Another gratuitous shot at Roman Catholicism

To a Protestant such as myself, the perpetual virginity of Mary is one of the loopier of the doctrines fabricated by Rome. As my best friend in college (now a Methodist pastor, of all things) put it, "If Mary was ever virgin, it's Joseph we should be worshiping."

As I prepare to preach Luke 2:41-52 this Sunday, it seems plausible that Mary and Joseph might have lost track of Jesus for a few hours, but for an entire day? That seems unlikely if they had only one child. If, on the other hand, they had four, six, seven or more children, any parent of two or more children can understand how the boy Jesus was able to wander off on his own, unaccounted for: Mary had to have more children than one on her hands.

Given the size of the average faithful Roman Catholic family, many of them will no doubt realize the integrity of this argument and shortly embrace Protestantism.

Antepenultimate

Because, all day tomorrow, English will need a word for "third from the end."

Glad tidings of great joy

Just under the wire, I've found a Christmas album for 2012: John Roderick and Jonathan Coulton's One Christmas at a Time, available for immediate download through the wonders of the webernet. Why it's worth your while: the long needed, but not until now composed, song about "The Week Between" Christmas and New Year, when the spirit careens between ennui and despair.

And on that note, merry Christmas!

Mary and the empty womb

“Mary” is the Anglicization of the Hellenized version of the Hebrew name “Miriam.”   The only Miriam in the Old Testament is the sister of Moses and Aaron, who plays a prominent role in the Exodus account.  Although the case cannot be proven conclusively, the name “Miriam” appears to bear some etymological relationship to “mar”, the Hebrew word for bitter.   This is further reinforced when we consider that Miriam was notorious for her and Aaron’s rebellion against Moses, precipitated by a bitter complaint (Numbers 12).   While Naomi does not call herself “Miriam” to accent her bitterness towards God, the name she does make up (Ruth 1:19) is based on the same root word.   Therefore, Naomi’s “bitter” name is simply another version of the name which would become “Mary” in the New Testament.

    Only two “Marys” (Miriam and Naomi) are found in the Old Testa ment, and both are infamous for their bitterness.  In the Gospel era, however, Marys pop up all over the place.  There is Mary, mother of our Lord;  Mary Magdalene;  Mary, mother of James;  Mary, mother of Clopas;  Mary, mother of John Mark;  and Mary, sister of Martha.   None of these women has a reputation for bitterness.  Indeed, if anything, they are well-known for remarkable faithfulness and piety.  Thus, the reason for their names must be found someplace other than in their personal characters.  Why would so many Israelite parents be naming their daughters “Bitter” around the time of Christ’s earthly ministry?

    The answer can be found in a consideration of redemptive history.  The last writing prophet of the Old Covenant Era, Micah, prophesied that the Day of the Lord was coming, on which the sun of righteousness would rise with healing in his wings (Malachi 4:2).  Four hundred years had passed, during which Israel waited eagerly for one like Elijah to come as a herald for this Messiah (Malachi 4:5-6).   Four hundred years is a long time to wait.  Many, no doubt, began to wonder if their hope was in vain.  I am reminded of a line from Langston Hughes:

What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?

    Hope denied very quickly sours into frustration.  The dream of the Messiah seemed endlessly deferred.  Israel became bitter in her frustration, naming her daughters “Mary.”

    Mary, the mother of Jesus, is thus representative of all Israel.  Figuratively speaking, she is the bitter barren woman.  Recall the recurrent Old Testament theme of the empty womb.  Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Hannah all were barren, and each consequently experienced some degree of bitterness.  Naomi’s bitterness also grew out of her empty womb, although her childlessness was the consequence of her sons’ deaths, along with menopause (Ruth 1:11-13).  In each case, these women were barren because the Lord had withheld conception from them, and each one had to wait on the Lord to open her womb.  

    The empty womb, then, represents the bitterness of frustrated hope, along with the requirement to wait on the Lord to reverse the situation and bring blessing.  Mary’s virgin womb was empty, symbolizing the bitterness of Israel, which was without her promised Messiah.  Just as a virgin cannot conceive a child by herself, Israel could not create her own Savior.  The nation would have to wait patiently for the Lord to send the Christ, just as a virgin must not become bitter, but instead wait patiently for the Lord to send children to her.

    The empty womb motif is a type, a prefigurement, which finds its fulfillment in the birth of Jesus.  When Israel’s Redeemer came through her, Mary became Pleasant, singing songs of praise to the Lord (Luke 1:46-55).  As she represented a ll of Israel, Christ’s birth is surrounded by exclamations and songs of thanksgiving from many (Luke 1:38, 41-45, 67-79; 2:13-14, 29-32).  With the Advent of Christ, Judah became a pleasant land again.  Mary, as she represents the bitterness of Israel, was prefigured in the bitter Naomi, who was made truly Pleasant when a redeemer was born to her, through Ruth (Ruth 4:14-15). 

    The meaning of the symbolic pattern of barrenness in Scripture thus becomes clear.  When the Lord opens the empty womb, he provides not merely a child, but a redeemer.  Its implications for you should also be obvious.  The Lord will reverse your bitterness through Jesus Christ, the Redeemer he has given to you.  In Christ alone shall your life be made pleasant and sweet.

Holiday cheer

For the second year in a row, I've not found any Christmas albums about which to get excited. The flagship compilation is Holiday Fun, featuring the usual list of hipster musicians and sold by (at least) Amazon, eMusic, and Starbucks, giving it ubiquity; however, it lacks any notable or innovative contributions. Tracey Thorn offered Tinsel and Lights, which maintains her Everything-but-the-Girl post-Ben Watt's electronica phase middle-age melancholy: satisfying song-writing, but not much for holiday cheer. I've also been downloading some Johnny Cash Christmas albums from Freegal, but lest's be honest: this isn't the work for which he'll be remembered.

This year, I recommend you save yourself some money and go to Noisetrade. There, you will find Fireplace Songs and the Paste Holiday Sampler to just as satisfying as anything for which you'd shell out shekels this year.

On the upside, I found a new Christmas beer! The famed Spoetzl brewery of Shiner, Texas, is now offering Holiday Cheer, a "Dunkelweizen brewed with Texas peaches and roasted pecans." I last enjoyed wheat beers around the time I wed Mrs. Curmudgeon (I remember drinking Samuel Adams' Summer Ale during our July honeymoon), but Holiday Cheer has none of the yeast and granular feel on the tongue to which I object. Maybe it's the darker wheat, or maybe it's the peach sugars, but it's refreshing and, simultaneously, bold enough to stand up to other winter ales. I recommend drinking it all by its lonesome in order to appreciate the complex interaction of the flavors.

