As it is in Heaven

As it is in Heaven is a Swedish film about a famous composer who, after suffering health problems, decides to return to the village of his youth - a place he hasn't seen since the age of 9.  He buys the empty school building, sets up a piano, his violins, and a place to sleep.  The first person to "welcome" him was the village pastor - offering him a bible and invited him over to dinner.  As it turns out - the pastor becomes one of the primary antagonists - obsessed with sin and guilt.  The stranger, at the invitation of one of the locals who recognizes him, attends a church choir rehearsal session - and long story short - eventually agrees to become the church cantor and choir director.  The choir is made up of a cross section of the village - young, old, businessman, housewife, cognitive disability, pastor's wife - the list goes on.  As the movie progresses we find out they are all dealing significant issues and the music seems to draw out the passions and the hurts, turning choir practice into mass therapy sessions.

The film has something to say about what it means to be and do church.  On the one side is the dogmatic pastor obsessed with law and sin... and on the other the artistic choir director who, through music, opens members - as well as himself - up to life, love, and passion.  One of the more powerful scenes is a tense "conversation" between the pastor and his wife.  She, having come home from a church choir party filled with laughter and dancing, is confronted by her husband - who tells her to ask God for forgiveness.  She responds with an impassioned speech railing against sin and guilt and the propensity of the church, symbolized by her husband, to hold people captive through such things.

One scene seems to sum it up - the church is empty and mass is canceled, while many have gathered at the old school to sing and dance... in a very important sense to worship.  Once again I'm reminded of the work of Vattimo and Badiou who see in Christianity, Paul specifically, the possibility of freedom and new life.  They read Paul as a "rupture" with the status quo - breaking free from the cycle of law and violence into the event of the resurrection - the possibility of new beginning.  This, to me, is what this film is about - new beginning, life, what the church is supposed to be about as the community of the resurrected Christ.  See for yourself - I recommend the film.

Taking Vattimo and Badiou to the Basilica

I just finished reading Alain Badiou's work on Paul - Saint Paul: The Foundation of Universalism.  Funny - an atheist advocating for Christianity. I just started Zizek's The Fragile Absolute which is a similar perspective.  I must say that the ideas put forth by Vattimo and Badiou's have had an impact upon me... I keep thinking about the implications.  Both emphasize charity / love over and against dogmatic rigidity.  Badiou sees Paul as someone who is faithful to the event of Christ's resurrection - an event that proclaims new beginnings... new life.  For Badiou - the resurrection is a truth event that collapses all difference... all opinions and cultural distinctions.  It is the truly universal from which the differences found in the various situations derive meaning.  In this context Badiou focuses upon Paul's insistence that differences be overcome - "There is no Jew or Gentile - male or female."  For Badiou, Paul is an egalitarian who recognizes how the law leads to death - to the "eternal recurrence of the same thing" - to the cultivation of what he calls automatic desire... desire that arises from the law's instigation.  Here Paul's message of faith, hope, and love overcomes the law - overcomes all particularity - bringing the possibility of new life, of breaking free from the natural cycle of desire cultivated by the law, becoming open to the future.

Yesterday my family visited the Basilica (St. Mary's) here in Minneapolis.  I've been there before - on Pentecost Sunday - which was quite the spectacle (in a good way.)  Yesterday's service was a bit more subdued - but fascinating none the less.  My kids loved it - my oldest daughter asked if we could go there every Sunday because, as she put it, "this is something I could get used too..."  I understand why - there is so much to take in, so many things going on, so many different movements - and of course the "smells and bells" are something she hasn't experienced very much.  As I experienced the service I couldn't help but think of Vattimo and Badiou.  I thought of the Basilica's work in the neighborhood on behalf of the poor, I thought of the various ethnic groups gathered together under the dome, I thought of the number of gay and lesbian attendees given it was Gay Pride weekend and the parade route went right by the church - I thought of all of these things in the context of Vattimo's "weak thought" and charity, and Badiou's universalist Paul.  I have to say - it was a fascinating way to interpret a worship service... even if I can't go with Vattimo and Badiou the full way.

The homily, however, was certainly not in the vein of Vattimo and Badiou.  It was the feast of Corpus Christi - so the homily was on the Eucharist.  Very metaphysical... emphasizing the Eucharist as the bodily presence of Christ.  In one way the priest acknowledged it as something that cannot be explained - there was no lecture on transubstantiation.  But in the end... it seemed to cut off us protestants... putting up a boundary, a dividing line, where Badiou might say Jesus and Paul emphasized unity.  What should I expect - it's a Catholic Church (of course they're going to emphasize Catholic teaching) - and to be fair the homily was not bad... he delivered it well and there were parts that I could very much agree with.  My critique, if it is one, is the result of taking these late modern philosophers to church with me... which is, I suppose, the purpose of getting an education.

