I can’t help but feel sorry for the Man In Black (MIB) the character in the TV series LOST who’s worst crime was his desire to leave The Island.  Yes, he killed a slew of characters, but he certainly wasn’t the only one to do so. In the series finale Jack Shepherd kills the Man In Black, who’s been posing as John Locke, by kicking him over a cliff [watch scene]. From the perspective of the storyline, the MIB’s death was necessary for Jack to save the Island, which was in danger of breaking apart. In the series commentary, the producers explain that the Man In Black was the epitome of evil, but was he really? There is absolutely no reflection upon this statement, whether it is truly justified or not. No one seems to be questioning it. Just take a look at Jack and Kate - Kate actually shoots Locke (the MIB) before Jack kicks him over the cliff - obviously they don’t feel an ounce of remorse.

I’m sure the producers even expected all those watching to cheer during the scene… to be participants in his sacrifice so to speak - what contemporary thinker Rene Girard calls a MECHANISM of UNANIMITY.

All I can say is, poor MIB,  stranded on the Island his entire life. Even as a boy all he ever wanted was to leave and see the world beyond the sea. What’s so wrong with that?

A bit of Rene Girard’s Mimetic Theory laced with ample amounts of post-modern thought provides one way to read this: in any ENCLOSURE, take the SYMBOLIC ORDER for instance, or an ISLAND, anyone who wants to escape, to get free, is automatically a problem.  Maybe the Man in Black, and his growing discontent with life on the Island, represents a threat to that order, one which has to be removed to re-stabilize things. Indeed “closure spells exclusion, exclusiveness; closure spills blood, doctrinal, confessional, theological, political, institutional blood, and eventually, it never fails, real blood.” (John Caputo, The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida, 6)  And for Rene Girard such bloodshed requires UNANIMITY.

Think about it - there’s nothing more enclosed than a remote island in the Pacific… wouldn’t we all want to get free? To be rescued by somebody? You tell me. Postmodern philosopher Jacques Derrida identifies islands as “aporetical places: with no way out or any assured path, without itinerary or point of arrival, without an exterior map…“  Indeed, for Derrida the absence of any recognizable horizon, of any calculable way forward “conditions the future itself.“  (Derrida, “Faith and Knowledge,” Religion, 7).  Thus we encounter what he describes as an abyss at the center of such experiences, how do we respond to this? These are risky places where the contradictions of our lives may be laid bare, where we’re given the opportunity to see our selves more honestly, to remember the traumatic events that have led us thus far. But for many this is a source of fear, of unbearable uncertainty and chaos.  Rather than open themselves to the unknown, to uncertainty, to the future, and the anxiety this provokes they choose to fill it with something, to cover it over.

In the Season Six episode “Across The Sea” [watch episode] we finally learn the history of the ISLAND, and the reason for the MIB’s antagonism. The Man In Black has lived on the ISLAND his entire life, he was born there and has never been anywhere else. His twin brother was born first and was named Jacob, but the MIB’s birth was unexpected. As far as we can tell he was never given a name.  Growing up to be curious and highly intelligent, he longs to know what lies beyond the sea.  His twin brother Jacob is not nearly as gifted, in fact he’s quite content with life on the ISLAND, and never questions what lies beyond the horizon, but he IS jealous of his brother. When crisis erupts, Jacob, throws the MIB into the abyss, “the Source” at “the Heart of the Island.” He does this to protect the light emanating from it, which we’re told is the source of stability, not just for the ISLAND, but for the entire world.  Thus the MIB is a victim of the ISLAND’s ENCLOSURE.

This action is duplicated thousands of years later when Jack, acting as a kind of savior figure, kills his rival Locke who desperately wants to leave the ISLAND. Jack has agreed to replace Jacob who’s been acting as the ISLAND’s protector all this time. Locke, on the other hand, has been possessed by the ghost of the Man in Black. As the rivalry between Jack and Locke intensifies, “the Source” at “the Heart of the Island” explodes in a volcanic eruption which threatens to destroy the ISLAND and everyone on it. We’re told that if the eruption is not contained, if the MIB is allowed to leave the ISLAND, uncontrolled violence will be unleashed upon the world… at least that’s what they’re afraid will happen.  As long the survivors refuse to open themselves to the unforeseeable possibilities that life on the ISLAND, and the SELF-DISCLOSURE it provokes, offers them, the tensions that arise in such aporetical places will escalate, multiplying into all sorts of interpersonal conflict.  Once the characters deny personal responsibility for their individual sources of aggression, resentment and anger, they will consciously or not, find another way to contain the violence before it explodes into uncontrolled chaos: in this case the MECHANISM of UNANIMITY, and the safety of ENCLOSURE. Indeed, the genius of LOST was the way the ISLAND exposed each survivor to the impossibility, to the personal deadlocks, which had gripped their individual lives. Crashing on the ISLAND offered each survivor a chance to face whatever life circumstances, the traumas that had brought them to that place - but that would require considerable courage and humility…

Unfortunately after three years on the ISLAND, and Six Seasons later, LOST’s writers opt for the easy way out.  Obviously they have no idea how to carry the plot forward… how could they unless they exposed themselves to the uncertainty, to the loss of horizons, to the abyss at the center of ISLAND. So just like Jacob, they use Locke’s death to resolve the crisis, dissolving all the tensions that have accumulated amongst the survivors since they first crashed on the ISLAND. Like a Grimm’s Fairy Tale, everyone is reunited in the final scene (in a church no less) - not one person bothers to shed a tear for the MIB. Of course not, they are completely at peace, literally basking in the light which has been restored, once the “the Source” of the eruption is plugged, and its fury quelled. They no longer have to deal with the anxiety, the loss of horizons, the abyss at the center of the ISLAND, the “aporetical place,” that gave rise to all the tensions in the first place. They no longer have to face their inner demons. But they have sacrificed whatever unexpected possibilities, the new ways of learning to live together, which the future may have offered. Instead they have projected all their tensions and anxiety onto the one person who wanted to leave - the MIB - and this UNANIMITY secures the ISLAND’s CLOSURE once again, at least for the time being.

I’m sure the writers expect us to view this as a miraculous event - salvific so to speak… but is it really?  LOST fans are conflicted on this, and maybe they ought to be…

More on this in my upcoming post: the role of THE ONE in LOST and The Matrix.  - Sue Wright

What is it about that first kiss?  Ever notice how in the movies the moment people kiss, they seem to fall in love immediately, sometimes against their wills? Is falling in love really that easy?  Don’t we have a choice in the matter?

For instance, in the Sandra Bullock movie The Proposal [link] high powered editor-in-chief, Margaret Tate, and her executive assistant, Andrew Paxton, are forced to kiss and unexpectedly discover they have feelings for each other.  My reaction was, “Huh? How did that happen?”  Especially when they’ve demonstrated nothing but mutual contempt. How do people go from hating each other, to head over heels in love? Only in the movies!

Maybe I missed something and should take a closer look.  In the movie, Andrew, played by Ryan Reynolds, agrees to marry Margaret, his boss, played by Sandra Bullock, so that she can stay in the country [view clip].  To convince the immigration office they have to fool everyone, including his friends and family, that they really love each other - no easy task since they’re barely able to contain their total disregard for each other. They go to visit Andrew’s family, who, during a large family gathering, insist that Andrew and Margaret kiss.  After a half-hearted and awkward attempt they finally lock in embrace and give it their all… and “voila!” - you can actually see the change come over them.  Later on, Andrew explains to Margaret: “three days ago I loathed you…but that changed when we kissed.”  There’s our clue: Andrew and Margaret were ALREADY ATTRACTED to each other, but it wasn’t LOVE, it was FASCINATION.

We see it time and again in the movies… the moment the barriers come down, former antagonists are irresistibly drawn to each other. For instance, remember Gone with the Wind and that greatest movie kiss of all time [view clip].  You get the sense that Scarlett has some sort of feelings for Rhett, but is it LOVE or FASCINATION?  It’s important to know the difference, but too few of us do.  The fact is, Scarlett and Rhett’s relationship is pretty tense throughout, caught as they are in a continuous game of back and forth, a perfect example of MUTUAL FASCINATION [view clip], what Rene Girard (one my favorite thinkers) describes as MIMETIC RIVALRY [link].  It’s caused by MIMESIS [link], the unconscious imitation of others’ desires, which leads us to want whatever it is we believe the other possesses.  Left unchecked, FASCINATION can develop into a sort of FATAL ATTRACTION, what Girard terms the MODEL-OBSTACLE relationship [link].

The problem with FASCINATION is that it’s so darn irresistible.  We can’t control it. We’re all vulnerable to its manipulations. In The Proposal, Margaret and Andrew describe themselves as “two people that weren’t meant to fall in love,”  but they did; all those late nights working together… “something happened, we couldn’t fight it.”  Once they realize this and give into their feelings, they can get married and live happily ever after, at least that’s the romantic myth portrayed in the movies, but it’s not reality. In the real world fascination rarely, if ever, ends that way. When the barriers are removed and we find ourselves in close proximity with the other person, the object of our fascination, it’s true each may be irresistibly drawn to embrace the other.  But that fascination can get ugly, especially when one or both sides becomes obsessive.

