I’m Calling a Session! (part ii)

I think we have some tools to come to some preliminary suggestions as to whether Devoted and Disgruntled is primarily a conference or a community. My conclusion, however, is based on one last observation and realization that I came to whilst at DandD and that is the overwhelming articulation of loneliness and lack of organic relationships with each other as artists.

I have experienced the freelance lifestyle and my personal impression was that it was a lonely existence interspersed with intense intimacy for short periods of time that, over time and repeated frequently, left me alone and scared of intimacy and commitment. I wanted others to know me deeply and to be vulnerable in my work but my experience told me that my interactions with others fed me for a time but everyone, in the end was using me, just as I was using them for personal fulfillment.

This is a process called individualization and it’s been noted frequently by sociologists and cultural commentators as the major destructive force within a consumerist, capitalist society. Add to this society a vocation that requires collaboration on deep ‘spiritual’/‘emotional’/‘human’ expression which itself requires a large amount of vulnerability on the part of the person and the group, it is no wonder that the theatre, as a collective of artists, is full of people damaged, lonely and deeply confused as to what it means to be a person.

I bring up this individualization because of this connection it has to our attainment of personhood. Here ‘personhood’ is distinguished from human being. John Zizioulas, an Orthodox theologian, conceives of the human being, purely as the biological entity of skin and bones, etc. To gain personhood one must develop, or allow to emerge, a deeper ontology. This, he proposes, is in our connection to others and to God. Let us make a massive side step for the moment on the subject of God but look at the ‘person’ stemming from our essential sociality. I have written a lot recently (Big Bible blog) on our identities being inexplicably linked to our sociality and I use those arguments here as a basis of my point. From my experience as a freelancer the more isolated and emotionally distant I became from people the more lonely and desperate I became. My inner parts cried out for intimacy but society was shaped that I would be individual and so I sought intimacy in the temporary and associative relationships with others without knowing I needed an organic relationship.

When I got married I publicly and contractually denied my individuality by agreeing to remain in communion with my wife; we became ‘one’. This meant that I could not have emotional barriers between us, vulnerability was a deliberate act every day. If I couldn’t be vulnerable on every level of my life then I was individualizing again. This may come across as aggressively extreme but I think its important to speak in these terms to depict the problem we find ourselves in as a society.

For DandD to be a community there needs to be a vulnerable connection between the parts. Each ‘individual’ needs to take the risk and participate in an intimate exchange of selves, willing to be shaped and impacted by the other. With the numbers present at DandD7, this would be impossible to achieve, hence why I want to know if it was ‘primarily’ a community. Was it my experience that, at DandD7, people were showing signs of being determined by others or by the ethos of the whole? I cannot say for I was not at each connection or able to be intimately engaged with every part all of the time. Is it possible, in the context, to experience that intimacy, etc.? I would say only if it is assumed that it is a possibility.

The principles that Open Space use, however, may help us to discern whether the intention is to establish a community or if they only will achieve, at best, a committed group of conference goers.

The Principles are

  1. Whoever comes are the right people …reminds participants that they don’t need the CEO and 100 people to get something done, you need people who care. And, absent the direction or control exerted in a traditional meeting, that’s who shows up in the various breakout sessions of an Open Space meeting.
  2. Whenever it starts is the right time …reminds participants that “spirit and creativity do not run on the clock.”
  3. Wherever it happens is the right place. …reminds participants that space is opening everywhere all the time. Please be concious and aware. – Tahrir Square is one famous example. (Wherever is the new one, just added)
  4. Whatever happens is the only thing that could have …reminds participants that once something has happened, it’s done—and no amount of fretting, complaining or otherwise rehashing can change that. Move on.
  5. When it’s over, it’s over …reminds participants that we never know how long it will take to resolve an issue, once raised, but that whenever the issue or work or conversation is finished, move on to the next thing. Don’t keep rehashing just because there’s 30 minutes left in the session. Do the work, not the time.

There is also one law: ‘The law of two feet’ or ‘The law of mobility’,

If at any time you find yourself in any situation where you are neither learning nor contributing: Give greetings, use your two feet, and go do something useful. Responsibility resides with you.

This law creates a vibrant environment of exchange in ideas and ‘bumble-bee’ cross pollinations. My own critique would be that this law has an inherent individualization underlying it.

“I am in control of my own experience”

Phalim McDermott, Artistic Director of Improbable and chief convener of DandD, believers that the law of two feet is not just about leaving,

Sometimes people concentrate on “The law of two feet.” as being about leaving somewhere: it might be a session, a person who is dominating a conversation, a topic that goes off somewhere you are no longer interested in, all these are things one might want to move away from. However it’s good to remember it’s a law of TWO feet….Maybe if you focus on where you are going to or where your presence has gone.. Then you could realise it might be rude to have already left a less than present self amongst the group. Or perhaps it’s even arrogant to assume people will even notice that you left.

What the law of two feet does do is enable the whole to function and feed itself. The parts need to be attuned to where the information may need to be passed to in order to grow and develop and create. When this happens then the second foot is an important engagement of the individual with the whole. It is not clear, however, if this indeed is how it is used.

In conclusion, I want to say that DandD has the exciting potential to be a community; an enduring organic whole which determines individuals and creates persons who can dare to be vulnerable and dependable with each other. At present, however, due to its size and it essential nature as a task orientated event it remains, for me, primarily a conference. This is not to deny its community aspect of intimacy but those relationships are fostered and grown elsewhere. This is a positive thing and I am so glad that communities are forming around these principles and the ethos of openness outside of DandD but it, on its own is not primarily a community.

