The Batcave

Movies A-Z: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (dir. Andrew Dominik 2007)

2011-08-30T12:21:00.008+10:00

There is a meditative dreamlike quality to this remarkable film that belies the brutality of its subject matter. Brad Pitt, as Jesse James, demonstrates that he can act when given the right role, but it’s the incredibly talented Casey Affleck, in the role of Robert Ford who gives the stand out performance. There has been a lot of talk lately about Leonardo Di Caprio being ‘the finest actor of his generation,’ and certainly he is a fine actor. But there is nothing in Di Caprio’s oeuvre to compare with Affleck’s performance here or in Gone Baby Gone, brilliantly directed by Casey’s brother, the other Affleck (turns out he’s been on the wrong side of the camera all these years).

As young, inexperienced and naïve Robert Ford ingratiates himself to the James gang, and gradually comes to see how much of a pigmy he is beside his hero, the hurt, the resentment, and the anger become almost palpable in Affleck’s performance. To go one better than the gunslinger whose exploits he has followed in treasured, dog-eared dime novels, he must kill his hero. Only then can he show them all, and more importantly himself, that he can live out the fantasy of the folk hero and join the pantheon of outlaws in the hallowed halls of wild bunch legend. The deepest aspect of the tragedy is that instead of becoming a legend, Ford becomes the most hated man in America.

The literary quality of the voice-over is due to the source material, Ron Hansen’s 1983 novel of the same name. Hansen is a Catholic Deacon who cites the influence of the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola on his storytelling. "One of the exercises is you are who you follow – Christ or the evil one?" he said. Robert Ford is a follower of James; he wants to be James and the results are tragic for both men. There is an interesting interview with the author here in which he reflects theologially on his work.

New Zealand-born Andrew Dominik’s direction is flawless. Dominik is perhaps best known for Chopper and though both films are about outlaws there is a romance and nobility about this story that is absent from the stark nihilism of Chopper. The realism of the film is notable, including gunfights that are completely out of step with Hollywood conventionalism. Those old six-shooters were remarkably inaccurate and it was a lot harder to kill a man in the days of the Wild West than John Ford ever let on. The close range gunfights with hopelessly ineffective weaponry that feature in this film make that clear, and lend an historical accuracy rare in a western. Watch also for a cameo from Nick Cave singing “The Ballad of Jesse James,” accompanying himself on a nice little parlour guitar. This is certainly one of my favourite westerns, even though in a way it's really about the end of "the west." You can view a trailer here.

Dear Jacky: A Letter from Susanna Wesley to John Wesley

2011-08-30T12:10:00.003+10:00

While spending the month of June at Duke Divinity School researching John Wesley and the American Revolution I came upon a fascinating collection of letters in the Frank Baker Collection from members of the Wesley family, including his parents, and lesser known siblings, older brother Samuel Wesley Jr, and sisters, Martha, Mary, Emily and Kezzia. A great number of the letters of John Wesley, both in the Bicentennial edition of the Works, and in the earlier Telford collection, have been published but less is known about letters to Wesley and these can often provide valuable insights. Particularly interesting to me are the family dynamics among the siblings revealed by the letters. There are some in-letters included by Frank Baker in the first two volumes of Wesley’s letters (vols. 25-26 of the Bicentennial edition of the Works), but these are often abridged. Randy Maddox is currently working on preparing full transcripts of every letter sent to John Wesley carefully compared to original texts, to be posted online as part of the Wesley Works project and a similar project for Charles Wesley letters is also underway.

I was only able to photocopy twenty of the Wesley family letters. These were photocopies of the originals made by Frank Baker and placed in his files with his own transcriptions and notes. I am very grateful to archivist Michael Shumate and the helpful staff at the Special Collections Room for their help, as well as to Randy Maddox and Richard Heitzenrater, of the Duke Centre for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition for making this research possible and also for Dr. Maddox’s advice on this particular blog post.

Even though these letters are being transcribed by much abler hands than mine I thought it might be fun to try my hand at a little transcription work of my own before consulting any existing published version. My approach was to first transcribe the letter as best I could before then checking against Frank Baker’s typewritten transcription. Eighteenth century handwriting can be idiosyncratic at times so it was great to able to check my own transcription against that of Baker who was a master of the craft, as well as to consult his notes.

The first of my letters in chronological order is from Susanna Wesley to “Jacky” written from Wroote (where Samuel Wesley was rector) on the 23rd February 1725. The original letter is framed at Wesley's Chapel, London along with a typed transcript. This is only a practice exercise for me and does not pretend to be original textual study by any means. This particular letter has already been published by Frank Baker in Works 25:159-60 and is also included in Charles Wallace, Susanna Wesley: The Complete Writings (p.106) which includes all of Susanna Wesley's letters to her children. (I have not yet compared my transcription with these published versions of the letter.) The original is dated 1724 but /5 is added on Frank Baker’s typed transcription. Until the 1750s the new calendar year in England began in late March, so letters dated in January-March 1724 were written in what we would consider 1725.

This letter is interesting for many reasons. It ventures an opinion on the Roman Catholic doctrine of Papal Infallibility, urges John to make religion the business of his life, urges him to take Deacon's orders as soon as possible, and that the best preparation for such is a close study of "Practical Divinity." An interesting insight into the relationship dynamics between Susanna and her husband is the comment, 'tis an unhappyness almost peculiar to our Family, That yr Father and I seldom think alike.'

Wroot Feb 23 1724 [/5]
Dear Jacky

I have receivd Two Letters from you, neither of wch Ive answerd. Yr Father kept the First, it being included in one to him, and sin[ce] the Receit of the last, I have bin very ill, and confind to my Chamber, but I thank God I’m much bett[er].

Yr last brings surprising News indeed about the Pope, whom I doubt the Conclave will not permit long to Live. His Justice to the young Gentleman, in restoring him the Estate his Bigotted Father gave from him to the Monks, is really very Commendable, but his allowing the Scriptures to the Laity, and declaring against his own Infallibility are Actions truly Christian. In the lat[t]er he has given a Mortal Wound to the Infallibility of that See, and whether he were in the right, or whether he was in the wrong, the matter is the Same, for both horns of the Dilemma Strikes them). They must resign, their more profitable, than honest pretence to Infallibility. The King of Prussia talks often but is not to be depended on for Action. Emly has answered for her self. Tis strange Mr Leybourn shoud send any service to me, but I accept the Compliment, and wthout one, wish him Health, & Happiness.

The alteration of yr Temper has occasioned me much Speculation. I who am apt to be [?] Sanguin, hope it may proceed from the Operations of God’s Holy Spirit. That by taking off yr relish of Sensual Enjoyments , wd prepare, and dispose yr mind for a more Serious and close application to things of a more Sublime, & Spiritual nature. If it be so, happy are you if you cherish those disposit[i]ons, and now in good earnest resolv[e] to make Religion the Business of yr Life. For after all, that is the one Thing that strictly speaking is necessary, all things beside are / [p.2] comparatively little to the purposes of Life. Dear Jacky I heartily wish you woud now enter upon a serious examination of yr Self, That you may know, whether you have a reasonable hope of salvation by Jesus Christ [;] that is, whether you are in a State of Faith, & Repentance or not, wch you know are the Conditions of the Gospel Covenant on our part. If you are, the Satisfaction of knowing it, will abundantly reward yr pains, if not, you’ll find a more reasonable occasion for Tears, than can be met wth in a Tragedy. This matter deservs great Consideration in all, but especially those designed for the Clergy, ought above all things to make their Calling, & Election sure, least after they have preached to others, they themselvs should be cast away.

Now I mention this, it calls to mind yr Letter to yr Father about taking Orders. I was much pleasd with it, & liked the proposal well, but tis an unhappyness almost peculiar to our Family, That yr Father and I seldom think alike. I approve the Disposition of yr mind, I think this Season of Lent the most proper for yr preparation for Orders, and I think the sooner you are a Deacon the better, because it may be an inducement to greater Application in the Study of Practical Divinity, wch of all other I humbly conceive is the best Study for Candidat[es] for Orders. Mr. Wes[ley]: differs from me, wd engage you I believ[e] in Critical Learning (tho Im not sure) wch tho of use accidentally, & by way of concomitance yet is in no wise preferable to the other. Therefore I earnestly pray God to avert that great Evil from you, of engaging in triffling Studys [sic], to the neglect of such as are absolutly necessary. I dare advise nothing. God Almighty direct, & Bless you.

Adeiu [sic]

I have much to say but
cannot write more at present.
I even long to see you –

Why Does God Answer Some Prayers and Not Others?

2011-04-28T17:20:00.005+10:00

In the latest student Apologetics post Rahel Ward asks why God answers certain prayers and not others. While recognising that there is a mystery to prayer she argues that the best way to understand prayer is to walk closely with God.

"The question I am about to present, was put to me by my non-Christian friend Evelyne, who was visiting from Switzerland a few weeks ago. After having “dragged” her to three services on Sunday, we started talking about God and Christianity around a coffee on Monday. Amongst many other questions, this one stood out and even intrigued me. She asked "Why does God answer certain prayers but not others?" One of the pastors she heard speaking was telling his story of how, many years ago, after just having come over to Australia from New Zealand, he and his wife did not have any money left for food or petrol. After praying for three days, a car pulled up and gave them a whole boot full of groceries and two weeks' worth of petrol money. This story obviously got her thinking. Why would God answer this prayer but not, for example answer the prayer of a starving child in Africa for food?

Previous conversations I have had with her and the question itself show that the following points are givens and therefore not subject to debate. However, the way I will enter into dialogue with her about this specific question is by re-establishing the following basics.

Firstly, Evelyne believes there is a God – the way Christians portray him. This rules out having to argue for the existence of God. Secondly, Evelyne considers the Bible to be a valid text, even though she has not necessarily read it. It can therefore be used as support for arguments. Thirdly, she believes that this God answers prayers. This implies a theistic belief system, which according to Richard Dawkins' definition is belief "in a supernatural intelligence who, in addition to his main work of creating the universe in the first place, is still around to oversee and influence the subsequent fate of his initial creation...the deity is intimately involved in human affairs. He answers prayers; forgives and punishes sins; intervenes in the world by performing miracles; frets about good and bad deeds, and knows when we do them (or even are thinking of doing them).” Prayer as Stanley Grenz puts it, is “the cry to God for the kingdom – the in-breaking of the reign of God to meet the needs of the present.” Having set the scene, this is how I would continue the dialogue with the emphasis on the question presented.

Scripture clearly reveals a God who is more than interested and willing to answer one’s prayer. Countless times the reader is encouraged to bring his or her petition to God for it to be answered. Here are some examples: “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” (Jeremiah 33:3)
“Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass.” (Psalm 37:3-5). “Ask and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened." (Matthew 7:7-8). “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” (Mark 11:24)

As one can see, these scriptures leave little doubt that God would want to answer prayers. However, there seem to be certain ways one ought to pray. For example one is to pray:

According to His will - “Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.”(1 John 5:14)

With a pure attitude - “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart”. (Psalm 37:4)

Without ceasing - “...pray without ceasing...” (1 Thess. 5:17) and “...praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit...” (Ephesians 6:18)

These verses show that there is a certain way one ought to pray. However, God is not limited to respond only to prayers prayed in a certain way; quite the contrary is true. In agreement with Rosalind Rinker, I suggest that God does answer every prayer. The issue does not lay with God but rather with the person praying the prayer and having a preconceived perception or expectation of how God should answer his or her prayer. Rinker puts it this way “God is greater by far than any idea or concept man could possibly conceive in his little mortal mind."

Besides what I’ve just stated, here are a few reasons why God might not seem to answer certain prayers. They might be hindered by some obstacle. Maybe a Christian on the other side of the world is not obeying God to sponsor a child in Africa and therefore, this child’s prayer for a meal can not be answered, due to the disobedience of others. Prayers might be delayed. This is simply because God will answer our prayers in his way and time and not ours. We might not yet be ready for what we are asking and have to learn a lesson first. God’s way of answering may be different to what we would imagine it to be. If asking for patience, God might just send an annoying person your way to teach you patience.

I suggest that the key to understanding how God answers prayers is to follow him and grow closer to his heart which then leads to greater understanding of his will for one's life. However, there will always remain mystery concerning God’s ways – simply because “God is God" and we are ‘just' his creation. While this is generally a satisfactory conclusion for a Christian it does not always hold the same weight for a non-Christian who is looking for physical evidence. Isaiah 55:9 concludes well for us: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.”

The Christian Basis for Science

2011-04-05T15:55:00.008+10:00

In the latest Booth College Apologetics student presentation, Patsy Shadbolt engages with a co-worker about the relationship between Christian faith and science.

"I work with a 30 year old Community Outreach Worker, whose background is in science. I have known her for five years and for the past seven months we have shared an office. We speak about a lot of things, mainly her work and what she is doing with the women and families she works with. The following are questions she typed up for me especially for this presentation. Captain Karen, the Chaplain, has given her a variety of books and I have given her an NIV Bible, with a daily devotion ‘Everyday with Jesus,’ and invited her to attend church with me at Christmas. She opted to go to her local Anglican Service. She applied to go on a three day Partially Silent Retreat with other employees, turning up to every session with the expectation that she had to get everything she could out of the time, but coming away feeling exhausted. I pray everyday about her but sometimes I feel that I am failing miserably. I resign myself to the fact that it is God, through His Holy Spirit who will do the prompting I just need to live out my love of Christ before her and God will do the rest. He has already begun. Here are the questions she supplied:

My questions that prevent me from fully accepting God into my life:

I really need proof. I have a science background and I find it very hard to change how I perceive the world. I am fact-based, I believe in evolution and Darwinism - survival of the fittest.

I WANT to believe that there is life after death but find it hard when I see that most literature is based around animal instincts, behaviours, the differences between animals and humans and how it can be explained through science. I believe that human beings came from apes until we learnt to use our (opposable) thumb to make tools after standing upright and walking on two legs instead of our four limbs.

I really want to believe. I see how spiritual Christians are and the majority are giving and loving. That’s why I keep trying, even though I find it exhausting and frustrating. Why can’t God show himself to those that find it hard to rely soley on faith?

I find it difficult to believe that someone came back from the dead. I have read a few books and I just can’t get it. I love the values of Christianity, I just find religion hard.

I would like to reply to her questions in the form of a letter.

Dear ______,

In reading your questions I first just want to express my excitement that you 'want to believe.’ I'd like to try to respond to your questions by quoting material from Nicky Gumbel's book Is God a Delusion: What is the Evidence? London: Alpha Interactual, 2008.

