Clarion: Journal of Spirituality and Justice

"I can only get to Alyosha via Ivan": Confessions of a Grumpy Universalist - Adrian Lovegrove w/ Bradley Jersak

The following was a conversation via email between Adrian Lovegrove and Bradley Jersak over the final weeks of 2022. 

 

ADRIAN LOVEGROVE

I began formal theological study back in 2011. I could no longer buy the evangelical package deal, but I hoped there might be a theology for a good God somewhere. I guess I've now reached the place of "grumpy universalism."

By "grumpy," I mean in the sense of Ivan's argument in the Brothers Karamazov about the acquisition of truth not being worth the cost of the little child's suffering. Or, put another way, David Bentley Hart's argument concerning the moral implications of creatio ex nihilo, pretty much leaves God with the obligation to bring all he has freely created to its telos, if we're going to call him "good." Consequently, I'm currently finding it hard to feel grateful to God for sending Jesus to rescue everything because it currently seems to me it is entirely God's responsibility to fix the problem he – as the first cause – literally created. 

I appreciate I'm talking as a blinkered and broken creature "looking through a glass darkly" at the inscrutable purposes of the Ground of all existence. I imagine if I were a proper Christian, I could do the "how long, O Lord," and "come quickly, Lord" without losing my temper. But right now, God just pisses me off, and -- though it is a denial of metaphysics since there can be nowhere where God isn't -- I'd really rather not be around him. I have sympathies with the one-talent guy. I guess I have a trust issue.

It's not that I don't like Jesus. It's not that I don't think (from all the ideas I have been exposed to) he has the best things to say about the most important stuff. It's not that I don't think his incarnation was infinitely costly. It's just that it currently seems to me that the things Jesus ultimately rescued us from – satan, sin and death – are all things of his own making.

Have you found ways of getting past this sort of thing to being a decent human being again?

Peace

Ade

 

BRADLEY JERSAK

Hi Ade, 

What a good and important question. 

Let me boil it down to your two punchline points...

1. It currently seems to me that the things Jesus ultimately rescued us from—satan, sin, and death—are all things of his own making.

 

2. Have you found ways of getting past this sort of thing to be a decent human being again?

On the first question, I see your point. And this is where Simone Weil saved my faith through her honesty and her cosmology. 

First, she says that we are faced with two contraries... the Goodness of God and the affliction of humanity.

The two are a real contradiction. There's an infinite distance between the two. We'll come back to that. 

In terms of cosmology, she does something similar. She speaks about (1) gravity and (2) grace or (1) the necessary and (2) the good.

And she regards these pairs as ways that God governs the cosmos. She says that ultimately, gravity and grace are both aspects of the GOOD, but humanity cannot conceive of their union. It's not possible from a human perspective. The GOOD transcends knowing. All we have is our experience, and in our experience, they appear as virtual opposites. To define them...

1. Gravity / the Necessary: refers to the necessary and unbendable pre-conditions for Life and Love, which are why and how God creates the cosmos. Life and Love are the point, the arche (foundations), and the telos (endgame) of the cosmos. God is the first and final cause of life and love. But for life and love to be possible, he must make space (kenosis) for their secondary causes, without which, they cannot be. The necessary pre-condition for life is natural law. And the necessary pre-condition for love is human agency. Without natural law and human agency, there is no possible outcome where life and love come to be that reflects God's life and love.

From these preconditions, all beauty emerges. Beauty as such is manifest in natural law and human agency to such a divine degree that we are tempted to worship them. They are, after all, appearances or images of the God in whom they have being. 

But there is a shadow side. For God to be Love, rather than coercive force, he cannot and does not violate natural law or human agency. If God did so, God would not be Love. And if God does so, God is lousy at it. The arbitrary violation of natural law or human agency would be a Deux Machina that would make all of creation an illusion and all God's creatures puppets. 

The shadow side of natural law is tragedy. The tectonic plates that keep us from sinking into magma rub together and create earthquakes and tsunamis that wipe out cities. The gravity that prevents us from flying to our deaths in space also pulls us to our death when we step off a cliff. This is necessary. But it is not beautiful. It is tragic. 

The shadow side of human agency is evil. The same freedom through which I can willingly turn toward love can be misused to turn willfully from love and toward indifference or hatred or violence. And we exercise this misuse of our passions all the time. That God makes space for this is necessary. In love, he consents to our freedom, and with our freedom, we defy him and wreak havoc. 

This is necessary, but as Weil says, there is an infinite distance between the necessary and the good in our real experience.   

And if we were to stop there, we would just be Deists and to be greatly pitied. Such a God offers consent without participation, and that is not love. So she continues:

2. Grace / the Good: refers to God's willing participation in our world through the mutual consent (surrender, participation) of willing human partners. I explain all of this in more detail in A More Christlike God, but basically, God does not wind up the clock and leave us to our tragedies and evils. He enters the scene in the Incarnation and undergoes them to the nth degree (at the Cross), through which, enters the shadowy abyss, not as an intervention that violates the secondary causes, but as the divine Lover who participates in their healing at every level.

And there on the Cross, he spans the infinitive distance as our affliction and his goodness intersect in his own wounds. Is God the cause of tragedy and evil? Yes and No. He is not the direct cause of any tragedy or evil (that derives from the shadows of secondary causes), BUT because he is ultimately responsible for secondary causes, his only just response is full participation and unfailing mercy, revealed on the Cross. Further, it means that WE are completely responsible to participate in the restoration of all things through our willing surrender to that same cruciform life, as feeble and foolish as it seemed to Paul's opponents in 1 Cor. 1.     

Ivan Karamazov gives what I think is the very best case against Christian faith. 

But for Dostoevsky himself, co-suffering love is the only adequate and completely sufficient response.

I suppose Weil's theology is a metaphysical expression of Alyosha's kiss, for which Ivan could offer no real refutation.  

This leads us to your final question:

Have you found ways of getting past this sort of thing to be a decent human being again?