I am willing, even hoping, to be corrected. This conference was such a blessing to me and to the people involved and has the potential to do so much more constructive and life-affirming work for the participants. There’s only simple stps that need to be made if DandD wants to pursue the primacy of organic rather than associative but most participants seem to engage on the associative aspects due to their continual fear and acceptance of our individualized society .

Can church ever use Open Space Technology? You’ll have to read my dissertation. What can be said at this time is that Church is also both organic and associative but, like DandD it is, sadly, primarily an associative social structure and not a space for intimate connections and freedom to vulnerable explore what it means to be connected as a person.

I’m Calling a Session! (part i)

It was on my way down to a conference called Devoted and Disgruntled 7 that I read,

one can distinguish between ideal types of organic and associative social structures. A person is born into an organic social structure, or grows into it; by contrast, a person freely joins an associative social structure. The former is a ‘living organism’ whose parts depend on the whole organism and are determined by it; the latter is ‘a mechanical aggregate and artifact’ composed of individual parts. The former is thus enduring, the latter transient. In short, organic social structures are communities of being, while associative social structures are alliances for a specific purpose.

I was heading down to DandD7 at the invitation of my sister who has been participating in it for several years. DandD aims to be a gathering place for theatre makers and performing artists to discuss and explore major issues surrounding the arts industry. The reason I was traveling the 271 miles from Durham was to experience a organizational framework used at DandD called Open Space Technology.

Open Space Technology was discovered by an American called Harrison Owen. The story goes that he had set up a conference to explore issues stemming from his paper about “organizational transformation” and ran two successful events. On the approach to the third conference he found he was not relishing the idea of all the work necessary to put on such a large scale event; agendas, speakers, etc. It was then that he realized; most participants of the previous years’ conferences said the best part of those events were the coffee breaks, which Owen had not organized. Owen then sent out a one paragraph invitation to anyone to come and discuss ‘organizational transformation’ and 100 people turned up.

The seats for delegates were set out in a circle and the time was booked. Apart from this nothing had been set in place; it was open. The basic premise is it’s a meeting based on the dynamics of a coffee break.

Open Space, therefore, is distinctive in its lack of an agenda past the initial problem which needs to be discussed; in DandD’s case ‘What are we going to do about theatre and the performing arts?

Before getting to DandD7 I asked my sister why she had invited me? She said she thought that Open Space Technology may well help me in my research to formulate some ecclesiology (lit. words about church) which denied the use the rigid hierarchy which, in my opinion, stifles creativity of a group and denies full participation of every member in a community. What was interesting in her description of Open Space was the deliberate use of the words ‘her church’ and ‘her community’.

When it came to Saturday morning my over arching question was: To what extent could DandD be described as my sister’s church?

I need to briefly explain my use of the word ‘church’ in this context. Church is both a building and a gathering of people, usually made up of Christians. The word comes from the Greek ecclesia, which means ‘gathering’ (or to be specific ek – out and kaleo – to call). The Christian associations were a later addition to the concept and in that respect I will play down this element for now. I do want, however, to hold onto the connection this term has with ‘community’ because it was this idea that encouraged my sister to use the specific word ‘church’.

In order to answer my question I wanted to discover whether DandD is primarily seen as a conference or a community. I use the term ‘primarily’ deliberately as it is perfectly reasonable to suggest that it was always going to be both. Indeed, most gatherings are a mixture of these two ideas. What I am keen to do here, however, is to discern whether it is possible to use Open Space purely as a community framework without the conference element and thus be able to agree with my sister that this is primarily a community she is a part of not just a conference she goes to religiously.

If we take these terms in the general sense they overlap in a number of ways. In the specific, however, I would be keen to posit unique attributes to each in order to communicate something important for my sister and many others whom I met at DandD7.

A conference, in this instance, encapsulates a business, mechanical artifact used to interact with others akin to the associative social structure we read about early. A community, on the other hand, is a gathering of people who participate in a level of intimacy brought on by experiencing liminality as a group. Community therefore, in this argument takes on the typology of the organic social structure.

For my sister she used words that would attribute themselves easily into the community/organic social structure model. Was this an adequate description of what happened? I was intrigued because Open Space Technology has its genesis in the conference world, where the task, it seems, is a primary focus with relationship as a happy by-product. Owen has, however, used it in community groups and in peace negotiations where, one could argue, relationships come first with the specific task as a necessary structure which is held to lightly.

Turning again to the quote I read before there are some clear qualities that separate organic social structures from associative. In the former the ‘parts’ depended on the whole organism and are determined by it, i.e. the whole adds or requires the part to have certain characteristics by its relationship to it; its focus is on being. The latter has no call for the individual part to depend or be determined by the whole; the individual can remain separate and singular. The associative social structure’s focus is on fulfilling a task without requiring an ontological connection.

At this point I would like to say that I am fully aware that I am attributing concepts and labels to things which may not, necessarily be the case. My observations are based, purely, on two days and an introductory investigation into the purpose and priorities of both Open Space and DandD. I would like the reader to be acutely aware that I am processing this and opening up a ‘session’ online. Please do correct where I have been unfair, ignorant or arrogant.