"For a long time Christianity and scientific study have been allies, not opponents. It was the belief that one God created the world that led scientists to expect a world that was ordered, intelligible, rational and uniform. History shows that religion was the driving force behind science. If you believe that God created the universe, then by investigating the world in a scientific way, you discover more about God through the revelation of himself in creation.

The following is a list of some of the most prominent [believing] scientists of the past. Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543) laid the foundations for modern astronomy and the scientific revolution by suggesting, on mathematical grounds, that the earth travelled around the sun. He held office in the Polish Church as a Canon of Frauenburg Cathedral and described God as ‘the best and most orderly workman of all’. Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), the mathematician, physicist and astronomer was the founder of modern mechanics and experimental physics. He argued that the earth was not the centre of the universe. Although persecuted by the church, he was a devout Catholic and once said, ‘There are two big books, the book of nature and the book of super nature, the Bible’. Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) was a brilliant early astronomer and mathematician. He was also a deeply sincere Lutheran and said that he was ‘thinking God’s thoughts after him’. Robert Boyle (1627-1691), who was a Christian, is renowned as one of the forerunners of the modern chemistry and gave his name to ‘Boyle’s Law’. Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727), perhaps the greatest scientist of all time, wrote theological as well as scientific books and he regarded his theological books as more important. He felt that no sciences were better attested than the religion of the Bible. Gregor Mendel (1822-1884) Austrian botanist whose research into the laws of heredity formed the basis of the modern science of genetics, was a priest, a monk and the Abbott of a monastery, where he did much of his research. Joseph Lister (1927-1912) Pioneered antiseptic surgery, which saved thousands of lives, throughout his life believed himself to be directed by God. James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) The Scottish physicist, best known for his formulation of electro-magnetic theory, is often ranked with Sir Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein for the [importance of] his contribution to science. All these people were scientists who held strong Christian beliefs.

In 1916, researchers in the USA asked biologists, physicists and mathematicians whether they believed in a God who actively communicates with humankind and to whom one may pray in expectation of receiving an answer. About 40% answered yes. The same survey was carried out in 1997, with the same result. Francis Collins, a scientist who is a Christian, led a team of over two thousand scientists to determine the three billion letters of the human genome, our own DNA instruction book. At the 2007 National Prayer Breakfast where Collins was a guest speaker he ended his talk by inviting those attending to sing the following song with him.

Praise the source of faith and learning
That has sparked and stoked the mind
With a passion for discerning
How the world has been designed.

Let the sense of wonder flowing
from the wonders we survey
Keep our faith forever growing
and renew our need to pray.

God of wisdom, we acknowledge
That our science and our art
And the breadth of human knowledge
Only partial truth impart.

Far beyond our calculation
Lies a depth we cannot sound
Where your purpose for creation
And the pulse of life are found
As two currents in a river
Fight each other’s undertow
Till converging they deliver
One coherent steady flow;

Blend, oh God, our faith and learning
Till they carve a steady course.
Till they join as one, returning
Praise and thanks to You, their source.

In almost every area of life, faith is an essential part of knowledge, and science itself is a venture of faith. On the alleged conflict between evolution and the biblical account of Creation, Professor Stephen Hawking (pictured), one of the most brilliant scientists of this generation pointed out that any physical theory is only provisional, in the sense that it is only an hypothesis. There are different interpretations of Genesis held by sincere Christians. Some Christians believe in a literal six-day creation, other Christians interpret Genesis 1 differently. They point out that the Hebrew word for ‘day’ (yom) has many different meanings, even within Scripture. Since the sun did not appear until day four, the writer probably did not mean literal 24 hour days. The word yom can mean ‘a long period of time’. Therefore it is not in conflict with the scientific view of the vast age of the universe, nor is it in conflict with the gradual evolution in which God not only started the process, but also worked within it to produce a system that culminated in human life.

The main point of Genesis 1 is not to answer the questions ‘How?’ and ‘When?’ (the scientific questions) but to answer the questions ‘Why?’ and ‘Who?’ (the theological questions). The Bible is not primarily a scientific book, but a theological one. It offers a personal explanation more than a scientific one. The scientific explanation does not prove or disprove the personal one, but is complementary. Even Stephen Hawking has admitted that ‘science may solve the problem of how the universe began, but it cannot answer the question: why does the universe bother to exist?

Dr John Lennox uses this illustration: 'Suppose I wheel in the most magnificent cake ever seen and I had in front of me various fellows of every academic and learned society in the world and I picked the top people and I tell them to analyse the cake for me. So out steps the world famous nutritionist and he talks about the balance of the various foods that for this cake. Then the leading bio-chemist analyses the cake at the bio-chemical level. Then the chemist says, ‘Well, yes, of course, but now we need to get down to the electrons and the protons and the quarks’. And last of all the stage is occupied by the mathematician. And he says, ‘Ultimately you need to understand the fundamental equations governing the motion of all the electrons and protons in this cake’. And they finish and it is a magnificent analysis of the cake. And then I turn round to them and I say ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, I’ve just got one more question for you. Tell me why the cake was made.’ And there in front of them stands Aunt Matilda who made the cake. It is only when the person who made the cake is prepared to disclose why she has made it that they will ever understand why. No amount of scientific analysis, however exhaustive and detailed, can answer that question.

Stephen J. Gould wrote: Science simply cannot by its legitimate methods adjudicate the issue of God’s possible superintendence of nature. We neither affirm nor deny it, we simply can’t comment on it as scientists… Darwin himself was agnostic. The great American botanist Asa Gray was a devout Christian. Charles D. Walcott was an equally firm Christian. Either half my colleagues are enormously stupid, or else the science of Darwinism is fully compatible with conventional religious beliefs and equally compatible with atheism.

Francis Collins writes that, ‘There is no conflict in being a rigorous scientist and a person who believes in God' and concludes that, ‘Those who choose to be atheists must find some other basis for taking that position. Evolution won’t do it.’ Albert Einstein said, ‘A legitimate conflict between science and religion cannot exist.’

As I said, I am not an expert when it comes to answering science and evolution questions, but I think writers such as Nicky Gumbel, Alister McGrath and C. S. Lewis can help you to consider the questions you have, and bring you to a place where you will be able to weigh up the evidence and enable you to make a decision for Christ.

Your friend Patsy.

The Use of Religious Experience as an Apologetic Method

2011-04-04T13:37:00.006+10:00

Our second Booth College student Apologetics post is from Neil Young, a retired Salvation Army officer. He demonstrates how the appeal to one's own religious experience can be utilised in the place of "rational proofs." His response to his neighbour also shows the value of genuine respect for one's conversation partners.

"A new family arrived in our small little cul-de-sac. Later in the week they came for an evening meal at our invitation. Their remarks were very courteous but he said that it was obvious that we were Christians because of the Bible texts on the wall and added that he hoped it would not disturb us to learn that they were confirmed atheists. He had read parts of Dawkins' book The God Delusion and this carried their judgment. They had no trouble with any church but just could not accept that there was any God out there. I was happy for him to quietly state his reasons and waited respectfully to hear all he had to say. He hoped our different life’s beliefs would not endanger our friendship. I assured him that this was no problem. He said that they had been through some serious trouble in the past but they had come to terms with that with their own resources and were now very happy and contented with life. Their family life was happy and they had many close personal friends and observed good moral standards in their home. They had achieved this balance without any reliance on a god and did not see any need to. They could comfortably manage on their own. To them religion was irrelevant. Then he went on to say that what turned them off religion was the fact that most of the world’s problems were caused by religion of one sort or another, internationally, nationally and in personal relationships. The world could be a much better place if people left religious conflicts out of their lives and accepted people regardless of their colour, race or beliefs. They also could not accept that there was a God because of the intense suffering that there was in the world and if there was a creator god, either he did not care or he just was not interested or he was powerless to do anything about it.

According to his limited knowledge of history it seemed to him that most, if not all wars over the centuries were over religious belief. So the world would be better off without any belief in a higher power when such divergent views caused people to go even to the extent of wiping out complete nations who thought differently. Further to this he could not see that there was any objective evidence, to believe that ‘there was anything out there’ at all. The world and people in it were just there. They were not there for any reason and when we died that was the end. Either both just happened to be there, or perhaps there was come kind of evolution that caused it to be like it was without anyone or anything causing it to happen. He also expressed the view that because we cannot account for so much in life, we invented an unknowable god in order to fill in the gaps. I made him quite comfortable and said that I could understand his reasoning because so much of what he said was true. I told him kindly that there was no easy way to believe in God through reasoning and logic. Regarding him not needing God, my answer to John’s question was best answered by reference to my own Christian life. For most of my earlier years I was a 'child of Christian parents’ (to use Dawkins' phrase) who insisted on my following their beliefs without question. I felt trapped. But throughout my teens I was (and remain) a questioning person. I did not believe in God. My attitude was that of so many great philosophers, who believed that you follow your own reasonings wherever that leads you to. Professor Flew, regarded as one of the world’s greatest thinkers followed this principle. But if I openly broke away from my home beliefs, as I wanted to, I would be treated as an ‘outsider.’ There were only insiders and outsiders and I would be harassed and excluded from normal family life. Dawkins makes a lot of this. That is control and I did not want to be controlled. Despite my inward rebellion I had an experience quite out of the ‘blue’. It was totally unexpected and to me without reason. It was like a ‘supra-natural’ invasion into my life by what I understood was God. This was not new to me simply because I had seen many, many other people entering into the same experience. I was in no sense a ‘disturbed person’ as Dawkins/Freud suggest. They claim that anyone who claims to have such experiences is emotionally sick. I was just a normal happy young man. This was a purely ‘subjective’ experience and not verifiable by any act of reasoning. Almost without my consent I was no longer a ‘child of Christian parents’ but a Christian myself. The verification of this subjective experience came as in harmony with genuine Christian beliefs and the experience of a vast number of other people. This gave my life a completely new and very happy new dimension. My life took a complete turn around. I gave up my career with all it prospects and entered a life of service to the world, not to force other people into what I had experienced but to let them know that such an experience was possible and deeply satisfying. This eventually led me into full time ministry and to Africa to love and help thousands of deprived young people, to give them an education so they would not have to spend their valuable lives ‘chipping in the maize fields’ Today many of those are professional people and some are happily devoting their lives to their fellow Africans, as they saw me do and so many others did. Previously my life’s ambition was to become rich and comfortable, but since that experience, all my life has been devoted to making the world a better place.

So my answer to the statment that we don’t need God is that many people feel they do not but they don’t realize what is out there for them. Consequently life becomes merely a self-centered thing without any other purpose than pleasing yourself. On the other hand if you have an experience of God you can live to a worthwhile purpose and do something about the enormous needs that are out there. You cannot reason your way into becoming a Christian as it is doubtful if there is sufficient objective evidence to prove that God exists. It has to be an experienced intervention of God into your life. You believe because you have experienced God yourself. John and his wife left more thoughtful people. I hope to convince them for their sake, not by argument but just by accepting and loving them."

Thanks for this thoughtful response Neil. Comments below are very welcome.

Is God Responsible for Evil?

2011-04-04T11:32:00.007+10:00

I'm presently teaching a unit on Christian Apologetics in which my students are asked to "describe to the class an objection to the Christian faith that has been put to you by a non-Christian friend and describe how you will seek to enter into dialogue with that person using the skills you are gaining in this unit." I've been quite impressed with a number of the presentations so far and thought I'd post some of them here. Here is the first from Jon Mayne with thanks to Jon for permission to post it.

"I have a well educated professional friend who is an architect and an artist. We worked in the same organisation for some years and we have been on a couple of work missions in Papua New Guinea . John is intelligent, good company and decent, but he is not a believer, at least not as far as I am aware, certainly I am not aware of him ever having attended a church service. John likes few things better than to debate issues – music, history, art, life in general and especially when I am around, religion and faith. Usually we talk around issues and concepts often quite light heartedly but respectfully. Eventually however, we come to a place where he will say something like, 'Jon, if God made everything, he also made sin and evil, so how can he also condemn anyone as a sinner? You can’t have it both ways he either made everything or he didn’t and if that includes sin, then he is responsible not me.' In the past this has probably been where the discussion has stopped, at least for that occasion – from my perspective, probably because I really had little more that I could throw into the ring. We haven’t revisited the subject for some years - our lives have diverged over time and John has lived overseas for some years. I do believe however that the door is still open and that some day we will pick up this conversation.

So how would I begin to address afresh this major question? Although I doubt that I can convince John, (and is it really my job to do that?) at least I can talk in a little more of an informed way as a result of my recent studies. I might commence with some comments about God as revealed in the Old Testament, the God whom Richard Dawkins describes as 'that nasty and spiteful little Israelite God.' I don't think Dawkins has really spent much time reading the OT,certainly I doubt he has approached it in anything other than on the most literal level, but that's another issue. I would suggest to John that the Israelites initially understood God in terms of their cultural setting, they were a minor tribe among some powerful nations with gods who required appeasement and who led their people to victory if they were pleased with them and abandoned them at other times. Fickle gods who were hard to read and placate and who in some cases demanded human sacrifice. I would suggest that Jahweh's dealing with Israel progressively revealed a faithful forgiving God, one who would turn aside his anger, who blessed a repentant people repeatedly, and sought to protect them. A God who warned them of the perils of wilful disobedience but as Abraham discovered at Sodom and Gomorrah and Jonah at Nineveh, here was a God who would go to great lengths to stay his judgement. I would say that the OT was not however the final word on the nature of God but that it strongly suggested that there was more to come. I would say that if Yahweh had designed evil or even allowed it, he also provided a solution or salvation from it and this is seen most perfectly through the incarnation through which he redeems humanity by taking on himself the penalty of sin and evil, breaking its power and hold on humanity and promising an eschatological ultimate vanquishing of evil and a restoration of all creation(a totally opposite outcome to one in which we could hold him accountable for or careless in regard to the problem of evil).

