For those unaware, the Echo is our student newspaper. I wrote this article the week before National Student Leadership Conference, which was, for lack of a more creative word: AWESOME, and also called "RE: imagine, RE: create, RE: new". But, more on that later. Here is the article:
This is the section of the paper that, in general, deals with art as we most often conceive of it—movies, music, books, television. I would like us to move behind much of what we consider good art to the place from whence it came. The creative mind.
To be fair, we should probably back up one more step and ask where our creative minds came from, but that's beyond the scope of this little piece. We will just answer the question—we were created by a more perfectly creative mind, in whose image we are also made. And because of this fact, I come to what I really want to say: it is not just the “artists,” as classically understood, who have a creative role to play in this world. We all do.
After all, what does the best art do? Bring joy, heighten awareness, make us ask difficult questions, help us contextualize, impress us with the power and capacity of the human mind, enrich our lives in a variety of ways, juxtaposition things to reveal a new perspective, et cetera. I do not want to diminish actual works of art and their role in our lives, only to say that if you find yourself in a similar place as me—with an inability to paint, draw, compose music, or write a good story—this does not diminish your responsibility to creatively act in the world.
We don't talk like this often, so it might be a bit of a challenge to discover what this actually means, and then looks like. Fortunately for us, the Creator who made us, made us in a variety of ways, with a variety of passions, gifts and backgrounds and an infinitesimal number of ways for our creativity to manifest. We should start trying some of those out. I can't really imagine what life would be like if we taught and encouraged thinking, dreaming, relating, speaking, and formulating creatively. I like to call it “life art.” Maybe that's not a very creative name. No doubt this kind of creativity already occurs, but no doubt there is a lot of room to grow into this part our true selves.
Some might say that life wouldn't change too drastically if we didn't have art. Or, that we don't need art, so we sure don't need this “life art.” I beg to differ. Surely, life would still be full of circumstances in which we encounter deep pain, confusion, darkness, and sorrow. But, I think that creative approaches to dealing with the difficult reality of what we have faced, are facing and will face in this world are life giving.
Life art (as well as art classically understood) can bring context for our pain, clarity in or confusion, light in our darkness, and redemption to our sorrow. It gets to us in ways that other things can't. It surprises us. It changes us. It is so very unnatural that it jars us out of our normal ways of being, thinking and doing, and renews us, and we need that. If we all did it, it might be a bit like creating a life-giving culture that we could draw people into, kind of like the Kingdom of God. That seems important to me.
4.17.2010
4.13.2010
Continual Clanging of Symbols
This is an excerpt from Charles Williams' "Bors to Elayne: on the King's Coins"
"...Money is the medium of exchange.
Taliessin's look darkened; his hand shook
while he touched the dragons; he said 'We had a good thought.
Sir, if you made verse you would doubt symbols.
I am afraid of the little loosed dragons.
When the means are autonomous, they are deadly; when words
escape from verse they hurry to rape souls;
when sensation slips from intellect, expect the tyrant;
the brood of carriers levels the good they carry.
We have taught our images to be free; are we glad?
are we glad to have brought convenient heresy to Logres?'
The Archbishop answered the lords;
his worlds went up through a slope of calm air:
'Might may take symbols and folly make treasure,
and greed bid God, who hides himself for man's pleasure
by occasion, hide himself essentially: this abides--
that the everlasting house the soul discovers
is always another's; we must lose our own ends;
we must always live in the habitation of our lovers,
my friend's shelter for me, mine for him.
This is the way of this world in the day of that other's ;
make yourselves friends by means of the riches of iniquity,
for the wealth of the self is the health of the self exchanged.
What saith Heracleitus?--and what is the City's breath?--
dying each other's life, living each other's death.
Money is a medium of exchange."
This whole poem gives various perspectives on money as the/a medium of exchange. This beautiful excerpt, though, discusses money as "a" medium of exchange. Render (exchange) to Caesar what is Caesar's, and God what is God's. And what is God's exchange medium? Love? Acts of love? Symbols of love? Money is one of those, but oh, there are so many more. "My friend's shelter for me, mine for him," and "dying each other's life, living each other's death." This is beautiful exchange. This is symbolic love. This is a love that points to something important, something outside of ourselves.
"...Money is the medium of exchange.
Taliessin's look darkened; his hand shook
while he touched the dragons; he said 'We had a good thought.
Sir, if you made verse you would doubt symbols.
I am afraid of the little loosed dragons.
When the means are autonomous, they are deadly; when words
escape from verse they hurry to rape souls;
when sensation slips from intellect, expect the tyrant;
the brood of carriers levels the good they carry.
We have taught our images to be free; are we glad?
are we glad to have brought convenient heresy to Logres?'
The Archbishop answered the lords;
his worlds went up through a slope of calm air:
'Might may take symbols and folly make treasure,
and greed bid God, who hides himself for man's pleasure
by occasion, hide himself essentially: this abides--
that the everlasting house the soul discovers
is always another's; we must lose our own ends;
we must always live in the habitation of our lovers,
my friend's shelter for me, mine for him.
This is the way of this world in the day of that other's ;
make yourselves friends by means of the riches of iniquity,
for the wealth of the self is the health of the self exchanged.
What saith Heracleitus?--and what is the City's breath?--
dying each other's life, living each other's death.
Money is a medium of exchange."
This whole poem gives various perspectives on money as the/a medium of exchange. This beautiful excerpt, though, discusses money as "a" medium of exchange. Render (exchange) to Caesar what is Caesar's, and God what is God's. And what is God's exchange medium? Love? Acts of love? Symbols of love? Money is one of those, but oh, there are so many more. "My friend's shelter for me, mine for him," and "dying each other's life, living each other's death." This is beautiful exchange. This is symbolic love. This is a love that points to something important, something outside of ourselves.
4.03.2010
Play the Cymbals for Symbols.
I never know what to name my blog posts. So, I end up with stupid titles like this one, and think of all the cheesiest ways to relate it back to the intended blog message. I am not going to do that to you.
