Link love

Milan hits the mark on another punctuation pet peeve and asks "how cynical should Obama make us?". There is also a good conversation (with plenty of links) happening on his blog about police and black bloc activity in Toronto during the recent G20 meeting.

Sam reminds us that we have one defender, so don't need to defend ourselves.

Matt quotes Williams on the need for science to be human. Very timely.

The jellyfish are coming: "All around the world, jellyfish are behaving badly—reproducing in astonishing numbers and congregating where they’ve supposedly never been seen before."

PhD on calling for papers.

Prof Eleonore Stump on the problem of suffering and divinely sanctioned violence in the OT.

Jason has a Stringfellow quote on nationalism and patriotism.

And Halden links to the best review ever.

Media as a dangerous drug

"In its purest form, a newspaper consists of a collection of facts which, in controlled circumstances, can actively improve knowledge. Unfortunately, facts are expensive, so to save costs and drive up sales, unscrupulous dealers often "cut" the basic contents with cheaper material, such as wild opinion, bullshit, empty hysteria, reheated press releases, advertorial padding and photographs of Lady Gaga with her bum hanging out. The hapless user has little or no concept of the toxicity of the end product: they digest the contents in good faith, only to pay the price later when they find themselves raging incoherently in pubs, or – increasingly – on internet messageboards."

- Charlie Brooker

I've been following Brooker's column over the last few months and enjoy his wit and insight, even if he does get a little silly sometimes.

My question for the day is, which media do you rely on for your information? Which sources do you regularly turn to? Are there any that you trust, or at least distrust less, or are you egalitarian in your cynicism? Are there any that you have lost respect for?

U2: No Line on the Horizon

So I bought the new album (actually, Jessica bought it for me). I will leave the full reviews for others; suffice to say that there are definite highlights and a number of tracks that I think will grow on me. Instead, I will just comment on what I take to be one of the key lines in the album:

Only love, only love can leave such a mark / But only love, only love can heal such a scar

Love is an intensification of the problem. In fact, some may say that love is the problem. It is our attachment to perishable things that causes us pain. We invest ourselves in our work that is ignored or undone by our successor, in crafting music that fades before the next bar begins, in sculpting bodies that sag and bruise. We love dying people. We love and let down our guard, becoming vulnerable to pain.

But there is no other way to live. Love is what makes us human. We are loved into being, and quickly learn to love in return, though the quality of our love varies with the object of our love and with our perception of being loved first. Love is our origin, our task, our burden, our destiny.

Love is a wound that only love can heal.
For a more cynical take on the matter, Michael offers ten things that irritate him about U2 (perhaps I have just transgressed against #3... And since when was being earnest a hanging offence?).

The Change We Need: Reflections upon Obama

The election of Obama is a good thing for many reasons. On average and compared with the alternative, I think it reduces the chance of new wars (though there will still be wars); it increases the chance of an international agreement on a response to climate change (though such a response will still probably be too little, too late); it helps to undermine racial stereotypes and mistrust (though violence and prejudice will survive); it is a little less likely to lead towards unbridled consumerism (but don't hold your breath); it is less likely to continue to undermine civil liberties and the rule of law (though Obama did vote to extend the Patriot act); it will almost certainly improve the quality of metaphors in political discourse ("war on terror"?); it may well improve access to healthcare for some of America's poor (though it will not erase poverty); and could even make this foreign nation a little less alien to some of the rest of the world (though one election doesn't undo the myriad sins of empire, even if Kenya has declared a national holiday).

But the speeches and discussion also left me worried. Not so much at the extreme partisanship of some commentators, who were unable to be gracious in victory or defeat. Not even so much at the Obamamania that thinks the election of one man has banished the politics of fear and ushered in a new era of honesty. After all, emotional attachment to political representatives is generally a good thing and this moment is a moving one for many people.

