The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1904-05) Max Weber puts forward the thesis that the spirit of modern capitalism was nurtured in developing models of Protestant asceticism (i.e. Calvinism, Puritanism, Methodism, etc.) which demanded not a retreat from the world but a march into the world where each individual must be equipped with a personal sense of calling which, as a worldly form of monasticism, forms a rational framework for all of life. A fundamental characteristic of this “calling” is the need to reflect the fruit of election or salvation. This view resulted in the rejection of Catholic “magic” in which sacraments gave evidence and assurance of salvation. Thus evidence was sought in work and actions of the everyday life. Someone in the communion of God must demonstrate a different life than the unsaved. As an ascetic movement all of a person’s life was to be included in their calling. This left idleness (the wasting of time) to be one of the greatest sins for this reflected a lack of calling or a lack of pursuing God’s calling. The wealthy were not exempt from this (wealth generally only condemned as it to led to laziness). In this way an industrious people were cultivated who pursued excellence in their calling (including greater production and efficiency) and the rejection of frivolity (a frugality that did not indulge in worldly pleasures). Weber argues that this culminates in Benjamin Franklin’s maxim “Time is money”.

Near the conclusion of his work Weber offers an interesting quote by John Wesley that encapsulates much of his developed thesis.

“I fear, wherever riches have increased, the essence of religion has decreased in the same proportion. Therefore I do not see how it is possible, in the nature of things, for any revival of true religion to continue long. For religion must necessarily produce both industry and frugality, and these cannot but produce riches. . . . Is there no way to prevent this – this continual decay of pure religion? We ought not to prevent people being diligent and frugal; we must exhort all Christians to gain all they can, and to save all they can; that is, in effect, to grow rich.”

This of course is followed with the admonishment to give all one can as well. And this is something that I have been struck with recently. I have recurrent thoughts that it would have been good to develop a business in which I could provide quality employment and products to whichever community I belonged.

The issue raised for me and in Weber is how central economic activity is to one’s calling from God. It will take me further reflection to understand why, until recently, economic activity was almost entirely marginal to my quest for God’s calling. However, according to Weber, economic activity became a primary model of exhibiting the fruit of God’s calling.

Weber concludes prophetically,
“The Puritan wanted to work in a calling; we are forced to do so. For when asceticism was carried out of monastic cells into everyday life, and began to dominate worldly morality, it did it part in building the tremendous cosmos of the modern economic order. This order is now bound to the technical and economic conditions of machine production which today determine the lives of all individuals who are born into this mechanism, not only those directly concerned with economic acquisition, with irresistible force. Perhaps it will so determine them until the last ton of fossilized coal is burnt. In Baxter’s view the care for external goods should only lie on the shoulders of the ‘saint like a light coat, which can be thrown aside at any moment.’ But fate decreed that the cloak should be become an iron cage.”

Can Revelation Be Anything But Special?
I have believed for a long-time that revelation has ceased. Now why have I believed this? It strikes me that I have believed this in the same way that I believed my sister when she told me that a tree would be begin growing in my stomach if I swallowed my bubble gum (I think I may have melded two warnings together here). Why oh why would revelation have ceased? Sure evangelicals allow the category of “general” revelation. This is revelation accessible to all through nature or reason. This is the inferior and almost useless of the various revelations. The evangelical quickly qualifies it; “This is revelation, BUT it is not enough to bring someone to a knowledge of God.”
Hmmm . . .

Then there is “special” revelation. This is the revelation recorded in the Bible. Questions of textual criticism and canonization aside I no longer understand this doctrine. I hope I am not being too trendy or critical but I see this doctrine as relating to issues of control. No one else can claim to have experienced the truth of God unless it can be directly reconciled to some passage of scripture. The irony for me is that the more I read the Bible the more I understand the Bible to be stepping out of the way for the living holy presence of God as the powerful red letters of Jesus tell us to realize that we cannot find eternal life by searching scripture.

