Category: Christ and Culture (Page 2 of 2)

The Tale of Two Calendars

November 29, 2014 / Trent / 2 Comments

It’s the first Sunday of Advent and I hope we are going to light the candles again this year. There is something cool about doing something that has its origins in the Middle Ages. I recently re-read Desiring the Kingdom by Calvin philosophy professor, James K. A. Smith. In it, he says that rituals are very important because they shape who we are. For some reason, repetition affects us very deeply–on the level of our identity.

The Church Calendar

Advent is the beginning of the church calendar. It is a time of expectation. It commemorates the hope that God’s people had for the Messiah, but it also reminds us that we, too, are waiting for Jesus. The Advent season reminds us that we are people of expectant waiting–that this world is not all that there is and it’s not as good as it gets. There’s more, much more, in store for us.

Christmas Day, when we celebrate the Incarnation, is our next stop on the church calendar. It is an incredible thing that the material world was visited by the transcendent God. God has bridged the huge chasm that separates us from himself.

Lent is a time for reflection, repentance, and prayer as a way of preparing our hearts for Easter. This is often accomplished by “giving something up.” The idea here is that some form of deprivation helps us to attend more deeply to the sin in our lives and our need for salvation. A keen awareness of these can make participation in a Good Friday and Easter Sunday services very profound.

These are just the highlights. The traditional church calendar celebrates the Epiphany, Ash Wednesday, the Ascension, Pentecost, the Assumption, and more. The annual remembrance of these events is a ritual in itself, and these have shaped the people of God for centuries.

The Church Calendar and Faith Formation

How might the rituals surrounding these important events in the church calendar have any formative influence on our identities? According to Smith, rituals aren’t just something we do, they do something to us.

When we celebrated these annual events, we understand ourselves as sinners in need of salvation; we know ourselves to wait expectantly for something better, and that this something better is the person of Jesus Christ; and we know that we are beloved. Our “knowledge” of these things is not on a cognitive level, says Smith. It is a knowledge that comes to reside in our bones. It gets there, in the bones, through our rituals and practices. Attending to the events of the Church year can be one of these rituals and practices.

Many Christians don’t really follow the liturgical calendar and are therefore not being shaped by it, but this does not mean they are not being shaped by rituals. There is another calendar that dominates our culture and it, too, is filled with repeated activities–it is the commercial calendar.

The Consumer Calendar

The commercial calendar does not begin with waiting, but receiving, immediately.

Christmas

Starting on November 26th, Christmas is the most important shopping season of the commercial calendar. Where the center of the church calendar is God made flesh, the high priest of the commercial Christmas is Santa Claus who models a generosity that, for those of us without a workshop of elves, must be preceded by purchases.

Not only do we buy gifts, but we also buy wrapping paper and bows, ornaments to dress our trees and homes, and enough meat to feed a non-Western family for a year. Out national economy is dependent on these weeks (months) of spending. And the day after we celebrate all our purchases, we go out (in Canada at least) to take advantage of the Boxing Day sales and buy more things.

Valentine’s Day

The next significant event on the commercial calendar is Valentine’s Day. We celebrate romantic love through the purchase of a card, roses, chocolates, and dinner with Champaign.

Easter, the 1st and the 4th of july

At Easter, too, we have a list of ritual purchases–if not Easter dresses, then certainly chocolate bunnies and eggs, and, my personal favourites, Peeps. The stores have sales to encourage our consumption on or around each of our national birthday holidays.

Back-To-School

And in August we engage in the annual ritual of Back-to-School shopping–not just for paper and pencils, but for a new wardrobe as well. As soon as school starts the Thanksgiving and Halloween related products and sales are advertised, and then we arrive at American Thanksgiving. This is the holiday where Americans give thanks by fighting over “door crasher” televisions. This holiday is important to Canadians as well because merchants north of the border must offer Black Thursday Sales to compete with the American rock bottom prices that kick off the commercial Christmas season.

Rituals shape who we are. To which calendar do you most closely adhere?

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Rituals shape who we are. To which calendar do you most closely adhere? The Church calendar? The consumer calendar is adding new rituals all the time–Presidents Day Clearance Sale!? #ChurchCalendar” quote=”Rituals shape who we are. To which calendar do you most closely adhere? The Church calendar? The consumer calendar is adding new rituals all the time–Presidents Day Clearance Sale!?”]

The church calendar is down to about two events, and even then most Christians we are engaged in commercial rituals at the same time.

What is a human being? A beloved creature, helpless in sin, but saved by a loving heavenly father? Or a consumer that finds comfort an meaning in consumption? Even if we think (or even believe) it is the former, before long we will know deep in our bones that we are, in fact, the latter. This is the power of ritual.

Was Jesus a vampire?

June 20, 2014 / Trent / 9 Comments

Photo by KT on Unsplash

Are there vampires in the Bible?

A few of the characters on HBO’s True Blood suggest there are vampires in the Bible. Lazarus, Cain and Eve are presented as possibilities, but then the dim-witted Jason Stackhouse hypothesizes, “Maybe Jesus was the first vampire?” Jason’s evidence for this assertion is that Jesus rose from the dead and he told his followers to drink his blood.

This conversation over a cafeteria lunch wasn’t any deeper than this, but it prompted some of the shows fans to ask the question again here and here.

Silly question? Perhaps, but the answer to this question is far from silly.

Jesus is like Dracula?

Jesus is like Dracula because he could not be contained in the grave. Actually, this comparison doesn’t really work. Although Dracula lived for many centuries, by the end of Bram Stoker’s novel the eponymous anti-hero was dead at the hands of the Crew of Light.