No, my anxiety is less that people might think Obama is the messiah (we will be surely disabused of that notion quickly enough) and more that Americans think their nation is messianic. American exceptionalism is alive and well. It was referenced repeatedly by both candidates in their speeches (full texts: McCain and Obama) and was an assumption deeply ingrained in most of the American commentators I saw interviewed last night (remaining politely unchallenged by the BBC coverage, apart from one or two significant pauses at (in)appropriate moments).

From its foundation, the United States has believed itself to be a unique nation, with a God-given role to be a light on a hill. This belief is the most ironic - yet also most frequent - theological error in a country obsessed with a "separation" between church and state: the confusion of the two.

Governments do indeed have a genuine role to play in God's plan, but the exaltation of Christ ("All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me" - Matthew 28.18) has revealed this role to be temporary and passing. At the end, when Christ will hand the kingdom to the Father, he will have "destroyed every ruler and every authority and power." (1 Corinthians 15.24) But what of now? Christ has been granted all authority but hasn't yet destroyed all competing authorities. Where are states left after the exaltation of Christ and before the final consummation? They do indeed still hold authority from God (Romans 13.1-7), but of a limited and strictly provisional kind. Crucially, this authority is not redemptive, but focused on, and limited to, the prosecution of justice: punishing the wrongdoer and commending those who do right. Governments are not the messiah, they simply restrain the very naughty boys (and girls). American political aspirations have often gone well beyond this mandate, hoping to "heal this nation" and "repair this world", in the words of another Obama speech.
For this argument in full, see O'Donovan's The Desire of the Nations.

But increasingly, it seems, US political rhetoric has become less about having a divinely-appointed role as it is a self-made one. God's gift or summons of the American people to a manifest destiny (confusing America with biblical Israel) has turned into a works gospel of an international pre-eminence earned through hard-work and self-belief. "We are the ones we have been waiting for." America is exceptional because it is the most fervent in believing itself to be so; it is the self-made nation that has pulled itself up by its bootstraps, conquering the world through will-power.

To illustrate these claims, let us turn briefly to the two speeches last night. The graciousness and eloquence of both candidates was evident in their respective speeches. Throughout the campaign, it had become clear that neither were going to be as rich a source for comic gaffes as Bush, but both speeches were highlights of public discourse. Yet both included strident claims to American exceptionalism.

McCain (emphasis added):

"And I call on all Americans, as I have often in this campaign, to not despair of our present difficulties, but to believe, always, in the promise and greatness of America, because nothing is inevitable here. Americans never quit. We never surrender. We never hide from history. We make history."

The greatness of America consists in its escape from historical necessity through sheer willpower.

Obama: (emphasis added)

"[Tonight's election result] is the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day."

Once more history is to be grasped and manipulated and determined by those who are self-determined, who believe it to be possible to do so.

Here is the key section from a little later in Obama's oration:

"And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world - our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those who would tear this world down - we will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security - we support you. And to all those who have wondered if Americas beacon still burns as bright - tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.

"For that is the true genius of America - that America can change. Our union can be perfected. And what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow."

This was finally an acknowledgement (so rare in this campaign) that America is not the extent of the world and finally a hint that more people were watching this election (and are likely to be affected by its outcome) outside the States than inside them. Even the claim to leadership need not itself be problematic, as long as the manner of leadership is moral, through ideals - that is, through persuasion and example, rather than merely military might or brute wealth.

However, it is the content of these ideals that forms the basis of a contemporary destructive idolatry. According to Obama, the genius of America is its transcendence of the past and the perfectibility of its union. Notice first how clever politically this is, to identify the genius of the nation with a progressivist mindset. Notice also the irony of this claim to many non-American ears, who usually see the American political spectrum balanced further to the conservative end of scale than elsewhere.

