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Quarantine Reflections – Nostalgia (1)

This post continues my quarantine reflections. As mentioned in my previous post, quarantine has provided opportunity to clean out. Among some random notes I came across were notations from a speech by Shaun Casey at the Christian Scholars Conference at Lipscomb University in 2017. The subject of my notes was nostalgia. They are thought provoking and obviously caught my attention listening to the lecture. The title of Casey’s lecture was ” Rage, Nostalgia and the Forgetfulness of God”. Prompted to re-listen to the lecture I was surprised to find that my notes were generated by a brief segment in the latter portion of a one hour + lecture. Those notes seem to be even more relevant 3 years later and worthy of sharing.
Excerpts on nostalgia:

I now want to turn to a troubling but all too common Christian response to rage and that is nostalgia.  I’m trying here to answer the question why are so many American Christians attracted to nostalgia today.

I also hear the voice of my 23 year old daughter who responds to any declaration I make and “Dad what is wrong with that?”. So to the people who think nostalgia is a good thing, I’m trying to address you if you’re here today.
 
I’m trying to argue that nostalgia is not a Christian virtue. That more often than not nostalgia masks darker impulses. While explicitly marketing certain forms of virtue that delude and misdirect Christian theology while purporting to restore some lost theology or practice.

Nostalgia is a misbegotten form of memory. It is the pursuit of that which never was in the pursuit of addressing some perceived current malady.

Nostalgia needs a narrative of failure and loss to be attractive and to be intellectually or psychologically effective. All nostalgic narrative have a golden era.

Something from the past has disappeared or it’s currently existentially threatened, in order to make the appeal to restoring what has been lost persuasive.

Ironically, what is lost often proved to be imaginary and not real. Nevertheless memory manufactured or misbegotten can be as powerful is memory of real events and we need to be able to separate the two.
Traditional Christianity is a nostalgic construct.

After reading my notes, I was again thrown in to a state of cognitive dissonance (Oh no, not again). On the one hand, Casey was playing to my choir. I perceive much of the divisive rhetoric I hear, political and religious, is based on a nostalgic construct that fits Casey’s description: Nostalgia is a misbegotten form of memory. It is the pursuit of that which never was in the pursuit of addressing some perceived current malady.
On the other hand, I am eaten up with nostalgia. In the longer view, it is probably a natural consequence of aging. As life gets shorter, looking in the rear view mirror becomes more appealing, for good or ill. More immediately, redoing my office and cleaning has revealed my nostalgic impulses. (See sample below)

Nostalgia is a pleasure I’m unwilling to give up.
…nostalgizing helps people relate their past experiences to their present lives in order to make greater meaning of it all. 
“Nostalgia makes people feel loved and valued and increases perceptions of social support when people are lonely.”
While I have no illusion about nostalgia as a Christian virtue, I understand it as human experience endowed by our Creator.
A bit of research on nostalgia produced some helpful insights.

Svetlana Boym identifies two distinct types of nostalgia: “restorative” nostalgia and “reflective” nostalgia. 

These two types of nostalgia represent fundamentally different attitudes toward the past, and it is this difference that largely determines whether our memories of those happy days of yore will evoke feelings of joy or of sadness.  Restorative nostalgia, involving a desire to “rebuild the lost home,” views the past with an eye toward recreating it—a desire to relive those special moments.  It is what spurs us to pull out our phone at 1 a. m. and call up an old boyfriend or girlfriend because we just heard “our song” on the radio.
Reflective nostalgia, on the other hand, accepts the fact that the past is, in fact, past, and rather than trying to recreate a special past experience, savors the emotions evoked by its recollection.  This acknowledgment of the irretrievability of our autobiographical past provides an aesthetic distance that allows us to enjoy a memory in the same way that we enjoy a movie or a good book.  If “our song” were to come on the radio at 1 a.m., reflective nostalgia would be more likely to make us reach for an old photograph than for our phone, evoking in us a momentary sense of emotional pleasure rather than a restless urge to recreate a special moment from our past, and a sense of sadness when we realize the futility of that desire, that special moment, as it was lived, being forever sealed off from the present we inhabit.  With reflective nostalgia, it is the very fact that an experience is sealed off from the present that makes it a source of pleasure.  Like a favorite movie or book, it possesses an aesthetic wholeness that allows us to savor it again and again with no nagging uncertainty about how it will turn out.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/time-travelling-apollo/201606/the-two-faces-nostalgia

Though I’ve had occasions of restorative nostalgia, wishing to recreate a “special” moment, they always proved to be a disappointment. As it’s been said, “You can’t go back”. Memories are tricky, often misbegotten. I am reminded of how shockingly small the roomy house I grew up in was when revisited as an adult.