Jesus, on the other hand, is not dead; he is seated at the right hand of God, ruling for all eternity. I suppose Jason’s mistake is understandable given that it’s not likely he’s read either Dracula or the book of Revelation.

Another way Dracula is like Jesus is that they were both thought to be human, but really weren’t. Oh, wait; this isn’t true either. Jesus was fully human. Born like a human, ate and drank like a human, died like a human. Dracula, on the other hand, is not very human at all. He could turn himself into various animals and even smoke. He didn’t come to be like a human, he didn’t eat or drink like a human and he didn’t die like a human.

Then there’s the whole blood thing that Jason brought up. Dracula drinks blood; Jesus doesn’t drink blood. I’m not sure how this is a positive comparison.

The Main Difference between Jesus and a Vampire

This is actually the essential difference between the vampire and Jesus. Jesus gives his innocent blood for the sake of the guilty; the vampire is guilty of taking innocent blood for his own sake.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”The essential difference between the vampire and Jesus: Jesus gives his innocent blood for the sake of the guilty; the vampire is guilty of taking innocent blood for his own sake. #vampireJesus #vampire #Dracula #Jesus ” quote=”The essential difference between the vampire and Jesus: Jesus gives his innocent blood for the sake of the guilty; the vampire is guilty of taking innocent blood for his own sake. “]

Jesus fills the empty with his blood; Dracula drains the full of their blood.

Christ’s giving of his blood is symbolically enacted in the Eucharist, where believers symbolically partake of the blood of Christ. Again, what is rehearsed in this ritual is Christ’s giving his blood for the sake of humanity. When Dracula drinks the blood, usually of a young maiden, he is rejuvenated–it is the secret to his immortality. As Jesus gives up his blood, he dies. This is the secret to our immortality.

How Jesus is like a Vampire

There is a small but signficant way that the way of Jesus is like that of Dracula.

Once bitten, Dracula’s victims become like him. Once the true believer accepts Christ’s sacrifice on his behalf, the true believer becomes more like Christ.

[tweetshare tweet=”Once bitten, Dracula’s victims become like him. Once the true believer accepts Christ’s sacrifice on his behalf, the true believer becomes more like Christ. #vampireJesus #vampire #Dracula #Jesus” username=”Dryb0nz”]

But that’s where the similarity ends. Because the vampire is all about the taking of blood, innocence, life, purity, his victims become the same–they take. Jesus is all about the giving of blood, giving life, so the behaviour of the true disciple will be very different–they give. This is one of the marks of a true follower of Christ–the giving.

Importantly, Dracula absorbs the will of his victims. The vampire has the power to mesmerize his victims as they surrender their will and become passively complicit to its attack. The product of Dracula’s blood taking will be creatures whose lives are qualitatively like his own because he has consumed their selfhood, their freedom, their autonomy. Their identity has become vampire, absorbed into and indistinct–a creature that must take to live.

Christ, on the other hand, desires a people whose wills are freely conformed to his–united with him, but still distinct. The essential difference between the Christian identity and that of the vampire is that behind Jesus’ desire is a perfect love and the result of submission to this love is, paradoxically, perfect freedom.

Although he’s not talking about vampires per se, as Lewis’ Screwtape beautifully articulates the vampiric view of life:

The whole philosophy of Hell rests on recognition of the axiom that one thing is not another thing, and, specifically, that one self is not another self. My good is my good and your good is yours. What one gains another loses. Even and inanimate object is what it is by excluding all other objects from space it occupies; if it expands, it does so by thrusting other objects aside or by absorbing them. A self does the same. With beasts the absorption takes the form of eating; for us, it means the sucking of will and freedom out of a weaker self into a stronger. ‘To be’ means ‘to be in competition.’ Screwtape, in The Screwtape Letters (C. S. Lewis 92)

The vampire is profoundly selfish and exploitative and will refuse to respect the autonomy of others. They use people to satisfy their own needs and desires.

The way of Christ is the exact opposite; in John 15:12-13 Jesus said:

My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.

Legalize Hit Men?

October 24, 2013 / Trent / 8 Comments

crystal710 / Pixabay

I observed an English class at my school reading the recent post by Betsy Childs entitled “Why We Should Legalize Murder for Hire.”

Some were horrified at first at the suggestion that “hit men [could] provide a valuable service to society” by helping women deal with “unwanted marriages,” but they quickly understood they were dealing with satire. Their appreciation of the author’s wit was evidenced by the readers’ giggles and parenthetic comments.

Students see that the author is building a parallel between killing one’s spouse and killing one’s unborn child.

The students commended the cleverness of Childs’ analogy when she says that “matrimony severely curtails a woman’s freedom” and that “the better course is to avoid unwanted marriage in the first place,” and “it is her marriage; only she can decide when it must end” . . .

One student pointed out that Childs correlates adoption to divorce when she says the latter “may be an attractive alternative to murder” but “some woman do not have the emotional and financial resources to go through a divorce.”

The students’ initial reaction to this article was positive.

Critical Thinking and Discernment

Teacher: How would you take this if you were pro-choice?

Student: I’d be mad.

It wasn’t very long and one student used the word “fallacy.”

The students continued to ask each other questions:

Stacked evidence?

Not quite.

Faulty analogy?

Yeah, that fits.

(Faulty analogy: an argument is based on misleading, superficial, or implausible comparisons.)

The students suggested that this argument is only effective if someone accepts that premise that a fetus was comparable to a husband. Someone who is pro-choice would not accept the premise. They concluded that if your audience was pro-life, Childs’ argument was effective, but if it was pro-choice the argument would be ineffective.

Who is the audience?