Before I begin talking about Symbols, and why they have been a recurring theme this week, please take a minute to stare at "symbol" and "cymbal." What an odd conjunction of letters. It only takes four seconds before I think they are misspelled. Weird words.
Really though, Symbols.
Monday night my Marion Spring Break team went to the Community School of the Arts and met with the director. He was a dynamic, talkative guy who somehow got on the subject of not feeling comfortable in churches. He doesn't like the raising of hands or "making a show" in church. I understand that. I started thinking about how potentially a lot of artists might not feel very comfortable in church settings. Most churches have cultural symbols that they get attached to and stick to. They are inherited symbols, and because they come from the Church, we don't question their purpose. We can tell that this is true when we go into churches in which we know that the regular order of worship hasn't changed at all since the Grandmothers were toddlers in the very same church. This isn't bad, maybe. This is just an observation. Unless we create them, or discover something detrimental about the old ones, symbols in churches rarely change--even our language doesn't change.
I can see why this would be a problem for the artistic crowd (and thus should potentially be a problem the church must address). Artists create symbols all the time. It is their mind's work to find new ways to represent truth and beauty and goodness in some powerful manifestation. It is the refreshing and readjusting of these symbols that keeps our minds renewed. After all, a symbol is not an end in itself, it always represents something. If we are creating symbols that are true to what they represent, then we should not be worried that a symbol change will skew the true of the message. When we worry about symbol renewal, we worry about breaking out of tradition, we worry about "not doing something the way its always been done." And, in my personal opinion, this often leads us to worship the symbol instead of that which it represents.
This is a difficult task in a church. After all, many powerful symbols have already been created, and are GOOD. Communion, baptism, songs of worship, etc., are all good, and quite important, really. But, not as important as what they represent. If we do not need to renew these symbols, then we do need to renew the way we see them, lest they become dead practices of a dead people.
I do not know how all of this works, but I think that the people of American Christianity (for that is the only culture of Christianity I know), hold on to many a symbol, in many a denomination, and have become partial to and partisan about their symbols. This does not mean that we should go out and start new churches in cities where there are already hundreds, but it does mean that we should come into who we are a creative beings and breathe new, God-given life into the symbols and traditions in the buildings we meet in every Sunday, of every week.
After all, would it be too terrible if a Methodist Church recited a liturgy, or if we learned to powerfully use everyday language instead of "Christianese" when we talked with people? Sounds crazy, I know. Sometimes, though, I think we need crazy to wake us up from complacent rhythms of everyday life.
(This thought process was spurred on by a visit to an Episcopal Church in Marion during this Holy Week. Each service was VERY powerful to me. I had never really experienced liturgy before, and was VERY impressed by the power of the new symbols I was witness too).
Before I begin talking about Symbols, and why they have been a recurring theme this week, please take a minute to stare at "symbol" and "cymbal." What an odd conjunction of letters. It only takes four seconds before I think they are misspelled. Weird words.
Really though, Symbols.
Monday night my Marion Spring Break team went to the Community School of the Arts and met with the director. He was a dynamic, talkative guy who somehow got on the subject of not feeling comfortable in churches. He doesn't like the raising of hands or "making a show" in church. I understand that. I started thinking about how potentially a lot of artists might not feel very comfortable in church settings. Most churches have cultural symbols that they get attached to and stick to. They are inherited symbols, and because they come from the Church, we don't question their purpose. We can tell that this is true when we go into churches in which we know that the regular order of worship hasn't changed at all since the Grandmothers were toddlers in the very same church. This isn't bad, maybe. This is just an observation. Unless we create them, or discover something detrimental about the old ones, symbols in churches rarely change--even our language doesn't change.
I can see why this would be a problem for the artistic crowd (and thus should potentially be a problem the church must address). Artists create symbols all the time. It is their mind's work to find new ways to represent truth and beauty and goodness in some powerful manifestation. It is the refreshing and readjusting of these symbols that keeps our minds renewed. After all, a symbol is not an end in itself, it always represents something. If we are creating symbols that are true to what they represent, then we should not be worried that a symbol change will skew the true of the message. When we worry about symbol renewal, we worry about breaking out of tradition, we worry about "not doing something the way its always been done." And, in my personal opinion, this often leads us to worship the symbol instead of that which it represents.
This is a difficult task in a church. After all, many powerful symbols have already been created, and are GOOD. Communion, baptism, songs of worship, etc., are all good, and quite important, really. But, not as important as what they represent. If we do not need to renew these symbols, then we do need to renew the way we see them, lest they become dead practices of a dead people.
I do not know how all of this works, but I think that the people of American Christianity (for that is the only culture of Christianity I know), hold on to many a symbol, in many a denomination, and have become partial to and partisan about their symbols. This does not mean that we should go out and start new churches in cities where there are already hundreds, but it does mean that we should come into who we are a creative beings and breathe new, God-given life into the symbols and traditions in the buildings we meet in every Sunday, of every week.
After all, would it be too terrible if a Methodist Church recited a liturgy, or if we learned to powerfully use everyday language instead of "Christianese" when we talked with people? Sounds crazy, I know. Sometimes, though, I think we need crazy to wake us up from complacent rhythms of everyday life.
(This thought process was spurred on by a visit to an Episcopal Church in Marion during this Holy Week. Each service was VERY powerful to me. I had never really experienced liturgy before, and was VERY impressed by the power of the new symbols I was witness too).
2.24.2010
The Picture.
In George MacDonald's book, The Wise Woman, there is a scene in which a girl stands in front of a picture. The picture is what she wishes for. A girl, much like her, standing on a stream, unassuming, good. She wants to be that little girl, and as soon as she wants it, she is allowed into the picture. She steps in, and realizes that the idealization of the situation of the little girl was a misstep, for the other little girl's life was not at all free of problem or pain.
