Category: Uncategorized

A downright positive (although somewhat spoilerish!) review of Revenge of the Sith from Variety (via Big Hominid).

I never had any doubt I would see it – my love of Star Wars was imprinted on me at a very young age, making it virtually impossible for me to be objective about the series (for what it’s worth, though, following the conventional wisdom I thought Episode I was terrible and Episode II was a slight improvement).

There’s an ongoing debate between proponents of free trade and those who favor “fair trade” (or, alternatively, “trade justice” – not sure of the extent to which the latter two terms mean the same thing). Fr. Jake had a post on the topic the other day, linking to this sermon by Rowan Williams as well as this pro-free trade piece (PDF) by Alex Singleton at the Globalization Institute.

Personally, I found the Singleton piece pretty convincing, but I don’t think one has to buy into the whole free trade argument to see that there could be a considerable overlap between free traders and fair traders.

Part of the debate boils down to whether its unfair to expect producers in poor countries to compete in a global market. Fair trade proponents often argue that poor countries should protect their nascent industries by means of tariffs or other trade restricitions. However, they also think that rich countries should lower their trade barriers, opening their markets to goods produced in the third world.

Free traders, on the other hand, think that everyone will be better off by lowering trade barriers and allowing the free flow of goods and capital.

In fact, the way most of the international trade agreements function is precisely by a kind of tit-for-tat – you lower your tarriffs on textiles, say, and we’ll lower ours on agricultural products. But fair traders criticize agreements like NAFTA and organizations like the WTO on the grounds that they force poor countries to open their markets to goods from richer countries, which supposedly undermines indigenous producers.

But often overlooked is the free trade case against such agreements. According to orthodox free trade theory, we benefit from lowering our trade barriers even if other countries don’t. This is because by lowering trade barriers we gain access to cheaper goods, thus improving our standard of living. There’s no need for high-level trade agreements; we could reap the benefits of free trade simply by unilaterally lowering trade barriers, including tariffs, “anti-dumping” laws, etc.

The insistence on tit-for-tat trade “concessions” only reinforces the notion that trade agreements are really about serving the interests of big corporations who want access to third world markets. But that’s not free trade at all, it’s managed trade or mercantilism.

A true free trader would like to see all countries lower their trade barriers, but if other countries want to shoot themselves in the foot (as he sees it) by engaging in protectionism, what business is that of his? He can still push for his own country to lower its trade barriers since, on his own theory, any country that does this benefits regardless of whether other countries follow suit. On free trade theory, it would be positively irrational to insist that other countries lower their trade barriers (however desirable that might be) as a precondition for lowering ours. As Singleton points out, that would be like throwing rocks into your own harbor just because someone else is throwing rocks into theirs.

But the lowering of trade barriers in the developed world is also a policy favored by fair traders because they want third world producers to have access to markets in rich countries. Thus they favor, for instance, the abolition of agricultural tariffs and subsidies.

So I don’t see any reason, in principle, why free traders and fair traders couldn’t concentrate on their shared interest in seeing rich countries lower barriers to trade, while letting developing countries chart whatever course they see fit.

An interesting discussion going on about sexual ethics. Hugo started things off with a bunch of posts about how he approaches sexual ethics with his youth group (several on Hugo’s front page – scroll down). Good follow up posts from Lynn at Noli Irritare Leones (here and here) and Camassia.

Also, a good post on pornography from Marvin at the Ivy Bush.

Hey, it’s the Feast of the Ascension!

I like this:

Consider this. Suppose Jesus was resurrected and returned to earth. But like any person who has come back from a near death experience, after a brief period of euphoria, things would have returned to normal. The days would have passed like those of any other life … and the years and the decades, to be followed as it is for everyone of us, with death.

Resurrection without the Ascension is a one day wonder, soon to fade. As it did for Lazarus who came back from the dead only to be remembered as the passive figure in one among many miracle stories of the Bible.

With Jesus the story does not end in this way. As the creed attests, “he ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father.”

Visually the scene is dramatic. A body defies the force of gravity and ascends towards the sky until it disappears. But behind the visual imagery, there is a still more stunning reality.