When fascination crosses that threshold it does not respect the other as other.  In it’s more developed stages, we not only want to be together all the time, attached at the hip, so to speak, we desire to be like the object of our fascination, to be in their skin so to speak, even to become them.  Andrew wants to be Margaret Tate, he wants to be editor-in-chief, that’s what drives him to keep up with her every step, to be always at her beck and call.  At times he even imitates her, drinking the same coffee beverage as Margaret: “unsweetened cinnamon lite soy latte.”  But in reality the closer they get, the more they imitate each other, the more conflicted their relationship will become.  In today’s competitive workplace, where everyone’s convinced they have a right to be the boss, or receive the next promotion, anger, rivalry and resentment tends to run rampant behind the scenes.  Just watching one episode of NBC’s The Office is proof enough of that [link].

Rene Girard explains: the social barriers which once prevented the editor-in-chief and her executive assistance from crossing the old thresholds, are quickly disappearing.  As Margaret says, its not the first time someone married their secretary, but in the old days, people still knew their place.  The secretary would never dream of becoming their boss, and bosses never felt so threatened. Now, free of constraints, there is nothing to prevent our fascination with each other.  Margaret, though she wouldn’t dare show it, is equally fascinated with them.  She knows that her employees are vying to take her place.  Her ability to keep her job actually depends on her maintaining her hold over them, on her ability to manipulate them. LOVE has nothing to do with it, these are really fatal attractions.

So why don’t we realize it until its too late?  Because LOVE often looks and feels like FASCINATION, but there’s a crucial difference. In fact it’s so difficult to tell the difference that many seek the advice of experts.  For instance, when asked the difference between “love” and “infatuation,” Dear Abby defined love as “giving, not taking. It wants the best for the one you love.” [link] When asked how to deal with a case of fatal attraction in the workplace, Dear Abby recommended contacting a lawyer [link]. This advice barely scratches the surface of the problem.  If what Rene Girard says is true, that fascination is both unconscious and infectious in nature, that it’s a widespread condition that influences each and every one one us, how are we to overcome it?  In the case of the fatal attraction, the women writing to Dear Abby insists that she has “a rock-hard Christian marriage” that can resist such temptations…. all I can say is, “good luck there.”  I wonder, is there even such a thing as a “Christian” response to this dilemma?

In Philippians 3:17-4:1 [link] Paul actually says:

Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me, and observe those who live according to the example you have in us…

Sounds like he’s trying to provoke his reader’s fascination… In the past, scholars actually assumed that Paul’s command to imitate him was an assertion of his authority, a demand for total obedience like that Margaret Tate exacts from her employees. But what if their own confusion between LOVE and FASCINATION has led to a one sided interpretation of Paul’s action? According to biblical scholar, Willard Swartley, Paul invites us to break free of our fascination with each other by focusing our attention on those who have already broken free, by imitating their examples [See Girardian Reflections on the Lectionary].

But be warned, as examples, they are far from fascinating figures, and in fact imitating them may be the most difficult thing of all, the IMPOSSIBLE.  Christ died a humiliating death, in total isolation.  Out of love, he refused to play games, to manipulate those close to him, to do anything which might draw us irresistibly to him, to bind us in any way.  He refused to cross that threshold. As a result, there is nothing attractive about him, except for the space that opens up between us when we do the same.

So instead of Dear Abby,  we may choose the advice of postmodern philosopher Jacques Derrida: to love is “to surrender to the other, and this is the impossible, would amount to giving oneself over in going toward the other, to coming toward the other but without crossing the threshold, and to respecting, to loving even the invisibility that keeps the other inaccessible.” (Jacques Derrida, On the Name, 74)

Philosopher-theologian John Caputo explains: the loved other …must remain other, must be kept safe as other,” rather than seize it in the grip of passion, “we must lay down our arms and surrender.” (John D. Caputo, What Would Jesus Deconstruct, 80)  Rather than pursue its every step, LOVE let’s the other slip away.  [read more: Derrida on Love]  So contrary to the movies, LOVE, unlike FASCINATION, does not happen to us against our will, it actually puts space between us and the other.  As Girard says, reintroducing this distance may be the only way to gain some freedom in a world caught in the inexorable grip of fascination (see Rene Girard, Battling to the End, 106).  LOVE may actually allow us to live in close proximity with others without crossing each others’ threshold.  - Sue Wright

This Lent I’d like to extend to you a friendly challenge, one I will undertake myself:  if you consider yourself a Christian I’d like you to suspend any and all confidence you have in your “Christian” identity and join me in this Lenten experiment…

I’ve decided to forgo giving up sweets, coffee, or certain foods. Instead, I’m going to give up my confidence, I’m going to question my certainty, in the hope that I’ll recognize what I’ve been blind to: for starts, the pain and suffering I’ve denied in myself and in others. 

I’m convinced that CERTAINTY is all too often grounded in DENIAL, which leads me to exclude others, to ignore the palpable reality of their existence.  For instance, if we want to prevent another tragedy in Haiti, maybe we need to question why and how we so effectively ignored them until now.  Haiti, for instance, is the largest diocese of the Episcopal Church in the Western Hemisphere, with 83,698 members in 2008. But for many Christians in this country, they might as well be “devil worshipers,” as Pat Robertson recently labeled them.  Our certainty in our Christian identity and our relationship with God, leaves little space for us to recognize or consider the Haitian reality, much less respond to the actual pain of their suffering.  Maybe “CERTAINTY” needs to be defined as a sin, one from which “Christians” in particular need to repent.

In fact, when it comes to my personal life, giving up certainty for Lent becomes even more challenging.  Years of placing all my faith in God’s purposes for creation, unconsciously allowed me to ignore the consequences of my own actions and their impact on others.  Having written and given numerous bible studies stressing Jesus’ concern for the poor and the marginalized, it never really hit home until I realized that all this activity prevented me from taking a closer look at myself: to what extent do I really welcome the stranger, the other into my life? Not too mention, the realization that the most threatening strangers are not necessarily those who live in other countries or cultures, but those who are closest to me, whose reality I’d prefer not to recognize, beginning first and foremost with the parts of myself that have never been “Christianized.”

With that said, I’d like to begin with the first of a series of weekly exercises that I will engage in through Lent.  After the exercise I will share my reflections (a day or two later) in the comment section, and invite you to do the same.

LENTEN EXERCISE week one:

I’ve chosen to begin my “Lenten Exercise” by reflecting on Peter Rollins’ parable, “The Orthodox Heretic,” which he first published in his book The Fidelity of Betrayal: Towards a Church Beyond Belief [link], and has recently included in a collection of his parables, also entitled, The Orthodox Heretic [link].

To watch Peter Rollins read his parable on YouTube [link here].

To read “The Orthodox Heretic” [link here].

Join us February 21st for an ongoing discussion of Peter Rollins’ parables at Empire Brewing Company [link].

I’m sorry, no matter how cute BABY JESUS might have been, you can’t tell me that the Three Wise Men (or Magi) knew just by looking at him that he was the messiah. How could an infant be GOD IN THE FLESH? And yet that is what many Christians believe took place, the very EVENT we commemorate during the Season of Epiphany [read more].

Traditionally Epiphany begins on January 6th, which celebrates the visit of the three Magi and concludes on February 2nd with the Feast of the Presentation, which marks BABY JESUS’ first official visit to the Temple. In many of these stories certain key individuals, like the Magi, recognize BABY JESUS’ true identity.  Thus throughout this season Christians celebrate this realization that God had come to dwell among us.  But if it’s true, that BABY JESUS was in fact GOD IN THE FLESH, why, 2000 years later, does God appear so absent?

One look at the news headlines makes my point: bottle necks in Haiti prevent the delivery of aid to earthquake victims, while poorly dug mass graves leave thousands of bodies exposed, displayed across our TV screens.  Almost daily a suicide bomb kills civilians in Iraq or Pakistan, while rumors circulate that the Sudan is once again on the edge of civil war.  In light of all this, why should we believe that BABY JESUS’ arrival changed anything?

The idea that even as a baby Jesus was immediately recognized as the fulfillment of the people’s longing and expectation sounds like an exaggeration born of hindsight.  Not to mention all those bible stories  which recount Jesus’ early childhood -  they’re downright silly -  sounding more like myths, than anything grounded in reality.

Recently however I encountered a news headline, which made me think that finally something had occurred which could be taken as the fulfillment of one these stories:  A federal court ordered the state of California to release nearly a third of its prison inmates! [link] This fulfills Luke 4:14-21 [link to text], the gospel reading for the Third Sunday of Epiphany, when Jesus, early in his ministry, stood up before the entire synagogue and read from the Prophet Isaiah:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

After reading this, Jesus closes the scroll and says, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”  True, the New Testament says that Jesus preached to the poor; he consorted with prostitutes and all manner of outcasts. It says he healed the blind, and raised the dead, but  other than that, the bulk of the evidence appears to contradict Jesus’ statement.