Only by willing surrender to the cruciform way one day at a time, which for me has required a program of recovery outlined in the 12 steps. Which is to say, on some days. Which is to say, I have a lot of grumpy days but fewer days where I try to overcome through self-will, which is how I (we all) got into this mess in the first place. And I'm still pretty damn grumpy.

All of the above is an explanation of an experience.

I have not found the explanation satisfying, but I did find the experience transformative. 

Thanks for reaching out. 

 

ADRIAN LOVEGROVE

Hi Brad,

Thanks so much for having the grace, and for taking the time, to lay this out so clearly, fully, and candidly in response to my last rant-o-gram. In the wilderness wandering of de/reconstruction, it's always reassuring to encounter folks who have already been there, and who know what it is to score highly on the grump-o-meter.

It seems to me that Ivan and Alyosha represent the only two sane responses to the insuperable contradiction (from a creaturely perspective) of a good God and the suffering of his creation and its creatures. I can take Ivan's place of accusation – which was rather the tenor of my last email to you – or I can take Alyosha's place of faith.

I hesitate to use the word "faith" because I think what we are talking about here is deeper than anything I have heard presented in my Christian experience. I've never read Simone Weil, but here is how I think I now understand faith from your description of her helpful thinking. It is no blind thing. It stares down the barrel of the gun of the suffering of creation without denial or dissociation. It makes no trite claims about God "being in control," or "moving in mysterious ways," or "working all things for good." Instead, it anchors itself in the character of the God-with-us revealed to us in the Christ-event, and on that basis is willing to give that God the benefit of the doubt on the inscrutable question of whether it would have been better not to have created given the risks involved.

Of course, such faith also goes further: choosing to adopt the ways and means of love shown and taught by Christ as the only meaningful approach to existence, within one's small sphere of influence, for whatever short time one has. And in that mustard-seed-sowing, yeast-kneading way, it finds its rest – "the easy yoke." But I'm not sure this "going further" to the place of Alyosha is possible without having settled "the character of God" question. And I'm not sure it's possible to settle this question without going via the place of Ivan, because until we have been there we have not really seen what is at stake.

Two things strike me.

First, having been to Ivan's place, it is very hard not to be a universalist. If this journey doesn't ultimately end well, for everything that the Creator has freely brought into existence, then I can currently see no moral justification for it having been embarked upon in the first place. That is essentially Dr. Hart's argument from creatio ex nihilo again. Perhaps I am still bargaining with God here, rather than simply surrendering to his infinitely better judgment. But I would prefer to love a demonstrably good God than grudgingly comply with an apparently amoral one.

Second, in terms of "demonstrably good," I used to think "the cross as a demonstration of God's character" was one of the weaker Protestant theories of atonement. As it happens, I'm not especially enamoured of such theories now, given the grander vision of salvation that folks like you and Dr. Hart have exposed me to. But for what it's worth, I'm currently feeling like it is the most important "theory" of all. When one bottoms out to where Ivan is, the only hope one has is in the character of God in spite of everything. I'm not privy to the pros and cons of to-create-or-not-to-create. I'm no longer academically interested in what was administratively or legally accomplished on Good Friday. What my heart needs to know is that God is good and that I can trust him. Now. In my actual life.

Wishing you and yours a peaceful and grump-free Christmas,

Ade

 

BRADLEY JERSAK

Thanks Adrian,

I feel like you've made some important points here that I will reflect on. 

First, YES, you are hearing me right re: Weil. Please read Weil, Awaiting God, chapter 2: "The Love of God and Affliction."

Second, she is my best example of your assertion that we only get to Alyosha via Ivan (a brilliant statement) and that this is precisely what she has done. Your restatement of how she does that is beautiful and it works. In a way, she represents the hypostatic union of Ivan and Alyosha (though I guess Dostoevsky already did). 

Third, exactly this: "I would prefer to love a demonstrably good God than grudgingly comply with an apparently amoral one."

And therefore, "having been to Ivan's place, it is very hard not to be a universalist." 

If God is good and good means anything at all other than evil, it simply can't be otherwise. And it isn't. And Jesus said so. "If I am lifted up, I WILL draw all people to myself." How? Via the Cross. 

And finally, "What my heart needs to know is that God is good and that I can trust him. Now. In my actual life."

YES. He cannot just be 'caring,' but somehow must be a real 'caregiver' in real life.

In light of the real affliction that we witness and experience, arriving there is inexplicable... yet somehow, I did. And that involved seeing the mystery of the union of my affliction to his. Not an explanation or theodicy. A Mystery. But real. 

Speaking of grumpy, I remember at one of my low points, mainly not functioning, binge-watching "House" with Hugh Laurie... my word of the year, stolen from him, was "Idiot!" 

My son called 2008 "the year Dad became harsh." I had to make my way via Ivan to Weil, as my path followed from defiance through decreation to acceptance and surrender. 

Blessed by your name,

Bradley Jersak

 

ADRIAN LOVEGROVE

Hi Brad,

You credit me with too much brilliance since, while I did originally write something like "I can only get to Alyosha via Ivan," I didn’t end up writing it quite so succinctly to you. Instead, I thought I had better explain what I meant by that. What I came up with was more long-winded, but that is the kernel of thought that you still picked up on, thankfully. It represents a take on the insight of Weil’s which is currently giving me hope in what I have euphemistically called my "grumpiness."

She has effectively stood, like me, in the place of Ivan and admitted that all he says is true. Yet she has also seen it is not the whole truth. Human suffering is real, and must be reckoned with, if any theological discourse is to have any credibility. But, to use your phrase, "self-giving, radically forgiving, co-suffering love" is also real, and also has to be reckoned with, as God's response in and through Christ, and in and through those trying to follow him. It can probably never provide the explanation my head needs, but it can provide the experience my heart needs, as you have found.