Get a six-pack of Holiday Cheer, and you may not need a ground-breaking Christmas album.

An excuse to freak out

Today I heard David Stuart, the archaeologist who translated the Mayan tablet which pegs December 21, 2012 as the end of an important cycle in time, but not the end of the world, explain the late hoopla thusly: "I think in our culture, too, or maybe globally — humans like to come up with excuses, sometimes, just to freak out."

And while we're on the subject of unnecessary freaking out:

 

Veneration of saints or of Christ (Calvin's Institutes, Battles edition: pp. 673 [vol. 1])

To refute the practice of selling indulgences, Calvin goes after the papist doctrine of the "treasury of merit," which holds that the saints have performed more good works than they need to satisfy their own accounts, these "supererogatory" or extra works go into a treasury, and the riches of this treasury can be dispensed to less worthy Christians on the authority of the pope of Rome. If the merits of Christ can be intermingled with the saints, Calvin asks,

What is this but to leave Christ only a name, to make him another common saintlet who can scarcely be distinguished in the throng?

The same question, it seems to me, can be asked more directly regarding the entire practice of venerating the saints in general and the Virgin Mary in particular. When considering popular Roman Catholic piety, I find it rather difficult to distinguish Christ from the throng.

Maybe if Juan Diego of Guadalupe could paint a really cool mural of Jesus...

Vengeance vs. chastisement (Calvin's Institutes, Battles edition: pp. 658-669 [vol. 1])

Given that the title of Book III, chapter IV is "How Far from the Purity of the Gospel Is All that the Sophists in their Schools Prate about Repentance; Discussion of Confession and Satisfaction," I went into it expecting some choice put-downs of Calvin's whipping-boys, the Scholastics and Peter Lombard, but not a whole lot of positive teaching on the doctrine of repentance. Cheerfully, however, I've discovered the exposition of error can lead to some helpful clarification.

Towards the end of the chapter, Calvin takes up a matter which perenially troubles believers: namely, whether we should expect God to punish us for our sins in this lifetime. Building primarily on Augustine and Chrysostom, Calvin points out that the wicked experience punishment for their sins in this life, but the children of God experience chastisements from their heavenly Father. These latter cannot be punishments because Christ has already paid full satisfaction for our sins. A summary of his argument comes in section 33.

But the children are beaten with rods, not to pay the penalty for their sins to God, but in order thereby to be led to repentance. Accordingly, we understand that these things have to do rather with the future than the past. I would prefer to express this thought in the words of Chrysostom rather than my own: "On this account," he says, "he imposes a penalty upon us–not to punish us for past sins, but to correct us against future ones."

7 Things a Pastor's Kid Needs from a Father

I well remember Bill Shishko, pastor of Franklin Square OPC in New York, saying that there's nothing in the Bible which puts pastors in a separate category from all other husbands and fathers. To that can be added this useful essay from a pastor's kid, Barnabas Piper, on the Gospel Coalition site.

The inconsistent curmudgeon

Try as I might, I find it very difficult to maintain an appropriately dour presbyterian demeanor when Tiger Cubs are JUST SO CUTE!!!

Just 8 more days until Christmas. I should be better soon...

The Color of Christ

On November 19, NPR's Fresh Air ran an interview with Edward Blum, co-author of The Color of Christ: The Son of God and the Saga of Race in America. I don't know Mr. Blum's theological training, but he offered a profound insight into idolatry when he said,

And so when the Klan wants to justify violence, when they want to justify exclusion, they don't have Biblical texts for it. They just don't have written texts. So they have to turn to image. And so the belief, the value that Jesus was white provides them an image in place of text.

In the American South, the white majority needed a version of Christianity which permitted it to oppress racial minorities, and used images, or more precisely idols, to create it. In medieval and contemporary Roman Catholicism, images of the Virgin Mary have promoted a popular Mariology utterly without support from Scripture. Of course, the phenomenon isn't limited to Klansmen and Catholics. As any presbyterian pastor who's removed images of Christ from a Church building can tell you, those pictures have a profound grip on all Christians' theological imagination.

In God's providence, an answer I recently wrote in my role as a doctrinal correspondent is featured on the hope page of opc.org this week, in which I discuss why God no longer gives supernatural revelations. That argument is firmly grounded in the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture, which doctrine, it seems to me, also rules out any need for images. Just as new "revelations" tend to lead people away from the truth of the Gospel, so do idolatrous images of our Savior.

As Hebrews 1:1-2 says, "Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world." Since the Son has spoken, and since his Word is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, what need have we of images?

Another dystopia averted

I subscribe to the BBC news feed so I can stay informed on topics the American media is afraid to cover, and boy, am I now relieved I do. I have had some sleepless nights since Mrs. Curmudgeon picked up a used Roomba from eBay, but now I, with Philip K. Dick's androids, can blissfully dream of electric sheep. The Cambridge Project for Existential Risk will, in the words of the BBC, study the "risk of a robot uprising wiping out the human race." Let's hear it for bold, and absolutely necessary, scientific inquiry.

As Mrs. Curmudgeon is prone to ask, how do I get any work done?

 

The Million Puppet March

For those in need of a whimsy fix the day before the U.S. election, courtesy of Ma Curmudgeon.

What Would Lincoln Do?

Somebody at Time no doubt thought themselves very clever for having put that question on the cover last week. (Perhaps not surprisingly, it wasn't answered between the covers; as the brief discussion of Lincoln was merely a pretext to run a fawning piece on Daniel Day-Lewis, the cover which appeared in the rest of the world would have been more honest. Who knew that shouting all one's lines makes one a great actor? Other than Sean Penn, I mean.)

However, I actually ask that question with some frequency. Ma Curmudgeon once told me it's unreasonable to expect every politician to be Abraham Lincoln, but I don't know why. Lincoln's greatness was abetted by his savvy political instincts and an astonishing mastery of American rhetorical craftsmanship, but it was grounded in a clear understanding of the American experiment in maintaining civil liberties through representative government, as articulated by the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. For all their elegance and eloquence, neither of those documents is particularly hard to understand. In that sense, in comprehending and furthering just what this country is all about, anyone could have Lincoln's clarity of vision and purpose. And frankly, anyone running for national office should.

I voted on Tuesday, instead of waiting for Election Day, mostly to put myself out of my misery. I didn't listen to the presidential debates because I'm working on not screaming at the radio so much, and I expect that I'll also take a pass on the victory speech delivered by whoever. I'll wager two things about that speech, though: it will make reference to Lincoln and/or his words, and will reflect a complete inability to grasp his understanding of this great country of ours.