Just look at the continued prevalence of prisons not only in Jesus’ own time, but in our own society.  No wonder John the Baptist, held captive in a prison, doubted Jesus’ identity; he sent his disciples to question Jesus: “Are you the one who is to come? If it’s true, why am I stilled locked up in this dingy cell?”  Again Jesus replies: “Go ahead and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them…”  I wonder, to what extent do we witness such things today? In Haiti? In Sub-Sahara Africa?  In the inner-city ghettos? Why is it that today the United States, a so-called Christian nation, imprisons more people than any other country in the world?

One could say that prisons are a necessary evil, which play an important role in maintaining a stable society.  That anyone expecting a miraculous turn around, will necessarily be disappointed.  Especially since God rarely, if ever, descends to earth to tear down prison walls… indeed, no one ever came to John the Baptist’s rescue, instead he was beheaded by his captors.  Jesus himself was arrested, taken prisoner, and tortured.  He was tried in the middle of the night and brutally executed the next day.  And, as it happens, the State of California, in response to public demand, has refused to release its prisoners.  It has filed an appeal to reverse the federal court order, delaying the process indefinitely.

It hardly comes as a shock that a large segment of the US population is not willing to free the captives. And yet, in spite of this, the process to free the prisoners, indeed, the process to free all us from oppression, from whatever binds us, has been put into motion.  As contemporary thinker Rene Girard explains, it did not come from a God on high, “the dominating God…that is incarnated in paternal, hierarchical difference.”  Jesus allowed himself to be taken captive, he intentionally submitted to imprisonment, to oppression, and execution, his humanity utterly destroyed, erased, denied.  But in doing so “a perfectly unknown god arises” with what Girard calls “the consenting scapegoat.”  He is “the one that is most outside yet also the most inside common humanity.” (Rene Girard, Battling to the End, 50) Jesus allowed himself to be taken captive, in the crazy hope that he could unlock the prison doors from within, that the way to free the prisoners was to dismantle the closed social structures  from the inside. Not only does this apply to prisons, Jesus did this so that any and all cultural and religious institutions which bind people and deny them freedom could be unlocked.  The problem is, we are so over-reliant on these institutions, there are so many encrusted layers which enclose us, it is difficult for us to imagine how a stable society could function without them. But this renders us blind to the plight of those held captive to the extent that we are hardly aware of their existence.  Which is why  2000 years later the process of freeing the prisoners is still underway.

We have this idea that Christianity was born, pure and simple, in a single event - a birth that changed everything - an assumption that postmodern philosopher Jean-luc Nancy calls the “Christmas projection” (Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 145).  When Jesus proclaimed that the prophecy had been fulfilled, he announced an opening in the closed structures which imprison people, a small crack in the prison walls that was not visible prior to this - a crack in the very foundation of Western culture - not to tear it down, but to free those trapped inside, to set free their reality, that which had always been denied.

We assume that the contemporary dissatisfaction with the Church and traditional social structures is “the effect of a modern transition toward a rationalized, secularized, and materialized society.”  And in large part society has turned its back on Christianity and the Church.  Certainly there’s plenty of reasons to do so.  But as Nancy says, the outright rejection of Christianity itself is just not possible, since “the modern world is itself the unfolding of Christianity;” to deny it “amounts to forbidding the modern world to begin to understand itself.” (Nancy, Dis-Enclosure, 143-144) There “is perhaps something to be brought to light… something Christianity may not as yet have freed.” (Dis-Enclosure, 149)

The decline of traditional social structures, the cracks in the facade of the institutional Church, and the criticism of its time honored doctrines, like the federal court’s demand to free the prisoners, may be unavoidable for this process of opening to occur.  Christianity calls to us, not from the Church steeples, nor  from the hidden recesses of its stone vaults, but from the prison cells, from the mass graves, begging us to hope for a future in which prisons and executioners have little, if any, role in maintaining the social fabric.  “As long as we do not grasp the full extent of this situation… we will remain prisoners to something that has not been elaborated in such a way as to be adequate to that history and that destiny,” (Dis-Enclosure, 148) - we are all held captive to some extent.

Indeed, the crisis with the California prison system may provide the opportunity for something unpredictable, some new realization that can only be gained through the recognition of the suffering of those whose humanity we’ve denied. Afterall, the prisoners slated for release are not not hardened criminals, they are drug addicts and those convicted of nonviolent crimes.  As long as they remain locked behind prison walls the rest of us can go on with our lives, believing that all is right in our world… I wonder, what is it, what experiences are locked up and contained within their broken and damaged lives, from which we so desperately want to hide?

We have made progress since Jesus’ day.  He was condemned for “religious” crimes: violating the Sabbath, threatening to tear down the Temple, acting and speaking as if he were God.  He directly challenged the closed religious structures of his day. Luckily, we no longer imprison people for those specific crimes.  However,only a century ago, entire families, women and children, were locked up in debtors’ prisons.  Imagine how many would be jailed today, if that was still the case. And yet, to this day many Americans are imprisoned by indebtedness, a reality, which not too long ago, most of us did not even recognize.  Thankfully, increased awareness of their suffering has led the Obama Administration to bring forth legislation which will begin to alleviate their plight.

Indeed hope itself is born, not so much within a manger, but from within these very sorts of prison cells, in the very places where, historically, hope has always been extinguished.  Its birth was a wondrous event, and its proclamation continues to be good news - a light in the darkness, a process of opening from within hidden depths of human suffering, the revelation of the divine as opening itself, which I find makes better sense when described by thinkers like Rene Girard, or by postmodern philosophers Jean-luc Nancy and John Caputo, than do the “Sunday school” stories the Church continues to tell.  “It is the Open as such, the Open of the proclamation, of the project, of history, of faith, that, by the living God, is revealed at the heart of Christianity.” (Nancy, 144) Reading Nancy I see that the first indication of this opening was the birth of Christianity, that the essence of Christianity is this opening, the structure of opening as an indefinite movement that does not cease opening itself  (Nancy, 146).

John Caputo speaks in terms of the EVENT, “a summons, a call, demand, claim or appeal, as well as a promise…” (Caputo, Weakness of God, 28-29). When Jesus entered prison, when he was taken captive, he unlocked the gates from within, he released an event which broke open the closed religious and political structures, which delivered an unprecedented shock to the system, an event which set off “unforeseeable and disruptive consequences.” This EVENT “need not be delivered by a thunderbolt. It gradually, quietly overtakes us, grows on us, until at some point we realize that everything has been transformed.” (Caputo, What Would Jesus Deconstruct, 26-27) What does this mean in 21st century terms? It must concern those we continue to criminalize:

“The people Jesus had in mind when he announced his mission, ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he anointed me to bring good news to the poor.’ (Luke 4:18) - is the drug scene in the inner-city ghettos”

Like those in Baltimore, “whose grim violence is unforgettably etched in our mind by the stunning cinematography of  The Wire [link],” the critically acclaimed HBO series which ran from 2002-2008. “In the midst of the mindlessness of much of commercial television, there are artists willing to speak the truth.”  (Caputo, 28) Like the debtors prisons, it is time to release the lives trapped inside, the women and children afflicted by poverty, the young men without hope, the drug addicts.

In a couple of weeks, on February 2nd, Christians will celebrate the Feast of the Presentation, when they retell Luke’s story of the first time Joseph and Mary formally presented the BABY JESUS in the Temple.  Looking upon the infant, Simeon, a holy man who refused to die until he had seen the messiah, utters his last words:

“Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory of your people Israel.” 

We can chose to read this literally, or dismiss it as just another mythological account of God’s appearance on earth in the form of an INFANT.  But I prefer to look, as John Caputo does, for “the event that’s transpiring in the name of God,” in the name of BABY JESUS (see Caputo, After the Death of God, 85, 160). The stories of Jesus’ birth and early childhood are one way to describe the highly anticipated, yet completely unpredictable event that interrupts, as Captuo says, the normal course of human history. In the case of the Epiphany stories, a PROMISE and a HOPE which Jesus, as the “consenting scapegoat,” the willing captive, the executed prisoner, let loose in Luke’s own place and time.

That PROMISE, “to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives, to let the oppressed go free,” is alive today. That PROMISE continues to call us, because, as Caputo says, “it is the very structure of hope,” an “unconditional demand” that becomes the process of opening itself, the breaking open to unforeseen possibilities in those places where hope and possibility is too often denied. To experience this, the BIRTH of this HOPE WITHIN US, could be very similar to those moments of recognition, those moments of Epiphany, what the Biblical writers took to be GOD IN THE FLESH.    - Sue Wright

Was your holiday everything you hoped it would be?

That may depend on whether you got a new laptop, a Wii, or that large screen TV you’ve been longing for…  Its hard to imagine how Santa loaded all those electronics on his sleigh.  I wonder what he really thinks when he’s reading those lists, and checking them twice.

But is that the true meaning of Christmas? How many Christians really celebrate the coming of the Messiah, does anyone still believe he’s going to intervene once again in human history?  Aren’t most of us just waiting for Santa and his twelve reindeer?  When I think about all that gift-giving frenzy that takes place during the holidays I can’t help but ask the question: if Christmas is really just about the presents under the tree, why bother with all that pretense about Jesus and the birth of the messiah?  Hasn’t the Santa tradition won out?