But it is this latter phrase, the perfectibility of the union, that really demands further reflection. The whole second paragraph here ("For that is the true genius of America [...] must achieve tomorrow") is taken word for word from his rightly famous speech on 18th March 2008, titled "A More Perfect Union", in which he directly addressed race relations for the first time in his campaign (and which will be studied for years to come as a model of effective communication. If you've never heard or read it, do so. You won't regret it). Yet, apart from this one paragraph which he re-used last night, that earlier speech was careful to speak of the political improvability of society but not of its perfectibility. I have written previously about the dangers of conceiving change in this way and of the necessity of liberating politics from the burden of perfection. But Obama offered no concessions: "what we can and must achieve tomorrow". While he mentioned the long-term nature of this project, he laid the full burden of this perfection upon his audience:

"The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America - I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you - we as a people will get there."

The expectation and demand for moral (or social) perfection outside of God's gracious calling, Christ's atoning sacrifice and the Spirit's indwelling is destructively impossible. Yet Obama offered this possibility based on little more than grit and determination: "So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other." Or rather, he offered it on the basis of a messianic promise: the promise of a nation where grit and determination, willpower and a belief that America is different can overcome all obstacles.

America is the leader of the world because it is special. It is special because of its ideals. Its ideals include the idea that America is perfectible. It is perfectible through willpower. Thus, America believes itself to be the desire of the nations largely because it desires this very fact to be true with such zeal. It is a self-made messiah with a mission to perfect itself, thus demonstrating to the world its own perfectibility.

Yet this account leaves no room for historical contingency or divine providence. Indeed America has become supposedly great through the denial of contingent limitations, the overcoming of nature through the unfettered human will. There is no acknowledgement of other factors that have contributed to America's global pre-eminence. America is great because it wants to be great, not because land was forcefully taken from an indigenous population decimated by European disease, not because of aggressive wars of expansion, not because the land thus claimed and united by a single European power was rich in natural resources, not because of the discovery and exploitation of oil, and not because of a thousand other factors. Of course, these alone do not explain American history, but neither does sheer willpower. And the danger of an account that only admits the latter is that when, inevitably, there are tectonic shifts in world power (through, for example, the eclipse of oil as a primary means of cheap and abundant energy, whether this occurs in five years or fifty years), there is no room in this self-understanding for America to be anything other than first. The danger of a messianic America based on a narrative of willpower is that if and when America's rule is threatened, it will never cede power graciously. It will blame first itself (those amongst it who oppose the changes "necessary" to keep the country great) and then those who stand in its way, with a zeal that is all the more blind for being so self-referential.

Obama, like so many of America's great orators, is deeply grounded in biblical imagery and language. His words will continue to inspire millions, even as the nation he will soon lead faces a bewildering array of urgent and protracted problems. Yet by perpetuating the myth of American exceptionalism, he continues a tradition that itself stands in urgent need of change.

Manent on the common good

"The common good is not a good that can be isolated from the different goods and elements that constitute the city. Nor is it a sort of common denominator, unlike the good of self-preservation which for the modern philosophers will be the foundation of human rights. It is both the supreme good and the good which binds the different goods together that can have no direct rapport without which the other goods could not coexist, that is, could not be present at all in the human world."

- Pierre Manent, The City of Man
(trans. Marc A. LePain; Princeton University Press, 1998 [1994]), 168.

Suspicion about the existence of a common good leads to the dissolution of politics into the cynical negotiations of self-interested individuals out to maximise their personal freedom. This is still a conception of the common good, albeit a very minimalist one, in which the only good thing we can share is to not disturb one another. Such a reduction in vision may be the result of previous scars, of well-intentioned policies that caused more damage than harm. But to give up at this point and retreat into self-protection is a failure of collective imagination. That it was "not good for the man to be alone" (Genesis 2.18) speaks not only the possibility of marriage, but also of society. Sharing goods is possible, even if it takes some creative compromises that enable us to each have a smaller share of a greater sum of goods.

The Word became flesh: looking again at Jesus VII

A sermon from John 1.1-14: Part VII
Verses 9-13 then give us a condensed version of the plot of the rest of the Gospel. It’s like the trailer, giving us glimpses into what is to come in the main feature.

The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.

