Homosexuality and Onanism

**This post contains references to sexual intercourse**

What if everybody's gay?

I mean, what if everybody is capable of enjoying homosexual intercourse?

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I see homosexuality debated all the time, although almost always in very situated terms. Usually it's political, arguing over the likely consequences of legalizing gay marriage. This debate doesn't really interest me. Of course, in a secular and open society, civil unions should be either given or not. I would add that the only seemingly valid boundary for this right would be for those who are not consenting adults, similar to the common limitation to the contractual abilities of minors. But amongst adult humans, I don't really understand one set telling another set how to order their affairs/property. Perhaps civil unions shouldn't come with federal benefits, perhaps they should. Seems like an economic argument to me. Either it benefits the state to give some strategic tax cuts/benefits, or it doesn't, and that can change over time.

But, they say, "they'll make us Christians recognize such unions as marriages. Christians who refuse to affirm such unions will be guilty of hate speech." Well, it seems reasonable to me to think that this is the agenda of some, but I am hard pressed to imagine how anyone could make me recognize or affirm gay marriage personally. The only thing that external powers can do is revoke a church's tax status or sue them on civil grounds. As far as I'm concerned, I'm not sure churches should be tax exempt, and I am pretty sure that it's possible to sue anybody for anything in civil matters. 

It seems to me that the church has gotten too comfortable being the favored child of the government. It seems to me that it's about time for church leaders to stop being politicians. But I digress…

Let me make my point about everybody being gay, possibly. I'm not making an argument. I'm just expressing a point of view, and perhaps (hopefully) elucidating some absurdity along the way.

1. I think that everybody is born into a state of sinfulness, commonly called original sin. I wouldn't die to defend the details, but I think minimally that we're born into Adam's headship and into his sin. That is, we're all broken, all sinners, and perhaps, all somewhat kinky.
2. I think homosexuality exists on a spectrum of sin, all of which is deviance (contrary to God's will or our true nature). That is, homosexuality is not special, except that it is, like all sin, iconoclastic. The biblical distinction regarding homosexuality, among other "abominations" is, I think, because the icon being destroyed is oneself.  All sin carries this aspect, but some more clearly than others.
3. Marriage, as John Piper describes it, is momentary. I don't think that anyone is "homosexual" in some inexorable state of being, but neither am I heterosexual. I can say that God calls us to abstain from homosexual sex just as I believe that one day he will call us to abstain from heterosexual sex as well. I am completely open to some form of supersex in Christ's kingdom, although to speak of it in such terms conjures too many images of orgies and not enough images of communion feasts.
4. I am convinced that heterosexual culture calls upon homosexual cultures as its rivals, just as Batman needs the Joker. Every time I see a pastor on twitter talking about his "hawt wifey", I think another gay teenager gets his/her wings. I think that many heterosexuals make a mockery of true marriage through objectification and lust. Men drive muscle cars and women find yet another accidental way to show cleavage. I'm guilty of such silliness too, but I can see how many others who are sensitive to the nature of such gross manipulation would seek to escape it through rebellion, taking the form of homosexuality. Thus, we heterosexuals become party to their blasphemy. Many heterosexuals are just patently pathetic, and there is a refreshing tone of honestly among many of the homosexuals I know. It's not that they know something we hetero's don't, but only that they're not playing the same stupid game. (I'm sure they have their own stupid games as well.)
5. I can't see how homosexuality is much more unnatural than onanism. Yet, as a guy, I have doubts that I've ever met a man who hasn't, you know… But seriously, when Christians try to simplify the nature of sex through hand motions, saying "It goes like this, not like this" or "It's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve", there should also be a reference to it not being "Adam and Palmela Handerson" either. In my opinion, the problem with homosexuality on a theological level is that God desires us to learn to commune with the Other, in the earthly realm being women (or men, respectively). This connects to my supersex idea in which we will all, after the fulfillment of all things, experience communion as God experiences it. This communion is consummated on earth in a fragmented way, through meals, through worship, through marriage, and in heaven these fragments will be unified and magnified. This is the problem, in my mind, with homosexuality. It is a closed circuit. There is nothing elevated about it; it doesn't call me to anything but my own desires, my own fulfillment, my own image, my own way. In this sense, masturbation, there I said it, is perhaps the most homosexual act there is. Autosexuality is the nature of all homosexuality.
6. The only reason people like me mock the pleasure of homosexual intercourse is because we're afraid of it, never experienced it, and are culturally conditioned to disavow it. Perhaps some people are not attracted to the opposite sex as a generality. I tend not to believe self-reports about who one does and does not find attractive. First, I believe that there are few areas with which we've been more programmed through propaganda (advertising) than on what is the ideal body image of a man and a woman. Our tastes are helplessly skewed, such that I'm surprised we find any normal humans attractive at all, of either sex. Second, I think that the attraction of one's personality is much more important to sexual attraction than looks. My impression is that standards for physical appearance are enforced mainly for social status and reproductive reasons. Although many may have a promiscuous phase where looks are all that matters, just wait and see who they marry. Personality is much more important when it matters. When a typical heterosexual male puts on an act about getting nauseated about the thought of homosexuality, I think this is almost always for show. It was for me. 