Honestly, can you blame anyone?  So many of the biblical stories told in preparation for the Christmas holiday are full of threats of punishment.  For instance, in Luke 3:7-18 [link to text] John the Baptist warns the people not to run from the wrath to come:

“Bear fruits worthy of repentance. Do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our ancestor’; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

The Greek word Luke uses for wrath is ὀργή or orgē [link].  It means anger, violent emotion, anger demonstrated in punishment.  John’s use of the word “wrath” gives the people such a fright they immediately ask him what they need do to save themselves.  He replies by offering the following instructions:

First to the crowd in general, he says,

“Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none; and whoever has food must do likewise.”

Then to the tax-collectors:

“Collect no more than the amount prescribed you.”

And finally to soldiers:

“Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.”

In all four gospels John the Baptist announces the coming of the Messiah who will judge the people. But in Luke, “John’s preaching is taken beyond mere warning of impending judgment to provide some guidelines for living in the meantime.  Though the crowds in general are said to pose the question, the response is directed specifically to those wealthy enough to have extra food or clothing.” (Sharon H. Ringe, Luke, 53)  In Luke, unlike the other gospels, John the Baptist returns to some of the oldest biblical traditions concerned with economic justice. In a world where most people were lucky to own even one coat, some might thin he was demanding a new economic order.  In fact, we often think of John as a radical extremist, a sort of revolutionary, who prepares the way for a Messiah that will intervene on behalf of the weak and the poor.  John even repeats his threats: if the people refuse to follow his instructions, the coming Messiah will burn them as chaff with unquenchable fire.

But, honestly, I’m tired of the message: “do it, or else… Feed the poor, or face the consequences of your greedy lifestyle.”  All too often its stated as a threat, a “should” dictated by liberals who sound more like angry tyrants, using scare tactics to force us to comply.  For instance, it was such a downer this holiday season listening to all the politically correct naysayers denounce our penchant for gift-giving.  Like Scrooge or the Grinch, they seem intent on robbing us of all the joy of Christmas.

But maybe there’s a reason to be frightened.  Rene Girard, one the most important thinkers on the relationship between violence and religion, warns, the wrath to come is a very real threat that looms on the horizon.  Rather than punishment inflicted by a cruel God, it is the result of an escalating crisis in which everyone competes for wealth and privilege, generating anger and resentment on all sides, which unchecked, erupts in violent chaos (see Rene Girard’s recent book: Battling to the End, 211).

[read more Girard on John the Baptist]

In Luke’s story, the crowd, which in Greek also translates as throng or mob, is desperate for someone to take charge and resolve the mounting tensions.  Whether they’re rich or poor, a member of the status quo, or someone longing for economic justice, they are all united by their fear of the wrath: the violent chaos which they interpret as divine punishment for their sins.  And since they refuse to take responsibility for the actual sources of that violence the crowd seeks out a leader, a “savior,” who will pronounce judgment and bring the situation under control. Is it any wonder they mistake John for the Messiah: his angry rhetoric seems to fit the bill.

 

We witness a similar crisis today, in which the refusal to equitably distribute the worlds’ resources breeds anger and resentment across the globe: the East accuses the West of being “greedy imperialists,” while the West insists the terrorists are “jealous of our freedom.”  As these tensions continue to build, they accumulate as a form of wrath, which threatens to erupt in violent upheaval.  In the past, biblical laws which demanded some sort of redistribution of wealth helped to limit the excess of greed and prevent violent eruption.

 

Today acts of generosity on the part of the wealthy nations have the same potential to alleviate mounting global tensions, but that generosity, as we know, falls far too short, leaving too many people without the basic necessities of life.  Meanwhile greed goes unchecked, reaching proportions that have outstripped any and all limitation.  Surely our over-consumption of goods, which reaches its most frenzied pitch during the holidays, heightens the problem.  Should we, like the crowd in Luke’s story, be afraid?  After all, by John the Baptist’s standards the ax cannot be too far from the tree… 

 

While its true that John addresses the problem of human greed, he is far less “revolutionary” than we tend to assume.  In fact his approach is not all that novel.  For instance, Proverbs, portions of which were written in the time of King Solomon, advises the wealthy person not to oppress the poor, not to extort through excessive interest, and to treat one’s enemies with kindness.  Material prosperity is understood to be a good thing, but warns that those who are stingy with their stuff will end up losing it.  

 

John’s language in Luke 3:7-18 is also reminiscent of Ezekiel chapter 18 [link to text].  The prophet Ezekiel, who lived three centuries earlier than John, promises that those who engage in generous acts, will be rewarded with a prosperous life.  If the wealthy person turns from selfish behavior and takes personal responsibility for fulfilling the promise of the law: do not oppress the poor, do not repay violence with violence, return the pledge of a borrower, and do not charge excessive interest, he will escape the violent eruption. But, like John the Baptist, the prophet goes on to threaten the one who does not repent:

he shall surely die; his blood shall be upon him. (Ezekiel 18:13)

The severity of these threats demonstrates an awareness, conscious or not, that the coming wrath, the cycle of accumulated anger and resentment, must be avoided at all costs.  It’s in everyone’s best interest to keep the effects of greed in check. As Girard says, John the Baptist is very aware that the cycle is building again, that violence looms on the horizon.  John responds by offering the same old solutions, which may calm things down for a bit, but only temporarily.

 

So is there any hope for us?  Can we escape the wrath to come?  All four gospels agree that John the Baptist is to be followed by someone greater.  John, trapped in the old way of seeing things, assumes this person will punish those who do not repent - not a very motivating or hope-filled vision… 

 

Luckily Jesus ends up being a very different Messiah than either John or the crowd expect.  In fact, there is a very important difference between John and Jesus, especially when it comes to social and economic justice; it is the same difference that postmodern philosopher John D. Caputo draws between an economic order, no matter how just, and the simple act of gift giving. If we compare John the Baptist’s instructions to those given by Jesus three chapters later, in the Sermon on the Plain (Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount), we get a sense of it:

“If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt.  Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again.  Do to others as you would have them do to you.”

Where John says to tax-

collectors:  “Collect no more than the amount prescribed for you.” Jesus goes further saying: “lend, expecting nothing in return.” (Luke 6:35)   While John is rigid and threatening in his approach to economic justice, Jesus is caught up in what Caputo describes as the “excess,” the “madness” of gift-giving. (John D. Caputo, What Would Jesus Deconstruct, 70-71, 84).

So maybe we should think twice before rejecting holiday gift giving.  Especially since we love gifts, not just because we are selfish and hope that by giving a gift, we will get one in return, but because the pure gift, the gift given entirely out of love, as impossible as it seems, is the very thing we long for (Caputo, 70-71).

For instance, instead of squashing our gift-giving mania, the Advent Conspiracy [link] taps into all that holiday good will, redirecting it into projects which help the poor and underprivileged. By asking their congregations to to spend less on Christmas gifts, churches have raised money to build wells in places where clean water is hard to come by.  These efforts certainly deserve to be applauded, but at the same time they must remain mindful of their rhetoric [link].  There’s always a risk it could turn to self-righteous indignation, and the sort threatening language Ezekiel and John Baptist were unable to avoid.

Afterall, we don’t want to end up like “Sombertown” in the Christmas TV classic, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, in which Santa Claus is arrested for delivering toys to the village children whose lives are dreary, because the burgermeister, who hates toys, has outlawed them:

“outlaw the dolls and sink the boats… every jack-in-the box be sealed… stuffed animals, unstuff them, any child that complains, rebuff them.”

Who knows, maybe he’s afraid that competition over the toys will get out of hand and create chaos?  In fact, when Santa first arrives in the village to deliver toys, the towns people are so frightened they hide in their homes.  But the children, who are more open-minded than their parents, quickly respond with joy to the unexpected generosity of these gifts.  Even the threat of severe punishment cannot block or inhibit the effect the toys have on all the town’s children who immediately start playing.  Slowly this joy impacts the adults, even melting the heart of the Winter Warlock.

The burgermeister, on the other hand, becomes increasingly disturbed by the interruptive power of Santa’s gift-giving; which proves impossible to contain.  In fact, Santa’s generosity ruptures the town’s rigid order, not only undoing every attempt to prohibit the toys, it finally unlocks the adults’ repressed longing for things they’ve been denied since childhood: a china doll, a yo-yo, a toy train. I admit, the idea that there is one toy or object that will make us happy is ridiculous - as Rene Girard says, we do not have autonomous control over our desires - we desire what others provoke us to desire: this year its a Wii, or a large screen TV, next year it will be something else... Sadly enough, now that the lights on the Christmas tree have dimmed, some of those presents we received Christmas Day have already lost their luster.

However, this in no way denies the fact that we continue to long for a gift that is, in a sense, indestructible.  “The gift is what we love and desire with a desire beyond desire, in which we hope with a hope against hope,” the gift that “is given with love,” even if the one giving is “not loved in return.” (Caputo, 72) This can’t be limited to any single object, to a single instruction, or calculation, or act of charity, but is the event of gift-giving itself.  Its not the toys which breath new life into “Sombertown,” but the excessive nature of Santa’s generosity, which despite the cost to Santa himself, keeps on giving, asking nothing in return.  Because the gift always exceeds our expectation, it invites our participation, calls us forward (Caputo, 71), towards a less rigid order in which people are more generous, more forgiving, less angry and resentful. Initiatives like the Advent Conspiracy, though not the gift itself, are examples of this, of an expansion of Christmas to include those once left out.

