benedson

Other - A Review

Other has been sat on my desk for the past few weeks waiting for a review... I've found it hard to formulate my ideas on the book, partly as I know Kester, but also because I found the book somewhat of a roller coaster ride.  There were parts that I enjoyed, parts I hated, parts I was stunned at the depth and parts I thought naive.  Overwhelmingly I found it a provocative book, at times slightly preachy, but also one that needs a critique as I am unsure about some of the idea within the book.  That critique has not be delivered yet so here goes...


The title of the book opens it to critique from the start, my question throughout was: How is this modelling the love of the other?  For example, how does the book model a love for Israel when it is clearly pro-Palestinian? How does it model a love for conservative evo's when it's clearly coming from a different perspective?  I think that this is a meaty topic and whilst I think that Kester brings come fascinating insights to it, the book does not share any long term experiences that Kester has of engaging with the other and whilst these may be in his experience, his omision of them is seriously problematic.

The book is divided into four sections:

Loving the Other within Self
Loving the Other within God
Loving the Other within Society
Loving the Other in Praxis

Loving the Other within Self is in my opinion the strongest of the four chapters.  I like the movement between philosophy, theology and the social sciences...even if the biblical studies is weak!  (On a side note he draws a lot from the book 'The Spirit Level' which has been seriously challenged in the past few days.) I found the thinking most interesting in the section on technology, 'the liquid self' and the section on the 'fantastic self'.  In the section on the liquid self he highlights how our online identities are essentially fantasy identities, where we project the image that we want others to see of ourselves.  I've commented about this before in a post a while back entitled 'what do our fb status' say about us'  And Kester develops this to look at the whole question of our online self.  I particularly like the metaphor of Manuel de Landa, endo and exoskeletal, does technology give us a new way to move or does it provide a place for us to withdraw into. 

The fantastic self is also a strong section where Kester introduces The Neophiliacs by Booker, I find it a helpful framework for my understanding of church and within this section there is a glimmer of the vulnerability of Kester in his experience of Vaux.  Vaux throughout the book is painted in an extraordinarily positive light and here we get a glimmer that things were hard at moments, and I warm to the humanity of that.  The memory of something can be stronger than the reality, I'm experiencing that with Sanctus and here we get a glimmer that Vaux wasn't perfect...

Loving the Other Within God:  In this chapter Kester plots a part between the immanent and transcendent natures of God.  He moves into an exploration of the separate and bounded trinity and I think that he is starting to develop an interesting line of thought but for me he needs to develop it further, I would at this point have liked to see him engage with Moltmann and Barth and their Trinitarian theologies, rather he moves to Zizek.  I've not read Zizek, and I doubt many others who have read the book have, but I do know that the Trinitarian theology of Moltmann in particular is far more influential in contemporary theology and hence I feel that an engagement with Moltmann at this point would have be interesting.

Kester also touches a little bit on a few gospel and OT stories in this chapter, I like Kester's interpretations, but I do think that they lack the depth of the rest of the book.  Many aspects of the book use some heavy philospohy, but the biblical studies in the book is somewhat the weaker partner in the book.  At times it feels like the biblical stories are being interpreted to support Kester's arguments.

Loving the Other Within Society:  Okay this is where the book really started to wind me up!  The section that did this was the section on Temporality - now don't get me wrong, I think that permanence is problematic, but I think that the swing towards TAZ - Temporary Autonomous Zones - is also problematic.  I've highlighted this with Kester and, fair play to him, he highlights the limitations of TAZ within the book.  I'm amazed that a number of people have been lauding the TAZ concept, Theo Hobson, and Paul in the review.  I think that TAZ is problematic as it's too middle class and arty!  Now I'm a middle class arty person and TAZ works for me, but I work in an area of  social deprivation and TAZ wouldn't hold any weight their.  Esther Baker highlights that in her work in prisons people need both boundaries and permanence - structures of security - if these structures are removed chaos will reign.  To operate with TAZ you need to operate from a position of individual security and I fear that the move towards TAZ will only work for people who have this personal security, and in my book this is not Gospel.