When the gospel writer refers to the “right hand of God,” that phrase would have been understood to mean not that God has a left hand and a right hand, but rather that God is powerful and active. Speaking of the hands of God is the biblical writer’s way of saying that God is present in the here and now, taking part in the stream of events that touch us all. The right hand in particular is the hand of vitality and power. Those seated on the ruler’s right hand share in the ruler’s power and authority.

It’s not Christ in outer space, but the Christ within that counts.

Further, since one of God’s remarkable features is omnipresence, this means that in the Ascension Christians affirm that Christ, too, is present now, at all times and in all places, whether one is conscious of the divine presence or not.

To affirm that Jesus has “ascended” connotes his continuing activity in and through all the miracles of daily life. Whereever the work and will of God are done, that is where we see the spirit of the living Christ at work.

And how is the work of God to be done in this world? As many a gospel hymn expresses it, “we are the hands of God.” The community of faith consists of those who consciously or unconsciously carry out the will of God by doing the work of Jesus in the world today. And the work of Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever; it is the work of peace, of justice, and of loving kindness.

Affirming that Christ has “ascended” as the Church does when it celebrates the Ascension constitutes a declaration that Christians are called be a visible and active in the world today, representing the will and the ways of God to all of humanity.

If by the Ascension it is understood that Jesus disappeared from view to reside in some distant, supernatural realm never to be seen or heard from again, the meaning of the holiday is lost completely. Understood correctly, the Ascension means that the Spirit of the living Christ rules in the hearts, the minds, and the wills of those who dare to call themselves his disciples now.

This is the only way that Christ’s victory over death will ever be complete. The miracle is completed in the community where Christ’s love reigns. This happens both within and outside the walls of any church. And thus is Christ’s own prayer fulfilled, and God’s kingdom has come “on earth as it is in heaven.”

Isn’t it kind of funny that people tend to use the expressions “desert island” and “deserted island” interchangeably? Usually when talking about things like “What five books” etc. would you want to take to a desert/deserted island.

Surely what we usually mean is deserted island, right? As in being stranded alone somewhere. Though I guess desert islands would probably not tend to be that populated either.

But are desert islands even that common? Most of the islands people frequently go to are quite tropical. Don’t deserts usually exist on large continents?

No larger point there, really.

Today I received an e-mail from Sojourners calling for military intervention in the Darfur region of Sudan to protect civilians from government-sponsored militias. This seems to have become a kind of cause célèbre among certain elements of the Christian left (for lack of a better term). And it’s certainly a worthy one.

Still, as I’ve said before, one needs a clearer idea of what actually we should do once we’re there.

Justin Logan has suggested that committing U.S. troops isn’t necessary (and it’s not entirely clear that we could); we should, instead, provide logistics and materiel to African Union troops on the scene.

I’m symathetic to such a plan insofar as I think it would be better all things considered if regional conflicts were handled, when necessary, by local powers. The idea that the U.S. should jump into every conflict is a recipe for disaster (Somalia, anyone?). Think of it as the principle of subsidiarity applied to international politics.

Still, there may be times when the U.S. is the only power capable of intervening and circumstances warrant it.

Here’s a question though: are those of us who would like to see a drastically scaled back U.S. military establishemnt (a pretty utopian goal, admittedly) prepared to accept that such a reduced force would likely not be capable of intervening every time there’s some kind of humanitarian crisis? (This applies to the quasi-pacifist types on the Christian left as well as “seamless garment” types and traditonalist non-interventionist conservatives.)

There’s a post at Here We Stand that is relevant to some of the things we’ve been discussing around here: “The Paradox of Submission to the Governing Authorities.”

This seems like as good a time as any to resume blogging Robert Kraynak’s Christian Faith and Modern Democracy (you thought I’d forgotten, didn’t you? For earlier posts see here and here).

Earlier we saw that, according to Kraynak, the Christian tradition, far from uniformly supporting democracy has been remarkably insouciant about the form of secular government. The “two cities” tradition has generally supported whatever government was in power so long as it left the church free to preach and evangelize and served the temporal ends of providing peace and security, and, under fortuitous circumstances, encouraging virtue and piety.