Big Man in Presbytery

This last summer, the 40th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America came down solidly against the practice of intinction; that is, partaking of the Lord’s Supper by dipping the bread into the cup rather than eating the bread and then drinking from the cup. In an essay entitled “Adiaphora and Intinction” found on byFaith, the Rev. Terry Johnson argues against intinction not on Biblical grounds, but because it is out of accord with our inherited presbyterian and reformed practice.

While many might find this line of argument of objectionable, preferring only Biblical arguments, I do not. I suspect Mr. Johnson agrees with the PCA’s 40th GA that intinction fails on Scriptural grounds because our Lord prayed over and distributed the two elements separately; I myself find that observation compelling. Appealing to our presbyterian tradition is a subordinate form of argumentation, but is entirely legitimate when one wishes to find support for a main point. As Mr. Johnson notes, in 1 Corinthians 11:2-16, the Apostle Paul himself presents precisely this form of argument: a practice is unlawful according to Biblical revelation, and is also out of conformity with the custom of the Churches.

Mr. Johnson goes on to suggest intinction is motivated by an unwise desire to celebrate the Lord’s Supper weekly, counter to Puritan and Scottish Presbyterian practice of less frequent “communion seasons,” in which the sacrament is preceded with a week or so of special services in which the preaching exhorts listeners to prepare themselves to receive the elements. This is in fact his main point, as he concludes, "Attempts to alter established practices in order to rush the administration of the Lord’s Supper are, from the perspective of Reformed Protestantism, both theologically and pastorally dubious." This comes as no surprise from a pastor who has made his reputation as something of an Old School presbyterian and strong proponent of the regulative principle of worship.

So far, so much to be expected, until one reads the biographical note after the essay’s conclusion: “Terry Johnson is senior pastor of Independent Presbyterian Church in Savannah, Ga.” Mr. Johnson serves a congregation which has made an oxymoron its very name. How is it, then, that he can admonish the readers of byFaith to adhere to traditional reformed practices when he has evidently failed to persuade his own congregation to abandon the manifestly anti-presbyterian custom of independency?

Very simply, because Mr. Johnson is a Big Man in the PCA. "Big Man Syndrome" is not peculiar to the PCA (although it sadly is a celebrated feature of the culture of those native to the American South), as any number of Big Men can be found in the assemblies of all reformed and presbyterian communions. The Big Man, by virtue of his position, is above criticism and so can freely, and without any apparent sense of irony, admonish others for failing to live by standards he himself would appear to be unacquainted with in personal practice. In Mr. Johnson's case, he is so convinced that weekly communion is unwise that he appeals to a traditon which more vigorously anathematizes his own pastoral position than it does intinction, and byFaith, not The Onion, runs the article.

With Mr. Johnson, I'd like to see presbyterians more self-consciously maintain our traditions (although I believe the regulative principle of worship favors weekly communion over less frequent celebrations). But first, we have to recognize and repent of the corruption introduced into the Church by deferring to the Big Man. Until we do, the traditions of men will continue to triumph over the traditions received from the apostles.

Privatized religion's incoherence

My ears perked up when I heard a self-described evangelical defend recent comments by Indiana senatorial candidate Richard Murdouck, in which he acknowledged God's role in bringing about human life even in cases of rape and incent, on NPR's Morning Edition today. Sadly (and perhaps not surprisingly, given the venue), after Amy Sullivan explained that finding God at work in the worst of circumstances is a staple of both Christian and Jewish theology, she proceeded to reject this doctrine in favor of a god who is not involved in, much less in control of, all events in his creation.

Perhaps more surpisingly, Ms. Sullivan went on to explain that a politician should not impose his moral convictions, derived from religious beliefs, upon others. Ms. Sullivan views these religious beliefs as being merely personal decisions which, given their private character, cannot, by definition, be made normative for other people.

This is a passingly odd position for an evangelical to take. When I traveled in evangelical circles during my eccentric youth, Christ's death as a substitute for sinners was a doctrinal staple. For that to be true, all humanity must be fallen and sinful, and every person has fallen short of God's moral standards which apply universally. That is, if the Christian Gospel is true, it is true only because God has imposed objective moral standards on his creatures; on that principle, a politician might very reasonably argue that abortion violates those standards. Privatized religion simply does not cohere with the public character of the Christian Gospel.

If one wishes to have the Gospel, then there are universal moral standards which a politician might legitimately seek to apply to our nation's laws. In other words, if one believes religious convictions are entirely private, one cannot have the Gospel.

Which of you people say you live in a flat?

The BBC website ran this article on the rise of "Britishisms" in America. With regard to about half of these terms, they're not so much Britishisms as slang terms which happen to be current on both sides of the Atlantic. With regard to the other half: if you're saying "loo," stop.

Right now.

The supportive expectant father

As Mrs. Curmudgeon will happily testify, I always extremely helpful and supportive.

Neighbors act to preserve urban blight

Since the University of Colorado moved its hospital, and everything else even vaguely medical, to just south of Chez Curmudgeon in lovely Aurora, Colorado (there's a Family Dollar right across the street for your shopping convenience!), its former campus at 9th Street and Colorado Boulevard in Denver has stood vacant, providing a perfect breeding ground for vermin and spirits with unfinished business from their terminal hospital stays. Plans centered on a new Wal-Mart had been in work to redevelop the site, but thanks in part to the vociferous opposition of its prospective neighbors, those have been kiboshed.

Which is a great relief, as Denver has diminishingly few scary places in which Stephen King could plausibly set a novel.

Man dies after cockroach-eating competition

Anecdotes and illustrations can sometimes threaten to overwhelm a sermon, but that's not why I use so few. The truth is, I can't come up with them. That's why I find preaching the Proverbs so delightful: real life provides more illustrations of folly than I could ever use in an entire homiletical career.

Christianity & rabbinic Judaism: Twins

On his blog, Peter Leithart summarizes Daniel Boyarin's argument that Christianity and rabbinic (read: modern-day) Judaism are both successors to Temple/Old Testament Judaism, rather than the latter being a kind of parent to the former. It's a historical argument I've often made, one to which Boyarin and Leithart add some interesting theological observations.

Pa Curmudgeon yanks my chain

Pa Curmudgeon sent me this article from the Willamette Week, in which the editors attempt to determine the state with the best beer. According the rules of the contest, Colorado (which, as we all know, has a beer culture vastly superior to that of Portland Oregon) came out pretty low, entirely because Fat Tire was chosen to represent the Centennial State. Well, duh.

