The importance of girls
My friend Jennifer Goodson alerted me to this site. I think it’s a powerful illustration of the interdependence of all people and why 600 million girls matter.
The ethics of consumption
I am currently reading Being Consumed:Economics and Christian Desire by William T. Cavanaugh. The author provides a theological and cultural analysis of our consumer society. He presents consumerism not as materialism, but as spirituality gone wrong. Consumerism has many of the elements associated with spirituality: the search for transcendence, detachment, community, and human solidarity. Cavanaugh provides an economic ethic based on the Eucharist in which the ultimate consumption of the body of Christ relativizes all other consumption. The economic belief in scarcity, because human desire is unquenchable, is met with the abundance of life in Christ. I believe this book provides important insights on how people of faith are to live in a world dominated by stuff. This might be a very good group discussion topic.
What money still doesn’t buy
Here is an article from the New York Times about how money doesn’t equal an abundance of friends. Whether it’s in the central city, or the suburbs, rich or poor, America is suffering from relational fragmentation. These are the times when the need isn’t for more information about God, or even a better church to attend on Sunday morning, but an incarnational,”God with us” theology. What does that look like for us in the 21st century city?
Gift or anchor?
I remember seeing a Gallager skit in which the comedian was extolling the benefit of children as an excuse for not attending a dreaded party. Not having a baby sitter is a handy excuse. The catch in the joke was an anchor in diapers tied around the comedian’s foot. More and more people are getting the message that what was once considered a gift from God is really just a bunch of never ending obligations that merely ties one down. See this story at Broadstreet on Salon.com on how children are no longer seen as necessary to a happy marriage. What’s more interesting than the original post is the comments from the readers. The whole conversation is a startling snap shot on where we are today when it comes to valuing family life.
If you have children you can almost feel like an environmental polluter needing to buy carbon credits. Why would any educated, intelligent person, give up exotic vacations and an exciting career for children who are expensive, and won’t even do what you tell them? There is not even a money back guarantee that they will visit you in old age. On the other hand, are children just another status symbol displaying the parents wealth? Those seeking to live a faith filled life need to think long and hard about what exactly they are doing when bearing and raising children. This also entails not resorting to calling people “selfish” if they don’t have children. That’s a shallow and weak argument. Childlessness, or the more positive term “child-free”, is a relative new choice in human history and we aren’t sure how to respond. There is something much more complex going on whenever people are deciding to have children or not. In trying to ascertain the meaning and repercussions of such a choice, a whole complex of issues are raised about sexuality, gender relationships, work and community. We don’t hear much discussion as it relates to biblical faith because everybody naturally gets defensive. The childless feel judged and the parents feel unappreciated. Or maybe we don’t think that this has anything to do with one’s faith and it’s strictly a matter of personal disposition, or maybe just economics. It makes me wonder what it’s like to be a child today.
Communal Table
As always, the media is talking about the obesity epidemic. According to this story you are more likely to gain weight if your friends do. This is a continuation on studies in recent years that all eating disorders have a social contagion element. Bulimia can spread like wildfire in dorms. It’s not surprising that our eating issues, and we all have them, are related to our relationships. Food is highly symbolic evoking feelings of love, acceptance, or control. That is why diets that focus on the individual are not very successful. The whole culture, or at least our immediate community, is implicated in the way we eat and how we feel about food.
This brings to mind all those notoriously fattening church pot-lucks or the Sunday morning donuts in the fellowship hall. Maybe this is connected to a theology that doesn’t take our bodies seriously or considers the powerful influence a community can have on its members. It’s easier to attributed it to “personal” sin.
Chip off the old block
Recently my husband came home telling me about a gated community he had just visited. This middle-class refuge caters to the active mature adult, people over 50 who were now ready to enjoy themselves after a lifetime of toil at the office. It belongs with other places with names like Quail Creek or Deer Ridge Ranch, where neither quail or deer can be seen . These are places where you can play golf and bridge, workout, swim, dance, attend the club house happy hour and sip a nice chardonnay, or join a ceramics class. The billboards promise a life of undisturbed dreams and no children are allowed to live there in order to maintain the heaven-on-earth like environment. My husband’s impression was that it seemed self-absorbed and rather sterile. Here you have people in the prime of their life with money and health enclosing themselves in a secular monastery. Oh, I forgot, they do have bible studies and yoga for the spiritually inclined. I guess it’s this or a nursing home.