In a blog exchange where I raise this point Kester points to Jesus' feeding of the 5000 as a TAZ.  I disagree.  The feeding of the 5000 points us back to the experience of the people of Israel in the wilderness where God provides for them.  Therefore this meal points toward the permanent faithfulness of God, it injects hope into the people, it says that God's faithfulness is timeless and that Jesus is part of this plan.  The moment is temporary but the narrative that it connects with is permanent.

I also disagree with Kester that Greenbelt is a TAZ.  Greenbelt is an institution, it has paid staff, a hierarchy, the Archbishop is the chair person...so whilst for a consumer coming on the weekend it is a TAZ, for the people who make Greenbelt - me and Kester for example - it is more than that.  It aspires to be a movement and relies on volunteers to make it happen, without the commitment of these volunteers it would not happen.  It is a TAZ for the consumer but a movement/hope for the people involved in the process.   I fear that this is indicative of TAZ - it works for the consumer.

Loving the Other in Praxis:  Okay by this point I was really wound up by the book and nearly quit.   I feel that the Praxis in this book is weak and for a book like this to work it needs to be rooted in Praxis.  Kester gives couple of examples where he is engaged with the other, walking more in a meditative way - a good practice - and playing football, as reminder of his weaknesses - again is helpful to be reminded of our short-comings.  However, this is not enough to give the book the integrity and authenticity that it needs, I want to know how the author is engaging with the other in society, the broken and vulnerable, how his thinking and engagement with the other is bringing about transformation.  Kester points to others who are doing this Street Pastors, Esther Baker and Sara Miles, this may be a noble piece of self-deprication or it may not...

I'm also concerned how Ikon's approach to pastoral care is lauded as a good model.  'We don't care about you' is Ikon's approach to pastoral care.   There hope is that the community will care for people rather than any trained pastoral team.  Unfortunately, this doesn't work.  Many people have be told all their life that they are not cared for, not loved, not valued and for the church to be saying that as well is once again not Gospel.  It is the antithesis of 'you are loved as a child of God'.  It's middle class idealism, it is hoped that the community picks up and cares for people - my experience in Sanctus was that this happend to a degree, but where there are people who are hard work, people who nobody really wants to be with, people who don't add to your sub-cultural capital, then they get excluded, their needs do not get cared for.  Hence, it was important to have some structures which made sure that those who society has told many many times 'we don't care about you' were loved and cared about.  I've often asked people involved with the EC how do you do pastoral care and the usual response is 'we're a bit crap at that'.  That is no way to love the other.

Okay, that's the book!  I would say buy it - it's provocative, you may not agree with it but it will stir you thinking up.  And as Kester says at the start of the book:

[I may be wrong]

 

Foundations for Mission

Back to blogging.  That 40 day thing took it out of me.

Foundations for mission is a study by CTBI into the language, theology and praxis of mission agencies in the UK.  It essentially looks at their websites and explores the language that they use with regard to mission and then from this exlplores whether the language that they use correlates with their theology of mission.

It's a great resource that encourages mission agencies to think about what their websites in particular, say and do not say about their theology of mission.

It's downloadable from here.  There are even powerpoints to go with it.

Subverting our Perspective

Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. Jn 13:15

Jesus washing the disciples feet encapsulates many of his unique characteristics.  His actions show he is a different messiah to the one expected, he is not an all-conquering Messiah, but one who prefers subtle yet provocative acts of subversion; acts that in this case cause us to reflect on the relationship that we have with serving and being served.

In this act of service Jesus could of sat or knelt at the feet of his disciples as he washed their feet. They are above him, looking down on him, looking down on God.  Through this act of service the disciples are not looking up to the heavens to find the messiah, but down to the earth, the earth that Jesus walked on.  Jesus is a different type of messiah, a messiah grounded in everyday human existence.

The act of foot washing changes the perspective through which the disciples view the messiah.  To ‘look down’ on a person means that we don’t respect them and yet here Jesus willingly places himself in a location where he will be looked down upon, both literally and culturally.  Through the act of foot washing the one in authority becomes the servant, and the one who is being served looks down on the one with authority.  Christ is subverting power structures and what it means to have authority.