Perhaps this is the point of this post. I am tired of having to act as though the only/best reason why I'm not "gay" is because I find homosexuality revolting. Once again, that never kept me from masturbating. I am sure that, if I weren't so sexually conditioned, I could come to enjoy homosexual intercourse. Similarly, I think the same is true of homosexuals, that they could enjoy physical stimulation, regardless of the physique of the partner. If all I'm after is pleasure, I suppose I could just enjoy the sensations. Honestly, this is all just elaborate masturbation, in my opinion.

No, there is a good reason for limiting one's sexual self to marriage, and it cuts against most instances of heterosexuality as well as all instances of homosexuality. I think that just as many married couples treat sex as the same elaborate form of masturbation, using each other for pleasure, playing roles and trying everyday to artificially inject novelty into their hopelessly boring monogamous sex life. This is why so many cheat, after all, and it's why cheating is never enough. Heterosexuality isn't enough. Heterosexuality, on such terms, is just as much a sin as homosexuality. Marriage is something more, something sacrificial, something countercultural. 

When I say that homosexuality is a sin, that there is no inheritance in the kingdom of God for the sexually immoral, I think that this means everybody. That is, everybody must turn away from their natural sexual orientation, undergo a form of celibacy, and take on the cross of Christ. He, an unmarried man, shows us how to be married, and I'm pretty sure he never spoke of his "hot wife". Homosexuals who feel oppressed by traditional Christianity because they feel that such dogma will lead them to an unfulfilled life (because their sexuality will be unfulfilled) are just as right as they are wrong. It is correct that they must interrupt their fallen nature, be baptized, and become new. But they are wrong that they are special in this regard. They demonstrate the rule. Everyone must go through this, and sadly, I don't know that many really are. The church's teaching in this area is, in my opinion, woefully in adequate. As many mock Augustine's "ascetic" view of sexuality, I suspect that he was more right than wrong. After all, he knew what it meant to be lusty just as well as he knew what it meant to be pious.

So, I think that everybody is sexually broken. I think that everybody is capable of abandoning ourselves to physical pleasures. I don't think that the labels "heterosexual" and "homosexual" are anything but temporary constructs. I think Christ calls us all to repentance, to discipleship, to communion.

Preaching Bad News

The Gospel. The good news. The better word. We think that it is one size fits all, that not only is it a novelty, but that it is good universally.

Such qualities are problematic. The Gospel, the life and times of Jesus, are not as "new" to us as those events were to eyewitnesses. Not only do we know that Jesus comes back from the dead, but we also know that Jesus did not come back from heaven "soon", like he seemed to have said. Jesus's contemporaries seemed to think that he would return and bring his new regime much, much sooner than…well, he still hasn't come back yet and we're going on 2000 years.

Good news, this quality is problematic as well. Good is in the eye of the beholder, is it not? Is Jesus the exception to the rule, that one cannot please all people all the time? Judging by the fact that he was killed by his own people, I think that the news Jesus brought was not judged as good by all people. And they didn't kill him in the way that many of us think of it. He wasn't sacrificed like the old guy on Survivor…"he taught us a lot, but he had to go for the good of the tribe." No, they actually wanted Jesus to die,that he deserved to die. We can look back and see that God had his own narrative going on, but on the human level, Jesus wasn't popular. Also, unless we think everybody goes to heaven (and dogs too), then his news isn't even actually good for everybody, regardless of how they might feel about it. Jesus comes as a seal of the nature of reality: God exists, he is holy, and we must be born again if we want to endure his judgment.

Thus, Jesus's news is only good to a certain subset of society, the one's who don't mind being born again. Jesus goes to recess at an elementary school and finds a group playing kickball. True to human nature, there's a team of all-stars and a team of rejects. Jesus comes and says he's going to reassign the teams. To some, this is good news. They suck and any change can only be a step up. To others, this news sucks. They were going to win. That's about as far as that analogy can go, but the point is, Jesus's news has implications which are evaluated differently by individuals in different situations. This seems rather obvious to me, but our culture seems to think that the Gospel is one dimensional, good news for all.

The Scriptures speaks of the ones who desire to be born again, to receive their King, to have their lives transformed, as being the poor, even sometimes as the poor in spirit. I take "poor in spirit" or "poor" to mean individuals who are not invested in their own identity or their place in the structure of reality. They are divested from reality because they are sinners and they know it. They feel that the world is broken; they know that they are broken; and they are in a state of lament until God kills them or delivers them. Jesus comes and his coming is good news to such men, because his news is that they are to be delivered from the world.