In my C.S. Lewis and friends class, my professor asked us to write a description of our picture--the ideal situation--the one that we convince ourselves to believe would be better, our "if only" picture. We read them to each other after ten minutes of writing. Here is what I wrote. It is not very well written, after all, it was more of a stream of consciousness, 10-minute endeavor. But, there is a beauty in the rawness of an admittance of our ideals as they come to us.
The little girl was quite puzzled by the first picture that she came upon. It was much like an infinite regress of pictures. A picture, of a picture, of a picture, of a picture, of a picture, of a picture of a, well, picture. And she supposed it would go on forever. When she finally got past the confusing nature of the picture itself, her eyes rested on the "initial picture," the first layer, and she realized that it was a girl, much like herself, at least in station, staring at a picture, eerily like herself, and then, of course, she realized that just as she (the onlooker) was looking at a picture of a picture of a picture of a picture, etc, so was the little girl in the picture. There was one primary difference, however, and that was that the girl in the picture was not half as confused by the picture as the little girl outside of the picture. She was, it seemed, quite a bit more satisfied with her understanding of the picture. The little girl was immediately envious of the girl once removed. Upon further reflection, the little girl was almost angry at the little girl for her wise and simple looking face and posture in the midst of what seemed to be such an overwhelmingly complex visual conundrum. Her anger at once turned to conceit. I deserve such wisdom and understanding, thought the little girl. That should be me. Things would be infinitely better if I could understand things like infinity, as this girl in the picture seems to. And suddenly, she found herself in the picture. It looked different, but the same...
In my C.S. Lewis and friends class, my professor asked us to write a description of our picture--the ideal situation--the one that we convince ourselves to believe would be better, our "if only" picture. We read them to each other after ten minutes of writing. Here is what I wrote. It is not very well written, after all, it was more of a stream of consciousness, 10-minute endeavor. But, there is a beauty in the rawness of an admittance of our ideals as they come to us.
The little girl was quite puzzled by the first picture that she came upon. It was much like an infinite regress of pictures. A picture, of a picture, of a picture, of a picture, of a picture, of a picture of a, well, picture. And she supposed it would go on forever. When she finally got past the confusing nature of the picture itself, her eyes rested on the "initial picture," the first layer, and she realized that it was a girl, much like herself, at least in station, staring at a picture, eerily like herself, and then, of course, she realized that just as she (the onlooker) was looking at a picture of a picture of a picture of a picture, etc, so was the little girl in the picture. There was one primary difference, however, and that was that the girl in the picture was not half as confused by the picture as the little girl outside of the picture. She was, it seemed, quite a bit more satisfied with her understanding of the picture. The little girl was immediately envious of the girl once removed. Upon further reflection, the little girl was almost angry at the little girl for her wise and simple looking face and posture in the midst of what seemed to be such an overwhelmingly complex visual conundrum. Her anger at once turned to conceit. I deserve such wisdom and understanding, thought the little girl. That should be me. Things would be infinitely better if I could understand things like infinity, as this girl in the picture seems to. And suddenly, she found herself in the picture. It looked different, but the same...
2.16.2010
The Power of Contrary Choice.
Do we have it?
This is the question that has pitted the Arminians and the Calvinists/Libertarians and the Determinists against each other for far too long. This blog post will not erase that divide. This blog post is my way to process the opinions of two devout groups represented in great number (for both "sides") that happen to be personal friends of mine.
So, we have the Calvinists. They want to "protect" (in a sense) the sovereignty of God. He is all powerful, knowing, good, et cetera. Thus, nothing happens unless it has been directly ordained and predestined by Him. Those who are Christians are chosen, they have to be, because they cannot, in their fallen state, ever really choose God. His grace is irresistible to them because He has opened their hearts and minds to receive Him.
Also, we have the Arminians. They want to "protect" (in a sense) free will. After all, they say, worship means nothing if it is compelled, if the world is just a mechanism and we are puppets on a string. Those who are Christians have seen the light and are living with the mission to help others find the Lord, because that is their job. No one is chosen, or denied salvation, they just need to be told. And, when they are, they have the ability to choose whether or not this is something they will believe.
[these may not be entirely accurate representations of what some adherents of these views believe. That is ok, the point is that I don't end solidly in their camp anyway.]
There are many, myself included, who just find the situation to be a little more intricate, mysterious, nuanced, et cetera than either of these views afford. Now, it will remain those things, even if I choose to formulate my beliefs in a different way. We have to put our beliefs into some sort of system in order to think of them. So, I will use John Donne's Holy Sonnet #14 (which has undoubtedly been cited before on my blog) to elucidate this problem, this pull that we feel between choice and compulsion, and then proceed to analytically process an "answer" to such a problem.
Here is is:
Batter my heart, three-person'd God ; for you
As yet but knock ; breathe, shine, and seek to mend ;
That I may rise, and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp'd town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captivated, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth'd unto your enemy ;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.
This poem, it seems, is a choice. The key moment is when Donne says, "Take me to you, imprison me." He wrestles with his inability to participate in the good, while, in fact, participating in the good decision to give over his reason, his morality, his life, to this "three person'd God." It is as if that is the only good choice he can make. He can make the opposite choice, it seems, but this is the only one that is truly life-giving. This decision, however, insinuates that he desire is to be compelled in a sort of "irresistible grace" sort of way. He is asking to be compelled to the point of imprisonment for the good, to God.
And so he lives in this tension, as I think we all do. We, on my view, by the grace of God, are free to choose Him (and we have this choice to bring Him glory), but when we are choosing Him, we are asking that he take away this freedom of contrary choice so that we no longer have freedom from external compulsion, but instead, are free to do his will. (Though this power of contrary choice hasn't really left us...but maybe it will in Heaven?!) But, all the while, this is a choice we have made to give over this power, but its also a choice he has given us. So, its not really up to us, but it is because He let it be so that our worship might be genuine, but then we give it back to Him because we, tainted by sin cannot genuinely worship, in which case, by His guidance, we must act.
Oh my. Enough for today.
This is the question that has pitted the Arminians and the Calvinists/Libertarians and the Determinists against each other for far too long. This blog post will not erase that divide. This blog post is my way to process the opinions of two devout groups represented in great number (for both "sides") that happen to be personal friends of mine.
