Marvel's religious pluralism in Thor: Love and Thunder

We went to see the latest Thor film on the weekend. It was highly enjoyable, and is the latest film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe that has theological implications that piqued my interest. There are some spoilers below the film poster - read on at your own risk of spoilerisation. There are also some spoilers for some of the Marvel TV shows, especially Ms.Marvel.

There was a lot to like in this film, from the opening few scenes that showed Thor trying the patience of the Guardians of the Galaxy until they went their separate ways, through to the reunion of Thor with Jane Foster in her guise as The Mighty Thor. I felt it was Natalie Portman's best performance in a Thor movie as she was given some material to work with both as Jane and as her version of Thor. 

Mining the same vein as Thor Ragnarok, this film contained a lot of comedy. It was fast-paced, thanks to the direction of Taika Waititi, who also voices the character Korg. It does feel like the difference between the first two Thor movies, which were helmed by Kenneth Branagh and Alan Taylor, and the most recent two is linked to the choice of director. There is also a strong musical theme in the movie, with Guns 'n' Roses songs prominent during major set pieces.  

The plot is fairly basic. There is a being called Gorr who possesses - and is possessed by - the Necrosword, a black sword that can kill gods. He embarks on a revenge mission to wipe out all gods in the universe after his god fails to intervene and save him and his daughter who are the god's last faithful worshippers.

Thor gets involved when Gorr attacks the Asgardian colony on Earth. That's more than just an attempt to kill another god - Gorr wants something else, which will lead him to his ultimate goal. 

On returning to New Asgard, Thor discovers his lost love, Jane, now possesses Mjolnir, Thor's hammer that was destroyed in the previous Thor movie. This begins a very funny sequence where Thor tries to reconnect with Mjolnir, causing his new weapon, the axe Stormbreaker, to get jealous. That sounds ridiculous, but it works surprisingly well and provides some light relief. 

Thor also tries to reconnect with Jane as they go into battle together. This includes a detour to Omnipotence City, where all the gods live. And that's where the theology gets interesting.

Marvel has gradually been co-opting every mythology into the MCU. That includes Greek myths in Eternals, Egyptian gods in the series Moon-Knight, and most recently djinns from Arabian and Muslim stories in Ms.Marvel. Now it seems they have decided that all gods exist somewhere in the universe and they are all characters. 

But - and this is an important point - Marvel have also decided that gods are not worthy of the worship afforded to them. Zeus basically says this when Thor challenges him to intervene and do the right thing. Humans - and presumably other creatures - exist to suffer for their gods and there is no eternal reward. It's an incredibly bleak perspective from a mortal point of view. 

Back when Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 was released, I wrote about how the movie depicted deicide. This film goes a step further into active antitheism. The gods are depicted as powerful and capricious, only interested in their own affairs. 

Marvel are hedging their bets a bit with this stance, though. Nobody really cares about the Greek, Norse or Egyptian pantheons. Marvel can do what they like with those redundant religions because nobody will get upset about what's said about those gods. Things would change quickly if Marvel started turning the gods from the big current religions into movie characters. 

Marvel might be testing that water with having a Muslim superhero in Ms.Marvel, where her religion is an important aspect of her character. However the supernatural characters in that show are djinns, which are a bit like Christian beliefs in demons. They're supposed to be real, but not something that can be blasphemed against so it's reasonably safe to make them aliens from another dimension instead. 

There has been a definite trend in the MCU from a god-like character being evil in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 to the sheer narcissism of "actual" gods inviting the audience to question whether any gods are worthy of worship in Thor: Love and Thunder. Especially gods - or Gods - who let children die while the prayers of their followers go unanswered. It leaves me wondering where they might go next.

End of an era: after 14 years I have closed down my freelance theology website

You may have come here as a redirect from www.freelancetheology.com - don't panic! That was meant to happen.

In January 2004 I launched a Typepad site (remember Typepad? No? Oh well) which I called 'freelance theology'. The idea was that people could submit a question and get an answer from a 'real, live theologian' (i.e. me), which would be non-partisan and give all the different angles on the subject.

The Typepad venture was quite successful. In 2006, with a lot of help from my friend Ian,  it was transferred to a Wordpress blog. Another friend, Matt, designed my logo, with a heavenly cloud one end and a hellish flame the other. The F had a halo. The G had horns and a devil tail. The idea was that somewhere between heaven and hell was freelance theology. After a couple of years, I transferred the web hosting to Dave, who has been a great help with technical stuff ever since.

Freelance theology got me into some interesting things. I wrote a chapter for a book about Jesus. I had a regular interview slot with Paul Hammond on UCB radio and even went to their lovely studios a couple of times as their live Friday morning guest. If you are one of the people who read my freelance theology posts, who commented, who asked a question, then thank you. Thank you for being part of it. I appreciate it.

The site has been on hiatus since November 2016 and I didn't post at all last year. I had been thinking for a while whether it was time to wind up the project and with the web hosting renewal bill coming in, I have decided it is time to call it quits. In 14 years I answered 222 questions, and I apologise to the handful of people who had questions pending, which I won't be answering now.

