Easter

                Easter

Rise, heart, thy lord is risen. Sing his praise 


Without delays, 


Who takes thee by the hand, that thou likewise 


With him may'st rise: 


That, as his death calcinèd thee to dust, 


His life may make thee gold, and, much more, just.



Awake, my lute, and struggle for thy part 


With all thy art, 


The cross taught all wood to resound his name


Who bore the same. 


His stretchèd sinews taught all strings what key

Is best to celebrate this most high day.



Consort, both heart and lute, and twist a song 


Pleasant and long; 


Or, since all music is but three parts vied 


And multiplied 


Oh let thy blessèd Spirit bear a part,


And make up our defects with his sweet art.

George Herbert

The Artist: Nostalgia or Metaphor?

Having recently seen the Oscar winning movie The Artist, I found myself thinking about it a lot more than I thought I would. Introduced as a nostalgic tribute to the silent film era of the '20's and '30's, The Artist is to my mind an unexceptional piece of film-making, okay, it is very good with excellent iconic acting from the stars, Jean Dujardin as George Valentin and Berenice Bejo as Peppy Miller and fine supporting roles played by John Goodman as the movie producer Al Zimmer and James Cromwell as Valentin's chauffeur, Clifton. All the cliched elements of Hollywood movies are here, from the beautiful people of movies and the exaggerated gestures of the silent film to the happy ending of enduring love winning out and the integrity of the protagonists maintained at the last. All this is expected and present. For those who wish for some work of homage to great actors of the silent film like Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton, this is not it. This is not nostalgia about the silent movie era; it is about navigating our way in a rapidly changing world.

The real value of The Artist is that it is a metaphor for our time. This is where The Artist becomes true art. Values, technology, and institutions are all undergoing dramatic shifts. For many of us who lived adult lives in the post-Viet Nam era and witnessed the fall of the Iron Curtain, the rise of modern Asia and the incredible modernist growth of financial and economic globalization, the possibilities were endless. One political theorist even had the temerity to write a book entitled "The End of History and the Last Man" in which he argued that "What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of postwar history, but the end of history as such: that is the end point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government." (Francis Fukuyama, 1992)

Now having endured the first decade of the 21st century and witnessed the trauma of the post 9-11 era characterized by the extended wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the financial crash of 2008, the ecological crisis and technological change, the ground seems to be shifting underfoot and the institutions incapable dealing with changing circumstances. My generation has become less trusting, more partisan and inflexible, wondering if there is still a place for the traditional or time-tested ways of living and contributing to our society. Churches especially are undergoing a testing time. Will we as churches and denominations adapt or, like George Valentin, try to resurrect our "greatest hits" and by repeating them stave off change, ultimately finding that our culture has left us behind? Quo Vadis? Where to now? Like Dorothy of The Wizard of Oz, we're finding out that we're not in Kansas anymore and yet we're not sure where we are or where we're going. Can we adapt? Will we recognize the church decades from now? Who knows? But somehow, I don't think we should expect or want a Hollywood ending.

Fathers and Sons

Every so often, I come across some movies which stand out for all the right reasons, you know, good storyline, excellent photography, great acting and deeply resonant with the human experience of love, self-discovery, and spiritual discovery. "Tree of Life" and "The Way" are two such movies. Both have very strong casts and the acting in each is superb. Both are filmed with extraordinary skill, capturing the personal and the panoramic dimensions of the movies. Both are thoughtful meditations on the the human condition, combining aspects of family and the wider search for community. "Tree of Life" is the story of a boy's search for his father. "The Way" is the story of the father's search for his son.

While I don't want to offer a full scale review of either of these two movies, I found them particularly moving in their descriptions of family and family relationships. "Tree of Life" is an impressionistic story of a Texas family in the 1950s and follows the life journey of the eldest son, Jack, (played as an adult by Sean Penn), from the innocence of childhood to his disillusioned adult years. Brought on in no small part by the complicated relationship with his father (played by Brad Pitt), Jack is a soul "lost in the cosmos", seeking meaning and direction in a world bereft of moorings of any kind. This is the story of a son's search for his father. Terrence Mallick, the director, asks the big questions and does not offer any cheap or easy answers. But, like a poet, he leaves the viewer with inklings and hints. 

