A good friend recently tipped me off to the homilies of Charles Chaput, the Catholic archbishop of Denver. This is the guy typically depicted as leading out the ranks of "ultraconservative" American Catholic bishops -- so go figure that he'd be a humble, gentle shepherd to boot.
He's also, in last week's sermon, the first clergyman I've heard to address head-on one of the most pervasive bits of foolishness rattling around the Church today.
The reading (from John's gospel) was of Jesus' miraculous multiplication of loaves and fish to feed a crowd of his followers. Apparently, Chaput had been tipped off that some priests in his diocese were preaching that the real miracle in the story was that Jesus had merely inspired those in the crowd who had already brought food to share it with others.
I'm sure I'm not the only one to have heard this "interpretation" all the time. In fact, I know a fair number of good, faithful Catholics who find it incredibly edifying. But there are at least two massive problems here.
The first is that it's simply not what the scripture says. Believing the "sharing" interpretation requires you to ignore not just the actual words of the passage, but every single theme the gospel writers are building around it. This is most obvious in Mark's gospel, where, immediately after the feeding of the five thousand, the disciples see Jesus walking on water. Mark says they were "terrified" and "completely astounded," because ... "they had not understood the incident of the loaves."
So: What, precisely, did the disciples not understand? That they were supposed to share food with each other? Or that Jesus posesses the full power of God?
The significance is even more clear from the Old Testament. The first reading last week was from 2 Kings, where Elisha performs a similar miracle. And, of course, there's God's provision of manna to the Israelites in the desert -- which Jesus references directly in the susequent Bread of Life discourse in John's gospel.
The takeaway: "I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst."
And that's the second thing wrong with the "sharing" gloss: It puts the focus of the story on us, exactly when Jesus is revealing something hugely important about himself.
It might be objected, of course, that I'm reading way to much into what remains a nice story with an important message: Jesus wants us to share. And, surely, anyone who's ever preached that interpretation of the loaves and the fish passage would readily admit that, no, it might not actually have gone down that way.
But they still do serious violence to the faith in the process. No one is going to remember the point of more than 2 percent -- tops -- of the homilies they hear. But what does stick with us is the posture towards the things of God that's communicated, constantly and ever-so-subtly, from the pulpit.
With regard to Scripture: Is it simply a collection of nice stories that we can take or leave at will, or spin however we want? Or is it the authoritative, trustworthy chronicle of God's deliberate revelation of himself to his creation? Show me a preacher whose words convey the former, and I'll show you a flock that looks elsewhere in times of trial.
Clearly, Chaput's not about to let that happen in Denver, even if it means calling a few priests to the mat.
Keep it up, Your Excellency.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Monday, July 6, 2009
Unforgiven
[Note: Just in case I hadn't mentioned it before, this blog has a standing spoiler alert. Read at your own risk.]
I finally Netflixed Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven last week. I've been on a slowly matriculating western-movie kick for about a year now, so I figured it was about time I saw what's supposed to be the quintessential anti-western. That's to say, the sophisticated, deconstructing sort of film that takes apart all those "naive" John Wayne ideals like justice and honor and rugged individualism.
It's a devastating one, too -- if one defines the western merely by its stylistic pretensions. But set Unforgiven up against the masterpieces of the genre, and it takes on a far different color. Far from debunking the western, it reinforces by contrast some of its most fundamental insights.
As to Eastwood's anti-western intent, I'd submit that he's created what could be the most artistically made straw man in the history of film.
Certainly, Eastwood's anti-hero, Bill Munny, has all the markings of John Wayne's evil twin: A retired and reformed former gunslinger, Munny rides out one last time to do rough violence, supposedly for the sake of his loved ones. But he's unable to return to his former profession without waking and embracing his old demons, ultimately committing mass murder in the town of High Whiskey, Wyoming.
Eastwood tells the story with skill and to effect, but Munny's relapse itself doesn't quite serve to stand the western on its head. If anything -- as a friend of mine put it -- it just shows there are a lot of violent, evil men out there who could probably use a killing . . . from someone like John Wayne.
What's always made western films so fascinating, however, are their political angles. It's interesting that the western is the only genre of film to be defined by its setting -- essentially, the outposts of civilization, beset on all sides by wilderness and violence. This allows the artist to get down to brass tacks with hard questions of justice, politics and the survival of human society.
Unforgiven is no exception -- except that Eastwood's High Whiskey is a town woefully incapable of responding to Munny's menace, despite the John Wayne bravado and rough justice of its sheriff. So much, Eastwood seems to be saying, for the possibility of noble individual action establishing any sort of justice.
Eastwood drives this point home most directly, ironically enough, in the one light touch of the entire movie. An earlier, lesser assassin than Munny rides into town accompanied by a weakling eastern author to chronicle his exploits. The sheriff (a terrific Gene Hackman) makes quick work of the assassin, then delights in debunking the writer's old-west cartoon fantasies with "how it really works." Naturally, the writer senses another story, and Hackman is soon parading him around with equal ostentation.
Until, that is, Munny shows up and kills everyone but the writer, who seems perfectly willing to attach himself to this new strongman. Eastwood's point: The "hero" who gets his "achievements" praised is really only the most effective killer. Nobility doesn't enter into it.
Or so he seems to be -- and, in all likelihood, tries to be -- saying.
But you can't think too hard about the politics of Unforgiven without noticing something quite peculiar. Whereas almost every other western depicts some marker of civil society -- a schoolmistress love-interest, for instance, or Jimmy Stewart's law practice in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence -- even if only as a foil for its loner hero, Eastwood's movie has nothing. There's no church, nor even any mention of religion -- odd for a film that invokes the theme of forgiveness in its title. Indeed, the only civil institution whatsoever -- and the one that drives the plot -- is a whorehouse.