It has been a wrench to close it down. I was 'Jon the freelance theologian' for a long time, but I don't really want to be him any more. I started with lofty aims - possibly even pretentious, arrogant aims - of providing impartial knowledge, sharing all the sides of arguments that are often much more complex than people realise. I still think there is a place for that on the web. I just don't think I am the person to do it any more.

It got hard to be impartial. Being blunt, there is so much in the modern Christian subculture that is either toxic or just plain stupid, I found it really hard not to be sarcastic and / or damning. I was asked a few questions that left me rolling my eyes. And I started to drift away from answering questions and posting excerpts from talks, or comments about other things I saw in church life. Those weren't what freelance theology was about. I could feel the drift and I didn't like it, even though it was my website and my rules.

Rather than let mission-creep overtake the site, I decided it was just time to bring it to a halt. I remember a conversation I had years ago with my dad about church-related activities and he said that people found it easy to start things, but hard to stop them. It is hard to stop. But it is the right thing to do and now is the right time.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 - big theological questions in a comic book movie (Spoiler warning)

Back in 2014 Guardians of the Galaxy was an unexpected hit after being widely tipped to be the first Marvel movie to bomb. Cathy and I both loved it (it was my film of the year) and we have subsequently got into GotG in a big way. Toys, books, comics, and playing the Awesome Mix soundtrack album quite a bit. I've blogged about how I found one storyline from the comics particularly inspiring. There was also a possible religious-themed social commentary in the first film - it's no accident the villain is a religious fanatic.

A few weeks ago Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 came out. I was a bit worried whether it would be anywhere near as good as the first one. But I also had high hopes. I wasn't disappointed. The film was brilliant. But what I got was something much deeper than I expected. It is probably the movie that has asked the most interesting theological questions for a long time. Spoilers follow, so don't read on if you don't want any.

I love this promo image

The first film ends on a slight cliff-hanger. Peter Quill (Star-Lord) is told he is half human, and half something else. Yondu tells a subordinate that he's glad he didn't deliver Quill to his father. This film is about Star-Lord and his dad.

His dad turns out to be Ego, the embodiment of the consciousness of a living planet housing the physical form of a Celestial, an incredibly powerful ancient life-form. The incarnated version looks just like Kurt Russell. Ego turns up to usefully save the Guardians from an attacking fleet of spacecraft and then proceeds to invite some of the team to come and visit his planet. When he explains who or what he is, he is asked if he is a god, and Ego says 'Yes, but with a small g.'

Star-Lord is told he is most likely immortal, what with being the son of a god with a small g. And then Ego reveals his intentions. His billions of years of consciousness have convinced him that other life forms are mundane and disappointing and he intends to wipe them out, transforming the matter of the universe into his own self. Presumably to become a God with a BIG G.

However to do this, Ego needed more power - the power of two Celestials - and had therefore roamed the galaxy as his Kurt Russell incarnated self romancing all kinds of alien races to try and procreate another being with Celestial power. One of the beings he procreated with was Meredith Quill, Star-Lord's mother, and Star-Lord is the only one of Ego's children to contain the necessary Celestial essence. (The rest of his offspring are now a mound of skeletons in a cave.)

Ego offers Star-Lord the opportunity to join him in transforming the universe into God but first Star-Lord has a question about his mother. Did Ego really love her? Yes, Ego replied, but his mission to change the universe was more important. Then Ego drops a bombshell, saying he gave Meredith Quill the brain tumour that killed her. Star-Lord doesn't ask any more questions, he just draws his guns and begins blasting away at the Kurt Russell-shaped embodiment of Ego. Star-Lord and the Guardians then fight Ego, first to escape, and then to kill him.

As I said this is the most theologically interesting movie plot I've seen in a while. You could almost say it's an anti-theistic plot, in that it shows attacking a god (with a small g) as an heroic act. The Guardians get to save the galaxy for a second time. It's rare that a movie depicts deicide - the act of killing a god. Of course this isn't the 'god' of any established religion, this is a 'god' in a fictional setting, but it still opens up those questions.

Like many people who have been involved in a church a long time, I have prayed for people to be healed, who then haven't been healed. Just over 10 years ago a brilliant Christian man I knew died of cancer at the age of 32, a few months after diagnosis. This was despite regular prayer meetings, including at the Christian charity I worked at, asking for him to be healed. My experience is not unique. Prayers for healing often go unanswered.

I don't think it's an accidental music choice that when the Guardians arrive on Ego's planet, the song playing is George Harrison's 'My Sweet Lord' with it's refrain "I really want to see you, Lord." This is something prayed in earnest by many believers when praying for God to intervene in a situation.

If God doesn't intervene, Christians console themselves with reassuring statements that God's ways are higher, or there must be a plan behind it all, or, the line I hate most, that God takes the best ones first. (What does it say about those who don't die young?) Sometimes it's said that by dying, people are "really healed" as in made perfect in the afterlife. But that wasn't what was prayed for. When I have prayed for people I wanted them restored to full health in this life. And then sometimes people say that God will have all the answers when we see him after we die. That feels a bit 'too little too late' to me.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.2 actually gives its main hero the opportunity to ask those questions without having to die first. If Ego is so powerful why couldn't he save Star-Lord's mother? The answer is so callous and cruel - not only did Ego not prevent it, he actively caused it - that Star-Lord forgets all about the promise of his own immortality and proceeds to attack the being who fathered him.