Since this article was posted on The Gospel Coalition website, one can assume that the audience was conservative to moderate Christians. The effect of the article was to reinforce the views of the audience. In other words, it was preaching to the choir.

What’s the point of writing this if your audience already agrees?

It was observed that the only effect of the article was to reinforce the view of those who agree that our society “celebrates [the murder of] family members”. Several students pointed out that this, in itself, is not wrong, but because the tone was mocking this article would simultaneously alienate opponents and inflame the passions of supporters.

Was this the purpose of the article?

Students wondered, if you get the two sides all riled up you can’t get anywhere.

How can Christians write about this issue that promotes dialogue?

Christian Modernism? Modern Christianism?

October 9, 2013 / Trent / 0 Comments

We just can’t escape the modern worldview. The term “worldview” is itself a product of the modern worldview.

The modern worldview sees the world in terms of clear boundaries between categories. Well, one of the most cherished categorical distinctions is between subject and object. Implicit in the term worldview is the division between the object, the world, and the subject, the viewer.

But it all evens out because a person who deliberately rejects the Christian worldview can’t escape it either.

Judeo-Christian Roots of Secular Modernism

Those who claim they have a secular-Modern worldview, don’t really. Their understanding of the world and themselves is unavoidably infused with the Judeo-Christian worldview out of which it grew.

The concept of “secular” is itself rooted in the Judeo-Christian past. A linear understanding of history, the importance of human rights and freedoms, are two tenets of Modernism that are basic to Judeo-Christianity. Science flourished in the west because the universe was understood to be ordered–“In the beginning was the Logos. Ordered means predictable and this is the basis of the scientific method.

These are just a few of many examples where the modern “secular” worldview is not truly secular.

Just as the secular worldview isn’t purely secular, the so-called “Christian worldview” of our day has been influenced by modern secular ideas.

The Influence of Modern Secularism on Western Christianity

First, there are many Christians that accept the modern reductionist understanding of “truth.” They are trapped within this syllogism: Truth is rational and empirical; The Bible is true; therefore, the Bible is rational and empirical. At a popular level, this idea leads to two common errors: that the Bible is true like an encyclopedia is true, or that it’s not true at all. Since this reductionist view of truth is so recent and so limited, it is neither appropriate nor useful to hold the Bible to this narrow understanding of truth.
Another way the modern worldview has infiltrated our churches is the valuing of reason over emotion. This is the one I need to own up to. I like the rational bits of the worship service–the sermon–far more than the more emotional components–the singing. And you notice that even by classifying the elements of the church service as emotional and rational I am being very modern.
Third, we have a tendency to be individualistic and we put more emphasis on the individual autonomy than in preceding centuries. We speak of having a “personal relationship with Jesus” and we sing songs like “I have decided to follow Jesus.” OK, we don’t sing that song anymore, but we sing a lot of songs that are essentially personal reflections. There is, obviously, an important personal or individual dimension to Christian faith, but modernism has lead us to put an unbalanced emphasis on the importance of the individual.
Modernism considers faith a private affair that ought to be kept out of the public arena. Some in the church find it handy to live within this false dichotomy. In these cases, one’s public life has nothing to do with one’s religious life. This makes it possible to not claim some income on your tax forms, or to underpay employees, or cheat customers, or pollute the environment, or fail to adequately tip servers in restaurants, etc. These behaviors do not really touch upon one’s conscience because “business is business.” In other words, the demands of the Bible are separated from one’s public activity.
A related dichotomy, equally false, divides the world into sacred and secular spheres. There are many examples of this kind of thinking. When I was a teenager, there was much debate as to whether or not Christian young people ought to listen to “secular” music. For many, it was clear that Christians ought not to do so, and no consideration was given to whether or not the “Christian” music was true, or even good. Some Christian schools are based on the sacred/secular dichotomy. The problem with the idea of the secular, as we understand it today, is it suggests there are areas of creation over which Jesus is not Lord. This idea is completely incompatible with scripture.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Five ways that the Modern Secular worldview has influenced Western Christianity #ModernFaith #Christianty” quote=”Five ways that the Modern Secular worldview has influenced Western Christianity”]

It is no easy thing, purging modernism from our minds and if we could ever completely succeed in doing so, we’d then have to purge our minds of post-modernism. I really don’t believe we can ever avoid being a product of our times. But reading the Bible helps a lot. It also helps a great deal to read history and non-western literature–the Bible nicely fits into these categories as well. These help us to provide a context for the idolatrous worldviews out of which we live.

The Story of Human Rights

October 2, 2013 / Trent / 0 Comments

dimitrisvetsikas1969 / Pixabay

While driving to one lecture, I was listening to another. The one I was listening to was delivered by A. C. Grayling on CBC’s Ideas. This was the first of eight “Fragile Freedoms” lectures held at the not yet officially opened Canadian Museum of Human Rights in Winnipeg (listen here).

This is an excellent lecture. It’s clear, unified, thorough and entertaining, but in his historical survey of the development of the idea of rights, Grayling begins in the wrong place.

The Modern Story of Autonomy–Human Rights and Freedoms

His story beings in the 16th century. It goes like this:

In the Reformation, humanity took its first step toward the freedoms that culminated in the Enlightenment and were embodied in the documents of the French and American Revolutions. Martin Luther and the other reformers freed people from the hegemony of the church by giving them direct and individual access to God without the mediation of the church. This freedom Grayling calls “liberty of conscience” and it began an “inevitable “process leading to “liberty of thought” and then “liberty of action.” These liberties led to the freedom to ask all sort of questions, first, of the natural world, which led to the scientific revolution and then, of the social and political systems, which resulted in the revolutions in France and America.