At least from a creaturely perspective, Ivan's place is legitimate. But so is Alyosha's place. And that was the hope that arose in me as I read your summary of Weil. I don't have to deny what Ivan sees in order to affirm what Alyosha sees. I don't have to disconnect myself from what is presently intolerable to also attach myself to what is ultimately restorative. And it is in that tension that, for me, the OT "how long, O Lord," and the NT "Our Lord, come," now makes better sense. They can only be prayed from the place of Alyosha, not from the place of Ivan (but only after having been there). And therein is my hope.

Peace

Ade

 

Christmas Begins in the Quiet - C.E.W. Green

Ecce Homo by CEW Green

Christmas Begins in the Quiet
Lk. 2:1-14

*

Thursday, Christmas Eve eve, as Julie and the kids and I drove down to my parents’ house, I found myself thinking about the Holy Family. (I have been doing a lot of that over the last few months and weeks.) Sometime that morning, a question flashed in my mind, and that night, after everyone had gone to bed, I wrote a little note to St Joseph, a funny-odd cry for help, which ended with a not-at-all-small request:

When you labored your way back to your clan, Mary,
your Mary, was already thick with child. But today, alone
in my father’s house, I feel not her burden but yours.
St Luke, nothing if not sure of his work, says that all
the world had moved to be taxed, everybody
by Caesar’s rule returning to their ancestral home—
a plan so patently insane only a man confused with a god
could’ve ever become pig-headed enough to conceive it.
But as you neared the city’s limits
(it was, I know, no little town for you),
I doubt you gave that madness any thought.
What weight, then, pressed you down? 
Nothing is as taxing as family. Still,
anxiety can’t be what silenced you.

There’s more to the prayer, but I want to stay for a moment with that last line and its question. In St. Luke’s Gospel, Joseph does not speak. The same is true in St Matthew’s. Joseph never says a mumblin’ word. Why? What silenced him? And what does the Spirit mean for his silence to mean for us?

*  *

We acknowledge Joseph as a saint, but I’m not sure we fully appreciate what truly sets him apart. Listen to how he’s praised in the tradition (the Litany of St Joseph):   

Saint Joseph,
Renowned offspring of David,
Light of Patriarchs,
Spouse of the Mother of God,
Chaste guardian of the Virgin,
Foster-father of the Son of God,
Diligent protector of Christ,
Head of the Holy Family,
Joseph most just,
Joseph most chaste,
Joseph most prudent,
Joseph most strong,
Joseph most obedient,
Joseph most faithful,
Mirror of patience,
Lover of poverty,
Model of artisans,
Glory of home life,
Guardian of virgins,
Pillar of families,
Solace of the wretched,
Hope of the sick,
Patron of the dying,
Terror of demons,
Protector of Holy Church, pray for us

Of all the figures in the opening chapters of Luke’s Gospel—Zechariah, Elizabeth, John, Gabriel, Mary, Simeon, Anna—Joseph is far-and-away the least defined. He does not appear even once in Mark, and in John is mentioned just twice, only in passing—and mistakenly identified as Jesus’ father! In the Scriptures, Joseph is not so much a flat character as an empty silhouette, constantly overshadowed by other players in the drama. Why, then, do we praise him as “Light of the Fathers”? How can he be “Patron of the dying” when his death isn’t even mentioned in the Scriptures? He lived without speaking and died without being spoken of. How in God’s name did he come to be celebrated as “Solace of the wretched” and “Terror of demons”?

*  *  *

Roughly 700 years ago, somewhere in southwest Germany, a wildly popular and controversial Dominican preacher, Meister Eckhart, began his Christmas sermon with these words: 

Here in time we make holiday because the eternal birth which God the Father bore and bears unceasingly in eternity is now born in time, in human nature. St Augustine says this birth is always happening. But if it does not happen in me, what does it profit me? What matters is that it shall happen in me.

Eckhart makes no mention of Joseph, but that’s no surprise. Unlike his wife and her son, Joseph rarely appears in Christmas sermons. But Joseph is never absent, even when he’s not seen. And his silence is never simply a void. His presence makes it possible for others to be present, to be presented. His silence makes it possible for others to speak and to be heard.

Think seriously for a moment about this marvel. If Joseph had not done what he did, and left undone what he left undone, there would have been no Christmas. Without Joseph’s obedience, Mary would not have been where she needed to be when she needed to be there—and you and I would not be here, now. Without Joseph’s dreams, Jesus would not have lived to live his life. Without Joseph’s (very pregnant) silence, Mary could not have borne the Word, and Jesus would never have spoken—God’s silence would be nothing to us.

That first Christmas, Mary was wholly consumed in awe, rapt in the contemplation of her newborn baby and the eternal Father whose praise he perfected. Joseph was left to do the “dirty work.” He had to “Martha” so she could “Mary.” As Leiva-Merikakis, says, Joseph danced around Mary as David had danced around the Ark. He was perfectly at ease in his role as a minor, backgrounding figure, happy to be a supporting character—because he knew it really is more blessed to give than to receive. No room was found for them in the inn. But none was needed, because Joseph, like his God, was roomy. That is why he shines with such a pure light, a barely visible star still guiding us.

We’re all meant to be Josephs—the terror of demons and the solace of the wretched. And there is not one but many Marys around us, all already great with child. Our job is simply to be their unassuming shelter, their quiet, stable support, to give so they can give—to the world’s delight.

Christmas always begins in the quiet.

C.S. Lewis, Atonement & Universal Salvation - Bradley Jersak

UNIVERSAL SALVATION

While I am convinced of the NT promise of ultimate redemption, I continue to be reluctant to identify myself personally with the label 'universalism.' That is mainly because its opponents typically assume they know what that word means, and have falsely accused me of not believing in the gravity of sin, the necessity of the Incarnation is necessary, the centrality of the Cross, the importance of a faith response, or in the dire warnings of a forthcoming judgment. I have found it difficult to convince them that I believe these are all crucial to the apostolic gospel, despite affirming each of these essentials in my published books and blogs over the past twenty years. At some point, the slander should be regarded as willful, and I do believe infernalists should join me in taking 1 Corinthians 6:10 to heart.   