Nevertheless, one might still argue that Christianity is “essentially” democratic due to its emphasis on the dignity of every individual human being. Shouldn’t that provide a kind of leveling effect on Christian politics?

Kraynak thinks that this argument rests on a confusion between the modern liberal democratic notion of human dignity and the biblical one. The former usually founds human dignity on the quintessential Enlightenment notions of reason and free will. But the latter, Kraynak thinks, is based in the biblical concept of the Imago Dei, which is by no means to be identified with our rational capacities. Kraynak surveys the passages where the Imago Dei is mentioned and comes to conclusions that differ widely from the rationalist notions of human dignity:

In these three passages [Gen 1:26-28; 5:1-3; 9:5-7], we have the only explicit references to the Imago Dei in the entire Hebrew Bible. All three make procreation and lifeblood the Godlike image in man; yet these are things that man shares with other animals. This is a real puzzle, one that is fraught with important moral implications. Many of the great commentators pass over the textual problems too hastily, usually because they have a preconceived notion of the attributes that reflect the divine image in man (the most common view is that reason and free will are the distinguishing features, although they are not mentioned explicitly in the passages on the divine image). What, then, is the Bible saying about the Imago Dei?

The only sense I can make of this puzzle is that procreation and lifeblood, while common to man and animals, must have a deeper meaning for humans than for animals. Procreation and lifeblood must be pale reflections of the original vitality and life-giving power that man alone possessed before the Fall when he possessed immortal life. The image of God in man would thus refer to man’s original immortality—an immortality that animals never possessed and that is different from God’s immortality in the crucial respect that man’s original immortality could be lost (it is an image of immortality, after all, not the real thing). In the biblical view, then, man stands between the animals and God as a creature with special dignity because he once possessed the Godlike attribute of immortality but lost it and became mortal, without, however, losing the hope of recovering it and gaining true eternal life. (p. 57)

The other aspect of the Imago Dei that the Bible focuses on is humanity’s capacity for holiness:

After the book of Genesis, there are no more references to the Imago Dei in the entire Hebrew Bible. Beginning with Exodus and continuing in subsequent books, man is compared with God in the capacity for holiness (kadosh). … To be “holy” in this sense has many connotations which are hard to define precisely. In a formal and almost tautological sense, holiness means being set apart from the profane. But it also implies separation from the profane in specific ways–by superior purity in sexual and dietary matters, by transcendence of the mundane through the mysterious presence of the invisible God, and by a high degree of righteousness in the execution of justice and social responsibilities. The divine image in man found almost exclusively in the Book of Genesis is thus superceded but not abolished by the imitation of God’s holiness in observing the divine law–making people more Godlike in their purity, transcendence, and righteousness. (pp. 58-9)

In the New Testament, says Kraynak, the notion of the Image of God is often applied to Christ, but also as reflected in the hierarchies of creation. Paul’s notorious statements about husbands standing in a relationship to their wives that is analogous to Christ’s relationship to his Church, for instance.

The upshot, says Kraynak, is that

[i]n the biblical view, dignity is hierarchical and comparative; in the modern, it is democratic and absolute. The Bible (both Old and New Testaments) promotes hierarchies because it understands reality in terms of the “image of God” which is a type of reflected glory–a reflection of something more perfect in something less perfect. Hence, dignity exists in degrees of perfection rather than in abstract equalities. The dignity or glory possessed by something made in the image of a more perfect being carries claims of deference, reciprocal obligation, and duty rather than equality, freedom, and rights.

[…]

[H]uman dignity in the Bible is both universal and selective; It proclaims the spiritual dignity of every person in light of their original perfection, but it permits and even requires different degrees of dignity in the created and fallen world based on God’s election of special people and the institution of human authorities. The Bible also seems to imply that while dignity in some sense is given and therefore ‘inalienable’ (as we would say today), it is also something to be won or lost, merited or forfeited, augmented or diminished. And it implies that obedience to emperors and masters, who are a part of the fallen world and largely conventional in status, does not violate the dignity of the Christian believer because true dignity lies in the possession of an immortal soul and interior freedom. (pp. 60-1)

This relative and comparative notion of dignity, reinforced by a metaphysical concept of the “Great Chain of Being,” has allowed the Christian tradition to comfortably coexist with hierarchies in family, church, and state. Although some hierarchies (those of the family, say) are natural, others are merely conventional (e.g. king and subject), the latter are still to be obeyed since they are willed by God as constraints on human sin.