Then I was having tea with a friend and she told me about a new survey of young people which showed that they are more narcissistic than ever. Then I heard it on the radio this morning - so I looked it up. Here is the story. Nothing new here. From the beginning of time the older generation has complained about the younger. Young people are lazy, aimless, don’t understand the value of hard work or a dollar. They are narcissistic ( we now have a test to prove it), selfish, and self-absorbed. They are now called the generation of praise. Too many parents were too enthusiastic with their toddlers. But are they much different from many of today’s aging boomers, with their demands for Viagra, cosmetic surgery, and uninterrupted frivolity? I guess that’s the point, in an affluent society we can afford to be as frivolous as we like regardless of our age.
No name woman
China continues to prove itself as a dangerous place to grow up female. Here is a story from the Washington Post about the high suicide rate among young rural women. Uneducated, poor, and with little status in or out of marriage, many find themselves hopeless with no way of escape.
This story reminds me of a work of fiction by Chinese-American Maxine Hong Kingston, entitled “No Name Woman” in her book The Woman Warrior:Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts. The narrative set in rural China instructs us on the power of community to shape or destroy us. The ability to just get up and leave, or to determine the course of their lives, is one few women in the world know. Both the daily news and the work of a fiction writer, reminds me yet of another story in Luke 7. Cultural oppression is something that Jesus understood very well and he demonstrated it when he forgave a “no name woman.” A low-status outcast, the woman with the alabaster jar, broke through social niceties to find transgressive freedom at the feet of Jesus. I highly recommend you read these three stories together. It really captures the timelessness of the theme and of Jesus.
Going towards a city
Today, I am inspired by a post on Rob Dreher’s blog about faith, families, and cities. There is, I think, a romantic notion about returning to the land, and small town life as a way to secure values that seem to be fading. Many people want a place were everybody shares their values. The fundamental reason given is children. As parents try to raise children to be decent human beings the city seems threatening. Cities allow people to live autonomous and monotonous lives cut off from others and nature. What kind of human being does that produce? Is it sustainable?
Wendell Berry has done much to makes us think about the land, and humanity’s relationship to it. His writings have inspired many to head off to a farm to till the soil and bake bread, at least in their imagination. I love Berry’s writing. Nevertheless, cities are here to stay and what we need is a Wendell Berry of cities. It’s curious that the bible narrative starts in a garden and ends in a city. Maybe there is some lesson for us here. Cities are easy to bash and rural life easy to idealize. It’s not easy to articulate a redemptive vision of the city. How might we organize our lives in the city in a way that make us more human? Next on my re-reading list is The Meaning of the City, by 20th century French sociologist, Jacques Ellul. Who knows I might even re-read Augustine’s City of God.
Does bowling alone lead to killing alone?
See this story in the New York Times. The roommates and acquaintances of Cho Seung-Hui, the student who went on the killing spree at Virginia Tech, say they hardly knew him. His professors were concern over the violent themes of his writing. Was it creativity or madness? They didn’t know him enough to be able to tell. Sleeping only a few feet from a roommate, he remained isolated, and apparently friendless. He is described as a loner who spent his time at the computer hardly responding to greetings. Does any of this sound familiar and is it more common than we think?
Social networks are weakening even as we live closer together. According to a recent study, people report that they have fewer friends that they trust with their most intimate information. The emotional safety net is fragile. Have we created a situation that sets up socially marginal people to lash out? Has American individualism and demands for privacy reached their limits?
Just about every social observer has made a plea for the revitalization of local communities. However, as much as people talk about community, I don’t see any big move toward real community. I think this is because calls to community are easy, practicing it is tough. It limits our freedom. Instead, the structural features of the society foster isolation. You really can get along pretty much by yourself. Apparently, Cho Seung-Hui was a very disturbed person and maybe an intervention could have saved many lives. But like we say, “it’s none of my business.” Maybe self-preservation will be the motivation for getting to know the people around us. Bowling alone appears to be dangerous for all of us.
P.S. Bowling Alone is a book by Robert Putman about the demise and revival of American community life.
Commit or die
Tonight as I talked with a friend at one of those life crossroads we all eventually encounter it became evident that for her and for all of us we either commit to something or we die a slow unsatisfying death. Our wiring seems to drive us to commitments. No matter how loose and fancy free want to play it in the end our happiness demands that we commit to a work, a relationship or a community. Our desire to give ourselves to something outside ourselves creates a crisis in a culture that views commitments and duty with suspicion. A commitment is risking change and we can’t control who we will become or where a commitment will take us. It’s a leap into the great unknown. Nevertheless, the power of a commitment can serve as ballast in the turbulence of life. It’s true, as Jesus taught, we have to lose our life in order to find it. It’s the only way to truly live.