Welcome! You have accidentally reached the blog of a heteroclite follower of Jesus: dave wainscott. I'm
"pushing toward the unobvious" as I post thinkings/linkings
re: Scripture, church and culture. Hot topics include: temple tantrums, time travel, sexuality/spirituality, U2kklesia, role of the pastor, God-haunted music/art..and subversive videos like these.
Having been a fervent follower of U2 since 1980, upon hearing "I Will Follow" on the amazing WPLR New Haven (Thanks to St Stoneman) I did (follow)...
And having been a fervent follower of Jesus since Spring 1983..
..when I had the chance, just days after signing on to that second followership, to see/hear/experience U2 at the New Haven Coliseum--a concert that was so historic and Holy Spirited that the leitourgia had no name, and inevitably they later had to literally blow up the arena (watch it here!), as no act could possibly top U2 (or even their alarming opening act)...
As one with wholly/holy obsession with said band , and an unrepentant bibliophile, these three books are among my favorites...and I own a few...
thousand.
Scot Calhoun, who directs the U2 Conference, has edited and curated these three voluminous (and luminous) volumes. Academic books about U2, including one on religious impulse? Order them yesterday.
Oh, before you go any further, soundtrack this coming conversation about Angela's observations with an opening act/prelude: the classic interview excerpt of Bono on Gay Byrne's "The Meaning of Life"; you can watch it below. See you after the break. You might even sense the religious impulse to be baptized/renew your baptismal vows after viewing this short clip...which may be precisely the the point.
The short section I have in mind starts at 1:55 (though do watch the first section as well, as Bono masterfully adopts/adapts the classic C.S. Lewis trilemma apologetic ( popularly called the "Liar, Lunatic, or Lord" apologetic).
Wow.. I hear that hushed silence from you after the video ended.
When I show this clip in class, it inevitably happens, even from non U2 fans!
That short section has moved me for years, not just because it is a humble, diplomatic but direct confession of Christian faith from the singer, but this particular exchange has often given me the chills and holy hush; it always felt deeply mystical...even liturgical..in a way I could never quite put my finger on..
Until now, thanks to Angela, who says on p. 162:
A video of an interview of Bono with veteran Irish broadcaster Gay Byrne, from his program "The Meaning of Life," includes an exchange oddly echoing the renewal of baptismal vows that take place in some Christian churches at the Easter:
Bono: I find it hard to accept that all the millions and millions of lives, half the earth, for two thousand years, have been touched, have felt their lives touched and inspired by some nutter. I just —I don't believe it.
Byrne: So therefore it follows that you believe (Jesus] was divine.
Bono: Yes.
Byrne: And therefore it follows that you believe that he rose physically from
Bono: Yes. I've no problem with miracles. (Laughs] I'm livingaround them. I am one.
Byrne: So when you pray, then, you pray to Jesus.
Bono: The risen Jesus.
Byrne: And you believe that he made promises which will come true.
The simple call and response. The rhythmic cadence. The simple but heartfelt "Yes" of Bono's answers the the questions of the host/inquisitive inquisitor/pastor Byrne. And even though the interviewer has been characterized as an agnostic/atheist, Byrne didn't see himself that way. He was more of a struggling Catholic. Someone
called him "a loyal if questioning Catholic later in life."
His genuine interest in Bono's responses are based on decades of friendship . I felt he was even rooting/praying for Bono to confess in a very Christ-honoring and orthodox way.
At the funeral Mass for the late Gay Byrne on Friday, the principal celebrant, Fr Leonard Maloney SJ said those who knew the broadcaster well knew him as “a man of faith”.
In his homily at St Mary’s Pro Cathedral in Dublin, the Jesuit provincial said Byrne’s faith was not the kind of faith that has all the answers. “It was the kind that asks all the questions. link
Bono's "yes" answers called to mind the many riffs and improvisations on the word I have heard over the years as a pastor officiating baptisms/ renewals. Sometimes it is said tearfully and barely audibly ; sometimes shouted as if from a rooftop. A student of mine's recent response was (video here)
But something about Bono's quiet, confident "yes' resonates with me...and I know it spoke to Gay Byrne like no armtwisting evangelistic sermon could.
"All the promises are yes," as St Paul asserted . . A confession of faith in summative one-word microcosm.
'Oddly echoing the renewal of baptismal vows," Angela so articulately commented.
Yes, that's what I had felt but had no language for.