Not surprisingly, Oregon came out in the top 10, represented by a porter. This is interesting, as the rules of the contest state, "Most candidates are the best-selling local brews in their homeland." A porter is the best-selling local brew in Oregon. Who knew?

While I disdain Fat Tire just as much as the next guy, let me take this opportunity to defend New Belgium. Its flagship product is nothing to write home about, but much of its output is. A few months ago I discovered Belgo IPA, a Belgian-styled IPA. Generally, I find Belgian ales overly yeasty and off-putting, but when combined with IPA hoppiness, this beer intrigues me to no end. I can't say I love it, but I find it endlessly fascinating, a challenge to which I want to keep coming back.

And no, it doesn't taste like Fat Tire.

Pulpit Freedom Sunday

God help us, it's come to this.

A group called "United in Purpose," which somehow has gotten access to my e-mail address, has organized "Pulpit Freedom Sunday." This coming Lord's Day, October 7, pastors are encouraged to advise their congregations how to vote.

If nothing else, I agree with the organizers that these are dire times and our congregants desperately need to hear how Biblical principles apply to their lives. So I'll be preaching the Gospel.

During both the morning and evening services.

But I'd like to forget

I wish I didn't remember, ever so clearly, the confused and misleading news report I heard on the radio the morning of September 11, 2001, just before I switched it off and went about my day until getting a call from my wife a couple hours later. I wish I could forget the airplanes slamming into those two tall buildings and erase the thought of people choosing between death by an impossible fall or by fire. I wish I could read the comics page on September 11 without Baldo (Baldo!) making me weep.

For that matter, I wish I could think about Japan or Germany without remembering the rape of Nanking and the subjugation of the Korean peninsula and the senseless slaughter of millions of Jews, Poles, and Russians. I'd like to think about my cherished memories of the American South without remembering the unreckonable number lost to the brutal institution of chattel slavery. I dearly wish I could think about the history of my nation and this world without feeling rage and hatred war with  sorrow.

Forgetting is not my problem. Remembering is.

Because I cannot forget, I remember 2 Peter 3:8-14.

But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.

Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.

Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace. 

There is no righteousness now, but righteousness is coming, and is at hand. In light of that, I strive to be found at peace, even while I can never forget.

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Just look at that face.

The cynical amongst my vast international readership might suggest Mrs. Curmudgeon and I would be suckers for pretty much any movie featuring a beautiful African-American girl with (let's be honest) unruly hair who has issues caused by being abandoned by her mother and father. Nonetheless, Beasts of the Southern Wild is, objectively, astonishing.

I won't try to summarize the plot because, while it appears to have one, it really can't be summarized in any way other than the way the curmudgelings summarize movie plots, by exhaustively recounting, scene-by-scene and line by line, everything that occurs. I had read and listened to any number of reviews and interviews with the director before we saw the movie, and I was utterly unprepared for anything that happened. (I should, however, insert a spoiler alert here; I'm a critic, not a reviewer.)

It's easier to jump straight from plot to symbol and archetype: Beasts of the Southern Wild is a consideration of the end of the world executed through a metaphorical account of how New Orleans and the Gulf Coast came through hurricanes Katrina and Rita seven years ago. And yes, it is audacious as all get out.

It works because of Quvenzhané Wallis, who, as Hushpuppy, delivers the most astonishing big-screen debut since Amy Adams in Junebug. The kid doesn't just carry the movie, she is the movie. According to the director, Benh Zeitlin, she rewrote her lines before each day's shooting, which makes me really hope she's responsible for "Kids who got no mommy and daddy have to live in the woods and eat grass and steal underpants." So true, and here's hoping the Adoption Exchange puts that on a bumpersticker.

By turning our attention the residents of the Bathtub, an mythical outpost south of a flood-control levee on the Louisiana Gulf Coast, the film runs the risk of coming off as a patronizing celebration of the noble savage. It escapes this by Court 13's approach to film-making, which is so collaborative it allows a six year-old to write her own lines. The company is comprised of Louisiana locals who had major input into the final product. Moreover, Hushpuppy's father, Wink, is hardly romanticized: his care for his daughter could be generously called "competent" only by a severely delusional hippie, and he also happens to be a violent drunk who is in the process of drinking himself to death. Hushpuppy is the movie's only hero.

Beyond that, Beasts of the Southern Wild is about far more than, well, the southern wild. The bayous are menaced not just by storms, but also by aurochs, prehistoric beasts who ate cave babies and are released from icy suspended animation by the melting of the polar ice caps. (Don't worry: this is all covered in the opening scenes.) The aurochs menace and destroy everything and everyone, not just the Bathtub, so the viewer cannot safely distance himself from the threats facing Hushpuppy and her neighbors.

While I don't think this movie is a celebration of people who make some pretty foolish choices and live a rather sordid lifestyle, it does claim that they, and by metaphorical extension, New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, exist and have a story, and that story should be heard. In that sense, it is a profoundly humanistic film in the sense that it defiantly recognizes that even the lowest of men are created in the image of God and, as such and even if only as such, deserve our recognition. Hushpuppy doesn't summarize the plot, but she does summarize the film when she says at its end, "Future scientists will know there was Hushpuppy, and she lived with her daddy in the Bathtub."

Incomparable Days

Peter Leithart shares a quote from Thomas Oden describing the pastor's great privilege in participating in signal events in the lives of believers. I'm glad to be reminded of these blessings, but a little disappointed the reminder came from a Methodist. Presbyterians and Reformed spill a great deal of ink on the importance of preaching, all of which I agree with, and all of which I'm pretty sure never needs be said again, it having been said over and over again. Just once, I'd like to hear someone from our team talk about the one event which, Mrs. Curmudgeon regularly notes, always gets me at least a little choked up during the liturgy: baptism.

To lead God's people in worship, Lord's Day in and Lord's Day out: incomparable indeed.

They are going to break my heart (again)

 Mrs. Curmudgeon and I saw a teaser for Man of Steel, the latest attempt at a Superman movie, last month. Principal photography has been completed and a release date in June 2013 has already been set. It's produced by Christopher Nolan, a bona-fide film genius, but directed by Zack Snyder, whose frenetic style was perfectly suited to bring 300 to the screen, but turned Watchmen rather flat.

I go back and forth on this: will Nolan's maturity balance out Snyder's Red Bull addiction? Will the excellent supporting cast make Superman more credible? Will I get my hopes up yet again only to have them dashed?