Finally this act draws us to the cross.  On the cross, Jesus in all his vulnerability and brokenness is looking down on the world, not from a position of power, but from a place of brokenness.  A man who ultimately has the power to take himself off the cross and raise himself above all of humanity in a mighty act of power, once again becomes a servant. A servant who has offered his life to us all and through that offers us a new way to live.  A way to live that has serving one another at the centre.

This writing is part of my contribution to the Favourable Time - Get it here!

Feasting with Jesus and Fasting with Judas

 Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus’ feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Jn 12: 3 (Jn 12: 1-11)

One of the trends of the last decade has been the rediscovery of the detox.  During a typical detox a person will only eat vegetables and drink water for a period of time.  It is seen as a time to cleanse the body from impurities.  It is hoped that after this short period of fasting that the body will once again be fit and healthy for the pounding of everyday life – a contemporary rediscovery of the importance of fasting.

This rediscovery of fasting can be contrasted with the estimates made by the University College of London that 13 million adults will be obese by the time of the 2012 Olympics.  As well as this overeating there is also the endemic problem of binge drinking in the UK with all the associated health complaints.  We also seem to enjoy a feast…

It appears that we have lost the balance between feasting and fasting.  The fast is either used as a confession of a past feast, or as a permission giver for a forthcoming feast.  The fast has become the servant of the feast rather than the opposite side of the same coin.

In the reading today Judas self-righteously scolds Mary’s extravagance.  We too can look at our contemporary situation and agree with Judas’ spoken justification: there can be no place for extravagance when we have the poor with us.  How can I feast when just a few miles away there will homeless people living on the streets of Manchester?  Judas calls for worship without extravagance or celebration; an austere faith where the feast has been removed.

If we agree, and act, on Judas’ argument then life for Christians will be a permanent fast and this is as equally unbalanced as life being a permanent feast.  The reading reminds us of the importance of balance; a life that includes both feast and fast.  Times where we can feast and celebrate but tempered by a time of fast.  Feasting and fasting are part of healthy spiritual discipleship.

This piece of writing is a contribution that I made to The Favourable Time get it here!

The Voice...

A few months ago I agreed to review a copy of a book called the voice. It's a book that attempts to offer a version of the Bible that brings out the story within the text, It presents the Bible in story form and therefore is essentially a retelling of the biblical stories.

So rather than me sitting down and reading it I thought that i'd use it in Sanctus1, read a story from it and see how people responded to it.  The story that i used was the feeding of the 5000, and after i read it a few people commented - 'What version of the Bible was that?'  There were some interesting words that they'd used, but I was quite surprise how important it was to people that they wanted a version of the Bible that they were familiar with.  I told them about 'the voice' and we started a dialogue as to how you use the Bible and the importance of the Biblical text.  I think that it'll grow into a series in January.

I really enjoyed reading the story from the voice, for public reading it works - It tells the story in a way that is accessible and introduces some of the cultural nuances within the text.  This for me is significant as it offers an engagement with the text which moves beyond an academic deductive method which tries to discover the meaning by working out what each word means in the original language.  It moves to the thought that the meaning is held within a correctly contextualized story.   If we understand the story then we will understand the message and character of Christ.  Some people will not want this, but for me in a culture where I believe story to be hugely significant, then i like it!

If you find reading the bible difficult then 'the voice', is a good place to engage.  If you want to academically critique translations etc. then the voice is not the book to go for.  Personally i think that we have spent too long trying to deductively understand each word in the Bible and in that have not understood the importance of the stories within which they are placed. 

Tags: BenEdson, the voice,

Progressive Spirituality

I've just finished reading Gordon Lynch's new book - The New Spirituality - which i thoroughly enjoyed and really recommend. It's subtitled 'An introduction to Progressive Belief in the 21st Century'. Lynch attempts to chart the rise of a religious left, a left that moves away from liberalism and engages politically, spiritually and sociologically with contemporary culture. There were moments in the book where i found myself having a 'post-evangelical experience' and saying 'that is me' and at other times where i think that Lynch was pushing me to far and i recognise the difference between the Christian path and that presented within this. There are points of connection and of conversation, but there are also points of major difference.