"The Way" is a film about pilgrimage, both external and internal. Tom (played by Martin Sheen), a well-to-do ophthalmologist working in California, is notified that his son, Daniel (played by Emilio Estevez), has just been killed accidentally while beginning his journey along the Camino de Santiago. Famous as a walk of pilgrimage for over a thousand years, the Camino is an 800km journey over the Pyrenees and along the border to the cathedral at Compostela where it is said that the bones of St. James are kept as relics. Arriving in France to claim the body, Tom impulsively decides to walk the Camino himself and complete it for Daniel. Of course, the journey becomes much more than that and Tom discovers much about himself and about his son, with whom he had a fractured relationship. Directed by Emilio Estevez, Martin Sheen's real-life son, "The Way" is another exploration of the father-son relationship in which the father tries to walk in the son's shoes for a time and finds himself radically changed. 

I encourage any and all to see these two profound movies. Put them together with Marilynne Robinson's two books, "Gilead" and "Home" and you'll have much to think about concerning families, especially the relationship between father and son.

The Immigrant Experience

My home community of Winkler has seen the influx of thousands of immigrants over the past ten years. Coming mostly from eastern Europe at first, there are now growing numbers of Asian, Middle Eastern, and African families coming to make a new life in southern Manitoba as well. These new immigrants  have been a welcome addition to the relatively homogenous culture which has characterized southern Manitoba for most of the twentieth century, offering new ideas, practices and energy to our community. Of course, cultural and language barriers have made integration somewhat difficult at times. Everyone has a different story to tell and many come to their new place of refuge as people with secrets, good and bad, which shape and colour both the past and the future.

I am a descendant of immigrants. My grandfather came to Canada from Russia in 1903 at age 19, alone, and with the support of his cousin who paid his passage and train fare. Much of his early life and his journey to Canada is unknown. He was a taciturn man not given to much talk about himself. He wrote only a brief description of his immigration to Canada. He died when I was 12 years old. Great-great grandparents on my other side arrived in the 1872-74 wave of Mennonite migration to southern Manitoba. Not much is known about them either except that they came with others to escape their situation in southern Russia; perhaps that will be research effort for me sometime in the future. For them, life in the new land was hard and death was a common occurence. What got them through these dark times could be attributed to a Stoic resolve to endure and overcome the hardships, a profound faith in the providence of God and an extraordinary commitment to take advantage of this opportunity for a new life. Together with other fellow immigrants they forged new and vibrant communities in southern Manitoba and beyond. 

While much has been written and documented about the Mennonite settlements in southern Manitoba, what has been lacking in my own appreciation for what my forbears went through has been an empathy or understanding of the inner life or dynamic at the root of their immigrant experience. How did they feel being here? Did they work at their jobs because they wanted to or because they had to? What were their real motives for coming? Did they harbour secret doubts about their faith, make compromises to get here or even intend to practise some form of penance to atone for some dark sin or event hidden deeply in their own past or sub-conscious mind? 

Reading The Cat's Table by Michael Ondaatje and This Hidden Thing by Dora Dueck has illuminated aspects of the immigrant experience for me in new ways. This Hidden Thing is the story of a young woman, Maria, recently arrived from the Russian Crimean Peninsula having fled her homeland with her aging parents after the Revolution and subsequent anarchy of the 1920s. Without facility in English and in desperate need of a job, she is hired as a maid in an English-Canadian household in Winnipeg. The clash of cultures, the desire to fit in and, above all, the desire to please, characterize Maria's work experience with her employers. She is let into their lives, but only at a distance; never as an equal. Misunderstandings and instances of poor judgment abound; Maria works hard to make herself indispensible and frequently sacrifices her own interests as well. Her choices, clear to her, become opaque to others. From the perspective of her family, her life is exemplary. She is seen as the pillar of the family and a model of self-sacrifice. But from her own perspective, her life has its own internal motivation, quite distinct from the impression she gives others. It is this "hidden aspect" which so often could inform if not explain a life regardless of one's past. For the recent immigrant, this "hiddenness" often has a much more exaggerated impact.

Much as This Hidden Thing investigates the immigrant experience in the new world, Ondaatje's The Cat's Table illuminates the experience of the child immigrant in transition, this time in the person of an eleven-year-old boy. The journey from one world to another, especially as a child without the stability of parental or even adult care can be and often is a harrowing experience. Events and  relationships of all kinds leave their marks and scars on the future lives of immigrants. In Ondaatje's book, young Michael, alone and abandoned by his family, in the company of two other boys assigned to the Cat's Table where they dine on the passenger ship, the Oronsay, makes his way from Ceylon, (present-day Sri Lanka) to England over the course of three weeks. The novel deals with Michael's experience of abandonment, new cultural expectations, danger, intrigue, crime, the beginnings of sexual desire and a variety of other experiences which shape his later life. The young life is especially impressionable; the young life of an immigrant without the safety of trusted adults and guardians can be especially difficult. How does one learn to navigate life's challenges in a healthy way? How does one learn to fit into a new society? To whom does one turn for help and guidance? How do impressions, hidden memories and iconic images impact one's later life and choices? For the young immigrant, these challenges can be especially acute and require understanding and patience from those of us who receive and welcome them.