It isn't hard to understand why this same news is bad news to many others. There aren't really any good terms to oppose to "poor". We could use "rich", but the connotation of this antonym is too material. My thought is more in the direction of the independently rich investor who lives off of the grift he can shave off of the backs of foreign slaves due to the structure of the system. Such men are usually more power-hungry than greedy. They don't even really attend to their money, since it is their birthright as sons of a superior race. They are supreme in the world system because the world is as it should be. They just took the opportunities afforded them by fate, and cannot be blamed for advancing themselves, even at the injury of others. If other men want to ascend as well, then they should walk in the same way. That's the system. If you buck it, you lose. They didn't make the rules

When Jesus comes into this world system, these independent men (and women thanks to Beyonce) get pissed off. Jesus isn't just a politician come to redistribute the wealth. Politicians can be handled, and as long as the system remains in place, the coins still settle to the bottom anyway. No, the threat of Jesus to such men is that he is coming in order to subvert the structure of the system. Jesus does not want them to make a charitable donation to the poor, but maintain their positions. No, Jesus wants their positions, their power, their vestments. Needless to say, Jesus had to go.

Even today, Jesus is dividing humanity. The poor are known by their submission, inheriting the earth in meekness. The independent ones, however, are known by rebellion and violence. They killed Jesus bodily, and they kill him still by domesticating his news. They say:

Jesus is a man of peace and love. He didn't come to cast anybody out, to send anybody to the outer darkness. No, Jesus accepts everybody. Jesus loves us just the way that we are. He loves our cities, our cathedrals, our vestments, and is honored by the tons of gold we give to the poor every tax season. Jesus would never ask us to give him more than we can afford or bear. He never asks us to change who we are deep down inside. Jesus loves us because deep down inside we are God just like Jesus. This is why he loves us, because deep down inside, we're the same. Jesus shows us that what we've heard about God is wrong. God isn't about laws and rules. God is at least as nice as Jesus, and Jesus accepts you just the way that you are. "Judge not lest you be judged." More like judge not because judging is pointless and unkind. 

Well, that's what they say anyway. You gotta remember though, this is always the message of the rich to the poor. When the rich, independent man preaches tolerance to the poor, you can wager that he's only protecting his own skin. The independent man preaches tolerance because he needs to negate the news of Jesus, needs to maintain the system, needs to regulate.

This is where we are today. We're living in a world seemingly reclaimed by the independence party, in a world which has forgotten the razor edge on the message of Jesus. The message of Jesus is not good news, not on such terms. The danger today is that everybody forgives the sins of the independence party because we all think that someday they're going to ask us to join. To follow Jesus, we'd have to give up that dream. We need to hear the bad news. That the system is going down, and pining for a seat on the Titanic is insane. 

On Le Guin's Omelas

"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas", by Ursula K. Le Guin, is available here: http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/dunnweb/rprnts.omelas.pdf 

The following is my reflection on this piece:


What a wonderfully haunting short story! The potential for allegorical interpretation abounds because the story is so relevant and yet abrupt. My mind immediately seeks to find the reason, if one is given or implied, for the necessity of keeping such "imbecile" children locked up. If this could be understood, then perhaps we might gain some allegorical insight into the way in which we, in the American Omelas, treat our unfortunate ones.

First, we must notice that we can only speak of these children as 'unfortunate', since no systematic or environmental etiology is implied. The possibility of neglect is acknowledged, but how could this be in Omelas, where all are engaged in the work of happiness? No, these children were feeble-minded from birth, and only fate can be blamed for their estate. If they were ever neglected, it was because they did not seem to respond with the spark of life to the movement of the trees or the sound of music. Thus, this fatalistic etiology provides a grounding, both for the stopping of all discussion into the possibility of preventing such children from coming in the first place, and in the second place, it justifies the social myth which seeks to create a value out of their seemingly valueless existence. In essence, Omelas did not cause the child to be born this way, but Omelas must, of virtue, act justly in light of this brute fact. There is a brutal logic which follows from this myth of origin. It is here that the rock divides the stream of consciousness, between those who stay in Omelas, having accepted that brutal logic, and those who leave Omelas, having rejected it. They are the ones in search for another explanation of the origin of that child, and thus for their origin as well.

The fact that one was born unfortunate means that all others who find their place in the tempered felicity of Omelas are the fortunate ones. They do not need to seek any further for a purpose for their lives. They ought to pursue life to the fullest, beauty to the highest, because they are the fortunate ones. Fate could have chosen them to be in that unfortunate one's stead, and so life is a gift, a grace, and a debt which must be repaid with virtue. The Unfortunate One ends up being their scape goat, their Messiah, their salvation.

This answers the hardest question of Omelas's brutal logic: why not just kill the unfortunate one(s)? Actually, it may be, from the information given, that all but one of the unfortunate ones, if there are many, are killed once they are identified. Only one must be kept for the purpose of the brutal logic. Only one is necessary to be a spectacle of what is possible if the fortunate ones deny their godhood, the transmigration of their souls through virtue and art. The unfortunate one represents the animal nature of the flesh which is alienated from its soul. This is why it is useless to identify the child as either boy or girl. Sex, art, music, all of these are without gravity to it. This is why it is no great tragedy to keep it locked up, out of sight but not out of mind. The real tragedy is letting it live. This is the price that it must pay for the good of society. The unfortunate one is the shadow they cast by daring to stand in the Sun. They do not seek to make the shadow smaller by laying down, by coming nearer to the ground and remember their flesh and the dust from which they sprang. No, their destiny is to cast a shadow over the whole sphere of the Earth, blotting out the Sun, on the way of their ascent, as the moon might eclipse the Sun.