Grayling is telling the Modern Story, the dominant story in our culture. It is a story of, among other things, the quest for individual human autonomy. This story begins in 1517.

The Ancient Origin of Human Rights and Freedoms

It is generally agreed upon that human freedoms and rights are a good thing. And we all like to take credit for good things. The Soviets claimed credit for the invention of the telephone, the Dutch for the sinking of the Spanish Armada and the Americans for the invention of basketball. So too, the Moderns claim credit for human rights and freedoms, and they do this by linking human rights to the modern quest for autonomy.

But the idea of human rights is not, in the first place, rooted in autonomy but rather in the idea of human worth. And this idea has a much more ancient origin.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Are human rights and freedoms rooted in autonomy or human value? #freedom #rightsandfreedoms ” quote=”Are human rights and freedoms rooted in autonomy or human value?”]

Genesis 1:27 says, “God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” The Biblical story says that human beings–male and female–were created with inherent value.

It is likely we are not all that impressed at such a declaration. We have heard these words, literally, for millennia. (And this is sort of my point; we’ve heard them so long, we were bound to listen to them at some point.) But how would these words have sounded in the ancient world–ridiculous, preposterous?

Human Value? Absurd!

The cultures that dominated the ancient near east, Early Babylonian and Egyptian, revolved around a priest-king, who represented the gods and as such, needed to be treated like one.

This idea was reinforced in the creation myths where humanity was created for the soul purpose of serving the Gods. The myth upheld the socio-political reality of the culture–inferior people are meant to serve the superior representative of the divine.

Imagine the how scandalous the idea that mankind–both male AND FEMALE–itself was the image, read “replacement for the idol.” This idea was immediately reinforced in the next chapter (2:20) when we see Adam naming things, an activity carried out by the gods in the stories of other cultures.

The idea that human beings were not existentially equivalent to the muck on the god’s celestial shoes would have been unthinkable, yet it is this radical idea of human value that undergirds the entire Bible.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”The idea that human beings were not existentially equivalent to the muck on the god’s celestial shoes would have been unthinkable, yet it is this radical idea of human value that undergirds the entire Bible. #rightsandfreedoms, #freedom #humanvalue” quote=”The idea that human beings were not existentially equivalent to the muck on the god’s celestial shoes would have been unthinkable, yet it is this radical idea of human value that undergirds the entire Bible. “]

Jesus summarizes the law and the prophets, which amounts to pretty much the entire Old Testament, saying love God more than anything and “your neighbour as yourself.” Further, the central event in the Bible, Christians would say in human history, is the son of God giving up his life for the world and its people. And the reason consistently given for this sacrifice is God’s love for people.

Christians believe that a human being is the Lord of the entire universe.

This is a very high view of humanity, indeed.

And it is this understanding of humanity, which comes directly out of our Judeo-Christian heritage, which is the foundation of human rights. The events of the 16th century and following amount to a discovery of what faithful readers of scripture had been saying all along.

A. C. Grayling is telling the Modern Story, a story which is based and draws upon the Judeo-Christian worldview.

I hope that the new Museum of Human Rights in Winnipeg will give more credit to the ultimate source of human rights as it strives to fulfill its worthy task “to explore the subject of human rights in order to enhance the publics understanding of human rights, and encourage reflection and dialogue.”

Is God an Environmentalist?

July 13, 2013 / Trent / 2 Comments

RitaE / Pixabay

At school, I occasionally I find an empty pop can in the garbage. This is particularly distressing to me when there is a recycle bin right next to the garbage can. This leads to an inevitable rant on the importance of recycling. Following one such outburst, that moved quickly from beverage containers to SUVs, a student asked, “Why recycle if God is going to destroy the world anyway?”

“Because he’s not,” I said.

God is not going to destroy creation

In Genesis 1, God declares creation to be “good” six times and on the final day, it’s “very good.” The created goodness of the world is a consistent theme in the Bible.

“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it” (Psalm 24).

God creates this beautiful and wonderful creation. He loves it.

This is why Satan deliberately sets out to ruin it.

In Paradise Lost he says,

To do ought good never will be our task,

But ever to do ill our sole delight, [ 160 ]

Because God loves it, Satan delights in its destruction.

So let’s be clear–there is a force in the universe that loves the created world that wants to see it flourish, and another force bent on destroying it. God is not going to destroy this world–to do that, he’d be joining the other team.

Which Side Are You On?

God’s love for creation as declared in the beginning, is consistent with what is presented in the end.

In Revelation 21 John describes the vision given to him by Jesus at the end of time.

I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.’ (Revelation 21: 2-3)

The end, fits the beginning. Because he loves this world, he is pleased to come live in it. Heaven–God’s very presence–comes down. He comes down to where we are, to be with us–in His creation. This was his intention for the Creation, and it how it will be in the end. Or, more accurately, at the new beginning.

God says in Revelation 21:5, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Darrel Johnson points out that God does not say, “Behold, I am making all new things.” God is not destroying the earth and starting over, He’s restoring what he’s already made.

So what do we do in the mean time? The task of humanity is to live in accordance with his purposes. Notice again, Revelation 21:5. It doesn’t say, I will make all things new. It’s “I am making all things new.”

Stewardship

How is God making all things new? It began with Christ’s death and resurrection–he died, not just to redeem people, but all of creation. Colosians 1:19-20 says, “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.”

Christ’s work continues through his people, the church until he comes again.

There are two forces at work in the world–one that would destroy the creation and one that would see it flourish.

So, those who wish to live and work in accordance with God’s purposes will start by taking recycling very seriously.

And that will be just the beginning.