Just Shut Up and Do It!: a manifesto

At an Open Space Conference/Community called Devoted and Disgruntled for theatre and performing arts practitioners, I called a session with the above title. The group came up with the following statements of intent…

The right people would like to articulate:

We believe that theatre is a living, organic force that we participate in a physical and effective communion with.

We are both united and multiple in a creative mystery.

We don’t want to be lonely anymore! We will seek pleasure in relationships with others. We want to be able to be vulnerable and playful with ourselves and with others, physically, emotionally, intellectually and financially.

We don’t need money to make theatre (but it helps!)

We need money to publicise theatre (but not always!)

We will continue to faithfully wrestle with each other and the deepest, unspeakable desires, frivolity and pains of life in a potent dance.

Now is the time we say “it’s over” and at the same time “it has just begun!”

Viva la revolution! (for now)

If we can’t…we may as well pack up and go home

We sit around talking about how the systems we work within are stifling and stubborn; fixed and inflexible.

We sit around talking about how these might be different and we dream of a future where everyone is equal and we are honored, respected and loved.

We sit around talking about models of leadership that might release others into work and happiness, fulfillment and life.

We sit around talking about newness, freshness, imaginative approaches but…

Once the talking stops so does the dream and we settle back into the system because it works and its not so bad and it is all we know.

Ensemble means ‘together, at the same time’. It means to be alongside and to be considered collectively; not one thing before another, not one thing above another; parallel. One might even suggest a connection in the concept between para and semble.To be in semblance with something is to draw beside to be called beside; parakletos?

Collaboration may seem like a buzz word but let us not forget that to be in collaboration with someone is to co-labour with someone; to share the tasks of life, to share in the burdens and joys of reality. We, as Christians, desire to be called co-labours with Christ in the promotion and construction of the Kingdom of God. It is here that the rubber hits the road. If we do not collaborate, come alongside, work together, be one in the task then we may as well pack up and go home.

But we want to; we seek it; we sit around and talk about it but…

Once the talking stops so does the dream and we settle back into the system we find ourselves in.

I have too many books wanting to promote collaboration and models of leadership that will sustain this interrelationship, this polis. Each time I open a book, full of hope and possibility, I am hit by disappointment when they buckle under the question:

But is it workable?

Here is the enemy. This one question, asked too soon, or even at all, cripples and asphyxiates the dream. This is the Genesis question which causes the fall.

One personality, one charisma will always come to the fore in any group and to squash it is counterproductive. Leadership, direction, decisions are needed to drive a community forward to proceed in life and work.

Ensemble does not deny leadership, it encourages it in every member, it seeks to destroy the cult of leadership, the worship of personality.

This, surely is not workable! No one can be of like mind and so there will be fractures and disagreements.

If we cannot live together with a difference of opinion; if we cannot imagine one person never attaining the wisdom and discernment to lead; if we cannot see a development of this in a person; if we cannot stand alongside someone as they make their first tentative steps into sharing in the experience of being depended upon, the power to impact another human being; if we cannot reject the worship of personality and be humble and honest to our equality in the eyes of God; if we cannot imagine the transformation and growth of any person, we may as well pack up and go home.

Ensemble does not deny the need for direction, it encourages the joy of discovery as we travel together.

This, surely is not workable! We cannot venture into the unknown without insurance, assurance of a successful journey.

If we cannot step out into the unknown without the foreknowledge of safety; if we cannot step out of the boat without a solid and provable promise that the water will hold us; if we cannot admit that failure is not the end and that any death of esteem or ‘faith’ can be conquered and redeemed, we may as well pack up and go home.

Ensemble does not deny the need to make decisions, it encourages rigorous discernment and deep listening to strive towards action.

This, surely is not workable! The task will be wrought with disagreements, unattainable togetherness. It will take time and resources, energy and you can’t please everyone.

If we cannot exist together allowing others ideas and suggestions to shape us, to conquer our own desire and hopes for the future; if we cannot imagine a place where our own, personal, deeply held convictions cannot be challenged, changed, adapted; if we cannot imagine a place where the wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the cobra’s den, and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest; if we cannot imagine a time when there will be no pain, no tears, no wars, where the weapons will be made into tools for creation, we may as well pack up and go home.

But the work needs to get done!

No the work does not need to get done. The work is not a means to an end; it is the end! The Kingdom of God is not a product, it is a way of working, of living, of relating, of creating. The Kingdom of God, as a community, is not a static thing to be achieved but the way in which you exist and move and have your being.

Maybe I’m an idealist, out of touch with reality or maybe I’m willing to see the reality that’s behind the broken and weakness of this world; the reality of God’s redemptive power, resurrection hope. The Kingdom of God is not a distant dream but is breaking through now. The more we wait for the final product the less we participate in the joyful process and celebration now!

But it isn’t workable! Show me a community that does this successfully.

A product does not produce itself; it’s the process that makes the product. The sooner we end this way of working or setting out on a journey the sooner we’ll realise that the intention and way in which we set out is where we judge something. If we cannot hope that our dreams and imaginations can change the world only when they are enacted in reality; if we cannot hope that the time is now and the possibility is here; if we cannot stand in front of the fear of failure and pain, disappointment and despair; if we cannot battle against all the voices that say this is an infant who’ll amount to nothing before its taken its first steps, we may as well pack up and go home.