The End is Near

No... this is not a Harold Camping type prediction of the rapture - unless by rapture you mean picking up and moving stuff back to Sioux Center.  Yesterday I took the first step in our move back - I brought home some boxes.  I even started packing away the books in my office I haven't used since I've been here.  There is a sense of happiness (we can't wait to get out of this 3 bedroom compressor / apartment and back into our house) along with some sadness (we have enjoyed exploring the Twin Cities.)

In many ways city life has fit us well.  Tamara doesn't mind driving in traffic - and she has found about every swimming hole one could find... and that's quite a few around here.  We've hit some Twins games, museums, and... as some will notice on me when I return... some excellent eateries.  Juicy Lucy has been my friend and enemy - eating bar food and sitting for long periods of time reading and writing is NOT a good combination.  Some of our favorite places to eat:  Matt's Bar, Jakeeno's Pizzeria, Pizza Luce, Mannings, Keys, and Aurelios (There's a definite Pizza theme...).  We've also enjoyed the parks and bike trails... which is badly needed after the above discussion.  Needless to say - we will miss what the Twin Cities has to offer.

That being said... there is something about rural life that I enjoy and look forward to.  I don't how many times I've had to "defend" living in Sioux Center - there's this weird compulsion found in some suburb dwellers we've encountered to rail against rural life - especially Northwest Iowa living.  I'm not exactly sure what they are compensating for... or why they think sitting their butts in the suburbs is some bastion of exotic urban living.  (A Target or Wal-Mart is a Target or Wal-Mart... we do have them in Northwest Iowa.)  I don't need someone who has never lived in Sioux Center to tell me what sucks about Sioux Center.  Believe me... I know.  But I also know what is good about Sioux Center living - and believe me there are good things about living there.  For now, I look forward to mowing my lawn... to sitting on my deck with a cigar... to sitting outside the Fruited Plain and having a good bottle of beer... to letting my kids go outside to play and not really worrying one bit.  I look forward to warm, muggy, summer afternoons - to the smell of tasseling corn, and to being the only car on the road for as far as the eye can see.  I look forward to the Mexican bakery (Olivia's) and the jalapeno bread that will keep me fat.

Will I miss the Twin Cities?  You betcha.  I've wanted to live here since I was a kid living in Willmar.  Something tells me I'll be back some day... but for now we are happy and content to make our home in Sioux Center, Iowa.  Lucy will just have to move on without me.

Weak Thought

I'm usually late to the game when it comes to philosophy - and I'm sure this is no exception.  I just finished reading Vattimo's After Christianity and Caputo's The Weakness of God.  I can't say the ideas they expressed were entirely new to me - it seems, after reading them, that I've been moving toward a "weak theology" my entire teaching career.  I'm thankful for both Vattimo and Caputo's work as they provide a way of organizing what I've been trying to articulate for a while.  Not that I buy everything they say - I definitely have some questions and push back - but overall they were a joy to read.

The problem is that I'm immersed in a tradition that wants so badly to erect "strong theology."  The world needs to be organized, categorized, and everything needs to be in its proper order.  The sovereignty of God, natural law, and double predestination become conceptual tools that not only provide a means for domesticating God, but they become the means for determining who is and who is not a part of the Kingdom of God.  Social and economic institutions become the means for ensuring the kingdom comes efficiently and with gusto.

So what of weakness?  What of kenosis?  What about, as Vattimo emphasizes, charity?  This past year I spent my Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday afternoons at a new high school in south Minneapolis - Cristo Rey Jesuit High School.  I spent my time with young people like Juan, and Hugo, and Jesstine.  These are young people who have been through quite a bit already - more than some of us will see in a lifetime.  What I sensed from them, despite their difficulties and through their triumphs, was an undercurrent of charity.  Its almost as if they had no choice but to be charitable -  there seemed no other way to navigate the messiness of life.

My experience at Cristo Rey has forced me to wrestle with the tendency within the Calvinist tradition to construct "strong theology."  At Cristo Rey I was invited into the lives of young people - into a realm where gang violence, homelessness, domestic abuse, and teenage pregnancy were a part of the everyday lives of students.  "Strong theology" leaves no space in which to encounter the lived experience of others.  "Strong theology" always has a plan... a strategy... the answers.  What I learned at Cristo Rey was an important lesson in "weak theology" - a theology that is grounded in charitable love and the embrace of differences.  I still hold to my tradition... I still call myself a Calvinist... because I believe in the end that Calvinism and what Caputo calls "weak theology" are not antithetical as so many seem to presuppose.  This will be, I think, the theological task I take from my experience at Cristo Rey - to explore the common ground between the "weak theology" necessary for the Christian community to live out the gospel in the world of differences and the biblical and theological insight provided by the Calvinist tradition.  Don't ask me how... I'm not quite there yet.