Language, Sex, and Violence — Will We Watch?

October 2, 2012 / Trent / 1 Comment

Photo by Charles Deluvio on Unsplash

“If it’s not appropriate for children, it’s not appropriate for anyone.”

I’ve always had trouble with this idea, because if I took that approach, I’d no longer be able to read my Bible.

I have been told by those who can read the original languages in which the Bible has been written that some of the language is pretty course, especially in the prophets. And you don’t need to read the original language to find sexual content both the beautiful stuff, like The Song of Songs, and the repellant, the story of Lot and his daughters (Gen. 19:30-36) comes to mind. There’s also plenty of violence. When I was young, my imagination played the tent peg story (Judges 4:21) and the murder of Eglon (Judges 3:12-30) clearly on the screen of my mind.

The good folks down at the Skeptics Annotated Bible give the following, tongue in cheek, review of the Bible using the same categories that some concerned Christian groups give to movies:

• Sex/Nudity: 197
• Drugs/Alcohol: no information
• Violence/Scariness: 957
• Objectionable Words/Phrases: 180

Their jibe does make a point.

Rather than using the naively using the MPAA rating system or a misunderstanding of Philippians 4:8, I would like to suggest a new standard by which discerning parents, can determine what movies to watch with their older children or patronize themselves.

A New Standard for Evaluating Movies

It is not the language, sexual content and violence in and of themselves that should keep us from reading the Bible. It is not the presence of Sex/Nudity, Drugs/Alcohol, Violence/Scariness or Objectionable words/Phrases that should prevent us from going to movies.

It is how these things are treated in the move. If they are treated as the Bible treats them, maybe we can watch them. Maybe we even OUGHT to watch them? You see, I’m not just looking for a loophole to get away with watching whatever movie I want.

Art—and movies are art—is a dialogue about what it means to be human. It explores the good and beautiful; it also explores the evil and sin, and it explores the need and longing for redemption. All movies are about these things.

Experiencing art broadens and deepens our experience and, therefore our understanding of our neighbours. Understanding the language of film, and how to talk about it, makes us better able to attend to, and even contribute to, the dialogue and, thus, be more effective servants to God and neighbour.

Art has this serious purpose, but it can also be fun. This distinction is important when we talk about movies and some of the more adult content they often contain.

“Just for Fun” or “Getting Serious”

Movies have two functions that occupy points on a continuum. On one side are movies which are made to provide consumers with pleasure or entertainment. Commercial success is the primary goal so these movies are designed to help large numbers of people. This is not in itself a bad thing. Because they want to attract as many viewers as possible, they have to provide a good product, and they need a PG rating, so they don’t have strong language, nudity, or realistic violence.—if successful, everybody wins. I would classify The Avengers (2012) or Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) as a film that occupies this end of the spectrum.

On the other end are movies that are made in the hopes that it may broaden, deepen or sharpen our awareness of the human experience. These have a more artistic purpose and they demand more from us in that they attempt to bring us more deeply into life’s joys and struggles, while they and often produce empathy in the audience. Precious (2009) or Ordinary People (1980) perhaps fit into this category.

Because this is a continuum, movies usually occupy some point between the two ends of the spectrum. Some lean toward the entertainment side but still tell us something about life—Finding Nemo. Others tell us something serious about life, but while they do it, they entertain—Little Miss Sunshine.

Too much sex, violence, and language?

How much language, sexual content, and violence we are willing to tolerate in a film has something to do with where it is on the continuum. Movies that are on the entertainment side of the continuum ought to have a minimum of language, sexual content, and realistic violence. These things are a means to an end, and they ought not to be an end in themselves. If they are presented as such, discerning viewers will avoid them.

But because language, sexuality, and violence are a part of the human experience, they can be in the sorts of films that bring us into reality. Context matters a great deal here. The nudity presented in Spielberg’s, Schindler’s List (1993) is much different than the nudity presented in American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile (2006). The first shows the humiliation and abuse of women in a very dark time in human history, and the other objectifies women for the viewing pleasure of its male audience.

I have never been impacted by a scene of violence as much as the opening scenes of A Time to Kill (1993). 10-year-old Tonya Hailey is brutally attacked by two rednecks. These two white racists are caught boasting about what they did to Tonya. Her father, played by Samuel L. Jackson is understandably distraught and, recalling an incident a year previous when four white men were acquitted after raping an African-American girl in a nearby town. He is determined that justice will be done. So he shoots and kills the smirking rednecks as they leave their arraignment.

The violence of the initial attack is intense, but it was necessary for us to share some of the horror and violation of the act so that we could empathize with the distraught father who killed the men who attacked his daughter. The rest of the film involves his trial for murder. There is no doubt that he is guilty, but we understand his actions because we watched the event that motivated his decision to kill. Had you read this story in the newspaper, you’d likely be able to offer a flippant opinion about who’s right in this case, but by your participation in the violence, the issue is at least more complicated and your empathy makes you a better neighbour.

The violence in this movie is not the end, it is the means to an end, and that end is the honest exploration of the human condition.

“Faking It”

There are some movies that seem to say something significant about life and human experience, but are really presenting sentimental and over simplistic views of life. One such movie is Remember the Titans, which the filmmakers would have you believe is a realistic representation of how a football team overcame issues of racism and hatred to win the state championship. Although, based on a true story, racism in the real world is not so easily dealt with and movies that tell us that it is are not doing us any good.

Food Analogy

The following analogy might be helpful.

