On writing history

I know it is the fashion to say that most of recorded history is lies anyway. I am willing to believe that history is for the most part inaccurate and biased, but what is peculiar to our own age is the abandonment of the idea that history could be truthfully written. In the past people deliberately lied, or they unconsciously coloured what they wrote, or they struggled after the truth, well knowing that they must make many mistakes; but in each case they believed that “the facts” existed and were more or less discoverable. And in practice there was always a considerable body of fact which would have been agreed to by almost everyone.—George Orwell, A Collection of Essays, 199 (emphasis original)

Who's the center here, anyway?

Or to put it in other words, according to Bultmann and Gogarten, modern men and women cannot understand history apart from our own responsibility for it; and apart from our responsible handling of it, there is in point of fact no history, for there is no history apart from the changes human beings have introduced into it. By our decisions we give the world its particular form, so that reality is now this changing history which we create, and beyond and apart from that there is nothing real for us.

Now quite frankly this is the biggest myth yet created by man — that we ourselves are the creators of all history, and that apart from the history created by human beings, nothing else is real! Man is the God of history! In view of this, it is clear that it is not the New Testament but Bultmann and Gogarten themselves that need to be radically demythologised! So long as they work with such inverted conceptions of history, scientific interpretation of the New Testament is quite impossible.—T. F. Torrance, Incarnation: The Person and Life of Christ, 285

The not-so-dark medieval period

The thirteenth century was a period of great intellectual activity in Europe, contrary to the popular stereotype of the medieval period as the “Dark Ages.” By the year 1300 at least thirty-three universities had been founded in Europe. These typically grew out of “cathedral schools” primarily designed to train clergy. The earliest universities date from the ninth century in Italy, probably in Salerno and Bologna. Oxford University was founded around 1115, with Cambridge following around 1209.—Evans, A History of Western Philosophy, 173

And even then…

This inability to live more than one tradition at a time means that in a crucial and, truth be told, rather sobering sense, even the central patterns of reasoning in one tradition—as that tradition understands them—will not be understood in another. Moreover, insofar as we do not participate in the alien tradition we seek to query, we cannot know what it is that we do not know. Short of conversion, we are literally shut out of one by the life we live in another. Rival rationalities are not surmountable by learning.—One True Life: The Stoics and Early Christians as Rival Traditions, 204

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And that should make us humble. And cause us to lower our expectations on what we can discover about the past. Part of it will always be unretrievable. No matter how much we dig up or how much we read, the past is still the past and much of it is beyond our grasp.
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Judging the past by the … present of course!

Where the encyclopedists looked to the past, they assumed that all thinkers offered accounts “of the rational status of one and the same timeless subject matter” (28). The measuring of these accounts as better and worse depended upon the perception of progress toward the encyclopedists’ conception of truth—which is to say that the past was judged in light of the present, conceived as the acme of intellectual progress.—One True Life: The Stoics and Early Christians as Rival Traditions, 177 (quotation from Alasdair MacIntyre's 1988 Gifford Lectures)

This is not something to be proud of!

Overall, what we can now boast of is an economy that in its inequality compares to that of ancient Rome. It has been estimated that the top four hundred taxpayers in the United States exercise ten thousand times the material power of the average citizen in the bottom 90 percent. This differs little from the gap between Roman senators and the slaves and farm laborers who comprised most of the population.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 43

Not so innocent!

I rehearse the stories of enclosure, the game laws, and US slavery to indicate that liberalism and its concomitant capitalism did not arise naturally and benignly. Human intentionality and, more specifically, state oversight and (sometimes nakedly violent) force were crucial to capitalism’s inception and growth. I made that explicit in recounting enclosure and the game laws. It hardly needs to be added that government was essential to the institution of and policing on behalf of slavery: making it legal, implementing and enabling the slave market, brutally punishing runaway slaves and their allies, and declaring, from the highest court in the land, that African American slaves were only three-fifths human.— Naming Neoliberalism: Exposing the Spirit of Our Age, 9

The role of science

Now, for the first time in history, science has become the handmaiden of the state. Now science must satisfy the demand of the state, and that demand is power. Therein lies the danger of its secular subservience and the cause of its conflict with humanity. For power, even if prompted by moral objectives, tends to become self-justifying and creates moral imperatives of its own.—Abraham Joshua Heschel in Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays, 217