Actually, the last isn't really a question. Yes, I will get all wound up, and yes, I will surely be disappointed because it is simply not possible to put an actual human being in Superman's costume and make me believe he's the real deal. Can't be done: it's a law of physics. I know this so well that it's become my rule of thumb for evaluating all superhero movies. (Captain America walks a very fine line; if they don't do something with his costume before his next movie, I won't be able to look directly at the screen.) And yet I keep wishing and hoping. I can't help myself.

Dear Hollywood,

  Please stop making Superman movies. My poor heart just can't take it.

yours,

 the Presbyterian Curmudgeon

Don't drive at night in Norway

A Norwegian driver who tried to avoid crashing into a moose hit a bear instead, a wildlife official said.

 This is why so many Norwegians moved to the American midwest over the last couple centuries: lots of ruminants, but not so many bears.

A little trouble staying on message

Note to my neurotypical readers: we're looking at the text, not the faces. Specifically:

 

Wicked and Delicious

In this essay which appeared on All Things Considered on August 13, D.W. Gibson perfectly expresses my own childhood shock, and then delight, when I first discovered Roald Dahl's fiction for older readers in an Alfred Hitchcock Presents omnibus. 

My mother was always surpised he wrote children's books.

The Dark Knight Returns

Since we so rarely get the opportunity to take advantage of the curmudgelings' grandparents, Mrs. Curmudgeon and I left them in their maternal grands' tender care whilst in Janesville, Wisconsin, a couple weeks ago in order to see The Dark Knight Rises for approximate two-thirds the cost of a screening in the Mile-High City. A few scenes paid homage to Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns, which clearly was a major influence on Christopher Nolan's entire Batman trilogy.

Then Elvis Mitchell did something very interesting. His The Treatment, in which he interviews mostly film-makers, is the latest addition to my regular line-up of podcasts. His interview of Christopher Nolan was prefaced by mentions of the movie theatre massacre here in Aurora. Then, without additional comment, he followed up that interview on The Dark Knight Returns by re-releasing earlier Nolan interviews on Batman Begins and Memento. My guess is Elvis Mitchell wanted to do his bit to remind us all that Christopher Nolan is an interesting film-maker whose word deserves notice on its own merits, which is very true. Listening to those interviews reminded me of my pressing need to see Memento again soon, and sparked an interest in watching the entire Batman trilogy once it's released on DVD. (Ideally, in one sitting!)

Since I don't have the time to do that, I took advantage of a nasty cold to, for the umpteenth time, read Frank Miller's The Dark Knigh Returns. I don't know how much my carefully-preserved first edition set might fetch on the open market, but I will never sell it. Miller's work fascinates not simply because it created the current definitive interpretation of this iconic character, nor because it changed the entire trajectory of superhero comics in these United States for at least two decades, but because of how he did it.

In collaboration with colorist Lynn Varley, Miller uses almost-cartoonish forms to make the Batman's physical presence dominate every frame, elevating him to mythic status. As a storyteller, he achieves the same effect by beginning his story ten years after the Batman's retirement. Hence, he's able, within the confines of the narrative, to begin with a mythical character rather than having to lift him to that status himself. He gets all the work done before his story begins so he can concentrate on the story itself, which faithfully reveals the person, good and bad, who would become the Batman in the first place.

The Dark Knight Returns is far from perfect (within six panels, the same character is referred to as both "Lois Lane" and "Lana Lang"), but its energy and impact continue to astound. While I like Christopher Nolan's Batman, Frank Miller's is the one which continues to fascinate me.

Oh. And Superman is in it, too.

The dog of my life

One day last summer, while sitting... in the veterinarian's waiting room, Ian had noticed a particularly sweet-faced golden retriever. "Nice dog," he had told the owner, and the owner–a middle-aged woman–had smiled and said, "Yes, I've had a good number in my day, but this one: this is the dog of my life. You know how that is?"

He knew, all right.

-from Saint Maybe by Anne Tyler

An alternative to in thesi declarations

Last month, a post I wrote expressing admiration of the PCA General Assembly's decision to not issue an in thesi declaration on an issue already settled by the Westminster Standards provoked a negative reaction from some who think such deliverances rather useful. The reactions of which I'm aware failed to persuade me on that point. However, a particular issue was raised in the "discusion" which I think warrants some further comment.

What ought we (that is, presbyterians) do regarding issues and errors not already addressed by the Westminster Standards? In my opinion, the major example of this class in our day is the entire area of sex and gender relationships, with specific reference to the nature and extent of male headship in the Church and home. My solution is rather simple: because the Church needs authoritative guidance, the confessional standards should be amended to give it.

I presented a paper, "A Time to Fight: Sex, Gender, and the Confessions of the Reformed Churches in North America" at a Presbytery of the Dakotas (OPC) symposium in September 2011 which argued precisely this point. That paper (a mere six pages in length) suggested a process for amending confessional standards throughout the Presbyterian and Reformed Churches and dealt with several standard objections to doing this kind of thing, so I won't repeat them here. While my paper dealt with a specific doctrinal issue, I believe my arguments could reasonably be deployed regarding other matters as well. The Reformed Presbyterian Church in North America, through her Testimony, has in effect long been amending the Westminster Standards, so I don't think my proposal as controversial as some might conclude.

Better, I continue to think, an amended confession than an impotent declaration.

Jesus answers prayer

The strange thing is that Luke 15 has got to be one of the easiest passages in the Bible to interpret. "[T]he Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, 'This man receives sinners and eats with them.'" So Jesus tells two parables in which something is lost, found, and friends come over to celebrate. Thus, at the end of Luke 15, when the older brother refuses to celebrate the return of the younger son, the whole thing rather plainly becomes an indictment of the Pharisees and scribes for their failure to rejoice over the Lord's recovery of the lost sheep of Israel. So why do people keep thinking this is a parable about the younger, prodigal son? Most likely, it's because of this line: "For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found."

Two years ago we lost our third child, because, technically, she wasn't ours. But four times I have gone into a hospital and they've handed me a baby and told me to take care of it, and for the life of me I couldn't make a distinction between my third child and the other three simply because she happened to have a different biological mother and father. Nonetheless, because her biological father convinced himself and some caseworkers he could take care of her, my wife and I had to give her up.

For six months I continued to live my life, and do my job, and laugh not infrequently. However, every time I thought about my daughter, a giant black hole opened up underneath me and I didn't know how I could go on breathing. I felt constant and tremendous guilt, which, I've been surprised to learn, many people have found hard to understand. On their logic, as it wasn't my choice to hand her over to irresponsible people, it couldn't be my fault. But fatherhood is an unchosen obligation to protect and defend one's children, and any man who doesn't die to keep his child from harm has failed, no matter the circumstances. That was what we lived with for six months.

