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Multum in parvo (I) Nicholas Lash on “What Christianity Is”

This is the first of an occasional series. Sometimes a sentence or two says so much is needs to be taken with attentive slowness, even clause by clause, allowing it to build towards those moments of insight and recognition that open mind and heart to a richer apprehension of God, the world, ourselves and the infinite variations of those relationships that sustain our existence.

The prose poem is often enhanced by being written as a form of blank or open verse. I did something like that in the previous post with A W Tozer and William Temple. And have done it before with theologians like Eberhard Jungel, Hans Urs Von Balthasar (I'm under a challenge to get that name included in a sermon without spooking a congregation !) and Kathryn Tanner.

The book Believing Three ways in One God by Nicholas Lash is itself an example of multum in parvo. I've read it twice before and am reading it again – and interested in the pencilled margin notes from last time. The following passage on page 54 has Q in the margin – in JMG code that means quotable, quote it, don't forget it, this is good!

What we call Christianity is supposed to be some kind of school

the purpose of whose pedagogy

is to foster the conditions

in which dependence might be relearned as friendship;

conditions in which

the comprehensive taming of chaos by loving order;

of conflict by tranquility,

of discord by harmony,

might be instantiated and proclaimed.

To use the Creed,

to make its articles one's own,

is, therefore,

to be pledged in labour towards the 'kind of heaven and earth'

in which our human work,

might be the finite forms of God's.

Oh yes!

27 January 2012
What worship is, or can be.

The picture is from the centrepiece of the Ghent Altarpiece by Van Eyck. Based on Revelation 5 it depicts the central subversive paradox of the Lamb slain, adored, worshipped, and the centre of attention in heaven during the vision of John.

Two prose poems follow describing worship. They sit near the front of a notebook I kept years ago, and they are now like theological tram-lines on which my own understanding of worship runs.

The first recognises, as Tozer always does, that our knowledge of the Holy is both biblical and mystical, revelation and mystery, eternal and incarnate, humbling and affirming, transcendent and intimate.

The second describes how worship is transformative of the personality, character and spirit of a human being so that all that is within us may bless His holy name.

What is worship?

Worship is to feel in your heart

and express in some appropriate manner

a humbling but delightful sense of admiring awe

and astonished wonder

and overpowering love

in the presence of that most ancient Mystery,

that Majesty which philosophers call the First Cause,

but which we call Our Father Which Are in Heaven.

A W Tozer

For worship is the submission of all our nature to God.

It is the quickening of conscience by His holiness;

the nourishment of mind with His truth;

the purifying of imagination by His beauty;

the opening of the heart to His love;

the surrender of will to His purpose —

and all of this gathered up in adoration,

the most selfless emotion of which our nature is capable

and therefore the chief remedy for that self-centredness

which is our original sin

and the source of all actual sin.

Archbishop William Temple

25 January 2012
When being fair is ungenerous, lacks compassion, is self interested and is thus unfair

You don't have to be an avid trawler of online news, or a TV News addict, or a close reader of newspapers, Tabloid or Broadsheet, to be aware of the ironies that are darting around in the political rhetoric and economic pontificating and partially informed opinionating these past few days.

Let me begin with the word "fair". We all want a fairer society – that is an assumed given, stated with omniscient assurance by representatives of almost every political colour and position. Except each time it is repeated it sounds less like a moral given, and more like a vested interest mantra. Fairness is a matter of standpoint. Something is fair depending on which point I stand, my point of view. So even if fairness was an acceptable moral concept, it is such a subjectively loaded one that it isn't much use in social discourse, or discourse about society.

Now – do I want a fairer society? Think about it. What relation does fairness bear to mercy? "Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy", seems a reasonable and fair deal. If you care for troubled and suffering people, you'll be cared for when you are in trouble or suffering. But I'm not sure Jesus meant such a radical quid pro quo – mercy is precisely not giving someone what they deserve, but what compassion demands.

Do I want a fairer society? Well if everything is fair, then words like generosity and grudge become redundant because everyone gets what they get with no remainder. What is fair about giving a gift? What is fair about being given a gift? Where does generosity come on the spectrum of calculated entitlement we call fairness?

Do I want a fairer society? Does that mean everyone gets treated the same? But what about the ludicrously obvious fact that we are not the same? Doesn't the sheer diversity of opportunity, natural giftedness, circumstances of birth, socio – economic starting point, genetic inheritance, the happenstance of life's experience mean that, to put it in tautological terms, we are each very unique?

Do I want a fairer society? What does fairness look like for Stephen Lawrence's family. Justice isn't the same thing, though it is an essential aim of the moral and humane society. What was profoundly unfair, toxic and cruel was violence against a young man because of his colour. Justice does not put that right – it does however state the importance and uniqueness of each life, and the cost and consequence of violence, to victim and perpetrator. But the word fair is seen for what it is in this situation – facile and superficial.

