the executed God

Ryan’s last post on Mary Ryder and her actions protesting the death penalty coincided with a book I’ve read a couple weeks ago, so I thought I’d post a brief blurb about it here.

I first encountered Mark Lewis Taylor’s work in a collection of postcolonial theologies. His 2001 The Executed God: The Way of the Cross in Lockdown America is an excellent example of modern theology; critiquing the modern prison-industrial system by using Foucault, James C. Scott and Mumia Abu-Jamal, Taylor uses historical examples of the early Christian movement outlined by scholars such as J. D. Crossan, Horsley and Schüssler Fiorenza to outline a very activist “theatrics of counter-terror” theology. A Mumia Abu-Jamal quote that stuck with me:

Conventional wisdom would have one believe that it is insane to resist this, the mightiest of empires… But what history really shows is that today’s empire is tomorrow’s ashes, that nothing lasts forever, that to not resist is to acquiesce in your own oppression. The greatest form of sanity that anyone can exercise is to resist that force that is trying to repress oppress, and fight down the human spirit.

Check out the preview here!

something uplifting and radical to prove my love for Catholicism

Here’s something interesting and heartening in the world of Catholicism. Apparently, on August 7th of last year, Mary Rider, a member of the Catholic Worker movement and mother of eight was sentenced to fifteen days in prison for protesting during an execution at a North Carolina prison.

On August 18th, 2006, Rider was arrested while protesting the execution of a prisoner at Raleigh’s Central prison. Ryder and a few others symbolically tried to enter the prison, resulting in their arrest and subsequent trial.

One of the most interesting parts of this story is that Ryder refused to pay the $100 fine along with $130 in court costs, telling the judge that she could not, in good conscience contribute financially to a “system that oppressed the poor and carried out executions in her name.” Rider went on to cite Catholic social teaching and allegiance to Jesus as the reason for the protest and her refusal of payment.

the sins of the Catholic church in three short stories

Initial hopes about the new Pope have largely faded from view, as Pope Benedict XVI’s Papal administration continues to astound in its unrelenting medieval conservative tendencies. While the Pope has declared support for the child, a living wage, and condemned the War in Iraq, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger has taken the relatively modest, though important progress made by John Paul II and turned them upside down. The Catholic, possibly out of fear of dwindling numbers in North America and rising numbers in the conservative global south, has given into reactionary elements within the church by catering to homophobic, sexist, and sectarian political and theological positions.

In a December 22nd Christmas address to the Vatican administration, Benedict cited the need to protect the environment, but continued saying that there was a similar need to protect the “ecology of man”. Redefining the traditional duality of genders, he argued, leads to the “self-emancipation of the human being from creation and the Creator”, citing the “link for life between man and woman, as a sacrament of creation, instituted by the Creator” as a prime example of the destruction of said ecology.

Though the Pope did not say directly that gay marriage is as much of a threat to humanity as climate change or pollution, he did bundle the two issues into the same manner of concern. This statement was likely meant in response to a French-sponsored human rights declaration made at the United Nations on December 18th that would seek an end to discrimination against “sexual orientation” and “gender identity”. Though the Vatican affirmed its commitment to protect homosexuals from violence and “unjust” discrimination, it still opposed the measure, citing that it “goes well beyond the abovementioned and shared intent” and that the two terms have no definition in international law. Basically, the Papacy is afraid that gay marriage could become a human right if the motion passed because it would cause, as Vatican permanent observer Cardinal Celestino Migliore stated, “states which do not recognise same-sex unions as ‘matrimony’ [to] be pilloried and made an object of pressure.”

Yet, the Pope’s continuing war against the world-wide gay marriage conspiracy is only a drop in the proverbial the baptismal font (which douses the fires of sin for fewer and fewer North Americans every year–though as a United Church person I can’t really talk). The Papacy has also railed against those who they consider deviants from Catholic orthodoxy as set by the Holy See.