Echoes are important.
Here is one version of the renewal of baptism vows:
V. Do you reject Satan?
R. I do.
V. And all his works?
R. I do.
V. And all his empty promises?
R. I do.
V. Do you believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth?
R. I do.
V. Do you believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was born of the Virgin Mary was crucified, died, and was buried, rose from the dead, and is now seated at the right hand of the Father?
R. I do.
V. Do you believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting?
R. I do.
V. God, the all-powerful Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has given us a new birth by water and the Holy Spirit, and forgiven all our sins. May he also keep us faithful to our Lord Jesus Christ for ever and ever.
Also, don't get me started on the two words in the sample ceremony above; and Bono's last and final answer, where it felt right to "say more" and add only two words: "Yes..I do"
They are still going strong as they near their seventieth.
May it be with all who we baptize, marry and speak to.
And interview about the meaning of life.
Amen,
"For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the 'Amen' is spoken by us to the glory of God. (2 Corinthians 1:20)
"In his interview in ‘The Meaning of Life’ Gay said this to Martin Sheen: ‘Suppose it’s all true, and suppose you get to meet God at the pearly gates. What will you say to Him?’After hardly a pause, the seasoned actor said: ‘Deo gratias. Thanks be to God.’”
But, you say, “It was at NBC.” Well, if something sounds crazy, check the URL. This particular story was on NBC.com.co.
Did you notice the extra .co on the end? That means it's not really NBC.com. Also, click around to the other stories, which literally have text that reads "adfasf weoogsdre gawerags."
You just make us all look gullible when you don’t do simple steps like that.
By the way, if you are a pastor you should already know that no one can make you officiate anything. In fact, you can refuse to officiate an interracial marriage. You'd be an idiot and a racist, but you wouldn't be arrested.
"It’s not gullibility; it’s malice. (C.S. Lewis is right and Ed Stetzer is wrong.)"
It has been “An Embarrassing Week for Christians Sharing Fake News,” Ed Stetzer writes for Christianity Today.* By “Christians,” Stetzer means the CT audience, which is to say white evangelicals. White evangelicals, he says, seem particularly susceptible to believing and spreading fake news stories because they are “gullible”:
So, here is the deal.
We are too gullible. …
You just make us all look gullible when you don’t do simple steps like that. …
Posting links to fake [news stories] just makes all of us look (rightly) gullible. …
Be less gullible next time.
That’s the gist of Stetzer’s entire post, which makes a commendable case against credulous gullibility and offers some practical advice for how to be more skeptical when evaluating outrageous-seeming news stories online.
--------------- 3)Rachel Held Evans: For the sake of the gospel, drop the persecution complex
d you hear about the pastor who was arrested for not marrying a same-sex couple? What about the publisher that got sued for refusing to censor anti-gay verses from the Bible?
Both of these stories have been exposed as fakes of course, but that didn’t keep hundreds of thousands of conservative Christians from sharing them online this week. When I pointed out to a friend that the story he had just shared on social media wasn’t true, he replied, “well it might as well be. Christians in this country are under attack.”
Sehnsucht (German pronunciation: [ˈzeːnzʊxt]) is a German noun translated as "longing", "yearning", or "craving",[1] or in a wider sense a type of "intensely missing". However, Sehnsucht is difficult to translate adequately and describes a deep emotional state. Its meaning is somewhat similar to the Portuguese word, saudade, or it can be equally translated as theRomanian word dor. Sehnsucht is a compound word, originating from an ardent longing or yearning (das Sehnen) and addiction (die Sucht). However, these words do not adequately encapsulate the full meaning of their resulting compound, even when considered together.[2]Sehnsucht represents thoughts and feelings about all facets of life that are unfinished or imperfect, paired with a yearning for ideal alternative experiences. It has been referred to as “life’s longings”; or an individual’s search for happiness while coping with the reality of unattainable wishes.[3] Such feelings are usually profound, and tend to be accompanied by both positive and negative feelings. This produces what has often been described as an ambiguous emotional occurrence.[citation needed]It is sometimes felt as a longing for a far-off country, but not a particular earthly land which we can identify. Furthermore there is something in the experience which suggests this far-off country is very familiar and indicative of what we might otherwise call "home". In this sense it is a type of nostalgia, in the original sense of that word. At other times it may seem as a longing for a someone or even a something. But the majority of people who experience it are not conscious of what or who the longed for object may be, and the longing is of such profundity and intensity that the subject may immediately be only aware of the emotion itself and not cognizant that there is a something longed for. The experience is one of such significance that ordinary reality may pale in comparison, as in Walt Whitman's closing lines to "Song of the Universal".,.
