Saving Souls
Well, I have an organic final Monday, a 20 page term paper due Tuesday, and two finals on Wednesday...so why not use this time to post theological and literary philosophizing? Good plan.
I'm actually going to start with the literary stuff because I just got a solid start on my lit paper for Modernism. Also, I think it ties nicely with whatever my current theology is. So...the central argument of my paper is that the goal of Modernist writers (we're talking Eliot, Pound, Cummings, Joyce, Stein, Faulkner, Steinbeck, etc) is to save us. They are, essentially, evangelical. From what, you may ask?
From history and tradition (and religion fits nicely into this category, as far as most of them are concerned [although I will never stop being surprised at Eliot's Anglo-Catholicism]). From corruption in government. From ignorance. From innocence (since they largely believed that true understanding could only result from experience). From complacency and laziness, and from apathy. From hesitation and stagnation. And from illusion. Enter the dynamism of the Modern, the fragmentation, the constant "making it new," the political radicalism, the frank confrontation with sexuality and discrimination, the graphic descriptions of suffering and corruption, the stream-of-consciousness, the paradox of struggling indefinitely with surety of failure, the epiphany, and the attempt to somehow impose order on and extract meaning from this fleeting life. Why does Eliot create Prufrock, why present him to us, why are we so appalled by him? Because Eliot is warning us--shoving the most undesirable existence imaginable in our faces in such a way that we cannot help but recognize pieces of ourselves in Prufrock. What should we do with Prufrock? We should learn from him--Prufrock is a Christ figure in this sense; he must suffer and we must witness it so that we can escape that same fate. If we do our work as readers correctly, then reading "Prufrock" should save us from fear and inaction. I could go on but you get the gist. These broken fragments we should indeed shore against our ruins...and if that phrase means nothing to you, then go read the Wasteland. Immediately.
I could perhaps have segued more smoothly, but on to church-type things. I had considerably more to say about all of this last week, and I will try to remember some of it. First, I love the UU church and am very happy that I am a member and go (more or less) regularly. Last week, the minister held a sort of new member orientation type workshop. I went and so did about four or five other people, most of whom I knew already from the campus ministry group. After an overview of UU history (with which I was already pretty familiar), we moved into discussion. One of the statements we had to take a position on was, "I have an understanding of a higher, divine power or being." There wasn't anyone there who was a traditional theist; most took varying degrees of agnosticism. I was the most atheist person there, and when it was my turn to explain my position, I gave the answer I usually give: that I had seen no evidence for a higher power (and furthermore had not even seen a purpose for one) and I didn't believe we needed anything greater than humanity--humanity should be enough. And the minister (who is pretty awesome) challenged--and perhaps even rebuked--me.
He began by briefly talking about hubris. Now, I know that pride is my biggest "sin", and so many things from this year have highlighted that for me and pushed me to work on it. Anyway, so he cautioned me against hubris, and justified his caution by saying (I'm loosely paraphrasing from memory here), "We need to have some sense of humility, some sense of our limitations. Where else can that come from, if not god? There was a psychologist who once said, 'Whether or not there is a god, we are not it.' Something to think about." The conversation about conceptions of divinity/god continued, and I thought long and hard about what the minister had said.
My initial reaction was, "Why not? Why shouldn't we be god?" But at the same time, I understood exactly what he said about needing humility. I tried to articulate then that since going to church, I have started to feel a calming sense of humility--the pressure that my worldview exerted on me had lessened somehow; perhaps it was because I am realizing, slowly, that the absence of the personal and all-powerful Judeo-Christian god does not mean that I must be god. I am atheist, but that doesn't prevent me from acknowledging that some things are simply beyond me. Humility can, I think, arise from sources other than a god. Considering the vastness of our universe and the notion that we are created from stardust (literally) certainly humbles me--just as lying in the grass and staring at a tree for a while does.
Listening to what other people had to say also made me seriously consider my label of atheism. That I do not believe in a personal, ominpotent god is certain. But surely other perspectives of divinity are possible, other notions of what "god" might be, and among those other possibilities I may find one that I works for me. Maybe nontheist is better? I think there is a difference, but I don't know how to articulate it yet.
Finally, my current thoughts on salvation. When I left church last Wednesday night, I wanted very badly to pray. This actually isn't too unusual for me, but it was particularly fervent on that walk home. And I am not sure that "pray" is even the right word, but I don't know of a better one. I didn't want to bombard a superpower with my problems and have it deliver magical solutions to me, but I was just consumed in this feeling of awe, and wonder, and I was humbled, and I was at a (mental) place of reverent peace. This might be incoherent; I don't know how to describe it. In my mind it is similar to when Christians want to worship their God for the sheer joy of worship, not to appease Him or appeal to Him (though I may be misinterpreting that state of mind). I didn't have a place to bestow my reverence and I didn't have an outlet for channeling these emotions. I don't think it was a bad thing, the inability to directly address something with reverence. Because maybe everything is worthy of reverence (now I sound like a pantheist). In any event, I have been thinking recently about the notion of salvation. One of my critiques of Christianity has always been its assumption that we all need to be forgiven. But lately, as my pride is being reworked, I am beginning to think there is some truth in this. Maybe we all do need salvation and forgiveness, because we have all transgressed. I do not like the notion of original sin and I don't agree with it (largely because I do not believe the story it is based on), and truthfully I don't even like the notion of sin. But I do believe that we have all done stupid or harmful things at one point or another. And I think that maybe the way to forgive ourselves for these transgressions--and to obtain salvation from our limitations--is to offer forgiveness to others for their limitations and mistakes. "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us"--except with self-agency--human agency--instead of divine forgiveness. And in this way we protect ourselves from hubris, and acknowledge our position as part of a larger whole.