For John the Baptist, or Ezekiel, this joyful interruption of gift-giving in the midst a threatening order would have arrived as an unforeseen possibility.  It is the “madness” that Jesus unleashes on the Cross (Caputo) when he gives of himself so completely.  This event exceeds their expectation, for not only does Jesus expose us, and our actions, as the source of violent wrath, at the same time Jesus saves us from the threat of violent upheaval, by giving us what can only be called a gift: the impossible possibility of a human response free of all anger and resentment, born of the most profound commitment to love the very ones who persecuted him. For this reason we can claim Jesus’ action on the Cross as the messianic event so many have longed for.

Has Santa Claus usurped Jesus?  No way… it’s just not possible, since Jesus was the one who got this whole Christmas gift-giving madness going in the first place.  When we participate in this kind of generosity, we open ourselves and each other to gifts we can not foresee, but so desperately need.  What if we built wells, not only for the poor in Africa, but for the Iranians, the Afghans, the North Koreans?  Like a jack-in-the-box, the accumulation of anger and resentment, and the rigid order that wants to contain it, could break open (even if just for a moment) and we’d glimpse some human possibility which is truly wondrous.   - Sue Wright

Have you received those e-mails forwarding photos of babies dressed up in costumes? Or depicting babies sleeping in flower blossoms?  Its one of those popular fads circulating online. I have to admit the photos are totally irresistible.  What is it about babies?  No matter my mood, when I look at one those cute smiling faces, I have to smile right back.

But even as I was smiling at a picture of a baby in a pink flamingo costume, I could hear the lyrics to one of my favorite Radiohead songs, “I Will” [Watch on YouTube] echoing in my mind.  Unlike the baby photos the song is not nearly as uplifting.

I will lay me down

in a bunker
underground

I won’t let this happen to my children
meet the real world coming out of your shell
With white elephants
sitting ducks
I will
rise up

Little babies’ eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes
Little babies’ eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes
Little babies’ eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes
Little babies’ eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes

While the song is intentionally written to sound like a lullaby, it refers to something much more serious: an act of transference which allowed us to shift a huge white elephant, all the fear and anxiety generated by 9/11, onto a sitting duck: Iraq.   This is part of the dynamic of scapegoating defined by René Girard, one of the most important thinkers on the relationship of violence and culture [more on Girard].  Girard explains: scapegoating allows us “to elude problems that seem intractable.”  It’s never a conscious activity.  We didn’t knowingly transfer all our emotional trauma onto the Iraqi people.  Its just that its extremely difficult to retaliate against terrorists, never mind bringing the problem of terrorism to some sort of resolution.  Instead we redirected all that tension onto an easier target and ended up doing to the Iraqis what had been done to us.

The idea that “shock and awe” would somehow spare the population was a delusion.  Not that we understood that at the time.  We convinced ourselves every step of the way: insisting that we were liberating the Iraqis, that there would be minimal loss of life, that our soldiers would return home quickly, safe and unharmed, and that the whole thing would be wrapped up in a matter of months.  As Girard says, “we are all prone to that delusion.”  This is proven by the paradox that “all of us can observe and denounce numerous examples of scapegoating we have personally observed, yet none of us ever identify past and, above all, present instances of [our] own involvement in scapegoating.” (Violent Origins, 74)

In fact its easy to identify other examples, wars or acts of genocide in which those who initiated the violence felt completely justified. It seems to happen all too often. How is it that an entire population can delude itself this way and what, if anything, has the power to break through such delusions?  For instance, what would allow us to recognize the incredible amount of suffering inflicted upon the Iraqi people, especially on all the innocent children who spent their nights in bunkers underground, as their world exploded all around them?  What, for instance, would we see if we actually looked into their eyes?

In the last decade neuroscientists have discovered that babies‘ eyes hold important clues for understanding the evolution of the human species.  Scientists now have evidence that we are hard wired for empathy, a capacity that begins to develop in the first moments of life. Its not just the fact that babies are so cute that compels us to smile; when we see a baby smile our brain has the same neurological response that the baby does.  This is due, scientists say, to mirror neurons.

To view a video clip describing  mirror neurons  [Link Here].

From the first moments of life, babies mirror their parents’ facial expressions.  Scientists observing the effects of this behavior on babies’ brains have discovered that all that imitation stimulates the development of the neurological systems which enable human beings to experience the emotions, the intentions of others, as if those emotions and intentions were our own.  The more I smile at a baby, the more it smiles back.  Before I know it I’m engaged in a back and forth game of imitation, poking out tongues and making silly faces.  Scientists say that this process of mirroring is necessary for social connectedness.

After testing babies, neuroscientists performed similar tests on newborn monkeys, and discovered that they have the same ability, but to a far lesser extent.  For instance, in the first day of life baby monkeys imitate their mother’s facial movements allowing their brains to adapt to their social environment. [Link to Journal Article]  Scientists see this as evidence of a crucial link in our evolution.

Indeed, some are labeling the discovery of mirror neurons as the most significant breakthrough in the last decade, with the power to transform other disciplines:  “Have you heard of neuroethics, neuromarketing, neuropolitics?  You will in the years and decades to come, and research in these fields will be rooted, explicitly or otherwise, in the functions of mirror neurons.” (Iacoboni, Mirroring People, 7)

While others, including a few New Atheists, have identified mirror neurons as a biological basis for morality [link] [link].  As tempting as that optimism might be, after all “it follows that good imitators should also be good at recognizing emotions, and so endowed with a greater empathy,” (Iacoboni, Mirroring People, 112), I can’t help but wonder…  If we’re wired for empathy, and if its true that’s its part of our DNA, then why aren’t we better off as a species?  Why, for instance, can Jack on 30 Rock state the truism, “human empathy, its as useless as the Winter Olympics.” (30 Rock, “Audition Day,” Season 4, Episode 4) 

In fact, Mark Iacoboni, neuroscientist and author of the popular book Mirroring People, says they have discovered a negative side to mirror neurons, which, I’ve noticed, the media has been far more hesitant to report.  The same neurons which allow monkeys to adapt so quickly to their social group and surroundings, have, over the course of human evolution, acquired some bad habits. Iacoboni believes that at some point in the development of our species we acquired super mirror neurons, which enabled complex forms of imitation, which are far more complex than the basic mirroring found in monkeys: “In which individuals observing aggressive behavior not only acquire complex coordinated motor behaviors that make them aggressive and violent but also become convinced in the process - in an unconscious way - that such behavior is a good way of solving social problems.” (Mirroring People, 211)  We resist such ideas, because “we are naturally inclined to think of ourselves as autonomous individuals who are not going to be influenced in any direct, slavish, monkey-see, monkey-do way by what we see. The data on imitative violence clearly threatens this precious notion.” (Mirroring People, 212)

Iacoboni says “we have seen how mirror neurons can undoubtedly be good for us, enabling feelings and actions of empathy for others, but they also provide a compelling neurological mechanism underlying imitative violence…” (Mirroring People, 211) We live in a world “filled with atrocities every day - and this despite a neurobiology wired for empathy and geared toward mirroring and sharing of meaning.  Why is this?”  Unfortunately, the evidence suggests that “the same neurobiological mechanisms facilitating empathy may produce, under specific circumstance and contexts, a behavior that is the opposite of an empathetic behavior.” (Mirroring People, 268-9).

Part of the answer lies in the fact that mirroring is pre-reflective, we respond before we are able to think about the choices we are making.  Iacoboni focuses, and rightly so, on the effects of video games, advertising and addiction, which exploit and reinforce negative imitation. But in my opinion, the neurological mechanism he describes is no more evident, and no more frightening, than in the act of transference described by René Girard, that which led our entire country to war in Iraq.

Iacoboni believes we can use our knowledge of the mirror neuron system and its automatic mechanisms “to prevent evil.” (210)  Some of the New Atheists would agree, that we can extend simple acts of empathy, like smiling at babies, to encompass the children of our so-called enemies.  But how is this possible, if we are unable to resist or interrupt, even for a moment, those more complex forms of transference and scapegoating which override empathy?  Especially given the evidence   that our evolution goes hand in hand with our ability to nurture and protect babies over the course of their development, when their mirror neuron system is being formed. As traditional social structures which historically contained violence with violence (war, for instance) prove so disastrously futile in solving the worlds problems; more and more children are exposed to traumatic events which interrupt the development of empathy.  When we consider the effects of war, of “shock and awe,” or starvation, ethnic cleansing, or even the plague of violence infecting our schools, on children’s brains, it becomes obvious that we need to find other ways to make the world safe for our children.  It is time to break free of the complex neural structures which allow for transference, but in a culture saturated with violence, its impossible to imagine where to begin.  In a sense we are brought to a standstill, to a deadlock in our own evolution.

