Preparing for a wedding today, have revisited Bonhoeffer's 'Wedding Sermon' of May 1943.What wonderful words from a cell.
Especially struck by: "It is not your love that sustains the marriage, but from now on, the marriage that sustains your love".
Tuesday 31 May 2011
Monday 30 May 2011
Law and Gospel
I enjoyed reading Julian Baggini's "Welcome to Everytown" three years ago - a study of the typical English person by reference to the most average post-code district (part of Rotherham) where he went to live as part of his research.
In the May edition of Prospect he writes an interesting study of lying - "The Whole Truth". In passing he refers to his book "Complaint: From Minor Moans to Principled Protest", where he argues that moral ways of thinking are increasingly being replaced with legalistic ones. "We think more of our entitlements, rights and strict legal obligations and less of what is required to be a good person" (shades of Nick Hornby here, who explores what it is to be good in "How to be Good").
It looks to be interesting and I'll add it to my long list of books I'd like to read. Is there a sense in which, when religious faith takes a back seat, we need more rules and regulations to keep society in order? Certainly Christian faith speaks of the heart, the will being renewed (Romans 7 and 8 come to mind). Christian faith which does not lead to more godly living is not true faith (James). But other traditions looks in this direction as well, not least Judaism. For example, my favourite Psalm, 19, speaks of delighting in the law of God. This is a renewal of the heart, which a view of the Old Testament as legalistic (within some strands of Christian theology) does no justice to.
Tom Wright and others are helping us see the Old Testament in a new light. It would be interesting to engage Tom Wright with Julian Baggini to seek insight into where our culture is going.
In the May edition of Prospect he writes an interesting study of lying - "The Whole Truth". In passing he refers to his book "Complaint: From Minor Moans to Principled Protest", where he argues that moral ways of thinking are increasingly being replaced with legalistic ones. "We think more of our entitlements, rights and strict legal obligations and less of what is required to be a good person" (shades of Nick Hornby here, who explores what it is to be good in "How to be Good").
It looks to be interesting and I'll add it to my long list of books I'd like to read. Is there a sense in which, when religious faith takes a back seat, we need more rules and regulations to keep society in order? Certainly Christian faith speaks of the heart, the will being renewed (Romans 7 and 8 come to mind). Christian faith which does not lead to more godly living is not true faith (James). But other traditions looks in this direction as well, not least Judaism. For example, my favourite Psalm, 19, speaks of delighting in the law of God. This is a renewal of the heart, which a view of the Old Testament as legalistic (within some strands of Christian theology) does no justice to.
Tom Wright and others are helping us see the Old Testament in a new light. It would be interesting to engage Tom Wright with Julian Baggini to seek insight into where our culture is going.
Tuesday 24 May 2011
There is No One but Us
From HOLY THE FIRM
by Annie Dillard
“Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? There is no one but us. There is no one to send, nor a clean hand, nor a pure heart on the face of the earth, nor in the earth, but only us, a generation comforting ourselves with the notion that we have come at an awkward time, that our innocent fathers are all dead--as if innocence had ever been--and our children busy and troubled, and we ourselves unfit, not yet ready, having each of us chosen wrongly, made a false start, failed, yielded to impulse and the tangled comfort of pleasures, and grown exhausted, unable to seek the thread, weak, and involved. But there is no one but us. There never has been. There have been generations which remembered and generations which forgot; there has never been a generation of whole men and women who lived well for even one day. Yet some have imagined well, with honesty and art, the detail of such a life, and have described it with such grace, that we mistake vision for history, dream for description, and fancy that life has devolved. So. You learn this studying any history at all, especially the lives of artists and visionaries; you learn it from Emerson, who noticed that the meanness of our days is itself worth our thought; and you learn it, fitful in your pew, in church.”
by Annie Dillard
“Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? There is no one but us. There is no one to send, nor a clean hand, nor a pure heart on the face of the earth, nor in the earth, but only us, a generation comforting ourselves with the notion that we have come at an awkward time, that our innocent fathers are all dead--as if innocence had ever been--and our children busy and troubled, and we ourselves unfit, not yet ready, having each of us chosen wrongly, made a false start, failed, yielded to impulse and the tangled comfort of pleasures, and grown exhausted, unable to seek the thread, weak, and involved. But there is no one but us. There never has been. There have been generations which remembered and generations which forgot; there has never been a generation of whole men and women who lived well for even one day. Yet some have imagined well, with honesty and art, the detail of such a life, and have described it with such grace, that we mistake vision for history, dream for description, and fancy that life has devolved. So. You learn this studying any history at all, especially the lives of artists and visionaries; you learn it from Emerson, who noticed that the meanness of our days is itself worth our thought; and you learn it, fitful in your pew, in church.”
Wednesday 18 May 2011
Kindle
I am surrounded by fire.
Kindle on the adverts. Kindle - download from Amazon. Kindle what? A fire, that is what I kindle. Seems a long way from the cheap plastic I held in my hand when I looked at a Kindle.
'Words' - words too can seem cheap and plastic. But words can and do change the world. The Middle East - driven by words, words kindling fire in hearts.
The Word became flesh, and kindles fire with us. Like on the Emmaus Road. The fire is kindled every day, but sometimes we do not recognise it. But the kingdom of God is at hand (Mark), within us (Matthew), kindled.
G-O-D-I-S-N-O-W-H-E-R-E*
The still small voice, kindled within (as well as against the prophets of Baal) - there, waiting for us to listen.
*(suggested by Peter Rollins)
Kindle on the adverts. Kindle - download from Amazon. Kindle what? A fire, that is what I kindle. Seems a long way from the cheap plastic I held in my hand when I looked at a Kindle.
'Words' - words too can seem cheap and plastic. But words can and do change the world. The Middle East - driven by words, words kindling fire in hearts.
The Word became flesh, and kindles fire with us. Like on the Emmaus Road. The fire is kindled every day, but sometimes we do not recognise it. But the kingdom of God is at hand (Mark), within us (Matthew), kindled.
G-O-D-I-S-N-O-W-H-E-R-E*
The still small voice, kindled within (as well as against the prophets of Baal) - there, waiting for us to listen.
*(suggested by Peter Rollins)
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