Setting Out Delving In

So here’s the thing;

If we see the world in dualistic terms then matter/material is, in some way, separate from the spiritual/immaterial. If this is, in anyway true then that which cannot be measured tangibly in space/ time cannot fully participate in the stuff of this world. We can talk about mixture, of transcendental union but essentially they are different.

If we see the world in monistic terms then matter/material is, in some way, connected/related to the spiritual/immaterial. If this is, in anyway true then that which can be measured tangibly in space and time is able to fully participate in the source of life/sustaining power of this world. We can talk about the fear of pantheism, of matter being God but essentially they are the same.

The power of the story of Jesus is not that one man could be God but that one God could be man. The shocking truth of the incarnation is that the Divine spark, the power behind our genesis became enfleshed. This is not the same as the Greek myths of a divine dress-up/play acting; this is matter humming with immaterial essence.

It is easy to speak of a dualistic existence and incorporate the mystery of the incarnation but what if it’s more beautiful than that? What if the incarnation isn’t the Divine intervening, breaking through into reality for the first time? What if it was the fullest revelation of a truth that He was there all along? What if matter is, in some way an echo of the Divine?

This does not mean that we worship those echoes. This does not mean that we, who consist of matter, are gods. What this means is that the immaterial/spiritual is the measure of reality. As I say that, however, I’m struck by how quickly the division between the material and the immaterial crops up in my dialogue. What if there is no distinction? How do we speak of God in monistic terms without it turning to pantheism which belittles the personal God who loves and was expressed in the incarnation Himself?

The Stoics offer a metaphysical suggestion.

 They [the Stoics] think that there are two principles of the universe, that which acts and that which is acted upon. That which is acted upon is unqualified substance, i.e. matter; that which acts is the reason [logos] in it, i.e. god. (Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers)

For the Stoics, all that exists must be corporeal and therefore both these principles are ‘bodies’ but made of different elements. The world is made up of the different states one substance in different states of being. This substance, for the Stoics, is expressed purely in a purifying fire. The passive principle is associated with earth and water denser expressions of this ‘fire’, the active principle is associated with air and fire. The question must be asked, within this understanding of a united world, what then differentiates one element from another?

The Stoics… explain all the formal or identifying characteristics of objects by reference to the presence, within their matter, of a divine principle that activates and shapes them. (Anthony Long and David Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers: vol.1)

For the Stoics, humans, as bodies, are matter, or the ‘passive principle’, with the divine, or ‘active principle’, within it.

The understanding of the interaction between the passive and active principle does not help, however, to distinguish elements from each other. Indeed, the elements themselves, as part of a unified world order, are from the same ‘designing fire’.

The introduction of the concept of tenor (tonos), or tension, helps here.

In his books On tenorshe [Chrysippus] again says…‘The sustaining air is responsible for the quality of each of the bodies which are sustained by tenor…’ Yet they maintain that matter, which is of itself inert and motionless, is everywhere the substrate for qualities, and that qualities are breaths and aeriform tensions which give form and shape to the parts of matter in which they come to be. (Alexander of Aphrodisias, On mixture and growth)

This opening theory sounds, at first, as ancient and ignorant hocus-pocus and memories of early medicinal practice jump up as a naive reminder that we’ve moved on and developed. What if there is something behind it that might help us to work towards a notion of God’s logos as eternally present in matter, expressed most fully in the incarnation. The incarnation, not as a metaphysical, mysterious mixture of Divine and matter for the first time but the pinnacle of reality which points us to a character of the Divine in whom we find our truth and essential being?

So here’s the thing;

There’s a pull on my heart to explore an alternative to the dualistic and escapist view prevalent in in some circles and to try and offer a God humming through His creation. It could lead me to heresy and the darkness of self-delusion but within a community of wise and loving interaction I feel safe in the knowledge of potential forgiveness and the quote of Ernest Hemingway rings in my ear,

Only those who are prepared to go too far can possibly know how far they can go.

Breaking the Silence?

After a break of about four months I thought I might re-start a discipline of blogging. I took a break for a number of reasons: I was writing and constructing a book which took up a lot of my head space. Once that was finalised I had to pick up all the thinking and processing I missed out on for creative worship events at college and then, after that, pick up on all the theological and academic head gymnastics involved in reading and writing for essays on a number subjects!

So here we are and what is it we have to talk about?

I guess this is an appropriate topic of conversation for me to consider after a period of digital silence; where does one begin breaking the silence with an expression?

In the digital space, if we can in fact talk of it as a ‘space’, silence as ‘nothingness’ is achievable, much more so than in the physical/ ‘real’ world. For those who know me only as the character behind the words on this site will believe me to have either ceased to exist or, at least, paused; frozen in time and this space we share. The truth is I never ceased to exist; I merely existed in a different form.

Silence in the physical world is often thought of, primarily, from speaking. If one speaks of another as ‘being silent’ they mean the other has stopped talking but, as many of us know, expression is only fractionally dependent on spoken words, there’s body language, facial expression, etc.. There’s also the strange phenomenon of the ‘not-saying’ saying much more; the sub text or the proverbial ‘elephant in the room’!

In the theatre world, particularly the physical theatre genre, there’s a theory, cited by Jacques LeCoq, which states all expression must begin from ‘silence’. This silence involves, as much as possible, both vocal silence and physical silence. The vocal silence is achievable but the physical is more complex. As physical beings we say something by just possessing space. If I stand before you I will communicate something, my existence, for a basic example.