I can’t help but think that this understanding of revelation has impoverished the evangelical church especially when it comes to the arts. I see us (I too am evangelical) setting up the elaborate structure of the Tabernacle. However, we ourselves huddle in the Holy of Holies, finding sanctuary from the ambiguity and chaos of the outside world. We choose this ordering because we believe that our understanding of God is the most stable and true. This choice is contrasted when we place at the centre of our significance and life the rupturing and terrible presence of the seemingly empty space between the Cherubim, that holiness concentrated but not contained.

In art, I believe at its best, we lay prostrate before emerging and often revolutionary images of reality. Now revolution has become co-opted and consumerized, much the same way “special” revelation has, we trade in it daily to keep us in the style we are accustomed to. Where now can the Christian seek to come into the presence of God? I ask this because I am coming to believe that revelation is on the loose. God help us.

Boundary and Presence
Well it has been some time now. Work can quickly become life, and non-work simply becomes rest with little time or energy for anything else. Regardless life is good.

I woke up Thursday morning and turned on AM 900, a pretty good little talk radio station (always a little right-wing, but not too right-wing). It was 5:30 in the morning and the morning show hosts said that police had just been dispatched to the native protest in Caledonia (I believe this made national headlines). Caledonia is small town neighboring Canada’s largest native reserve. Some native people moved onto a section of land under development claiming it was rightfully theirs. This was interesting, but all the more interesting to me as I knew that I would have to drive through Caledonia to pick some materials for work that morning.
As I approached the small picturesque town (most small towns in southern Ontario seem to at least be quaint) I realized that I would need to turn before reaching the disputed area. As good grace would have it there was construction at my turn-off. I could have turned around and tried another route but I thought, “Why not go a little further?” Before I knew it a scene emerged ahead of me where large trucks were pulled across the highway, gravel was dumped on it, black smoke billowed into the sky (I found out later that these may have indeed functioned as 'smoke signals'), police cars and officers were scattered throughout the town, and radio reports offered contradicting reports of what happened ('force' has used on both sides of the conflict).
It struck me that this story would have had little to no impact on me had I not come into its presence.
Most of life is lived in well maintained boundaries. And indeed this must be so. Our bodies only function within the boundaries of our skin. The difference of form whether in art, language, or culture only exists with boundaries. However, to engage with life around us things must pass through or boundaries. Air must enter our lungs, food our stomach, and, well, other things must enter other things for life as know it to continue. It is this largely this final unspoken (or overspoken) reality of sex that bridges our concepts of the seen and the unseen boundaries. In our sexuality we carry the greatest possibilities of triumph and terror. Here accepted frameworks of belief and practice strain under the force of our god-like but fallen selves.
Our sexuality does not and will not lay down to prescribed categories, and here I return to Caledonia. The native position (as I have witnessed it) is one where, for whatever other complexities are involved, a people have not lived along the boundaries set for them. If the national government is our “body” then with the native community there exists the constant possibility of haemorrhaging. The native “bloodline” will flow along its given channels until it is met with obstruction (the police moving in Thursday morning). Caledonia began to throb with the possibility that its citizen’s established life was no longer tenable in the relation to native reserve it bordered.
What I reflected on was that this carried with it the great and terrible possibility of holiness. Those in its path would either be cleansed in its flow or charred in its wake. In any event, that morning was a reminder that we live largely to insulate ourselves from such possibilities. Most experiences with the intimate realities of another can at best be called “raw.” This was not so for the Israelites. While both the Tabernacle and Temple were highly ordered structures they existed for the express purpose inviting or perhaps enduring the holy presence of God. But Christians believe that the Temple curtain has been torn and holiness is on the prowl, hugging the walls of constructed social forms pressing at seams, unrelenting in its movement and engagement with us. As an evangelical I need to discard irreverent notions of achieved holiness. “Be holy as I am holy.” This is not a call to action. This is only one of two possible options. Be holy as I am holy, or as with the sons of Aaron, be consumed as I come into your presence as I find the gate to the Temple of your body.

