Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Capitalizing evangelicalism?


From the February 2012 issue of First Things:
Alert readers may have noticed the unusual capitalization of "Evangelical" and "Evangelicalism" in a couple of the articles. The stylebooks frown on this, because Evangelicalism is a movement and not an official body, but we do it to give Evangelicalism a kind of typographic equality with Catholicism and Orthodoxy.
But of course, that's precisely the issue in contention. The Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Churches are identifiable bodies with definite (if not always consistently held) doctrines and boundaries. Evangelicalism is nothing of the sort: as an ontological fact, it is not an "equal" of Catholicism and Orthodoxy in the sense that it is an entirely different kind of thing.

Which, in connection with the recent death of Charles Colson, reminds me of a suspicion I've long held regarding "Evangelicals and Catholics Together." This association discusses sundry theological and religious topics and occasionally publishes a paper outlining what they perceive to be agreements and/or disagreements between the Catholic and the consensus evangelical views on one of those topics. At its beginning, Colson was a de facto leader of the evangelical wing, and worked closely with Richard John Neuhaus, the Roman Catholic founder of First Things (which publishes the association's papers when they are released). 

My suspicion, whether justified or paranoid, is that Roman Catholics would rather dialogue with evangelicals than with representatives of an actual Church body: evangelicalism, being amorphous and insubstantial because it is fundamentally anti-ecclesiastical, will always find itself unable to offer a substantive argument against a well-defined set of doctrines supported by an actual ecclesiastical body. That is, Rome would prefer to enter an argument it's guaranteed to win.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Little Red Riding Hood


Check out this Robert Krulwich post, and make sure to scroll down for the PowerPoint.

Yup, I never thought I'd write that, either.

Monday, April 16, 2012

The Hunger Games


  I've written about The Hunger Games before (the books, of course; that's just how high-brow I am), but as much to express my anger at the Millenium Trilogy as to gush over Katniss Everdeen. The release of the film version of the first book of the trilogy (given how the Harry Potter and Twilight franchises have been stretched out, I hesitate to say "the first film in a trilogy") has given me occasion to interact with a couple (I think) deliberately censorious reactions from other protestant clergy, so I thought I should post my thoughts for the helpful edification of the entire webernet.

  I looked at Doug Wilson's review of the Hunger Games on his blog; it appears to interact only with the first volume, which is a pity. Unfortunately, it's not Doug Wilson at his best. He's eager to demonstrate he's too clever by half, eager to label and dismiss, and conveniently ignores any evidence which does not fit his thesis.
 
  Now, I can't speak for the film, but the book, contra Wilson, is certainly not a brief for situation ethics. The 3rd-person narrative almost necessary to film may obscure Katniss' motivations, but as the books are in the 1st person, her inner life is much more clear to the reader. The really interesting bits are in the first and third volumes (in my opinion, the second serves primarily to move the plot along and set up the third).

  With her father dead in a mining accident and her mother having become virtually catatonic as a result, Katniss has taken responsibility for providing for her family's welfare; this is pretty much her sole concern throughout the first book. When she volunteers to take her sister's place in the Hunger Games, Katniss assumes she will die: until the very end of the Games themselves, she continues to believe she will not survive. Living as she does under a totalitarian regime, she knows that any refusal to coopearate with the authorities will certainly result in reprisals against her mother and sister. By not mentioning this fact, Wilson conveniently ignores why refusal and flight aren't options for her.

  Moreover, Katniss' willingness to sacrifice herself for the sake of others makes her, in literary terms, a Christ figure. This, no doubt, is why her character has been appealing to so many readers: all human beings, whether they know/admit it or not, are looking for the Gospel story. Related to this is that Katniss never buys into the Games' premise: she only kills, in what is essentially self-defense, those who embrace the Games, and hence the value system of the oppressor government. Suzanne Collins,  however, very successfully draws the reader into Katniss' moral dilemma, as the latter repeatedly asks herself whether she will ultimately become a willing participant in the Games. Her character has three dimensions; her choices rarely come easily. While all her reference points and ambitions are entirely personal and immediate, she continually strives to come to terms with the larger issues at play in her society and respond to them responsibly.

  Now, the really interesting bit, in terms of response to totalitarianism, comes at the end of the Games when Katniss and Peeta opt for mutual suicide rather than one killing the other. They both realize suicide is not only the most romantic option, and hence appealing to their audience in Panem, but also would ultimately invalidate the Games and Panem's government. Suicide is their final refusal to accept the circumstance into which they've been thrust. The third volume closes the series with an equally brilliant strategic response to exploitative and cruel regimes, but I don't want to ruin it all for you.