The movies which are just for entertainment are like home-made apple pie with a scoop of good quality ice cream; they are really good, but you oughtn’t to have a steady diet of the stuff.
The artistic film that brings us into reality is like a well-balanced meal—I’m thinking turkey dinner here—they are good for the soul.
Then there are the TV-dinner type movies that pretend to be saying something about life, they got processed turkey and mushy vegetables, but they are really giving us such a simplified version of reality that we’re better off eating the pie.
The ones that are full of sex, violence, or base humour are analogous to chocolate covered dog poop—they might look good in the trailers, but you won’t like the taste it leaves in your mouth.

Art has this serious purpose, but it can also be fun. This distinction is important when we talk about movies and some of the more adult content they often contain.

Dog Poop in the Brownies: How to read Philippians 4:8

September 20, 2012 / Trent / 4 Comments

Photo by Michelle Tsang on Unsplash

“You must destroy your secular music!”

The speaker told us we had to get rid of all of our “secular” music. I was in high school, and the speaker at the youth event was a youngish, cool youth pastor. He said we had to destroy our albums; selling it or giving it away would just spread the evil.

He mocked the counter arguments leveled at him by those who loved the pagan lyrics and musical brilliance of Led Zeppelin and The Who. One argument I remember, perhaps because it was mine, was that, although there might be some “bad” content in it, there was much that was good in the songs of my favorite artists – especially Pink Floyd.

His response to this argument was the dog-poop-in-the-brownies analogy. It went something like this:

If I offered you a plate of brownies and I told you that I mixed a tablespoon of dog poop in the batter, would you still eat it?

I didn’t like this analogy. For one thing, it seemed pretty convincing and I didn’t want to be convinced.

But, I also sensed there was something inherently wrong with this analogy. I knew that Pink Floyd’s songs were artistically beautiful, which is more than could be said of most Christian Contemporary Music of the day. What’s more, some of what the secular artists said was true. I had a hard time reconciling the truth and beauty with the analogy.

I wasn’t so clever to reframe and ask, “Would he eat a plate of tofu and Brussel sprouts soaked in cod liver oil just because it had no dog poop in it?”

[click_to_tweet tweet=”He said we were supposed to destroy our secular music, but I inherently felt that there was something wrong with his demand. I now know what it is. #Philippians4:8 #secularmusic #sacredsecular” quote=”He said we were supposed to destroy our secular music, but I inherently felt that there was something wrong with his demand. I now know what it is. #Philippians4:8 “]

Philippians 4:8

I still encounter this issue in my personal and professional life. My musical tastes are now acceptable to most people except, possibly, my children. Nowadays, I find myself in conversations around literature and movies like Lord of the Flies and Harry Potter; Shawshank Redemption and No Country for Old Men.

Those who question whether Christians should read/watch these often use an argument similar to the dog-poop analogy and they do so by invoking Philippians 4:8.

“[W]hatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”

I am almost certain the youth pastor who wanted us to burn our secular music used this verse as his scriptural back up.

After all these years, I can now declare confidently that I agree with Philippians 4:8 while at the same time I dismiss the dog-poop-in-the-brownies analogy.

Sorry, but there are no Poopless Brownies

Foundational to the analogy is the notion that there are things in this world that are purely good, and true and beautiful–chocolate brownies–and other things that are thoroughly evil, false and ugly–dog poop.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”It is possible to agree with Philippians 4:8 while dismissing the *dog poop in the brownies* analogy. #Philippians4:8 #secularnusic #sacredsecular” quote=”It is possible to agree with Philippians 4:8 while dismissing the *dog poop in the brownies* analogy. #Philippians4:8 “]

This is a false dichotomy; not only logically, but also biblically.

All things were created by God and he declared it all, very good. Later, with the Fall, the same “all things” were distorted by sin. If this is true, then we don’t live in a world full of clearly evil things and clearly good things. We live in a world where everything is fundamentally good and also profoundly distorted by sin; in other words, everything and everyone, is both good and evil.

When Paul tells us to think about things that are true and noble and right, we are doing so in a world where it’s all mixed together. And it’s not simply that one song on the album is good and true and beautiful, and the other is not; the blending happens within the same song.

This complicates life, but complicated is good in this case. We can end up doing a lot of harm when we start seeing the world in terms of good and evil.

I think the speaker of my youth was wrong when he suggested the Christian life meant burning all my secular music. If he had understood Philippians 4: 8 in the light of Genesis 1-3, he would have told us to burn some of our “secular” albums, and we knew which ones he’d have been talking about, and then he’d tell us to listen to our Christian music and burn all the trite, simplistic and sentimental gunk that was far from true, excellent and admirable. Which, at that time, would have been most of it.

Christians Must Tip Higher Than 15%

August 2, 2012 / Trent / 0 Comments

Photo by Sam Truong Dan on Unsplash

Overheard one morning in a New York Subway near Broadway:

“I only made eleven dollars last night because it was a gospel show and the people only wanted the complimentary ice tea and they wanted it now!”

This young man experienced what so many in the service industry already know—when it comes to tipping, Christians are cheap. Servers do pretty well in tips during the weekday lunch hour because the shopping and business crowd are not cheap. Evenings are even better for tips because lovers, friends, and partiers also are not cheap. But the tipping pool dries up for Sunday lunch (and gospel concerts) because here come the Christians.

A friend of mine and an experienced server said that they had never met another server who wanted to work the post-church rush. The reasons? Customers on Sunday afternoons are “rude, impatient, and the least self-aware people [they] have encountered while working in the restaurant business.” And yes, Sunday afternoons are notoriously bad for tipping.