I recommend these two books without reserve. Read and learn.

The Rites of Spring: The Great War and Birth of the Modern Age - Modris Eksteins

One of the characteristics of the first decade of the 21st century has been the increased polarization of politics and religion. "Pragmatism" and "compromise" have become dirty words and descriptors of "muddled thinking" and "luke-warm faith." While for the most part I have sought to distance myself from such ideological positions, it is true that on some issues I am more "conservative" while more "progressive" on others. I suspect that this is true for most people. But as we move closer to "silly season", otherwise known as election time in some of the western democracies, it is helpful to see some of the cultural and social histories and analyses written about previous eras to get a perspective on our own.

I have mentioned the works of the noted liberal historian Tony Judt in previous posts. Another significant historical study is Margaret Macmillan's book Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World.  Recently I read another such book by Modris Eksteins entitled Rites of Spring: The Great War and Birth of the Modern Age. Wrongheaded at times but never dull, Eksteins explores the first half of the twentieth century in three parts or "acts" as part of a battle between tradition or history on the one hand and progress or freedom on the other. Taking the so-called Great War as the signal historical feature of the twentieth century and using the arts, social development, cultural artifacts and psychoanalysis to inform his historical argument, Eksteins has woven a tapestry which is both interesting and provocative. His strongest sections describe the horrors of World War I trench warfare and the impact of the life in the trenches among the ordinary soldiers; his weakest the significance of the contribution of historical anti-semitism to the rise of Nazi Germany. But Eksteins' depiction of the incredible suffering of soldiers on both sides of the conflict beggars belief. It is not surprising that so many survivors came back to their homes broken and tortured people. But it is some of the other elements of the book which grabbed my attention and gave me pause and suggested parallels to our contemporary situation. For example, the mood immediately after the war is described in vivid terms by Eksteins"


        "On July 14, 1919, Bastille Day, Paris manufactured an official 'victory' parade. Its size was grand; its emotions were not. America refused to ratify the treaty and even to embrace Woodrow Wilson's political offspring, the League of Nations. The United States retreated into isolationism and abandoned Europe to her wheelchair.
   The gargantuan effort, especially the motional intensity, of the war could not possibly be sustained in effecting the peace, and Europe slumped into a monumental melancholy. The homes promised its heroes remained fictional places, and the utopian social dreams evoked by wartime rhetoric were brutally erased by inflation, unemployment, and widespread deprivation, not to mention an influenza epidemic that ravaged the world in 1918-1919 and killed more people than the war itself. Disillusionment was the inevitable upshot of the peace.
   Faced by the horrendous idea that the war might not have been worth the effort, people simply buried the thought for a time. And if one was to bury that thought, one also had to bury the war. So be it. The war was buried. Robert Graves and T. E. Lawrence had an agreement at Oxford that they would not discuss the war. Edmund Blunden tried to write his memoirs in the immediate aftermath and found that he simply could not. And so, after composing a fragment, he stopped. One mourned loved ones, but avoided thinking about the object for which one had paid such a price. Nine million dead. Twenty-one million wounded. Economies in ruins. Godless Bolshevism in Russia and threatening central Europe. Civil strife in Russia, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Ireland, Italy - everywhere, it seemed. Turkey and Greece at war. the middle east inflamed. "Lest we forget" was intoned on every conceivable occasion, but forget was what everyone wanted to do." (pp.253-54)



In the post-Iraq, post-Afghanistan world of today, one could substitute different names and places and say much the same thing about the mood of the supposed victors of the war against terror. In a world such as ours, the western democracies, fatigued and deeply wounded as they are by international combat, international economic turmoil, and disagreement over tactics and goals, this description of the mood of the times sounds eerily familiar. Our world seems to be crumbling. The dominance we as the wealthy nations once had over others seems to have evaporated. We're (rightly) tired of war, and (wrongly) tired of giving leadership and looking out for others. Now apparently we are the ones who need the strong man, the one to give us hope, the one to lead us to safety and prosperity, the one to re-establish our standing in the world.

As was true for Germany in the '20's and '30's, this is a dangerous time for all of us because we think there are easy answers. Anyone who offers easy answers should be mistrusted. The jingoism of an all-to-predictable turn to nationalism and/or patriotism will only offer false hope and confidence. This is where the churches be clear about the times we live in and and the dangers we face. We need to remember that we are people of hope and reconciliation. We need to continue to challenge our leaders to do the right thing, seeking peace amid conflict and finding ways to work with others toward the common good. I would suggest that for us now is the time to be especially vigilant. Now is the time to remember and take care.