But one reason that Evangelical and Orthodox universalists of good faith continue to be maligned is that so many pop-universalists have lived down to the caricatures of which we're accused and have readily dispensed with the gospel altogether. So for me, "universalism" is too big an umbrella term. At the very least, in needs the parameters of a limiting adjective, such as "Patristic Universalism." As for me, I opt to drop the -ism altogether and prefer to cite the many biblical texts that announce a gospel of "ultimate redemption" or "apokatastasis" (the restoration of all things) by "the Saviour of the world." 

I'm inclined to say, "I am not a universalist (by your definition), but I do believe in ultimate redemption." Then inquirers who hear that as a contradiction at least have to ask me what I mean. Some (okay, many) who ask come from traditions of zealous biblicism (as I have), so I am pleased to cite Scripture upon Scripture (in context), beginning with Jesus Christ's promise, "If I am lifted up, I will draw all people to myself" and remind them that God's plan has been revealed in Ephesians 1 (the summing up of all things in Jesus Christ) and 1 Corinthians 15 (that God will be all in all). I can go on for dozens of verses on that, but then I also like to add, "I am a conservative on these things, opting to conserve the Tradition as we see it in Macrina the Younger, Gregory of Nyssa, Isaac of Nineveh, and especially the hymnology of the Great Tradition..." Then I show them many many samples of weekly songs from the Octoechos. At that point, I may say, "You may still believe in the hell of eternal conscious torment, but I believe ... [and I cite the Symbol of Faith, aka Nicene Creed], which means we may disagree, but any charge of heresy is above our paygrade. 

A HEALING TORMENT

"So you don't believe in hell?" Sigh. Of course I do. See, for example, my book Her Gates Will Never Be Shut or my many blogs affirming divine judgment and the importance of talking about hell (better). It's just that when the Bible speaks about hell, there's a powerful case to be made from the Bible itself that it's not describing infernalism (eternal conscious torment)... including the 'gotcha' verses in Jesus' parable of the sheep and goats in Matthew 25.

One friend (who I'll take the heat for), talks about "Gehenna" (the word often translated as "hell" in the NT) this way:  

"If Gehenna is the torment of the conscience, then it should be a healing torment that works for redemption, 'the restoration of all things,' as the apostle Peter says, the end to the alienation between the human nature and the Divine nature." 

LEWIS ON ATONEMENT & HELL

At the roots of the controversy are two very different understandings of God's nature. In the Orthodox tradition of which I am a part, we see nothing in the nature of God that demands retribution through violence. This has implications for our understanding of both the atonement and the Day of Judgement.

"But," I am asked, "if God doesn't satisfy his wrath through the death of his Son, then why did Jesus die?" It's a fair question until it extends to another common accusation: "Then you believe Jesus didn't need to die and that the Cross is dispensable." An odd leap, and hurtful, considering the centrality of the Cross in books such as Stricken by God?, A More Christlike God, and From the Cave to the Cross. 

Now CS Lewis is an interesting case, both on the atonement and on the topic of hell (both following the man he called his 'master,' George MacDonald).

Re: the atonement, Lewis retrieves the theology of the early church (especially Athanasius), and he refutes standard penal substitution theory (especially as wrath-appeasement), which he explicitly rejects in both Mere Christianity and in his letters to Bede Griffiths. And he sets up the Patristic alternative in his Chronicles of Narnia. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, you get the combination of biblical themes--the ransom paid for freedom AND the plunder of the strongman's house, both reflecting the Hebrew Exodus narrative. Readers might enjoy this 1-page article I wrote about that: 

https://www.clarion-journal.com/clarion_journal_of_spirit/2016/03/god-is-not-the-witch-cs-lewis-on-the-atonement-brad-jersak.html   

On the topic of hell, The Great Divorce was amazing. My favourite Lewis book. He leaves the door open (as does Revelation 21-22) to human agency and the perpetual possibility of a response, without dogmatizing the redemption of all (even if Paul does so in Eph. 1, Phil. 2, Rom. 5, Rom. 11, 1 Cor. 15, etc.).

But beyond that fictional classic, it's worth pondering and responding to Lewis' claim that "The doors of hell are locked from the inside" (from The Problem of Pain). 

First, he is obviously refuting literalist readings of texts where Christ or his angels are represented as actively casting the damned into the lake of fire or outer darkness. Those texts are obviously in our Scriptures, sometimes coming from Jesus. But I don't believe Lewis is ignoring them to get God off the hook. More likely, he is clarifying that such language is limited to the symbolism of visions, parables, and metaphors that, in the end, Lewis affirms human agency and describes self-inflicted consequences.

BUT...  I like to go a step further, and leave you imagining Lewis in conversation with Christ, like so:

Lewis: "The doors of hell are locked from the inside." 

Jesus' answer #1 at the Cross - "Doors?" as he tears the veil of the Holy of Holies, which has represented paradise locked to us.

Jesus' answer #2 on Holy Saturday - "Doors?" as he shatters the gates and stands on them, pulling us up by the wrists (as in the resurrection icon). 

Jesus' answer #3 on Easter Sunday - "Doors?" as he passes through them as if they are mist, as he did in the upper room.

 

 

Christmas Is What God Does - Fr. Kenneth Tanner

Icon by by Ivanka Demchuk UBP

The story of the world—the story we just heard read in the church as our gospel for Christmas, the world’s true story from which all true stories are told—happened in a world exactly like our world.

It was as is ours a world of emperors and governors, of trade routes and ships, of armies and (less deadly) missiles, of wheat, wine, and oil, of palaces and hovels, of well-appointed houses and simple shacks, of swords and spears, of pubs and caves and lean-tos, of banquets and famines, of night, stars, cold, and sheep...same world.

A person that humans allowed to be important, Augustus, with a big made-up title—“Caesar” (if that sounds ancient, try ones we make up like czar, prime minister, führer, or president [persons who are here today and gone tomorrow, whose power is illusory—it’s not ultimately real and it doesn’t last])—wanted a head count of his conquered masses. And everyone had to go out of their way to appease the bully.