And then she came back, and on June 27 of this year she was adopted, and on July 8 she was baptized.

We wanted to make her middle name "Jesus Answers Prayer," but thought that might not fit on all the forms one has to fill out in life. Nonetheless, it's true, and that has become our testimony and witness. American conservative presbyterian circles in our day have become somewhat obsessed with the doctrine of covenant, and tend to focus on God's promises to individuals and families. Without wanting to diminish those, what can be forgotten is the character of God which is the basis for those promises. He is the God prodigal in his mercy and compassion and pity on us poor sinners, and so he made a covenant within himself which he kept at the cost of his own life so that he might make that covenant with us. His love is wider than those individuals and families with whom he happens currently to be in covenant, and so he brought my daughter back to us and into his Church.

Jesus doesn't say what all the friends were doing during the time the three things were lost, before they came to celebrate with the shepherd and the woman and the father. However, my wife and I know what our friends were doing: they were praying to Jesus. He heard their prayers, and he answered them. Our friends were not like the older brother, distant and censorious, and our Lord was not far off. Our child was his child, the absence of a stated promise to that effect notwithstanding, and he has always been the good shepherd who goes off after the lost sheep.

She was lost, and is found.

Jesus answers prayer.

Daddy's girl

Ray Bradbury, the Pedestrian

First Things provides another reminiscence of Ray Bradbury today.

My e-mail was (& still is) broken

This has meant fruitless hour upon hour on the phone with Apple tech support, which is one reason I haven't been producing more blog posts for your amusement and edification. (Amongst other reasons are pastoring a congregation, producing approximately two sermons a week, parenting four children, getting the third of those adopted, nominally helping Mrs. Curmudgeon plan and prepare an adoption party, not coming anywhere close to helping Mrs. Curmudgeon plan our vacation for later this month, and occasionally folding laundry in the presence of Mrs. Curmudgeon: quality time for married folk. Not amongst those reasons is a dearth of barely informed opinions. But you'd guessed that already.) 

At any rate, this appears to be why I wasn't notified by the Google of several comments to my June 25 post, "Grown-ups prevail at the PCA General Assembly." I learned the post had been aggregated on the Aquila Report site earlier this week while another pastor in my presbytery was trying to deflect my ruthless mockery over his ignorance of Lou Reed. Unbeknownst to me (for the record, Don Clements, the Aquila Report's editor, later apologized to me for my post being accidentally aggregated without my express consent), I seem to have caused a slight ripple in the waters of the conservative presbyterian pool in this nation. An Associate Reformed Presbyterian pastor, Tim Phillips, has taken rather lengthy umbrage in a piece entitled "The Grownup Solution."

Pastor Phillips argues that, since the Westminster Standards preceded the development of Darwinism by a couple centuries, the modern Church has no recourse to address the theological error of theistic evolution other than an in thesi judgment. While I agree there are any number of issues which the Westminster Standards do not address, and that at least a few of those issues should be addressed by the Church (and here note I've written and spoken on that particular problem in the past and hope to write a follow-up post on it in the near or not-so-distant future), this is not one of them.

To momentarily turn to another question, the Standards were written long before the peculiar doctrine of reincarnation became widely known in the West, and at no point explicitly address the question. Nonetheless, WCF 32.1 rather clearly rules it out:

The bodies of men, after death, return to dust, and see corruption: but their souls, which neither die nor sleep, having an immortal subsistence, immediately return to God who gave them: the souls of the righteous, being then made perfect in holiness, are received into the highest heavens, where they behold the face of God, in light and glory, waiting for the full redemption of their bodies. And the souls of the wicked are cast into hell, where they remain in torments and utter darkness, reserved to the judgment of the great day. Beside these two places, for souls separated from their bodies, the Scripture acknowledges none.

Accordingly, I can see no need for a presbyterian assembly to issue a declaration against reincarnation.

Pastor Phillips seems to have entirely missed the PCA General Assembly's similar reason for not issuing an in thesi declaration on theistic evolution:

While not wishing to diminish the importance of engaging the current controversies regarding the historicity of Adam and Eve, we believe that what is most called for is not a new deliverance from this Assembly, but rather a clear and uncompromising appeal to Scriptures (Genesis 1:26-28; 2:18-22) and the Westminster Standards (Westminster Confession of Faith 4:2; Westminster Shorter Catechism 16; Westminster Larger Catechism 17), which are already sufficiently clear that Adam and Eve are real, historical human beings directly created by God.

Now, perhaps Pastor Phillips believes those sections of the Westminster Standards do not, in fact, rule out a theory of theistic evolution. However, I and the PCA General Assembly do, and I imagine we together would direct inquiries on the question to our shared Confession.

Pastor Phillips also expresses a certain impatience with judicial process, expressing a concern about a possible fox in the henhouse. While an in thesi deliverance may appear to threaten any such hypothetical fox, only the shotgun of judicial process will actually remove him. Moreover, if there are any such foxes in the henhouse, why in the world is anyone wasting time drafting in thesi declarations when they should be submitting charges to the relevant presbytery? Judicial process is the presbyterian tool designed to remove theological error from the Church; a failure to employ it when necessary is, at best, irresponsible.

One last comment on Pastor Phillips' piece for now. Towards the end, he writes,

Near the end of the blog post, the pastor writes this statement:

The practical impotence of in thesi declarations is why I think them corrosive to the Church’s well-being.

After reading that, a friend of mine (a pastor in the PCA) commented, “How can he claim something to be ‘impotent’ and ‘corrosive’ at the same time?” It’s a good question, one that requires some thoughtfulness.

That question has the strength of appearing clever, but the rather sad weakness of a failure to read my statement in context. The original paragraph goes on to explain it this way:

The practical impotence of in thesi declarations is why I think them corrosive to the Church's well-being. Church officers are free to agree or disagree with them with whatever degree of openness they prefer; disagreement brings with it no automatic sanctions. This creates the impression that the Church's highest judicatory has spoken in a final way on a matter, and can be freely ignored by any and all of the Church's members; this simply cannot be healthy for any ecclesiastical body. Far better, I think, to read our confessional standards and be content with the very grown-up statements they provide.

I continue to think that, and hope, upon further reflection, Pastor Phillips will as well.

God bless Wayne Sparkman

Wayne Sparkman's work as the director of the Presbyterian Church in America's Historical Center doesn't get nearly the attention it deserves, which I can say with some authority because I was, until a few years into my pastoral career, utterly unaware of his work; this despite being a PCA member with a keen interest in Church history and a pastor who just happened to have a PhD in the field. The Historical Center is a treasure trove of data and primary sources on American presbyterianism of both the northern and southern species, and really should be better known to the wider world.