Much to the same effect, and even more jarring when you think about it, is that the prostitutes of High Whiskey are practically the only women in the entire film. This is certainly intentional on Eastwood's part. Hackman, in one loaded vignette, is shown futilely trying to build a house -- for himself and by himself. The woman whose absence is felt most acutely is Munny's late wife, whose presence, we are told, was what reformed the old gunslinger.
Still, one wonders what Eastwood is trying to say here. At the very least, it seems unfair to completely write off old-western virtue while denying one's protagonists the benefit of half of human society. Unfair, and possibly anachronistic, too: It was John Steinbeck's memorable observation that the church and the whorehouse arrived in each western town at roughly the same time, as men sought a broad range of options to soothe their primal restlessness.
In any event, it somewhat impeaches the credibility of Eastwood's quite-literally Godforsaken canvas when he denies his protagonists the cultural resources necessary to make a proper stand.
It could be, of course, that this is precisely Eastwood's point -- for it's obvious that the loner heroes of western lore aren't the ones to lay down the cultural foundations they seem to need. A world of John Waynes, in other words, is really no different than a world of Bill Munnys.
The thing is, the best western films already understand this. Take The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence. The John Wayne character stands apart from civilization, but what sets him apart from brigands like Valence is his reliance upon it -- mainly in the form of his affection for the lovely Hallie Stoddard. Of course, it becomes just as clear how much civilization relies on John Wayne.
Navigating this relationship, especially in the wild early days -- or, say, upon the arrival of idealistic young lawyers from back east -- can be a messy thing and the source of great drama. But instead of the graceful treatment such tensions are given at the hands of someone like John Ford, Eastwood just rubs his audience's face in them.
Thus, his only conclusion is the nihilistic refrain, "we all got it coming, kid."
It's powerful, sure, but not especially true to life.
I finally Netflixed Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven last week. I've been on a slowly matriculating western-movie kick for about a year now, so I figured it was about time I saw what's supposed to be the quintessential anti-western. That's to say, the sophisticated, deconstructing sort of film that takes apart all those "naive" John Wayne ideals like justice and honor and rugged individualism.
It's a devastating one, too -- if one defines the western merely by its stylistic pretensions. But set Unforgiven up against the masterpieces of the genre, and it takes on a far different color. Far from debunking the western, it reinforces by contrast some of its most fundamental insights.
As to Eastwood's anti-western intent, I'd submit that he's created what could be the most artistically made straw man in the history of film.
Certainly, Eastwood's anti-hero, Bill Munny, has all the markings of John Wayne's evil twin: A retired and reformed former gunslinger, Munny rides out one last time to do rough violence, supposedly for the sake of his loved ones. But he's unable to return to his former profession without waking and embracing his old demons, ultimately committing mass murder in the town of High Whiskey, Wyoming.
Eastwood tells the story with skill and to effect, but Munny's relapse itself doesn't quite serve to stand the western on its head. If anything -- as a friend of mine put it -- it just shows there are a lot of violent, evil men out there who could probably use a killing . . . from someone like John Wayne.
What's always made western films so fascinating, however, are their political angles. It's interesting that the western is the only genre of film to be defined by its setting -- essentially, the outposts of civilization, beset on all sides by wilderness and violence. This allows the artist to get down to brass tacks with hard questions of justice, politics and the survival of human society.
Unforgiven is no exception -- except that Eastwood's High Whiskey is a town woefully incapable of responding to Munny's menace, despite the John Wayne bravado and rough justice of its sheriff. So much, Eastwood seems to be saying, for the possibility of noble individual action establishing any sort of justice.
Eastwood drives this point home most directly, ironically enough, in the one light touch of the entire movie. An earlier, lesser assassin than Munny rides into town accompanied by a weakling eastern author to chronicle his exploits. The sheriff (a terrific Gene Hackman) makes quick work of the assassin, then delights in debunking the writer's old-west cartoon fantasies with "how it really works." Naturally, the writer senses another story, and Hackman is soon parading him around with equal ostentation.
Until, that is, Munny shows up and kills everyone but the writer, who seems perfectly willing to attach himself to this new strongman. Eastwood's point: The "hero" who gets his "achievements" praised is really only the most effective killer. Nobility doesn't enter into it.
Or so he seems to be -- and, in all likelihood, tries to be -- saying.
But you can't think too hard about the politics of Unforgiven without noticing something quite peculiar. Whereas almost every other western depicts some marker of civil society -- a schoolmistress love-interest, for instance, or Jimmy Stewart's law practice in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence -- even if only as a foil for its loner hero, Eastwood's movie has nothing. There's no church, nor even any mention of religion -- odd for a film that invokes the theme of forgiveness in its title. Indeed, the only civil institution whatsoever -- and the one that drives the plot -- is a whorehouse.
Much to the same effect, and even more jarring when you think about it, is that the prostitutes of High Whiskey are practically the only women in the entire film. This is certainly intentional on Eastwood's part. Hackman, in one loaded vignette, is shown futilely trying to build a house -- for himself and by himself. The woman whose absence is felt most acutely is Munny's late wife, whose presence, we are told, was what reformed the old gunslinger.