Which brings me to irony, the irony of elevating the word "fair" to the top of the political point scoring league. Yesterday we had Ian Duncan Smith promising he was not seeking to punish the poor by capping benefits. We had Vince Cable hand wringing about how to curb excessive board-room salaries, bonuses and other complex formulae for remunerative rip-offs. And various politicians speaking on my behalf as a taxpayer about what was and was not fair to me. It isn't fair that I work hard, earn money, pay taxers only to see these taxes fall into the benefits black hole. It isn't fair that I work hard, earn money and pay my taxes, and in a lifetime's work would not come close to earning a modest bank executive's annual package with bonuses.

Three comments more. First – to use the phrase "punish the poor" whether to deny it or recommend it, is to use the vocabulary of a welfare state suffering a serious case of semantic amnesia; it is also to reveal an unacceptable lack of emotional intelligence and social awareness.

Second to try to save some millions of pounds by capping benefits, while doing little of any real substance to curb excessive salaries and even less to deal with the problem of tax avoidance by the rich, is not only irony. It is a failure of nerve or perhaps more seriously, a deliberate evasion of moral principle by a coalition government surviving on expediency and compromise. These are not necessarily bad words, it depends what is compromised and to whom it is expedient.

And finally, I do not think it is fair the way politicians are using the word fair to justify policies, which should require criteria that look beyond the limited horizons of mere fairness. The cost of caring for the vulnerable and the poor, the old and the sick, the disadvantaged and marginalised, should not simply be lumped together with the admittedly expensive problem of welfare benefit dependency, and the exploitation of the welfare system. To do so is not fair – and nothing is solved if you replace one unfairness with another.

This is a ridiculously unfair question and I'm quite prepared to be laughed at for asking it – In the choice between capping benefits and curbing excessive salaries, what would Jesus do? I know – daft question. Fair enough!

24 January 2012
The Good Shepherd – but Without Sentimentality

Ever since farm days in Ayrshire I've regarded sheep with affection and interest. Jack Duncan was a good farmer – knowledgeable about the land, and careful and respectful of animals which he referred to as 'the beasts'. He was a keen if not great golfer who took a couple of clubs and some golf balls out into the fields on a summer night to practice and we got two shillings ( probably around £5 nowadays) each for retrieving them.

It was on his farm that I first helped with sheep dip, sheep shearing and working the sheep with a dog. My father trained working dogs, always the border collie, and sold them to other farmers, some of them going abroad. Not many people know that! I still remember a spring night walking miles across the fields with Jack Duncan, the dog gathering the sheep, and Jack taking out one or two that were limping, examining their feet, cutting off the horn where foot rot was beginning to take hold, and putting ointment on.

It's such experiences, listening to the peewits complaining loudly at our intrusion, and displaying the most stunning aerobatics as they dived and swerved towards us. These same memories are what makes the cry of the curlew the most poignant and powerful Scottish sound to my ears. I still can't hear that cry without a lump in my throat and a sense of gratitude that, for all that I might have missed brought up in the country miles from shops, I have a love and affinity with the woods and the fields and the hills, and all who live therein, that is part of who I am.

Jack Duncan's care for his 'beasts', (he's standing at the right in the photo taken when I was a boy!) and my father's reputation as a first rate dairyman who cared for the herd, mean that when I read Psalm 23, or John 10, I have no sentimentality at all about sheep and shepherds, or cows and byres (I helped muck them out at weekends!). It isn't sentimentality that sheep need – but watchful care, reliable provision, a safe environment and a knowledgeable shepherd.

The coloured photo above was taken on a walk to Drum Castle – the photo could be better, but the image of sheep sheltering under a massive conifer is biblical, pastoral and evokes memories for me of a boy wearing large wellingtons, a holy jersey, and stressed jeans long before they were made fashionable, chasing across fields after a sheepdog, taking seriously the welfare of sheep. And whatever else the Lord is my Shepherd might mean, it has to do in my mind with that welfare that comes looking for us, that protective wisdom that singles us out for care and healing, that watchful care that means there are indeed times of green pastures and still waters, dark valleys and tables spread. If the goodness and mercy that follow me all the days of my life are the perfect expression of Jack Duncan's humane husbandry, then without an overload of sentiment it is true to say 'I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me'. By the way, that one line contains an entire theology of divine – human encounter, the I that I am, encounters the Thou that God is.

Psalm 23 is never quoted in the New Testament but the pastoral image is recurrent, as Jesus described variously as the Good Shepherd, the Chief Shepherd and the Great Shepherd. I've read many a commentary on Psalm 23. It is such a richly textured, spiritually resonant text that echoes throughout the corridors and cathedrals of Western Christianity. The best reception history of this psalm is in the remarkably fine book, The Psalms in Christian Worship. A Historical Commentary. Bruce Waltke and James Houston (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010) pp. 416-445.