  Now, this is certainly not a Biblical ethic in action; it is much more classically Stoic than Christian. Given that Suzanne Collins is deliberately evoking the Roman Empire in tone, if not in precise detail, stoicism is actually a very appropriate philosophical choice. (Interestingly, there's no religion or rumination on the supernatural at all in the Hunger Games trilogy; while this may be a function of the simplified Young Adult genre, it's also a reason this will only be an entertainment and will not be much read in coming generations.) But Stoicism, for all it lacks as a philosophical system, is not situation ethics.

The best cultural apologists in our tradition have always been able to appreciate what is noble and good amongst the heathen even while demonstrating its uselessness apart from God's revelation of himself in Christ (here I think not only of Francis Schaeffer and Abraham Kuyper, but the Apostle Paul himself).  The Hunger Games is not much more than thrilling entertainment, but has had such runaway success because, despite its heathenishness, it describes much that is noble and good in the human character.

 

Thursday, April 12, 2012

A reading suggestion


If you're not a subscriber, and if you can still find a copy, I recommend the March 2012 issue of First Things. Two essays, "Religious Freedom Abroad" and "The Dangers of Anti-Sharia Laws," helpfully illustrate how anti-Islam hysteria, dismayingly prevalent among conservative Christians, can undermine basic American Constiutional values. They suggest better ways forward in both domestic and foreign policies.

"Presbyterianism's Democratic Captivity," by Joseph D. Small, provocatively examines whether the processes and philosophical assumptions of democracy are consonant with presbyterian principles and the Church's obligations to handle matters of doctrne and practice with pastoral care. He writes from within the Presbyterian Church USA, and so, as he laments that denomination's recent rejections of Biblical ethics, an OPC man can't help but think that the recent apostasies were made inevitable by the PCUSA's rejection of Scriptural authority throughout the first two-thirds of the 20th century. Nonetheless, there's food for thought for even the most recalcitrant OPC presbyter here.

Matzo and Christian liberty


I listen to the Planet Money podcast for information and insight into economics, but the latest edition related more nearly to my day job. It proved the point of Westminster Confession of Faith 20.1, which says in part "...under the New Testament, the liberty of Christians is further enlarged, in their freedom from the yoke of the ceremonial law, to which the Jewish Church was subjected." The story on the Manischewitz corporation's matzo production facility illustrates the incredible lengths to which Jews have had to go in order to keep the ceremonial law. Of course, rabbinic Judaism, which is descended from New Testament-era Phariseeism, has adumbrated that law with any number of requirements; no doubt, law-keeping during Biblical times was not nearly so complex. Nonetheless, this contemporary illustration can help the modern-day Christian understand just what Leviticus is going on about.

Nat Hentoff sounds the alarm (again)


In "We Can't Hide from the National Security Agency," Nat Hentoff asks,
Will Republicans in power be any more protective of your Fourth Amendment national birthright “to be secure in (your) persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures” by a government that you yourselves elect to protect who we are as Americans?
Umm, no?

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Time magazine gets really, really stupid


I used to go through life not knowing what would annoy me next. Then I subscribed to Time magazine, and that uncertainty was mercifully removed.

I must say, though, that with this week's cover story, "Heaven Can't Wait," received in our home during Saturday's Easter vigil, Time has plunged to new depths. The author, Jon Meacham, describes himself as a Christian, but seems blissfully unaware of the most basic Christian doctrines. The article is on the purported conflict between Christians who hope to go to heaven when they die, and those who long for the resurrection of the dead. At one point he does acknowledge the orthodox view that, in the words of Shorter Catechism #37, "[t]he souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory; and their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves till the resurrection." In other words, Christians who confess the Apostles' Creed believe in both heaven and the resurrection.

As one of those Christians, I can't tell you how difficult it was to read this article. It's non sequitur after non sequitur, suggesting, for instance, that since the present order will be destroyed in the fires of God's judgment, we should work harder to preserve the earth's environment so it will be nicer when the resurrection arrives. I can't make this stuff up, and for once I wish I was.

An interesting story might have been on why the doctrine of the resurrection has been downplayed as the ultimate Christian hope in American evangelicalism, and whether this development is related to evangelicalism's gnostic tendencies. Instead, Time has published a major story which can't get even its basic facts straight. That may demonstrate, more powerfully than any editorial stance ever could, the magazine's dismissive attitude towards matters of Christian faith and practice.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

OPC.org Mobile Now Live!


Another step forward in the campaign to make reactionary, backwards-looking curmudgeons uncomfortable...

Monday, April 9, 2012

Calvin's Institutes, Battles edition: pp. 503-507, vol. 1


Calvin begins Book 2, chapter 16 with four remarkable sections on God's love for sinners. Interestingly, he forcefully argues God's love for us preceded his decision to be gracious to us.

Powerful prose, well worth reading and meditating upon.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

An unclear ending


As the Revised Common Lectionary returns us to Mark 16 for Easter Sunday this year, I point you to previous posts on Mark's authorial choices and the broader question of Mark's Gospel within the New Testament canon.