Still, one wonders what Eastwood is trying to say here. At the very least, it seems unfair to completely write off old-western virtue while denying one's protagonists the benefit of half of human society. Unfair, and possibly anachronistic, too: It was John Steinbeck's memorable observation that the church and the whorehouse arrived in each western town at roughly the same time, as men sought a broad range of options to soothe their primal restlessness.
In any event, it somewhat impeaches the credibility of Eastwood's quite-literally Godforsaken canvas when he denies his protagonists the cultural resources necessary to make a proper stand.
It could be, of course, that this is precisely Eastwood's point -- for it's obvious that the loner heroes of western lore aren't the ones to lay down the cultural foundations they seem to need. A world of John Waynes, in other words, is really no different than a world of Bill Munnys.
The thing is, the best western films already understand this. Take The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence. The John Wayne character stands apart from civilization, but what sets him apart from brigands like Valence is his reliance upon it -- mainly in the form of his affection for the lovely Hallie Stoddard. Of course, it becomes just as clear how much civilization relies on John Wayne.
Navigating this relationship, especially in the wild early days -- or, say, upon the arrival of idealistic young lawyers from back east -- can be a messy thing and the source of great drama. But instead of the graceful treatment such tensions are given at the hands of someone like John Ford, Eastwood just rubs his audience's face in them.
Thus, his only conclusion is the nihilistic refrain, "we all got it coming, kid."
It's powerful, sure, but not especially true to life.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Getting Redemption Wrong
Why won't Mark Sanford shut up?
I was a fan (as much as one could be) of the disgraced South Carolina governor's initial public confession his marital infidelity. He rambled a bit, but he gave the impression of someone who knew he had sinned before God and his family.
But then he kept talking. First came the meeting with his cabinet where he compared himself to King David. Next, he told the AP that he'd also "crossed the line" -- but not "the sex line" -- with other women, and that although he believes his Argentine mistress was his "soul mate," he's "trying to fall back in love" with his wife. Now (h/t NRO) comes this, explaining why he decided not to leave office:
Right: God is punishing me by making me be governor -- but think of all the kids I'll inspire! This is, first and foremost, a scary degree of narcissism for any public official -- but I wonder if there isn't something cultural going on as well.
What's fascinating here is the way Sanford -- a man, lest we forget, who was not weeks ago considered presidential material -- so seamlessly wraps his exhibitionist impulses in the language of Biblical Christianity.
Others have written far more eloquently about the dangers posed to American Christianity -- and perhaps American society -- by the sort of therapeutic, Oprah-fied deism marketed by folks like Joel Osteen. My read of Sanford is that he fits squarely in that tradition, updated for the age of Twitter. In other words, while many fallen public figures have likely convinced themselves with the same self-serving logic, Sanford is one of the first to do so under the cultural expectation -- real or imagined -- that he keep the public posted on it in real time.
For Christians, this should be seen as the ultimate mockery of the proud tradition of public personal testimony.
"Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope," urges St. Peter. For most, this takes the form of a story: this is what God has done in my life.
Nothing wrong with that. But anyone who's hung around evangelical circles long enough knows of instances where someone shares just a bit too much information, or rambles on a bit too long. Most of the time, of course, this happens due to excusable enthusiasm and in perfectly good faith. But it's also not hard to see the danger lurking, especially in today's therapeutic culture.
The temptation is always to set up one's testimony itself as a sort of idol; to substitute the self-referential cultivation of one's "faith journey" for the direct, fearsome worship of God.
This phenomenon has probably only been aggrivated by the arrival of Twitter-style instant self-broadcasting. Indeed, for us to talk about God's redemption at all anymore, it needs to come quick and easy.
Thus, Sanford compares himself to King David with Bathsheeba the day after he gets caught, proving once and for all that he doesn't understand the story. If there's one thing we learn from King David, it's that truly receiving God's forgiveness is a lengthy and painful process. I, for one, couldn't imagine what it must have been like to lose a child as God's direct punishment for my sin, and yet be able to sing, "Let the bones you have crushed rejoice."
There's a deep, deep mystery here that's more than a little unseemly to throw around so lightly. But you'd think, listening to Sanford, that whatever lessons God needs us to learn come in quick, 140-character sound bytes just in time for the next news cycle.
This is not to say that redemption doesn't happen, or that it can't one day make for an amazing testimony to God's faithfulness -- just that it comes, for anyone, at great cost. Some of us might even suffer the great indignity of not being seen as a role model for "thousands" of children.
"Work out your salvation in fear and trembling," says St. Paul. If he could see us today, he might add, "in private."
I was a fan (as much as one could be) of the disgraced South Carolina governor's initial public confession his marital infidelity. He rambled a bit, but he gave the impression of someone who knew he had sinned before God and his family.
But then he kept talking. First came the meeting with his cabinet where he compared himself to King David. Next, he told the AP that he'd also "crossed the line" -- but not "the sex line" -- with other women, and that although he believes his Argentine mistress was his "soul mate," he's "trying to fall back in love" with his wife. Now (h/t NRO) comes this, explaining why he decided not to leave office:
Immediately after all this unfolded last week I had thought I would resign — as I believe in the military model of leadership and when trust of any form is broken one lays down the sword. A long list of close friends have suggested otherwise - that for God to really work in my life I shouldn’t be getting off so lightly. While it would be personally easier to exit stage left, their point has been that my larger sin was the sin of pride. ...
Accordingly, [these friends] suggested that there was a very different life script that would be lived and learned by our boys, and thousands like them, if this story simply ended with scandal and then the end of office — versus a fall from grace and then renewal and rebuilding and growth in its aftermath.