The government order causes hardship for a lot of people. The most trouble (as in our present pandemic moment) is visited on the poor who are made to travel long distances on meager resources to the place of their birth for the census because that’s what Caesar’s order dictates.

The world’s truest story is the story of one such family, a pregnant mother, and her rough-handed carpenter fiancé, who could find no room, out in all of that cold and all of that dark, for the God she bore and the God he protected.

They had both in their own ways made room for God. Mary had said yes to the divine invitation to bear God in her womb. Joseph had heeded the Angel and shielded Mary, his betrothed, had loved her as he had been loved.

They had made room for God but the world had no room for them or for God—you see, it’s the same world as our world—even though she was pregnant and in labor. But such is God’s way in this world, homeless and with no place to lay his head.

The first Christians tell us that the couple found space with the animals in a cave among shit and straw. And then she gave birth like all mothers do: it was painful, and there was blood and sweat and serum, and cords to cut, and a cry from the human God split their ears and their silent night.

We Should Be Unimpressed - Christmas Eve Sermon by Allen Doerksen

Isaiah 9:2-7; Luke 2:1-20

Recounting his visit to Bethlehem Fr. Allen unpacks what he saw that day in light of Isaiah's majestic prophecy and the familiar scene painted by Luke.

Audio version HERE 

ISAIAH 9:2-7

The people who walked in darkness
    have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
    on them light has shined.
³ You have multiplied exultation;
    you have increased its joy;
they rejoice before you
    as with joy at the harvest,
    as people exult when dividing plunder.
⁴ For the yoke of their burden
    and the bar across their shoulders,
    the rod of their oppressor,
    you have broken as on the day of Midian.
⁵ For all the boots of the tramping warriors
    and all the garments rolled in blood
    shall be burned as fuel for the fire.
⁶ For a child has been born for us,
    a son given to us;
authority rests upon his shoulders,
    and he is named
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
    Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
⁷ Great will be his authority,
    and there shall be endless peace
for the throne of David and his kingdom.
    He will establish and uphold it
with justice and with righteousness
    from this time onward and forevermore.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.

Looking in at the grotto, surrounded by a lot of people from all over, I thought, "Sure, why not, it's grubby enough, it's ordinary enough, this could be it. And if it isn't, well, it's as good a place as any in this city—this city under oppression as it seemingly always has been."

I'm referring to Bethlehem and my experience almost forty years ago, visiting the Church of the Holy Nativity and the very spot, according to tradition, where Mary bedded down and, through the ordeal that is human reproduction, birthed the most consequential human being to have wandered the continents of this planet.

I didn't say the smartest, the most charismatic, the strongest or most attractive, or even the most creative. Just the most consequential.

I was entirely unimpressed as a young man—a theologically uninformed young man—when I paused briefly before the spot and then was relentlessly and inexorably pushed forward and away by the surging crowd and the urgings of the officials.

Indeed at every place in my three months in Israel/Palestine, I was underwhelmed—underwhelmed by the dust and grime of all the holy sites, so ordinary, I came to see in retrospect that they actually "got it."

They actually captured how it is that God glories in ordinary, grotto humans, and by glorying in the ordinary, highlights how everything about us is truly extraordinary.

Ernest Hemmingway: Ski Nomad - Ron Dart

There were no ski lifts from Schruns and no funiculars. You climbed on foot carrying your skis and higher up, where the snow was too deep, you climbed on seal skins that you attached to the bottoms of the skis . At the tops of the mountain valleys there were the big Alpine huts….The most famous of these high base huts were the Lindauer-Hutte, the Madlener-Haus  and the Wiesbadener-Hutte.          

—A Moveable Feast

 

Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) lived a life of diverse adventures, but when young, many were the ski trips he did with his 1^st wife, Hadley Richardson. Hemingway had a tangential engagement in WWI (served as an ambulance driver and infantryman with the Italian army), but given the fact WWI ended in 1918, Hemingway’s involvement was short-lived, he being only 19 years of age at the time. It was, though, from 1921-1926 that Hemingway and his wife Hadley Richardson (and their son Bumby) lived in Paris, and, when Paris winters were wet and cold, they took to Schruns in Austria to ski. Hemingway and Hadley, when in Parish, hob knobbed with the literary high mucky-mucks such as Stein, Pound, Fitzgerald, Ford, and others, but it was to the winter beauty of the Austrian Alps that they often turned to for oxygen of the soul and literary inspiration (The Sun Also Rises, Hemingway’s breakthrough novel done in drafts when in Schruns). Hemingway, in the final chapter of A Moveable Feast, writes, “We loved the Vorarlberg, and we loved Schruns. We would go there about Thanksgiving time and stay until nearly Easter.”

Ernest and Hadley had begun their skiing days together in Switzerland and Cortina d’Ampezzo in the Dolomites when Bumby was near birth. But, it was to the spacious Montafon Valley in Austria where Ernest and Hadley turned to ski when Paris was not pleasant to live, Schruns and Tchagguns their favourite ski treks. Ernest was in his mid-20s, Hadley in her early 30s in the peak of their ski years, the Hotel Taube in Schruns their winter home. Hadley and Ernest were fortunate, in the early 1920s, that Walter Lent had started a ski school in the area, Lent a disciple and friend of the ski pioneer Hannes Schneider (1890-1955). Lent took them to the high glaciers and superb ski runs, no lifts in those days, treks to the high alpine huts their scenic delights, Madlener-Haus a favourite ski trip. Many of the Austrian huts mentioned by Hemingway are beauties worth the visit as hikes in the summer or ski trips in the white-clothed winter. Hemingway mentioned the dangers of avalanches, his courses in avalanches with Lent and the death of 13 buried (9 killed) in an avalanche when Lent did not heed his own sense of mountain safety and was called a coward for not taking guests from Germany to places he should not have taken them—sadly so, Lent lived to regret his intimidation. Lent’s ski school took a dive afterwards and, in many ways, Ernest and Hadley became his only students. Hemingway makes a gentle dig against the Roman Catholic Church by mentioning a man killed in the avalanche “was refused burial in the consecrated ground by the local priest, since there was no proof he was a Catholic”.