So, we have the Calvinists. They want to "protect" (in a sense) the sovereignty of God. He is all powerful, knowing, good, et cetera. Thus, nothing happens unless it has been directly ordained and predestined by Him. Those who are Christians are chosen, they have to be, because they cannot, in their fallen state, ever really choose God. His grace is irresistible to them because He has opened their hearts and minds to receive Him.
Also, we have the Arminians. They want to "protect" (in a sense) free will. After all, they say, worship means nothing if it is compelled, if the world is just a mechanism and we are puppets on a string. Those who are Christians have seen the light and are living with the mission to help others find the Lord, because that is their job. No one is chosen, or denied salvation, they just need to be told. And, when they are, they have the ability to choose whether or not this is something they will believe.
[these may not be entirely accurate representations of what some adherents of these views believe. That is ok, the point is that I don't end solidly in their camp anyway.]
There are many, myself included, who just find the situation to be a little more intricate, mysterious, nuanced, et cetera than either of these views afford. Now, it will remain those things, even if I choose to formulate my beliefs in a different way. We have to put our beliefs into some sort of system in order to think of them. So, I will use John Donne's Holy Sonnet #14 (which has undoubtedly been cited before on my blog) to elucidate this problem, this pull that we feel between choice and compulsion, and then proceed to analytically process an "answer" to such a problem.
Here is is:
Batter my heart, three-person'd God ; for you
As yet but knock ; breathe, shine, and seek to mend ;
That I may rise, and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp'd town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captivated, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth'd unto your enemy ;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.
This poem, it seems, is a choice. The key moment is when Donne says, "Take me to you, imprison me." He wrestles with his inability to participate in the good, while, in fact, participating in the good decision to give over his reason, his morality, his life, to this "three person'd God." It is as if that is the only good choice he can make. He can make the opposite choice, it seems, but this is the only one that is truly life-giving. This decision, however, insinuates that he desire is to be compelled in a sort of "irresistible grace" sort of way. He is asking to be compelled to the point of imprisonment for the good, to God.
And so he lives in this tension, as I think we all do. We, on my view, by the grace of God, are free to choose Him (and we have this choice to bring Him glory), but when we are choosing Him, we are asking that he take away this freedom of contrary choice so that we no longer have freedom from external compulsion, but instead, are free to do his will. (Though this power of contrary choice hasn't really left us...but maybe it will in Heaven?!) But, all the while, this is a choice we have made to give over this power, but its also a choice he has given us. So, its not really up to us, but it is because He let it be so that our worship might be genuine, but then we give it back to Him because we, tainted by sin cannot genuinely worship, in which case, by His guidance, we must act.
Oh my. Enough for today.
1.14.2010
Stop. Motion. Sledding.
Mark, Gracie, Nathan, and I had a grand old time on New Year's Eve day. We went sledding on the only one (man-made) hill in Rochester, IN. Love it.
1.11.2010
It's Complicated.
No, this is not a post intended to review Meryl Streep's new blockbuster hit (joke).
Its not too complicated, even based on the commercials, to know that that one isn't really worth my time.
But, there are some things that are really complicated. Such as:
1. When you are walking outside in the freezing cold, and have forgotten your gloves, where do you put your hands? You could leave them in the cold, or you could put them in your pocket. It may seem like an easy choice, but consider, also, the ice on the ground. If you fall you need your hands--and they are not easily accessible when they are hidden in your pockets.
2. (And the real reason for this post, inspired by today's post-spanish class events) Who you are, versus who other people think you are. It, at first glance, doesn't seem like a complicated problem. I, after all, am the only one with access to my mind, and thus, a full analysis of it. How much of who I am is what resides in my mind, though? It can't be all of it. Though I may be the only with access to the inside of me, I am also the only one without access to visual or aural perception of myself from without. While motivations and desires (which exist somewhere outside the physical) are key in comprising who we are, it must also be said that many of these thoughts/beliefs/motivations, are not really that real unless incarnated. Once they become incarnate, we are no longer their only perceiver, others can perceive and interact with them. While others might be able to perceive these actions/manifestations/incarnations, this is not directly correlated to a correct appraisal of motivations/thoughts/desires that gave birth to said actions/manifestations/incarnations. [Such causes become more clear, however, in people whose actions seem to follow a discernible pattern, coherently interacting with other motivations, causing correlated action, in different areas of their life. So, it seems that we are the only ones that can understand, with certainty why it is that we do things--or can we? To some extent, probably, and yes, probably better than those around us, however, this may take a higher view of human mental life than I would like to assume. Often (and i think this is biblical) if we aren't aware of the warring passions in our minds, and even if we are, it can become overwhelmingly confusing to discern specific motivations and correlate them to specific actions. It takes work, like most complicated things.
So.
Today we tried to work to a better understanding of ourselves. And by "we" I refer to Mark, Jordan, and Steve. We went through the Strengths Finder 2.0 book (using it more for our own purposes than testing purposes), looking through the list of 30-some adjectives or "strengths" in order to help further identify the gaps in our own lives between perceived motivation from within and perceived motivation from without. There were some discrepancies, not many, but instead of discouraging me by showing how much people, even people around me, don't understand me, it served to be a cool time of encouragement--like a "hey annie, you might not think that this is you, and even if it is not natural to you, you do this, which means this, and it is helpful in this way," or a "hey, annie, you may lack any (or "annie" if that joke is thrown out) empathy, but you are working on it, and we appreciate you for the strengths you do have, and we aren't gonna throw you out because you suck at identifying with peoples hurts."
That is cool. I'm pretty sure that it's part of being the body of Christ--reflecting back to one another the characteristics we have been gifted with, helping one another see where each excels, and where each falls short(of the glory of God), and loving each in either case. This also might be a part of loving God with our mind--the pursuit of understanding Him, through understanding who He created us to be.
Its complicated, but good.
Its not too complicated, even based on the commercials, to know that that one isn't really worth my time.