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How much does our religion, our civic mythology as Americans, as modern people, as those in the technological age of information, mimic that of Omelas? Or perhaps a more interesting question: to what extent does the Judeo-Christian ethic of the West result in the brutal logic of Omelas? One thing is sure: every time a capitalist propagandist exclaims that "One cannot multiply wealth by dividing it! There is no way for government to give wealth to some without taking it from others!" and other such phrases, he is plying wares of Omelian logic. What this Capitalist is saying is true, if we assume that those who are fortunate are so because of fate (and thus the Unfortunate One is born of fate as well). In order for Omelas to humanize the Unfortunate One, she must lie. She must be unjust. She must halt the music of the flutist, and ask him to go change the diaper of the Unfortunate One. The horses must be stabled because of the danger that the Unfortunate one may be trampled. There is no more time for games, since Omelas must stop euthanizing all the other unfortunate ones, and now the excess which gave Omelas her leisure and art is to be consumed with caring for those who cannot care for themselves. Omelas must become content with occupying her body forever. There is no time, being told by religion it is wrong to shirk her moral responsibility to care for all, to transcend her body and become like a god. This is the great tragedy; this is the stake. The issue, seen through Omelian eyes, is not one human life over another, but the life of God(s) over the life of an animal. The unfortunate one will die; there is no getting around that fact. And while its lungs pump air, it will not ever experience one moment of divine wonder. Why, the logic of Omelas begs, must so many gods be sacrificed on the altar of one animal who's doomed to die anyway. The gods live forever, transcending their bodies in pursuit of perfection, but Fate has already decided that the unfortunate one is dead to this chase. Thus, Omelas is not killing this Unfortunate One, it is already dead to all the values which transcend this life, and thus are the only values which really matter. No, Omelas actually honors the Unfortunate One by allowing it to play a role in the deification of Omelas, by being the black velvet upon which the diamonds of Omelas shine all the more brightly.

Do we justify our inhumane treatment of all flesh that is not alive in the soul to divine virtues? Sadly, I would say that this is true, but perhaps only true of the best of us. I am afraid that there is an unthinking sentimentalism which causes some of us to "care" for the needs of these unfortunate ones, but yet always looks on them as unfortunate. Thus, the power of the logic is only broken for these sentimental caretakers through incoherence. Perhaps this is a hidden virtue, to call another unfortunate, and yet not to treat oneself as fortunate, and thus to join the damned in their damnation. I do not know how to divide these things aright, but only to see that they are divided. The best of us, in our cruelty, understand the logic of Omelas. And we are prepared to confirm the damnation of Fate. We readily damn the Unfortunate ones, and all flesh which is not engaged in deification. We will use all animal life and all of the flesh of the earth if, through burning it, our souls might be raised into heaven on the smoke. 

The only alternative is to reject the fortune which Fate delivers, to reject it even as a concept. Perhaps "imbecile" children are born in Omelas because she has not yet learned charity. Perhaps there are ecological virtues as well. Perhaps there's no such thing as a weed. Perhaps one cannot become perfect through escaping the demands of the flesh.
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I might also speculate on the estate of those who leave Omelas. They do not go to another city; this is sure. No city can exist without casting a shadow on her countryside. There is no permanence to the city, nothing like the permanence of the redwood forest. The city is a launch pad for the cultured elite to blast off into heaven. It will consume the earth.

The Lure and Doom of Analytic Theology

1. Analytic theology (AT), through its affirmation of an analytic method in which a problem is analyzed (broken down) and properly reconstructed, assumes that all theological problems are improperly constructed. That is, there really are no "problems" in the logic of Christianity as such, but only problems in Christian understanding of Christianity/God. So what?

-well, first, this assumes that what is problematic for one culture can be explained by another culture in such a way that the problem is really solved for all. This is the lure of logic. You can gain argumentative power through defining terms nobody wants to deny and which lead to the desired conclusion. But culture often confounds this seeming solution. If we have analyzed and improved our understanding of God's relation to time, for instance, this does not necessarily mean that we have done so for anyone operating in another cultural paradigm. All arguments are laden with cultural-linguistic baggage, or location. This means that there is no "proper" analytic construction of God's relation to time, unless…

-unless AT affirms that we are approaching the end of language as we have known it. Perhaps we are approaching the end of history, and entering into a time where all people speak the same language, the perfect language of logic (mathematics). Here, the problems become final solutions because we all occupy the same cultural-linguistic location. We're all playing the same language game.

-but what about the problems which appear in the Scriptures themselves? Are these problems only phenomena of human misunderstanding? What does this mean about the inspiration of these texts? And once analytic theology has done its work on the Scriptures, would not these Scriptures become obsolete, the problems all being solved?

2. AT assumes that our knowledge of God is natural. That is, while revelation serves to get the ball rolling, so to speak, theologians can use analytic method to reconstruct a theology which can be appropriated and evaluated without reference to Scripture. Scripture becomes an artifact of nature which rests alongside all the other books ever written. 

-but this also leads at least to the redundancy and problematic nature of Scripture. If God can be known naturally, then Scripture becomes less than useless. There are many aspects of Scripture which are ethically problematic or scientifically anathema to rationalism.