Developing the theme of the incarnation I would describe how in the person of Jesus, God shared our humanity, being tempted and suffering in all things like us if you like but also suffering uniquely the full force of evil expressed against him. At this point I would drop into the conversation reference to such landmark thinkers as Augustine and describe how he believed that evil was not a separate creation or even a separate reality, arguing that evil was rather the absence of God or the privation of the good intended by God, essentially evil was an unfortunate by-product of the exercise of human freewill and can't be ranged as a charge against God. Furthermore, pursuing Augustine's argument, to expect that God should intervene to deflect or mitigate the unfolding repercussions of human freewill - the bad choices, deliberate evil, evil arising from inaction or dereliction or cowardice in the face of wrong, would in effect make us mere robots or puppets, without any personal identity or true capacity for free will. I would note that the existence of evil is not a statement against the existence or character of God, but rather, evil can be an instrument which can be turned to achieve God's good purposes. There is no difficulty in finding many contemporary examples of people, Christian and non Christian, who triumph over great adversity and whose struggles result in outcomes /discoveries which not only define them but often benefit communities or humankind generally even if only by being exemplars. However, one needs to be sensitive as to how this argument is pursued. I would be keen to make some reference to Martin Luther and recognise his implacability against impassibility, offering the fact that Luther, unlike many of his contemporaries, held that as Christ suffered in his humanity, so he suffered in his divinity.

Of course, I would not be surprised if he were to counter at this point with something like, “I expect you are about to introduce the idea of Process Theology and refer to Bonhoeffer and Moltmann et al arguing the concept of a suffering God. But to what length can you take the concept of a suffering God before you render that deity divinely compromised or even impotent?” I might then reply, “well you are not the first or last person I expect to ask that question and maybe we need to accept that this is a work in progress”. This would probably be a good time in the discussion to return again to comment further on the person and teaching of Jesus Christ. The thrust of his teaching and ministry I would suggest, is clearly in opposition to evil at every level. His actions in healing, restoring life, exorcising demons and forgiving sins, are inarguably anti-evil. And his dealing with people caught in sin or despised by others because of perceived sin, was completely compassionate. At the same times, his trenchant opposition to institutional wrong, hypocrisy by authorities or persons trying to pass judgement on others and the exploitation of others, or putting barriers up to frustrate people finding forgiveness or compassion from religion, is clearly recorded in the Gospels for anyone to read. There can be little ground to suggest that God in any sense is in league with or accommodating of evil."

Thanks to Jon Mayne for this thought provoking response. Comments are very welcome.

Workshop on the History of Australian Methodism

2010-12-24T11:51:00.008+11:00

On 3 December 2010 the first of a series of Workshops was held at Wesley College, University of Melbourne, on the History of Australian Methodism. The project is funded in part by an ARC grant and is co-convened by Professor Hilary Carey, Dr. Troy Duncan (both of the University of Newcastle) and myself. Three Conferences will beheld in all - in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide - and it is hoped that a new published history of Australian Methodism will result.Those in the photo taken in the Wesley dining hall are from left Hilary Carey, Robert Linder, Troy Duncan, Stuart Piggin, Glen O'Brien, Ian Breward, William Emilsen, Daryl Lightfoot, Brian Howe, Jennifer Clark, Renate Howe, Barry Brown. Not pictured - Garry Trompf, Marion Maddox, David Roberts.

Movies A to Z: Angels with Dirty Faces

2010-09-08T16:17:00.006+10:00

Angels with Dirty Faces (1938 dir. Michael Curtiz) is Warner Brothers social conscience movie making at its best. Pat O’Brien and Jimmy Cagney are perfect as the boyhood friends whose lives take opposite turns. One couldn’t run fast enough to escape the cops after a bit of childish stealing and ends up in reform school, prison and a life of crime. The other becomes a reformist priest, Jerry Connolly, ministering to the Dean End Kids of his parish and pitting himself against corruption, determined to weed it out of his city even if it means turning against the friend he still loves, despite his criminal ways. Cagney is brilliant in the role of Rocky Sullivan. He’s wound up like a spring as he delivers his snappy liners (“Waddya know? Waddya say?”). “It girl” Ann Sheridan is great as street-smart Laury Ferguson, caught between her love for Rocky and her innate sense of justice. Humphrey Bogart, on the verge of becoming a leading man in his own right, is at this point in his career still in the role of sideman to Cagney (as in other classic Warner gangster films such as The Roaring Twenties). His performance as the menacing, scheming and slippery James Frazier shows the charisma he will soon take into leading roles in such films as The Maltese Falcon and The Big Sleep. Michael Curtiz does not get the attention he deserves as one of the great Hollywood film directors (Casablanca, The Adventures of Robin Hood). His use of shadows during Cagney’s walk to the chair (see the still below) and the way the camera tracks with the anti-hero’s every step leads to a dramatic climax you will not soon forget. Rocky’s final act of selfless service redeems him and Father Connolly leads the Dead End kids up the stairs out of the basement and into the light of heaven. Highly recommended – four stars. You can enjoy the trailer by clicking here.

Anti-Americanism and the Wesleyan-Holiness Churches in Australia

2010-06-08T14:35:00.006+10:00

My journal article on "Anti-Americanism and the Wesleyan-Holiness Churches in Australia" in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History has finally arrived on my desk in hard copy. JEH are also making the article available in a free download from this "deep link" for those who may be interested in reading it.

Movies A-Z: All of Me to Angel and the Badman

2010-06-05T13:59:00.020+10:00

All of Me (1984 dir. Carl Reiner) is a good showcase for Steve Martin’s physical comedy, making it clear that he is the bridge between Jerry Lewis and Jim Carrey. The scenes in which he first discovers that his body is shared by the soul of a woman, the recently deceased wealthy heiress (played by Lily Tomlin) are hilarious. His attempts to coordinate the two sides of his body make for some very funny scenes. Beyond that this Carl Reiner-directed vehicle does not have a lot going for it. The character of the Indian swami is an insulting racial stereotype, the sort of thing Peter Sellers might have pulled off with genius but here it’s just stupid. There are a few risqué scenes but nothing that will offend too many people. Overall, not one of Martin’s better films but good for a few laughs. Three stars. The embedding on YouTube was disabled but you can watch the trailer here if you like.

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930 dir. Lewis Milestone and produced by the great Carl Laemmle) is well deserving of its 1930 Best Picture Oscar. Its set-piece battles are very well achieved with state of the art special effects (for the day). One of the first films to showcase the genuine horrors of the Great War of 1914-18, it was banned in Germany as unpatriotic, as the nation aggressively rearmed for the next world war. Its depiction of the profoundly psychologically disturbing effects of battle on soldiers, their fear in the face of battle, their sympathy for the enemy, and their cynicism about the futility of war was seen as bad for the national morale. The image of a pair of severed hands swinging on barbed wire, though glimpsed for only a fleeting second, leaves a striking impression and is indicative of the fine level of detail achieved.

Though an American film, the war is seen entirely from the viewpoint of the German soldiers who are its protagonists. Though at first the American accents are jarring, they probably had the desirable effect of giving American audiences greater sympathy for the German soldier, who was after all, not very unlike his American counterpart, caught up in a war he didn’t really want or even understand. The butterfly and the helmet that are the focus of the final tragic scene form one of the great iconic images of the war movie genre, effectively juxtaposing the gentle and the barbarous. A title card at the beginning of the film states, “This story is neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped its shells, were destroyed by the war.” One of the truly great films of the 30s and probably one of the top ten war films of all time, this one is highly recommended. Four stars. You can see the re-release trailer at the wonderful Turner Classic Movies site.

Angel and the Badman (1947 dir. James Edward Grant) is a lightweight western, one of the many films John Wayne churned out before he really launched his career in John Ford’s infinitely more worthy Stagecoach. Like Stagecoach it has what look like Monument Valley locations and John Wayne but that is about where the comparisons end I’m afraid. Quirt Evans (what kind of a name is Quirt?) is wounded in a gunfight and falls in with a family of Quakers who nurse him back to health, while he slowly falls in love with their daughter, played by Gail Russell. Of course, by the end of the film the hard-bitten Quirt has been tamed, found his softer side, and decided to marry and settle down as a farmer. Harry Carey as the crusty Territorial Marshal Wistful McClintock, who dogs the outlaw’s tail, suspicious of his “conversion” to the gentle Quaker ways, gives a good performance and Gail Russell provides the eye candy. Wayne is good as the big dumb lug he often played but was the kind of actor who could never really rise above the material he was given. When given scripts of the standard of The Searchers or Red River, or the direction of a John Ford or a Howard Hawks, he could really shine. Here there is not much he can do, I’m afraid. Two and a half stars. Here's a nice teaser trailer from the YouTube channel, American Pop Classics.

The Master Press Release

2010-05-21T16:02:00.003+10:00

The Master: The Life and Work of Edwrad Sugden, to which I contributed chapter 9, "Reading Wesley's Sermons in Edwardian Melbourne," has appeared in Melbourne University's e-newsletter. I have yet to see any reviews of the book. If anyone comes across one please let me know. Queen’s College archivist Dr Jennifer Bars, writes that, “The papers reflect the extraordinary range of Dr Sugden’s interests and involvements over his long life, and illuminate a fascinating period in the early history of Melbourne.”

Click here to read the article.

2nd Annual Conference of ACWR now taking registrations

2010-05-21T15:49:00.003+10:00

Australasian Centre for Wesleyan Research

2nd Annual Conference
Friday, August 20 -21, 2010

Salvation Army Training College
303 Royal Parade
Parkville, Australia

Dr. Joseph E. Coleson, Professor of Old Testament, Nazarene Theological Seminary and Fellow of Wesley Studies Research Centre, University of Manchester will be presenting four papers on what he considers to be the major exegetical/hermeneutical issues these chapters present, and a number of theoological/pastoral/incarnational conclusions he believes all Wesleyans should take seriously because they are Wesleyans. Dr Coleson has written a number of books and is the Editor of, and contributor to, four volumes in the Wesleyan Theological Perspectives series. His forthcoming works include the fifth volume of the WTP series, Care of Creation: Christian Voices on God, Humanity, and the Environment; the Commentary on Joshua in Tyndale’s Cornerstone commentary series and a volume on Genesis in the NBBC series. There will also be paper presentations from other Research Fellows and Junior Fellows. For online registration and payment details visit our website: http://acwr.edu.au/events/conference-registration

Worship Text on E-Reader

2010-05-21T15:46:00.001+10:00

Here's how the draft of a worship text I am preparing for publication looks on an e-Reader. Courtesy of Steve Wright.

Review of Be Holy

2010-04-15T16:22:00.003+10:00

Joseph Coleson, ed. Be Holy: God’s Invitation to Understand, Declare, and Experience Holiness. Indianapolis, IN: Wesleyan Publishing House, 2008.

This collection of essays gets off to a rather poor start with a chapter from former General Superintendent David W. Holdren. His assertion that at salvation we receive Jesus as Saviour and only later do we receive him as Lord (p. 23) is neither biblical nor Wesleyan. To speak of trusting Jesus as Saviour without simultaneously receiving him as Lord is out of step with the New Testament’s insistence on uniting the two. This sounds more like something one would hear emanating from Dallas Theological Seminary where “Lordship salvation” is decried as an awful heresy. And to speak of “entire sanctification” as “receiving Jesus as Lord” would certainly seem odd to John Wesley for whom among “the glorious privileges of those who are born of God” was to be found freedom from all wilful sin. Certainly for Wesley, obedience to Jesus Christ and submission to his Lordship (albeit not yet perfected) was a mark of the new birth, not of entire sanctification.

Right here lies much of our problem with preaching and teaching both the new birth and entire sanctification. We have so lowered our expectation of both that our eighteenth and nineteenth century ancestors would be hard put to recognise our doctrine and practice as authentically Wesleyan. For example, we tell people that they just have to “receive Jesus” and he will forgive their sins. They will be saved without any repentance, moral transformation, or obedience. Later, when they get serious about following Jesus they make a commitment to follow him that brings a radical change of heart and behaviour issuing in a great degree of obedience and satisfaction in living the Christian life. They are in fact now born again, following Jesus as Lord, but on the assumption that that level of experience had already been reached earlier, we tell them they are now “entirely sanctified.” The problem is that now they have nowhere else to go and their Christian experience is seriously truncated. Essays like Holdren’s contribute to this problem. It’s not all bad, however. His warnings about the limitations of traditional terms now past their use-by-date is timely (pp. 15-16), and his identification of the shorter, medium, and longer way to holiness (pp. 20-22), borrowed from Chris Bounds, is helpful.

Things definitely improve with the following two essays from Joe Coleson and Terence Paige on the Old and New Testament materials on holiness. These scholars take complex biblical theology and relate it well to a non-technical audience, the intended readership of this book. John Tyson provides a good summary essay in chapter 4 on the eighteenth century roots of Holiness teaching and, in keeping with his own research interests, includes Charles Wesley along with his brother John highlighting both convergence and difference between the two. Clarence Bence gives an excellent historical overview in the fifth chapter, again addressing a non-technical audience and providing a user friendly contribution that is nonetheless well grounded in solid scholarship. Particularly good is his placing of the American holiness movement in the context of three formative influences – Jacksonian democracy, Wesleyan perfectionism and Finney’s radical social reforms – and in his discussion of Wesleyanism’s ambivalent relationship to fundamentalism. It’s a pity, though that the chapter should be focused only on what Bence calls “American holiness.” The Wesleyan Church (the publisher of this book) is supposedly a global church (the International Wesleyan Church), and only one holiness denomination among many spread throughout the world. Broadening this chapter to provide a more internationalist perspective or providing a separate chapter on the wider world presence of the Church would have added considerably to the value of the book.

Keith Drury is always one to ruffle feathers and shoot from the hip (pardon the oddly mixed metaphor). In his chapter on “Experiencing the Holy Life” he makes the insightful observation that “[W]hen the Holiness Movement married evangelicalism, we downplayed our own family traditions for the sake of the marriage.” (p. 130). This loss of distinctiveness has brought the Wesleyan-Holiness movement to a crisis of identity. Judy Huffman, in chapter 9 on “Practical Holiness” relates her experience of growing up in a Holiness context dominated by rule-based legalism and the expresses the debt she owes to contemporary Wesleyan scholars who have helped her understand holiness in a new, more relational way, grounded in social Trinitarianism (pp.135-59). This is all very good but it begs the question of the distinctive nature of Wesleyan discourse about holiness. That the older take on entire sanctification is fading is evidenced by the several places in this book where traditional holiness movement themes are challenged or rejected. For example in chapter 3 Terence Paige states:

In my opinion nowhere does the New Testament explicitly address the question whether sanctification is ‘instantaneous’ or ‘gradual.’ That may be a legitimate question to ask today, but I am not sure it was a question Paul or Jesus asked or answered. Rather, sanctification is presented, I believe, as part of the life journey of a disciple. To ask Paul, ‘When are we perfectly sanctified?’ is like asking ‘When have I perfectly loved my spouse?’ The answer is that it is something that happens every day as God works in us and we work with God.(p.52)

That sanctification is the “life journey of a disciple” is certainly true. But what Christian, Wesleyan or otherwise, would state anything to the contrary? When there was a clear “second blessing” message about entire sanctification, the Holiness movement had a distinctive message, even if one that some could not accept. With that emphasis fading what features of our teaching about holiness might be said to be distinctively Wesleyan? Rich Eckley helpfully reminds us in chapter 6 that holiness is the concern of all Christians, and Mike Walters in his chapter 7 on “Preaching Holiness Today” reminds us that holiness “stands at the beginning and centre of God’s call on [all] our lives.” (p. 110). I concur wholeheartedly with this, but is it the case, then that the Wesleyan contribution is simply to emphasise holiness as something important? Or are there also specific confessional statements that need to be set forth? These are questions of confessional identity that I believe need to be asked and answered.