But, there are some things that are really complicated. Such as:
1. When you are walking outside in the freezing cold, and have forgotten your gloves, where do you put your hands? You could leave them in the cold, or you could put them in your pocket. It may seem like an easy choice, but consider, also, the ice on the ground. If you fall you need your hands--and they are not easily accessible when they are hidden in your pockets.
2. (And the real reason for this post, inspired by today's post-spanish class events) Who you are, versus who other people think you are. It, at first glance, doesn't seem like a complicated problem. I, after all, am the only one with access to my mind, and thus, a full analysis of it. How much of who I am is what resides in my mind, though? It can't be all of it. Though I may be the only with access to the inside of me, I am also the only one without access to visual or aural perception of myself from without. While motivations and desires (which exist somewhere outside the physical) are key in comprising who we are, it must also be said that many of these thoughts/beliefs/motivations, are not really that real unless incarnated. Once they become incarnate, we are no longer their only perceiver, others can perceive and interact with them. While others might be able to perceive these actions/manifestations/incarnations, this is not directly correlated to a correct appraisal of motivations/thoughts/desires that gave birth to said actions/manifestations/incarnations. [Such causes become more clear, however, in people whose actions seem to follow a discernible pattern, coherently interacting with other motivations, causing correlated action, in different areas of their life. So, it seems that we are the only ones that can understand, with certainty why it is that we do things--or can we? To some extent, probably, and yes, probably better than those around us, however, this may take a higher view of human mental life than I would like to assume. Often (and i think this is biblical) if we aren't aware of the warring passions in our minds, and even if we are, it can become overwhelmingly confusing to discern specific motivations and correlate them to specific actions. It takes work, like most complicated things.
So.
Today we tried to work to a better understanding of ourselves. And by "we" I refer to Mark, Jordan, and Steve. We went through the Strengths Finder 2.0 book (using it more for our own purposes than testing purposes), looking through the list of 30-some adjectives or "strengths" in order to help further identify the gaps in our own lives between perceived motivation from within and perceived motivation from without. There were some discrepancies, not many, but instead of discouraging me by showing how much people, even people around me, don't understand me, it served to be a cool time of encouragement--like a "hey annie, you might not think that this is you, and even if it is not natural to you, you do this, which means this, and it is helpful in this way," or a "hey, annie, you may lack any (or "annie" if that joke is thrown out) empathy, but you are working on it, and we appreciate you for the strengths you do have, and we aren't gonna throw you out because you suck at identifying with peoples hurts."
That is cool. I'm pretty sure that it's part of being the body of Christ--reflecting back to one another the characteristics we have been gifted with, helping one another see where each excels, and where each falls short(of the glory of God), and loving each in either case. This also might be a part of loving God with our mind--the pursuit of understanding Him, through understanding who He created us to be.
Its complicated, but good.
1.02.2010
{compulsory}
Its the new year....I have to write a blog post. Everyone else is.
{Maybe I should make a new year's resolution to be less of a conformist}
-a half hour later-
I literally thought forever(a half hour) about what I could write.
I just can't think meaningfully about my life in years, or months, or weeks, or days.
So I won't.
{New Year's resolution: fulfilled}
{Maybe I should make a new year's resolution to be less of a conformist}
-a half hour later-
I literally thought forever(a half hour) about what I could write.
I just can't think meaningfully about my life in years, or months, or weeks, or days.
So I won't.
{New Year's resolution: fulfilled}
12.10.2009
What do philosophy majors do?
This.
This is a paper for my metaphysics class. You probably won't want to read the whole thing. You might. It shouldn't be too confusing, except that my writing skills are not quite honed. I'm just putting it here for posterity's sake. We all know how often hard drives crash these days.
Enough. Here it is--
All is Flux: What Change Means for the Persistence of Personal Identity
Change, the becoming different of certain particulars, has posed no small problem in philosophy throughout time. It would seem that “to be” would mean to remain the same, thereby maintaining the same “being,” and persisting in identity. Quickly though, we are posed with a problem when an entity that possesses “being” is “becoming” something else by change of some property. We are left with a few different options to explain such a phenomenon. We can deny change all together; but this option seems counterintuitive, as this discussion would be irrelevant if change wasn't evident all around us. Or, we can affirm that change occurs and that because of this, nothing persists in its identity; but here again, by merely examining this problem over a long period of time, we affirm ability to conceive of, at least, our own existence as persisting mentally. We can explain away change in many different ways to show that the identity of anything with an essence, a mind, or a memory can persist. But, in this paper, I would like to go a step further than this mere explaining away, and explore the paradox of change in light of the Aristotelian notions of material, final, and efficient causation, and its potential to not only destroy persistence of personal identity, but instead, to allow a being to step into a fuller identity.
One of the primary “paradoxes of change” comes in a series of questions about the nature of “Locke's Socks.” In this paradox, socks, and not persons, are the subject, making the problem simpler, but nevertheless, providing a principle that can be abstracted. John Locke wonders about whether, when his sock develops a hole, it is the same sock if he patches it. He wonders further, if this process were to continue until all the material of the sock was entirely replaced, would the sock, lacking all of the original material, be the same sock? Does its identity persist despite lack of identical material substance? I think that in order to “answer” these questions we need to ask another question in response: Can anything be “itself” when it is not fulfilling its purpose? It seems clear that a sock is intimately tied to its purpose, and thus is more itself when it is patched. In Aristotelian terms, this purpose is a “final cause,” the end for which a thing was created. Thus, the sock's “being” is found in fulfillment of that purpose. This not to say that what it is made of, in Aristotelian terms, its “material cause” is unimportant, but to say that materials do, in all cases, deteriorate. This seems to be a reason to assert, to all material causes, the property of deterioration or change, leaving us unsurprised when deteriorating material properties take away the ability to fulfill a purpose.