This story seems to be a tragedy. The source of all that is going unrecognised, unthanked, unreceived. The creator entering his creation and being overlooked. The director walking on set and being ignored. But in the end, it will not be a tragedy. The ignorance is not total, the distraction is not universal. Some recognise him, believe in him, are welcomed into the conversation as loved children.

As readers, the pressure is on: are we going to recognise him? John is making sure we’re given plenty of warning. We face a strange situation: in the pages of this text we are to meet the one who is the light of all people, who gives light to everyone, who is the source of life and through whom all things were made, and yet, who ordinary enough to be missed. The single most amazing figure in history, but blink and you might miss him.

How is this possible? It’s as though people were walking around outside in broad daylight and didn’t notice the sun shining in their faces. The very light that enables them to see is almost too bright to look at directly. They don’t want to look at the light.

A few chapters further in, John has an even stronger explanation of how people can miss the sun shining in their faces: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. All those who do evil hate the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But those who live by the truth come into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. (John 3.19b-21)

Light doesn’t just illuminate, bringing warmth and the possibility of life. Light also exposes. To keep reading, trying to gain a fresh look at Jesus, might not only mean being dazzled, but it might uncover things we’d rather stayed hidden. Talking with God, being addressed by his Word, having his light shine on you is dangerous. Very dangerous. Much safer to stay in the dark. Much safer to close the book, to walk away. Is your life comfortable? It will be easier if you stop coming to church. Or if you do keep coming, then better make sure Jesus stays safely familiar as a friend, or securely distant as an inspiring historical figure. Try not to take his words too seriously, because he lived in a different culture don’t forget. Don’t pay too much attention; don’t become fanatical. Cultivate a healthy cynicism. Make sure there are always excuses to not get too involved. If you want to keep your feet on the ground, then please ensure that you don’t try reading the Bible for yourself, you don’t make more than small talk at morning tea, stick to people you know, treat the liturgy as a nice ritual, the songs as a chance to stretch your legs, the confession as a vague generality, communion as just a beautiful quiet moment. Really, it’s much safer for everyone that way. Don’t open the door, it’s much nicer in the dark and we don’t have to face one another. We don’t have to be honest with ourselves. We can avoid hearing God’s unsettling query: where are you?

Plato allegedly once said, “We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.”
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI; VII; VIII; IX; X.

The opposite of faith, hope and love

Eric Meyer over at A Few Words asks us to clarify what we mean by the central virtues of faith, hope and love by suggesting a word to express the opposite of each:

The opposite of faith is _______.
The opposite of hope is ________.
The opposite of love is _______.

How would you finish each sentence?

Eric offers his suggested answers.

It seems to me that there are at least three ways we could think about these virtues "going wrong": misdirection, inversion or absence. That is, faith, hope and love can be placed in the wrong thing, can turn sour, or can wither away.

First, they can have the wrong object and in each case, become idolatry (or at least find their centre in the wrong object, since trusting, hoping in and loving God does not compete with or destroy similar orientations towards our neighbour). However, this is not so much the opposite of the virtues as a perversion of them.

Second, we might think of the feisty opposites of each, that do battle directly against them. In this sense, the opposite of love is hate, of hope is despair, of faith is mistrust. In each case, there is still a good desire at the heart of each of these mirror-virtues. They are what often results when passionate but unformed virtue meets bitter disappointment. The one who hates still cares enough to put his heart into it; the one who despairs has not, in one sense, given up on the desire for things to be different, she has just come to think that nothing in reality corresponds to that desire; the one who is filled with cynicism still desires trustworthiness, but has never met it. In each case, I think such a person is close to the kingdom of God.

But I think the most common and most pernicious opponent of the central theological virtues is not when they are multiplied by -1, but by 0, not when they explode into protest, but when they fade into silence, muffled by fear. And so the true opponent of love is not hate, but indifference or apathy - the belief that others simply don't matter anymore. The true opponent of hope is not despair but resignation or complacency - the belief that another world is neither possible nor desirable. The true opponent of faith is not mistrust but isolation or independence - the belief that I am self-sufficient.