Robert Blacks’ chapter on “Social Holiness” reminds us that the expression as used by Wesley did not primarily have reference to social reform but to the importance of Christian community. Dr. Jo Anne Lyon’s chapter on “Social Justice” picks up the reform agenda admirably, and calls the Wesleyan Church back to its more radical roots. She recalls how Dr. Virgil Mitchell expressed regret late in life that the Wesleyan Church had been largely silent during the great civil rights era of the 1960s. Charles Edwin Jones provides the sobering fact that “within twenty years of assuming denominational form, holiness churches officially abandoned welfare work.” (Charles Edwin Jones, Perfectionistic Persuasion (Scarecrow Press, 1974), p. 177 cited in Be Holy, p.186.) What had happened to the earlier political radicalism that had been a defining characteristic of the Church’s abolitionist ancestors? The election of Jo Anne Lyon to the General Superintendency is one of the most encouraging signs of the Wesleyan Church’s recapturing of its original justice ethos and this return is long overdue.

Each chapter ends with “Action/Reflection Suggestions” that will prove helpful in both small group discussion and personal study. The list of books for further reading is accompanied by helpful synopses of the content of each book. Overall I am pleased that the denomination to which I belong has produced a book such as this and the “Wesleyan Theological Perspectives” series to which it belongs is a commendable one, even if the quality of individual essays varies considerably.

Contagious Holiness

2010-02-05T16:11:00.006+11:00

Craig L. Blomburg, Contagious Holiness: Jesus' Meals with Sinners (Downers Grove: IVP, 2005). Notwithstanding its title, this book is not really about holiness (though its central insight on that topic is invaluable). Rather it is a book about the social and theological significance of meals in the Bible. The author sets out the current debate over whether Jesus' meals with sinners involved genuinely wicked people or simply those who did not live up to the overly particular standards of ritual purity laid down by the Scribes and Pharisees. To arrive at his findings he surveys meals in the Old Testament, Jewish and Graeco-Roman meals in the inter-testamental period, and finally the core texts in the Gospels that deal with Jesus' meals with "sinners." The sixth and final chapter discusses some contemporary applications of Blomberg's finding that the practice of Jesus eating with sinners subverted the rules of ritual purity so that far from Jesus becoming contaminated by contact with sinners, it was they who became "contaminated" by contact with him! His holines rubbed off on them as they came into contact with his transformative presence.

It should not surprise us that with the arrival of Jesus the meaning of holiness should undergo a revolutionary change. In the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth, while there is direct continuity with Old Testament concepts of holiness there is also radical reinvention. For one thing the "location" of holiness is moved. “Holiness looks different now”; it looks like Jesus (see Stephen C. Barton, “Dislocating and Relocating Holiness: A New Testament Study,” in Stephen C. Barton., ed. Holiness Past and Present (London and New York: T & T Clark, 2003), 197-98. ) In the holy character of Jesus there is a contagious power present to make holy all who come within its influence. Kenneth Walters sees this as the heavenly realm encroaching upon the earthly realm in the person of Jesus so that “where contact with God once meant destruction for any earthly being or object, contact with God in Christ now means sanctification and life.” (Kenneth L. Walters, Sr., “Holiness in New Testament Perspective,” in Kevin W. Mannoia and Don Thorsen, eds. The Holiness Manifesto (Grand Rapids, MI and Cambridge, UK: Eerdmans, 2008), 52.

Historically the church has "fenced" the Lord's Table so that entrance to fellowship with Jesus has been carefully guarded. The early church practice was to limit access to the Eucharist to the baptised. The Puritans looked for evidence of a conversion experience and this remains the usual practice among Evangelicals. Methodists have often taken an "open table" approach based on John Wesley's conviction that the Lord’s Supper was not only a confirming but also a converting ordinance. (His own mother was brought to full assurance at Communion). He welcomed “penitents” (what we today might call “seekers”) to come to the Table and thus take a step closer to saving faith. The practice of an “open table” has become a contentious one among some Methodists and a difficult stance to take in an ecumenical context where baptism is normally seen as the rite of entry to the Table, in keeping with the practice of the ancient church. In the argument from Wesley’s practice of inviting people who had not undergone a conversion experience to approach the Table, it is often forgotten that those Wesley addressed were for the most part baptised as infants and could therefore be admitted to the Table as a way of confirming the grace received at baptism in a conscious act of faith. Those who argue for an open table on the basis that Jesus “ate with sinners” and that this is after all, his Table, not ours, make a more persuasive point. Do we exclude for the sake of maintaining clear marks of discipleship? Or do we include for the sake of bearig witness to Jesus' "contagious holiness"? Blomberg's book will be must reading for those who are seeking to answer such questions from a textual basis.

Holiness in the Gospels

2010-02-05T14:32:00.006+11:00

In his book, Holiness in the Gospels (Kansas City: Beacon Hill Press, 2005) Dr. Kent Brower makes an excellent contribution to the much needed project of establishing a solid exegetical base for Wesleyan perspectives on holiness. Embroiled in a controversy over the use of “Baptism of the Spirit” language in reference to entire sanctification, the late Asbury Seminary professor Robert W. Lyon once wrote: "We must all keep in mind our basic goals in working through Scripture on the matter of Wesleyan doctrine. We are seeking to show that Wesley’s doctrine of Christian perfection is biblical in substance, though we all need to assert the right to revise, when required by Scripture, his perspective in any number of directions. To be able to make it marketable, we must be able to show that it is biblical. Attempts to define the baptism of the Spirit in ways not in accord with the tradition must be viewed from this angle: they are attempts to set Scripture in perspective, to set aside what is exegetically untenable in order that we – the holiness tradition – might rest our case and proclaim the good news on grounds that will bear the weight." (Robert W. Lyon, “The Baptism of the Spirit – Continued,” Wesleyan Theological Journal 15:2 (Fall 1980), 76-77)

Books like Holiness in the Gospels and Dr. Brower's forthcoming book on Pauline perspectives on holiness contribute admirably to this end. David W. Kendall has noted how odd it should be that the holiness movement has paid little attention to the Gospels as an exegetical basis for the doctrine of entire sanctification. Instead the focus has been on Old Testament themes and images, on the Pauline literature, on the Pentecostal motif of the Book of Acts, and on the theme of “perfect love” drawn from 1 John. (David W. Kendall, “Jesus and a Gospel of Holiness,” in Kevin W. Mannoia and Don Thorsen, eds. The Holiness Manifesto (Grand Rapids, MI and Cambridge, UK: Eerdmans, 2008), 57.) Yet it is in the Gospels that the call to discipleship is most radically set forth and where the redefinition of holiness in new covenant terms is firmly established.

Those of us who sat under Dr. Brower's teaching at the Inaugural Conference of the Australasian Centre for Wesleyan Studies, held at Booth College in Sydney on 14-15 August 2009, know the high standard of his scholarship. (Dr. Brower is pictured here in the foreground.) This book began as the 2000 Collins Holiness Lectures delivered at Canadian Nazarene University College in Calgary, Alberta. It has also been informed, according to the author's Preface by the experience of teaching courses in the MA course in Aspects of Christian Holiness at the Nazarene Theological College Manchester where Dr. Brower is Vice Principal and Senior Lecturer in Biblical Studies. The book has an unusual structure, eschewing the canonical ordering of the books in favour of giving priority (after a helpful chapter on Holiness in the Second Temple Period) to the Gospel of Luke. The author's purpose is Christological, as he purposes to deal first with the humanity of Jesus and then (in John's Gospel) with his divinity. Furthermore, Luke gives special emphasis to the work of the Spirit, a key theme in holiness thought, and to Jesus' interaction with Pharisaism, itself a first century holiness movement. The chapter on John's Gospel takes a welcome Trinitarian approach. Mark's Gospel is then covered with a focus on discipleship. A series of texts from the Sermon on the Mount forms the centrepiece of the chapter on Matthew's Gospel, appropriately culminating, given the purpose and intended audience of the book, with a discussion of Matt 5:48 - "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." A final chapter sets out five "Lessons in the Holy Life" - Christian holiness is 1) centred in the Triune God 2) defined by Jesus 3) communal and personal 4) a journey and 5) present life and future goal.

On a minor point, an odd feature of the book, though I'm sure it is an editorial decision and not the author's, is the continuation of numbering in the endnotes. Instead of the numbering restarting with each chapter, it continues through the length of the entire book from footnote 1 to footnote 367. This is a rather untidy arrangement which I hope the Beacon Hill editors will change.

It is encouraging to see Wesleyan theologians such as Kent Brower working in the fields of biblical studies and biblical theology. We need scholars who will enter into the confessional task of articulating a Wesleyan theology. Too often Wesleyan theologians do fine scholarly work in their fields but do not do much more than apologise for the inadequacies of their own tradition. We need a creative articulation of Wesleyan theology that reads the Scriptures, informed by its own tradition yet at the same time open to fresh exegetical findings that will advance the tradition. It has often been said that Wesleyan theology is less “systematic” and more “biblical.” If that is the case why are the most fruitful and creative Wesleyan theologians all systematic and historical theologians (Maddox, Collins, et al?).

The current crisis in the Wesleyan-Holiness churches over the doctrine of sanctification cannot be met by giving up the simplistic formulas of the nineteenth century, but finding no adequate substitute. Much that is said in many recent books on holiness by Wesleyan authors might be found in a book by an evangelical of any particular theological tradition. The Wesleyan-Holiness tradition still awaits an adequate contemporary formulation of its core doctrine. (Dr. Brower suggested to me that this may be provided by the forthcoming work of his Colleague Tom Noble.)

If Professor Lyon was correct in alerting us to the need to “set aside what is exegetically untenable in order that we – the holiness tradition – might rest our case and proclaim the good news on grounds that will bear the weight” then systematic and historical theologians in the Wesleyan tradition will have to enter into more vigorous cross-disciplinary dialogue with their colleagues in the field of biblical studies. Dr. Brower will be an important dilaogue partner in this process.

Reform and Conflict

2010-02-05T11:52:00.005+11:00

Rudolph W. Heinze, Reform and Conflict: From the Medieval World to the Wars of Religion (Oxford: Monarch, 2006) is an excellent one volume introduction to the Reformation period, suitable for a college level text. In fact I will use it as such the next time I teach "The Reformers and the Reformation" at Booth College. It's long reformation extends from 1350-1648, nicely framing the central events in a larger context. The work of revisionist historians is taken seriously but Heinze also wants his readers to understand and appreciate the insights of older historians and the importance of their work. One of the most helpful aspects of Heinze's book is his discussion in chapter 11 of women in the Reformation period including interesting discussions of Wibrandis Rosenblatt, pictured above (who was married three times including to both Oecalampadius and Martin Bucer), the Strasbourg reformer Katherine Zell, and the Catholic reformer Vittoria Colonna.

The Monarch History of the Church (Baker History in the US) is an outstanding multi-volume series, and this is the third of the four volumes appearing so far that I have read. Each one delivers in terms of avoiding too much technical discussion but at the same time introducing the reader to recent scholarship on key issues in dispute. The books are attractive and inexpensive (you can opt for the hardback or paperback editions), and include helpful timelines and suggestions for further reading after each chapter. Four out of five stars from me.

B.J. Kidd, The Counter-Reformation. London: SPCK, 1958.

2010-02-05T10:44:00.004+11:00

Arnold Toynbee once derided those historians who think that “history is just one damned thing after another.” They may have had Kidd’s book on the Counter-Reformation in mind. Light on any kind of historical analysis, this is essentially a chronology of significant events in the movement to turn back the tide of Protestantism in Europe in the second half of the sixteenth century. As one might expect, the Jesuits, the Roman Inquisition and the Council of Trent figure prominently, each being given a chapter of its own (the Jesuits in fact get two chapters). Other than these thematic chapters (and a few others) the rest of the material is arranged on a more or less geographical plan, beginning with Italy and Spain, and extending as far as Britain, the Netherlands and the Baltic states. Germany of course figures prominently.

The first edition of this work appeared in 1933 so naturally a study of the Counter-Reformation would need to be supplemented by more recent works such as John O’Malley’s Trent and All That (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) or Martin Jones, The Counter Reformation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995). Even an older work such as A.G. Dickens’ The Counter Reformation (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1969) will yield a lot more reading pleasure than Kidd whose tone is for the most part a dry recitation of events.

Though Kidd is dry I would not say he is impartial. Warden of Keble College, and canon of Christ Church at the time of this edition’s publication I read the SPCK edition of 1958 not the 1980 reprint by Greenwood Press), his disdain for the fracturing tendencies among Protestants is thinly veiled, and there are one or two passages where he almost becomes interesting in praising the beauty and resilience of Catholic resurgence. It is more than a little frustrating that not until a footnote on the very last page of the book (p. 262, fn. 4) does he provide a definition of the word “Protestant,” and when it comes it is very narrow (though historically accurate enough). “Protestant” to Kidd means only “Lutheran” and “Reformed” means “Calvinist.” This is fair enough, but what is really interesting is the brief excursus he provides in the same footnote into the nature of his own Church of England, which he is keen to insist is neither “Protestant” nor “Reformed.” He cites the decision of the bishops at the Savoy Conference in 1660 to reject the term “Protestant” and the insistence, in 1689, of the Lower House of Convocation that the Church of England could not be termed Protestant without associating it with Socinians, Baptists and Quakers (!). Clearly Kidd was one of those Anglicans for whom the very Protestant (and perhaps even “Reformed’) Thirty-Nine Articles could only be likened to the “forty stripes minus one” received by Paul.