How do we silence our physical expression?

LeCoq outlines a process of the ‘neutral mask’, establishing an homogenous physicality by acknowledging our individual idiosyncrasies and attempting to put them aside aqnd thus achieving a form of silence from self-expression (the expression of one’s self). The silencing of our physical expression,however, is, one must admit, impossible. LeCoq’s neutral mask, therefore, is achieving silence of self-expression and so true silence is a desire never to be achieved.

Here’s the rub; the theatre world has to conclude that we can never create ex nihilo (out of nothing). We are always reshaping what is already there. I have spoken before (see ‘An Idea! (part II)’ post) about the human being’s inability to ‘create’ in the same way as God created (bara in the Hebrew). Our expressions stem from the past for we are all caught in the continuum of space and time and we cannot transcend that.

So from the attempt of silence comes an understanding of, first, the present and then, naturally, the past; what has caused this moment to exist. We can dwell for eternity in the past but there is a spiritual discipline of forcing ourselves forward again into the present. The difficulty is we often push too hard and end up landing in the potential future (see ‘The Futre Doesn’t Exist/Everybody’s Free‘ post). The present is ‘tense’; a delicate balance between past and future. In this tension, creative energy begins but it is not creative in the sense of beginning something new but rather a shaping of what is already there.

What’s being hinted at here? I’m currently striving towards a theory which unites an emergent monist view of the human being with a belief in a ‘spiritual’ God or, if this is not possible, proposing, by discovering the lack of unity in these thoughts, a deeper understanding of an incarnated God.

I am not totally sold on an emergent monistic view which states that there is no ‘soul’ but rather a mind which has emerged from complex physical process of protons, neurons, etc.. The reason is because of its implications on our view of resurrection and of the ‘spiritual realm’. I am, however, uncomfortable with a dualistic view of the world because of it’s implications on our view of ourselves. My view is that dualism, naturally, leads one to view the self as, in some way, separate from the physical person and that the ‘true self’ is a static or distinct entity existing prior to the body and, therefore, not connected with the physical world. The incarnation leads me to consider the entanglement of self in with the physical and that God’s plan was never to create this world for us to visit only to return to ‘the homeland’ but to create a world for us to inhabit fully.

From the place of ‘attempted-silence’ an expression is made of past, present and potential future colliding. The vista opens up again and the unity of the cosmos is understood and questioned simultaneously. Let us dwell together in this place to contemplate and develop together.

(Read my digi-disciple posts on this topic, 28th of each month, and look forward to my contribution to Transpositions’ symposium on Art, Embodiment and the Digital)

A Bell Tolls

Just come back from a placement with the Northumbria Community. This time has been so affirming and essential to my personal journey I haven’t felt able to write any reflections here. I return so excited about my call and refreshed in passion for life.

I did write a poem whilst on placement as part of a short retreat led by the community and I thought I could at least share that. It is a form of ‘beat’ poetry. I was fortunate and privileged to be asked to participate in the Beat Eucharist at Greenbelt Festival this year and it involved writing several poetic, prayers/ sermons/’prophetic’ rants. I have begun to use this poetic style to express myself. The thing I find helpful is it is like a train of consciousness and allows my web style thinking to be expressed in a linear format.

A Bell Tolls

A bell tolls in the distant sky, rings out a call to consider, contemplate, to cry out to Christ our King, a call to climb out of the cave and into intercessory prayer, where, we care, despair, tear down the walls of separation, segregation and sanitation of our own pleas. Here we join with voices echoing out through time, space, history and in this wind swept landscape of solitude our sighs sing with the Psalmist who says: “From aching pit of my dark, dank, daunting depths a soul shattering scream, a piercing pitch capable of breaking the sinews of any hearer, echoes out to you the Spirit source of unspeakable prayers. Can you hear it, my God? Can you feel it, my Lord? Listen! Listen to this broken, brittle, barefoot disciple of Yours, this minuscule amount of matter, turn Your gaze on my meagre matter. If you, Faultless Father, should mark, record, consider, remember my shaken steps of sinful saintliness, steps so steeped in self-centredness, steps in sands swept by sea-sent cyclones, steps mis-placed, mis-directed, misshapen, missed the mark, who could stand? Who could stand? Who could bear the shame so solid, so dense it’s hard to stand?”1 Stories of saints standing on islands swept by sea salt sent from Scotland to speak of peace,
gentleness,
authenticity,
prayerful presence in pagan lads, piece by piece, person by person, preaching, proclaiming grace.
Grace.
God-sent, God-glorifying giants of faith humbly humming harmonies of hope home to hearts of helpless, hardened, harsh inhabitants. The balance of life; cell to connacle, alone to others, monastery to mission, Aidan praying: “Leave me alone with my Lord as much as may be, As the intemperate tide draws the tempestuous waters close into the shore, make me an island, set apart, solitary with You, God, holy. And then, with the turning of the tide, teach me to take your presence to the tired, time orientated tribes beyond. The world where world weary eyes weep, the world that wants me, calls me, rushes in on me till the timely tide treads again across the causeway and folds me back to you.”2 My poem intercepted, interspersed, interacting with Psalms and prayers, where their voice stops mine begin unbroken beats bubbling up behind bold but barren beliefs. Their story, spirituality seeping so softly into my spirit. “The Sacred Three our blessing be.”3 Songs sewing us together, stories stitching us into one sign of God’s faithfulness. “Encircle us, Lord.”4 Secure our steps on these trodden paths. “Come wind, Come rain, Come pelting storm, Whatever it may be. Be my shield, my refuge, Come walk beside me.”5 Songs of praises, shouts of Psalms, unstoppable strength sourced from the stream of solitude.
A bell tolls,
for friendship, food, fellowship in our Faithful, Faultless Father, bearing fruit of enfleshed favour of Him who send us out from refectory to road. Clear, distinct and yet the same. “I love to serve”6 you, my guest, Christ in the other, at home, hospitality, being available for you, my guest, Christ in the other and away, availability for you, my host, Christ in the other. “Don’t wash my feet!” “I must.”7 He says humbly inviting humility in my heart. Availability leading to Vulnerability.8 Open to other’s honesty, questions of motive, critique of meaning but all the time testing, refining, eyes of others, eyes of Him. Who could stand? Who could stand? “With Him there is assurance, steadfast, shame-reversing passion and with Him there’s the source of strength to stand!”9 Stand alone on distant islands, hopeful hermit. Stand with others reluctantly in refectory, faithful friend. Stand for others in King’s courts, ancient apostle. Stand in the shadow of Celtic saints, ride the rule, the regulus, the rhythm of prayer everywhere. Stand, sing, shout,
whisper words of wholeness to a world weary of religious rhetoric.
Recite the written stories, the spoken stories of ancient times afresh. A bell tolls in the distant sky, rings out a call to stop,
silence,
sit with saints,
stop.