O'Donovan on wakefulness IIb: Admiring

Admiring (cont)
This is a summary of the second half of Oliver O'Donovan's second lecture in the 2007 New College Lectures Morally Awake? Admiration and resolving in the light of Christian faith. This second lecture is on Admiring.

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The feeling of dread arises when we reach the limits of our knowledge. We fear the unknown. This is most clearly seen in children, who, in order to praise one thing as good, often need to demonise alternatives. We treat our dreads as though they were as real as our loves. We can love evil by refusing the adopt the self-reflective position, becoming curved in upon ourselves, according to Luther's definition of sin: incurvatus in se. We then divide the world in two: good and evil. This creates a negative sense of "world" to go alongside the positive use assumed throughout these lectures so far. This negative world is a world our self-enclosure pitched in opposition to the real world.*
*Perhaps I missed a crucial step in this paragraph. This is one section I'd like to revisit when the recordings and full text of the lectures appears on the New College website.

Repentence is thus the progress from unreflective knowledge to reflective knowledge. In coming to know ourselves we come to know (reflectively) our unreflectiveness. Conversion is the beginning of the perfection of love, which casts out dread, according to St John (1 John 4.8). Augustine spoke of learning to love the self, by this he meant that the love of God and neighbour is a self-aware love; we do not come to love God and neighbour absent-mindedly. These loves are not in competition. We do not love ourselves as much as we love God, for we are to love him with our whole being, and there is nothing left over after this love. Self-love is not self-interest or protectiveness, yet nor can we rule the self out of perfect love. Reflective self-love is the opposite of unreflective self-absorption in which we are left at the centre of our own universe without a purchase on the reality of others.

Love must be ordered. There are many good things in the world; how can we love a pluriform world? We need an ordered set of relations as we participate in the moral order. Our admiration has to be structured, rather than simply saying "wow" to each new thing. We must learn to value most what is most valuable. Our love must learn nuances, similarities, contrasts, causes and effects. An ordered knowledge of an ordered world will lead to an ordered knowledge of self. We come to learn about our eyes as we use them to observe the world. We discover that there are others like myself, who see and love. The neighbour is always the self's companion; indeed, it is through the neighbour that we come to awareness of the self: I am other people's other people - vulnerable, capable of disappearing to them as they are to me.

Returning (once again) to Augustine (a frequent touchstone throughout this lecture), in his De Doctrina Christiana he distinguishes between loving and using in order to create a hierarchy in which God is the supreme good to be loved. The first lecture spoke of wakefulness to the world, the self and to time, but why not to God? Why isn't God a fourth thing alongside the others? Each of the other three are not fully grasped except in relation to God. God is the source and end of our awakening. Yet God is not the direct object of our attention, except through the incarnation and prophetic utterance of the Spirit. How can God be the source of our admiration?

To answer this question, let us focus on the experience of gratitude. I admit that what is good, is good for me. I belong to this world and am indebted to its goodness. Gratefulness makes our knowledge of the world come alive. Yet it has also seen that good is a communication: it is for me, but from whom? Who is the source? Once we have caught ourselves being grateful, we are driven to address the supreme good. It is possible to enjoy this or that good without thinking of the source in the supreme good, though it is not possible to do so throughtfully. We can only grasp God's goodness is relation to created (and redeemed) goods. Love thus follows a path from the world through the self and neighbour to God.

Goodness for me is an event, a history. It occurs in time. This doesn't mean that change is all that matters. The goodness of God is not simply something past and achieved, it is also a promise. In admiring, we learn to anticipate God's future goodness. It is as we are placed before a given good that is open to perfection that we begin to hope. Hope holds before us a future that is our good. Opens a space in which we may act. Our ultimate hope, extended to an absolute future means we can intend to our immediate future.*
*Again, I wasn't sure I followed this section, but I think O'Donovan was making a similar point to Barth's comment about little and big hopes. He included a quote from Augustine and extending and intending, which I missed. There is more on hope in the third lecture.