It is reflective nostalgia, sealed off from the present, that brings deep pleasure. As the writer above observed, …it possesses an aesthetic wholeness that allows us to savor it again and again with no nagging uncertainty about how it will turn out.
I would suggest that reflective nostalgia may be counted as a Christian virtue. I’ll have to think on that some more.

There is a lot more to to consider, not the least of which is why Casey is in such twit over nostalgia? Part (2) will address that question and some other aspects of nostalgia.

If you are interested (I know you have the time), you can watch Casey’s entire hour long lecture below.

Quarantine Reflections: Hospitality

The Coronavirus quarantine has provided opportunity to clean-up, clean-out and and take on a few projects. I refurbished my office and in the process I “discovered” numerous notes from classes, readings, sermons, lessons and such. I found several I thought worthy of sharing. This post is the first in a new category “Quarantine Reflections”.

The following are notations on hospitality. My original notes have no date or source. I am certain they are not original to me. They are not intended as definitive, just opportunity to reflect and ponder.

A shared meal is the activity most closely tied to the reality of God’s Kingdom, just as it is the most basic expression of hospitality.

Seeing Jesus in every guest reduces the inclination to try to calculate the importance of one guest over another.

“The tasks aren’t what hospitality is about, hospitality is giving yourself.” If hospitality involves sharing your life and sharing in the life of others, guests/strangers are not first defined by their need.

(Meal time) is the time when hospitality looks like spiritual service.

Simple acts of respect, appreciation, presence are indispensable parts of the affirmation of human personhood.

…the pinnacle of lovelessness is not our unwillingness to be neighbor to someone, but our unwillingness to allow them to be a neighbor to us… (Alan Boesak)

The greatest lie of this broken universe is that God cannot be trusted and we have to take care of ourselves.

Nothing we as believers do together will ever make up for our own relationship with God.When we put the church in that place we make it an idol and others will always end up disappointing us.

Still on the journey…

Christian Values (?)

This post is the second in a series on Christian Values. You can read the first post HERE.

Experiencing cognitive dissonance after reading articles such as those cited in my earlier post, my first inclination was to provide proper definition of Christian Values and relieve my, and your dissonance. Fortunately, it occurred to me, those authors were doing the same in their respective articles.
What makes me think I have better understanding of Christian Values than people obviously more qualified than me?
In all likelihood, I, like them, am certain my understanding is correct and therefore have an implicit responsibility to defend those (my) values and challenge any deviation. Ergo, our divisive culture.
Feeling foolish, I have abandoned the idea of defining Christian Values, at least for now.
Instead, I want to probe some thoughts and ideas about values to stimulate our thinking and hopefully move toward greater clarity about Christian Values.

Your values are the things that you believe are important in the way you live and work. They (should) determine your priorities, and, deep down, they’re probably the measures you use to tell if your life is turning out the way you want it to. When the things that you do and the way you behave match your values, life is usually good – you’re satisfied and content. But when these don’t align with your personal values, that’s when things feel… wrong. This can be a real source of unhappiness.
https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTED_85.htm

I propose the first step (of course there is a plan) in moving toward greater clarity comes at a personal level. Step (1) Conduct a complete and thorough self-examination to determine my real values . Since all of us are irrationally wedded to our beliefs and derived values, any reasoned attempts to come to a truthful understanding of our values will be futile; unless there is some transcendent existential intervention. i.e. Moses and the burning bush…David and Nathan…Isaiah in the temple…Saul on the Road to Damascus… Peter again and again. et al.