Upon further reflection, it seems that change is a property that resides above and within the materials themselves, existing as a meta-property. And purpose, or final causation, is a property that we ascribe, by mere creation, to all things, a kind of teleological meta-property. The issue, and where the paradox seems to lie, is where these two meta-properties conflict, the point at which change or deterioration runs against an entity's ability to accomplish its final cause. A decision must be made about whether we consider the teleological property supersedes an entity's deterioration, in this case, a sock's deterioration.
When we attempt to apply what we have learned from the sock to our experience as human beings, we find that the problem becomes much more complicated. Besides a difference in final cause, the sock's situation is distinct from the human person's situation in that for the person there is a conscious volition, whereas the sock, and how its identity will persist, are the conscious choice of not the sock, but the wearer of the sock. It is here that the sock analogy diverges from the true subject of this paper, the persistence of personal identity.
Taking care to be thorough, and fair, we will present this paradox of identity with the human person as the subject of inquiry. Human persons, like socks, possess, at least, the two causes we have spoken of thus far, material and final. The socks, like the human persons, possess a third Aristotelian “cause,” the “efficient cause,” or creator, though this cause is less important when we discuss the sock because of the wide range of efficient causes for the wide range socks we might encounter in the world. It is also important to note that the despite this diversity of socks we find in the world, the final cause of a sock is much more widely agreed upon, making it easier to diagnose a view on how to weigh the teleological property and its intersection with its material meta-property of change in the sock's persistence of identity, though even that is, by no means, a simple task.
With these differences in mind, we will begin to work out a view of identity for human persons. We acknowledge that humans change, sometimes as a result of personal volition and action, sometimes as a result of material deterioration, or sometimes as a result of intervening outside causes. There are, unlike the socks, many ways that a person can change, many of them being immaterial or mental. But, like with the socks, personal material causes will naturally change, according to their meta-property of deterioration or change, which is as persistent as the materials themselves. And before considering other changes that may happen less naturally, or without conscious choice, we must decide on the teleological meta-property of human beings, because, like the socks, whether or not change conforms with a human person's final cause is a determining factor in how personal identity persists. And here there are a variety of highly debated options, but, as with all other material entities, I assert that there is a final cause to the human person, something that many would not do, and that even further, this final cause emanates from the efficient cause, or creator, the God of the Christian Bible, which is, again, one more large step in a direction many would not take. However, on Aristotle's view, the burden of proof is on those who would want to rid his system of final and efficient causes as they pertain to the human person. I will move forward asserting that these causes do not only exist, but highly inform personal identity and its persistence over time.
Thus far I have ascribed to the human person an efficient cause, the God of the Bible; a final cause, or teleological meta-property, found in the purposes of the efficient cause; a material cause, the stuff human persons are made of; and the meta-property of change or deterioration effecting material cause (which may or may not be all material, depending on one's view, but is a discussion outside the scope of this paper). When this point was reached in the analysis of the sock's identity, the teleological meta-property, that a sock would insulate a person's foot, and the meta-property of deterioration of material cause, which caused the sock to have holes, were pointed out as conflicting meta-properties. If the teleological meta-property is seen as most important, then the sock retains its identity, even when patched, and perhaps moves even closer to its original identity when the patch is applied. This patching can even be seen as a reversal of the material deterioration meta-property, a material reclamation property, acknowledging that the material is merely a means to a fulfillment of purpose. However, if the material deterioration meta-property is seen as preeminent, then when it is patched the sock loses its identity. It is also important to note that even without the patch, a sock with holes in it will have an identity devoid of purpose in the end since, even though it is the “same” sock because it has stayed true to it's meta-property of deterioration, it can no longer be the material between foot and shoe, so any clinging onto a strictly material deterioration meta-property as distinct from the teleological meta-property is a denial of persistence of purposeful identity. When we begin to apply this to the human person we see a similar dilemma, where do we place identity? Which of these meta-properties will win out?
For the Christian, it seems that the material cause is quite important. In scripture, an emphasis is placed on the body, mind, and soul—all components that “materially” (this word is used loosely) comprise a human person. It is important, however, to note that in the majority of cases, when scripture speaks to these material causes, it pairs them with efficient and final causes as well. In 1 Corinthians 6:19-20, Paul states, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought with a price. Therefore honor God with your body.” He speaks of the material cause, the body, as subject to the final and efficient causes, honoring God and His purposes with the material cause. Paul goes farther, in Romans 12:1-2, when he urges the people “to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” Not only is the body subject to this teleological meta-property, but so too with the mind—both are subjugated to the will of God. The whole of scripture speaks to this truth. Man, who is separated from God, is deteriorating on a number of levels, his material cause is subject to the fall, to the meta-property of deterioration. This, for many, is a defining property, and thus, their identity “persists” by a natural deterioration meta-property.
For many, the deterioration of their human mind and soul is something they are not aware of (though most are quite aware of bodily deterioration), and in the search to find and assert a final and efficient causation, people create their own teleological meta-properties to cope with the meta-property of deterioration—as if that is something that can be done, man not having created himself. For the Christian, the problem of deterioration is no less of a problem, but the Christian person, acknowledging the deterioration, also acknowledges a higher meta-property, a teleological meta-property, rooted outside of himself in his final and efficient causes. He asserts the existence and importance of the material cause in one's identity as it conforms to a “renewal,” taking the meta-property of deterioration and flipping it on its head, allowing life and purpose-giving change, in the mind and soul, hoping for this same bodily renewal after death. On the Christian view, the final cause, God, and the efficient cause, his purposes, directly oppose the human material causes, which have fallen out of accord with the former two causes. Paul bemoans this fact in Romans 7:22-24 saying, “For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” The answer, for Paul, and other Christians is found in the person of Christ, who bridged this meta-property gap, and allowed us to say that “In [God, our Final Cause] we live, and move, and have our being.” It is because of Christ that a Christian may not only persist in identity only on the basis the property of deterioration, but, align his material cause with the pursuit of his final cause, often called sanctification, resulting in an even fuller identity.
This is a paper for my metaphysics class. You probably won't want to read the whole thing. You might. It shouldn't be too confusing, except that my writing skills are not quite honed. I'm just putting it here for posterity's sake. We all know how often hard drives crash these days.