Virtue is a form of goodness realised in others around us, a glimpse of what human action is given to be. Virtue is in the first place in the third person and visible, rather than internal. It is not a law, ideal or command. The virtues are not to be imitated, but to be loved. They are the evidence or seal on God's promise for our lives, communicating a promise of the perfection we lack. Virtue is a kind of goodness, not rightness.

-----

Question time included queries about the Word of God (O'Donovan spoke with great care of Christ, the Scriptures and Christian proclamation), more on his closing comments about virtues, the reality of evil (O'Donovan repeated the view of the fathers that Satan is perfectly good insofar as he exists. The problem with Satan is not what is there, but what is not there: love. There is a hole at the centre of Satan. Living from fear is living out Satanic emptiness [making interesting links with Voldemort]. When we confront the Other, do we highlight what is not known and centre on that? Satan asks us to worship a lack. A further question asked then if evil only existed in the mind, to which he replied that evil is an event, a doing, rather than a being. Satan's evil is not in his being, but in his rebellion. In our sin we assert ourselves against reality), the difficulty of portraying goodness in art due to our cynicism (a protective mechanism, which believers can dispense with in order to be expert admirers), and on eschatology. This final question took a few attempts to articulate, until finally the questioner came right out and asked "Are you pre-, post- or amillennialist? What is your eschatology?". There was an audible dropping of the collective penny and we turned to hear O'Donovan's reply. "I have no eschatology," he said, "apart from that of the New Testament." He refused to systematise or sequentialise the scriptural images of what he called "the absolute future", though confessed his orthodox belief in the return of Christ, the judgement of God and the resurrection of the dead.

All three nights were well attended and had excellent, albeit fairly brief, question times. Everyone I spoke with agreed that this second lecture was the hardest to follow. As I heard someone say on the third night, "I followed him down all the streets, but I missed some of the corners." And I think my note-taking reflects that: I got many/most of his assertions, but didn't always grasp the logical links and moves between them. If these summaries feel jerky, that is why.
Ten points for providing a link to a very similar photo on this blog, taken just a few metres further back.
Series: I; IIa; IIb; IIIa; IIIb.

Why Politics? II

Yesterday, I posted the first half of a talk I gave on Friday night at the State Election Forum hosted by my church. Here is the second half.

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But there is another way, as hinted at in our language of public servants and commonweal. Politics can be more than self-interest. Leadership can be about more than lining my own pocket, or having my ego massaged. It is possible for us to deliberate together about the common good, to ask what is best for society, indeed, not just for our nation, but for the whole human community. Such questions are, of course, often very complicated and difficult, and we are likely to often, even usually, reach different conclusions about what is the best course of action. Yet it is possible to elect servants who will represent us - not by simply mirroring the desires of every vocal interest group – but who represent us by being entrusted with the task of making wise judgements about what will serve the common good.

This vision of the common weal, the common good, of the greatest leader being the one who serves, is deeply rooted in Christian assumptions about authority and makes most sense when placed in the context of Jesus’ own example of using his power in service of others. I’d like to finish briefly by offering an answer to the question ‘why politics?’ with which we began.

As a Christian, I bother with politics, I put effort to thinking about how I vote, and take my political involvement beyond voting, because of Jesus second great command: to love my neighbour as myself. The decisions made across the road in the Town Hall, over in Macquarie Street* and down in Canberra affect us all in a huge variety of different ways. While I might feel pretty comfortable and have the luxury of cynicism, thinking that exchanging one set of politicians for another won’t make any difference, my many neighbours in need don’t have that luxury. It is because I trust Jesus that I seek to make a difference for my neighbour. Of course, voting, and formal political involvement is only one aspect of doing that, but it is one that we can’t avoid.
*The NSW Parliament is found in Macquarie Street, hence together with the Leichhardt Town Hall and Federal Parliament in Canberra, these represent the three levels of government in Australia.