Right: God is punishing me by making me be governor -- but think of all the kids I'll inspire! This is, first and foremost, a scary degree of narcissism for any public official -- but I wonder if there isn't something cultural going on as well.
What's fascinating here is the way Sanford -- a man, lest we forget, who was not weeks ago considered presidential material -- so seamlessly wraps his exhibitionist impulses in the language of Biblical Christianity.
Others have written far more eloquently about the dangers posed to American Christianity -- and perhaps American society -- by the sort of therapeutic, Oprah-fied deism marketed by folks like Joel Osteen. My read of Sanford is that he fits squarely in that tradition, updated for the age of Twitter. In other words, while many fallen public figures have likely convinced themselves with the same self-serving logic, Sanford is one of the first to do so under the cultural expectation -- real or imagined -- that he keep the public posted on it in real time.
For Christians, this should be seen as the ultimate mockery of the proud tradition of public personal testimony.
"Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope," urges St. Peter. For most, this takes the form of a story: this is what God has done in my life.
Nothing wrong with that. But anyone who's hung around evangelical circles long enough knows of instances where someone shares just a bit too much information, or rambles on a bit too long. Most of the time, of course, this happens due to excusable enthusiasm and in perfectly good faith. But it's also not hard to see the danger lurking, especially in today's therapeutic culture.
The temptation is always to set up one's testimony itself as a sort of idol; to substitute the self-referential cultivation of one's "faith journey" for the direct, fearsome worship of God.
This phenomenon has probably only been aggrivated by the arrival of Twitter-style instant self-broadcasting. Indeed, for us to talk about God's redemption at all anymore, it needs to come quick and easy.
Thus, Sanford compares himself to King David with Bathsheeba the day after he gets caught, proving once and for all that he doesn't understand the story. If there's one thing we learn from King David, it's that truly receiving God's forgiveness is a lengthy and painful process. I, for one, couldn't imagine what it must have been like to lose a child as God's direct punishment for my sin, and yet be able to sing, "Let the bones you have crushed rejoice."
There's a deep, deep mystery here that's more than a little unseemly to throw around so lightly. But you'd think, listening to Sanford, that whatever lessons God needs us to learn come in quick, 140-character sound bytes just in time for the next news cycle.
This is not to say that redemption doesn't happen, or that it can't one day make for an amazing testimony to God's faithfulness -- just that it comes, for anyone, at great cost. Some of us might even suffer the great indignity of not being seen as a role model for "thousands" of children.
"Work out your salvation in fear and trembling," says St. Paul. If he could see us today, he might add, "in private."
Friday, June 26, 2009
Jesus, Mary & Josephus
I like Jews. I've had occasion recently to ponder why this is.
Typically, one of my biggest pet peeves is when people confuse the terms "ecumenism" and "interreligious dialogue." The latter, obviously, concerns conversations aimed at mutual understanding and whatnot between adherents to different faiths. The former is just like it, only between Christians of different denominations. Except that it's not. What sets ecumenism apart is that those who engage in it can not only talk but worship together, thanks to the centrality of their common faith in Jesus Christ. Thus, sloppiness about ecumenism often foretells a broader confusion about Christ himself.
An interesting middle case, however, is in Christian relations with the people of Jacob. We don't share Christ, yet there's no question that Christians and Jews worship very much the same God. Plus, without the ways of worship and belief that the Jewish people, by and large, continue to keep alive, God's self-revelation in Christ would never have made sense in the first place.
This was all brought home to me quite vividly in reading Jerusalem's Traitor: Josephus, Masada, and the Fall of Judea, by British historian Desmond Seward. Josephus, his subject, must be one of the more fascinating figures in antiquity. A philo-Roman upper-class Jew born in Jerusalem shortly after the death of Christ, he served half-heartedly as military governor of Galilee after the Jewish uprising of 66 AD. After feuding incessantly with Galilee's more zealous, err, Zealots, he was captured by the Romans and immediately turned state's evidence, advising future emperors Vespasian and Titus as they laid seige to Jerusalem.
You get the feeling that this guy would have made a great character study: one of the many cooperative figures among Rome's conquered peoples, but one who nonetheless took for himself the dignity of a prophet, depicting Rome's destruction of Jerusalem as God's punishment for the sins of the Zealot leaders -- who indeed, Josephus tells us, spent much of their time under seige feuding with each other and slaughtering their own people. Seward doesn't do a great job of this; then again, his only source for much of the history was Josephus himself.
It's an amazing -- and heartbreaking -- story anyway, particularly when it comes to the final storming of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. A Christian remembers that Jesus foretold as much -- but also that he wept for the city as he did so. And why not? There would have been no Jesus Christ without Jerusalem and its Temple.
The meaning of the Temple, especially to Christians, is apparent from its first dedication under King Solomon. "Can it indeed be," he asks, "that God dwells among men on earth?" (1 Kings 8:27) Oh, I don't know ... maybe? For a Christian, God's presence in the Holy of Holies prefigures his presence in Christ himself.
I think you could say a similar thing about the entire Jewish people -- that there are hints of the Incarnation in the mere fact that God chose them. The beauty of the Incarnation is its earthiness -- the idea that God physically became one of us to redeem every aspect of human existence. So it really only makes sense that to prepare us for such a thing, he would choose not to rule from on high like some evenhanded, abstract watchmaker, but rather to stick his nose into every corner of the life of one nation.
(This, by the way, is how I've come to appreciate the Virgin Mary -- as the ultimate Jew. In other words, just as God blessed and set apart a certain people as the means by which he would come into the world, so, when the time was imminent, he blessed and set apart one woman from that people, to get the job done.)