But Jack Duncan remains in my mind and memory as the most persuasive existential commentary on the spiritual experience of being a sheep under the care of a good shepherd.

22 January 2012
Stating the obvious again – revision is good for the soul!

Having read what I wrote yesterday, I've made the corrections to spelling, spacing and grammar! Since I'm in the middle of marking I guess yesterday's effort before revision was a narrow squeak B1 – now at least it is securely that!!

It isn't that anything I wrote yesterday was unclear because of the typos – but literary carelessness easily erodes the credibility of the writer, as at a subliminal or conscious level, the reader notes the glitches in the syntax and suspects glitches in the content. But more than that – it is surely important to write with grace and accuracy, with precision and freedom, within the rules of language and grammar yet with creative and imaginative flair. So that factual statements are not undermined by inaccurate spelling; beautiful thought is not deconstructed by being expressed in carelessly shaped language; and persuasive encouragement is not contradicted by red pen marks all over the exhortation.

Of course the spell-check helps, and the wavy green lines – but stick to them all the time and language becomes standardised, those tricks of language and structure, the bending of the rules that identify originality, are flattened out into a prosaic properness lacking the very things that make writing interesting, memorable and worth the time to read and enjoy.

Amongst those whose lives depend on taking care with words are poets. Elizabeth Jennings has a special place in my personal canon. Her care with words, and her care for human experience, her inward surrender to the power of words and to the wonder of language as the limited expression of what we sense is inexpressible but essential to say, make her a poet of immense sensitivity and insight.

Hours and Words

There is a sense of sunlight where

Warm messages and eager words

Are sent across the turning air,

Matins, little Hours and Lauds,

When people talk and hope to teach

A happiness that they have found.

Here prayer finds a soil that is rich

And sets a singing underground.

Let there be silence that is full

Of blossoming hints. When it is dark

Men's minds can link and their words fill

A saving boat that is God's ark.

O language is a precious thing

And ministers deep needs. It will

Soothe the mind and softly sing

And echo forth when we are still.

(Elizabeth Jennings, New Collected Poems (Manchester: Carcanet, 2002), 324-5

"O language is a precious thing……"

And therefore our prayers are to be crafted, shaped and formed out of the language of the soul so that the language of our prayers is not insultingly banal, lazily informal, or repeatedly recycled cliche.

And therefore our writing is to be thoughtful and careful, not pedantic nor neurotic in a colourless rectitude, but open and freedom loving, expressing in words the beauty and ordinariness of what is so about our lives.

And therefore our emails may have to take a little more time if our language and meaning are to be clear, and the expression of ourselves as writers is to display courtesy, respect and care for our words, because they convey courtesy and respect and care to the recipient.

"Warm messages and eager words…" – that would be a telling criterion for those emails and texts, those letters and prayers, those compositions in words, of our best thoughts and best feelings.

20 January 2012
Stating the obvious – reading is good for the soul.

I wonder how many readers of this blog know the names and some of the books of Nels F S Ferre, A W Tozer, Elton Trueblood, Baron Friedrich Von Hugel, Evelyn Underhill, Alexander Whyte, Samuel Chadwick, Lesslie Newbigin, and more familiarly, C S Lewis?

What they have in common is entirely arbitrary, and I discovered it only because I happen to have read certain works of theirs over the years. They each recommend choosing one or two authors of substantial fare who should become lifelong conversation partners.

Ferre urged students to become an expert on one particular theologian or philosopher and use that knowledge as a benchmark, a critical measurement of everything else they read and thought.

Tozer, passionate evangelical that he was, enthusiastically read several Catholic books of devotion regularly and commended that practice to those serious about 'the knowledge of the Holy'.

Trueblood, a philosopher Quaker far too much forgotten today, recommended identifying several books as lifelong companions, including A' Kempis' Imitation of Christ, William Law's Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, Augustine's Confessions, Fenelon's Letters.

Von Hugel read Thomas a Kempis for 15 minutes every day, and one of the most complex and teutonic style philosopher theologians became intellectually docile and receptive to deeper truth.

Evelyn Underhill positively revelled in the writings of the Christian mystical tradition, her favourites being Van Ruysbreck, The Cloud of Unknowing and Augustine Baker's Holy Wisdom.

Alexander Whyte, Free Church of Scotland minister with a noble ecumenical sympathy was happy with the entire Christian tradition, from puritans to Carmelites, and from Boehme to Newman.

Samuel Chadwick, Methodist evangelist and College Principal and Bible Conference preacher and teacher of Christian holiness and perfection, had a classic Catholic devotional book always on his desk during Lent and Passion Week, and so soaked in the classics of Christian devotion.