Some think the Coronavirus pandemic is divine existential intervention, regardless, it is a significant transcendent existential experience which provides an opportunity for an examination of our values.
Admittedly, the depth and breath of the pandemic varies widely. But, even for those of us in our privileged confines are being forced to think about what we value.
This pandemic may not be a Damascus road, but we shouldn’t let a crisis go waste.
To that end, I am making an intentional effort to gain better clarity about what my true values are.
That is a daunting task but it pales with the thought that I might discover my values are misplaced and need to be changed. Sorry, that’s premature, one step at a time .

In case you’re having trouble getting started, here is a thought starter:
Did you rush out to buy toilet paper, a lot of toilet paper??

In the next post we’ll look at Step (2). How do my values align with “Christian Values”?

Lent, Lament and Coronavirus

Lent is an intensely penitential time as we examine our sinful natures and return to the God we have, through our own rebelliousness, hurt time and again. Lent is also an opportunity to contemplate what our Lord really did for us on the Cross…

I am a stranger to any formal observance of Lent. My spiritual heritage was non-liturgical and ignored the Christian calendar. If I had read the above description of Lent, my response would have been, “Yeah, that’s what we do every Sunday.”. In the intervening years, my spiritual journey has drawn me to a deeper understanding of the meaning and purpose of lent. I’ve still got a long way to go to catch up with my liturgical sisters and brothers.

Although, I’m not a stranger to lament, awareness of lament as an important part of one’s spiritual journey has come in relatively recent times. I have written several posts on lament which you can read HERE.
In my words from one of those posts: …lament is the natural, intuitive response of all humans to the reality of the brokenness in our world as seen and/or experienced in their lives. I would describe brokenness as anything that is wrong, perceived or otherwise….if you meet someone who has no capacity to lament, they would be labeled a sociopath. … my conclusion is that lament is a universal human emotional response to real or perceived wrong.

The irony of a pandemic emerging in this Lenten season has been the subject of much writing and commentary. Lent and lament go hand in hand. This Lent is unique, the Coronavirus pandemic has exposed our vulnerabilities and dashed illusions of independence and self-sufficiency in ways beyond our collective memory. If it weren’t so sad, it would be hilarious that the first responders were hoarders of toilet paper.
I expect those who embrace Lent seriously have found their observance deepened and more focused than usual. For those of us who are casual Lenten observers, (i.e. gave up Twinkies) it is an opportunity to embrace Lent/lament seriously. Even in the midst of increasing anxiety and peril, I am finding that I resist lament and opt for feel-good cliches:

  • God will never give us more than we can bear.
  • When the Lord closes a door he opens a window.
  • As long as we’re in God’s will, we will be safe.
  • If God brings you to it, God will bring you through it.
  • God will put a hedge of protection around his people.
  • This is just our cross to bear.
  • God allows bad things into our lives so that he can turn it into good.
  • God has given you this trouble to test your faith.
  • God is trying to teach us something through this trouble.
  • With God, everything happens for a reason.
  • God is in control

I know, those cliches are sacred and they satisfy be-happy impulses and allow me to conceal my real fears. I think they are what Job’s friends would say. After all, won’t unvarnished lament diminish our witness to our neighbors? Doesn’t our piety and ministry depend upon stiff upper lips and courageous defiance.
Lee Camp’s latest post gives some helpful perspective. An excerpt follows, you can read the complete post HERE.

…something like a third of the book of Psalms is comprised of Lament Psalms:  bold and indignant; complaining and pleading; asking God where God is, sometimes profanely. There is no emotional avoidance here. No false sense of machismo. And sometimes they are shockingly impertinent: “why don’t you wake up up there, and come down here and show us a little mercy?”

This posture of complaining is not a sign of unbelief, but precisely a manifestation of faith. The lamentations arise precisely because the complainer does believe that the Master of the universe can, and has, in dramatic times past, worked wonders. So why now the absence? Why now the cursedness, the loss, the death?

The laments are one reason I find I can believe. They are true to human experience. They evoke a sort of sadness and weary grief which we know to be real. Yet they refuse stubbornly to despair, refuse stubbornly not to see some awe, some transcendent beauty in it all. And they refuse to believe, even in the midst of all that weary grief, that we have been left alone.

I suspect, many are like me. The pain and discomfort of stay-at-home and quarantine has mostly produced compliant and whines. If predictions are accurate, we will soon find our complaints, whines and soothing cliches to be wanting. Facing the reality of utter helplessness we will voice our grief in deep lament to our only HOPE.