Mountain Mentors - Poem by Ron Dart

Mountain Mentors

Delores LaChapelle (d. January 22 2007)    

Edward LaChapelle (d. February 1 2007)                   

I was young in those days, 
keen to learn mountain lore, to take to glaciers and snow packed slopes,
could ski better than walk, left school before finishing, against my elders’ advice, to live the mountain life, to be far from the madding crowd, early 1970s with mountain sami in northern Norway,

Arnae Naess a north star, Swiss guides my guides.

There were, of course, dangers on peaks, places to be alert and alive to when off piste, when in deep powder.

It was Edward who pioneered avalanche safety in those unsure, untried years, research from Alta Utah our north star, The ABCs of Avalanche Safety (1961) our primer and sacred text on the subject.

Alpine touring in those years was still in its infancy, and it was Edward again that did much of the early work on transceivers when most of us used antiquated means to find a buried friend.

It was in the late 1960s, I was one winter never a day not on skis, traveling the slopes like a mountain gypsy, high ridges and peaks my meccas and New Jerusalem. Was there more to mountain life than skill finesse and the rush of a challenging and steep descent between rocks on all sides? 

Dolores, you walked me yet deeper and further, taught me much of the real reasons for mountain life and soul sanity.

Your many books were tender, probing, informed, D. H. Lawrence and Martin Heidegger, deep ecology and mountain soul knit affectionately with soft powder Tai Chi spirituality, the new society and a deeper way of being ever before you.

It was all about future primitive, wisdom of the earth and a return to the mountains.

You parted paths for reasons oft-stated, a sadness I felt, but understood the reasons for—mentors are rare in our time, mountain mentors that remain together rarer still.

You took different trails, took to different peaks, far, far from one another—Edward to a one-room log cabin in Alaska, Dolores in Silverton,

You left us Delores in January 2007. It was kind of you Edward to make the long journey south to attend the funeral to bid adieu to Delores.

Did you realize how the trip would end?

The funeral over and done, you decided, at 80, to do a final deep powder descent. Why? What were you feeling at the time? You died on the mountain Dolores called home.

The thick ropes of mountain memories are not easily shredded or ripped apart.

montani semper liberi

Ron Dart

Alan Dennis' "Snow Nomad: An Avalanche Memoir" - Review by Ron Dart

Alan Dennis, Snow Nomad:  An Avalanche Memoir
Friesen Press, 2022

Review by Ron Dart

I have had an ongoing interest, the last few decades, in the life and philosophic vision of Dolores LaChapelle. LaChapelle’s early pioneering work with Arne Naess in deep ecology and her deep powder skiing insights were partially birthed when working with her avalanche legend husband, Ed LaChapelle—such a nomad life of sorts both lived in the snowfields of time and avalanche research set them apart as much respected avalanche mentors for many. Ed LaChapelle is mentioned, with due reverence, a few times, in Alan Dennis’ compelling read of an autobiography of sorts, Snow Nomad: An Avalanche Memoir.

Snow Nomad is a fast-paced, quick read of Dennis’ early novice journey into the demanding world of more mature avalanche work, courses few, hard lessons learned on the job as he gradually rose the ranks to become an avalanche expert in BC and other parts of the world. Many of the photographs, sketches, and text tell an honest and raw tale from the perspective of an insider on the layered and complex world of those who live within the avalanche tribe and, as with most families the internal tensions, clashes, and betrayals. This is no romanticized view of mountaineering, skiing, and avalanche life in Canada or in the various places outside of Canada in which Dennis has lived his avalanche vocation.   

Alan’s initial journey into the ethos of mountaineering was shaped and informed by his experiences with Outward Bound (when it was in Keremeos) in the early 1970s (I have many found memories of being with Outward Bound in the mid-1970s). Such a key in the ignition with Outward Bound was to take Alan into the larger and fuller world of mountain culture and avalanche safety. His time spent in the Yukon, then to the more demanding challenges of Granduc Mine Road and Bear Pass moved Alan’s avalanche apprenticeship to a higher level. But, it was in New Zealand at Milford Road in the early 1980s (avalanche conditions even more perilous and precarious) that the skills learned, intuition elevated and local insights heeded, that more was internalized about the science-art tension of avalanche safety heightened.

The journey back to Canada and Alan’s leadership role from Revelstoke with the Canadian Avalanche Association/Canadian Avalanche Centre from 1991-1998 is worth many a read (chapter 19)--no punches are pulled, his time a difficult one, the inner dynamics of leadership contested, Alan departing in a trying manner, bureaucrats and consultants often hair shirts of sorts ((chapter 20)---such is often the dilemma when different temperaments and reads of how avalanche safety is to be interpreted collide. A significant number of people in Canada and elsewhere are named in positive and negative ways by Alan as he makes sense of his journey with them in the avalanche clan.

The description of Alan’s time with the Scottish Avalanche Information Service (SAIS) from 1999-2004 and 2008-2011 makes for a mesmerizing read (chapter 24). The time spent in Meager Creek, Adanac Moly, and Coeur Alaska from 2004-2007 reveals yet more about the far-flung avalanche family, his time in Veladero (chapter 30) on the border of Chile and Argentina (camping at 3800 metres, high point on the road 4800 metres) a read that remains with the reader as a nail biter of sorts.

There is much in Snow Nomad that is worth sitting with and reflecting on---few have the sheer breadth and wide-ranging experiences in avalanche work both for the purpose of safe skiing, ski touring, and high mountain passes avalanche safety as does Alan. The accumulated wisdom of such diverse experiences and lessons learned about avalanches both near and far makes this evocative book a definitive primer and must-read for those (regardless of the mountain terrain they live, move and have their being in) who ever need to be aware of the ambiguities of avalanche dangers.