Here are some things you need to know if you ever go out to eat:

Servers make minimum wage or less. Where alcohol is served they can be paid less because it is assumed they will make money on tips.
Many servers, especially when starting out, work few shifts and those can be as short as two hours. In general, a server is lucky to get 20 hours a week in one restaurant.
Higher-end restaurants have fewer seatings, so, although the tips will be larger due to larger checks, the waiters make less money than they would in a restaurant with higher turnover.
The more courses you order, the more your server has to work on your behalf.
The person who waits on your table will split their tips with the kitchen staff.
In some restaurants, the kitchen tip is a simple 15% of the table receipts. This means that if you tip only 10%, it is theoretically possible for the server to be out of pocket for the evening.
It is not customary to tip in all parts of the world. The language of generosity is not the same everywhere.

My friend insists that there are some wonderful customers in her restaurant after church on Sundays, but she added that she “would rather work Friday nights with the drunk people than Sunday afternoons.”

What do these this firsthand experience with Christians say about us and our Lord?

1 Timothy 6:18-19 (ESV) describes Christians who can afford to eat in restaurants:

They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.

What might we say about ourselves, and more importantly, about a life in Jesus if we were to follow the biblical teaching to be polite and generous customers?

My server friend is a Christian and she really enjoys what she does. Perhaps it is because she is a Christian that she is such an excellent server. It’s in how she views other people. She works hard to facilitate their experience while in the restaurant. She does this by showing respect and being pleasant. She listens to what they say and tries to intuit what they need so that she can give them the best service possible. This, for her, is the essence of the service industry, but is it not also the essence of living in Christ? To love and respect people because they are created in God’s image and to put their needs over yours?

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Regarding tipping: Yes, servers are paid to serve us, but Christian customers are commanded to be generous. Christian tipping should be noticeably higher than the standard. #generousity #tipping ” quote=”Regarding tipping: Yes, servers are paid to serve us, but Christian customers are commanded to be generous. Christian tipping should be noticeably higher than the standard.”]

Yes, servers are paid to do this, but Christian customers are commanded to do it. But there is an even more compelling reason—we have been recipients of God’s Grace and, so, out of gratitude we share that grace with every human being with whom we come into contact—including our server at a restaurant or at a Broadway gospel show.

I thought it was awesome that my wife’s reaction to overhearing the conversation in the New York subway was the same as mine. We both looked at each other, I am convinced by the Spirit’s prompting, and whispered something like, “I want to do something about that.” It turns out she’s much more generous than I am because she doubled what I had in mind. When I gave him the overdue tip, I told him that we were Christians and that this means we take joy in giving. And we were sorry he wasn’t treated more generously the night before. His face was a combination of disbelief and joy, as was that of his companion.

My wife firmly believes that the cost of the evening is not just the meals and the tickets to the show; it’s the tips as well. If people can’t afford both, then they can’t afford to go out. It’s wrong to make your server subsidize your night out.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”If you can’t afford a generous tip, you can’t afford to go out. It’s wrong to make your server subsidize your meal. #Christiantipping #tipping #generousity” quote=”If you can’t afford a generous tip, you can’t afford to go out. It’s wrong to make your server subsidize your meal. #Christiantipping #tipping #generousity”]

For Christians to be considered generous, we need to exceed the standard. The standard is around 15-20% in a restaurant, five dollars on the bed in the hotel every morning and at least a couple of dollars for every suitcase that someone handles for you.

And then, of course, we need to express the joy and gratitude that comes from living in the generous Grace of our Redeemer. Perhaps then our servers would prefer spending time with us on Sunday afternoons, or better yet, Sunday mornings, than with the drunks on Friday nights.

Why Christian Education? (Part 1): Three Different Types of Christian Schools

July 15, 2012 / Trent / 1 Comment

Photo by Daniel Watson on Unsplash

I was at a church service some months back and a guest pastor was, in essence, exhorting the congregation to get out of their Christian ghetto and do some good for the world. He has a point, of course. It’s easy to live in the suburbs and surround ourselves with other Christians who indulge in the same flavour of the faith that we do.

I agreed with the guest pastor completely until he suggested that this meant getting children out of Christian schools. I was taken aback when some in the audience responded with applause and cheering. Maybe I am a little sensitive, but I thought I heard some vindication in their applause.

As someone who has dedicated over 30 years to the furthering of Christian education, I was saddened as I drove home, first, because there seems to be a passionate opposition to Christian education in at least part of the congregation, but more so, because the minister’s comments were based on a complete misunderstanding of Christian Education as I experience it every day.

Many sincere Christian parents send their children to the local public school. This may be because there is no local Christian school, or because of financial constraints. These can be difficult barriers.

There are other reasons given for the renunciation of Christian Education. There are some, like the guest pastor, that believe the children of Christian parents are to be salt and light in the world. Other more philosophical types have told me that they wish to avoid a sacred/secular dualism. Against these positions, I would like to push back and assert that the school that best addresses these concerns is the Christian school. I don’t mean just any Christian school, however. There are different kinds and I’m not ready to defend all of them with equal fervor.

There are many reasons parents send their children to a Christian school and behind these reasons is often a particular view of culture and the Christian’s relationship to it. The various views of the relationship between Christ and culture will produce different types of Christian schools. In his book Christ and Culture, H. Richard Niebuhr describes several Christian responses to culture. These responses are useful for distinguishing different types of schools.

Different Types of Christan Schools

Christ Against Culture

One group of Christian school advocates sees an antithetical relationship between the culture and those who proclaim Jesus as Lord. Niebuhr calls this stance, Christ against Culture. Adherents of this view believe that to be loyal to Christ one must reject culture.