The Antichrist - Part 1
Awhile back I planned to address some of the critiques of Christianity that shaped the Twientieth century. Nietzsche's Antichrist is certainly one of those critiques. I remember first trying to read The Antichrist a year or two out of high school. I was at home working on the farm for summer. We had this little area of the yard that was sort of like a camp-site. There was a fire pit, picnic table, and good place to set up a tent, so I did. I set up a tent and every evening I would make a fire do some reading and sleep in the tent (man, I forgot what great set-up that was). I started reading the Antichrist and found myself simply pulled along by the force of his persuasive words. I thought to myself that perhaps the Christian story was all silliness and archaic. I had never really heard someone blatantly attack Christianity before and I had no rebuttal. It was amazing how easily such thoughts were stirred in my mind. What made this event so striking is that very next night when I went out of my parent’s house to the tent it was already dark. As a good small town Mennonite I had been formed in way that guilt can strike with paralyzing force. And as I walked out into the darkness I was struck by an overwhelming sense of fear of God’s presence. The image that came to mind was Jacob wrestling with Esau. I prayed fervently, “God I do not want to wrestle with you tonight.” I literally felt like a hand would emerge from the shadow, come over my shoulder and pull me to the ground. Was this God reminding me of his presence? . . . I don’t think so. Writing now I am struck anew by the force of “persuasion”. I am convinced that we may learn from Nietzsche’s critique. However, his greatest impact comes in the force of his presentation. As walked out of my house the next night I was struck by the accumulation of guilt and shame that my Christian formation had no way of responding to. This too was persuasion. It was the persuasion of accusation, of the Accuser and so, ironically, another encounter with the Antichrist.

Raskolnikov's Dream
Before any of you get the impression of Dostoyevsky as the sentimental love-struck author here is another moving passage towards the end of Crime and Punishment. Throughout the book Raskoknikov suffers with a type of feverish illness which makes his perception hazy. In the prison hospital in Siberia Raskolnikov remembers the dreams which he had while in fever induced delirium.


“Raskolnikov was in hospital during the last weeks of Lent and Easter week. When convalescing, he remembered the dreams he had while running a high temperature and in delirium. He dreamt the whole world was ravaged by an unknown and terrible plague that had spread across Europe from the depths of Asia. All except a few chosen ones were doomed to perish. New kinds of germs – microscopic creatures which lodged in the bodies of men – made their appearance. But these creatures were spirits endowed with reason and will. People who became infected with them at once became mad and violent. But never had people considered themselves as wise and as strong in their pursuit of truth as these plague-ridden people. Never had thought their decisions, their scientific conclusions, and their moral convictions so unshakable or incontestably right. Whole villages, whole towns and peoples became infected and went mad. They were in a state of constant alarm. They did not understand each other. Each of them believed that the truth only resided in him, and was miserable looking at others, and smote his breast, wept, and wrung his hands. They did not know whom to put on trial or how to pass judgment; they could not agree what was good or what was evil. They did not know whom to accuse or whom to acquit. Men killed each other in a kind of senseless fury. They raised whole armies against each other; but these armies, when already on the march, began suddenly to fight amongst themselves, their ranks broke, and the soldiers fell upon one another, bayoneted and stabbed each other, bit and devoured each other. In the cities the tocsin was sounded all day long: they called everyone together, but no one knew who had summoned them or why they had been summoned, and all were in a state of great alarm. The most ordinary trades were abandoned because everyone was propounding his own theories, offering his own solutions, and they could not agree; they gave up tilling the ground. Here and there people gathered in crowds, adopted some decision and vowed not to part, but they immediately started doing something else, something quite different from what they had decided. And they began to accuse each other, fought and killed each other. Fires broke out; famine spread. Wholesale destruction stalked the earth. The pestilence grew and spread farther afield. Only a few people could save themselves in the whole world: those were the pure chosen ones, destined to start a new race of men and a new life, to renew and purify the earth, but no had ever seen these people, no had heard their words or their voices.”