The cover of Snow Nomad with two skiers on a high mountain ridge gazing down on layered snow dunes makes it seem that the book might be about skiing and avalanche safety--not so. The broad approach taken in Snow Nomad covers a wide variety of places and methods used in different weather conditions to, as much as possible, anticipate the deadly nature of avalanches and avoid their tragic consequences.

The style of writing in this charmer of a book is lucidly autobiographical, honest and raw regarding people, organizations and tensions in the leadership of avalanche safety but a sane and sensible breadth permeates each chapter, each step of the journey of mistakes learned from, lessons internalized and insights gained, no silver bullet or snake oil a conclusive answer on how to absolutely avoid avalanches. But, no doubt, this is a beauty and bounty of a book that one and all should own, read and inwardly digest if interested in mountain life and the challenges avalanches present to those who spend time in such places. There can be no doubt, though, that the rich and varied life of Alan Dennis has taken him to places and upped the level of avalanche work and awareness far beyond that of the pioneering life and research of Ed LaChapelle and, to a lesser degree, Dolores LaChapelle.

montani semper liberi

Ron Dart                                                     

Mary and John: Troubled Families - Ron Dart

House of the Virgin Mary

When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Dear woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home (John 19: 26-27).  

There is a worrisome tendency, amongst some, to project an idealized and romanticized version of the family. Was this the experience of Mary and John? Let us, all too briefly, enter the family realities of both Mary and John, the Biblical text is often lean but suggestive—much, though, can be read between the historical lines.

We know Mary would have been on a difficult journey in which she was frequently misread and misunderstood. The pregnancy would have raised multiple eyebrows, and if not for Joseph’s dream, the pregnancy would have been yet more trying for her. The fact that Roman taxation upped the taxes, meant Joseph and Mary had to leave Nazareth for Bethlehem near delivery time must have been painful—no supportive parents close by when the birth occurred. Was there extended family in Bethlehem after the birth? Where was God in all this? Seemingly absent from a certain perspective! Then there was Herod’s death squads (worst of the Roman military), the slaughter of the innocents, and flight to Egypt—not quite the sanitized and domesticated Christmas we celebrate, religious festivals aplenty, songs and carols, door-to-door caroling, presents opened on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. The 1^st Christmas was fraught with uncertainty, ambiguity, and threats from various places and angles—certainly no secure, warm, and predictable few months.

Did Mary and Joseph have extended family in Egypt? And did Mary have other children when in Egypt (church tradition differs on more children or none)? The text is silent on such a question. And, when did Joseph die? How many children did Joseph-Mary have before his death? How did Mary raise the children (if there were more), and more to the pertinent point, how many of her children truly and deeply understood Mary’s internal life and Jesus’ vocation? Much she must have kept quiet within her heart, her honesty often ignored or opposed, questioned, and doubted. What were the years like with Jesus and Mary as he aged and his vision and vocation became more obvious and clearer? And, most of his siblings probably thought his unfolding journey most questionable and dangerous (given Roman occupation and Sanhedrin ideology).

We know James and John were called “sons of thunder”, their lives were, initially, oriented to making a living with nets, water, and fish. How did their families respond when they left their jobs for a vocation? It seems there were, as we read between the lines, tensions with their decisions, mother, father, and siblings thinking such a decision naïve and foolhardy, both men expected to remain near kith and kin to provide for growing families. And, being “sons of thunder” (when young and such a tendency never fully disappearing), what were discussions like when points of differences emerged about Jesus, job, and vocation? Did John, in time, feel less and less comfortable with his blood family? And Mary, much the same?

We know that as the disciples dispersed, John moved to Ephesus, and the Johannine community took root and flourished there, Ephesus being a strategic Greek port city and hub of trading in the Mediterranean.  But, for a moment, let us linger with Jesus’ final few words to Mary and John and, perhaps, the reasons for them. John records Jesus’ final words to Mary and himself in John 19:26-27 when Jesus was hanging on the cross. Why did Jesus not ask his siblings (other friends or extended family) to care for Mary? What was it about John’s potentially difficult family (parents and siblings) that Jesus suggested to John Mary was to be his mother? Both Mary and John’s larger blood family, it seems, were not the most sensitive and aware of their deeper vocations and supportive of them. Was there simply indifference, opposition, betrayal? We can only guess and speculate, but we do know as Jesus was hanging on the cross, he understood the sadder story of familial disappointments and lack of siblings' support and understanding. There is much to reflect on in Jesus’ words to John (Mary is to be his mother) and Mary (John is her true son). There is an obvious backstory to such a compassionate concern for both Mary and John. What was the nature of the many discussions Mary and John had with Jesus about their families that led to Jesus’ final acts of concern for them, knowing he would soon depart and life would go on? How would the life of Mary and John go on? 

As mentioned above, John and Mary moved to Ephesus, a layered and complex Christian community in existence there (the writer of Revelation 2:1-7 having much to say about the church in Ephesus), John the Abba and Bishop of sorts, Mary his true mother in faith, John her true son on the faith journey. We know, in Ephesus, there remains, as a tourist destination for Christians and Muslims, “The House of Mary” or “Our Lady of Ephesus,” a sacred shrine, certainly worth a visit or a watch on YouTube.  What was it like for Mary for John (the beloved) to be her protective and pastoral son? What was it like for John for Mary to be his soul mother? They shared so much history together, such tales to tell about Jesus and the growth of the young church. Needless to say, such a relationship certainly transcended the more natural families of birth. It would be interesting to reflect (evidence slim yet significant) on how John-Mary’s leadership of the church in Ephesus altered direction and pathways after their deaths that gave rise to the warnings of Revelation 2:1-7. 