The book’s most interesting chapter for me (also its longest) was chapter 4 on the Council of Trent. A helpful summary of important decisions of the Council is given and the way in which different visions of Catholic reform were set forth provides an interesting record. It would be the reforming zeal of Pope Pius IV that would be the most determinative factor and Trent is really his most important legacy. His successor Pius V continued in a similar vein with a special zeal for the repression of heresy. It was the insistence on an educated, literate and articulate clergy, and the establishing of universities and seminaries in order to bring this about, that did more than any other single initiative to promote genuine reform of the Church. Chapters 6 and 8 on “The Great Powers” and “The Forces behind the Revival” make it clear that there could be no reforms without the willing participation of the princes (especially in light of the established rule cuius regio, eius religio) and the special genius of religious thinkers and activists with a passion for organisation. Ignatius Loyola was only the most conspicuous of the latter, whose ranks included others such as Charles Borromeo, Robert Bellarmine, and the earlier mentioned Popes Pius IV and V. In case the reader should think that religious reforms are solely the result of the prayers and labours of the saints, Kidd wisely reminds us that behind the reform stood also Phillip II of Spain’s “great scheme to crush out Protestantism in Europe.” (p. 160)

Those wanting an introduction to this period should probably not begin here. But those who are already somewhat familiar with the lay of the land, and who are looking for a detailed chronology, could do worse. Two and a half stars.

The Holiness Manifesto

2010-01-20T14:41:00.005+11:00

This book is the result of considerable consultation among scholars in the Wesleyan-Holiness tradition operating first as the Wesleyan-Holiness Study Project and subsequently as the Wesleyan-Holiness Consortium. Member churches included Brethren in Christ, the Church of God, Anderson, the Church of the Nazarene, the Free Methodist Church, and the Salvation Army. There were also a number of lesser-known Holiness bodies represented such as Shield of Faith. Conspicuous by its absence is my own Wesleyan Church, a missed opportunity in my view. I wonder whether either the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel or the Christian and Missionary Alliance can really be said to belong to the Wesleyan-Holiness tradition and their identification as such through their participation in this project is interesting. A more natural participant who would bridge the Holiness and Pentecostal traditions would have been the Church of God, Cleveland, but again that church is not represented here.

As for the essays themselves they give us, like all such multi-author collections,a mixed bag in terms of quality. Preliminary material includes an introduction by Kenneth Mannoia, a helpful historical overview by Barry Callen which will be helpful for those who may be unfamiliar with this particular theological and ecclesial tradition, the text of the Holiness Manifesto itself (2006) as well as the subsequent 2007 document on living out the Manifesto. The Manifesto is worthy enough but somewhat unremarkable as a confessional document. There is nothing in it to which a member of any Christian tradition could not subscribe. Perhaps this may be seen as its strength and indeed one of the great strengths of Wesleyanism itself - its essential catholicity, and lack of interest in theological innovation. There was a time when the Wesleyan-Holiness movement had a very distinctive (some might say quirky) view of entire sanctification as a definite second work of grace received instantaneously and which cleansed the heart from all inbred sin and filled it with perfect love for God and neighbour. As this volume, along with so many others being produced by the movement today makes clear, such a view is no longer being set out as normative for Wesleyan-Holiness belief. That is all fine, but one must then ask whether the tradition's ongoing purpose is simply to emphasise the importance of holiness, without holding any distinctive belief about it. What exactly is "the Wesleyan doctrine of holiness"? Since every Christian tradition is concerned for holiness in one way or another what is distinctive about the Wesleyan approach? My own view is that the distinctive feature of the Wesleyan doctrine of holiness is that it places no limits on the capacity of God's grace to perfect holiness in believers in this life. One need not be dogmatic about how this plays out in religious experience, but any movement claiming to be confessional must have some things to confess.

The essays in this volume are divided into disciplines - biblical studies, historical and theological studies, and ministry. Of the three biblical essays David W. Kendall's treatmeant of "Jesus and a Gospel of Holiness" is a standout. It's a pity there could not have been more historical material but Bill Kostlevy's paper on the rejection of lodges and secret societies by radical evangelicals in nineteenth century America is really excellent. The title - "The Social Vision of the Holiness Movement" - is a little misleading, since the paper is not as broad as the title suggests. His analysis is based largely on gender and race as he demonstrates that the world of the lodge was an exclusively white male domain to which Holiness and other radical evangelicals strongly objected. Associated with this was the perception that radical evangelicalism with its concern for womens' rights, antislavery, and perfection reflected the feminisation of evangelicalism during this period. The lodge protected male power, male dominance, and male concerns. The holiness churches expressed the more feminine qualities of altruism, compassion, perfectionism, and commitment to racial equality. Those in Wesleyan-Holiness denominations today who have wondered why their churches even have statements on lodges and secret societies will be helped to see the social justice origins of this stance.

Of the six esays on Ministry I found James Earl Massey's final essay on "Preaching as Charisma" the most interesting, though it is only tangentially related to holiness. I find odd the positioning of five appendices (or should that be appendixes?) in which participants each try to define holiness. These would have worked better in the earlier introductory section and this is where I have positioned them in the reading schedule for my students who are using this as one of their texts.

Overall I am pleased to see this volume appear and believe it will make a good contribution to reviving interest in the neglected doctrine of holiness. The fact that it is published by Eerdmans, rather than one of the Wesleyan-Holiness denominational publishers, will help provide a wider audience for what might otherwise have been merely an in-house discussion.

Movies A-Z: The African Queen

2010-01-19T17:14:00.009+11:00

The African Queen (1951, dir. John Huston) is what classic Hollywood is all about. Based on C.S. Forester’s novel of the same name, it’s both a rollicking adventure and a touching romance. It reels back and forth between laugh-out-load humour, and lump-in-the-throat sentiment, and you just can’t help yourself; it grabs you by the heart strings every time. Humphrey Bogart received his long overdue best actor Oscar for his pitch perfect portrayal of happy-go-lucky adventurer Charley Allnut. His chemistry with Katherine Hepburn as straight-laced missionary Rose is perfect. The dialogue is whip-smart and watching their romance slowly develop through one adversity after another on their wild river wide is a delightful experience. John Huston took the actors on location to Africa (Bogart already dying of cancer wearing wigs to hide his hair loss from medical treatment) and frustrated the studio by going way over time and way over budget. (For a fascinating semi-fictional retelling of the making of the film see Clint Eastwood’s Black Hunter White Heart). But the location shooting pays off, even though there is clearly also stock footage in use here and there.

For all its brilliance, there are a few false notes. Bogart’s character is Canadian but there isn’t even an attempt at a Canadian accent. The script drops the ball on historical accuracy when Morling’s missionary demonstrates envy at a former junior classmate who has been promoted to bishop. Rose and her brother (played well by Robert Morling) are English missionaries and only American Methodists had bishops. A small error perhaps and lost on the average moviegoer I’m sure. Rose and her brother serve “1^st Methodist Church Kundun” in German East Africa in September 1914 at the outbreak of the First World War. There is some nice historical detail. As “the Brother” is taking tea he is reading a Methodist newspaper and the camera shows us the titles of two articles adorned with portraits of their subjects. One is “Charles Wesley’s Masterpiece: Wresting Jacob” and the other is “In Praise of [John] Wesley’s Literary Style.” There is even an advertisement for “Wesleyan Wind Pills” a humorous nod to Charley Allnut’s uncouth stomach rumblings at the tea table.

The film takes us on an exciting journey down the river as Charley and Rose decide to wager all on an attempt to do their bit for the British Empire and sink a German cruiser guarding the headwaters of the river. Their leaky little river steamer is faithful and unreliable in turns, much like its captain, but with Rose’s can-do attitude both the boat and its pilot are kept ship-shape. Bogart really convinces in every aspect of his role – whether drunk or angry, sceptical or positive, fed up with Rosie or madly in love with her. In one particularly harrowing scene the horror and revulsion he feels for what look like real leeches suggest that it may not all have been acting! Hepburn’s performance as the prissy but slowly thawing “old maid” is equally good. Her line about riding the rapids ("I never dreamed that any mere physical experience could be so stimulating!") is a classic double entendre as her character warms up to the joys of romantic love. Just as the film appears to end on a tragic note an unexpected turn of good fortune resolves all in a hilarious way that leaves us on a feel-good high.

If you have not seen this film, do yourself a favour and view it; you won’t be disappointed. The poor quality transfer of the only available DVD (available at a budget price from MRA Entertainment) is scandalous. A film like this deserves better treatment than it has been given. It’s a Technicolor film but presently looks drab and murky. A restored version is long overdue and hopefully there is an original camera negative out there somewhere for the restorers to work their magic on. The film was made by independent film company Romulus Films, so I’m not sure whether Warner Brothers or some other major studio has the rights. The kind of treatment that other Bogart films such as Casablanca and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre have been given, would really be wonderful along with a decent set of special features to do justice to this landmark of a film. A Blue-Ray disc would be a revelation. [Stop Press: See the article at the end of this post for news on a Blue-Ray edition!] Until then the next best thing would be a screening at the Astor Cinema the next time it appears on the calendar. This film gets five big stars from me.

Here's a ten minute excerpt for you to enjoy, one of the film's more lighthearted interludes:

An Advent People - Sermon for the First Sunday of Advent

2009-12-02T14:42:00.014+11:00

Text: Luke 21:25-36

Today’s Gospel reading may seem an odd one for the first Sunday in Advent. Aren’t we supposed to have more positive and comforting messages as we approach the Christmas season? So what is all this talk about the end of the world and distress among the nations and people fainting with fear? It all seems a little alarmist doesn’t it?

These words of Jesus are thought by many people to refer not to the very end of the word but to the great destruction that was to come upon Jerusalem in 70 AD when the Roman army surrounded the city and then destroyed it slaughtering tens of thousands of its inhabitants and desecrating all that was holy, including the Temple, the centre of the Jewish people’s religious life, which was never to be built again.

Verse 32 supports this idea with its declaration by Jesus. “Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away until all these things have taken place.”

Yet there are other verses that seem to speak of a more universal destruction “For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth (v.35).

Perhaps there are element of both a soon to occur event and a telescoping toward the very end of the world. Whether this passage refers primarily to the very end of the age or only to a time of great cataclysm that will usher in a great historic transition, its message remains the same.

1. Whatever else may change, God’s Word endures forever. “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (v. 33)

2. Our hearts are not to be weighed down with worries. "Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly like a trap (vv. 34-35)

3. We need to be alert so that when all the shaking is over and everything is settled again we will be found standing before the Son of Man. “Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.” (v. 36)

Whatever else may change, God’s Word endures forever.

“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (v. 33)

Things in this world are in a constant state of flux. Nothing stays the same for very long. What a week it has been in politics with Malcolm Turnbull (left) not knowing from one day to the next whether he will continue as Leader of the Opposition. The once formidable Liberal Party, once so united and strong under Howard, is now in complete disarray.

Our local church is facing great changes in the coming year and we are all uncertain about the outcomes. At such a time we need to hear Jesus’ reminder that though heaven and earth may pass away, God’s Word never will.

Jesus told his disciples that when they saw signs of great changes about to happen, they should “stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (v. 28) He didn’t say “run and hide,” but “stand up and raise up your heads.” He told them to place the present unsettling circumstances into the bigger picture of God’s redemptive purposes.

“On May 19th, 1780 the sky of Hartford [Connecticut] darkened ominously, and some of the [members of the house of] representatives, glancing out the windows, feared the end was at hand. Quelling a clamor for immediate adjournment, Colonel Davenport, the Speaker of the Connecticut House of Representatives…rose and said, "The Day of Judgment is either approaching or it is not. If it is not, there is no cause for adjournment. If it is, I choose to be found doing my duty. Therefore, I wish that candles be brought."

This should also be our response in times of great change and uncertainty about the future. Our message is not "run away and hide!" but "bring candles!"

Our hearts are not to be weighed down with worries.

“Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly like a trap.” (vv. 34-35)

It is interesting to note the connection here between a lack of confidence regarding the future and “dissipation and drunkenness.” It seems that a common human response to an apparently meaningless future is to “eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die.”

My mum asked me to take her to the Chatswood RSL Club for her birthday dinner. After I got bored with the karaoke performances, I wandered into the gaming room and just stood and watched as people sat on their stools, eyes dull and listless, and pressed their little buttons, over and over and over again. Each person hoping that the next moment would see the big payoff. They lived so completely "in the moment" that they were trapped in it. They had no setting out point, no horizon, no destination, no sense of direction, but were trapped in an eternal now with no entry point and no exit point.

“Neill Hamilton, who taught at Drew University for many years, once observed how people in our time lose hope for the future. It happens whenever we let our culture call the shots on how the world is going to end. At this stage of technological advancement, the only way the culture can make sense of the future is through the picture of everything blowing up in a nuclear holocaust [or the ice caps will melt through global warming, the seas will rise and the coastal areas will be swamped.] The world cannot know what we know, that everything has changed in the death and resurrection of Jesus, that the same Christ is coming to judge the world and give birth to a new creation. And so, people lose hope. As Hamilton puts it: This substitution of an image of nuclear holocaust for the coming of Christ is a parable of what happens to Christians when they cease to believe in their own eschatological heritage. The culture supplies its own images for the end when we default by ceasing to believe in biblical images of God's triumph at the end. The good news of the gospel is this: when all is said and done, God is going to win.”

I noticed a magazine in the newsagent on Friday called Tattoo Revival. It reminded me of how popular tattoos have become in the last few years. It used to be that only sailors and bikers got tattoos but now fresh young people, boys and girls like to cover their bodies with ink art. I mused on why there had been a revival of interest in tattoos. After all, most of those tattoos that look cool on a nineteen year old are going to look rather uncool on a fifty or sixty year old. And I wondered whether they were not symptomatic of a culture that gives no thought for tomorrow. If it looks good now, why worry about tomorrow? Deborah Harry sang back in the 70s – “Die young, stay pretty.” People live with no sight of the end in view.

Christians, however, are to be Advent people, living in anticipation of the end, knowing that there is indeed a direction to history. Believing that there is a destination to their lives they are not content to live dangerously for the moment.

We need to be alert and ready

“Be alert at all times, praying that you may have the strength to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.” (v. 36).

When all the shaking is over and everything is settled again we need to be found standing before the Son of Man.

The same God who stooped over and gathered up a handful of dirt, shaped it into a "man" and breathed into its nostrils the breath of life, will meet us also at the culmination of all things. We stood before God that day and we will stand before God again. There is purpose in our lives - a beginning, an end, and a purposeful direction. Our existence has momentum, forward thrust. It is bracketed by "let us make man in our our own image" and "enter into the joy of the Lord." This is what it means to be an Advent people.