If we did get answers to our questions and we didn't like them what would our reaction be? Would we suddenly turn on God like Star-Lord? That's a big question. All the assumptions are that when we get answers we will be satisfied by them, but what if we are not?

I discussed this with Paul Hammond, presenter of the morning show on UCB Radio last week and Paul asked whether comic book movies are the right place for these kind of theological topics to be explored. It was a question that surprised me a bit, but as I thought about it I realised that they are possibly the only movies left where they can be asked. There is a layer of cynicism running through most 'realistic' cinema these days so perhaps to discuss questions of belief you first have to get the audience to suspend disbelief. If you've accepted spaceships and pink slimy monsters and genetic experiments that look like talking raccoons, it's not a stretch to consider interacting with a divine being - even if it only a god with a small g.

2015 in review: The non-fiction books I read

I've already blogged about the fiction I read in 2015. Here are some short reviews of the non-fiction I read during the year. I've divided them up into sections.

Football

I do read quite a few football books. The joke in book group is that I tend to read books about goalkeepers, particularly German goalkeepers. This year I kept up the tradition...

The Outsider: A History of the Goalkeeper - Jonathan Wilson
This is the book about goalkeepers and starts from the interesting premise that goalkeepers are different, both in terms of the role they play and psychologically. The historical stuff about the development of goalkeeping as a specialist role is really interesting. Unfortunately it gets bogged down discussing the various goalkeepers produced by different countries. While the research into, say, Cameroonian keepers, or the inheritors of Lev Yashin's spot in the Russian national team, can't be faulted, the material does all get a bit samey. There are also a few occasions when the author references stuff with the assumption the reader will know what he is talking about. I got most of them, but some I had to look up.

The Incredible Adventures of the Unstoppable Keeper - Lars Pfannenstiel
I got sent this to review for When Saturday Comes. Lars Pfannenstiel is a German journeyman keeper who ended up playing on all six continents, although never for anyone particularly good. He seems to regularly ditch everything to follow the gilded promises of agents or club owners, which invariably come to nothing. He cuts a fairly naive figure as a result. My (longer) review for WSC is online here.

An Autobiography - Pat Jennings
When I was a kid I collected football stickers (I still do!) and the first collection my brother and I had was Panini's 'Football 85'. The first team in the album were, of course, Arsenal, and the first player was their goalkeeper, Pat Jennings. So, he is one of those players who I can picture really clearly (at least, his sticker!). This autobiography was from 1983 and it's interesting to a point. He comes across as fairly dull, but some of the things he talks about aren't. For example, the stuff people chucked at him from the terraces. He ended up with a dart (!) in his arm on a couple of occasions. There's also a bit late on in the book which just wouldn't appear in a book by a pro sportsman now, when he worries that players playacting and pretending to be injured would make other people think footballers are "poufs". That's a word that doesn't tend to be used these days. Altogether now, "It was acceptable in the eighties..."

Full Time - Tony Cascarino
Not a goalkeeper, but another footballer from a different era. Cascarino played for a number of top clubs and also the Republic of Ireland in the late 80s and the 90s. This was one of the first truly confessional footballer autobiographies and it is really interesting. The section when he talks about splitting up with his wife is raw and honest and you can tell he feels like an utter shit about the way he treated her. There's a revelation that he might not have ever been eligible to play for Ireland after all, and an interesting accounting of where all the money he made disappeared to. It's hard to read the book and not like Tony Cascarino, mainly because he is being honest about how unlikeable he is. I'd quite like to read an updated version to find out what happened to him after he retired.

Theology

Gospel of Freedom - Jonathan Rieder
This is a very scholarly, yet accessible, study of Martin Luther King's 'Letter from Birmingham Jail' that unpicks King's theology of non-violence and liberation to thoroughly explain it. It's rare I would use the term 'life-changing' of any book, but this has really impacted on me. Particularly the challenge of Dr King regarding what kind of 'extremists' we will be. In a world that seems to be dominated by the actions of extremists, the call to be extremists of love and justice, is still powerfully relevant.

Other non-fiction

A Universe from Nothing - Lawrence Krauss
This is trying to make astrophysics simple and it must work because I understood it. Put simply, it proposes that the existence of the universe was inevitable given quantum fluctuations. There is no 'cause' to the universe; it just is. In philosophical terms this means the world is just a 'brute fact' and various cause-related arguments for God's existence are rendered moot.

Too Much Information - Dave Gorman
This is like a book version of Dave Gorman's TV show Modern Life is Goodish. He makes some great points about how spammers ruin Twitter and how bands shouldn't stick new songs on 'Greatest Hits' albums (or release such albums if, in fact, they haven't had many hits!), but generally it's one of those semi-forgettable books you breeze through, chuckle at, and then stick on the shelf to never read again.

So, that's it. All in all I read 22 books in 2015. Not a bad reading rate!

Previous posts:
The Douglas Coupland books I read in 2015
The other non-fiction I read in 2015

My five star books

Since 2002 I have been noting the books I read and giving them a review of between one and five stars. A bit sad, I know, but it’s helpful when I can’t remember whether a book was any good or not.