Father Ray Bourgeois, a Catholic Priest of the Maryknoll Catholic Foreign Mission Society of America and outspoken critic of the American foreign policy and the annual protest against the US Army’s School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia was threatened with excommunication by the Vatican for taking part in a ceremony this summer to ordain a member of the group called “Roman Catholic Womenpriests” . Father Bourgeois replied in an interview on Democracy Now:

“For eighteen years, I have been speaking out against the injustice of the School of the Americas, and for many years I’ve been speaking out against the injustice of the war in Iraq. As a Catholic priest for thirty-six years, in conscience, I cannot remain silent about injustice in my Church. I and many have come to the conclusion that the exclusion of women in the Catholic Church is a grave injustice, and I simply must—I cannot, in conscience, accept the Vatican’s demand that I recant my belief and my public statements in support of women’s ordination.”

Essentially, Bourgeois’ participation in women’s ordination was for the sake of a much more open and equal church. While he has spoken with a prophetic voice on issues of injustice in war and neo-colonialism in South America, the church has decided to move on him for acting in opposition to official church teaching. The exclusion of women, he argues, is an institutional injustice, claiming that the doctrine implies that only men are worthy of the honour of the priesthood–an invitation he believes from God to priesthood, to the ministry of priesthood, comes from God. The actions of the Vatican, he argued, are just another example of the moral hypocrisy of the church:

“I’m sad to say that the Vatican, our Church leaders, the hierarchy of the Catholic Church, took many years to respond to the crimes of thousands of priests who sexually abused over 12,000 children. That was first reported in 1988. It wasn’t until eleven or twelve years later that they began to intervene and investigate and really, you know, demand that priests step down from the priesthood.”

Bourgeois, like other priests who act against the official doctrine of the church are punished, where priests who have abused small children were only acted upon until a decade later. Even then, many priests were simply moved from the parishes that they committed their crimes. Is then, child molestation a lesser crime than the ordination of women? One assumes that child molestation is also contrary to church doctrine.

If the church wishes simple moral consistency, why doesn’t it against all challenges to church teaching? For example, Pope John Paul II spoke out against the 2003 invasion of Iraq, denying it the status of a “just war” and the church has consistently upheld that opinion. If this is the case, why doesn’t the church deny communion to American Catholics who voted in favour of the War in Iraq, which the church has spoken out against, while denying communion to pro-gay marriage Catholics by the same token? Aren’t both gay marriage and immoral wars both contrary to Catholic doctrine?

Acting against the doctrines of the church is one thing, but other church leaders and church members have been punished similarly for theological views considered contrary to the church’s teaching as well. In 2005, Jesuit Father Roger Haight, past president of the Catholic Theological Society of America, was censured in 2005 for causing “great harm to the faithful” with his 2000 book Jesus: Symbol of God, and the conflict culminated with the Vatican banning him from teaching:

Jesus: Symbol of God has been described by Haight as an attempt to express traditional doctrines about Christ and salvation in a language appropriate to postmodern culture. In particular, the book offers a positive theological reading of non-Christian religions and savior figures. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith asserted that the book endangered traditional doctrines on such matters as the divinity of Christ, the Trinity, the saving value of Christ’s death on the Cross, and the importance of the church.

The Jesuits have always been proponents of branching out philosophically and theologically. Walter Ong, for example, provided the inspiration for Marshall McLuhan’s Gutenberg Galaxy (some have even suggested that he virtually plagiarized it). The book, apparently, was an attempt to put traditional Catholicism and Christology in a contemporary context. The real threat however, was not the notion of post-modern or contemporary Christology:

Most observers see the action on Haight as part of a broader concern with the “theology of religious pluralism,” referring to various attempts to treat non-Christian religions as vehicles of salvation in their own right. Prior to his election as pope, Benedict XVI repeatedly warned that such theologies, if pushed too far, lead to religious relativism – the idea that one religion is as good as another. In particular, critics worry that such approaches may sap the missionary energies of the church.