Growing up on a farm I suppose what struck me here was nestled in the midst of people stabbing and devouring each other on the one hand and “wholesale destruction” on the other is the simple line, “they gave up tilling the ground.” The question was asked on my “Rose Machine” post whether the greenhouse I work in has “soil”. I suppose the short is yes there is soil, but there is certainly no land to grow flowers and I also question whether there is earth. Containers of prepared “soil” are shipped in and flowers are grown analogously to our society and to our TV’s (pre-plasma). Soil in the greenhouse is pixelated. Each flower grows independently of the other. At first glance there is an image of unity across the flower “beds”. However, like looking closer at your TV screen it becomes apparent that the whole is composed of entirely independent units offering an illusion of the whole. This is no integrated body. The individual is managed to control the whole. Hmmmm . . . tilling the ground, more to reflect on here (a fertile topic :))

Crime, Punishment, and Repentance
I just finished reading Crime and Punishment. There is simply not enough good that can be said about Dostoyevsky. For any of you who would like to read this book and savour the anticipation please don't read on, it may well spoil it for you.

The book revolves around Raskolinkov, a young intellectual who has discontinued schooling for lack of funds. The story tracks his struggle with the consequences of murdering an old woman who was a money-lender (and subsequently her daughter who comes in during the act). The murder is committed to raise support for further endeavours. His idea is that many “great” men in history have conquered others to further their cause, and surely the murder of an insignificant pawn-broker would pale in comparison to such acts as that of a Napoleon.
A significant movement in this book is how Raskolnikov deals with the reality of his “idea”. The following events torment him mentally and physically, not because of the “guilt” of what he has done but because of the arbitrariness of how the world interprets all our actions. They condemn him only because he did not succeed in his plan.
Into his life comes Sonia. This is someone who understands the world’s judgment and commits herself to Raskolnikov. The book culminates in repentance. However, nowhere does Dostoyevsky indicate that Raskolnikov repents of his murder. Rather, he understands that he has not loved and now he does love. Sonia has loved him, and while he sensed it earlier only now does he himself love. He is re-born into love. And so in one of the concluding paragraphs,

“And what did all, all the torments of the past amount to now? Everything, even his crime, even his sentence and punishment appeared to him now, in the first transport of feeling, a strange extraneous event that did not seem even to have happened to him. But he could not think long and continuously that evening or concentrate on anything. Besides, now he would hardly have been able to solve any of his problems consciously; he could only feel. Life had taken the place of dialectics, and something quite different had to work itself out in his mind.”

In many ways this reminds me of the pleas of Kierkegaard who says that there is an aspect of engaging life irreducible to conceptual analysis.

It's About Time
Well after I was snubbed by joeljoel and nathan (although nathan put indiefaith on his daily site hits) my dear old friend rudy (see pic below) finally tagged me. So here goes.


1. Four jobs you have had in your life
a) Farm hand (also the best job title ever)
b) Adjunct college instructor
c) Mover
d) Greenhouseman

2. Four movies you would watch over and over
a) Footloose
b) O Brother Where Art Thou?
c) Romeo and Juliet (Leo and Clare)
d) Tombstone

3. Four places you have lived
a) A farm south of Altona
b) Winnipeg, MB
c) Yuba City, CA
d) Steel Town, ON

4. Four TV shows you love to watch
a) Seinfeld
b) Survivor
c) Gilmore Girls (you know you do to)
d) The Food Network

5. Four places you have been on vacation
a) Cabin
b) Couch
c) Tent
d) Van

6. Four websites I visit daily
a) The blogs to the left (and yes you too Nathan:))
b) Hamilton 5-day Forecast
c)?
d)?

7. Four of my favorite foods
a) Coffee
b) Ice Cream
c) Coffee
d) Sweet things that go good with coffee

8. Four places I would rather be right now
a) In the Vatican archives.
b) In a time-machine where I could meet Dostoevsky in some dirty back-alley in Russia.
c) Some place warm and relaxing with my wife.
d) In a comfortable chair reading a book with nothing else to do.