Anyway, here’s a list of the books I’ve given five stars to. I was a bit surprised at some of the ones on this list. Obviously I really liked them at the time. I’m not sure I’d rate them all so highly if I read them now. That shows how subjective this is. I’m also interested by what is not on there – no J.D. Salinger, for example.

God’s Debris – Scott Adams
Stupid White Men – Michael Moore
The Silmarillion – J.R.R. Tolkien
The River of Time – David Brin
The Incarnation – St Athanasius
Sabriel – Garth Nix
Becoming Fully Human – Patrick Whitworth
Lirael – Garth Nix
How to Read the Bible for all it’s Worth – Gordon Fee
Paul, the Spirit and the People of God – Gordon Fee
Abhorsen – Garth Nix
A New Kind of Christian – Brian D. McLaren
A Theology of the Dark Side – Nigel G. Wright
Possession – A.S. Byatt
Velvet Elvis – Rob Bell
Use of Weapons – Iain M. Banks
Nineteen Eighty-four – George Orwell
Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
The Secret History – Donna Tartt
The Eyre Affair – Jasper Fforde
The Road to Wigan Pier – George Orwell
To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
Surface Detail – Iain M. Banks
Wonder – R.J. Palacio
The Plot Against America – Philip Roth
Ragnarok – A.S. Byatt
Generation X – Douglas Coupland
Wise Children – Angela Carter

I’ve noticed that as time has progressed I’ve stopped rating Christian books so highly. I’ve also started reading more well-known authors, which is probably the influence of my book group. But I’ve awarded fewer five star ratings as time has gone on, so I’ve given F. Scott Fitzgerald, Salinger, Solzhenitsyn and others four or four and a half star ratings, where a few years earlier they would probably have got a five. (This also explains why Stupid White Men is in this list. I don’t think I’d give that a five now.)

Threatened worldviews threaten other worldviews

I've been reading 'The Last Word and the Word After That' by Brian McLaren, that covers a lot of the same ground as 'Love Wins'. This struck me as a relatively good explanation for the criticisms levelled at Rob Bell during the recent "controversy".

"...faith must engage with the culture in which is finds itself but... can become so excesively enmeshed with that culture that its power is neutralized - actually, neutered... If a faith becomes enmeshed, not just engaged with a culture... people hardly notice - until a wave of cultural change hits. Then, when people want to move on from that fading culture, when they want to be part of that new wave, they feel they must leave their faith behind as well. Their only alternative is to try to disengage their faith from the fading culture, but this is one of the most painful things a person can do - mentally painful, spiritually painful...

"In times of profound cultural change... such as our current transition from a modern colonial culture, with its emphasis on rational certainty and conquest and control, to a postmodern and postcolonial culture, which distrausts rational certainty because of the violence that confident people have inflicted on others in their striving to conquer and control them. In times like these, people, thousands at the same time, face this agonizing task of disengaging their faith from the culture it has grown with, like two trees whose roots are intertwined." [page 15, bold text mine]

It's no accident that the last colonial superpower left is the battleground between the modern and postmodern elements within Christianity. It's no surprise that those with the most to lose - the theocrats whose worldview is bound up in a scientific narrative that insists on one form of truth as supreme - are so vocal in their criticism of reformulation (and potential reformation).

IMO.

A more personal review of Love Wins

As a follow up to my previous post, which was more of an examination of the theology in Love Wins, I decided to post about how I felt reading it.

Firstly, it resonated with me because many of the questions he asks are questions I've asked. Reconciling the idea of a loving, all-powerful God with the view that God condemns millions of created beings to hell is a difficult one.

It's a difficulty that I saw articulated years ago by Scott Adams in a cartoon about not mixing logic and religion. "What happens to the people that don't knowthat God loves all his children?" asks the protagonist. "Eternal hell!" is the response. That cartoon has always challenged me.

(Of course, Calvin's response to the exact same issue was that God sends people to Hell as evidence of His glory. (Section 3.22.11 of the Institutes) I've never felt particularly comfortable with that, ever since I read Calvin at University. The idea that our view of God as holy and glorious and righteous is contingent on him sending sinners to Hell makes God's attributes only applicable through the actions of human beings. Or, to put it another way, Calvin's articulation of God is that He is not self-sufficient.)

What I felt reading Love Wins was that here was someone else articulating many things that I've thought before, particularly the idea that an obsession about where you end up after death means you end up ignoring the realities of the here and now.

I think Rob Bell does a good job of evaluating Jesus' teaching on heaven and hell, and the commentary of the early church. I think he is fair to the Scriptural texts and his exposition of the original Greek is actually quite good. It's not the usual kind of thing I've heard in evangelical contexts, but that doesn't necessarily make it wrong.

I was particularly struck by his use of the parable of the prodigal son to highlight the negative images many Christians have of God - as a 'slave-driver', constantly looking over our shoulder to catch us out, and us not rejoicing in always being with him.

I think that chapter is actually a very good corrective to how God is talked about - his comment when talking about the atonement that Jesus doesn't save us from God, but that God saves us from the hell we create for ourselves is a good counterbalance to other technical theories of atonement that imply God is all about the wrath.