Lynch starts by looking at the roots and the ideology of progressive belief. The roots he suggests are in the following:

1 - A desire to find new ways of religious thinking and new resources for spiritual growth that really connect people with modern, liberal societies.

2 - It has arisen out of various initiatives that seek to develop spirituality that is not bound up with patriarchy and hence liberate women.

3 - it has arisen out of a desire to reconcile religion with contemporary scientific knowledge, particularly in relation to our understanding of the cosmos.

4 - It seeks to develop a spirituality that has a healthy understanding of the relationship that humanity has with the natural order

The ideology is where he pushes me, and i think that from a Christian perspective it needs re-mixing so that a progressive Christian ideology can be developed. Groups such as Progressive Christianity have done this, i have a great deal of sympathy with them.

The ideology that he develops is focused on a number of themes; The unity of the ineffable and immanent divine, Pantheism/Panentheism; Mysticism and the divine feminine and the sacralization of self and of nature. There are points of correlation with Matthew Fox's Creation Spirituality, which is another book that i have a great deal of time for.

Lynch moves forward to look at the relationship between the demoralization thesis and progressive spirituality, basically there are a number of theories as to why society is become less moral - secularisation, move towards a liberal society etc. - and he explores the relationship between these theories and progressive spirituality.

Great book, academic but accessible - i really enjoyed his book exploring the relationship between religion and popular culture - and for me this book is an equally important read.

Technorati Tags: Gordon Lynch, Progressive Spirituality

The Hefted Church

The hefted holiday maker is a phrase that Julian Baggini comes up with in his book Welcome to Every-town. He distinguishes between the herded, the hefted and the individual - When i reflect on Church I find them three rather useful terms.

The herd is obvious, you follow the crowd you go with the majority, because that is the easiest. Choices are removed as you climb on board the coach and the coach takes you to all the places that you could possibly want to go. However, you sacrifice choice and spontaneity for convenience. We don't really get any students at Sanctus1, and the reason why is because the majority of them are herded. They'll go where the other students go because it's convenient...

At the other end is the individual, those independent free spirits who seek out the unusual places just because they don't like the herd or being herded. This is, of course, over simplistic - the 'independent traveller' is also herded - just in a different way. They are herded by the rough guide or lonely planet...yes, they have a degree more choice, but they are still herded.

The heft is very interesting and reminds me of the flea circus. A heft is an unfenced area of a field that sheep learn to keep themselves in. This was originally taught to them by a Shepherd, but as time goes on the sheep pass it on to each other - they no longer need shepherding they have been hefted...the territorial boundaries become blurred and more flexible, but they rarely stray beyond them and there are no fences to keep them in.

Need I say more?

Technorati Tags: Ben Edson, emerging church, Hefted Herd

The emancipated woman?

I've just finished reading 'Welcome to Everytown' by Julian Baggini. It's a fascinating book, the author goes to live for six months in S66 - the postcode that is the most English in it's demographic. Through that experience he writes about the English mind - what makes us tick, who are we, what are our values...very interesting from a missiological perspective. I'll probably blog more about it later...unless facebook takes over my entire life.

One chapter is called 'Ladies and Gentlemen' and it explores gender roles within the UK and since watching the first episode of Big Brother i have to agree with some of his conclusions. BB presented some truly awful female role models...but they know that they'll get the viewing figures as this is what people want to see. (i did turn BB off after about 15 mins).

Baggini thinks that the women's liberation movement has stalled over the past 10-15 years and is now possibly going backwards. Zoo and FHM portray an image of the woman that is defined by sex, the dieting industry profits on negative self image - only 2% of women are happy with their body - Asda's advert where the mum pockets the change 'every little counts' suggests that the woman is still receiving her weekly allowance from her husband. If a woman is empowered and emancipated certain aspects of the press present them as Lesbians. It's all horrifying and I could go on...

I thank God for the women who are strong enough not to fall into this media driven image, but also wonder who is leading the drive for female equality now.

Technorati Tags: Gender, Gender, Big Brother, puppy