So, what does all this have to do with Jews today? It's certainly been a blessing of my two years in New York to get to know so many of them and to see how my Jewish friends cling to God's law -- and the idea of themselves as a people. (Though they'd doubtless disagree with my gloss on some of our shared scriptures.) This is fairly hard to miss: By one count, the New York metropolitan area holds 15% of the world's Jewish population.
What's surprised me is how edifying a strong Jewish presence has been for my Christian faith. I think that's because there's a sacramental reality going on here -- that's to say, and outward sign of an inner truth. To wit: The perseverance of God's original Chosen People is a living reminder of the long and laborious care he took to reveal his ways to man.
(Note: The late great Richard John Neuhaus says some simlar things, much better, here.)
Typically, one of my biggest pet peeves is when people confuse the terms "ecumenism" and "interreligious dialogue." The latter, obviously, concerns conversations aimed at mutual understanding and whatnot between adherents to different faiths. The former is just like it, only between Christians of different denominations. Except that it's not. What sets ecumenism apart is that those who engage in it can not only talk but worship together, thanks to the centrality of their common faith in Jesus Christ. Thus, sloppiness about ecumenism often foretells a broader confusion about Christ himself.
An interesting middle case, however, is in Christian relations with the people of Jacob. We don't share Christ, yet there's no question that Christians and Jews worship very much the same God. Plus, without the ways of worship and belief that the Jewish people, by and large, continue to keep alive, God's self-revelation in Christ would never have made sense in the first place.
This was all brought home to me quite vividly in reading Jerusalem's Traitor: Josephus, Masada, and the Fall of Judea, by British historian Desmond Seward. Josephus, his subject, must be one of the more fascinating figures in antiquity. A philo-Roman upper-class Jew born in Jerusalem shortly after the death of Christ, he served half-heartedly as military governor of Galilee after the Jewish uprising of 66 AD. After feuding incessantly with Galilee's more zealous, err, Zealots, he was captured by the Romans and immediately turned state's evidence, advising future emperors Vespasian and Titus as they laid seige to Jerusalem.
You get the feeling that this guy would have made a great character study: one of the many cooperative figures among Rome's conquered peoples, but one who nonetheless took for himself the dignity of a prophet, depicting Rome's destruction of Jerusalem as God's punishment for the sins of the Zealot leaders -- who indeed, Josephus tells us, spent much of their time under seige feuding with each other and slaughtering their own people. Seward doesn't do a great job of this; then again, his only source for much of the history was Josephus himself.
It's an amazing -- and heartbreaking -- story anyway, particularly when it comes to the final storming of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. A Christian remembers that Jesus foretold as much -- but also that he wept for the city as he did so. And why not? There would have been no Jesus Christ without Jerusalem and its Temple.
The meaning of the Temple, especially to Christians, is apparent from its first dedication under King Solomon. "Can it indeed be," he asks, "that God dwells among men on earth?" (1 Kings 8:27) Oh, I don't know ... maybe? For a Christian, God's presence in the Holy of Holies prefigures his presence in Christ himself.
I think you could say a similar thing about the entire Jewish people -- that there are hints of the Incarnation in the mere fact that God chose them. The beauty of the Incarnation is its earthiness -- the idea that God physically became one of us to redeem every aspect of human existence. So it really only makes sense that to prepare us for such a thing, he would choose not to rule from on high like some evenhanded, abstract watchmaker, but rather to stick his nose into every corner of the life of one nation.
(This, by the way, is how I've come to appreciate the Virgin Mary -- as the ultimate Jew. In other words, just as God blessed and set apart a certain people as the means by which he would come into the world, so, when the time was imminent, he blessed and set apart one woman from that people, to get the job done.)
So, what does all this have to do with Jews today? It's certainly been a blessing of my two years in New York to get to know so many of them and to see how my Jewish friends cling to God's law -- and the idea of themselves as a people. (Though they'd doubtless disagree with my gloss on some of our shared scriptures.) This is fairly hard to miss: By one count, the New York metropolitan area holds 15% of the world's Jewish population.
What's surprised me is how edifying a strong Jewish presence has been for my Christian faith. I think that's because there's a sacramental reality going on here -- that's to say, and outward sign of an inner truth. To wit: The perseverance of God's original Chosen People is a living reminder of the long and laborious care he took to reveal his ways to man.
(Note: The late great Richard John Neuhaus says some simlar things, much better, here.)
Monday, June 22, 2009
A Man for All Seasons
My handy parish calendar informs me that today's the feast day of St. Thomas More. How could I have nearly forgotten?
One quick thought, reliant (as ever) on Robert Bolt's wonderful play:
It seems quaint, in our great enlightened age of religious toleration -- and toleration of every other sort -- to see a man go to the gallows over his king's intention to change his wife and change his church. Then again, it was probably pretty quaint back then, too. Every age has plenty of perfectly sincere religious folks who'd swear to you that this or that aspect of doctrine or practice isn't that big a deal.
So: How does one keep the faith, simply, without falling into the opposing trap of judgmental legalism? There's a hint of it in Bolt's More, the evening he cuts ties with his closest friend:
And later in the Tower, asked by his daughter whether he hasn't already done all that God could reasonably expect: "Well, finally, it isn't a matter of reason; finally it's a matter of love."
That's to say, when one truly puts on Christ, to deny him anything becomes as unnatural as to deny one's own self.
Yeah, can't say I've quite figured it out, either.