...Sehnsucht took on a particular significance in the work of author C. S. Lewis. Lewis described Sehnsucht as the "inconsolable longing" in the human heart for "we know not what." In the afterword to the third edition of The Pilgrim's Regress he provided examples of what sparked this desire in him particularly: That unnameable something, desire for which pierces us like a rapier at the smell of bonfire, the sound of wild ducks flying overhead, the title ofThe Well at the World's End, the opening lines of "Kubla Khan", the morning cobwebs in late summer, or the noise of falling waves.[5]
As one with a special interest in the temptations of Jesus, literary structure of Matthew, I wouldn't have resisted the testation to buy it at double the price (:
Come on..NO reviews on Amazon US or Amazon UK (He was British)?!...
"His activity in philosophy, theology, and
spirituality led many to consider him the outstanding figure of 20th
century Anglicanism. -Wikipedia
Turns out he was well-respected by C.S. Lewis,and had an intriguing solution for the synoptic problem. Wiki calls him a "maverick."
I like him already...even if/especially if he is sometimes wrong (:
Even in the preface, Frederick Borsh partly agrees with accusations of Farrer's sometimes fanciful flights into literary structural analysis, midrash and typology. But he defends him as being very thoughtful, creative..and ahead of his time as far as redaction/compositional criticism etc. "He may have seen too many typologies, but he was not wrong in understanding that biblical writers often thought in typological categories. This keen awareness pays particularly rich dividends in his study of Christ's temptations." (p. 2)
He does well, as does Donald Kraybill, in seeing many links from the temptations to the rest of Matthew's gospel.
I haven't read enough for a review yet, so I'll just
1)ask if any are familiar with this work
2)quote this:
Satan's insinuation...contains a hidden poison: "If you are the Son of God..If you cannot or dare not, what sort of divine Son are you?"... Jesus declines..not because it is wicked..but because it is wicked to make a willful use of spiritual power... "throw yourself down"...The suggested action is so utterly useless in itself, it can have one purpose only:.."Jump and find out; if you won't jump you can't really believe it." ...Christ refused to do what Phaethon did [doubt his paternity]. But could he have even thought in those terms? We may give a double reply. First, though Christ did not think that God was an inhabitant of Jerusalem, he took the sanctity of the holy place with complete seriousness He can, indeed, be said to have pulled his own death on his head, by taking the law into his own hands and cleansing the temple from trade. Second, we must say that in dreams or visions symbols become realities...
..It would be absurd to claim any sort of certainty for the suggestions we have advanced. We cannot be sure what paths of association Christ's visionary thoughts, as St Matthew represents them, follow out. Yet our guesses are not valueless. They were the sort of lines along which a devout Jewish imagination ran; and the exercise of working out probable tracks and junctions in the movement of such a mind puts us in sympathy with the author we are trying to understand.. Chapter IV
The whole video here by NT Wright is worth watching.
He so reminds me of C.S. Lewis with his series of apt metaphors. Here are three
Think if I offered you a drivers license, claiming i had authority to issue it
-Think if someone destroyed all bank records and evidence of any debt you owe?
Think what would happen if you pointed at something, hoping for your dog to look at it?
But let's focus on the third (4:13ff) here:
The telling and true-to-life illustration of pointing your dog towards something;
and the temple being a signpost pointing to something (Someone) else is so good.
Try it on your dog, I double dog dare you(:
He may have clarified this in the longer video of which this is an excerpt, but it's likely Wright is actually drawing (as he often acknowledges) on C.S. Lewis:
The sunlight in a picture is therefore not related to real sunlight simply as written words are to spoken. It is a sign but something more than a sign, because in it the thing signified is really in a certain mode present. If I had to name the relation I should call it not symbolical but sacramental.. ..I have tried to stress throughout the inevitableness of the error made about every transposition by one who approaches it from the lower medium only..You will have noticed that most dogs cannot understand pointing. You point to a bit of food on the floor; the dog, instead of looking at the floor, sniffs at your finger. A finger is a finger to him, and that is all. -"Transposition," from The Weight of Glory...someone has uploaded the whole essay here)