The real issue was religious syncretism, and Haight’s book is complementary of Eastern religious traditions and compared them with the Christian story. The Vatican’s fear is that Catholicism will drift from the realm of the “true faith” to one among many. While moral relativism would be an understanding worry, the Vatican has only affirmed fears of exceptionalism. While some traditional Catholics were uncomfortable with the “reaching out” to Protestant Christians as kindred spirits after the Second Vatican Council, the notion that a Catholic Priest would affirm the worthiness of a faith that has nothing to do with Christianity was deemed a threat to the power of the Catholic church. There is a fear, likely, that Catholic faithful would not bother going to church and possibly attend a Buddhist temple instead, thinking they would still be provided with eternal salvation.

One wonders why the Catholic church is starting a slow march back into the dark ages while the true heresies of war, poverty and ecological disaster have come to the forefront. While the Vatican has expressed concern for climate change, extreme wealth and genetic engineering, it appears to miss the point–that the Christian story is one of love and justice for all members of the earth community. Of all times, this is the time to open up and be true to the core mission of the church in a world of violent turmoil.

crossposted here.

the irrational “other” in Palestine

How many times did we hear the phrase, “they hate us for our freedoms” in the aftermath of September 11th and the Iraq War? Terrorists are terrorists, it is argued, because they hate something innate in the modern liberal democracies. They hate t-shirts, internet pornography and pension plans. Don’t forget mini-skirts.

The very same argument has been brought out once again for the latest invasion of Palestine by Israel. This time, however, the enemy (Hamas), simply hates the existence of the invading country (Israel). This simplistic view of the situation has been upheld by our own government with the phrase “Israel has the clear right to defend itself” then qualifies this with “it must minimize civilian casualties”. “First and foremost” said foreign minister Lawrence Cannon, “the rocket attacks must stop”. Since Hamas has launched rockets into Israel, Israel has the right to launch an all-out attack on Gaza to supposedly defend its citizens. Little mention in the mainstream media has been made of why Hamas has launched rockets into Israel in the first place, or why Hamas exists and is calling for the destruction of the Israeli state. This suggests that the assumption is that Hamas hates Israeli irrationally and must be destroyed in order to protect the citizens of Israel.

In an article titled “they hate us for our bombs“, Globe & Mail columnist Rick Salutin dissects this disturbing myth:

This is so in Kandahar, where Canadians keep dying, and “they,” or some of them, don’t hate us for our good intentions, but for the bombs that land on wedding parties. It’s so in Gaza, where people often show bomb remnants marked “Made in U.S.A.” That’s why they see “us” as enemies, like Israel. That, plus “our” support for Israel’s bombing. George Bush said it was fine with him. “No comment,” said Barack Obama, squandering some of the goodwill toward him. “First and foremost, those rocket attacks must stop,” said Canada’s Foreign Minister. It’s the “first and foremost” that invited rage. Most people, including Palestinians, know that rocketing others is bad – but so is being bombed. This is about understanding how people think, not debating it.

The bad guys should be punished with violence, not because of their actions or why they commit their actions, because there is something inherent to their character that causes violent outbursts. Could they be launching rockets because they feel locked up like animals in a compound smaller than the size of metropolitan Toronto? Could the violence committed by Israel in response to their treatment of the Palestinians be spurring even more violence, increasing hatred in retaliation? This does not justify the violence perpetrated by Hamas–it just makes sense of it.

This comes down to simple dehumanization. The perpetrators show no sense of rationality–one of the markers of humanity. They attack because they are either evil or commit evil acts with no rationale. To mark fellow human beings as “other” is to deny the fact that they are human and psychologically remove any right that they have to justice or compassion. This gives the “good guys” any right necessary to blot out the irrational other. You see this in the violence in Iraq, the oppression of Apartheid, and the massacres akin to My Lai. It is far too easy to call someone a religious fanatic because it takes the onus off the perpetrator for their own indiscretions and divides the world neatly into Manichean realms of absolute good and evil. And evil must be extinguished, must be extinguished through an act or acts of redemptive violence, which barring complete extermination of the “other” has never brought security to the “good guys” no matter how smart their bombs are.

Victory before peace, once again, rather than justice before peace.