1. a poetic re-hash of Psalm 130: 1-3
2. a poetic re-hash of the prayer of St. Aidan (why not read the Monasticism and Ascesticism posts)
3. from a song used as ‘grace’ at meal times in Northumbria Community.
4. from a song used by Northumbria Community.
5. from a song I sang whilst walking.
6. a phrase that had led to a conversation with one of the guests on retreat.
7. from John 13:8.
8. The two aspects of the Rule of Life for the Northumbria Community.
9 a poetic re-hash of Psalm 130:4.


The Future Doesn’t Exist/ Everybody’s Free

WARNING: This post is more sporadic, disjointed and ultimately more passionate than most of my posts. Hang in there and invest in the proposal…please… oh and comment, suggest books, ask questions. Now, more than ever, I need your help!

For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. (Jer 29:11)

Over the last year I’ve become more and more convinced that God is more interested in the present than He is in the future. I often sum up the idea by proclaiming the un-nuanced version; “I don’t believe in the future.” I don’t exist in the future, which is a healthy psychological position, and therefore I don’t participate in the activity of believing in that realm. I also don’t have trust in the future, I don’t have faith in this thing we call ‘future’. As well as both of these opinions I also don’t believe the future exists, i.e., It has not been created yet, it is not a static place or thing that we can in anyway grasp. The future is not reality. In most Churches the use of language about future is not fully explored.

What is ‘the future’?

The future is a designated time after this moment. We can call anything that may happen after now as ‘the future’. Its existence is considered inevitable due to the laws of time (tomorrow will happen after today). The inevitability of its existence doesn’t mean it exists currently, indeed the definition rejects any possibility of the future existing in the present for if it did it would be the present…

If we live in the belief that the future is a reality then we live within that belief system. For example:

Say someone believes that in the future they will be a doctor that belief impacts their present. They then believe that that future is inevitable and so the present moment and the decisions taken are changed in order to prepare for that reality. When that reality doesn’t arrive there’s a tear in their inner belief system. They had built a false reality around an imagined future and believed and trusted it would happen.

Trying to define the concept is difficult but I want us to rely on our simplistic understanding of ‘the future’ so we don’t have to enter into the physics of the future. We all feel at some time, divorced of the scientific thoughts, the sense of time just washing over us. Each moment has gone in a flicker of an eye and we enter into the next moment or it pushes onto us. Here is where I’d like to stop and ask a question.

Can we step into ‘the future’? or, do we step into ‘the future’?

You may ask what’s the difference between entering into the future or the future stepping into us? I believe it’s all in the interpretation. If you see yourself stepping into the future then there’s an implicit understanding that the future is a place/reality in which you can step into; it has become more concrete then just a mere concept. The onus is on you to make a decision as to whether you go or not. You have some element of control. We all know, however, that we will be in that moment whether we choose to or not. The future will become the present and the present moment will become the past. So the heavy concoction of sensing some control of time and its frightening inevitability makes us want to know the future before it happens. “If I am being forced to step into a room I want to at least know what’s in it.”

If, however, you see the future as coming at you like a freight train or a gentle stream then there is no control over it, implicit or explicit; all you have to do is stand there and deal with what comes. It is this idea that has been deeply liberating for me.

The passage from Jeremiah which we started with implies God is a puppet master of the cosmic order. The confusion happens when we acknowledge we also believe in free-will. What is free-will if God, ultimately will get His own way. That’s not true freedom, that’s manipulative! So how do we marry these two opposing views?

I wrote, last year, on God as the Divine Director and cited both Joseph Myers and T.J. Gorringe. The two posts (Divine Director (part I) and Divine Director (part II) posts) talk about the subject from a leadership perspective. Today I’d like to see it from a more general perspective.

What does God want me to do? What are His plans for me, plans to prosper me and not to harm me?