In Mark 9:30-37 [link to text] the author says that Jesus “took a little child in his arms and put it among them; and taking it in his arms, he said to them, ‘Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me, but the one who sent me.’”  Jesus actually engages us in a trajectory, which is the opposite of scapegoating, because he identifies not only himself, but the one who sent him with the helpless, innocent children, the victims of our delusions.  But that’s not all…

The lyrics to the Radiohead song suggests that the bunkers built to protect people are really tombs.  Not only are they the underground, hidden recesses where so many Iraqi children spent their evenings, some even losing their lives (to this day, the trauma they suffered remains invisible to the rest of world), the effects to all of us are far reaching, for it guarantees that we will continue to mirror the motor responses that turn normal, rational human beings into violent and aggressive people.

As I read Mark, Jesus not only reminds me just how lacking our empathy can be, I see that babies’ eyes hold the key.  Not only do they engage us in the most basic acts of empathy, stimulating the neurons in our brains to smile at them, they beckon us, as ambassadors of the future, towards positive alternatives for the continued evolution of the human race, possibilities we have yet to imagine.  Maybe then we’ll compose some new lullabies to sing our children to sleep.  Isn’t it time to rewrite some of those traditional lyrics, at least the ones which tend on the morbid side: “Rock-a-by baby on the tree top…”?  Think about it, its no accident that the first lines of the Radiohead song echo the children’s bedtime prayer:

Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, if I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.  

- Sue Wright

For more info on Mimetic Theory and Mirror Neurons: [Link here] to Imitatio.org and scroll down to the articles listed under Natural Sciences.

I highly recommend Marco Iacoboni’s book, Mirroring People: The Science of Empathy and How We Connect with Others (2009).

Why do we create idols?  Only to destroy them?  Princess Diana, Michael Jackson, Elvis, they all literally died for fame… and the list goes on. Some would say they paid the ultimate price for climbing too high, but are they really the only ones to blame for their tragic fate?

After watching Michael Jackson’s superstar status devolve into a media circus focused almost entirely on his bizarre behavior, his trials and subsequent death, I have to ask whether the whole world has gone insane?  I can’t shake this sneaking suspicion that somehow we are all responsible for the death of the “King of Pop.”

When I shared my suspicions with a friend, she insisted I watch the South Park episode “Britney’s New Look,” which depicts the American public ritually sacrificing Britney Spears.  [watch episode] [read synopsis]

When Kyle, one of the main characters, asks why Britney has to die, various members of the crowd explain that “nobody wants her to die, young man, we all just simply need her to…. Throughout history humans have found it necessary to engage in human sacrifice…  But since Americans no longer like to do the killing themselves, we rely on the celebrity to kill itself… Britney was chosen a long time ago, built up and adored, then sacrificed for the harvest.”  [watch clip]

In a brilliant scene by South Park’s writers, the crowd surrounds Britney as if ready to stone her, but in the very moment you expect some anonymous member of the crowd to throw the first stone, one by one they begin to kill her with camera shots [watch clip].  Members of the crowd explain that Britney was to supposed to kill herself a while ago, so now she has to be sacrificed in time for the corn harvest.  And indeed that is a fairly accurate portrayal of how sacrifice functions in primitive cultures.  My favorite French thinker, René Girard, explains: the sacrificial victim “is a substitute for all the members of the community… The purpose of the sacrifice is to restore harmony to the community, to reinforce the social fabric,” by redirecting the violence and discord that arises from conflicting desires and the competition over resources (Violence and the Sacred, 8).

Thus in South Park, the members of the crowd explain “its not just the press, everyone agrees she has to die… It’s all America, we’re all apart of this together.”  However, we are more civilized than our primitive ancestors. We have economic and government institutions which insure the peaceful distribution of the “harvest,” so that we don’t have to compete over goods, but we still have the fundamental problem of desire.   As Girard says, we no longer offer human sacrifices to appease the gods, but our need for idols does not disappear.

 Another master of irony, Chuck Palahniuk, offers us a further clue in his novel, Choke. The main character, Victor, who’s convinced he’s the latest incarnation of Jesus, thinks he’s about to be stoned to death by the crowd.  Victor, as much as he might want to be, is not a celebrity.  He is however the momentary object of everyone’s fascination.   When they discover that he’s been misleading them, the crowd quickly turns into a murderous mob.  But instead of killing Victor, they tear down the edifice of his self-delusions, all his attempts to get attention, to be other than what he really is. For an actual celebrity the loss of their inflated image is probably more than they can bear, but for Victor it provides a rare opportunity to discover his identity for himself.  But ironically, in a society which claims that we can be who ever we want, that we can have whatever we want, few people have the courage to really pursue this.

Instead, we prefer to worship celebrities.  All the media hype magically grants them an irresistible allure, allowing the public to focus all their desire on the star.  What would we do without them?  We’d have to find satisfaction and fulfillment in our day to day lives, in our actual relationships.  By channeling all our desire through the godlike images the media creates for us, we don’t have to confront our reality, our mediocrity, our flaws, all our shortcomings. We don’t have to face that secret fear that no one could possibly be attracted to us as we truly are?  We don’t have to risk rejection.

We leave all the risk to the celebrities.  But since they’re only human, they can’t keep up the show indefinitely.  In South Park both the media and the public constantly criticize Britney: “she’s gained weight,” she’s “chubbed up,” has zits, scars from plastic surgery and “is obviously lip-synching.” Once the celebrity’s image has cracked, its just a matter of time before she’s gotten rid of and quickly replaced.  As long as our appetite is fed without interruption, we won’t have to notice the human flaws in each other.  But what really seals their fate: is the fact that all the love and admiration we initially lavish on them inevitably turns to hidden hate and resentment, because we all know in the back of our minds that we, like Victor, will never be the center of so much attention and desire.  Obviously, we never admit this to ourselves, but instead find plenty of reasons to blame the celebrity.

[Link to example: Celebrities We Love to Hate]

It reminds me of one of those frenzied scenes in Dostoevsky’s novel The Possessed (also translated Demons), in which the entire town consumed with envy, is caught up in a murderous spree.  In the novel Nicholas Stavrogin, who has an extraordinary mix of intelligence, good looks and aristocratic breeding, achieves a sort of celebrity status.  As a young man, he is admired by all and quickly rises to the height of society.  However all the attention and success thrown his way leads him not as one would expect to a long and brilliant career as a social or political leader,  but to a series of bizarre and offensive acts.   Like Britney Spears and Michael Jackson the constant media attention eventually turns our idols into freaks.

Once this happens, there is no turning back.  The gossip surrounding Nicholas spreads like wildfire, but instead of ruining his popularity, it actually increases it exponentially, with the result that his admirers and even his close friends begin to treat him as a god.  But this leaves him no way of knowing whether his exalted status is based on anything concrete in his own person, or whether its a vicious game in which he is the ultimate victim.  Once he achieves this status, he can not conceive of returning to normal life.  Instead he dreams of escaping to a remote mountain hideaway, to live out his life in isolation, but never does so. Wishing to be free of his admirers, he remains dependent on them for his very being, but that being doesn’t really exist.

As we know Michael Jackson was from a very young age deprived of a normal life; a painful reality from which even his music could not protect him.  Indeed, the public fascination with Jackson’s eccentricities completely overshadowed his incredible talent.  And despite the fact that he worked tirelessly for the comeback which would restore him in the public eye, tragically it was not until his death that suddenly everyone, everywhere began to play his songs again.

Even Jesus struggled with celebrity status.  Aware of the dangers, he consistently deflected the crowd’s attention.  Even so, he was followed everywhere he went. For instance, in Mark 6:30-34, 53-56 [link to text] Jesus tries to escape the crowds, but is quickly outmaneuvered.  Mark says he took compassion on the crowd and healed them of their sicknesses.  Maintaining his distance and refusing to be an idol is the only way he can continue to care for them, it is the only way to escape the love-hate relationship.

The moment celebrities seek isolation they are hounded and criticized for it.  In South Park Britney tries to escape the paparazzi by going on a camping trip in the Colorado Rockies, but is quickly discovered.  In fact the possibility of escape creates its own problems.  Thom Yorke, the lead singer of Radiohead, publicly admits he hates his celebrity status.  He writes in his blog, that the moment he gets a break, he quickly loses his sense of identity and purpose and sinks into deep depression.  As Girard warns, “the affirmation of the self ends in the negation of the self.”  To allow oneself to be raised to the status of a god inevitably brings about self-destruction, because the celebrity’s identity is only ever a projection of the public’s desire.  Few stars discover this reality before its too late.

Girard says, “it is Stavrogin,” not his followers, “who bears the heaviest cross.” As with Michael Jackson, Dostoyevski’s reader is unable to decide just how human Nicholas really is, whether he feels desire, or whether he is completely cut off from his own humanity, being denied as he is, any real intimacy in his life.  In Michael Jackson’s case, we watched him, over the course of his career, become sexless, even featureless, losing the distinct features of any palpable personality.  Isn’t it incredibly sad that the more closely Jackson was imitated, the more slowly, but surely he destroyed his own appearance?

In a similar way Nicholas Stavrogin sets out on a path of self-destruction, possibly in a desperate attempt to free himself.  Girard explains that Nicholas “is beyond desire.  It is not whether he no longer desires because Others desire him or whether Others desire him because he no longer desires.  Thus is formed a vicious circle from which [he] cannot escape… he becomes the magnetic pole of desire and hatred” (Deceit, Desire and the Novel, 163).  Unfortunately, public demand for an idol is insatiable and those stars who chose to go this route, are inevitably consumed by it.