Palestine as the nexus of history

On the heels of the latest Israeli assault on Gaza, it may be instructive to examine how history repeats itself. This is especially true when it comes to empire and imperialism. While the Christian story, for example, speaks to the brutal injustice of the Roman Empire, it also channels the subjugation of the Jewish people over several thousand years. Empires such as Egypt, Babylon, Assyria and Greece all found their way to Palestine, and found it hard to leave. For Christians, Rome is just the climax of the two texts, the inevitable butting of heads between the God of Israel and the authority of Caesar.

As a result, the story speaks to all form of imperialism, and could just as easily be applied to the modern American Empire as any other. The most interesting intersection in this wider continuous narrative is that the “holy land” of Israel/Palestine has been at the nexus of Empire since the enslavement of the ancient Hebrews by the Egyptians. Islam conquered the holy land over a millennium ago, while the Ottomans inherited the fiefdoms of Islam’s political collapse. The British found their way to the holy land, if not just as an adjunct to protect the vital Suez canal, eventually establishing the state of Israel as an imperfect solution to the new “Jewish question” after the horror of the holocaust.

This brings us to today. Israel is now a modern liberal democracy, which boasts an open and free society rivaling the rest of the western world. Except for all of those Arabs who were displaced by the founding of Israel. We call them Palestinians, but they are now the new inhabitants of the land of Empire, Palestine, taking up the story of the ancient Israelites, this time at the mercy of modern Israel.

It is not, however, Israel that constitutes this new Empire. The United States provides 2.4 billion dollars in aid annually for Israeli defense. While this is only around a quarter of Israeli defense-spending, it means that Israel receives the most aid out of any country in the world–even the poorest nations of the world requiring dire assistance. The US continues its support of Israel, in fact, even though it is the largest debtor nation in the world. This suggests that their motivations are either humanitarian reasons at play (protecting “the Jews” from another supposed holocaust) or it is in the best interests of the American Empire to have a satellite state in the Middle East to offset the interests of perpetual spoilers Iran and Syria? Since rational self interest is the underlying philosophy in the American psyche, it is probably the latter.

the diapered infant vs. the mutant superhero (the Christmas special)

If we want to be part of these events,
Advent and Christmas,
we cannot just sit there like a theatre audience
and enjoy all the lovely pictures.
Instead, we ourselves will be caught up
in this action,
this reversal of all things;
we must become actors on this stage
For this is a play in which each spectator has
a part to play,
and we cannot hold back.
What will our role be?
Worshipful shepherds bending the knee,
or kings bringing gifts?
What is being enacted
when Mary becomes the mother of God,
when God enters the world
in a lowly manger?

We cannot come to this manger
in the same way that we would approach
the cradle of any other child.
Something will happen to each of us
who decides to come to Christ’s manger.
Each of us will have been judged or redeemed
before we go away.
Each of us will either break down,
or come to know that God’s mercy is turned
toward us…
What does it mean
to say such things about the Christ child?…
It is God, the Lord and Creator of all things,
who becomes so small here,
comes to us in a little corner of the world,
unremarkable and hidden away,
who wants to meet us and be among us
as a helpless, defenceless child.

-Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “the Reversal of All Things”

Another Christmas has come and gone, while many Canadians are celebrating the real holiday, Boxing Day, with the “sweet deals” of salvation.

Yet, in Christianity, it should mean more than a crass exchange of credit card-financed debauchery. This much is obvious. It should mean the old school “good will towards men.” As the blog-prophet Ted Schmidt reminds us, Charles Dickens always understood the meaning of Christmas:

“Business!” cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. “Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!”

So says the Ghost in Dickens’ Christmas Carol.

Dickens’ ghost, with its virtues, contrasts directly with “business”, meaning Scrooge. Scrooge’s business is accumulation, not justice or love associated with so-called Christian charity. The “spirit of Christmas” for Dickens, was spiritual, not material, and therefore held the meaning of Christmas against the obvious excesses of the British Empire and Victorian London.

