If there is any way to acquire information about the economic stratification (or at least the GDP) over the last 500 years, I would be thrilled.

Why? It seems that while there is “more wealth” in the world, there are more people of course, and I wonder if the ratio, as well as the ratios of stratification, are at all remotely constant over a long-period. In times of the nobility, town-and-countryside conditions for Europe were much like middle-Asia is today. By today’s Western standards, this is beyond poverty, yet by today’s Western standards, even kings lived without a/c, fast or reliable transit, respectably clean showers and toilets, etc. They just had gold (ok, maybe not, but they had plenty of “huge tracts of land”), and people that listened to them.

I know that any social-strat expert will say the rich are getting richer, and I don’t doubt that over the 20th century, but what and where has this been the case before? Where and when has it not been the case? Anyone, anyone??

Louis Gabriel Ambroise de Bonald.

Never heard of him until today. Apparently a highly conservative French counter-revolutionary. Aka, not in vogue today.

His significant contribution to the world of ideas is primarily in “a universal triadic logic of faits sociales which are ‘general’, ‘external’ and ‘visible.’ The universal ratio pouvoir/ministre/suject is found expressed as I/you/he, father/mother/child, sovereign/executive/subject and God/priest/faithful (Milbank, 56: ISBN: 978-1405136846).”

At modern first-read, this is preposterous. There are many more options available by which society can structure itself. Of course there are. This is one man’s motif applied in all things. A singular perspective, against and of which the late-Modern perspectivalism desires more. But let’s say there’s something to his view, instead of just reacting against it. Let’s take a non-Catholic, “Biblical” approach to this triad.

First, there are Christian New-Testament makes much more frequent claim to Jesus being our priest, and still claims that “the faithful” are ourselves all priests, as well as children of God, and furthermore representatives of God and clearly executives on this planet. That leaves us with the triad initially replaced with God/Jesus/faithful into God/Jesus::faithful. Now what of the other triads? The sovereign is never to be the head of power alone; the master is the direct, executing servant (not the indirect, apersonal, theoretical, rationally justified “public servant”). Second, in terms of family, we are left with either the ‘mother’ being pushed down into child-level, or raised up into father-level. Guess what? Jesus came down to us not to keep us as children, and certainly not just to diminish God, but to raise our own pouvoir: fathers and mothers are categorically equal. This is obvious.

Regressing for a moment, we can say that de Bonald’s triad is a rather standard-religious approach, as well as a standard-secular approach. Yes, secularism is likely more neo-religious than it would like to be. Thereby, were we to take this conservative Catholic, as well as standard-secular sociology as final in de Bonald, Christ comes and radically alters the power-structures in society, and thereby creating a wholly other and new sociology. Is it any wonder why there are Christian statements of co-equality of slaves, masters, husbands, wives, etc. This is not simply a new edition of the old; something new entirely, worthy of study, lived-ness and enjoyment. Altogether curious.

Aside:
It is not enough to say that conservatism & liberalism are the same, and thereby positivism is “the way” (As my idealistic self is prone to do!). Christian theology comes with specific content and form which finds similarity in all of them. One can always conform Christianity into any given smaller idealism, but that takes the fun out of theology.

Paul was a missionary. He went on missionary journeys. He wrote missionary letters; letters to those who needed to understand his mission, the gospel: Jesus.
Now, what can we say about the North American Evangelical church today? Need they hear more of first-generation “Christian living” (which to later generations sounds like moralism) or second-generation “Christian living”, which might actually be more “applicable”?

What is it a missionary does? Overtly, communicate Jesus. Secondarily, covertly, intentionally or unintentionally, they communicate “Judeo-Christian values”. Paul however, saw the *lack* of Judeo-Christian values & after preaching Christ, preached a moral system to clarify what behaviors are becoming of a Christian.
Directly, abstractly, do I agree with such procedure? Sure. I’d rather have Paul preaching morality after redemption than before, and that is what he did. Were I to sit him down and ask him if he was even preaching morality, he would never even agree to such a statement.

Now, bring in the Contemporary Evangelical context. First, the every-man has much of the Judeo-Christian ethic already (relative to the Corinithians, say), so simply: why the Pauline addiction by Evangelicals?

I suppose my question and concern is simpler: What books (generally) “apply” more to the later church than the early church? Oddly enough, how about those which were written to the 2nd generation of church-goers! Hebrews-Revelation. Such a question has already been answered, and few will doubt it.

So why then is there so much emphasis on preaching Pauline lit & not enough of the General Epistles? I admit, I love the General Epistles (potentially for their novel factor), and I’ve never heard enough from them. Practically, there is more content. And I’m not going to say a moralism cannot be found in the General Epistles; moralism exists whereever you seek for it. Likewise, “Human nature is evil: we will find something anywhere to become addicted to, to build our pride through.” True, and for that, perhaps a sufficiently changing terrain of call-and-response in preaching & personal study is necessary.