Enough. Here it is--
All is Flux: What Change Means for the Persistence of Personal Identity
Change, the becoming different of certain particulars, has posed no small problem in philosophy throughout time. It would seem that “to be” would mean to remain the same, thereby maintaining the same “being,” and persisting in identity. Quickly though, we are posed with a problem when an entity that possesses “being” is “becoming” something else by change of some property. We are left with a few different options to explain such a phenomenon. We can deny change all together; but this option seems counterintuitive, as this discussion would be irrelevant if change wasn't evident all around us. Or, we can affirm that change occurs and that because of this, nothing persists in its identity; but here again, by merely examining this problem over a long period of time, we affirm ability to conceive of, at least, our own existence as persisting mentally. We can explain away change in many different ways to show that the identity of anything with an essence, a mind, or a memory can persist. But, in this paper, I would like to go a step further than this mere explaining away, and explore the paradox of change in light of the Aristotelian notions of material, final, and efficient causation, and its potential to not only destroy persistence of personal identity, but instead, to allow a being to step into a fuller identity.
One of the primary “paradoxes of change” comes in a series of questions about the nature of “Locke's Socks.” In this paradox, socks, and not persons, are the subject, making the problem simpler, but nevertheless, providing a principle that can be abstracted. John Locke wonders about whether, when his sock develops a hole, it is the same sock if he patches it. He wonders further, if this process were to continue until all the material of the sock was entirely replaced, would the sock, lacking all of the original material, be the same sock? Does its identity persist despite lack of identical material substance? I think that in order to “answer” these questions we need to ask another question in response: Can anything be “itself” when it is not fulfilling its purpose? It seems clear that a sock is intimately tied to its purpose, and thus is more itself when it is patched. In Aristotelian terms, this purpose is a “final cause,” the end for which a thing was created. Thus, the sock's “being” is found in fulfillment of that purpose. This not to say that what it is made of, in Aristotelian terms, its “material cause” is unimportant, but to say that materials do, in all cases, deteriorate. This seems to be a reason to assert, to all material causes, the property of deterioration or change, leaving us unsurprised when deteriorating material properties take away the ability to fulfill a purpose.
Upon further reflection, it seems that change is a property that resides above and within the materials themselves, existing as a meta-property. And purpose, or final causation, is a property that we ascribe, by mere creation, to all things, a kind of teleological meta-property. The issue, and where the paradox seems to lie, is where these two meta-properties conflict, the point at which change or deterioration runs against an entity's ability to accomplish its final cause. A decision must be made about whether we consider the teleological property supersedes an entity's deterioration, in this case, a sock's deterioration.
When we attempt to apply what we have learned from the sock to our experience as human beings, we find that the problem becomes much more complicated. Besides a difference in final cause, the sock's situation is distinct from the human person's situation in that for the person there is a conscious volition, whereas the sock, and how its identity will persist, are the conscious choice of not the sock, but the wearer of the sock. It is here that the sock analogy diverges from the true subject of this paper, the persistence of personal identity.
Taking care to be thorough, and fair, we will present this paradox of identity with the human person as the subject of inquiry. Human persons, like socks, possess, at least, the two causes we have spoken of thus far, material and final. The socks, like the human persons, possess a third Aristotelian “cause,” the “efficient cause,” or creator, though this cause is less important when we discuss the sock because of the wide range of efficient causes for the wide range socks we might encounter in the world. It is also important to note that the despite this diversity of socks we find in the world, the final cause of a sock is much more widely agreed upon, making it easier to diagnose a view on how to weigh the teleological property and its intersection with its material meta-property of change in the sock's persistence of identity, though even that is, by no means, a simple task.
With these differences in mind, we will begin to work out a view of identity for human persons. We acknowledge that humans change, sometimes as a result of personal volition and action, sometimes as a result of material deterioration, or sometimes as a result of intervening outside causes. There are, unlike the socks, many ways that a person can change, many of them being immaterial or mental. But, like with the socks, personal material causes will naturally change, according to their meta-property of deterioration or change, which is as persistent as the materials themselves. And before considering other changes that may happen less naturally, or without conscious choice, we must decide on the teleological meta-property of human beings, because, like the socks, whether or not change conforms with a human person's final cause is a determining factor in how personal identity persists. And here there are a variety of highly debated options, but, as with all other material entities, I assert that there is a final cause to the human person, something that many would not do, and that even further, this final cause emanates from the efficient cause, or creator, the God of the Christian Bible, which is, again, one more large step in a direction many would not take. However, on Aristotle's view, the burden of proof is on those who would want to rid his system of final and efficient causes as they pertain to the human person. I will move forward asserting that these causes do not only exist, but highly inform personal identity and its persistence over time.
Thus far I have ascribed to the human person an efficient cause, the God of the Bible; a final cause, or teleological meta-property, found in the purposes of the efficient cause; a material cause, the stuff human persons are made of; and the meta-property of change or deterioration effecting material cause (which may or may not be all material, depending on one's view, but is a discussion outside the scope of this paper). When this point was reached in the analysis of the sock's identity, the teleological meta-property, that a sock would insulate a person's foot, and the meta-property of deterioration of material cause, which caused the sock to have holes, were pointed out as conflicting meta-properties. If the teleological meta-property is seen as most important, then the sock retains its identity, even when patched, and perhaps moves even closer to its original identity when the patch is applied. This patching can even be seen as a reversal of the material deterioration meta-property, a material reclamation property, acknowledging that the material is merely a means to a fulfillment of purpose. However, if the material deterioration meta-property is seen as preeminent, then when it is patched the sock loses its identity. It is also important to note that even without the patch, a sock with holes in it will have an identity devoid of purpose in the end since, even though it is the “same” sock because it has stayed true to it's meta-property of deterioration, it can no longer be the material between foot and shoe, so any clinging onto a strictly material deterioration meta-property as distinct from the teleological meta-property is a denial of persistence of purposeful identity. When we begin to apply this to the human person we see a similar dilemma, where do we place identity? Which of these meta-properties will win out?