One quick thought, reliant (as ever) on Robert Bolt's wonderful play:
It seems quaint, in our great enlightened age of religious toleration -- and toleration of every other sort -- to see a man go to the gallows over his king's intention to change his wife and change his church. Then again, it was probably pretty quaint back then, too. Every age has plenty of perfectly sincere religious folks who'd swear to you that this or that aspect of doctrine or practice isn't that big a deal.
So: How does one keep the faith, simply, without falling into the opposing trap of judgmental legalism? There's a hint of it in Bolt's More, the evening he cuts ties with his closest friend:
And what would you do with a water spaniel that was afraid off water? You'd hang it! Well, as a spaniel is to water, so is a man to his own self. I will not give in because I oppose it -- I do -- not my pride, not my spleen, nor any other of my appetites but I do -- I! [Grabbing hold of Norfolk] Is there no single sinew in the midst of this that serves no appetite of Norfolk's but is just Norfolk? There is? Give that some exercise, my lord!
And later in the Tower, asked by his daughter whether he hasn't already done all that God could reasonably expect: "Well, finally, it isn't a matter of reason; finally it's a matter of love."
That's to say, when one truly puts on Christ, to deny him anything becomes as unnatural as to deny one's own self.
Yeah, can't say I've quite figured it out, either.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Too clever by half
What is it about a good speech that makes a man willing to die for you?
That's the question I kept coming back to as I re-watched Kenneth Branagh's wonderful production of Shakespeare's Henry V recently. Henry's "band of brothers" speech at Agincourt justly takes pride of place, but nearly as famous -- and nearly as good -- is his rallying cry at the siege of Harfleur:
"Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with English dead!
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility.
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favor'd rage...
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To his full height. On, on you noblest English,
Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!
Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,
Have in these parts from morn till even fought,
And sheath'd their swords for lack of argument.
Dishonor not your mothers; now attest
That those whom you call'd fathers did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war. And you, good yeomen,
Whose limbs were made in England, show us here
The mettle of your pasture. Let us swear
That you are worth your breeding, which I doubt not,
For there is none of you so mean and base
That hath not noble luster in your eyes.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game's afoot!
Follow your spirit, and upon this charge
Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'"
To watch Branagh's performance is to realize that such speeches are not mere rhetorical frills on Shakespeare's part; they're as essential a military asset as any cannon. The bit to the peasantry about the "noble luster in [their] eyes" is especially interesting. The play is full of instances where Henry invites -- acknowledges? -- such social levelling as a consequence of action in which death plays the ultimate equalizer.
It's hard not to think about the power of this kind of rhetoric in light of the current unrest in Iran -- and, specifically, the debate over what President Obama should be saying about it. I'll concede at the outset that I don't know what, specifically, he should say, but what I simply don't understand is all the hand-wringing going on about how any statement in support of the protesters would simply "play into the regime's hands."
I'll leave it to others to size up precisely what's lacking in Obama's current approach. My question's a simpler one: Assuming that Khameni, Ahmadinejad & Co. would try to exploit any message of support for their own purposes, why is everyone just assuming they'd succeed?
The case could be made (though I'm in no position to make it) that invoking the "Great Satan" in the face of hundreds of thousands of people in the street would just look desperate -- while expressing solidarity with the protesters is an important move for us to get on the good side of the country's new pro-Western power base.
What I think it clear, though, is that the "don't meddle" crowd fundamentally misunderstands the power and purpose of rhetoric. Theirs is an incredibly static analysis: If we say this, they'll say that, so let's just not say this in the first place. You saw the same sort of thing, in part, with Obama's "Address to the Muslim World" in Cairo a few weeks ago, where he went so far as to apologize for the CIA's interference in the Iranian coup of 1953. To what purpose? Well, they have a grievance, the thought goes, so I need to clear it out of the way before we can all move on.
This is all very sophisticated and "historically aware," but really, it's too clever by half. Politics, even international geopolitics, has always been a question of "what have you done for me lately?" The folks on the streets aren't likely to spurn our goodwill just because we did some sketchy things in their country 30 years before they were born. History is simply too fluid and unpredictable to keep playing catch-up like that. (And go figure: Khameni wound up denouncing our "meddling" anyway.)
The power of rhetoric, rather, is in shaping a narrative. Henry's arguments at Harfleur and Agincourt were essentially the same: In this battle, you're just like a king. Fight to claim your rightful honor. Our job now, it seems, is simply to articulate a principle -- that we stand with the peaceful, democratic aspirations of the Iranian people. We won't know how this ends until the dust settles, but the advantage of having a solid, noble position on the whole thing -- if we're convincing about it -- is that it gives us much firmer ground from which to act when we see our opening.
Plus, solid principle and goodwill, resolutely expressed, have their own gravitational pull. If that past seven days of protests have reminded us of nothing else, it's that the higher longings of the human soul can be a huge force in politics. After all, if reports of a coming crackdown are true, a large number of Iranians are getting ready to die for their country tomorrow. They need all the reasons they can get -- and I doubt a kind word from the President of the United States would hurt.
That's the question I kept coming back to as I re-watched Kenneth Branagh's wonderful production of Shakespeare's Henry V recently. Henry's "band of brothers" speech at Agincourt justly takes pride of place, but nearly as famous -- and nearly as good -- is his rallying cry at the siege of Harfleur:
"Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with English dead!
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility.
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
Disguise fair nature with hard-favor'd rage...
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To his full height. On, on you noblest English,
Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!
Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,
Have in these parts from morn till even fought,
And sheath'd their swords for lack of argument.