So why the divide between Jesus & Paul? And more to my concern, why the Pauline unacceptance by socially minded “liberals”, as opposed to a consistent reprimand of Christians for not being sufficiently Jesus-like (by “liberals”)?

I suppose my final stance of Paul, generally, is one of “how to be a missionary in a non-Judeo-Christian ethnos (society).” A fine missionary, showing the tenacity and patience needed, and surely we all face this in “preaching” to ourselves. Yet I suppose I find him to be an extension of the book of Acts (and for good reason!) — akin to the “Books of History” (Writings) in the Old Testament (for our example) than any pure, direct. But of course, this is way too general a statement to uphold for each and every verse; more a generic background tone for the genre than the guitar-solo in the foreground.

So, who or what ever came up with the term “Deluxe”? And who ever decided that it was even more de-luxe to hyphenate it?

Dictionary.com to the rescue: “1810–20; < F[rench;] de luxe of luxury”

So this is where the guessing comes in. “Luxe.. like ‘light’”, right? Light is nice, pretty & good. Nope. Luxe: “Origin: 1550–60; < F < L luxus excess.” (Oddly enough, in 1810, Napolean was unmarried & remarried! )

“Luxurious” means “you don’t need it.”

Sure they don’t exist, but their role of theologian seems to be taken on in philosophy, especially the German Lutheran ones of the 1800′s.

While there were plenty of “actual” theologians after the Reformation, philosophers moved thought along in a distinct way. Grant their way was inaccessible to the average joe, and that void of practice was taken up by Wesley, and the other 1800′s preachers. This new arising piety along with some strange conclusions of the Philosopher-Theologians lead to the early 20th century backlash against philosophers & modern life & thought in general.

..well, at least, that’s what I woke up a few days ago thinking..

A Series of Questions:

A refresher: What are the 4 major areas of Philosophy?
* Metaphysics (with a subset in ontology)
* Epistemology
* Value-Theory: Ethics & Aesthetics

Of these, which “is” Christanity? Many would say in our time “ethics”. My parents generation certainly would. But doesn’t Christianity make claims regarding the nature of this world (as well as the next!)? Doesn’t it make claims as to what we can and do know? Certainly there are ethical statements as well. From a philosophic perspective, Christianity is, requires, and encompasses all areas of philosophy.

Take the 19th century philosopher Hegel. He was a believing Christian in his day. He made metaphysical claims as to “what was real.” His claims were so vast and ‘certain’ that they are and were a full *system* of thought. Those punk-kids of you who despise “organized religion” probably have more issues with this guy than with the Pope (ok, so maybe not, but close). Systematic thinking is good. It challenges us to make sure our ideas are *coherent*. Why that’s important I’ll hold off on. The trouble here is that no one today believes Hegel’s system of theology/Christianity is “true” or “what is”. Why? Because things change, and people realize the errors in others.

What I now propose is the 20th century Christianity produced another system of thought, though not one of metaphysics. Metaphysically, Christians started trusting science’s “If I see it, then it’s real” (naive realism/materialism) for their everyday, pragmatic view of the world. This foundation lead to a general belief that “The way things *are*, can not be changed, but the way you act can be.” Christians decided to trust science for their metaphysics, but they could not trust science for their guide into ethics, and rightly so, since it was only adding to the list of ethical questions with all its options.

This ethical entrance produced not just here-and-there spotty ethics, but a whole system of ethics amongst the more rational Christians. God, and/or the Bible could answer our questions, and so “Biblical” Christians sought to tease out all the ethics they could to serve out to the hungry masses, as well as unify the ethical system.

The question our new generation of Christians is now faced with: was the ethical system handed to us, taught to us every Sunday (often in place of theology), right? This skeptical stance will likely put the previous generation, who put their whole lives to understanding ethics, on edge! How can these kids question our logic!

The reflective process (which each generation undertakes) is often not one of reason, but one of affection. I do not deny that there are systematic, logical answers in ethics. What I deny is that objective ethics is Faith, not faith. Faith, as a System, is really just Enlightened Reason. There is trust, but trust in a logical system, not a person, and certainly not directly in a deity.

This is an age-old balance between objectivity and subjectivity. Where does truth lie? Many up front would say “In the Bible, in the creeds” or others “In reason”. I suppose I am claiming more like Kierkegaard: Truth is not in this physical world; I only trust that I have it.