For the Christian, it seems that the material cause is quite important. In scripture, an emphasis is placed on the body, mind, and soul—all components that “materially” (this word is used loosely) comprise a human person. It is important, however, to note that in the majority of cases, when scripture speaks to these material causes, it pairs them with efficient and final causes as well. In 1 Corinthians 6:19-20, Paul states, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought with a price. Therefore honor God with your body.” He speaks of the material cause, the body, as subject to the final and efficient causes, honoring God and His purposes with the material cause. Paul goes farther, in Romans 12:1-2, when he urges the people “to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” Not only is the body subject to this teleological meta-property, but so too with the mind—both are subjugated to the will of God. The whole of scripture speaks to this truth. Man, who is separated from God, is deteriorating on a number of levels, his material cause is subject to the fall, to the meta-property of deterioration. This, for many, is a defining property, and thus, their identity “persists” by a natural deterioration meta-property.
For many, the deterioration of their human mind and soul is something they are not aware of (though most are quite aware of bodily deterioration), and in the search to find and assert a final and efficient causation, people create their own teleological meta-properties to cope with the meta-property of deterioration—as if that is something that can be done, man not having created himself. For the Christian, the problem of deterioration is no less of a problem, but the Christian person, acknowledging the deterioration, also acknowledges a higher meta-property, a teleological meta-property, rooted outside of himself in his final and efficient causes. He asserts the existence and importance of the material cause in one's identity as it conforms to a “renewal,” taking the meta-property of deterioration and flipping it on its head, allowing life and purpose-giving change, in the mind and soul, hoping for this same bodily renewal after death. On the Christian view, the final cause, God, and the efficient cause, his purposes, directly oppose the human material causes, which have fallen out of accord with the former two causes. Paul bemoans this fact in Romans 7:22-24 saying, “For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” The answer, for Paul, and other Christians is found in the person of Christ, who bridged this meta-property gap, and allowed us to say that “In [God, our Final Cause] we live, and move, and have our being.” It is because of Christ that a Christian may not only persist in identity only on the basis the property of deterioration, but, align his material cause with the pursuit of his final cause, often called sanctification, resulting in an even fuller identity.
12.03.2009
Excuses, excuses. and pardons.
I think that we don't make enough excuses for people.
Christ gave up his life to pardon all, including the ones nailing Him to the cross. He did this unconditionally, He did this though He didn't deserve it, He did this even though we didn't deserve it, He did it knowing full well that many would not accept or even acknowledge His sacrifice, He did all the work, not expecting us to do anything, He, alone paid the price for things that He didn't do.
He took blame, and excused us from it, he pardoned us from it.
Where, in our lives, do we make excuses for the life and death of Jesus not being the focus? Where do we not make excuses for other people, like we excuse ourselves? We have been taught, many of us, since we were young, that “[We] are Special.” Max Lucado wrote a book about it. We are convinced of it. And honestly, we are. God loves us so much that He sent His son to be our excuse, our pardon. We have been taught that we are special enough for that. We, thus, end up loving ourselves like that. Which, is by no means a bad thing. We make excuses for ourselves all day long. We pardon ourselves, attributing failure to a bad environment, or a slip of the tongue. But, when it comes to other people, we are quick to blame mistakes on intrinsic motivators. So, if I say something mean to someone, I make an excuse for myself, but if someone else says something mean to me, I don't allow them such an excuse, instead, I blame it on all the malice in their heart. In psychology, this phenomenon is called the attribution theory.
We get so caught up in receiving love or giving it to ourselves (in the form of excuses), that we fail to remember that the love we have received in the person of Christ, calls us to be the bearers of that love, giving as we have received. In the same way we have received pardon, we are to pardon others, whether they deserve it or not. This not to say that Christ died as an act of making all the bad things that we had done perfectly acceptable, but instead, that he died that his love might cover a multitude of sins, making us perfectly acceptable.
Perhaps this is what "loving others as we love ourselves" means. I love myself enough to give myself excuses. Loving others might mean excusing others in the same way I allow myself to be excused, forgiving as I have been forgiven.
Christ gave up his life to pardon all, including the ones nailing Him to the cross. He did this unconditionally, He did this though He didn't deserve it, He did this even though we didn't deserve it, He did it knowing full well that many would not accept or even acknowledge His sacrifice, He did all the work, not expecting us to do anything, He, alone paid the price for things that He didn't do.
He took blame, and excused us from it, he pardoned us from it.
Where, in our lives, do we make excuses for the life and death of Jesus not being the focus? Where do we not make excuses for other people, like we excuse ourselves? We have been taught, many of us, since we were young, that “[We] are Special.” Max Lucado wrote a book about it. We are convinced of it. And honestly, we are. God loves us so much that He sent His son to be our excuse, our pardon. We have been taught that we are special enough for that. We, thus, end up loving ourselves like that. Which, is by no means a bad thing. We make excuses for ourselves all day long. We pardon ourselves, attributing failure to a bad environment, or a slip of the tongue. But, when it comes to other people, we are quick to blame mistakes on intrinsic motivators. So, if I say something mean to someone, I make an excuse for myself, but if someone else says something mean to me, I don't allow them such an excuse, instead, I blame it on all the malice in their heart. In psychology, this phenomenon is called the attribution theory.
We get so caught up in receiving love or giving it to ourselves (in the form of excuses), that we fail to remember that the love we have received in the person of Christ, calls us to be the bearers of that love, giving as we have received. In the same way we have received pardon, we are to pardon others, whether they deserve it or not. This not to say that Christ died as an act of making all the bad things that we had done perfectly acceptable, but instead, that he died that his love might cover a multitude of sins, making us perfectly acceptable.
Perhaps this is what "loving others as we love ourselves" means. I love myself enough to give myself excuses. Loving others might mean excusing others in the same way I allow myself to be excused, forgiving as I have been forgiven.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)