-this also has the effect of validating or normalizing conventional thought or intuition. That is, instead of judging an idea with reference to an external norm, like the God-breathed Scriptures, we now see reference being made to intuition. Intuition begins to serve as a source of inspiration, not that it comes from a vertically transcendent source, but a horizontally transcendent one, because it is the voice of Man. It is thought to be illogical to propose an idea which undercuts the supremacy of the intuition of Man. If it is possible that what we intuit to be true is false, then, having already naturalized Scripture, we are at an epistemic stale mate. This is no fun for anybody, so we just assume that our intuitions are true. (And nobody even wonders anymore why we don't start by assuming that the Word of God is true, especially where it shows Man to be a foolish liar)

3. AT is also impotent to really solve the problems it is advertised to solve (or if it does anything, it only moves the goal post and dissolves the problem by annulling the authority of Scripture).

-Does God exist?

• AT: Well, yes. But why don't we ask a more answerable question, like "Am I within my epistemic rights to assert that God exists in public?" (Goal post moved, also note that when one defends one right, he often leads to the assumption that he doesn't have the right to say all the things he didn't argue he had the right to say. What about "Am I within my epistemic rights to assert that the prologue of Genesis is a myth which is historically accurate?" Let's bet on the AT answer for that one….)

-Is the bible inspired?

• AT: We'll get back to you on that one/We're working on it (but we're pretty sure that we wouldn't sign the Chicago Statement ;)

-Does hell exist?

• AT: Have you heard of annihilationism? What about evangelical universalism? There are a lot of options on the table historically…If hell exists, it is probably where all the continental philosophers go. lol.

-What about the problem of evil?

• AT: Again, depending on your view of hell, and your view of the nature of God, maybe there isn't a problem as such. Let's move the goal post. Here's a better question: Do humans have libertarian free will? And remember, if you say no, then you're a fatalist. (Why is fatalism so bad again? If we had to pick between fatalism and chaos….) It's not that God couldn't have stopped evil, but more that in order to create a world with LFW, then the possibility of evil must exist. Thus, the problem of evil is weakened (solved?) if we understand that it is necessary to all worlds in which there are humans who have LFW. (Don't ask the obvious follow up, which is why LFW is so valuable that it exonerates God for the existence of evil. Apparently LFW is so intuitive, that to deny it is grounds for institutionalization) (Also notice that we get open theism here, whether they admit it or not. They'll try to convince you that Molinism prevents this, but it doesn't. Otherwise, one must defend that this is the best of all possible worlds, an assertion which only begs the question.)

We could go on. But I brought all this up to set the stage for three rhetorical questions:

1. Doesn't all of this mean that analytic theology presumes an end to itself, a terminus? What happens when the majority of analytic scholars have fully explored the all the domains of theology? They seem to be pretty sure that they have already figured out many of the prolegomena to theology since the 70s. How long will the rest take if the movement really picks up steam? I suppose there will always be nibbles of work to accommodate new scientific discoveries or drifts in language, but for the most part, this is a finite program. What new data could come to light which would really change any of these considerations? Short of digging up Jesus's body, not much. Perhaps this is the only solace AT offers, that it will soon be over.

2. Who are they trying to convince? The problem at the core IMO is that AT is based on a rejection of the total depravity of Man, which leads to an emphasis on natural theology and rationalism. The tragedy is that they think they're doing apologetics for the faith, that they're constructing a biblical defense for a scientific age. They think that pagans will be convinced if a really good argument is used to prove the existence of God. The problem is two-fold. First, they never give any really good offensive arguments for the existence of God. They end up offering an apology in the more contemporary sense, where they demur from the classical conception of God and make little peace offerings to the idol of Intuition. They don't try to get the pagan to say "Jesus is Lord", but rather "Theism is epistemically viable, and theists should be allowed into academia". This leads to the second tragic consequence, which is that the Scriptural foundations for Christianity are sacrificed. I don't think that there are any big name Analytic Theologians who would earn the respect of their forefather, Thomas Aquinas. It's more likely that they would be anathematized. While I can't name any big name analytic theologians who are known for their orthodoxy (historical), I can think of some who aren't even Christians any more. Perhaps this is merely circumstantial. Perhaps all the orthodox analytic theologians like anonymity. It seems much more likely that the whole enterprise which springs from the analytic method leads to varieties of atheism. They think they're preaching to the World, but they're really scandalizing the Church.

3. Whatever it is, can we really call it theology? This seems to be a somewhat debated topic, even within the Christian analytic movement. Some seem to recognize that there is a qualitative divide between theology and philosophy. Thus, even when analytic philosophical methodology is applied to problems within the Christian tradition, these projects are not theological projects. Theology deals with dogmatics; philosophy does not. Theology speaks for the church, philosophy does not (?). What does it mean that analytic philosophers are starting to feel their oats, starting to say, after Plantinga, that all the real theology is being done in philosophy departments? Well, it probably doesn't mean that the American theological tradition is so strong that it has infiltrated philosophy. No, it is more likely that what this signifies is the invasion of analytic philosophy into the culture of the Church (theology having left the building a long time ago). There was a vacuum of academic rigor, and analytic philosophers who happen to be Christian have made a market niche for themselves. I'm not sure if they want to call what they're doing theology because they don't recognize the classical subordination of reason to revelation, or perhaps because of some latent Neo-Calvinist eschatology which thinks that the Church will save the world, literally, through conquering academia. I'm not sure that there is one way to slice it in particular, but I am sure that analytic theology, so called, is not theology. When your god is Intuition, "thinking God's thoughts after him" becomes a purely human affair. Why not just call it analytic philosophy.