There were one or two throwaway remarks I wasn't happy with. Saying that a woman wrote Hebrews is a definite statement on a subject that from a Biblical Studies standpoint is hard to make definite statements on. There were one or two comments about people who hold a rigid view on hell (as not throwing good parties, for example) that were a bit needless. But generally, he reigned in the sarcasm.

The general tenor of the book - that we create heaven and hell through our choices and that affects how we live now and in the world to come reminded me of CS Lewis in The Great Divorce. I wish he had referenced Lewis' book, as it's not that well-known.

His comment on the literal nature of hell, based on his experience of seeing amputee survivors of the Rwandan genocide, is an intelligent way of taking something that can be quite theoretical and applying it. "Do I believe in a literal hell? Those weren't metaphorical limbs..." And then, later: "We can all choose to pick up machetes." Earlier he said "Our eschatology shapes our ethics." That's true too.

In that sense his realised eschatology is more realistic and relevant than the idea that it all happens after judgement. I've believed for a while that we need to start locating heaven and hell in the here and now to render them real. I said as much last year when talking to the youth.

For me, personally, it's been a bit of a journey to get where I am, theologically. On the subject of hell, I was helped by an insight of Frederick Buechner who made the point that if someone choose to withdraw from God, then they are withdrawing from the source of all things. That way leads to utter destruction or non-existence.

Buechner asked whether Hell was the stopping point - that God says 'You can go so far and no further'; that God wouldn't allow people to tip over the edge and cease to exist. Seen like that, Hell is an extension of God's mercy and love, because however far people run from him, he won't let them disappear forever.

I don't think Rob Bell's book was really written for those who are in churches and are happy with what's taught there. I think it's more for those who are unhappy, or who have left a church because they sense there is a discrepency between the emphasis on God's love, and the way hell is talked about.

What Rob Bell has done is offer an alternative view, that I feel is faithful to the Biblical texts, and presents a positive and affirming view of God as a loving Father. It made me feel hopeful and inspired to talk about my faith experiences with people to try and open up the reality of the Kingdom of  Heaven right now.

Theologically insecure Christians

There's a little part of me that is concerned for the person who felt the need to doctor this piece of graffiti with gaffer tape, just to make it theologically correct.

Runnin' with the Devils

People of a certain age and musical preference will get that title.

I have been to see the Cardiff Devils play for the last two weekends and have seen them win twice. Obviously a lucky mascot for them. Although they already have their own mascot, Lucy Fur.

Last night my friend Bryan was there with his wife, Elaine, and two of their friends. It was reportedly Elaine's first live sporting event of any kind. In the first period Bryan got hit by a puck (shoulder injury, probably not as bad as he made out, the wimp), and then in the second period, the group won the 'Domino's hot seat' competition and got a free pizza.

I, meanwhile, had a rather uneventful time at both games, although as ever I had fun introducing people to the drama and chaos that is ice hockey. I went to the one the previous weekend with Cathy and her uncle and aunt, who both thoroughly enjoyed it and want to come back with Cathy's cousin at some point. Last night we were with the Glenwood Youth for Soul Mister, and we had some kids who hadn't been before.

It's rewarding introducing people to new experiences. Especially when your team win.

Survivally Challenged

So I made it through the week at Soul Survivor. The weather was great, thanks. We had one night of rain and that was about it.

A few things stood out, mainly from one of the nightly talks by Ants Watts, a New Zealander linked to Soul Survivor in NZ. He said:

I was always told that you don't have to like people as long as you love them, but actually I think you have to love them until you like them.

We are very good at creating ways of loving people - mechanisms for loving people - we can drop food off at the food bank, and we can give items to the thrift store, and we can sponsor a child on the other side of the world. And those are good things to do. But the problem with them if that is all we do, is that we can show that we love people, and people can have their needs met, but neither of us are transformed by it.

Lots of people are trying to be 'somebody'. Lots of Christians are trying to be 'somebodies' - trying to get on the platform, to lead the worship, to do a CD, to get their book out. But do you have what it takes to be a 'nobody' for Christ? To say 'this isn't about me'?

These are how I remember him saying those things. They aren't verbatim quotes. The third one in particular struck me. I had been in a seminar given by a 33 year-old theology graduate who already had three books published and was doing seminars to a packed out room. It made me think 'Where did I go wrong'. And then I thought 'Hang on...'

On the last night I made someone cry because I asked them to just clarify a throwaway remark they'd said earlier in the week that had rested heavy on me. It turned out I identified a real hurt that needed healing. But most importantly, they needed to know that someone understood, that someone cared, that someone loved. I wouldn't have been in that first conversation if I had been a 'somebody', let alone had the opportunity to be in the second.

Book idea - the resurgence of primitive religion

Here's another book idea I've got, based around studies of primitive religious motifs/magic and contemporary culture and religious trends. I've got a few ideas written down somewhere, but I'm not sure where. I can only find notes on two potential chapters. So I'm constructing the following sections mainly from memory:

Return of the Fertility Goddesses
The fetishization of over-sized breasts in our culture, linked to the fertility/grain goddesses of the ancient near east, who are always large-breasted and wide-hipped. The cosmetic search for perfection linking into an ancient represntation of the Divine.