I’ve had so many conversations with people who are desperately trying to figure out what to do with their lives (one of those people was me!) There are so many options and choices to make; work, relationships, houses, money, religion, etc. We all have to make the ‘right’ choice and God is interested in the choices we make because the choices we make define who we are and our priorities. But what if we state that the future doesn’t exist yet and that any choice we make in the present directly impacts the creation of the future?

We create the future.

Take improvisation in drama. As an actor you stand on stage and, in order to create a narrative, you have to make a decision, you have to impact the story. This is deeply frightening as you stare into the emptiness of the next moment. You don’t know what is going to happen and the more you remain silent and frozen the larger that abyss becomes. There’s great wisdom in the slightly frustrated director’s command, “Do anything.”

The truth is it doesn’t matter what you do in that moment, what matters is how you do it. The question we must ask when making decisions in the present is not “Is this what God wants?” but “Is this in line with the character of Christ?”

So what are God’s ‘plans’? In this passage the word for ‘plans’ can be translated as ‘thoughts’. In the Hebrew Bible it is translated as ‘For I know the thoughts I am having for you…” “I know what I think of you.” It is more about the character of the person rather than their action.

What if following Jesus isn’t about asking What Would Jesus Do but rather How Would Jesus Be then the choices we make are important not because of the actual decisions but whether they’re made in line with the character of Jesus. God requires us to live this moment in the character of Jesus. Do not live in the future for it doesn’t exist yet, live in this moment. ‘Do not worry about tomorrow…’ The future will happen and when it does, if you live like Jesus, then all will be well. If you make a decision, God will bless it if you make it whilst being faithful to the character of Christ.

As a director, in improvisation, I don’t care what actor’s say or do as long as they do so with consistency of character. Jesus, likewise, criticizes religious hypocrisy a lot because their actions are not in line with their belief. They maybe making good decisions in line with the law but not in line with the character of God.

Do I marry this person or not? It doesn’t matter. What matters is how you marry them and consequentially fulfill those promises that matter. Or how you separate. Faithfully follow God’s commands; ‘Love God and love your neighbour.’

What do I do for a living? It doesn’t matter. What matters is how you live as whatever you become. Faithfully follow God’s commands; ‘Love God and love your neighbour.”

Does God know the future? Yes. He knows everyone’s decisions and the consequences of everyone’s action colliding together. Can He fully control the future? No because He has given His people free-will.

I hope you can begin to see why I’m struggling to write this book! So many ideas and implications it’s hard to contain them all. I guess I want everyone to know this; Do not worry about what you will do or what you will say. Life is not about which path you walk  but the way you walk it. Jesus is ‘the way’ not path so walk like Him. The future will arrive inevitability and will ask you to make choices but you cannot predict what those choices are so concern yourself with making decisions now in this moment.

We’ve not been able to get into the subject of prophecy, eschatology, discernment. At the end of the day (it gets dark!) God wants us to share responsibility for our decisions, He wants you to choose. He can’t control what you choose but He can advise and give you strength how to choose.

I will finish on some lyrics from Baz Luhrmann’s ‘Everybody’s Free (to wear sunscreen)’:

Don’t worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubblegum. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday… Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life…the most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives, some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don’t.

Our Basic Needs (part II)

I think of myself as self aware. I have spent the last two years in an institution that forces you to reflect almost constantly on how you respond to different stimuli, who you are and how you are developing. Increasingly I want to find the strength to cast off all that separates me from others. Personality tests, Psychological profiling, all of them helpful but each one I am forced to ask the question ‘What was Jesus like?” If our Myers Briggs type can change then I want it to change to Christ. There are so many ways people can pretend like they get to know themselves but all is fruitless if our aim is to die to our self and be raised in Christ.

I have used this quote before but I find it helpful in this discussion,

If your life is centered on yourself, on your own desires and ambitions, then asserting those desires and ambitions is the way you try to be true to yourself. So self-assertion becomes the only way of self expression. If you simply assert your own desires, you may have the illusion of being true to yourself. But in fact all your efforts to make yourself more real and more yourself have the opposite effect: they create a more and more false self… people cannot simply assert their true self; they need to pray for the strength to find that self beyond their desires. (Finding Sanctuary – Abbot Christopher Jamison)

And this one too,

Many poets are not poets for the same reason many religious men are not saints: they never succeed in being themselves. They never get round to being the particular poet or the particular monk that they are intended to be by God.There can be an intense egoism in following everybody else. People are in a hurry to magnify themselves by imitating what is popular – and too lazy to think of anything better.Hurry ruins saints as well as artists. They want quick success and they are in such haste to get it that they cannot take time to be true to themselves. And when the madness is upon them they argue that their very haste is a species of integrity. In order to become myself I must cease to be what I always thought I wanted to be. (Seeds of Contemplation – Thomas Merton)

If my aim is to be more like Christ and Christ died to self, then I too must stop focussing on trying to be true to myself (if such a thing were possible). I want, rather, to be true to Christ.