Review of Robert Gribben's "Uniting in Thanksgiving"

2009-11-30T17:06:00.004+11:00

Robert Gribben, Uniting in Thanksgiving: The Great Prayers of Thanksgiving of the Uniting Church in Australia. Melbourne: Uniting Academic Press, 2008.

This book is an extended commentary on the Eucharistic Prayers in use in the Uniting Church. Professor Gribben is admirably equipped for this task having been closely involved in the authorship of the prayers themselves as a member of the team that produced Uniting in Worship. I am a great admirer of the Uniting Church's liturgy and would that my own church would take as much care over its worship, or at least make some services available for those of us who want to do more than mimic Hillsong, recreate a camp meeting atmosphere, or make it up as we go along.

The Uniting Church has Prof. Gribben to thank for such admirable phrases in the Thanksgiving for Creation as, "In time beyond our dreaming you brought forth light out of darkness" and "We bless you for this wide, red land, for its rugged beauty, its changing seasons," words which evoke the Uniting Church's commitment to be an authentically Australian church. The expression in the Narrative of Institution, "Do this for the remembrance of me" rather than the expected "in remembrance of me" is something quite unique. It is a noble attempt to capture the meaning of anamnesis, which is so much more than just a reflection on a past event, but more a lived experience of participation. If the wording is at first a little disarming, this may lead to deeper reflection on their meaning which can only be a good thing.

The book is divided into three sections. First the "Genealogy" of the Great Prayer of Thanksgiving is given, tracing its historic precedents and giving an idea of its general structure and "theo-logic." Part Two, the lengthiest section of the book, is an extended commentary on each section of the Prayer, and a final third part is a practical commentary on its use. So the reader moves neatly from provenance, to meaning, to rubrics.

The book is a delight to read. Prof. Gribben writes in fine, engaging style. He is an internationally known liturgist and ecumenist who knows his material well. In addition to a deep familiarity with the Christian Church's wider liturgical and sacramental theology, being nurtured in the Wesleyan tradition, his appreciation for and knowledge of Methodism is clear throughout. The commentary is sprinkled with judicious anecdotes that keep the reader engaged and often shine a light on the theological meaning being considered.

This book certainly deserves to be read by members of the Uniting Church but anyone with an interest in Christian worship will benefit from it. One would hope that it would be used as a text in the training of Ministers of the Word and others responsible for leading worship in the Uniting Church. The provision of such a theologically well grounded liturgy needs to be accompanied by careful instruction regarding its use and this book meets that need admirably. It would be a pity if it were not widely read and used.

A word must also be said for the editors of Uniting Academic Press for the attractive design of the book, the first release from this new publisher. The glossy card insert which reproduces the Prayer itself is a useful tool for use in worship and makes a helpful bookmark, though sadly it has some typographical errors.

You can order the book from Mosaic Resources.

The Reformation and the English People

2009-11-30T16:53:00.003+11:00

This is one of the earliest of the revisionist accounts of the English Reformation. It helpfully states its central thesis in its second sentence: "On the whole, English men and women did not want the Reformation and most of them were slow to accept it when it came," a contention confirmed and built upon by others since, most notably Christopher Haigh, Eamon Dufy and Diarmaid MacCulloch. Instead of the traditional account of a disgruntled layfolk, sick and tired of "priestcraft" and superstition calling for reform, we have instead a picture of a thriving late-medieval Catholic piety among a laity, having enforced upon it an unwelcome reform from Protestant-minded bishops and statesmen. Scarisbrick's work is thoroughly researched and his findings now entering the mainstream of opinion. Contrary to the view that Luther's doctrine of the "priesthood of all believers" gave rise to a literate, liberated laity, Scarisbrick argues that the loss of the medieval lay fraternities left lay people with less self-determination and less of a role to play in their religion. The English Reformation led to "a marked shift in the balance of power in favour of the clergy...The new Protestant minister, if he was a zealous servant of the Gospel, was a disciplining, preaching authority-figure. He may not have had the sacramental powers of the old priest, but he expected rank-and-file lay people to be more passive..." (p. 39) Balancing this is the massive transfer of ecclesiastical lands into the hands of the laity through the loss of religious houses with the dissolution of the monasteries. An incident recounted on p. 108 serves as something of a metaphor for the reluctance of some English Christians of the sixteenth century to embrace the iconoclasm of Protestant worship. In 1569 at Durham as a high altar stone was being hidden in a rubbish heap to be recovered when things swung back to conditions more favourable to Catholic worship, one of the ringleaders was heard to address the stone "Domnius vobiscum (The Lord be with you)." In such ways did English Catholic laity of the period come to terms with the new order.

The Master: The Life and Word of Edward H. Sugden

2009-11-26T12:05:00.007+11:00

I'm pleased to announce the publication, by Uniting Academic Press, of the result of a symposium at Queen's College last year on Edward H. Sugden, its first Master. My contribution is chapter 9, "Reading Wesley's Sermons in Edwardian Melbourne." You can purchase a copy through Rainbow Book Agencies. Here is a brief excerpt.

"The Edwardian era was a very religious one which, at least for A.N.S. Lane produced far more interesting religious figures than those of the Victorian age which preceded it. It was the age of religious controversialists such as G.K. Chesterton, and of such figures as William James and H. G. Wells who, though not themselves religious, gave Christians much to think about and contributed significantly to public religious discourse...Though his life extends well beyond the Edwardian period, Sugden was in many ways an Edwardian figure and the designation 'Edwardian' is a legitimate description of his social, cultural, ecclesiastical and theological milieu, and more than simply a play on words...Thirty two years after [his arrival at Queen's] Sugden having become a well known, much loved and sometimes controversial church leader [published] an annotated edition ofJohn Wesley's Standard Sermons...The fact that Sugden's work is still in print is perhaps a testament to an ongoing interest in Wesley's Sermons rather than in Sugden himself. The description in the Preface to the American edition of 1986, published by Zondervan, describing Sugden's work as 'the best existing edition of Wesley's standard sermons' cannot be taken seriously and is certainly not the case. It had then already been replaced by the superior critical edition of Albert C. Outler published in 1984...While somewhat helpful in placing each sermon in its context in Wesley's life and ministry and the eighteenth century world in general, [Sugden's annotations] add nothing to the more critical work done on the Sermons since Sugden's time... [they] are perhaps most valuable in providing insights into the practices of the Methodist Church of his day and there are many interesting sidelights for the reader... "

"The world of an eighteenth century Anglican priest and that of an early twentieth century Methodist minister were very different worlds indeed. Conservative Methodists were holding on to the earlier world; liberal evangelicasl [like Sugden] were pushing forward to a new one. Sugden's annotations are symptomatic of this development. To study Sugden's notes on Wesley is to see two worlds in collision, as the 'reasonable enthusiasm' of Mr. Wesley meets the rational modernism of Mr. Sugden. Few Methodists today would make much fuss over theistic evolution or biblical criticism. At the same time, while we have not entered a post-critical world, we do seem to have entered a post-liberal one. A post-liberal reading of Wesley would, I think, be willing to accept his 'storied world' without the need to dismantle it. A reader need no longer share the worldview of his or her subject in order to enter into a sympathetic understanding of it. Sugden cannot resist the need to 'correct' Wesley, yet he makes little effort to read him in light of Wesley's own Anglican theological tradition or the wider Christian interpretive tradition. He exhibits the rhetoric of modernist dismissal of all things ancient and pre-Darwinian. One may read Wesley today with a less defensive posture. Though some twentieth century Evangelicals hardened into Fundamentalism, Evangelicalism itself continued as the thoroughly modern movement it had always been, despite its own claim to be resistant to all things new. Sugden's edition of Wesley's Sermons reflects a recurring pattern in Evangelical religion - the unsettling tension between engaging with modern thought and holding to 'the faith once delivered.'"

Review of Gordon Rupp, The Old Reformation and the New

2009-10-14T16:26:00.005+11:00

Gordon Rupp, The Old Reformation and the New: The Cato Lecture for 1966 (London: Epworth, 1967)

I love a book of good lectures now and then because it's not weighed down by too much detailed scholarly analysis. Originating as spoken presentations to a live audience they give scholars (and Rupp was an outstanding Reformation scholar) an opportunity to get into free style mode. When such reflections are based on a lifetime of scholarly activity, the peppering of anecdotes and well chosen aphorisms are a delight to read. Rupp was one of the greatest Luther scholars of his day and a Methodist to boot! (His 1947 Lectures on "The Righteousness of God" constitute a classic in the field.) This slim little volume reflects on the nature of the twentieth century as an Age of Revolution, examines the revolutionary impact of the sixteenth century Reformation (as a Crisis of the Word, a Crisis of Communication, and Crisis of Compassion) and then brings some words of sage advice to those engaged in the "New Reformation" of theological revisionism. He has little patience for innovators such as the Bishop of Woolwich, John AT Robinson, who compared himself with Martin Luther. "I wish him well," says Rupp. "He has now only to be unfrocked, tried and condemned for high treason, to write four of the world's classics, to translate the Bible and compose a hymn book, and to write some 100 folio volumes which 400 years hence will concern scholars all over the world, and to become the spiritual father of some thousands of millions of Christians - to qualify as the Martin Luther of a New Reformation." (p. 51) Rupp has no aversion to contemporary constructions of the faith but has only scorn for superficial mass media treatments that offer the same "baloon-like inflation" to theology and liturgy as are given to the Beatles and James Bond! (ibid) Though he has admiration for Bonhoeffer and his "religionless Christianity" he is not willing to "unchurch the Church" or "unpeople the people of God." "Once we admit that God has called us not because of our virtue or wisdom or efficiency - the ability to be up-to-date and impressive or exciting or brilliant - but simply because in His mercy he has pitied us, then we have another measure for the life and death and reformation of the Church." (p. 64). There is something here for contemporary missional and emergent thinkers who often speak as though the church is a hindrance rather than a help in engaging in mission and can even speak of being "post-church." Augustine, Luther, Newman, and Bonhoeffer (Rupp reminds us) were not only "incurably religious men, but professional religious men." (p. 64) That is, they were clergy - professional church leaders. Even Bonhoeffer with his secular Christianity was consumed with zeal for the house of the Lord. Rupp was convinced that there could be no genuine renewal of the Church in his time without the same kind of prophetic voices. The same remains true today.

Pipeline article on Booth College

2009-10-12T17:47:00.004+11:00

The Salvation Army's Pipeline magazine has a write up on Stuart Devenish and I in our roles at Booth College. You can read an online pdf version of the magazine at this link The article is on p. 14 of the online version.

Homelands Delegation in Canberra

2009-09-11T14:43:00.006+10:00

I was very glad to be able to offer a small amount of financial support for a delegation of Indigenous people from East Arnhem Land to travel to Canberra to put their case to the Federal Government. The Northern Territory government plans to restrict its funding to a small number of urban population centres thus requiring the people who live in their traditional Homelands to travel out of country to access services.

The delegation met with Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin;Minister for Indigenous Health, Rural and Regional Health & Regional Services Delivery, Warren Snowdon; Senator Mark Arbib; and advisors to the Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard.

This short video shows some of the delegates expressing their thoughts on the meeting. I pray that the concerns of this delegation will not fall on deaf ears, and that the federal government will put pressure on the NT government to ensure a fair deal for the people in the Homelands. You can learn more about the Homelands by watching the following video.

Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities

2009-09-04T15:15:00.004+10:00

This is a must read for clearing the air on the substance of Arminian theology. It is not Pelagianism; it is not semi-Pelagianism (why do people never say "semi-Augustinianism"?); It does not involve any kind of works-righteousness system. It does not have human free will at its centre but rather a view of God as a God of grace and love. Olsen is very fair to Calvinists, courteous and irenic. He takes his fellow Arminians to task for misrepresenting Calvinism. Any further ongoing public debates between Calvinists and Arminians must take Olsen's account into consideration. For all this praise there are some weaknesses in the book. There is a considerable amount of repetition as each chapter is designed as a stand alone rejoinder to each of the 10 myths covered. (The author concedes this problem in the introduction.) Connected to this arrangement is a certain sameness to the chapters as each one follows an almost identical format. The myth is stated and then refuted by citations from Arminius, Episcopius, Limborch (who proves over and over to be the real problem, rather than Arminius), John Wesley, nineteenth century Methodists (this means Watson, and Pope in Britain and Ralston and Miley in America), and twentieth century Arminians, including the Nazarene theologian H. Orton Wiley and frequently Thomas Oden, who disclaims the label "Arminian" but clearly holds Arminian views as is clear in his "Transforming Power of Grace." Olsen's dependence on Wesley is almost entirely from Oden's "John Wesley's Scriptural Christianity." It would have engendered more confidence on the part of this reader if Olsen had demonstrated a more independent grasp of Wesley's writings. Nonetheless, Oden's work is a safe guide to Wesley so nothing really goes awry. Overall, I am enthusiastic about this work and hope it will be read widely by those on both sides of this theological divide.

Living as God's Holy People: Pauline Perspectives on Christian Holiness

2009-09-04T14:15:00.011+10:00

New Testament theologian, Dr. Kent Brower of Nazarene Theological College, Manchester (pictured above), treated his audience to a preview of his forthcoming book on Paul’s theology of holiness at the Inaugural Conference of the Australasian Centre for Wesleyan Studies held at Booth College 14-15 August. Representatives of the Church of the Nazarene , the Salvation Army, and the Wesleyan Methodist Church were part of the organising committee for this stimulating series of lectures.

In Paul’s theology, holiness is an essential aspect of God’s purposes for his people. Through faith in Christ we have peace with God, a peace marked by the end of our old pattern of living, because sin’s reign has been broken. There can be no genuine conversion apart from the sanctifying work of the Spirit who produces within believers the cruciform character of Jesus. The fruit of the Spirit flourishes in love-based, grace-restored relationships and holiness is profoundly communal. While the Spirit lives in individuals, Paul understands the people of God in community as the dwelling place of the Spirit. God’s holy people are to exhibit a contagious holiness as they engage in holy mission and holy love in the world.

Each day began with worship and each of the four lectures was followed by a time of stimulating discussion. A number of scholars presented capsule summaries of their current research in an information session on Saturday afternoon which also saw the official launch of the Australasian Centre for Wesleyan Research. Current research topics included John Wesley as a pastoral theologian, holiness and the Incarnation, Gregory of Nyssa on holiness, and Edward Sugden on entire sanctification. Dr. Brower was interviewed on Jon Cleary’s Sunday Night ABC Radio programme on 30 August. The podcast of the interview can be heard by visiting the programme's website by clicking this link.

