing number of projects the term “churchplanting” is not relevant anymore. Much better is “ building communities of the Kingdom”. Although orthodox evangelical churchplanters give Jesus a very different meaning than their more liberal counterparts, they still unite in a desire ‘to be as He was/is´. Conversations on Jesus and the Kingdom are not easy in this setting yet they are highly productive.

Only recently Dutch missional/emerging stories were written down and published. So far all we could read were the usual suspects from the Englisch speaking world. During the last twelve months two handbooks on churchplanting were published (one practical and one more academic), two pioniers wrote down their own story and learning process. Together with Martijn Vellekoop I wrote down five different pioniering stories together with some theological thoughts that are not afraid of postmodernism and acknowledge the marginalisation of the church. These books are crucial to tell encouraging stories beyond the limits of blogophere.

The Dutch missional/emerging context is overall not very innovative. Last year Martijn Vellekoop wrote his MA thesis on churchplanting in the Netherlands. He found around 150 churchplants since the turn of the century and estimated that the real number would be at least twice as much. He also found that few churchplants were rural and most were located in the biblebelt with limited or no contextual awareness. If there was a contextual awareness is was most clear in the churchplants with a reformed theological background.

The missional/emerging context in NL has, I believe, just one real foe; A beast that hides in all of us: The christian subculture. It haunts us in several way’s. The obvious way is via (financial)support. Many projects are not sustainable, for the long run they need financial support (this is one of the problems of limited innovation in churchplanting) by more conservative organisations and churches. The less visible but more important way the christian subculture haunts us is within ourselves: Most churchplanting pioneers come out of a very subcultural conservative evangelical context and constantly have to (un)learn and recontextualise in their new context. Churchplanting is being a ‘overseas’ missionary in your own backyard. Part of the diversity in churchplanting I mentioned earlier is because people differ in their dealing with this re-contextualisation (the other part is the diversity in local contexts that each require their own reading). The majority of churchplanters is only partialy aware of this and resort to the “change the format but not the message” approach.

For the last two years or so, their has been a debate in the press on how to read the “return of the religious”, these last weeks opinionpages are filled on how to read the rise of the new xenofobic attitudes and the high precentage of christians supporting Geert Wilders. So far the debate has not been very productive for missionality. I feel this is partialy because most Dutch evangelical christians do have a rather simplistic reading of ‘the times’ where all things postmodern are kept at save distance instead of engaged. This engagement that may not always be easy but it will push the conversation “off the charts”: beyond the (orthodox/liberal) confinements of christian subculture into new religious territory. Today’s missional/emerging community may actually be a good starting point for such a journey of engagement: It’s small and based on personal IRL relationships. It is diverse yet has a strong spirit of cooperation. It has a, often forgotten, robust theological an philosophical history that both needs and allows for a postmodern turn for the Kingdom.