I hope that tonight, we have a chance to start deliberating together, thinking about a couple of the issues that face our area and our state. As we do so, I’d like to encourage all of us, whatever our background, to think beyond our own preferences and desires and consider the common good: asking the question, how can I love my neighbour through my politics? This may be slightly scary exercise for some, because the danger is, if I don’t look out for myself, who will? The good news is that we are free to take this dangerous step of thinking more about our neighbour’s need than our own because Jesus has served us all. He has provided everything we truly need. If that’s a foreign idea or even ridiculous idea for you, then come and check it out. Try being part of a Christian community for a while and see whether mutual service makes sense in the light of the one who is the true prime minister.

So, as we start to engage with the issues, with the candidates, with one another, let’s keep asking the question: what will be best for all of us, not just me.
Apologies for the lack of pictures recently. Blogger wasn't letting me upload anything for about a week. Now that it seems to be working again, ten points for the historical figure in the statue down the bottom of the picture.

Why Politics? I

Last Friday, I gave a short talk at the start of our State Election Forum. Here is the first half of the talk. Second half tomorrow.

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A politician wanted a special postage stamp issued with his picture on it. So, he instructed his people, stressing that it should be of international quality. The stamps were duly released and he was pleased. But within a few days of release of the stamp, he began hearing complaints that the stamp was not sticking properly, and he became furious. He called the people responsible and ordered them to investigate the matter. They checked the matter out at several post offices, and then reported the problem to the politician. The report said, "There is nothing wrong with the quality of the stamp. The problem is people are spitting on the wrong side."

Politician: "Election time has come again! The air will be full of my campaign speeches!"
Cynical voter: "And vice versa!"

Why politics? Why bother?

Traditionally, we Australians are often cynical about those in power. The media loves to run stories of politicians’ failures and indiscretions. And they love to run them, because we love to hear them. Perhaps it adds some drama to our lives. Perhaps it gives us someone to blame for our society’s failings.

Yet the fact that we keep being shocked also reveals that somewhere, we expect more of our leaders than the lies and indiscretions that all-too-often make the headlines.

Our members of parliament are called public servants, and the leader of our nation is its prime minister, or first servant. Somewhere, embedded deep within our language, we know that our leaders ought not do what is best for themselves, or those like them, or even just for those who elected them, but they are to serve the public good. Even our nation is the Commonwealth of Australia, a nation set up on the ideal of the common weal, the common good.

It doesn’t help that many of us think about elections as times to vote for those who will best serve our interests - or perhaps more accurately, best serve our interest rates. With bumper stickers proclaiming, ‘I fish and I vote’, ‘I drive a 4WD and I vote’, ‘I practice origami and I vote’, our attitude is to threaten to vote for someone else unless our desires are met. We organise ourselves into political pressure groups to get our voice heard, to put our issue forward, to demand my rights and those of people like me. In doing so, we lose sight of the common good, and instead imagine that it is each interest group for itself, grabbing as much of the cake as possible. In this way, our attitudes swing between cynicism and pragmatic selfishness.

UPDATE: Please see comments for relevant discussion of the language of "public servants" and "ministers". My post is not an accurate reflection of the connotation of these words, but I will leave it as is so that the discussion below makes sense. You can read the second half of this talk here.

Changing the wind: elections and social change

Why elections don't really matter

In our idolization of modern secular democracy we have imagined that, provided our leaders attain power by a popular vote, that’s all that matters, and that the only possible critique is to vote them out again next time round. The early Christians, and their Jewish contemporaries, weren’t particularly concerned with how people in power came to be in power; they were extremely concerned with speaking the truth to power, with calling the principalities and powers to account and reminding them that they hold power as a trust from the God who made the world and before whom they must stand to explain themselves.

-N. T. Wright, Where is God in 'the War on Terror'? H/T Hebel.

