life itself...

Merton in 'the Pasternak Affair' writes about Pasternak as someone opposing Communism not with ideology or dogmatism, but with life itself... (Disputed Questions, 15-16)

...the most dangerious kind of Christian to be...

The priest is expected to KNOW.

But that's the most dangerous kind of priest to have... the most dangerous kind of Christian to be...

Pray the Bible

Wouldn't it be nice if we could put Biblical studies, critical or otherwise, in their place, and PRAY the Bible instead? Wouldn't it be nice if we could pray it and not just pull it apart and put it under a microscope?

Scotist vs. Thomist

I am no expert on either Duns Scotus or Thomas Aquinas...

But if I read John Milbank correctly (and if he is reading his late Medieval theology correctly), Scotus' God is characterized as an arbitrary tyrant imposing his (however benevolent) will upon creation (including us).

But Aquinas' characterization of God is one who is deeply connected to us (or, rather, to whom we are deeply connected)--a lover who wants what's good for us. (Eros rather than raw power--drawing us to him rather than imposing himself on us).

Scotist: God outside of us and us outside of God.
Thomist: Us participating in God.

What does it mean to say, "I believe?"

What does it mean to say, "I believe?"

Doesn't it mean something like finding a way into the reality that the Church is describing in her doctrine? Not that we have to find our own truth, but that we have to find THE truth AS true within us, in our lives, etc.

I remember trying to will myself to believe in Santa Claus* when I was young enough, but just barely, to believe in him... trying to tell myself--almost desperately--that he was REAL. While there may be moments of that, Christian faith can't be some adult version of a child's need to believe.

Likewise we can't just say, "The Bible (or the Church or some other authority) says it and I believe it and that's that." That's just laziness and extrinsicism. It doesn't take root. We have to wrestle with these truths... the gospel truths... and make them ours--to find them in the living room, in the grocery store, in the parking lot, on the baseball field, in the daily life of marriage and family, work, play, etc.

But we tend not to do that. We let all of these (living room, grocery store, parking lot, baseball field, etc.) be in their own area and the propositions of the Christian faith exist in their own priveleged field without letting either touch or be touched by the other. No wonder "faith" is dying. What we call faith these days is a lie because it has nothing to do with reality.



*Now of course I know myself to be in communion with the Bishop of Myra as part of the communion of saints and so have regained Santa Claus, but I suppose that's another post.

Less holy...?

In Brad Warner's second book on Buddhism (Sit Down and Shut Up) he mentions the tactic of the Japanese political authorities allowing (requiring) Buddhist monks to marry in order to take their aura of holiness away... to make them less powerful... less holy... more human... (146-147).

I wonder if the same has happened with Anglican priests (intentional or not).

Broken Open

We could learn more about theology, about how to read scripture, about prayer by meditating on a Japanese painting (or even painting one ourselves) or reading poetry than a thousand Christian Ed. curricula.

It's not how much is said to us or even how someone uses words to teach us. It's how we are broken open--laid bare--how we lose ourselves and have everything that we have been holding onto be exposed as the idol it is.

It can happen with a movie, a poem, a painting, a Koan, a saying of the Desert Fathers (and Mothers), lectio divina...

This is my problem, I think, with program in parishes, with so many attempts at formation, with vestry meetings, etc. We keep ourselves so busy and think we're accomplishing something. We'd be better off reading poems, painting, etc.