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I hate to contradict him, but while it is true that science is truly the handmaiden of the state in our culture, it's not the first time. The city of Syracuse in the Hellenistic age comes to mind, with Archimedes and his many inventions. But, his point is well taken: Power corrupts. Always and in every age. Period. And I emphasize always.
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About those statues…

"Social memory theory maintains a group’s memory of the past is always socially constructed—never how it actually was. The past has run through a social filter so that it serves the needs of the community and its coherence. Further, this past impinges on the present moment, as a community understands and acts in the present moment in a way that for them seems consistent with that memory. Communities keep the constructed past alive and in front of the community through myth, stories, festivals, sites, media, and various social institutions. Likewise, the community structures its future vision based on this constructed history."—Rodney Werline, in Early Judaism and Its Modern Interpreters, 2nd ed. (Atlanta: SBL Press, forthcoming).

<idle musing>
And don't forget to add statues! They are part of the ordering of our memory. We need to always be examining that ordering; perhaps—no! definitely—it needs to be reordered and modified to bring it more into line with what actually happened and whom we want to be as a nation and as a people. This should especially be true of Christians, who follow the only truth.
</idle musing>

Writing history

All history writing is rhetorically shaped. Authors cannot be exhaustive in their telling of the event, so they choose what is important or, better stated, what they think is important about the event. Thus, authors provide the perspective through which we hear or read about the event.—Lost World of the Flood, 21

Around the interlinks

If you are looking for comments on the happenings in Washington yesterday, look elsewhere. That said, is the church in a slumber? This RNS article thinks so:

Regardless of how you think about these movements [past awakenings/revivals] in American Christianity or how you divvy them up, the important point for our purposes is that despite their seemingly conservative religious bent — steeped in rhetoric of sin and redemption — there was, with notable exceptions, often enough a progressive moral, social and political agenda for its time.

How odd, then, that the current custodians of the evangelical movements would be seen, rightly this author judges, as anything but progressive and in fact stunting the work of churches to labor for greater freedom, inclusion, aid and equality of people as marks of a robust religiousness. Maybe the millennials are seeing what too many Christians are not.

Is it possible that we are living through “The Great American Slumber,” a time when too many churches are not pressing for the reform of the nation but lining their pockets, becoming court evangelicals and traveling around by private jets? Are these churches asleep while the youth of the nation are “woke?”

And what about all these continued assaults on the Salvation Army?

The first thing to know about the Salvation Army is that it is a church, founded by the Methodist preacher William Booth. He started his Salvation Army, with military ranks for its clergy, to reach the hungry and the needy through service. With more than 1.5 million members and a presence in roughly 130 countries, it is a spectacular example of, as Billy Graham once put it, “Christianity in action.”

As such, it obviously reflects Christian morality. “Soldiers, the core group among members,” one religious writer explained, “take covenant vows that cover doctrine, loyalty, willingness to evangelize and help the needy, and clean living (no alcohol, drugs, gambling, pornography or profanity).” The army’s position that marriage should be between a man and a woman isn’t an exotic invention, but standard Christian teaching.

The idea that the Salvation Army has an anti-gay animus stems largely from its opposition to anti-discrimination laws that it worried would impinge on its conscience rights, and criticism over its policies regarding transgender people (especially the practice of some places of assigning people to male or female facilities depending on their gender at birth). The organization has made clear again and again, though, that its services are available to all.

Commenting on the scandalous Buttigieg bell-ringing images, the press secretary for the left-wing Alliance for Justice opined, “I know the photos are two years old, but still, I can’t help but wonder if Mayor Pete just looks at what LGBTQ activists have been working on for years and then chooses to spite it.” Or perhaps he was rational and broad-minded enough to appreciate the massive good done by one of the most admirable institutions in the country.

'Nuff said.

Heard about the latest example of our national love affair with fast cars? Bicycling magazine has this:

103 mph. That’s how fast three drivers recently went as they crossed the country in their successful attempt to break the informal “Cannonball Run” record for fastest crossing of the contiguous United States. The time: 27 hours and 25 minutes.