Representative and Sympathetic Magic in a Health Store Near You
The growth of homeopathic remedies aligned to sympathetic magic in shamanistic/druidic cultures and how they both feed off the primitive religious idea that becase a looks like b, a must somehow influence b.

Tribalism and the Shamans Battling Evil on our Behalf
A worked up version of my Is Football a Religion? article published several years ago on a football website (and now no longer online it seems), that identifies players as representatives of the tribe doing battle in an artificial realm against the forces of the 'outsider/other' (the archetypal format of 'evil'). The huge growth in sport as recognisable tribal affiliation over the last few years (including ceremonial tribal vestments ie replica shirts).

Spirituality Without Spiritual Conflict
The rise in 'local gods' and spirit guides, particularly in angelology divorced from the Christian context. Belief in the spiritual but not in forces of good/evil. The moral neutrality of 'being spiritual' paralleling the tribal vision of the spiritual realm which is there to be interacted with, and used by the 'wise'.

The Power of Words
Ironically a powerful sub-theme in the major monotheistic religions - Scripture as a talisman charm to ward off evil in phylacteries, Qu'ranic inscriptions, learning by rote, plastering Bible verses on all sorts of tat. Reference to the 'cursing stone' of Carlisle. The return of a qabbalistic belief in the power of words over a subject.

If I can find my other notes I'm sure I've got enough ideas to make quite an interesting book.

Book idea - t-shirt theology

Every so often I have ideas that I think would make a great book.

Yesterday I thought about writing a theology book based on various t-shirts I own, starting with my "theologian" t-shirt, then incorporating in no particular order "Got Jesus?", "Love your enemies" (with a pic of the ghosts from Pacman), "Think slowly", "Video games ruined my life - good thing I've got two more lives", "You're worth a lot to me" (pic: Lego Boba Fett), "665 - the neighbour of the beast", "I pulled a princess" (pic: Mario & Princess Peach), "Everyone has the right to be ignorant, but you are abusing the privilege", Darth Vader's anger management, and "It's all fun and games until the flying monkeys attack".

I reckon I could make a theological point on all of those, covering just about all the major doctrines of the faith and a commentary on how they pan out in real life, or not as the case may be. But here's the thing, who would buy the book? More importantly, who would pay me to write it?

More Neo-Orthodox then I thought

Ages ago I did a quiz on my theological worldview, where Neo-Orthodox scored third place. Having now done a similar kind of unscientific pop quiz to discover my inner theologian it turns out my alter ego is one of the founders of Neo-Orthodoxy: German uber-scholar Karl Barth.

Which is interesting (to me anyway).

Karl Barth

A 20th century German Reformed theologian, Barth lived from 1886-1968. He followed in the tradition of Calvin, though teaching that the Bible CONTAINS the Word of God, but is NOT the Word of God itself. He also taught that Jesus Christ is the only one who is elect, and Jesus Christ is simultaneously the only one who is reprobate. Otherwise, Barth agreed with Luther and Calvin in preaching that justification is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, as understood by Scripture alone.

When Jesus says 'So, what?'

This is the provocative title of the session I led in our works prayer time today. Here are my notes...

John 2
Jesus Changes Water to Wine
On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus' mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, "They have no more wine."

"Dear woman, why do you involve me?" Jesus replied, "My time has not yet come."
His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."

Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons. Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water"; so they filled them to the brim. Then he told them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet." And, you know the story, water into wine, everyone got merry, ‘wow! you saved the best to last’ and so on.

What interests me though is Jesus’ response to his mum. In this Bible version he says ‘Dear woman’, but that’s been softened for our fluffy Western sensibilities. In the original Greek he just says:
τι εμοι και σοι γυναι ουπω ηκει η ωρα μου
(I know what you’re thinking. Wow, Jon’s not just handsome, but he knows New Testament Greek as well. What a valuable skill to have in the modern age.)

Literally the Greek says: "What (is that) to you and me, woman?" There doesn't have to be a subject to a sentence in Greek.

Now we soften that and make it ‘dear woman’ and say ‘how does that involve me’, but an equally valid translation would be ‘So, what, woman?’

I like the thought that Jesus turns round and says ‘So, what?’ You know that annoying smile people give you when they say ‘…and what would Jesus do?’ Well he might just say ‘so what?’

What I really love about this story is the authenticity of the little vignette. He’s with his mum who says something disapproving about the party planners and Jesus says ‘look that’s not our problem’ and she then does something that is SO mum-like. She ignores him completely.

Mums do that, don’t they? It doesn’t matter how old you are – Jesus is 30 years old and his mum just completely ignores him. You can imagine it. She says ‘Look, they’ve run out of wine.’ He says ‘So? What’s that got to do with us, woman?’ And she just goes ‘Oh hush’ and calls over the waiter. ‘Hey you yes, you, listen, do whatever he tells you.’ And Jesus is left there thinking ‘What? What are you doing? I just said this wasn’t our problem. Oh for goodness sake…’

It comforts me that Jesus knows every trial and temptation that we face. I think this particular temptation was to drown his mum in a water jar. Okay, maybe not that extreme. But he must have been a bit annoyed. After all, he had said ‘What’s this got to do with me and you?’