Mr. Sparkman comes up because, in a comment on an earlier post, he posted a link to a bibliography on in thesi deliverances he is presently composing. I recommend it to you, as the excerpts which are already posted provide a thorough introduction to both the question and to its importance for presbyterian doctrine and practice.

A little Monday afternoon aggregating

PRI's The World in Words podcast turned me on to The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks. This blog proves the oft-cite rule that it's better to laugh in mockery than to weep tears of impotent rage as one's native language slowly slips away from one's desperate grasp. (Well, it's a rule I often cite, anyway.)

And over at the First Things website, Peter Leithart provides a lovely remembrance of Ray Bradbury's writing by way of a brief review of his classic Dandelion Wine.

Grown-ups prevail at the PCA General Assembly

Bob Godfrey still being Bob Godfrey, I imagine he's still telling seminarians in his Church history classes that Church officers should make a point of reviewing their confessional standards about once a year just so they can remember what they're supposed to believe. I've long thought that discipline might prevent the eagerness in some circles for presbyterian General Assemblies to issue statements on whatever the putative theological controversy of the hour might be. The Westminster Standards cover a great deal of doctrinal ground, and I (for one) think it unlikely a committee-penned statement on, say, justification will be any more clear than the Confession, Larger Catechism, and Shorter Catechism.

Thus, the cockles of my curmudgeonly heart (if, in fact, a curmudgeon can be said to have a heart) were warmed when the 40th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in American rejected an overture that it make an in thesi declaration against theistic evolution on the ground that Scripture and the Westminster Standards do so with sufficient clarity. This is important for two reasons: first, the Assembly has taken the very grown-up position that presbyterians need not restate what they've already stated, no matter how many people insist it is VERY IMPORTANT that they do so. Let the Baptists issue statements; we've subscribed to a confession.

The second reason has to do with that lovely latinate phrase, "an in thesi declaration," and what I believe to be the corrosive effect of these declarations. Such a declaration would state, in this case, that the Assembly believes a minister teaching theistic evolution would be in error. In practice, however, that declaration would do nothing, even if it were passed and a pastor began preaching that God ordained to evolve mankind from lesser organisms. Such a pastor would have to be dealt with through judicial proceedings, and in this case the prosecuting judicatory would have to prove our supposed pastor's views to be out of accord with the Bible and our confessional standards, notwithstanding the existence of an in thesi declaration. (The Orthodox Presbyterian Church has already had such a judical case concerning a ruling elder who taught theistic evolution, which is why the issue is already settled in our denomination.)

The practical impotence of in thesi declarations is why I think them corrosive to the Church's well-being. Church officers are free to agree or disagree with them with whatever degree of openness they prefer; disagreement brings with it no automatic sanctions. This creates the impression that the Church's highest judicatory has spoken in a final way on a matter, and can be freely ignored by any and all of the Church's members; this simply cannot be healthy for any ecclesiastical body. Far better, I think, to read our confessional standards and be content with the very grown-up statements they provide.

Betrayed by Geoffrey Nunberg?

In a May 30 piece on NPR's Fresh Air defending the AP stylebook's decision to begin permitting use of the adverb "hopefully," Geoffrey Nunberg gloriously demonstrated why he is my favorite linguist (don't you all have one?). Consider this wonderful bit of prose:

...the historian T. Harry Williams went so far as to pronounce it "the most horrible usage of our times" — a singular distinction in the age that gave us expressions like "final solution" and "ethnic cleansing," not to mention "I'm Ken and I'll be your waitperson for tonight."

At the same time, he clearly showed there's a world of difference between the linguist-as-antropologist and the style fetishist such as myself. He's right: there's no grammatical, or even stylistic, rule which could legitimately prohibit sticking "hopefully" at the front of a sentence; and for the record, I've never had a problem with that particular verbal tic, in and of itself.

What gives me the fantods is the phrase "I am/one is hopeful that...." Whenever someone utters that abomination instead of the simpler, clearer, and infinitely more vivid "I hope...," poor George Orwell, who told us good writing (not to mention good speaking) requires "using the fewest and shortest words that will cover one's meaning," rolls over in his grave. This is why "hopefully" should be avoided: it's like letting your 5-year-old pick up a cooked carrot from his dinner plate instead of using his fork. It's just one vegetable, but let it go and pretty soon he'll be pawing up mashed potatoes and shepherd's pie.

For too many, "hopefully" is the gateway drug to "I am hopeful that." AP stylebook or not, just say no.

"You are not special" commencement speech

A member of our congregation sent me this high school commencement speech delivered by David McCullough, Jr., himself a high school English teacher. Apparently, I'm coming to it relatively late in webernet terms; read the first two-thirds or so, and you'll understand why. His blunt announcement to the type of privileged high school student I came to resent not only because I taught under-privileged students in inner-city Houston, but because I was one of them, that they are not particularly unique or wonderful is a delight to the disgruntled heart of the curmudgeon in each one of us. What makes this speech great, however, is not its deliberately deflating opening, but its lovely turn towards an exhortation to live the one life we have.

In 1992, my fellow Teach for America corps members and I came early on into the program, long before it became a resumé-padder for the kind of kids graduating near the top of the class at Wellesley High School. For the most part, we joined up not because TFA was a stepping-stone to something else, but because we wanted to spend a couple years helping out under-privileged kids. It changed our lives, and McCullough offers all who hear or read his speech the opportunity to stop living their lives for a distant objective, but instead for the sake of living their lives.

And while we're at it, let's take a moment to remember that despite right-wing attempts to vilify school teachers for sucking up government funds and left-wing attempts to vilify teacher unions for blocking their typically utopian and block-headed visions for school reform, there's a countless number of them out there not only successfully communicating content, but inspiring and changing lives.

God bless the high school English teachers. They just may save the language yet.

The Avengers

I may not see The Avengers as frequently as does Dean (from Mark Tatulli's Heart of the City), but overall both Mrs. Curmudgeon and I were impressed. I bring up my better half because, sadly, she lacks my careful study of the art of sequential narrative, and so can bring a (perhaps healthier) outsider's perspective to this genre. I will say my worst fears about Captain America's uniform were realized: you just can't make wings on the side of one's head look anything other than silly in a live-action movie, no matter how well they complement a costume on the page of a comic book. But since that's about my only criticism, consider this an endorsement of the summer's biggest blockbuster.

And the new Batman film is just around the corner...