9. Given me last response I will add another question that people can answer in my comment box. Four historical figures you would love to meet (and I will say it, Jesus cannot be one of them. If you haven'y already met him I have something to share with you . . .)
a) Kierkegaard
b) Plato
c) Johhny Cash
d) My Grandfather

10. Four friends I am tagging that I think will respond..... (you can put them in my comment box if you want)
a) Marco
b) Dave B
c) The Chief
d) Juan Pablo Peters
e) Anferny

Alright. I can't believe I took the time to do this.

The Rose and the Machine (aka The Rose Machine)
Well my leisure time as an unemployed bum is now at an end. Today I began work at greenhouse. Apparently 45-50 hours a week will be the average except for the 'busy' seasons (damn you mother's day!). Two things struck me today. When I first arrived at work I was immediately taken back to the A-Team episode where the Team is somewhere in California and they happen upon a farm where the workers (of course all are hispanic) are being grossly mistreated. At some point in the episode Hannibal spokes some great communist rhetoric to rouse their spirits. I am not saying that I work for the same kind of operation (otherwise I would have to go B.A. Baracus on them; complete with welding something awesome) but that this type of work attracts the same segment of society. I suppose I will have a chance to reflect on all my pompous marxist ramblings.
The second thing that struck me, which is perhaps my first "marxist" reflection, is that I work for a greenhouse that grows only roses. This greenhouse is fully set-up to “produce” roses as an assembly line factory. I find the image of the rose and the machine intriguing. I'll have to sleep on it. Anyway, its good to some bucks coming my way.

Commentary
I was not entirely sure about what grabbed me in the last post. To be honest, as some may have suspected, I was the one who wrote it. However, sometimes we may feel the need to put some distance between our identity and the things we produce. In any event the passage was an initial attempt to articulate some concepts that I have been reflecting on.
First, the comment about Hegel. Hegel gets hammered by Kierkegaard a great deal because Hegel does not offer much (or any) space for God's transcendence. As a Christian then it is easy to write him off. Important to his project is the role of "the negative" that which creates "movement". I can't say I fully understand this but it appears to be an intangible force (force is probably not the right word) which drives things on. Kierkegaard criticizes that in fact Hegel's system is based then on "nothing". The image that arose for me was the space between the Cherubim in the Holy of Holies. This was the most concentrated point of presence in the OT and it was likely that there was never anything there. God's presence was a type of absence which always created movement and could not be captured by human structures.
The second half of the quote was an experience I had in Winnipeg when one night Chantal and I were woken up by the sound of yelling (in itself not an uncommon experience in our neighbourhood). I looked out the window and saw a man sitting on top of a woman. Clearly they were fighting about something. However, the way the man yelled really impacted me. There was a type of release and restraint in it. A type of charismatic frustration as he was in the presence of what, at that moment, he most loved and most hated. That is why I could not call it a yell. It was some attempt at release, something that I think we can all relate to in some way.

Something to chew on or spit out
An unpublished quotation I read, not sure what to make of it.

"There are two, at least two, who point me to God. The first is Hegel. Hegel sees all and knows all. From this perspective he recognizes that all movement in the world comes from nothing. In fairness to him, it comes from the negative. We cannot touch or hold what relentlessly drives us on, though we may be a part of it. That a man could so intensely get wrong what he has seen right is divine. The void between the Cherubim still lies vacant in the movement of our world. The second is the man outside my window. I saw him, one night, straddling his wife (I assumed it was his wife, yes it must be) who had her back pressed against the sidewalk. In their fury (passion?) he yelled. No, that word really does not address the sound the man made mounted atop the woman. He cried out. Yes in many ways he did. No, rather, he released. His gated rage found first escape through the threshold of his lips. It was a release. It never came to blows. That we do not all sit pinning our great love to the sidewalk screaming, being able to neither strangle nor embrace her is a great work of the spirit."