‘So what?’ isn’t a particularly caring attitude – not a particularly Christian attitude. But I think there are a few things we can draw out of this response. We don’t get to pick and choose which bit’s of Jesus’ life we get to emulate. Are there any times when we are justified to shrug and say ‘so what?’

Well, yes I think there is.

First off there’s the way Jesus’ mum says ‘they have no more wine’. Now if that was my mum, I’d probably be saying ‘Really, and who’s drunk most of it, mum? Hmmm?’ while looking pointedly at her empty glass. [My Mum reads my blog, but hopefully won't read this bit...]

But what’s in that statement. Is it a criticism? They’ve run out of wine. Ooh, bad planning. Such a shame. And the wedding was so well organised up to this point…

Jesus refuses to join in by passing judgement. His response is ‘So what?’

Sometimes we will be in a situation where we will be asked to comment on something when it really isn’t our business. I’m willing to bet that in your church there will be some people who gossip. Despite the many Biblical injunctions against gossiping it seems a habit we Christians find hard to break. We do it at work too, don’t we? Or is that just me? It is just me? Ooh, you liars!

So a challenge to us when we are invited to comment is to say ‘What’s that to you and me?’ When the gossip starts we should try to say ‘so what?’

Then there’s the anticipated reaction. Jesus’ mum obviously expects him to act and he resists. He effectively says – ‘actually that’s not my responsibility’.

He could have stood up and said “Aha! I see you have run out of wine. Now fetch me jars of water. Behold I will work a miracle and solve your problem! Here you go - the freshest, tastiest and all-round best wine you have ever tasted!”

But he doesn’t do that. In fact, when he’s pushed into doing something by his meddlesome mum he does it quite secretly. Only the servants know where the wine comes from.

I believe his reluctance comes from a great compassion for whoever’s wedding this is. It’s embarrassing when you run out of wine at a wedding. I went to a wedding a couple of years ago and at the reception the caterers ran out of food. I was offered bread rolls and gravy. The couple getting married were really embarrassed when they found out.

Weddings are a big deal and to run out of wine is embarrassing. Maybe they couldn’t afford it. Expensive weddings are not an entirely new phenomenon. And Jesus knows that, so he doesn’t draw attention to it.

We will frequently find ourselves in similar situations. It is hugely tempting when we see a problem to seek to take control – to take responsibility for the project in hand. To stand up and say ‘Aha! I see you are having a problem. I will do this because you are obviously incapable!’ and so on.

But it is incredibly disempowering and undermining to do that to someone. It is embarrassing and humiliating. It dents people’s self-esteem and sense of worth. People begin to feel they are useless, and that then becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because they are afraid to try to do things.

So here’s the question – when you see a problem are you going to flamboyantly take responsibility for it and potentially undermine someone or are you going to ask, as Jesus does, ‘what is that to me’?

In fact, by saying that to his mum, Jesus leaves it open for the bridegroom or whoever is paying for this shindig to approach him and ask for help. In similar fashion, do we wait until we are approached, until our opinion is asked, until our help is sought? Of course, his mum doesn’t give the bridegroom a chance – she gets the servants over. So Jesus has to act but he does so in a way that protects the dignity of the unnamed bridegroom.

And the third – and final thing that occurs to me – is that this is a genuine question. ‘What is that to me and to you?’

It invites a response.

Most of Jesus’ questions do.

He turns to his own mum and says ‘What is that to me and to you?’

And maybe he wanted to know her response. Was this his test to her – ‘do you believe that I can make a difference?’

His mum’s response – in her typically-mum bossy way – is one of faith – possibly born from an unswerving conviction that it is her business and therefore her son’s business and that he can sort it out so he will sort it out. She ignores Jesus’ ‘so, what?’ and acts in the conviction that he will act in the situation.

We are gathered to pray and I’m sure we’ll pray about all sorts of things – here, now, in other places, at other times. As we take problems to Jesus, are we prepared, in case he says ‘so what?’

What will our response be?

The powerlessness of God

The Easter service today contained the following interesting observations, based on the work of a sociologist called Willard Waller and his concept of the 'least love'.

According to this, in any relationship one person will love the other more. The one who loves least therefore has more power in the relationship, because the one who loves more will forgive more often, will compromise more readily and so on. The one who loves the most will have the least power and potentially is more likely to be abused.

In the context of Easter, if the theory can be extrapolated that far, God loves most and therefore in relationship to humanity is rendered powerless. The death of Christ is not God pouring out His wrath on the Son (the evangelical demi-heresy which divides the persons of the trinity), but God extending his love to us through embracing death, even death on a cross. God is abused on the cross, and by the cross, and is broken for us, he dies and in that death is also bereaved, because of his love for us.

It's deep stuff. And it's made more deep by the passage of John's gospel which was the text for the day where Jesus invites his disciples to eat breakfast with him on the beach. This is the powerless God who invites us to breakfast, after everything we've done. Because he loves us more.

Ask a theologian

Had a (small) older youth cell group tonight which was 'ask a theologian (i.e. me) any question you want'.