That 103 mph is not a top speed; it’s an average speed. And everything about the attempt—from the meticulous preparations designed not only to maximize efficiency but evade law enforcement, to how it’s being covered in the media—is a striking example of the slavish devotion we have to cars in this country, safety be damned.. . .

It’s clear that the drivers in the most recent attempt don’t fear punishment. They weren’t caught in the act, and while they’ve admitted flagrant speeding, and telematics from both the vehicle and the GPS systems they used would provide incontrovertible evidence, I don’t expect any enterprising prosecutor to subpoena that information.

Everything about the Cannonball Run, from its entitled, narcissistic beginnings to how we talk about it, exemplifies the worst excesses of car culture in this country. Maybe once, in some America of long ago, it had a purpose, but that’s gone now. It’s time for the Cannonball Run to die, before someone does.

Glad I wasn't on a bike when they went whizzing past. Or walking.

Shifting gears a bit, Ron Sider talks about the absurdity of Christmas:

The early Christians ran around the most powerful empire of the time saying their leader was in charge of the world.

To see the patent absurdity of this claim, just remember that the Roman empire at that time was perhaps more dominant over a huge part of the earth than any empire until America after the collapse of the Soviet Union. And this vast overwhelmingly powerful Roman empire was ruled by the almighty (divine) Caesar. The Romans had the best army in the world and they enforced Roman rule—ruthlessly!

Do read the rest for more perspective. Speaking of absurd, how about the guy who registered his bees as a service animal?

On a more serious note, a Scandinavian author takes on Nobel Prize winner Handke's Bosnian writings. Long read, but worth the effort.

And while we are on the theme of mass murder, the Houston police chief had a few choice words on the NRA, the GOP, and (lack of) gun control.

"You're either here for women and children and our daughters and our sisters and our aunts, or you're here for the NRA," Acevedo said. "So I don't want to see their little smug faces talking about how much they care about law enforcement when I'm burying a sergeant because they don't want to piss off the NRA.

"Make up your minds," he said. "Whose side are you on? Gun manufacturers? The gun lobby? Or the children that are getting gunned down in this country every single day?"

Too simplistic? Maybe. But if you want to stop the murders, maybe it's time to get simplistic.

Speaking of simplistic, that seems to be the order of the day when it comes to evangelicals and the unwavering support of #45. Warren Throckmorton, no liberal in anybody's book, has this to say about the recent "worship leaders" convergence on Washington:

In October, no refugees were settled in the U.S. for the first time since the 1980s. There is an ongoing humanitarian crisis happening at our Southern border. Recently, a migrant teen boy died of the flu while in custody of U.S. Border Patrol. I could go on to discuss the Kurds and the faith community there that Trump left to be slaughtered by the Turks.

There is reason to believe the Administration’s rhetoric on human trafficking is faulty. Many of their policies toward migrants and refugees actually make trafficking worse. But because Christian leaders have stars in their eyes, they won’t challenge what they are being told or do any independent research. Because Trump and Pompeo say it, it must be true.

Christians are supposed to be monotheists. However, in the age of Trump, there are two gods in many of their lives, and as I have written before, Trump shall have the preeminence.

Along those lines of what a person is worth, Stephen McAlpine, an Australian blogger, muses on the recent euthanasia bill in his Australian state:

A signed off euthanasia bill—one of the most radical and invasive in the nation—may bring glee to the faces of its most vocal proponents, but the heart-aching decline of my dad that we allowed to occur, despite our misgivings and pain—brought grace to our hearts. I totally understand the heartache and despair of seeing a loved one die terribly. Indeed I see the challenge it presents to me, should I suffer a similar or worse pathway to death when it comes, as it inevitably will.

Yet, leaving that aside, if you have to choose between glee and grace in this increasingly graceless culture, then choose grace every time. Even if it means giving up some other choice or right that you wish to impose either on yourself or on others.

Speaking of grace, here is a thoughtful piece on Bonhoeffer by five different scholars. Read it!

On the happenings on the other side of the pond, Philip Jenkins asks how nations disappear. He is of the opinion, as an ex-pat, that the United Kingdom is about to disintegrate:

In some ways, this takes us back to the Middle Ages, when Europe’s nations were such fragile things, adding to people’s need for a higher religious loyalty. That is why they turned so readily to “Christendom,” the Res Publica Christiana, a true overarching unity and a focus of loyalty transcending mere kingdoms or empires. Kingdoms such as Burgundy, Wessex, or Saxony might last for only a century or two before they were replaced by new states and dynasties, but any rational person knew that Christendom simply endured. We grew up thinking we lived in a very different kind of modernity, based on the nation state – but maybe we don’t, and perhaps we never really did.