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I would also say that the longer AT masquerades as theology, the weaker the mind of Christianity will get. Theology is first and foremost for the service of the Church to the glory of God, and who would say that this service is being rendered? Mark Noll (et al.) hasn't made his money extolling the vigor of theology in the Church. Further, as we witness the atrophy of theology/philosophy departments in Christian universities around the nation, who's to blame? I would say that a factor in this is that when theology becomes something which is merely apologetic, and not for the life of every Christian, when Christianity is dumbed down and secularized, then philosophy becomes a parachurch ministry, an optional facet of education. What used to be central has become peripheral, and we've got nobody to blame but ourselves.

Pink's Proposal, Revisited

Yesterday I wrote a post about Daniel Pink and the concept of getting paid "enough". At the end I wonder what I would do if I was offered a job in which I was paid "enough", allowed autonomy in a ResultsOnlyWorkEnvironment, am encouraged to pursue mastery of my job, am allowed to design my work space, and have a voice in the higher purposes of the company. The imagination leaps to magazine lists highlighting Google and Starbucks and whoever as the best companies for employees. Also, the imagination leaps to the, shall we say, solidarity required between these companies and their employees. They rise and fall together. They must trust each other. They're family.

I wonder if this is the best we can do. I wonder if this is the moon for which to shoot. You see, I actually intended my earlier post to set up this one, in which I put forward the idea that everything Daniel Pink is spinning, everything these accoladed companies are trying to synthesize, is actually already available*.

Now, they're available in the sense that they can be had at a price. But that shouldn't bother us, since as Pink's psychology points out that we want more value out of our work than just money. Perhaps both paradigms of the future come at a price. But, I'll get to the point, which you may have seen coming...

Let's see, we're talking about a job in which only the results matter, so it's functional. Also, since I'm not wasting a lot of time doing non-functional work, I'll have more free time for self-mastery. I'll get to design my own work and work space, and I'll have a say (or the say) in the higher purpose I pursue in my work.  You know, there's a guy that was writing about this a long time ago, come to think of it (and he's just the one that happens to leap to mind).

Say "'ello" to Henry David Thoreau. Good old HDT got quite a jump on Daniel Pink, I must say. He was experimenting with Walden in the 1840s. If you've ever read Walden, you know that all of these values that Pink is trying to revive were those being championed by Thoreau way back when. Thoreau definitely lived in a Results Only Work Environment. So, check. His main purpose was self-mastery, which incorporated the mastery of his place (or the place of his squatting anyhow), and which was his (as a consummate transcendentalist) higher purpose. So, check, check, check. I'm not at all saying that you have to be an atheist(?) anarchist(?) in order to learn from Thoreau, since I'm not sure he was these things. But, you must learn to question the gods of society, and this is to have the imagination of anarchy. I'm not going to bore you with what America "used to be", but let's just say that the lesson of Thoreau's scandalous life was perhaps that an anarchic imagination is a virtue, not a vice. If anarchy was scandalous then, how much more today? If it was a virtue then, how much more today?

I suppose that the only issue is with the concept of "enough" income. It may indeed be impossible today, due to an IRS conspiracy, to re-Walden ourselves. I am not so sure that there hasn't been some giving as well as some taking since 1840. I am sure that the need for men to live deliberately has never been greater. You don't have to parrot Thoreau's experiment to value his insights; actually, it's probably best not to do so. No, the point is to live deliberately, or as Kierkegaard says, live such that you make all things a matter of conscience.

Here are some quotations chosen without too much care as I flipped through my copy of Walden. I hope if you are interested by Pink's ideas, you'll take the time to listen to his betters.

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

The following could be considered HDT's statement of purpose for Walden:

Let us consider for a moment what most of the trouble and anxiety which I have referred to is about, and how much it is necessary that we be troubled, or, at least, careful. It would be some advantage to live a primitive and frontier life, though in the midst of an outward civilization, if only to learn what are the gross necessaries of life and what methods have been taken to obtain them; or even to look over the old day-books of the merchants, to see what it was that men most commonly bought at the stores, what they stored, that is, what are the grossest groceries. For the improvements of ages have had but little influence on the essential laws of man's existence; as our skeletons, probably, are not to be distinguished from those of our ancestors.

(not sure how much longer that last sentence will hold true...)

Most of the luxuries, and many of the so called comforts of life, are not only not indispensable, but positive hinderances to the elevation of mankind.