The Australasian Centre for Wesleyan Research promotes and supports research on the life, work and times of John and Charles Wesley, their historical and theological antecedents, their successors in the Wesleyan tradition, and contemporary scholarship in the Wesleyan tradition. This includes areas such as theology, history, biblical studies, education, ethics, literature, mission, philosophy, pastoral studies, practical theology, and social theology.

Some of the organisers of the Conference: Graeme Durston, David McEwan, Glen O'Brien (at rear); Bec Cundasamy, Adam Couchman, Bruce Allder (front row)

Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangsters, and the Birth of the Comic Book

2009-08-22T17:31:00.002+10:00

This is a meticulously researched and fascinating account of the origins of comics. It is part journalism, part social history, part biography, and part mystery. The connection between the comics, the pulps, pornography and organised crime is disturbing but like a road accident as much as it repels you, you can't look away. The human interest element lies in the tragic injustice perpetrated on Jerry Seigel and Joe Shuster, the kids who created Superman and the disintegration of Seigel into old age, nursing anger and bitter resentment at the suits in the industry who ripped him off so badly. There's a screenplay hidden in here, if this could be given the kind of noir treatment found in the excellent biopic of TV Superman George Reeves, "Hollywoodland." There is some brief interesting material here on Marvel creators like Stan Lee and Jack Kirby but it's primary focus is on DC/National Comics. Once having read this it is hard to read a Golden or Silver Age comic as an innocent piece of naive entertainment. Once known, the human cost behind all that spilt ink is hard to shake off.

10 Life Lessons from Sam Raimi

2009-08-22T15:09:00.007+10:00

WARNING: Oblique spoilers ahead!

1. Always be nice to old gypsy ladies and give them what they want.
2. Do not attempt to leave an underground car park on your own after hours.
3. Keep your air conditioning vent well closed when in the vicinity of cursed doilies.
4. Keep well away from the body when attending a wake.
5. Do not attempt to exhume human remains from a grave in a heavy downpour of rain.
6. Killing your cat will not appease the devil.
7. When attending sceances make sure you kill the goat.
8. When you have a chance to eliminate your competition at work...do it!
9. Never walk backwards on a train platform.
10. ALWAYS check what's in the envelope!!

And one from me - Do not go see Sam Raimi's latest film if you have a weak heart or are easily offended by over the top "Evil Dead"-style gore. If you do not fit either of these descriptions go and enjoy a good scary laugh.

Movies A-Z: Action in the North Atlantic (1943)

2009-08-22T14:45:00.011+10:00

This is not a bad actioner if you can get over the gung-ho propaganda. The special effects are good for the period. The strategy was so accurate this was used as a training film in the Merchant Marine. The problem is the film feels like a training film. There's some pretty snappy dialogue, but the relentless propaganda is so unforgiving that a sailor who simply expresses a wish to be home with his wife and family is made to feel like an unpatriotic coward. Needless to say he has a change of heart and signs up for another tour of duty. I actually preferred the brief civilian scenes when Bogie goes on shore leave and gets himself a wife after getting into a scrap in a bar with a poor bozo whose loose lips threaten to sink ships. Raymond Massey as the ship's captain hams it up considerably. There is a great funeral aboard ship where Bogie leads in the Lord's Prayer, reads from the Scriptures and says, "Now that's God's Word. And it's good." That's worth the price of the DVD! The cover said it was 102 minutes; it was actually 120 and it does drag a bit. Two and half stars from me. Here's the trailer:

Come and Study at Booth College

2009-08-20T10:01:00.004+10:00

Booth Seminar with Tom Noble

2009-07-24T18:35:00.020+10:00

I have just concluded two enjoyable days at Booth College reflecting on John Wesley's Doctrine of Holiness with Dr. Tom Noble of Nazarene Theological Seminary. What follows is an attempt at a precis of what he presented. The exposition was punctuated throughout by a series of thirty-one well-chosen direct quotations from Wesley's writings which I'm not going to reproduce here, but trust me it was very well grounded in the primary sources. What exactly was Wesley's doctrine of holiness and is it coherent? There are a number of hurdles that must be overcome in order to answer these questions. The first is that Wesley's writings were occasional in nature; they were written to address particular occasions rather than being systematic statements of Christian doctrine. The largest treatment of the topic is The Plain Account of Christian Perfection which is a pastiche of materials from across his whole career, hence there is a certain lack of coherence to it. His doctrine developed over time so one must give careful consideration to when a given statement was made andin what context. A further complicating factor is that we come to a reading of Wesley with other theological sytstems in mind and it is difficult for us to lay those aside and read Wesley on his own terms. Finally there is the matter of semantics. We must define terms in order to reach understanding and Wesley uses his terms with a distinct meaning that must be identified. It's important to remember that theological definition is a kind of map of the Christian life. The map is not the journey itself.

Wesley's theologiccal heritage is a broad one. It begins with the Fathers especially the Ante-Nicene writers of the "primitive church." Clement of Alexandria speaks of two levels of perfection - every Christian is "perfect" in the sense that he or she is perfectly a Christian (one cannot be half a Christian) and yet there is a higher degree of perfection that awaits the believer. The anonymous writer "Macarius" speaks of a holy flame that purifies from sin. Augustine, [pictured at left] (not one normally associated with Wesley in a positive way) spoke of love (amor) as either concupiscentia or caritas. We either love the things of the world or we love the things of God. It is a matter of how our love is directed. "Turn the waters flowing into the drain into the garden." It was admitted that there is no direct influence of Augustine on Wesley, in the sense of a paper trail that demonstrates Wesley's close engagement with Augustine's writings. Rather, as the theologian of love par excellence, Augustine's theology profoundly influences the entire Western tradition and Wesley is a part of that tradition, especially in his emphasis on loving God with the whole heart, soul, mind and strength. Moving beyond the patristic period we may consider Bernard's four levels of perfection in love, and Thomas a Kempis' "purity of intention," the latter having a particular emphasis on Wesley's thought. Through the Moravians Wesley discovered the Lutheran emphasis on justification by grace through faith, and he draws on the Pietist and Puritan emphases within the Protestant tradition.

Next we turned to the development of Wesley's doctrine. He was first captured (well before his Aldersgate experience) by the goal of Christian perfection. Only later did he grasp justification by faith whereupon there was a shift from an emphasis on a steady obedience to God's law as the means to perfection to an emphasis on the grace that flows from Christ and his atoning work on the cross. Then he combined the two in what George Croft Cell famously referred to as "an original and unique synthesis of the Protestant ethic of grace with the Catholic ethic of holiness." Tom Noble suggests that a better way to think of it is as a synthesis of the Protestant Evangelical doctrine of justification by grace through faith and the Patristic and Medieval doctrine of holiness [this sounds like the same thing to me so I may have missed something here. During question time we also discussed the possibility that the Eastern idea of theosis has been seen by some as an important contributing factor in this synthesis].

How exactly did Wesley use the term "sanctification"? In a number of ways. Sometimes the word means "initial sanctification" or the "regeneration" that accompanies the new birth. At other times it means "gradual" sanctification and at other times "entire sanctification." To avoid confusion Wesley recommended that the qualifier "entire" should always be used if a second work of grace beyond the new birth was in view. The problem was he didn't always follow his own rule, leading to some confusion. Justification effects a relative change; sanctification (that which comes at the new birth) a real change. The word "relative" here should be understood in the sense of "relational" - a change in relationship toward God. Nineteenth-century Holiness teachers, contrary to Wesley, almost always used the word "sanctification" to refer to "entire sanctification." One is "saved" and then later "sanctified." But this has a tendency to obscure the breaking of the power of sin that takes place in the new birth (initial sanctification). [As an aside Dr. Noble expressed the view that the doctrinal expressions of our nineteenth-century forebears in the American holiness movement were more culturally conditioned than Wesley's in his own day.]

One of Wesley's key texts is 1 John 3:6,9 given here in the Authorised (King James) Version, the standard translation of the day. "Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him...Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God." How can this text be reconciled with Christian experience? It is in the context of dealing with this passage that Wesley comes up with his well-known definition of sin as "voluntary transgression." The term "transgression" is used by Wesley in two ways - 1) voluntary transgression - "sin properly so called" and 2) involuntary transgression. It is only the first that is in view in 1 John 3. Real Christians do not deliberately go out and break God's commandments. Their lives are marked by obedience. But we are not free from involuntary trangressions so long as we are in this body. These are not properly speaking "sins" (in that they are not voluntary trangressions of a known law of God) yet still they fall short of absolute perfection so they must be daily confessed and they require (and receive) the continuing cleansing of the shed blood of Christ. John's declaration that the believer cannot sin (in the first and proper sense of a willful trangressionn) is a conditional impossibility. So long as he relies on Christ he cannot live in a manner that denies Christ's Lordship.

The intial sanctification that is concommitant with the new birth is followed by the "gradual work" of mortificatio (putting sin to death) and vivificatio (bringing the Christian graces to life). Different Christians are at different stages in this process. Some, in the language of John's first epistle, are "little children," others "young men", still other "fathers." The goal of the complete mortification of inbred sin is possible in this life (contra Calvin)but it is not something attained in a "holiness meeting" in which a holiness sermon is addressed to a group of lukewarm Christians with otherwise no previous interest in the pursuit of perfection. Rather it comes in the context of a lifelong pursuit of perfect love for God and neighbour to serious Christians who are availing themselves of all of the classical Christian disciplines. Mountain tops are not reached in a few easy steps but after a long and arduous ascent.

"Entire sanctification" is the act of God bringing the believer to perfection in love. It is not something to be sought for its own sake, not an end in itself but the means to the end of perfect love. Wesley's focus is on the result rather than the means, whereas the nineteenth-century holiness movement tended to focus on the means (the "moment" or "instant" of entire sanctification). Wesley never used the word "crisis" in reference to entire sanctification (that is a nineteenth-century term), though he did speak of the "instantaneousness" of the gift. Nor did he ever use "experience" as a noun, that is, he never spoke of "getting the experience" of entire sanctification. Instead he spoke of loving God more and more until God was loved perfetcly.

What then in this "perfect love"? Wesley employed three models. 1) The Psychological model - purity of intention. 2) The Christological model - "all the mind that was in Christ Jesus" and 3)The Ethical [or Love] model - the great commandment to love God with the whole heart, soul, mind and strength and the neighbour as onself. Entire sanctification is not something different in kind from the holiness received in the new birth but different in degree. The heart filled with love has no room for sin. It has experienced the "expulsive power of a new [or greater] affection." It is not the rocket propulsion that sends a spacecraft to the moon, but the moon's own gravitational pull. The spacecraft has been freed by the earth's gravitational pull and captured by the moon's until it is drawn into a safe landing. So entire sanctification frees the heart from sin's gravitational pull until it is captured by the gravitational pull of perfect love.

Whether or not this change is instantaneous is not a question Wesley answers dogmatically. He concedes [in The Plain Account of Christian Perfection] that an instantaneous change had been wrought in some believers. Others canot perceive the exact moment in which this change was made nonetheless they do now love God perfectly. "It is often difficult to perceive the instant when a man dies; yet there is an instant in which life ceases...And if even sin ceases, there must be a last moment of its existence and a first moment of our deliverance from it." Still, in the sermon "On Patience" he declares that the Scriptures are silent on this question and that every person may hold his own opinion so long as others are allowed to do the same. "Be the change instantaneous or gradual, see that you never rest till it is wrought in your soul..."

It is also important to establish what entire sanctification is not. It is not final salvation, legal perfection, or freedom from "involuntary transgressions." It is not a holiness independent of Christ for even the most fully sanctified must rely daily on Christ's shed blood. It is not "static," not a permanent state from which it impossible to lapse. Nor is it a proud or self-sufficient holiness, for none know their "imperfections" so well as the "perfect." It is not the first reception of the Spirit for the Spirit is received at the new birth.

Wesley's doctrine of holiness is not a straightjacket for determining theological orthodoxy. It is a map, a guide, and like all theological language it is analogical, built on metaphors not exact correspondence. Even so it is an approach which is coherent, challenging and richly satisfying.

Above: Some participants at the Tom Noble Seminar (l to r): Sing-Chee Tan, Tom Noble, Steve Wright, Glen O'Brien (photo courtesy of Heather Wright's Facebook page.)

The Preacher Special Edition

2009-07-06T18:42:00.009+10:00

I don't really get the point of so-called "Mature Age" comics like this. Fair enough, a parent needs to be warned against giving something with this kind of filthy content to little Johnny to read. 80% of comic readers are adults anyway and we don't need to read the F word in every panel to enjoy a comic's dialogue with an adult level of sophistication. Look, it's not that I'm prudish. I can cope with strong language on the screen and in literature without getting offended. What does offend me is when Garth Ennis thinks I will be impressed if he throws in a bunch of really disgusting dialogue and that this will make me think, "Ooh a comic for my age group. How impressive." Well, no, I don't think that and no, I'm not impressed. Look I love the folks at the DC Nation; they give me a lot of reading pleasure but really, Mr. Didio, what is this "Special Edition" branding but a big cash-in on the Watchmen movie? "After Watchmen...What's Next?" Well it certainly isn't The Preacher that's for sure. Alan Moore's Watchmen is a genuine masterpiece of its type. The Preacher is not. What's the connect here? I can only assume anticipated sales. I picked this up because it was cheap ($1.95 AU with a $1.00 US cover price). DC hopes people will read this and the others in the series and then go off and buy the more expensive graphic novels in trade paperback. Well, here's one customer who won't be doing that.

So what's the story all about? The Rev. Jesse Custer is the pastor of a small Texas congregation who one day begins to act very out of character, using dirty words and such . Apparently he has been possessed by some cross-bred Angel/Demon creature called Genesis who has escaped from heaven (heaven is somewhere you want to escape?) after pulling an angel's head off. Now it's coming to earth and wants to wreak a bit of havoc down here too. So the angels call up from the dead some kind of vigilante called "the Saint of Killers" (a bit unimaginative Garth) to sort the whole thing out. I wish these guys who want to follow biblical themes (commendable) would read a bit of actual theology. It's so much more interesting than the pea soup of ideas based around the old threadbare heaven and hell/angels and demons dichotomy offered up here. This is a critically acclaimed series (first published in 1995 in DC's Vertigo inmprint), so maybe it got better as it went along, but this first issue doesn't impress I'm afraid. As for Steve Dillon's art it looks like something from the portfolio of an ambituous young artist that DC would send back with a kindly word to "keep developing your style son..." Again maybe it improved in subsequent issues but I don't think I'll be bothering to find out. Two stars from me.