Summertime Blues

Although I always await summer with eager anticipation, I usually end up disappointed at the end of it. Some of that disappointment I attribute to the unrealistic expectations I load on to it. For example, the spring weather preceding it will be warm, rainy at the right times, the soil ready for planting in late April, no mosquitoes, and the lengthening of days will be accompanied by visits with dear family and friends, evenings on the deck and great conversation. The summer then will be characterized by a good vacation away from home, the cultivation and neverending supply of fresh produce from a bountiful garden, long days and warm nights, the reading of books on the summer reading list, coffee with friends, and, combined with the reflection about the year just past, the preparation for the church year ahead. For various reasons, these ideals are never met, at least to my satisfaction. I almost immediately regret lost opportunities, lack of discipline, and the pressure of events and external developments encroaching on the present and potential enjoyments of summer living. And so, half way through the summer, I begin to recognize that my dreams will remain unfulfilled and I become jaded over the prospects of the rest of the summer getting any better. Thus, disillusioned and devoid of hope, I limp toward the end of the holidays thinking of next year.

This summer I have tried to alter my approach and practice. Travel, the getting away completely from routine or familiarity, is a way of introducing newness and the unfamiliar into the well-established routines of living. Living more intentionally with short-term goals and projects rather than always being focussed on the future or the "big picture" invests present activities and goals with more significance and enjoyment. Finally, the absence of mosquitoes in the garden or on the deck, even in the evening has a way of brightening every day throughout the summer. Reading for delight, not just for purpose, watching the backlog of films and DVDs I've built up over the course of the year, and of course, having extended conversations over a shared meal with good friends and fellow travellers rounds out many of my hopes and dreams for the remainder of the summer.

But of course, this too can be a pretext for avoiding the deeper things of the spirit. I like to drive around the countryside on a regular basis, surveying the fields of grain and other crops as they first develop and then mature. Part of the rural and agricultural world in which I grew up still draws me to its own rhythms and I use it as a devotional and spiritual exercise to open myself to the inner workings of Spirit as I reflect, pray and intercede for my congregation and my community. That's been my experience this summer. It has turned out better then I hoped. This has been a good summer. I am grateful.

On Loaning Books

"Never loan a book to someone if you expect to get it back. Loaning books is the same as giving them away."    Doug Coupland

It has been a great pleasure of mine to share my library with many other people. It has been part of my underlying justification for spending far too much money on books. One excuse for a fairly liberal book budget is that I just love books. But then many people love books and books do get to be onerous if you are moving all the time so there needs to be a greater justification for having books in hand and controlling their distribution. And so I've developed another one. My argument goes this way: I'll read the book and then let someone else read it which then in some way may elevate my status in their eyes (perhaps/perhaps not) but then also occasion a conversation between us over the book and thereby contribute to my own greater pleasure of talking about ideas and other things that matter. Yes it's still selfish and self-serving but it works for me.

Until now. The other day I was counting the cost of  loaning out books and then not getting them back. Some of the books I have loaned to others but have not had returned to me are as follows: the complete corpus of Soren Kierkegaard's philosophical works translated into English by Howard and Edna Hong, Walter Brueggemann's Genesis commentary in the Interpretation series, Eugene Peterson's memoir, Pastor, Rowan Williams' book of sermons, A Ray of Darkness, Stanley Hauerwas' The Cross-Shattered Church, and the list could go on. It reminds me of the 1st ed. vinyl pressing of the set Jesus Christ Superstar  by Rice and Webber which I bought while I was in High School. I gave it to a friend to listen to and never got it back. I still think about it.

Then there are the books you loan out and have returned to you in really bad shape. In one case, the person borrowing my Spiritual Friendship by Aelred of Rievaulx dropped it in a small pool of oil. It came back to me rather differently ornamented and accompanied with great apologies, but because it was out-of-print at the time, it could not be replaced and I had decided that perhaps the stains had their own particular beauty. And then I came across a quote from C.S. Lewis in which he says something to the effect that books loaned out and then returned with dog-ears, tears in pages or even damaged covers, will, in the grand scheme of things, emerge with jewels where the damages once were, and even more valuable than the books ever would have been if they had not been shared with others.

So, I continue to share my books, in spite of the losses I have already suffered and knowing that I am sure to suffer more. There is no greater pleasure than to be able to say to someone, "I have just the thing you should read. Here, I'll get it for you." Somehow, I think that that is what books were always about anyway.