Niebuhr identifies several problems with this stance. The first is that separation from the world isn’t really possible. Secondly, this view seems to presuppose that sin lies in culture and that by avoiding culture, one can avoid sin. A final problem is that, at its root, the Christ against Culture model seems to suggest that Christ has little or nothing to do with culture—that the material world of which culture is a part, is at odds with the spiritual world, ruled by God.

It is not difficult to understand why adherents of this view of culture would seek a separate Christian education for their children. The public school, like culture as a whole, would be seen to contain much that is in opposition to the ways of God. The purpose of the Christian school, then, would be to further the separation of the Christian community from the culture as a whole.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Some Christian schools pull out of culture which they see as evil. This stance overemphasizes the fall and fails to see the creational goodness in culture. #ChristianEducation #ChristianSchools” quote=”Some Christian schools pull out of culture which they see as evil. This stance overemphasizes the fall and fails to see the creational goodness in culture. “]

Christ with Culture, Christ of culture, or Christ Above Culture

Not all Christians frame the relationship between Christ and culture as an either/or proposition. Many see much good in culture that may, or even ought to, be embraced. Some of these views can give rise to the second type of Christian school. In these schools, because of a positive attitude toward culture, there is little reason for the curriculum to be much different than that of the local public school.

It is a Christian school because various devotional practices have been added to the schedule. These would be things like devotions at the beginning the day, weekly chapels involving corporate worship, religious instruction and prayer, and Bible or religious education classes. We might think of the Christian aspects of this sort of school as the creamy icing spread over the already pretty decent cake that is the standard curriculum taught in the public school.

This view of the relationship between Christ and culture is perhaps at the root of many sincere Christian parents sending their children to a public school. What the child learns at school may be considered as, at worst, philosophically neutral and the religious instruction and devotional activities that occur in the home and at church are considered adequate for the spiritual nurturing of the child.

Where the first anti-culture view underemphasizes the good in creation, the critique of this pro-culture view is that it under-emphasizes the extent to which sin has distorted God’s good creation—including culture. The failure to appreciate the extent of sin’s corrupting effects often results in a corresponding failure to appreciate the scope of Christ’s redemption.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Some Christian schools maintain an open stance toward culture which they see as neutral. This stance overemphasizes the creational goodness and fails to appreciate the effects of the Fall in culture. #ChristianEducation #ChristianSchools” quote=”Some Christian schools maintain an open stance toward culture which they see as neutral. This stance overemphasizes the creational goodness and fails to appreciate the effects of the Fall in culture.”]

Christ Transforming Culture

There is a third type of Christian school, one that is unlike the Christ against Culture model in that it has a far more hopeful view of culture. It is unlike the second in that it places greater emphasis on the depth and breadth of the effects of sin. The view of culture from which this school arises is what Niebuhr calls the Christ transforming Culture model.

Adherents of this third type of Christian school recognize three fundamental truths. First, that culture is a manifestation of God’s good creation and a product of human creativity and community. Second, that sin distorts every part of this good creation, including human culture. Thus, there is nothing created, that was not created good, but there is nothing that has not been distorted by the Fall. A third truth is that Christ is the redeemer of all that God created. This process began with his death and resurrection, and continues, even now, by the work of his Spirit in and through his people.

The task of the Christian, then, is to explore what it means to live faithfully. This means that we strive to shape God’s world by enhancing and celebrating the creational goodness and also discerning the presence of sin and working to reduce its effects. The role of the Christian, then, is to take care of the environment, feed the hungry and take care of the sick. It also means to be involved in culture as movie-makers, lawyers, florists, plumbers and union leaders that bless our neighbours. It means being available if God chooses to work through our meager efforts and transform our local communities, or even the world.

The work of Redemption is Christ’s, but we are invited to participate in it. Rikk Watts of Regent College in Vancouver once left me with this analogy: We are called to imitate Jesus, like a child who enthusiastically pushes his plastic lawnmower behind his dad when he’s mowing the lawn. “Look Mom! We’re mowing the lawn!”

What kind of Christian School arises from this worldview? It would not disengage from culture for that would be a failure to recognize the essential goodness of the creation found in it, but neither would it indiscriminately embrace the culture, for to do so is a failure to appreciate the distorting effects of sin that is present in all aspects of life. This Christian school would explore all aspects of creation, including culture, and celebrate the creational goodness that we find there, but it would also train students to discern evil, not just “out there”—where it certainly is, but also inside our most intimate circles and within ourselves.

[click_to_tweet tweet=”Not all Christian schools are the same. Some exist to escape the evils of the world. Others simply add a Christian veneer to a *neutral* curriculum. Others accept Christ as Lord of all aspects of school life. #ChristianEducation #ChristianSchools” quote=”Not all Christian schools are the same. Some exist to escape the evils of the world. Others simply add a Christian veneer to a *neutral* curriculum. Still others accept Christ as Lord of all aspects of school life. “]

Holistic Christian Education

It’s not just daily devotions, weekly chapels and Bible classes that make a Christian school. Neither is the Christian content in the curriculum the full picture. All aspects of the school fall under the Lordship of Christ: our understanding and use of technology, our approach to learning assistance and special education, the way discipline is carried out, how budgets are finalized and decisions about the programs we offer.

Human experience in this world cannot simply be divided up between good and evil where we, as Hamlet says, “Throw away the worser part of it, and live the purer with the other half.” Nor can we live as if Christ is something we can add to the surface of culture like icing on a cake. Rather, Christ’s Lordship is at the core of every aspect of life—and this would include the way we educate our children.

Rather than isolating children, as the guest pastor supposed, a Christian education is about preparing students to meaningfully engage the world with a full understanding of the gospel.

Read: Why Christian Education? (Part 2): Three Objections to Christian School