Above all I believe that Christianity is about Jesus being Truth, whom we as individuals subjectively commune with through faith. To say that again: My daily actions are to be trusting Him. When I face an ethical dilemma, what am I to do? God has given me reason, history, His Word, friends and my wife. These are enough ‘priests’ already. We will figure out what to do, and do as we have decided. Our actions “in faith” are that of a stand-in: trust that we are enacting His will on this planet; trust that He would do the same; trust that I do not need another preist to keep me from directly communing with him in prayer and expression of concern.

But all the masses need direction! Without a system it will be mass-chaos! This is (by the way) the same logic which leads people to assume that anarchy=chaos. I am not opposed to organization, I am not opposed to communication. Nor am I opposed to structure. But Jesus has given us the structures we need: husband-and-wife, those with like-faith, rememberance of His death & resurrection. I believe we only *think* we need more. Otherwise, we become text-book, cookie-cutout people.

Is there a difference between me “following God/Jesus in faith” vs. me “following God/Jesus in reason”? The latter is what people have come to term “making God into your own image.” The alternative is a life of openness (or dependence, as Schleiermacher wrote, though I would say the Scriptures & creeds point to this idea!). But one cannot live in this world without decision-making amongst responsibilities, and for the young & without responsibilities (note: not necessarily “irresponsible”, just a more open & potential life) things get confusing and tough. God is The God of History, not just of our personal histories, but of world history. He can work with anything we throw at Him, but the question is always the opposite: can we handle what we throw at ourselves & can we handle what He would throw back at us?!

So to return to the question: most of us likely follow God passively in our own reason: we do as we think we are to do. The opposite option is to follow God actively in our faith: asking daily (dependently, openly) what am I to do/act/think/allow/follow through with today. The 2 middle roads are to follow actively in our reason: which is to make a mockery of Christianity, it is the least mature position. Or we are to follow passively in our faith: when something comes along, we take it. I’m in this last camp, I’ve came from the worst camp, and I’m yet to move forward toward active openness.

Anyone who has read this blog knows I’m a HUGE fan of Johannine lit, and that thanks to the last class in undergrad I took which explained it for me. But in detail, John, being a good shepherd himself, attempts to teach each person to listen to God’s voice (truth) – not just in example, not in knowledge, but in experience – in a soul. “You already know, what you have already heard from the beginning..” He is always calling us to look to what we know, and dive in deeper instead of thinking you already know it, and trying to add on novelties.

Contrast this with Conservative Evangelicalism, which seems to presume Jesus & Paul going around shouting. So in the image they perceive, they fulfill and follow! However, such shouting to the masses is likely not the reality of the matter: Jesus was very discerning, even selective (Zaccheus!) & did not shout or assume all men were willing & able to listen..

John however, followed this selectiveness, speaking to those who can hear instead of forcing ears to be open, or trying to open men’s hearts and lives into conformance, only killing men in the end, creating callous hearts unable to feel or hear the shepherd’s voice, which ought to be known and heard much easier without all this violence..

Now, I understand how all this happened: mid/late modern individuals felt the truth needed defense or modernizing.. that it was an untenable position in the eyes of the masses and needed to be made ‘hearable’ to men’s ears. Sadly, with the updating of this ‘hearability’ or the truth, it weakens the hearability in one’s soul, and even those ‘ears’ were already being closed up by other anti-humane Modern traits and trends.

So what of it all? We are now in a place historically where men’s hearts are pushing against these systemic heart-closing trends, and the most of us who grew up with the half-truth are returning to its fullness once again. To avoid such troubles, what ought we expect in our lives? In our ‘small groups’, amongst our friends, towards our modern cubicle jobs?

Most of us in our 20′s are holding on to some form of identity statements. There’s a set of reactionary statements we make, pushing us from our stodgy, modern childhood & adolescence through our college brains into something called ‘life’ now. Most of us don’t have a good idea where we’re being pushed into, and most of us are ok with just being reactionary. It’s a tad healthy to ‘get away’ from all that was killing us and driving us crazy, but at the same time, it’s not very healthy to not have a solid, grounded, well-explained and considered position or two. Most of us are addicted to reactionism, since it’s just too easy, relative to being responsible & chained down or something.

So what are we to hold on to? What is “what we have heard since the beginning”? Our childhood? The politics and weird social ideologies surrounding “Jesus loves me”? How our parents are too squishy to have anything behind them? Or, our novel ideas which we would say are ‘the beginning’ to our ‘new’ lives as rational adults?

The answer to these q’s are obviously “yes and no”. There’s truth just about anywhere, and that’s the point. Modernism has taught us to learn something, learn it’s place, and them move on from it. That is “growth”. But John’s repetitive writing is obnoxiously incompatible with such a late western ideal. In all my studying of the philosophy of mind and Artificial Intelligence, there’s one thing that makes us human, and it’s not ‘choice’ like The Matrix held up. It’s our forgetfulness. Sure we can ‘learn and move on’, but life isn’t so hierarchical or ordered. We forget (oddly enough, in a logarithmic curve), and we need to be reminded, and relearn not just ‘the place’ but the places each idea influences.