There is much said about the commercialization of Christmas. Conversely, there has been much said about the secularization of Christmas, which frankly, doesn’t help Christmas resist commercialism or oppressive fundamentalism. I’m not talking about secular people who celebrate the holiday as a time to be with loved ones and reflect on peace and turkey. It is the shifted meaning of Christmas from a fundamentally important and meaningful holiday at the end of the year, to an excuse to spend extravagant amounts of money while missing the point.

There’s a story behind the holiday, and when we forget where our stories come from, that’s when we either spiral into abject nihilism or cling to the text-as-worship or fundamentalism. The Christmas story for much of North America is about buying and turkeys–little room for the story of Christ–which is a story of liberation. Conversely, to read Christmas as a celebration of the “birth of our Lord,” with that supposedly historical event as the important element in the story, you miss the whole point. Jesus was born in a Roman-controlled backwater, much like what we would call the “third world” today. King Harod–the Roman-backed vassal ruler of Palestine–immediately orders the baby to be killed. Why? Because Jesus was a nice guy who said nice things? Highly unlikely.

Harod orders Jesus to death because Jesus is a threat to Harod. Jesus is a political threat to Harod’s power and consequently, Rome’s power. Now, Palestine wasn’t officially a Roman colony. It just so happened that there were legions on the ready at the coast, ready to spring into action at the first sign of “disorder” within their sphere of influence. Jesus is ordered to death by Pilate, the Roman governor. Is it the fact that he’s a nice guy preaching you to love everybody? Deepak Choprah has been spared the wrath of the Bush administration thus far, so it seems unlikely that this would be the case. Or could it be that Jesus was preaching a non-violent revolution that would see the first one last and the last one first in God’s kingdom?

If that much is obvious, why the sappy story of the manger? Because God has entered the earth in the form of a defenseless child. Free of ideology, full of innocence, desiring nothing more than to be in communion with, to be close to, his mother. In contrast with Jupiter (or Zeus), the high God of Rome (and of justice) who violently overthrows his father, Cronus, for the kingship of the Gods. Cronus, of course, overthrew his father Ouranos for kingship of the universe before that. A God incarnated in the world in the form of a poor child born in a manger is a stark contrast to the glorious birth of the imperial gods. Not only that, but later on, that God incarnate takes the title “Son of God,” appropriating the title given to the living god of Roman mythology: Caesar.

This was not anything new for the writers of the Bible, as the area we now know as Israel and Palestine has always been the central point of conquest for neighbouring empires like Egypt, Babylon and Alexander–then Rome. Moses was born a slave and brought his people out from under the yoke of Pharaoh and Moses never reached the promised land; an inappropriate end for a heroic figure worthy of imperial theology. The Gospel writers of the New Testament wrote the character of Jesus into their tradition as a way to creatively counter the might of the latest empire to displace the Jews. This is the good news.

Yet, while examining the Bible, many who call themselves Christians do not acknowledge this fact. They forget, much in the same way that the commercializers gloss over the true meaning in order to move products. They do not understand that the Christmas story is an act of imagination that offers an alternative story to the dominant discourse of the “masters of the universe.” If they did, they would then understand that Christmas is a time for imagination, where we envision a God very different than the gods of the powers. In the manger, and in the life of Jesus, that God is shown in all truth–a non-violent God of love, justice and liberation that reiterates the promise of Psalm 82 and “all the foundations of the earth are shaken.”

Joy to the world. Merry Christmas and Peace to all.

putting the Augustus back in Christmas

Just a quick post, given the time of year, to discuss the Christmas narrative in its imperial context. Picking up from J.D. Crossan in mid-sentence…

As Matthew says in 2:1-2, “in the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, asking, ‘Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.’” A new and therefore a replacement King of the Jews has been appointed by God and not by Rome. Moreover, a new and therefore replacement star has appeared in the sky; instead of guiding three individuals westward from Troy to Rome, as the old star did, it guides three individuals westward from Persia to Jerusalem. (No wonder, then, that the post-Matthean tradition came up with three wise men!) Whether you take star and counter-star as both factual or both fictional, or one factual and the other fictional, recognize that Matthew’s first-century counter-story is high treason, not just a cute Christmas carol whose historicity we can discuss once a year in our media. Herod, of course, did not debate historicity- he got the message and decreed murder. (God and Empire, 106-7)

Peace and best wishes to you and yours!