The man who discovered Mars

The first paper I wrote in college, so far as I can remember, was for my freshman English class on Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. How can one describe Ray Bradbury, who died last week? I despair precisely because description, prose, was his great gift as a writer. When you read Bradbury, you feel the textures of cloth and you taste the smoothness of vanilla ice cream. Even as he aged and his stories descended into sentimentality and predictability, his powers of evocation remained as powerful as ever. This may be why he excelled in the short story form: with the exception of Fahrenheit 451, the novels for which he most celebrated are actually short story collections. The short story is the prose form closest to poetry, and Bradbury's prose was always something just barely short of poetic.

His great gift to his chosen genre of science fiction was never a revolutionary storyline or a new conception of the human relationship to technology. Instead, it was to put human beings into space and the future. For all their strengths as writers, Asimov and Heinlein's lead characters tended to be super-human: clever, morally upright, and generally infallible, even when making mistakes. Bradbury's astronauts and housewives, on the other hand, were always us: not stereotypically flawed, as is the all-too-common antihero of modern popular fiction, but limited, uncertain, and as bewildered by childhood and adulthood in Dandelion Wine as by alien landscapes in The Martian Chronicles.

In the 1980s, DC Comics launched what we today would call a "reboot" of the Martian Manhunter, whose home planet clearly owed a great debt to Bradbury's imagination. As was absolutely necessary, then, the comic was dedicated "To Ray Bradbury, the man who discovered Mars."

Inalienable

At the First Things website, James R. Rogers helpfully explains how it is you have "Rights You Can't Give Away," so memorably enumerated in the Declaration of Independence.

The central motivation (Proverbs 22:17-21)

Proverbs 22:17-21 introduces what most agree is the book's third major section. (The debates on division get interesting after that.) As Bruce Waltke observes in his NICOT commentary, the section is composed of two quatrains around a center line. The three sentences employ what he calls a main clause (MC) and subordinate clause (SC) pattern which is "stitched together" thusly (vol. 2, p. 221):

MC:SC//SC:MC//MC:SC

Neatly observed. However, those subordinate clauses give the motivations to heed the exhortations of the main clauses, which can also be patterned as a chiasm:

A: exhortation + motive (22:17-18)

  B: motive + exhortation (22:19)

A': exhortation + motive (22:20-21)

This suggests the central motive, trust in the Lord, is the most important one. Theologically, something of a given, but here also literarily.

It fits in with my mission statement

However, since shirt.woot raised its t-shirt price to $12, I'm a little slower to hit the "buy" button.

Sigh.

Mark Tatulli nails it

Lío gives Maurice Sendak an entirely appropriate farewell.

A pagan Christ figure

Mrs. Curmudgeon may recall the anticipation and trepidation with which I looked forward to Superman Returns in 2006. I so wanted to be wowed by a big-screen Superman, but suspected it would be impossible to make a real human being, interacting with other human beings, take on the larger-than-life image the character requires in order to be successful. I knew that could easily be pulled off with the visual language of a comic book, but probably not in a film. Sadly, I was correct.

Interestingly, other film superheroes have been more successful. Batman, entirely human, is also entirely believable clad in what amounts to body armor. Equally successful have been the recent spate of Marvel superhero movies. Perhaps this is because Marvel's heroes have always been very human and entirely fallible; it hasn't hurt that computer graphics have become virtually indistinguishable from reality to the untrained eye. At any rate, I thoroughly enjoyed the Iron Man and Captain America movies; since they were obviously setting up this summer's Avengers, I figured I should also watch Thor before seeing the biggest hit of the season (thus far).

So it was I sat down with the curmudgelings with a rental copy of the Kenneth Branagh-directed (yes, that Kenneth Branagh) feature. The Norse gods came off as thoroughly believable, and although I've never once felt the urge to buy a Thor comic book, I found him a sympathetic character on film, and, for a deity, believably human. The really interesting bit came at the film's climax (SPOILER ALERT!). Thor was banished from Asgard by Odin for arrogance, divested of his power and, most importantly, the mighty hammer Mjolnir; now his brother Loki (the Norse god of mischief) has sent a really scary creature to kill him and anyone associated with him. In order to save fellow Asgardians and a group of American research scientists he's befriended, Thor presents himself to the creature to be killed. With this, his divine powers and Mjolnir are restored to him, and Thor proceeds to, well, you know where it goes from here. Thor's greatest glorification comes only after he's gone down the path of humiliation.

Only the American comic book tradition, I think, could turn a pagan Norse god into a Christ figure, because only a Christian literary imagination would find humiliation-before-glorification an intuitive character arc. This may be where Superman Returns failed. Though its Superman was clearly a messianic figure, he was only ever glorious and almighty. Only a lesser, entirely human deity like Thor could do the hard work of earning his glorification, a work which we always demand of our heroes.

Centuries from now, I will try to remember you

Science has discovered I will live forever.

Thanks, science!

As though I needed another reason to avoid Wal-Mart

Last week Wal-Mart once again lived down to my lowest expectations, which, for this chain of stores, is saying something. I went in to print a couple pictures, selected a few more items for purchase during the six minutes the little slip of paper I was given told me it would take for my photos to print, waited another 15 minutes, then put said items on top of the printer machine and walked out without making any purchases or having received my photos lest I arrive home even later than I had promised Mrs. Curmudgeon.

Nonetheless, next to this occurrence, my every trip to Wal-Mart has been pure bliss.

The Family in Crisis

On April 2, our congregation hosted a symposium entitled "The Family in Crisis: Three Pastoral Responses" in conjunction with the stated meeting of the Presbytery of the Dakotas of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Unfortunately, the hard drive recording the event crashed, depriving the greater world of the opportunity to hear the rather lively discussion between myself and the Revs. Shawn Mathis and Kevin Swanson in response to questions from the audience. I personally hoped the audio would open the event to a broader audience because I have found little serious interaction by proponents of the family-integrated Church movement with their mature critics; in God's providence, however, this was not to be.

Not all was lost, though: the three papers which provided a basis for the discussion are posted at Park Hill Presbyterian Church's SermonAudio site. Read, and reflect.

So what was the pitch meeting for this like?

I'd be stunned by this, but the truth is Hollywood beat me into irremediable jaded cynicism a long time ago. However, I must admit it never once occurred to me, while being loving and supportive through three pregnancies, that a preachy book written to make pregnant women feel bad for not eating enough wheat germ had the makings of a romantic comedy buried deep down inside.

I would like to think this is all a brilliantly clever joke perpetrated on the movie-going public. Maybe that would be the best way to view it.