In Choke, Victor and Paige, his equally self-deluded partner, survive the crowd’s destructive furor, and are able for the first time “to see each other for real.”  Freed not only from their own delusions, but also from allowing the world to define them as flawed and less than desirable, they have the chance not only to create some other reality, they are able to detect just a silhouette of their being in each other’s eyes.

So maybe folks shouldn’t be so quick to criticize Thom Yorke, for his coldness (he’s notorious for just walking away from admirers without response) [link to criticism].  Maybe he’s aware of the precarious position he’s in.  It comes from time to time in Radiohead’s songs.  “Life in a Glasshouse” is just one example [video] [lyrics], in which Yorke sings: “Of course, I’d like to sit around and talk, but someone’s always listening in,” and once again the crowd “is hungry for a lynching.”

For some reason Yorke’s resistance makes people furious, including other celebrity wanna-bees like 15 yr. old Miley Cyrus, who drummed up lots of publicity in 2009 by complaining about Yorke’s rudeness [link]. Sadly, she has no clue that she’s playing right into the public’s obsession. I truly hope that someone warns her that at the end of the South Park episode, she’s identified as the next one on the way to becoming a major superstar [watch clip].

The good news is, if South Park can make an episode exposing the true nature of the public’s fascination with celebrities, we, like Victor and Paige, may chose to give up this obsession with attention and fame, maybe then fewer childhood pop stars will have to self-destruct before our eyes.

-Sue Wright

What would summer be without the release of an action packed, blockbuster movie?  We’re a culture addicted to displays of power, the proportions of which seem to be increasing, as special effects, high tech weapons and machines get more and more spectacular. Compare, for instance, the original Transformers TV Series with the newly released Transformers 2.

[watch movie action trailer]

[watch first TV episode]

Is it me, or have the those robots gotten a bit more intimidating?  For folks who aren’t sure what tranformers are: they’re a popular toy and TV cartoon introduced in the mid-80s, which spinned off a comic series, games and more recently a couple of movies.  Transformers are alien robots from the planet Cybertron.  They can ‘transform’ themselves, rearranging their bodies into everyday objects, usually vehicles.  At times they will transform into devices or animals. [more info] Unsuspecting humans have no idea that their supposedly harmless cars, trucks or bull-duzors, are actually not what they appear to be.  That is until, on a moment’s notice, they transform into dangerous alien robots.  [watch demonstration]

I think human beings are capable of the same sort of thing.  For instance, in 2 Corinthians 12:2-10 [read text] Paul is embroiled in a rivalry with other teachers who claim to be Christian apostles.  In chapter 11 Paul, being ironic, labels them “super-apostles” (2 Cor. 11:5) for boasting of superior abilities and talents and for claiming miraculous powers of healing.  Paul says they have  “deceived” the Corinthians and led them astray.  In 2 Cor. 11:13-15 Paul goes even further, and accuses his rivals of being ministers of Satan who have “transformed” themselves into apostles of Christ.  To stress this point he uses the same word three times:

μετασχηματίζω  metaschēmatizō: to transform the figure of something [link]

On the other hand, Paul too may be labeled a “transformer.” Postmodern philosopher, John Caputo in his book The Weakness of God [link] cites Paul’s statement in 2 Cor. 12:10, as the moment in which he, Caputo, quietly takes his leave of Paul.  After a long list, boasting of his weaknesses, Paul makes an incredible claim:

Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong. (2Cor. 12:10)

Caputo responds, “Paul inscribes his idea of the weakness of God that is revealed in the cross in a larger economy of power.”  (Weakness of God, 42) For Paul insists that his weakness is not really what it appears to be, but instead “transforms” it into a power play: just another transformer, one that some philosophers claim is a far more dangerous stunt than anything those “ministers of Satan” could have conjured.   As Caputo says, “the power of God is embodied in the helpless body whose flesh is nailed to the cross…” (Weakness, 54) it requires the full renunciation of any and all power tactics, however well disguised. This leaves me begging the question, how are we to tell the transformers apart from the real apostles, if they even exist at all?

In the Transformers first TV episode the story is immediately founded on a rivalry between the forces of good and evil.  They are divided into two factions: the heroic Autobots, led by Optimus Prime, who protect humans, and the evil Decepticons, led by Megatron, who wants to take over the universe.  However each side relies on power to overcome the other.  As long as this is the case, displays of power always provoke new rivalries.  This is precisely the case in this first episode, when one of the Decepticons, jealous of Megatron’s status and authority, boasts that he will take his place some day.

Granted, the Autobots (or “good” robots) seem very willing to spend much of their time as cars or trucks, as good citizens so to speak.  Even so, the moment a rival transformer appears on the scene they immediately transform themselves into ultra-powerful robots.  The conflict between the Autobots and the Decepticons led to the destruction of their home world Cybertron, and now the escalation of their rivalry threatens Earth too.

In 2 Corinthians Paul is being pushed to the limit.  His rivals have clearly gotten the upper hand with the Corinthians, impressing them with their superior display of power.  But this is precisely what identifies them as anything but apostles.  By claiming to possess special knowledge and miraculous powers, they demonstrate that they’re just the same-old pagans in disguise, who have transformed themselves as Christians (Søren Kierkegaard, Christian Discourses, 66).   Like the Emperor boasting of his victories in battle, making such claims as proof of one’s power or authority is first and foremost a power play, and a continual source of rivalry and conflict which undermines the entire community. Paul, on the other hand, chooses a very different tactic.  As biblical-scholar Robert Hamerton-Kelly says, “Rather than enter into rivalry by imitating the opponents’ desire for power and prestige, he enters ironically by imitating the weakness and humiliation of Christ…In weakness the power of Christ to diffuse…. rivalry is most effective; so it is not despite his affliction that Paul is a successful apostle of Christ, but precisely because of it.” (Hamerton-Kelly, Sacred Violence, 175)

For instance, in 2 Cor. 12: 1-5, Paul responds to his rivals’ claims of mystical experiences, a typical claim to knowledge and authority in the ancient pagan world.  Whether or not Paul actually had such an experience, receiving a special communication from God, he, unlike his rivals, is unwilling to boast of it.  First, as we have already noted, to boasting is a power play, which always creates more rivalry, but more importantly, whatever encounter Paul did have with Jesus, or God, it had a negative, rather than a positive effect upon his confidence.  Like Peter, who can never forget that at the crucial moment, he betrayed Jesus three times, Paul full of boasting, in his most arrogant moments, when he was totally convinced he was in the RIGHT, was doing the worst kind of WRONG.  As the 19th century theologian Søren Kierkegaard says, Paul guarded the coats of the executioners while they stoned Stephen, an innocent man, to death (Kierkegaard, Eighteen Upbuilding Discourses, 341) .

For Paul, to encounter the crucified God, is to realize that his own ego, his own judgment, his understanding of right and wrong cannot be trusted. When Paul says he is given a “thorn in the flesh,” sent by a “messenger of Satan,” he refers to the knowledge of his own guilt, which he can not forget (Kierkegaard, Eighteen, 340).  That he, sick with rivalry and heady with power, was on a moment’s notice transformed into a murderer.  The only confidence he is left with is his confidence in his own weakness, which finally allows him to identify with the victim on the cross.   Therefore, the only good he can accomplish, as Kierkegaard says, is in keeping this thorn ever present in his mind.

We are each one of us, alien robots, capable, at a moment’s notice, of being transformed into rivals of our fellow human beings.  When that happens, watch out, it doesn’t matter if you’re an Autobot or a Decepticon… without the self-awareness and humility that Paul has learned, we end up wreaking destruction, doing more evil than good.  -Sue Wright

What is speaking in tongues?  It just sounds like babble to me, its not even a language that can be understood.  I have to admit, when I read in the Book of Acts, that “Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them.  All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages,” (Acts 2:3-4) it kind of freaks me out.

Glossolalia, as its often called, is big among Pentecostals who claim its a gift of the Spirit; evidence that they’re saved. [see explanation and example] That may work for them, but honestly, its just a bit much for me to take. Not to mention, that it could be used to exclude those who for whatever reason haven’t been “baptized in the spirit”.  I’ve never spoken in tongues; I just don’t think I can go there.  Does that mean I’m not really a Christian?

That said, I have to admit there’s one thing about these stories in Acts that does interest me.  There appears to be a connection (in the text) between speaking in tongues and the Christians’ ability to love each other.

In Acts Chapter 2 [read text] wealthy and sophisticated diaspora Jews, who had come from all parts of the Roman Empire to settle in Jerusalem, end up rubbing elbows  with uneducated rural fishermen, those they would normally have dismissed as backwards and beneath them.  (Martin Hengel)  They are even willing to accept Peter’s authority as a teacher, shocking given that the diaspora Jews were devoted to the synagogues, where they studied with highly trained rabbis and maintained a strict adherence to the Sabbath codes.  Incredibly,  however, they are, seemingly out of the blue, willing to set aside their prejudice and step outside the boundaries.  The result of all this is a new found fellowship:   “All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.” (Acts 2:44-45)

Once it was unleashed this radical hospitality could hardly be contained within the boundaries of the ancient Hebrew religion; so much so, that in subsequent chapters of Acts, the horizons are expanded to include the Gentiles (non-Jews): an even more shocking event.