For instance, we are taught to ‘love your neighbor’. (That is sufficiently ‘from the beginning’ as well!) Our first modern question is “and who is our neighbor?” We can learn through someone telling us that we are “to love everyone.” But most of us will not learn such a lesson until they fail to love everyone they meet, and learn the consequences of creating so many broken hearts in this world. This is the repetition we need, for the forgetfulness we bear, and the central point behind grace and mercy shown to another as well as us: we fail, and given enough time, we just might succeed once in awhile.

So back to our small-group. What and how are we to expect our friends to grow and learn? It’s awfully depressing to hear the same issues and concerns each week over and over again, but it’s awfully pressured to feel like we ought learn something weighty upon our hearts.

I’ve never been a fan of ‘a new topic each week’. It’s fickle, and who is doing anything more than repeating their trite identity-building resolutions/reactions anyways? Book-studies are better, and oddly enough, they are more pointed. That’s my point: perhaps ‘small groups’ ought not be focused on the people involved, the times that are compatible to meet, topics agreed upon, but each group have one central goal/theme/recurring idea. “We go to the ‘grace’ group”, or “This is the ‘wrath of God’ group”( ) that kinda sounds fun. The point is to focus our lives around a topic we believe we need to learn, and then to dive in, reminding each other each week ow that has played out in our lives for good or ill, how we forgot, how that could have been useful to survive the week, or perhaps in mildly more intellectual fashion: compare-contrast: each week is a new topic, yes, but how does some societal problem, theological point, sermon this week fail or succeed with or without mercy, or love? This way we learn the depths of God’s truth, love, mercy and wrath. Perhaps even reading a book on the topic, or reading another book off-topic to see how it is or is not shown in characters’ lives..

This all sounds so fruitful to live in the reality of  human forgetfulness instead of in the modern assumption of learn-and-move-on. Most of us will never move on from the Gospel. The love of God is not something to ‘step up from’.. Our lives are not just built on top of his grace, but each brick’s substance is his grace.

So why is it that NASA is having trouble building a new rocketship? Why is it that each generation thinks they’re on to something new & great? And why is it that the collegue of an old nuclear guy has come up with innovation?

Innovation isn’t my topic of choice in the post, but it comes up anyways: perhaps each generation is blinded to the original hope and greatness of the previous generations ideas. “Familiarity breeds contempt.” Not just contempt, but inability to truly innovate. It’s easy to improve, to stand on the shoulders of giants, but to understand the original hope and power of an idea.. now that’s hard to not just maintain across a culture over time, but also to remember and rediscover.

Rediscovery ends up happening when a truly innovative mind comes along and finds out his idea is either too late (someone else did it already in his own time) or when he finds someone else in past history tried, but was either “before his time” or had a poor implementation. Those are not the only options: my concern is when the original glorious hope bred too many ideas and implementations that a society could only handle a few of them, with the rest (wonderful as they were) end up as “failures”, not because of their own merit, but because of the conflation due to a simple collective understanding of the idea. I suppose I speak of fission.. there was much more than just warheads possible.. also semi-clean powerplants. But nuclear power is hardly limitable to electricity-production and bloodshed. And as grateful as I am that there’s now becoming improvements on  the cleanliness side, still I’d prefer to see the original ideas of all the Manhattan Project.

This question is behind any religion-backed legislation & lobbying. This was the original concern in Europe post-reformation (“separation of church and state”). The answer lead many to the New World. Europe has learned it’s lesson for the most part in these matters, and has turned to a legislation type which is (typically, to the American) “liberal” in that it favors allowance for immorality, letting the populace decide just how liberally they want to live. That is to say, just because the law allows one to live and immoral lifestyle does not mean that everyone wants to nor that they will take up the offer. 

It seems 40 years ago American conservatives got scared seeing the world act like the world (allowing immoral behavior), and assumed the worst: that once the immoral gained the foothold, they would strike back with legislation against the moral. What has actually happened is the ‘immoral’ have held up the Constitution which forbids making the moral concerns of the religious illegal. 

The “immoral” have struck back. With simple silence and turned cheek they have made the ‘moral’ look foolish (indeed they often are) and without sensibility.  I don’t for a single second believe Jesus came to set up his throne one this planet, in this age, through his followers pushing legislation. That sounds more like the kind of people Jesus rebuked (Peter, with his man-powered sword and ambitions). So I do not understand why Jesus followers don’t follow the silent, undermining influence of Jesus. Sometimes holding back a tide doesn’t require motion.