The questions (in no particular order):
Should we believe in aliens?
Should I go out drinking with my mates?
What is a 'doctrine'?
What about the dinosaurs?
What about the stuff Jesus said about adultery and divorce?
Why is the Old Testament about Israel and the Israelites?
How literally should we believe the Bible?
Should you be baptised before you take communion (because in another church they won't let you take communion unless you've been baptised)?
Why did people live to ridiculously old ages in the Bible?

Afterwards the general consensus was 'this was good - let's do it again'.

Faith

I'm reading a (dodgy liberal) theology book at the moment and found this definition of faith, which I quite like:

"Faith is reason turned courageous."

It's rational to believe in a God, but it takes courage to believe the things people say about God (or the things He says about Himself).

The other true religion*

*it's a paradoxical statement, but then I am disturbingly post-modern

A few years ago I was told to look after a work placement girl from Canada, who's dad worked for a fundamentalist Christian organisation. I was showing off how wise I was and quoted Jedi Master Yoda, "you know, from Star Wars..." "Star Wars?" she asked incredulously. "Yeah," I said. "It is the other true religion."

On Wednesday I'm going to be doing a talk on the spirituality of Star Wars. I don't want to give too much away ahead of the evening, but in terms of understanding concepts of God in a technological age, the cultural impact of the Star Wars films in my generation can't be underestimated. The conflict between materialism and spirituality predates post-Modernism as a popular movement, and certainly at the dying end of the Modern era, the films explore a definite yearning for something more than the world we can see.

So far I've got 12 clips ready from the original trilogy to illustrate my points with regards to conceiving and perceiving God; the duality of matter and force; and the mastery of evil within and the possibility of redemption.

Oh, yeah, it's going to be good.

Beanless

Went out last night after building furniture and shunting boxes round at Dr Nicholl's behest to Nandos, only to be greeted by a sign that said: 'No bean patties today'. So I had to have a veggieburger instead, which wasn't too bad actually.

Now you might be asking 'Why didn't you just have the piri piri chicken and be done with it?' And I guess that's the thing. Since coming back from the States, I've harboured a secret. I've become a vegetarian.

There were plenty of reasons to do it. The farming industry is notoriously cheap and animals are mistreated badly. And I actually quite like animals. Sheep and cows not so much, but pigs are cute. Maybe I like grunty, snorty creatures who don't care much what anyone thinks because they remind me of me. Is it hypocritical to think pigs are cute and feed them in petting zoos and then chow down on some bacon? And, incidentally, what is the difference between eating pigs and eating dogs? It all seems very arbitrary to me.

So, reason 1: I like animals.
Reason 2: I'm fortunate to live in a society where I have a choice in what I eat, and I believe when you're given a choice it's your moral duty to make an ethical decision. I disapprove of people who prioritise their own tastebuds over the human rights and dignity of tea-pickers (in fact, deliberately choosing not to drink fair trade tea or coffee is a good reason why some people will go to hell). So, if I have the choice, and I should make an ethical choice, surely the ethical choice is to not eat meat, on so many levels.

And then there's the third reason. As I've already said the farming industry is shabby and cheap. We'll feed animals dead animals and then watch people's brains turn to mush. We'll pump our chickens full of oestrogen and wonder why men are growing boobs. I've put on some weight, and my man-tits are getting weighty. But they've shrunk since I stopped eating chicken and turkey.

And finally, in New York we met up with Dan Piraro. He's an artist I respect and he's passionate about animal rights. We chatted a bit around the subject (he's a vegan) and much of what he said made sense, but unlike many vegetarian prosetelysers, he didn't try to put me on a guilt trip, he didn't try and disgust me by telling me jelly babies are made from horses' hooves, or that pork sausages are full of pig eyeballs, and he didn't judge me. And that convinced me you can be a vegetarian and not be a swivel-eyed loon.

Plus you have to look at the ridiculous things people say to justify eating meat:
1) Hitler was a vegetarian. No, he wasn't, unless vegetarians eat Bratwurst. But it is true he was prescribed a vegetarian diet in order to treat his chronic flatulence, presumably because his doctors wanted it to get worse...
2) The Bible says we should eat meat. Really? Who's got the theology degree here?
3) Biologically we're built to eat meat. I'm not a biologist, but I have seen proper carnivores and we don't look much like them. Sorry, at best we're omnivores. Like hedgehogs.
4) Vegetarians are weird. Well, I was weird a long time before I became a vegetarian. If you don't believe me go for a trip through my blog archives.

Ho logoi egeneto sarky - my new tag line

In an email conversation today someone decided to sarcastically send me a definition of sarcasm. I hadn’t twigged before, but sarcastic comes from the Greek word sarkasmós, which is derived from sarkázein, which literally means ‘to rend flesh’.

Right, yes, sarx = flesh. I should have known that. After all ‘ho logos egeneto sarx’, is perhaps one of the most controversial phrases ever used by the author of the fourth gospel, and even now the jury is out on what "the word became flesh" is actually supposed to mean.

Perhaps in life, and with another identity always ready in case of emergencies, my tagline could be ‘ho logoi egeneto sarky’ (the words became sarcastic). I like the classical gravitas such a bon mot would give me.