If God expects us to trust Him completely, how must he feel when we are reluctant or refuse to lament over real pain and suffering but freely complain about inconveniences? I would not presume to be God, but I might feel like a vending machine. It seems to me lament may be the purest expression of faith. Trusting when there are no answers. Where do we take those questions if not to God? 

Christian Values

I anticipate this post to be the first of several on the subject of Christian values. The subject, Christian values, has been on my “to blog subjects” for the last few months. My interest has been tweaked as of late by the Coronavirus pandemic and the varied responses of Christian churches and individual Christians. It appears to me, based on the wide range of responses, there is a significant diversity with regard to Christian values. The continuum of responses to orders to discontinue worship service meetings and practice social distancing, range from outright defiance to agreement and cooperation; all of which I presume to be based on Christian values. It seems there is some cognitive dissonance, on Christian values among Christians. when it comes to pandemics.

Understanding and applying Christian values is not just a current problem, I would suggest it has been a struggle for every serious Christian for the past two thousand years. However, the character of the struggle has evolved over the centuries, particularly for western Christianity. The advent of a secular age, led by the enlightenment produced profound cultural shifts; not the least of which included, relativism, rationalism, individualism which dismantled our ancestors values, direction, purpose, significance and meaning. It is my premise that, cut loose from those anchors of an enchanted world, we have found new anchors upon which establish we our (Christian) values. As a result, I have lost confidence in the mantra “Christian Values”.
My personal objective is to better understand spiritual values grounded in a relationship with God through faith in Christ. I do not see this as a discrete project, but an opportunity for continued self-examination, repentance and realignment, extending through the course of my journey. Facing the prospect of values I hold dear and guide my life and decisions being misguided, is not a pleasant idea.
In the short run, I plan to share some questions and insights I have and will encounter in future posts. Once again, this subject is above my pay grade. I know there are readers with better understanding and knowledge. Feel free to help. I’d be glad to provide for guest posts.

The challenge of Christian Values

The good ole days. I sometimes long for the those days when Christian values were clear concise and unequivocal.
“Don’t Smoke, Drink, Dance, and Chew or Date Girls Who Do.”
Well, at least I didn’t chew and never dated a girl who did.  
I was very struck by a list values I came across. It might be good exercise to eliminate any non-Christian values and then print a out a card to carry with you and remind you of the values you should hold firmly.

These make “Don’t Smoke, Drink, Dance, and Chew or Date Girls Who Do.” an attractive option.

Back in December, two articles prompted me to think more about Christian Values:
The first was in Christianity Today written by editor Mark Galli entitled “Trump Should Be Removed from Office” His argument was based on Trump’s “grossly immoral behavior”. “That he should be removed, we believe, is not a matter of partisan loyalties but loyalty to the Creator of the Ten Commandments.”

The second article written by Jentenze Franklin entitled “Why I still stand by 45” was also an argument based on Christian Values.
“If you have the courage, you stand with the leader who stands for the very things you would hope a president would stand for—the sanctity of life, religious freedom for private citizens and business owners, conservative federal judges, standing with the nation of Israel, and a better tomorrow for those living in poverty, especially in our largest cities—the very values and policies you pray to God your president will push forward and stand on. And he has stood up for every single one. Those ARE Christian values. …
Is your disdain for the man greater than the policies and values that matter most to our faith? 

See what I mean by cognitive dissonance? At a minimum those articles illustrate a need for clarity regarding Christian values. Of course, the problem is, both wrote from unambiguous understandings. Similarly, each of us believe our political, moral positions and religious are anchored in Christian values. For that reason, we all need to examine our “Christian Values”.

Imagine how the cultural landscape would change if Christians were clear and united in their values. Sadly, the world is confused about “Christian Values” because we are.

…given the view Christians have of culture–it’s about godless ideas and values–the way to change the culture is to 1) create a populist revolution focused on values, or 2) get Christians into positions of political power so that Christian values can become the law of the land.
But all this, according to Hunter, is based upon a flawed view of culture and, as a consequence, these Christian efforts “to change the world” have had both ironic and tragic consequences.

James Davison Hunter http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0199730806/deyorestandre-20