In Acts 10:44-48 [read text] “while Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word. The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astounded that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles, for they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling God.”  After this the Gentiles were welcomed into the community.  Was it simply because they had received the gift of the Holy Spirit? Was speaking in tongues evidence that they too had been saved?  That explanation is just not good enough.

When the first Christian communities gathered people from all walks of life, economic, religious: wealthy Romans, slaves, prostitutes, religious leaders, fishermen, they shared one thing in common: a moment of openness to each other, in which their worldly status, however high or however low, was overwhelmed by something else, something that can only be described as a gift.

Whatever it was, it breached the walls, the social barriers that keep people divided, which make it difficult for people on either side of those barriers to understand each other.

We know that Jesus welcomed all sorts people into fellowship with him, including prostitutes and tax collectors.  The same sort of hospitality is inextricably linked to this new event, which is described in Acts as the gift of the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues.  And as much as I’d like to pinpoint the cause, its like the chicken and the egg, its impossible to say which came first, but one thing is for certain, in these stories speaking in tongues is more related to openness to others, and not simply my own personal salvation.

What I find really interesting is that for about 2,000 years, speaking in tongues completely disappeared.  Over time, as the church became more structured, speaking in tongues faded into the past, so that by the 4th century it was considered an ancient bygone. Augustine and other church leaders of the time explain it away as inevitable…. but I’m suspicious.  To this day Christians commemorate Pentecost as the founding of the church, as if that moment has been perfectly reproduced, without interruption from then until now, when in fact its the opposite.  The church slowly but surely rebuilt the walls that had been torn down by the radical hospitality described in Acts.  The openness that had brought people together was lost, and to this day the churches have yet to recover it.

And whether they do or not may already be a moot point, since we now live in the post-Christian era.  Even so, while the traditional structures of church and even family are crumbling all around us, we may, in fact, have found better walls to replace them.  For centuries, intimacy within the family, where people lived in the closest possible proximity, was carefully controlled by the rules of patriarchy.  Now in postmodern societies, like our own, who I get close to is all too often a matter of appearances, determined by what a person wears, by the music they listen to, or by what they buy. Couples about to marry relate to each other through the consumption of consumer goods.  Composing the gift registry is more important than composing the marriage vows.  People are increasingly isolated within their neighborhoods, their homes, where high-tech security systems keep strangers out.  In the process we are safely cordoned off from each other, never having to broach the issue of real intimacy, and what it would be like to relate to each other, our spouse, or our neighbor, if all of those external barriers suddenly disappeared.

But what if we try to imagine it? Would it be heaven or hell?  Total chaos or the moment of new possibilities?  The words, the titles, the outward appearances by which we categorize each other, through which we create meaning and differences, would lose some of their power.  Language itself would be stretched to its limits.  What would we do? Would we immediately set out to define new barriers or would we open ourselves and attempt to communicate with those with whom relationship had previously been unimaginable?

In any case, we may have no choice in the matter: the world is changing at a rate far greater than many of us have the ability to cope with.  What the future holds will probably depend on our capacity for welcoming each other as new spaces open up between us.  If we actually succeed and find a way to relate, free of divisive barriers, it would feel like a tremendous gift, a new reference for reality.  This is what the people listening to Peter must have experienced that day, when all of a sudden people from across the Roman Empire could understand each other.

What do you think?  Do I sound like a Jesus Freak?

Must we always live in fear of our enemies:  Iran, Syria, and all those terrorists plotting to strike at any moment?  It wasn’t long ago that we were afraid of Russia, Libya, and Cuba.  I think I detect a pattern…  What will it take to break this never ending cycle of anta- gonism and violence?

Recently President Obama, extended his hand and offered renewed relations to Iran [link to BBC story], a nation the previous administration had labeled the “axis of evil”. Some have criticized Obama as naive, as being too soft on our so-called enemies.  But I see his action as a breath of fresh air.  When will we finally learn that targeting others as the enemy is one of the worst ways to galvanize our nation?  That political leaders who use those sorts of accusations as a basis of power lock us all into no win situations, which only ever lead in one direction: towards conflict.

Obama, on the other hand, says he’s seeking an opening, some way to avert the growing threat of conflict fueled by the previous administration: “With the coming of a new season, we’re reminded of this precious humanity that we all share. And we can once again call upon this spirit as we seek the promise of a new beginning…”  But again critics claim that Obama’s gesture will prove useless if Iran does not desist in aggressive behaviors.

In Acts 4:5-12 [link to text] the Apostles, have been arrested for healing the sick and for preaching the resurrection.  They are brought before the most powerful people in Jerusalem: “the rulers, elders, and scribes… with Annas the high priest, Caiaphas, John, and Alexander, and all who were of the high-priestly family.”  This is the apostles’ first confrontation with the very people who plotted to kill Jesus, who are most likely considering the same fate for Peter and John.

The political and religious leaders interrogate the disciples:

“By what power or by what name did you do this?”  The rulers demand to know who or what has given them this authority? In other words, “Who do you think you are?”  But Peter doesn’t take the bait.  Instead, “filled with the power of the Holy Spirit” he responds:

“Rulers of the people and elders, if we are questioned today because of a good deed done to someone who was sick and are asked how this man has been healed, let it be known to all of you, and to all the people of Israel, that this man is standing before you in good health by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth…”.

This is not the sort of response the rulers are used to.  For instance, the apostles demonstrate none of the bravado that Mel Gibson displays in the movie Braveheart.  Who can forget that famous scene in which William Wallace (Braveheart) challenges his English oppressors with his weapon raised high?  Or his freedom speech [watch on youtube]. Not to mention that scene at the end of the movie, when Braveheart, during his gruesome execution, screams “freedom” [watch on youtube].  It was in his memory, in his name, that the Scots finally drove the English from their land, but at what cost?

Peter makes no inflammatory statements in the name of freedom or justice.  Nor does he claim that his authority comes from a God who is more powerful, or in whose name, he threatens vengeance on his persecutors.

On the contrary, Peter immediately identifies Jesus as the one “whom you crucified”. He says this, not to incite antagonism, or as a demand for revenge for the death of their leader.  Instead he does something quite unexpected, he offers healing: the same healing that the God of the Old Testament had offered the Jews for centuries.  He makes one demand: repent, give up your antagonism, “so that times of refreshing may come” (Acts 4:20) when and if the cycle of violence is broken.   He doesn’t ask for justice, he doesn’t even ask for an apology. This is an incredible offer which is only possible because Peter has already given up his own antagonism and has forgiven them despite the fact that the High Priest and his cronies don’t for a moment regret what they have done, and  would certainly kill Peter and the apostles if they could.  Forgiveness is given regardless of whether they repent or not.

I can imagine the rulers’ reactions: they thought they had gotten rid of Jesus once and for all.  By preaching Jesus’ resurrection, the apostles have tapped into a whole new basis of power, one which overrides that of the powerful elite and their gods of power.  As Peter’s says to them:

`the stone that was rejected by you, the builders;
it has become the cornerstone.’

No wonder the political and religious leaders are worried; they’ve just been deprived of their most effective means for squashing their enemies: execution.  But Jesus’ resurrection in of itself is not sufficient: it arises out the moment of his crucifixion, when Jesus, quite unlike Braveheart, forgave those still intent on killing him.

The act of forgiveness is then repeated when the resurrected Jesus first appeared to the disciples who had also rejected him in his darkest hour, he extended his hand in reconciliation,  transforming their darkest hour into an offer of healing.  [see Luke 24:36b-48] In John’s Gospel, Jesus said to them “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’” Jesus then breathed the Holy Spirit on them, which in turn enpowered them to offer healing to their enemies. [see John 20:19-31]

It is for this reason that Peter says, “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.”  This is not a claim that Christianity is the one true religion.  Quite the opposite, Jesus has founded a basis for power that has no need to malign anyone, but instead extends itself to everyone, saving the oppressor and the oppressed, from antagonism on both sides.  This is no small accomplishment.  Indeed Jesus’ action interrupts the old order of events, it opens a space in human relations, creating an opportunity for healing that had previously been impossible, even unimaginable.

The High Priest, the elders, and scribes, are left speechless.  Luke says they are amazed by Peter’s speech because he is uneducated, a fisherman, untrained in the art of speaking (which was a big deal in the ancient world).  But I say it is his offer of reconciliation even at the moment that the authorities are plotting to kill him.  More than once they threaten the apostles, but their threats no longer have any power, not because the disciples believe that God will restore them to life, making them indestructible like the Terminator, but because forgiveness has freed them, and can free us, from the power that death holds over humanity; it becomes a new “cornerstone” for meaning and action in the world - a new source of life.

When Luke says that Peter is filled with the power of the Holy Spirit, he describes one freed from the cycle of antagonism and violence, one who, at the crucial moment, has the ability to offer his outstretched hand.  He has no need to fear his enemies, in fact, as far as Peter is concerned, he has no enemies.

I hope that Obama, in the spirit of forgiveness, can give up all the antagonism he’s inherited, and in the process open a space for refreshment, for healing for the nations of the world.    -Sue Wright