Nations are imagined communities, and sometime they unimagine themselves. It can happen very quickly. Thank heaven the United States could never evaporate like the United Kingdom seems to be doing. Well …

Shifting gears a bit, I'm familiar with the backstory on "O Holy Night," but I had never before read the literal translation of the French original. Mike Frost has it. And it's even more powerful than the version we sing. Take a look at what reading the Gospel of Luke can do for you. Careful! You might be forced to modify your opinions on things! But, as N.T. Wright observes (somewhere!), the Gospels are powerful weapons.

Another long read, but definitely worth the time, is this look at the dramatic increase in the number of kids (boys especially) diagnosed with ADHD. Here's the intro, but don't avoid the whole article; it doesn't deny that ADHD exists, it looks at how we got where we are and if there are alternatives to drugs (hint: there are, but it requires time and energy):

By the time they reach high school, nearly 20 percent of all American boys will be diagnosed with ADHD. Millions of those boys will be prescribed a powerful stimulant to "normalize" them. A great many of those boys will suffer serious side effects from those drugs. The shocking truth is that many of those diagnoses are wrong, and that most of those boys are being drugged for no good reason—simply for being boys. It's time we recognize this as a crisis.

Meanwhile, at the Scholar's Kitchen, David Crotty reflects on the loss of shared cultural moments.

This, and other things I've been reading lately lead me to ask: Are we losing too much in a digital world? Can we retain the good while mitigating the bad? I don't know the answer to that, but I leave you to ponder it as we continue through Advent and approach Christmas.

Give me your rich, your empowered, those desiring to control

Oh, wait, that's not right, is it? It is supposed to be

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

But, in actuality, it has never been so. Take a look at the post on the Anxious Bench today. These paragraphs are especially heart-rending:

During this period, as would be the case during subsequent refugee crises in history, Americans strongly opposed accepting refugees. In July 1938, one public opinion poll published in Fortune found that only 4.9% of Americans surveyed believed that the United States should accept political refugees fleeing persecution in Europe. In an era of virulent anti-semitism, Americans appear to have been especially reluctant to accept Jewish refugees. In January 1939, in the wake of Kristallnacht, a Gallup poll found that 61% of survey respondents did not believe that the United States should open its doors 10,000 German refugee children, the vast majority of whom were Jewish.

American immigration officials were able to prevent refugees from entering the United States by relying on the immigration quotas established by the Johnson-Reed Act, but also by using an extremely stringent interpretation of public charge rules. As Stephen Porter points out in his book Benevolent Empire: Power, Humanitarianism, and the World’s Dispossessed, President Herbert Hoover in 1930 directed American consuls to apply public charge rules strictly, in response to American fears of labor competition during the Great Depression. The use of public charge rules ended up allowing the United States to admit far fewer immigrants than what was permitted under the Johnson-Reed quota limits, which were already set at unprecedentedly low levels. By restricting immigrants only to those who had wealth, the United States used less than 20% of its available immigration quotas, and immigration during this period dipped to its lowest level since the United States began keeping records in the 1830s. Importantly, the United States made no exceptions to admit refugees or asylum-seekers.

Anti-Semitic immigration officials were particularly harsh when applying the rules to Jewish applications for immigration. “Virtually all Jews applying to enter the United Staes to escape persecution abroad were required by the State Department Visa Division to have affidavits filed on their behalf by a sponsor in the United Staes promising to support the immigrant if granted admission,” Porter explains. “While other poor and potentially dependent immigrant applicants also had the affidavit requirement applied to them, contemporary refugee advocates and later observers have noted that it was applied much more strictly and systematically to the Jewish refugees, partially the result of strong pockets of anti-Semitism among American consuls abroad and their counterparts in Washington.”

Christian nation!? Hardly! We need to repent on our knees. And by repentance I don't just mean mouth a few words and feel sorry about how or ancestors behaved. I mean change the way we behave! Our descendants (if any survive!) will judge us as mercilessly as we judge others...