I want to explore briefly the view that life is a performance. I’ve been re-reading ‘Faithful Performances: Enacting Christian Tradition’ and Ivan Khovaks’ cites Shannon Craigo-Snell work on interpretation of Biblical text. It’s an interesting exchange of ideas. What struck me was the move to acknowledge that by seeing life as a performance we are putting on pressure to achieve absolute and static truths all the time. If, however, we view life as a rehearsal we do not deny the possibility of achieving a connection with the character (of Christ) but we are aware that we continue to seek it until the final performance. Craigo-Snell places the Biblical text side by side to a playscript

…to show that although both are complete works, they nevertheless call for an in-the-flesh realization… she conceives of this enfleshed realization as taking place not only at the moment of performance but largely through personal commitment to the rehearsal process.

Khovaks goes on,

For the pilgrim, however, the journey is as important as the destination. Equally, one’s role in Christ, as much as it is given, nonetheless requires apprenticeship for learning to ‘put on Christ’, a life time’s rehearsal that will determine the quality of the end of performance.

Our society is so keen for us to reach the destination of self actualization that we belittle the journey of life. I believe, as a Christian pilgrim, that our destination is the eschatological performance in the resurrection where we will all take on the role of Christ. We will perform the character differently but in order to be faithful to that role we must be prepared to fully deny our own self. We will not achieve this fully until then. Until that point we can rehearse, trying to limit the times we slip out of character or exploring dead ends as we wrestle with what the character is or does.

What the riots have shown is that we are a society who have a fascination with pretending to be something we’re not. We are a society hiding from true reality. Many would say that being a Christian is to be blind to the truth/reality. The very nature of Christianity, for me, is the painful acknowledgement of reality and the hopeful path to living in reality. We have built a false reality and it is so complex and deeply set that we’re lost in it. Our basic need should not be to layer more stuff on us but the opposite of stripping back, allowing all that separates us and segregates us is to die.

The image of baptism is so important here; we are to be wrenched from this dream that we have constructed and look again at the reality outside. Outside our ‘self’ is seen as the statue of sand blown away in the wind of truth. The way to prosper and grow and live in true happiness is to clothe ourselves in Christ and allow that character to embed itself within us.

Believe me, there are several metaphorical cans of worms lined up in front of me but I will resist. Need to find a way to control the worms and structure them into my book… God, help me!

Our Basic Needs (part I)

Having stayed up watching the riots and the consequent responses to the three day looting by young people and ‘opportunists’ it struck me that one of the factors behind this outburst is the concept of identity.

I watched an interview with four of the looters and when asked “Why did you do it?” they all spoke about getting the things they need which they cannot afford. This did not surprise me; of course they think they need trainers, clothes, plasma TVs, because that is what they perceive their culture’s demanding of them to have. Many commentators have talked about the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’ and it’s sad that there is so much truth in that. Zygmunt Bauman wrote,

These are not hunger or bread riots. These are riots of defective and disqualified consumers.

I would disagree with Bauman. These are our culture’s hunger riot because these consumable products have become our basic needs. Maslow’s hierarchy is collapsing and the second level of his pyramid, which states security of body, employment, resources, morality, family, health and property are all secondary needs to breathing, food, water, etc., is now perceived as the first.

The saddest part of watching the riots and the thing that is making most of us feel upset is the fact we have been forced to stare into a mirror. Our society does place material possession as equally necessary to the basic need of food. We can all pretend that this is mindless violence and greed but in actual fact this is predictable and is as valid as bread rioting.

Before I get misquoted I want to state I don’t think looting a plasma TV is acceptable but what I am suggesting is that for the looters society is communicating that material possession is our basic need; if you do not have these things then you are ill. (It is interesting that David Cameron said he thought parts of our society is ‘ill’) It follows that our society has bred a generation of people who believe that the ability to possess a certain commodity is on the same level as food and water; if they cannot consume then they are starving. In short, if they don’t have these things then they will die.

The riots are not about individual criminals, they are about consequence of a system. The riots are predictable because society has led my generation to believe that in order to discover who you are you must consume, if you cannot then you will die. Think of advertisements stating no less; ‘You need.’ ‘You deserve.’

The destination of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is ‘self actualization’. Here is the issue; we are all seeking identity, to know who we are, what we are for, our purpose. The riots and looting were about grasping for the perceived building blocks of self identity. We have successfully built a social system which believes that our identity and purpose revolves around consuming certain products. Add to this implicit message the belief, that one can know ones self, with the statement, ‘To thine own self be true’ and we begin to see the twisted path we’re on.

The very fact that the purpose for which we need food, love, etc. is to find out about ourselves is dubious to say the least. Is self actualization and self identity really the benchmark for mental health? is this really the purpose of our lives? What I read in Scripture is very different.

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves…” (Mk 8:34, Lk 14:27)

You were taught to put away your former way of life, your old self… and to clothe yourselves with the new self, created according to the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. (Eph 4:22-24)

Do not lie to to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self…according to the image of its creator. (Col 3:9-10)

Without heading into a whole chapter of my book (you’ll have to continue to wait for that!) I believe to be ‘Christian’ is to allow all our self to perish in order that we can be more like Christ. My view of Christ is informed very much by Paul’s letter to the Philippians,

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death- even death on a cross. (Phil 2:5-8)

What Christ modeled in his death was the total emptying of ‘self’, selfish ambition, desires, basic needs, ‘self’. As a follower of Christ we must become like Christ, emptying ourselves and putting on Christ.

That’ll do for now…

Come back for (part II) for further exploration. Until then find some time to listen to some of the political rhetoric flying around and reflect on what people are trying to achieve. Pray for our society lost in a matrix of problems revolving around self identity and purpose.