To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school, but so to love wisdom as to live according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity, and trust. It is to solve some of the problems of life, not only theoretically, but practically. The success of great scholars and thinkers is commonly a courtier-like success, not kingly, not manly. They make shift to live merely by conformity, practically as their fathers did, and are in no sense the progenitors of a nobler race of men...The philosopher is in advance of his age even in the outward form of his life. He is not fed, sheltered, clothed, warmed, like his contemporaries. How can a man be a philosopher and not maintain his vital heat by better methods than other men?

All men want, not something to do with, but something to do, or rather something to be.

The cart before the horse is neither beautiful nor useful. Before we can adorn our houses with beautiful objects the walls must be stripped, and our lives must be stripped, and beautiful housekeeping and beautiful living be laid for a foundation: now, a taste for the beautiful is most cultivated out of doors, where there is no house and no housekeeper.

The student who secures his coveted leisure and retirement by systematically shirking any labor necessary to man obtains but an ignoble and unprofitable leisure, defrauding himself of the experience which alone can make leisure fruitful. "But," says one, "you do not mean that the students should go to work with their hands instead of their heads?" I do not mean that exactly, but I mean something which he might think a good deal like that; I mean that they should not play life, or study it merely, while the community supports them at this expensive game, but earnestly live it from beginning to end. How could youths better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living? Methinks this would exercise their minds as much as mathematics. If I wished a boy to know something about the arts and sciences, for instance, I would not pursue the common course, which is merely to send him into the neighborhood of some professor, where any thing is professed and practiced but the art of life;--to survey the world through a telescope or a microscope and never with his natural eye; to study chemistry, and not learn how his bread is made, or mechanics, and not learn how it is earned; to discover new satellites to Neptune, and not detect the motes in his eyes, or to what vagabond he is a satellite himself; or to be devoured by the monsters that swarm all around him, while contemplating the monsters in a drop of vinegar. Which would have advanced the most at the end of a month,--the boy who had made his own jackknife from the ore which he had dug and smelted, reading as much as would be necessary for this,--or the boy who had attended the lectures on metallurgy at the Institute in the mean while, and had received a Rogers' penknife from his father? Which would be most likely to cut his fingers?

In short, I am convinced, both by faith and experience, that to maintain one's self on this earth is not a hardship but a pastime, if we will live simply and wisely; as the pursuits of the simpler nations are still the sports of the more artificial. It is not necessary that a man should earn his living by the sweat of his brow, unless he sweats easier than I do. 

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn, which does not forsake us in our soundest sleep. I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavor. It is something to be able to paint a particular picture, or to carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience, and be able to give a true account of it in my next excursion. For most men, it appears to me, are in a strange uncertainty about it, whether it is of evil or of God, and have somewhat hastily concluded that it is the chief end of man here to "glorify God and enjoy him forever."

I'll stop here with a comment. Perhaps it is better to come to confess through experience, in accord with revelation, than to woodenly profess through the confessions...

Daniel Pink on Getting Paid

"The best use of money as a motivator is to pay people enough to take the issue of money off the table." Daniel Pink, "Drive" (@ 4:50 http://youtu.be/u6XAPnuFjJc )

I've been listening to Daniel Pink ever since I've started studying education. He's no Ken Robinson, but he has some good points. If I seem sarcastic about him, I am. He thinks that we can have a global economy based on designer spatulas. But, aside from his economic positivity (insanity?), Pink is making radical comments about how to change the speed of business in America.

Nothing he says is new. The only thing about Pink is that he's a politician, and so is good at getting people to listen. He's the mouthpiece of an idea who's time has come. Here are the highlights from my perspective:

1. ROWE: Results Only Work Environment. We don't care when you clock in or out. We don't care if you bring your dog to work, or your kids. We don't care if you need to listen to Rush all day in noise-cancelling headphones. The only thing we care about is that you get your work done.

2. Mastery: People will do hard work for free if it means that they are building skills toward mastery. Mastery is also a euphemism for power.

3. Higher Purpose: People will work harder for less if their work is perceived to have a positive effect on society or the environment. People feel better about doing well when they know everyone else is doing well as well :)

4. Creative Capital/Design Revolution: Although I think that this shift is over-hyped, it is important. Basically, the first world is awash in materials. Pretty much everyone in this socio-economic level who wants a car, a TV, a cell phone, a computer has them. On our way up, the economic model has been all about making the car cheaper so that more people could buy it. But what do you do to compete when you've made cars as relatively cheap as possible? Well, then you start designing good cars which are demonstrably better than the POS cars everyone already has. This is the design revolution. This is why when you go to Target, your spatula has some designer's name on it. This is why IKEA is IKEA (they're actually an interesting disruptive forerunner here). This is why I'm typing on an Apple MacBook Pro (brushes shoulder off). This is why the local food movement is trendy. There have always been those that prefer quality. The point is, now it is trendy to prefer quality, and it's because it's now the only way to distinguish one's self in a world where everybody has everything. (I wouldn't put any stock in this long-term, btw. This is a 10 ft tall house of cards. This is where I'm on-board --> http://opensourceecology.org/gvcs.php )

OK, those are all good ideas, good changes. But when Pink says that we need to find a way to give people access to my 4 bulleted items, and then figure out how much to pay them so that money is no longer an issue, I start to scratch my head.  I want to disagree. I want to cry "Absurd!" How could you ever pay someone "enough" money? How could money be taken "off the table"? Won't I always want a little bit of a raise every year or so, just so that you have a chance to tell me that you love me as my employer? How else will you communicate that I'm doing good work? How will you likewise tell all those who don't get raises that they aren't doing good work?

