Week 8 – Paper Outline

I’d like to look at economics as my aspect of culture.  I live in a community with significant socio-economic divisions, so this topic is of particular relevance in my local setting.  Things that relate to this topic would include both financial well-being and mode of employment (i.e. production-based or service-based versus corporate or white collar).  Racial and cultural issues are also very intimately tied to this issue.

I’d either like to address the issue through application of the countercultural model outlined in Bevans’ work.  Some specific issues to consider with regard to the church community would center around relational involvement and boundary destruction.  It seems that a challenge for many in the more wealthy churches are willing to “serve” those with financial needs, but less willing to interact on an equal relational level.   It might be interesting to explore some ways to foster a more relational approach.

Week 8 – Bevans Chapter 8

I find this approach difficult in terms of understanding how one ultimately comes to faith. Theology itself, we are told,

is possible only for the converted subject, only for the person who in full openness has allowed God to touch and transform his or her life.

The very act of revelation, in this model, seems to be dependent on both experience of God and adherence to transcendental principles. Given this model, one wonders how a person becomes aware of God in the first place. The approach seems both human centered (in that it demands a certain attitude of seeking) and insufficient (in that it doesn’t really explain how that first experience of God occurs).

The author suggests that:

God’s love floods a person’s heart where he or she is, and theology is understood as the search for understanding one’s recognition of such gracious action.

And yet, the suggestion is unhelpful; the actual process still remains very abstract and vague.

Week 7 – Barker Chapter 14

Note: this post was written last week but, due to a technical glitch, was not posted until today

The concept of a “fictional closing” to meaning is significant. On a broader scheme, Hall essentially suggests that words fail to serve their function (communication) unless at some point we arbitrarily (and temporarily) close their meaning. Recent discussions regarding the “essentials” of the gospel (in reference to the translation model) lead me to ask a similar question of our understanding of the Christ event.

That is, if one were to describe the “meaning” of Christ’s life, death and resurrection, an infinite number of nuanced concepts come to mind (i.e. triumph over sin, triumph over death, fulfillment of the Law, victory over powers and principalities, justification, substitution, restoration of human-God relationship, etc.). However, if we are ever to express the gospel (which indeed is central to its purpose), we must on some level temporarily close its meaning. We simply cannot explain “gospel” without choosing to temporary limit its range of meaning.

Week 8 – Wednesday

Interesting discussion today on deconstruction.  There seem to be some helpful insights here with regard to criticism of current praxis.  I appreciated that the presentation emphasized the response – brining things more inline with the biblical model.  I think its essential to avoid the always present temptation to tear things down without suggesting how to build them back up.

Week 7 – Response to Randy’s post

Randy commented:

Paradise is lost and through our consumerism, materialism and trying to satisfy all our wants and needs, we try to bring back that paradise.  Funny thing is no matter how hard we try, we fail and end up spiritually broken.  The reason being the original “paradise” was about a relationship with God; not the garden itself.  We all need that relationship to experience the paradise lost. 

Well put.  It’s somewhat ironic isn’t it?  Hungry for God, we devote ourselves to consuming everything but him, and then somehow are surprised to find ourselves unsatisfied.  The irony of the jermiad appraoch is that when the search for Eden comes up short, we don’t reconsider the search.  Rather, we give up the quest all together and choose to become content with paradise hoped-for in the midst of lived brokennes. 

Week 7 – Bevans Chapter 7

I affirm how the synthetic model seeks to recognize God’s truth in all contexts, not just our own.  I think it worhtwhile to assert that the soverign God can speak in and through circumstances and voices beyond our own.  Yet, I also strongly agree with the criticism that this approach is likely to become “wsihy-washy” if not grounded in something.  I think it dangerous for the authors to include “Hebrew and Christian Scriptures” among the many relevant contexts, without distinction. 

 Utlimately, we must appeal to some source as more central than the others (and I would argue that Scripture is that source).  Otherwise, our various truth sources are likely to simply “cancel out” one another and leave us with very little left to grasp. 

Week 7 – Barker Chapter 13

Cohen’s critique of CCCS’s “Resistance trhough Rituals” seems warranted.  While it seems clear that there is some element of resistence and intentionality in stylistic choice on bricolage, I do wonder if the use of these symbols is as active of a process as suggested by thHall and Jefferson.  I affirm Cohen’s critque, as paraphrased by Barker:

Style is over-inflated as resistance while resistance is reduced to questions of style.

The attempt to give meaning to all forms of stylistic expression may under-credit the novelty of genuine resistance and, at the same time, fail to take into account the arbitrariness of stylistic trends.

Week 7 – Cobb Chapter 7

It’s interesting that both the Gothic and covenant/jeremiad approaches to sin seem to suggest a humanity that has not merely fallen, but ultimately prefers fallenness and darkness (yet for different reasons). For the Gothic:

…dark as it is, offers epistemological certainty; it allows us to believe that we’ve found the truth.

And for the jeremiad, darkness is preferred over the “almost Eden” that seems to fall short. Thus, we’d rather “hope again in wretched darkness” than live in a paradise that is not quite satisfying (again “hyperreality”: we’d rather imagine paradise than live in a good world that falls somehow short of perfection).

Week 7 – Wednesday

Today’s discussion was particularly helpful for me because it very closely relates to some of my own ministry activities.  I appreciated that we distinguished between church planting within the praxis model and the development of church outreach.  It seems that the latter is a significant challenge for us today because the Western church has been so powerfully shaped by the modern individualistic mentality.

Week 7 – Monday

It seemed like most of what we covered today was introduced in our reading during the first or second week of class. I’m not sure that I understand why we are covering it now. The concepts are interesting, but I haven’t yet figured out how these topics will play out within the broader purposes of the class.