As far how this interacts with my Objectivism...more on that after I have thought it through more ;)
Thanks for reading.
I'm actually going to start with the literary stuff because I just got a solid start on my lit paper for Modernism. Also, I think it ties nicely with whatever my current theology is. So...the central argument of my paper is that the goal of Modernist writers (we're talking Eliot, Pound, Cummings, Joyce, Stein, Faulkner, Steinbeck, etc) is to save us. They are, essentially, evangelical. From what, you may ask?
From history and tradition (and religion fits nicely into this category, as far as most of them are concerned [although I will never stop being surprised at Eliot's Anglo-Catholicism]). From corruption in government. From ignorance. From innocence (since they largely believed that true understanding could only result from experience). From complacency and laziness, and from apathy. From hesitation and stagnation. And from illusion. Enter the dynamism of the Modern, the fragmentation, the constant "making it new," the political radicalism, the frank confrontation with sexuality and discrimination, the graphic descriptions of suffering and corruption, the stream-of-consciousness, the paradox of struggling indefinitely with surety of failure, the epiphany, and the attempt to somehow impose order on and extract meaning from this fleeting life. Why does Eliot create Prufrock, why present him to us, why are we so appalled by him? Because Eliot is warning us--shoving the most undesirable existence imaginable in our faces in such a way that we cannot help but recognize pieces of ourselves in Prufrock. What should we do with Prufrock? We should learn from him--Prufrock is a Christ figure in this sense; he must suffer and we must witness it so that we can escape that same fate. If we do our work as readers correctly, then reading "Prufrock" should save us from fear and inaction. I could go on but you get the gist. These broken fragments we should indeed shore against our ruins...and if that phrase means nothing to you, then go read the Wasteland. Immediately.
I could perhaps have segued more smoothly, but on to church-type things. I had considerably more to say about all of this last week, and I will try to remember some of it. First, I love the UU church and am very happy that I am a member and go (more or less) regularly. Last week, the minister held a sort of new member orientation type workshop. I went and so did about four or five other people, most of whom I knew already from the campus ministry group. After an overview of UU history (with which I was already pretty familiar), we moved into discussion. One of the statements we had to take a position on was, "I have an understanding of a higher, divine power or being." There wasn't anyone there who was a traditional theist; most took varying degrees of agnosticism. I was the most atheist person there, and when it was my turn to explain my position, I gave the answer I usually give: that I had seen no evidence for a higher power (and furthermore had not even seen a purpose for one) and I didn't believe we needed anything greater than humanity--humanity should be enough. And the minister (who is pretty awesome) challenged--and perhaps even rebuked--me.
He began by briefly talking about hubris. Now, I know that pride is my biggest "sin", and so many things from this year have highlighted that for me and pushed me to work on it. Anyway, so he cautioned me against hubris, and justified his caution by saying (I'm loosely paraphrasing from memory here), "We need to have some sense of humility, some sense of our limitations. Where else can that come from, if not god? There was a psychologist who once said, 'Whether or not there is a god, we are not it.' Something to think about." The conversation about conceptions of divinity/god continued, and I thought long and hard about what the minister had said.
My initial reaction was, "Why not? Why shouldn't we be god?" But at the same time, I understood exactly what he said about needing humility. I tried to articulate then that since going to church, I have started to feel a calming sense of humility--the pressure that my worldview exerted on me had lessened somehow; perhaps it was because I am realizing, slowly, that the absence of the personal and all-powerful Judeo-Christian god does not mean that I must be god. I am atheist, but that doesn't prevent me from acknowledging that some things are simply beyond me. Humility can, I think, arise from sources other than a god. Considering the vastness of our universe and the notion that we are created from stardust (literally) certainly humbles me--just as lying in the grass and staring at a tree for a while does.
Listening to what other people had to say also made me seriously consider my label of atheism. That I do not believe in a personal, ominpotent god is certain. But surely other perspectives of divinity are possible, other notions of what "god" might be, and among those other possibilities I may find one that I works for me. Maybe nontheist is better? I think there is a difference, but I don't know how to articulate it yet.
Finally, my current thoughts on salvation. When I left church last Wednesday night, I wanted very badly to pray. This actually isn't too unusual for me, but it was particularly fervent on that walk home. And I am not sure that "pray" is even the right word, but I don't know of a better one. I didn't want to bombard a superpower with my problems and have it deliver magical solutions to me, but I was just consumed in this feeling of awe, and wonder, and I was humbled, and I was at a (mental) place of reverent peace. This might be incoherent; I don't know how to describe it. In my mind it is similar to when Christians want to worship their God for the sheer joy of worship, not to appease Him or appeal to Him (though I may be misinterpreting that state of mind). I didn't have a place to bestow my reverence and I didn't have an outlet for channeling these emotions. I don't think it was a bad thing, the inability to directly address something with reverence. Because maybe everything is worthy of reverence (now I sound like a pantheist). In any event, I have been thinking recently about the notion of salvation. One of my critiques of Christianity has always been its assumption that we all need to be forgiven. But lately, as my pride is being reworked, I am beginning to think there is some truth in this. Maybe we all do need salvation and forgiveness, because we have all transgressed. I do not like the notion of original sin and I don't agree with it (largely because I do not believe the story it is based on), and truthfully I don't even like the notion of sin. But I do believe that we have all done stupid or harmful things at one point or another. And I think that maybe the way to forgive ourselves for these transgressions--and to obtain salvation from our limitations--is to offer forgiveness to others for their limitations and mistakes. "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us"--except with self-agency--human agency--instead of divine forgiveness. And in this way we protect ourselves from hubris, and acknowledge our position as part of a larger whole.
As far how this interacts with my Objectivism...more on that after I have thought it through more ;)
Thanks for reading.