It is significant that in the Greek language and Christian tradition, there are two notions of family. There is the Greek term, oikos, which means one's family of birth or extended families. There is no guarantee such families will be ones of concord, unity, support, and understanding---this was, probably, not the experience of Mary and John. There is also the Greek term, paraoikos, from which we get the notion of the faith family, a version of the family that transcends the natural family—such is the supernatural and eternal family, those whose souls are knit together for a higher and fuller end and journey. We derive our English word, parish (meaning broader area and people who faithfully live within such an area) from such a Greek and Latin word. Mary and John certainly understood the notion of paraoikos on all three levels: supportive soul companion, a faith community in Ephesus and the broader area of which Ephesus formed the geographical and cultural context. But, we also know that the high ideals of the paraoikos can deteriorate and be dimmed, as the vision and warning to the 7 churches in Revelation 2-3 embody. Whose version of the divine family can be trusted? Obviously, a combination of loyalty and criticism must be lived in ongoing tension, some being loyal but not critical, others only loyal to criticism (and its impotent tendencies)    

In sum, Mary and John offer a distinctly Christian notion of family that is not necessarily at one with the natural family—such a vision goes much deeper, is more comprehensive but knows the soul suffering of being misunderstood and often betrayed by the natural family—Mary and John have much to teach us if we take the time to sit with them and hear their deeper version and vision of the family that ever grows closer and closer, deeper and deeper, ever maturing like fine wine.

Amor Vincit Omnia

Ron Dart

Bonhoeffer: Pacifism and Resistance Revisited with help from Karl Barth - Roger Newell

How do we reconcile the fact that the same Dietrich Bonhoeffer whose pacifist sympathies are well known and whose intention to travel to India and visit Gandhi are well documented, joined the Resistance conspiracy to assassinate the German head of state? In two recent books, Mennonite scholar Mark Thiessen Nation and fellow minded colleagues cut the Gordian knot by insisting that if contemporary readers are to encounter the real Bonhoeffer, his role in the Resistance must be significantly calibrated downward, amounting to a ruse crafted by his brother-in-law to keep him from military service. In the process, he served as a pastoral counselor to a few of the conspirators.¹ Whether we end up agreeing or disagreeing, Nation raises important questions that invite fresh consideration of Bonhoeffer’s path. This essay will look at some details of Bonhoeffer’s reflections on pacifism and resistance, with special attention to the influence of Karl Barth on his path. I will also look at the implications for our own troubled times as the Church again responds to war in Europe.

Nation’s thesis entails two claims. First, he insists that a close examination of Bonhoeffer’s writings reveals a thoroughgoing commitment to pacifism from which he never departed. Consistent in his reflections on pacifism from 1932, Bonhoeffer made an unequivocal call to peacemaking along with a denunciation of participation in war on the part of Christians. “This sort of witness is typically referred to as pacifism; and Bonhoeffer so labels his own approach.”² The implication is that any serious participation in the Resistance conspiracy would have amounted to a betrayal of his beliefs. Nation ascribes the usual view of Bonhoeffer the conspirator to reading him through the filter of Reinhold Niebuhr, Bonhoeffer’s American teacher. According to Niebuhr’s Christian Realism, a morally honest confrontation with the horrors of Hitler would compel one to do whatever it takes to stop the perpetrator, assassination included.³ However, if, as Nation gradually came to do, one holds the Niebuhr paradigm lightly and weighs far more heavily Bonhoeffer’s own writings, his role in the Resistance amounts to naught. Nation’s other argument (to be discussed later) is that when it comes to the conspiracy and Bonhoeffer’s role, the historiography of Bonhoeffer’s friend and biographer, Eberhard Bethge, is unreliable.

How shall we assess this reappraisal? Straightaway we should note Nation’s alignment with the across-the-board consensus that the Sermon on the Mount was at the center of Bonhoeffer’s understanding of the Christian faith. In letters to family and friends, he repeatedly asserts the Sermon’s centrality to discipleship. He writes his brother, Karl-Friedrich, “But I do believe I am on the right track, for the first time in my life.... I think I think I am right in saying that I would only achieve true inner clarity and honesty by really starting to take the Sermon on the Mount seriously... The restoration of the church must surely depend on . . . a life of uncompromising discipleship, following Christ according to the Sermon on the Mount.”⁴

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Page 1 Foototes

1 Mark Thiessen Nation, et al., Discipleship in a World Full of Nazis. Recovering the True Legacy of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. (Eugene, Oregon: Cascade Books, 2022), 174, 187. The book includes essays by Stanley Hauerwas and Scot McNight. Cf. also Nation, et al., Bonhoeffer the Assassin? (Baker, 2013)
2 Ibid., 85.
3 Ibid., 3. Here Nation follows Charles Marsh, Strange Glory, (NY: Knopf, 2014), 108. Marsh admits, however, that Bonhoeffer himself never acknowledged any serious theological debt to Niebuhr.
4 Dietrich Bonhoeffer Collected Works, Vol. 13, London: 1933-1935, (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), "Letter to Karl- Friedrich Bonhoeffer," Jan. 14, 1935, 284.

The Church is Everywhere (Even In Churches) - Fr. Kenneth Tanner

It is true that the church is universal and so everywhere, enveloping all creation. The church does not have borders or rails or walls.

I had a friend whose church was the massive entourage of workers that accompanied the global tours of a rock group. Marriages. Baptisms. Loitering. Listening. Word. Presence. Communion. He was their shepherd.

He was grateful for a friend who called his flock a church. He told me so.

My wisest friends in the Eastern churches tell me we can never say where the church is not, only where it is.

Lately, it’s become fashionable to say that the church is not in buildings with pews and altars and pulpits. And I understand the inexcusable beliefs and the practices, abuses, and harms that lead to such convictions.

I still see the church in unusual and unexpected places, like AA meetings and bars, and I celebrate its presence everywhere two or more are drawn by the human God.

And, God forgive me, I still see the church in its institutions. The Spirit of God is not limited by our judgments against one another or our experiences or our bad theology.

The Spirit falls and moves in places we judge as dead or broken or irredeemable.

Humility teaches us to love every gathering of God’s people for God loves them.

This is not a counsel to settle for anything less that the goodness and mercy, the beauty and justice, of Jesus Christ.

We welcome the fire of his restorative works that will eventually make of us gods, beginning with our own house, but we do not say where the church is not.