Leading up to the recent US mid-term elections, I noticed a number of insightful posts. This, combined with continuing to read Oliver O'Donovan has led me to realise that elections are quite peripheral to a well-functioning society. Democracy is a procedural system to ensure some measure of respresentation (which for O'Donovan has more to do with the populus seeing themselves in their leader than any idea of congruent proportions of genders, races, backgrounds, religions, etc), but the real heart of our political system ought to be free and open parliamentary debate, informed by a broader public debate, over the imperfectible task of pursuing the common good. Elections can actually impede this through emphasising partisanship at the expense of genuine inquiry into the common good.

Jim Wallis makes a similar point with less nuance (but more memorably) with his image of 'changing the wind' - elections simply exchange one set of politicians waving their fingers around in the air to see which way the wind is blowing for another. Changing the politicians doesn't make much difference. The point is to change the wind.

Actually, now I think of it, I've realised the fairly obvious point that Wallis and O'Donovan are both limiting the importance of elections but for quite different reasons. For Wallis, it's a pragmatic one: popular opinion is more important than the (nearly always derivative) opinions of politicians. This is a cynical admission that few politicians are willing to step out in front of the electorate and lead. For O'Donovan, it's because the pursuit of the common good is more important than the process used to select leaders to take us there. Less important than who is how they interact with each other and their constituents. O'Donovan therefore claims that it's not the ballot box that represents a free society, but parliamentary debate.
Ten points for naming specifically where I was standing to take this photo ('London' is not good enough - and is technically incorrect since this is part of the city of Westminster anyway).

Faith, hope and love

Heard a sermon tonight from Gen 49-50 on Joseph's faith, love and hope (Barneys evening service sermons are available here). It got me thinking about the objects of these virtues. While we nearly always speak of our faith in God, our hope in God, when it comes to our love, we have a dual focus: God first, then neighbour. Can we think of faith and hope as having analogous double focii, or is love unique? Oliver O'Donovan has an interesting argument claiming that there is no competition between the two loves, that we do not love neighbour less in order to love God more (Resurrection and Moral Order, 232-36). The thrust of his point is that we recognise the difference between God and our neighbour and love each according to the manner apt for each. We love God as God, and neighbour as neighbour, recognising her as one of God's creatures and loved for his sake. Far from being in competition then, the former is the impetus towards the latter.

Could it be that the same is true for faith and hope? Might we trust our neighbour ('as ourselves'?) in a manner appropriate to fallible and fallen (and redeemed) humanity and in a way that is not in competition with our utter dependence upon God, but as its correlate? Is this not indeed the situation in which we find ourselves? At the very least, trusting God means trusting the human messengers who bring us God's gospel. Should our first stance towards the human other be trust (understood as conditioned by co-humanity, certainly, but trust nonetheless)? Is it going too far to say that we ever trust our enemies? Does this ignore Jesus' injunction to be 'shrewd as serpents'? Or is it that a unilateral first step of trust is the only way out of the cycle of betrayal? That a smile to a stranger is the first step to friendship? Risky? Sure, but so is love for neighbour, and if our trust, love and hope in God are all interconnected, the same holds for human relationships. This needn't be blind trust to the stranger or the enemy, but being one step closer to them than they are to me, being open for another step. And of course, just as we are to not 'love' the world (1 John 2.15), yet are nonetheless to love our neighbour, so we are not to put our ultimate trust 'in princes, in mortals, in whom there is no help' (Psalm 146.3), and yet trusting God means trusting our neighour.

What about hope? Can we hope in our neighbour, or only for her? Our hope in God, in his resurrected Son, gives us hope for the redeemability of all things. We can never afford to write off a neighbour as 'hopeless'. If death is no barrier to God's transformative new creation, if the Spirit of the risen Christ has been loosed upon the world, then cynicism and despair are passé. Again, will we be disappointed? Sure. But better to be rejected, better to be betrayed, better to be disappointed than retreat to a hostile antipathy towards the world. If God loves the world, entrusts his salvation to frail messengers, and subjected the creation to futility in hope, who are we to do less?
Ten points for naming the location from which this picture was taken.