In the last analysis, the New Testament teaches obedience to created, natural, and conventional hierarchies because the dignity of every person is a matter of inner freedom that is independent of external authority. Unconditional submission to Christ as Lord and King is the only absolute demand; all other obligations (to one’s nation, emperor, social class, the whole natural world, and even to one’s family) are conditional. … Everyone has an immortal soul with an eternal destiny which has at risk its eternal salvation or damnation. Compared to this question, the various forms of external obedience are of secondary importance. Thus, it is possible for the Bible to uphold the dignity of every human person as a creature made in the image of God and redeemed by Christ while supporting created, natural, and conventional hierarchies.

[…]

If this interpretation is correct, then the main conclusion we should draw is that both liberalism and the Bible seek to defend human dignity, but they define human dignity in different ways and draw different political conclusions. Liberalism equates dignity with autonomy of personality adn mastery of one’s destiny–political ideas that are inherently tied to democratic human rights. By contrast, the Bible equates the dignity of human beings with their relations with God, especially in their original immortality and their capacity for holiness–spiritual notions that permit spiritual hierarchies as well as undemocratic and illiberal politics. (pp. 63-4)

Kraynak makes a good case, I think, that liberal democracy can’t be read off from the Bible or the Christian tradition in any straightforward way. However, I do think there are a couple of places where we could take issue with some of his conclusions.

First, while the early Christians certainly didn’t preach revolution, it doesn’t follow that they were content to leave the social structures of society exactly as they were and were only concerned about a realm of “inner” spiritual freedom. Kraynak downplays the notion of the church as a social reality of its own that may have transformed social relationships between men and women, Jew and Greek, master and slave. Recent exegetes have paid more attention to this idea that the church was a new social body all its own with a distinctive way of life (John Howard Yoder and N.T. Wright come to mind among others), something which could not have failed to impact the larger society, at least indirectly. I would have liked to see Kraynak engage some of these thinkers.

Additionally, there is one other argument for liberalism/democracy that one might draw from the Bible and tradition that Kraynak doesn’t address (at least in this chapter). We might call this the pessimist’s argument. This kind of argument would begin not with human dignity, but with human sinfulness. Since “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God,” it’s foolish to trust any one person or group of people with too much power over their fellows.

One Protestant view emphasizes that the only righteousness we “have” is Christ’s righteousness, and without that we are nothing but sinners deserving death. This is summed up in the Lutheran phrase simul iustus et peccator – we are both entirely righteous (in Christ) and entirely sinners (in ourselves). Virtue is not something we come to possess; we are radically dependent at every moment of our lives on God’s grace. As Luther wrote, in what was probably the last note to come from his hand, “We are beggars. This is true.” In this respect we are equals.

Luther’s sense of human sin seems to have created a horror of anarchy in him, as demonstrated by his response to the Peasants’ revolt. But those of us who have lived through the 20th century, when tens of millions of people were murdered by their own governments, might be forgiven for seeing a greater danger in excessive power and authority. Or at least we might conclude that there’s something to be said for liberal democracy after all.

In later chapters Kraynak is going to discuss how the Christian tradition came to embrace democracy and also what a “politics of the two cities” might look like today, so he may address some of these concerns as we go on.

Earlier I suggested my approval of the liberal theory of government that holds that “governments are instituted among Men” to “secure” the rights of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness,” and that governments dervie “their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

On its face, though, this seems to contradict the Christian understanding of government given in what Josh called the “much-abused” Romans 13:

Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. For he is God’s servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor. (Rom. 13:1-7)

On the one hand we have governement as essentially a human construct that exists to serve the needs of people (and could theoretically be changed or even abolished if it failed to do that).

On the other hand we have a notion of government as an instrument of divine wrath that serves to punish evil, requiring obedience. But how does that fit with the idea that we must “obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29)?

Are these two notions compatible? Or does one or the other have to go?