Children of Men: Christmas story

Looking for a movie to watch with the family? Want to cash in on that Christmas spirit? Behold, the answer: Alfonso Cuarón’s Children of Men. Set in 2027, the entire human race has been rendered hopelessly and mysteriously infertile (due to pollution? radiation?), with Britain the only remaining functional (while dystopic) government. Implementing apartheid-state strategies to “deal” with the hordes of refugees, one of these refugees is miraculously pregnant. A reluctant protector (Clive Owen) must then protect her from the murderous powers that be and shepard her to safety- and towards hope for humankind.

Swap Herod with dystopia and you’ve got yourself the Christmas story!
Here’s the trailer:

What also might be of interest is this special feature The Possibility of Hope, featuring philosopher Slavoj Žižek, Naomi Klein (you’ll recall Cuarón directed the 7-minute short for The Shock Doctrine), futurist James Lovelock, sociologist Saskia Sassen, human geographer Fabrizio Eva, cultural theorist Tzvetan Todorov, and philosopher and economist John N. Gray.

Parts 2 and 3 here.

the revolution in the “hello”

Came across the latest sermonette and thought some might enjoy it:

Our Mapquest was, it turned out, hallucinated. Everyday we had a trip to take, from here to there and there to here. There were miles of pavement, hours of sitting in softly-vibrating holograms that moved us through the sprawl. We would push a button for a song that sounded like an orgasm, and then wait for security to search us, or an elevator door to open.

We learned to wait longer and longer as we grew older, but we would spend more and more. Packages multiplied in our hands, on shelves, the FedEx was at the door. The proliferation of products, flashing with landscapes, sexual parts, the logic of convenience — gave off the sensation that we were getting somewhere. In fact, we had become masters of an insane kind of yoga.

We commuted through time, walking down the long hallway wallpapered with logos – and there were always logos nearby as the years passed. We didn’t notice them so much. The shapes combined the power of crosses, breasts, and bullets, – they would burst into view, on an elastic band of underwear, or up on hollow metal poles by the side of the highway.

What is happening to us here at the end of 2008? We are laughing, shrugging our shoulders and walking sideways off the Mapquest. It can happen while standing in line, or waiting at that elevator – when somehow a new logic enters our mind like a little radical common sense, “What am I waiting for? I’ve been waiting for years.”

The dream of being a Consumer was supposed to be a one-way trip. It was the new America and there was no way out – only the deeper dream. Buying more simulations of life, the way of products lay shining before us, the American utopia. There was unlimited debt to buy more time to dream this dream, more miles in the hallucinating trip-tych. Now whole banks vanish overnight. The billionaire is arrested in his pajamas. The mirage falls to the pavement as trash.

We wake up, but we can’t move. Are we are overwhelmed by the prospect of a sensual life beyond products? We have an open field before us. The change a-comin’ will not be an adjustment. It can be as basic as we want to make it. We are not ideological – there is no great “ism” waiting in the wings. But when we begin to move – we’re sluggish now from our deep sleep – we will go to the neighbor that we daily padded by with our iPod, go up to that person and slow down. Taking in that so ordinary and so fantastic neighbor – the revolution is here.

Have we noticed that we stopped buying cars? Let’s give ourselves credit for that and get to work on the replacement, which starts with walking. If we walk in our streets again we re-magicalize them. Touching each other for a moment, “Hello!” – in that moment the architecture around us seems to change. Doorways light up and windows seem to have better intentions. Ordinary life is the great entertainment as we re-enter public space…

Say hello to a neighbor and trade names and a new economy begins. Can we sense the release from debt and the launch into real wealth when we find a stranger who was always nearby but was lost in our consuming?

Change-a-lujah!

more Change-a-lujah!