Dishonor not your mothers; now attest
That those whom you call'd fathers did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war. And you, good yeomen,
Whose limbs were made in England, show us here
The mettle of your pasture. Let us swear
That you are worth your breeding, which I doubt not,
For there is none of you so mean and base
That hath not noble luster in your eyes.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game's afoot!
Follow your spirit, and upon this charge
Cry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!'"
To watch Branagh's performance is to realize that such speeches are not mere rhetorical frills on Shakespeare's part; they're as essential a military asset as any cannon. The bit to the peasantry about the "noble luster in [their] eyes" is especially interesting. The play is full of instances where Henry invites -- acknowledges? -- such social levelling as a consequence of action in which death plays the ultimate equalizer.
It's hard not to think about the power of this kind of rhetoric in light of the current unrest in Iran -- and, specifically, the debate over what President Obama should be saying about it. I'll concede at the outset that I don't know what, specifically, he should say, but what I simply don't understand is all the hand-wringing going on about how any statement in support of the protesters would simply "play into the regime's hands."
I'll leave it to others to size up precisely what's lacking in Obama's current approach. My question's a simpler one: Assuming that Khameni, Ahmadinejad & Co. would try to exploit any message of support for their own purposes, why is everyone just assuming they'd succeed?
The case could be made (though I'm in no position to make it) that invoking the "Great Satan" in the face of hundreds of thousands of people in the street would just look desperate -- while expressing solidarity with the protesters is an important move for us to get on the good side of the country's new pro-Western power base.
What I think it clear, though, is that the "don't meddle" crowd fundamentally misunderstands the power and purpose of rhetoric. Theirs is an incredibly static analysis: If we say this, they'll say that, so let's just not say this in the first place. You saw the same sort of thing, in part, with Obama's "Address to the Muslim World" in Cairo a few weeks ago, where he went so far as to apologize for the CIA's interference in the Iranian coup of 1953. To what purpose? Well, they have a grievance, the thought goes, so I need to clear it out of the way before we can all move on.
This is all very sophisticated and "historically aware," but really, it's too clever by half. Politics, even international geopolitics, has always been a question of "what have you done for me lately?" The folks on the streets aren't likely to spurn our goodwill just because we did some sketchy things in their country 30 years before they were born. History is simply too fluid and unpredictable to keep playing catch-up like that. (And go figure: Khameni wound up denouncing our "meddling" anyway.)
The power of rhetoric, rather, is in shaping a narrative. Henry's arguments at Harfleur and Agincourt were essentially the same: In this battle, you're just like a king. Fight to claim your rightful honor. Our job now, it seems, is simply to articulate a principle -- that we stand with the peaceful, democratic aspirations of the Iranian people. We won't know how this ends until the dust settles, but the advantage of having a solid, noble position on the whole thing -- if we're convincing about it -- is that it gives us much firmer ground from which to act when we see our opening.
Plus, solid principle and goodwill, resolutely expressed, have their own gravitational pull. If that past seven days of protests have reminded us of nothing else, it's that the higher longings of the human soul can be a huge force in politics. After all, if reports of a coming crackdown are true, a large number of Iranians are getting ready to die for their country tomorrow. They need all the reasons they can get -- and I doubt a kind word from the President of the United States would hurt.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Up
It's been nearly a decade now since Pixar eclipsed Disney's traditional animated-film studio as the genius behind the company's big-name family releases, and I'm starting to wonder what that means. Disney films were a huge deal when I was growing up; I only learned later that I was living through the second golden age of Disney film.
You could make the case that the streak never ended, that the what-are-they-putting-out-next-year excitement -- and critical acclaim -- was simply transplanted to Toy Story's successors around the time I got my driver's license (and I took dates to both Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo).
But the two shops are very different. Much as I love the Pixar canon, we haven't seen another sweeping epic like Beauty & the Beast or The Lion King. Maybe robots, fish, and domesticated superheroes don't have that kind of acting chops. Pixar films can be just as mature, but they tend to sell it in a lighthearted, ironic manner.
Briefly, I thought their latest offering, Up, was about as good as most people are saying. Which is to say it was very, very good: deep, affecting, heartbreaking, delightful, and so on. Beauty & the Beast scored a best-picture Oscar nomination for the 90s Disney films; you could make the case that it's Pixar's turn.
And Up is a very adult movie. Peter Suderman makes the case that Pixar has essentially turned the family film formula on its head: Whereas typically such a film aims for a second-grade level, with just enough inside jokes to keep the parents entertained, Pixar movies tend to explore grown-up themes through the conventions of childrens' entertainment.
Suderman, granted, wants Pixar to dispense with the flying houses and talking dogs entirely and make a serious adult film. I'm not so sure, mainly because I keep thinking about how good it must be for kids to see this.
It's clear that the studio takes its role as an educator very seriously. WALL*E, essentially a crunchy-con morality tale, proved that sufficiently. Up, meanwhile, upends the typical "believe in your dreams" pablum we like to forcefeed the kiddies by using Carl's unfulfilled dream to explore adult themes like loss and regret. That's one of the many wonderful things about the opening montage of scenes from Carl and Ellie's life together: It puts in front of its youthful audience, in a direct but understated manner, a whole range of emotions they haven't felt yet.
Especially powerful (and technically impressive) was the time the opening devoted to the couple losing their unborn child. In no more than 10 seconds, the film clears a major plot hurdle (why doesn't Carl have kids who can take care of him?), delivers an emotional beatdown, and teaches an important lesson about the responsibilities of adulthood. Without it, the rest of the film becomes problematic, and Carl and Ellie's dream of seeing Paradise Falls looks more like selfish escapism than the ennobling aspiration of a couple that was denied the adventure of raising children. With it, it's no surprise that the film ends with Carl experiencing a sort of December fatherhood.