I want to just reject this notion, but I'm going to let it in. I'm going to think about it. What would it mean if I was employed by a company who offered to pay me "enough". I admit that it's hard to imagine this outside of some extremely socialistic situation where the "Company" provides me with a house, a car, utilities, and pays all of my school loans. Then all of my income would be pretty much discretionary, besides food. It seems that if this wasn't the case, all of the employees at the company would be actually getting "paid" vastly different sums of money. There would be those with 12 kids and a huge house working beside the unmarried, but they're both getting "enough". But "enough" doesn't always equate to "enough", now does it?

Why would this bother me? Again, why do I care? Having 12 kids is its own punishment. Our difference of lifestyle has its own risk/rewards without thinking of pay. I don't really know. I will say that it creates a storm of thoughts in my brain about work that is very different. It lessens the natural antagonism which exists between employer and employee when pay is "on the table". Also, it changes my view of aspirations. If I'm expecting to advance through making more money, then my expression of this as an individual will be to buy expensive stuff. But if I'm basically "advancing" in the sense of mastering my job and capitalizing on my own time to spend on other things, then my aspirations are more DIY-esque. I'll dream about taking our work to places of need, or learning how to play guitar, or learning how to bake good bread, or whatever. Things that I'll really enjoy every day. My money won't be getting saved up for the escapes we call vacation, but I'll be more focused on mastering my everyday life.

I don't know. But imagine if a company like Google came to you and offered you a job which payed you "enough", in which you were allowed autonomy in a ROWE, in which you were encouraged to pursue mastery of your job, design your work space, and had a voice in the higher purposes of the company. I'd probably take it. But I like granola, own a pair of Birkenstock's, and have lots of student loans. What about you?

Stumbling in Ephesus

Let me draw your attention to the fifth chapter (as we reckon it) of Paul's letter to the church in Ephesus. In this section, Paul delivers his "therefore" of verse 1: 

Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. (ESV, here and following).

This structural turn follows an exposition on the life of light, and leads to an analogy of love. It is this analogy, as analogy is want to do, which leaves me with questions. The analogy follows from verses 20-21, in which Paul concludes that "out of reverence for Christ" we should give thanks in all ways, at all times, for all things and all persons. In this state of reverence and thankfulness, it follows that we are to "submit to one another". Blessed and vexing absoluteness.

Now, to the point. If one were to keep reading in this section, one would come through an application of this concept of submission to what seems to me an stunning assertion. In verse 29, Paul says:

For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it...

Paul says this in order to establish the order of love upon the concept of marriage, in which two bodies become one body. Thus, the act of love begins with an act of self-love, truly born (I tip my hat to Kierkegaard here). Christ is the fountainhead of this flow of love, which consummates and communes. 

I get the bit about how we ought to love because Christ loves, and that we ought to love as Christ loves because we only love with His love and through His love and in His love. The Christocentricity of love is not my problem. My problem is with this passing (unnecessary?) reference to this natural law, which is that men nourish and cherish their own flesh. 

Maybe they did then, but I can't see how this is true today.

Paul doesn't say that men prefer themselves, seek to give advantage to themselves, seek to strengthen themselves, usually over and against others. No, this reference is in some supposed continuity with the flow of love. Paul isn't saying that men are selfish, and must learn to turn their selfishness with others. No, Paul is calling upon some nature by which men actually nourish their own bodies.

Maybe all that Paul is saying is that men eat food regularly. They groom and wash their bodies. Maybe this soaring exposition of marriage is based on good relational hygiene. But no. Men also tattoo, scar, poison, disuse and abuse their bodies. Especially in America, this, that seems like natural law to Paul, seems today to run counter to intuition, or even counter to natural law, if there is such a thing.

I cannot understand this verse. I feel as though I can skip it without losing the point of the passage, but I don't see how it is true, or how it ever was.

But it does matter. Kierkegaard argues that the ground of love is true self-love. In this I think he has some insight into the matter, no doubt. But surely Kierkegaard would never say that a man never (ever) hates his own flesh, but rather that when he loves truly, he does so out of the ground of self-love, born by transformation in Christ.

The difference is that it seems to me that the call of Christ is based on a hatred of the natural self, a dying to and turning from the old man. If this can be called love, then I think perhaps Paul is being especially Kierkegaardian here.

Perhaps Paul is establishing a truth which redoubles on itself, has a double meaning.

Man always loves, never hates, himself because in his natural state, his selfishness is perceived as self-love, falsely. In Christ, however, his love is transformed into the Truth, and his love turns to repentance, to hatred of the self, to renouncement of the self, and in the sign of baptism is resurrected.

There are no loves or hates which are not redoubled on themselves like this in resurrection.

Perhaps this is what Paul meant. But if it isn't something complex and subversive like this, then I can make no sense of it.