Lesslie Newbigin in a little known book on ministry, The Good Shepherd, urges a similar regular discipline of exposure to biblical text, 'always having biblical work going with a scholarly commentary'.

C S Lewis in his introduction to Athanasius' The Incarnation, rebukes that chronological snobbery that thinks new books are preferable to old, and insists the reading of old books is essential for Christians to catch the scent of another and heavenly country.

With the advent of Kindle, there are a lot of these devotional, spiritual and theological classics available free or for very little. I'm currently working through The Imitation of Christ. Wonder if that saintly and stern Thomas would approve his meticulously written treatise being read on an electronic screen while travelling on the train, waiting at the dentists, or having a coffee in the favourite coffee place….

Hmmm…

19 January 2012
A Search for George Herbert

A search for new books on George Herbert, the Anglican poet par excellence, brings up an intriguing not to say amusing range of options. George Herbert's poetry, to modern ears, can seem bizarre in its conceits and metaphors, flowery in its language, and at best distant echoes from a previous age. But his poetry has enduring value for human development and spirituality, and explores the intensity of guilt and gratitude, of self criticism and divine acceptance, of insatiable longing and unbearable bliss.

But the name also brings up books about and by George Herbert Mead, the American philosopher of social consciousness and psychology. He too explored the nature of the self, not through prayer but through the importance of play and game in developing social values and relations. The give and take of human activity such as asking and giving, seeking and finding, winning and losing, talking and listening becomes the basis out of which the self is created. Mead's work also has enduring value for human society

Then there are books about George Herbert Walker Bush. At which point you become aware of the bizarre juxtapositions of the Amazon search engine. And you become aware too of the weird fact that an Anglican 17th century priest and patron saint of devotional poetry, and a 19th Century philosopher of human development and social values, share the same name with a President of the United States whose contribution to human spirituality and development and social inter-relationships is of an altogether other kind.

18 January 2012
“Stephen Lawrence”, by Carol Ann Duffy

I have been a fan of Carol Ann Duffy's poetry for years. I presented a paper on her love poetry at a theological conference and said she should be the next Poet Laureate. That she was honoured with the appointment is no surprise to those who appreciate the humane and perceptive way she deals with human weakness, longing, hurt, anger, tears, love, desire and so much else that we include in our never adequate descriptions of what it means, and more importantly what it feels like, to be a human being.

I missed her poem on the outcome of the Stephen Lawrence trial. Talking over a meal with a friend last night he mentioned it and sent me the link. It needs no comment other than it demonstrates why she is Poet Laureate, the poet who captures the significant moments in our shared life.

"Stephen Lawrence", by Carol Ann Duffy

Cold pavement indeed
the night you died,
murdered;
but the airborne drop of blood
from your wound
was a seed
your mother sowed
into hard ground –
your life's length doubled,
unlived, stilled,
till one flower, thorned,
bloomed
in her hand,
love's just blade.

17 January 2012
Why the word mystical shouldn’t be used as a synonym for woolly thinking.

Now here's an interesting way of thinking, of looking at the world, at the self, and at others.

"I can survive only by trying to build bridges, both affirming and also denying most of my own ideas and those of others. Most people tend to see me as highly progressive, yet I would say I am, in fact, a values conservative and a process liberal.

I believe in justice, truth, follow-through, honesty, personal and financial responsibility, faithful love, and humility – all deeply traditional values.

Yet in my view, you need to be imaginative, radical, dialogical, and even countercultural to live these values at any depth.

Whether in church life or politics, neither conservatives nor liberals are doing this very well. Both are too dualistic…they do not think or see like the mystics"

Richard Rohr, The Naked Now (New York: Crossroad), page 10

16 January 2012
Wild geese, Loch Skene, and our place in the world

In Scotland the wild goose is an image that goes back to early Christian days. The Iona Community has almost made the metaphor its brand name. Migration as the search for food and home, the costly but lifegiving freedom of flight, the forward lunge of the wings, the honking in unison of a long skein, the collaborative use of the slipstream, the lead goose giving direction and creating impetus – it isn't hard to see the spiritual implications of wild geese in flight.

The photo is of Loch Skene – at this time of year a major stop-off point for migrating geese. Long noisy skeins of them fly over our house. A field a mile away was brown with grazing geese and must present a headache and dilemma for farmers who see young grass being eaten with frightening thoroughness.

Mary Oliver's poem about Wild Geese is one of her best, and she is one of the best North American poets writing today. You can have your own go at working out the significance of the migrating goose for our understadning of the human journey, the spiritual quest, the hunger for home, for community and for what lies ahead. For now, here's Mary Oliver's take on those chevrons of fellow pilgrims and travellers on this beautiful fragile planet

.

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

.

15 January 2012