Again, this is no Beauty & the Beast, with its ever-present themes of sacrifice and honor and its dramatically magical landscape. (One of the endearing things about Up is that it only wants you to suspend disbelief so much: Talking dogs are out of the question, for instance -- unless they have nifty GPS/translator collars.) Pixar movies in general have been almost aggressively bourgeious, with the nuclear family unit -- think The Incredibles -- often the central setting.
What does such a shift betoken? I could only guess. I think I've heard it remarked that film is often an exercise in nostalgia -- in trying to capture for the future a world that's quickly fading away. Maybe we're seeing such a phenomenon with Pixar: a sudden golden age of childrens' films that reflect deeply on the values and choices that shaped past generations just as that society is on its last legs. Or it could be evidence of the staying power of such values.
Of course, none of this really matters unless the kids actually watch it. That, I'd imagine, is the lurking fear behind my former colleague John Podhoretz's semi-contrarian review, in which he argues that, for all its just acclaim, Up is at points a fairly boring movie.
I don't quite see it. Then again, I was one of the few people I knew who thought the opening sequence in WALL*E -- in which the eponymous robot wanders alone over a deserted Earth -- was far too short.
But Podhoretz's main thesis is still an intriguing one. He argues that even if Up were a boring film, no one would say it; so powerful is the Pixar brand. Pixar movies, he says, are now an "object of cultural piety," something that everyone in polite society is simply required to acclaim. He worries that, long-term, reaching such status means death for an institution's creative power.
So: Does that mean Pixar gets its Oscar nod after all? I could think of worse things.
You could make the case that the streak never ended, that the what-are-they-putting-out-next-year excitement -- and critical acclaim -- was simply transplanted to Toy Story's successors around the time I got my driver's license (and I took dates to both Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo).
But the two shops are very different. Much as I love the Pixar canon, we haven't seen another sweeping epic like Beauty & the Beast or The Lion King. Maybe robots, fish, and domesticated superheroes don't have that kind of acting chops. Pixar films can be just as mature, but they tend to sell it in a lighthearted, ironic manner.
Briefly, I thought their latest offering, Up, was about as good as most people are saying. Which is to say it was very, very good: deep, affecting, heartbreaking, delightful, and so on. Beauty & the Beast scored a best-picture Oscar nomination for the 90s Disney films; you could make the case that it's Pixar's turn.
And Up is a very adult movie. Peter Suderman makes the case that Pixar has essentially turned the family film formula on its head: Whereas typically such a film aims for a second-grade level, with just enough inside jokes to keep the parents entertained, Pixar movies tend to explore grown-up themes through the conventions of childrens' entertainment.
Suderman, granted, wants Pixar to dispense with the flying houses and talking dogs entirely and make a serious adult film. I'm not so sure, mainly because I keep thinking about how good it must be for kids to see this.
It's clear that the studio takes its role as an educator very seriously. WALL*E, essentially a crunchy-con morality tale, proved that sufficiently. Up, meanwhile, upends the typical "believe in your dreams" pablum we like to forcefeed the kiddies by using Carl's unfulfilled dream to explore adult themes like loss and regret. That's one of the many wonderful things about the opening montage of scenes from Carl and Ellie's life together: It puts in front of its youthful audience, in a direct but understated manner, a whole range of emotions they haven't felt yet.
Especially powerful (and technically impressive) was the time the opening devoted to the couple losing their unborn child. In no more than 10 seconds, the film clears a major plot hurdle (why doesn't Carl have kids who can take care of him?), delivers an emotional beatdown, and teaches an important lesson about the responsibilities of adulthood. Without it, the rest of the film becomes problematic, and Carl and Ellie's dream of seeing Paradise Falls looks more like selfish escapism than the ennobling aspiration of a couple that was denied the adventure of raising children. With it, it's no surprise that the film ends with Carl experiencing a sort of December fatherhood.
Again, this is no Beauty & the Beast, with its ever-present themes of sacrifice and honor and its dramatically magical landscape. (One of the endearing things about Up is that it only wants you to suspend disbelief so much: Talking dogs are out of the question, for instance -- unless they have nifty GPS/translator collars.) Pixar movies in general have been almost aggressively bourgeious, with the nuclear family unit -- think The Incredibles -- often the central setting.
What does such a shift betoken? I could only guess. I think I've heard it remarked that film is often an exercise in nostalgia -- in trying to capture for the future a world that's quickly fading away. Maybe we're seeing such a phenomenon with Pixar: a sudden golden age of childrens' films that reflect deeply on the values and choices that shaped past generations just as that society is on its last legs. Or it could be evidence of the staying power of such values.
Of course, none of this really matters unless the kids actually watch it. That, I'd imagine, is the lurking fear behind my former colleague John Podhoretz's semi-contrarian review, in which he argues that, for all its just acclaim, Up is at points a fairly boring movie.
I don't quite see it. Then again, I was one of the few people I knew who thought the opening sequence in WALL*E -- in which the eponymous robot wanders alone over a deserted Earth -- was far too short.
But Podhoretz's main thesis is still an intriguing one. He argues that even if Up were a boring film, no one would say it; so powerful is the Pixar brand. Pixar movies, he says, are now an "object of cultural piety," something that everyone in polite society is simply required to acclaim. He worries that, long-term, reaching such status means death for an institution's creative power.
So: Does that mean Pixar gets its Oscar nod after all? I could think of worse things.
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