65 Revisited

2009-07-02T17:42:00.011+10:00

This film is a bonus disc of outtakes from D.A. Pennebaker's classic film Don't Look Back. I have had two different editions of the film for a couple of years (including the deluxe set pictured below) but have only just gotten around to watching this bonus disc. It is very similar in style to Don't Look Back with its black and white cinema verite style. The camera can actually be heard whirring and clicking through much of this footage. This is a great little slice of life recording Dylan's 1965 tour of England just before the 1966 world tour that saw him shock the folk purists by plugging in and rocking out with the Hawks. It is more than a collection of disconnected outtakes but a film in its own right. Think of it as another witnesses version of the same events. It was actually released in cinemas in 2007. Bob is charmingly friendly to his fans which is in stark contrast to his withering contempt and merciless sending up of journalists. In one scene he is standing around with a few spotty teenagers who are clearly overawed to be with their idol. After a little small talk, a long awkward pause is broken by an embarrased fan blurting out, "I dunno wot to say." Bob replies in all sincerity, "Neither do I." If you have never imagjned Bob Dylan in a suit and tie you need to see the scene in this film where he buys himself a new suit coat and gets very enthusiastic about the pink tie he chooses to go with it. (How can Dylan still be the coolest man on the planet 44 years later?)

There are some great musical moments. Unlike Don't Look Back, here you will get full length concert performances of classic songs such as It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding) and To Ramona. There are also plenty of interesting moments tinkering around back stage including a piano-based It takes a Lot to Laugh (It Takes a Train to Cry). In one odd moment Bob can only remember the tune to Let Me Die in My Footsteps and cannot for the life of him remember the words, or even the title. It's hard to believe that he recorded this great song only about two years earlier and now it's only a vague memory. I guess it's a testament to just how prolific he was at the time and to his strangely cavalier attitude toward his own material, an attitude that has remaiend within him throughout his career. The film ends with an alternative version of the famous cue cards film clip of Subterranean Homesick Blues, on a rooftop instead of an alley, and with his record producer Tom Wilson standing in for Alan Ginsberg. This is a classic rock documentary not to be missed, but make sure you see Don't Look Back first.

Here's Bob buying that pink tie:

If you liked this entry you might also enjoy some of my other Dylan posts. Dylan in Melbourne 1966, Don't Look Back, Dylan in Melbourne (2007)

Australia by A.D. Hope

2009-07-02T16:26:00.006+10:00

A nation of trees, drab green and desolate grey
in the field uniform of modern wars,
darkens her hills: those endless outstretched paws
of sphinx demolished or stone lion worn away.

They call her a young country but they lie
she is the last of lands, the emptiest,
a woman beyond her change of life, a breast
still tender, but within the womb is dry.

She has no gods, no songs, no history:
the emotions and superstitions of younger lands,
her rivers of water drown among inland seas;
only the river of her stupidity

floods her monotonous tribes from Cairns to Perth.
In them at last those ultimate men arrive
who will not boast “we live” but “we survive”:
a type that will inhabit the dying earth.

And her five cities, like five teeming sores
each drains her: a vast parasite robber state
where second-hand Europeans pullulate
timidly on the edge of alien shores.

Yet there are some like me turn gladly home
from the lush jungle of modern thought, to find
the Arabian desert of the human mind;
hoping, if still from the deserts prophets come,

such savage and scarlet as no green hills dare
springs in this waste, some spirit which escapes
the learned doubt, the chatter of cultured apes
which is called civilization over there.

Hulk 282 (April 1983) "Again, Arsenal!"

2009-07-01T21:53:00.008+10:00

The story opens with The Leader sitting at his computer aboard Omnivac, his orbiting space station plotting ways to conquer the world now that he believes the newly intelligent Hulk, finally under the control of Bruce Banner, is no longer a threat. Back at the Empire Hotel, Tony Stark is informed by the management that Bruce Banner and his friends can no longer stay at the hotel after it was trashed in last issue's battle with the Leader. They relocate to Avengers' Mansion to avoid more civil destruction. There, Bruce Banner helps Iron Man search for Ommivac, the Leader's orbiting space station using Stark's Omnifunctional Detection Device. Banner's Krylorian lover Bereet requests permission to film scenes for a documentary she is making on the Hulk. Iron Man refuses because there is no security clearance for cameras in Avengers Mansion. Bereet storms out in a huff and meets Jennifer Walters aka the She-Hulk in the hallway. Jen tries to be friendly but Bereet gives her the brush off. Meanwhile in the Bahamas, Betty Ross is sunbaking on the beach in a bikini trying to forget Bruce Banner. Her father General Thunderbolt Ross, on the beach in full military uniform, tells her that Banner remains a monster and should be forgotten once and for all. He embraces his daughter and they both shed a tear. Meanwhile back at Avengers Mansion Bruce and his cousin the She-Hulk are in deep conversation. Bruce aske Jen for forgiveness for turning her into a monster, but she tells him that she does not consider herself a monster and likes being the She-Hulk, as she is no longer the victim she once was. Her origin is retold. A former lawyer, Jennifer Walters was gunned down and lay close to death until a gamma-radiated blood transfusion from Bruce saved her but also transformed her into the savage She-Hulk. She considers herself now "an aggressive, positive force for good"; she likes being green and fighting supervillains and only has gratitude for what Bruce did. She tells Bruce that she does not consider herself or Bruce to be monsters and reassures him of her support. Suddenly, Jarvis is heard crying out in pain. Bruce, now with the power to transform into the Hulk at will, morphs into the Hulk and heads off to see what is happening,just as Stark's Omnifunctional Detection Device locates Omnivac. Arsenal the Living Weapon has emerged from the deepest sublevels of Avengers Mansion (Arsenal was created by Howard Stark, Tony Stark's father, in the closing days of WWII, and was controlled by a computer code-named "Mistress" with the voice of Maria Stark, Howard Stark's wife. It made its first appearance in Avengers Annual #4). The She-Hulk is attacked by the Living Arsenal and she wonders whether Bruce still has the rage that the Hulk had formerly now that he has control over his transformation. That question is answered in the affirmative as Banner gets angry and fights the living Arsenal with full Hulk power, until he destroys him. Banner discovers that the fight has been set up by the She-Hulk and her fellow Avengers, who suddenly appear, to prove to him that if he fights with Hulk's heart instead of Banner's head he can still be unstoppable. Iron Man informs the Hulk that the Leader has been located and the Hulk calls the Avengers to join him and go after the mad genius. "Next Month: Follow the Leader!"

The best thing about this comic is the art. Sal Buscema and Joe Sinnott are two of Marvel's greats. After reading a comic I like to just flip through the pages revisiting some of the interestig panels. Usually there are one or two worth considering again. This issue has whole pages full of great panels. The Leader never looked quite so egg-headed and malevolent as he does here. Tony Stark's eyes behind Iron Man's helmet speak volumes and the She-Hulk just leaps off the page. Bill Mantlo writes some pretty good dialogue too. Here's a sample of Sal Buscema's Hulk art, this one from three issues later - Hulk #285. Of course, it looks better in colour but this will give you an idea of his dynamism! "Get out of my way, insect!"

My rating 3 and and half stars. You can see the page I built at the Marvel database here.

Movies A-Z: Across the Pacific

2009-07-01T18:51:00.008+10:00

I'm watching my DVD collection from A-Z and have decided to post my reviews here at The Batcave for your reading pleasure. Across the Pacific is a good little espionage movie with witty dialogue and Bogart in fine form as the weary cynic who is more than he appears. Mary Astor and Sydney Greenstreet, who also costarred with Bogart in The Maltese Falcon (also directed skillfully by John Huston) are good here. Astor takes a more comedic turn in this than the ingratiating manipulator she plays in The Maltese Falcon. The racial stereotyping of the Japanese (seen clearly in the trailer below) is what one might expect from a propaganda film of this sort. No doubt it was films like this that fed into the sentiment that saw many even second and third generation Japanese-Americans interred in prison camps for the duration of the war. The "Warner at the Movies" special features make their usual appearance and gaurantee a great immersion experience, of going to the movies in the 40s with a trailer for a film on the Royal Canadian Airforce starring Jimmy Cagney, a wartime newsreel, a half-hour long American military propaganda film on pilots, interesting because it's in colour and a war-themed Loony Tunes cartoon. Rating: 3 and a half stars.

My Little Golden Book About God

2009-06-26T10:32:00.005+10:00

I read this profound little book to my children when they were small and bought a copy for my grandaughter yesterday. How many books about God first published in 1956 are still in print today? Yet this can still be had at any Woolworths store for less than three dollars. The text by Jane Werner Watson is simple but childlike in its trust. The marvelous drawings by the incomparable Eloise Wilkin remain moving and quietly meditative with their large cherubic faces marvelling at creation's wonders great and small. Try to beat the following for a little piece of natural theology.

Look at the stars in the evening sky.
so many millions of miles away
that the light you see shining left its star
long, long years before you were born
Yet even beyond the furthest star,God knows the way.

Think of the snow-capped mountain peaks,
Those peaks were crumbling away with
age before the first people lived on earth.
Yet when they were raised up sharp and new
God was there, too.

Bend down to touch the smallest flower.
Watch the busy ant tugging at his load.
See the flash of jewels on the insect's back.
This tiny world your two hands could span,
like the oceans and mountains and far-off stars,
God planned.

John Wesley on "the Brute Creation."

2009-06-24T16:34:00.012+10:00

Wesley’s sermon No. 64, “The New Creation,”[1] written in 1785, includes many speculations, and reflects his unfaltering optimism of grace. He looks forward to remarkable changes in the galaxies above us and in the earth's own atmosphere and elements. The plant and animal kingdom will share in this cosmic renewal. The greatest change of all will be “An unmixed state of holiness and happiness far superior to that which Adam enjoyed in paradise.” There is here no sitting around on clouds playing golden harps while in some disembodied state. The bodily resurrection will be matched by a cosmic renewal of all creation. What implications might this have for a Christian view of animals? If we are to treat our bodies with respect for they are the temples of the Holy Spirit, and will one day be raised in glory, how then should we treat the natural world, including animals, which will also share in that cosmic renewal? In “The General Deliverance” (Sermon 60)[2] Wesley asks, how the love of God to all his creatures is compatible with the suffering we see around us.[3] He is seeking in part to resolve the philosophical problem of evil. Wesley views the pre-fallen animal creation as “more highly exalted in intelligence than they are today.” Therefore, it did not surprise Eve to hear the serpent speak. Humanity was the channel of conveyance between God and the creation. When this channel was blocked or broken the “brute creation” was plunged into the Fall along with Adam and Eve.[4] The brute creation groans and, though we don’t hear it, God does. “He knoweth all their pain, and is bringing them nearer and nearer to the birth which shall be accomplished in its season.” Wesley sees the word of God in Romans 8 about the deliverance of creation very seriously, foreseeing even the possibility of animals being exalted to the present intellectual ability of human beings. Some have argued that the Western tradition up until Descartes believed that animals had souls. Wesley seems to hold this view, speculating that God might even give animals, in the redeemed order, the capacity to love God. "May I be permitted," Wesley asks, "to conjecture concerning the brute creation? What, if it should then please the all-wise, the all-gracious Creator to raise them higher in the scale of beings? What, if it should please him, when he makes us “equal to angels,” to make them what we are now, - creatures capable of God; capable of knowing and loving and enjoying the Author of their being? If it should be so, ought our eye be evil because he is good? However this be, he will certainly do what will be most for his own glory."[5] For many people the problem of animal pain is the worst aspect of moral evil, for animals are not moral beings. [This why when watching a battle scene in a movie you might find yourself saying when a horse is killed, “Oh not the horses! They haven’t done anything wrong!”] Wesley goes some way toward answering this by hypothesising that they also may have something better ahead of them in the new heavens and the new earth. Wesley attempts to answer the theological problem of evil, in a felix culpa fashion, by hypothesising that animals may also have something better ahead of them in the new heavens and the new earth.[6] Just as John Wesley thought that the creation of a new world, purged of everything that hurts or kills, was the only final answer to the problem of evil, perhaps an eschatological scenario that includes the animal kingdom will help give us greater compassion toward animals. According to Wesley, God is concerned “every moment for what befalls every creature upon earth; and more especially for anything that befalls any of the children of men.” This may seem hard to believe considering the “complicated wickedness” and “complicated misery” we see on every side. Yet it remains true that all God’s wisdom is employed for the good of his creatures, both human and non-human.[7] In the final analysis, the only satisfactory answer to the problem of evil for Wesley is that “It will not always be thus.”[8] In eschatology, we find some hope in the face of animal suffering. Believers are called to live out in the now, the principles of the world that is to come. Generally the Christian tradition has respected the body, since it is destined for resurrection. Paul, for example, argues against both gluttony and fornication (in 1 Corinthians 6:12-20), on the basis that the body will participate in the resurrection. Nothing should be done with the body in this world that would be inappropriate in the next. A similar respect needs to be learned for the environment and for non-human life forms, since these also will participate in the general restoration of all things in the new heavens and the new earth. (Wesley became a vegetarian though it is not clear that it was for this particular reason.) Echoing Wesley, either consciously or unconsciously, animal ethicist Andrew Linzey reminds us that “the world as we know it is not the only possible world.”[9] As an eschatological community, the Church is to give a watching world some glimpse of that world to come if it is to be faithful to its trust. [1] Based on Revelation 21:5, “Behold, I make all things new.” [2] John Wesley, Sermon LX, “The General Deliverance,” in Vol. VI of The Works of John Wesley [Jackson ed.] (Kansas City: Beacon Hill, 1979 reprint of 1872 edition issued by the Wesleyan Methodist Book Room, London), 241-52. [3] Sermons in Works (BCE), 437. [4] Ibid, 438-40. [5] Wesley, Works (Jackson edition) VI:250. [6] Felix culpa is a Latin expression meaning “O blessed fault!” It refers to Augustine’s view that God must have allowed the fall to take place because he had something far greater in mind. That is a blessed fault that leads the final renewal of all creation in the eschaton. [7] Sermons, in Works (BCE), 540. [8]John Wesley, Sermon LXIII, “The General Spread of the Gospel,” in Vol. VI ofThe Works of John Wesley [Jackson ed.] (Kansas City: Beacon Hill, 1979 reprint of 1872 edition issued by the Wesleyan Methodist Book Room, London), 499. [9] Andrew Linzey, Christianity and the Rights of Animals (New York: Crossroads, 1987), 40-41.

In this final post on Animal Theology I want to look at some of John Wesley 's reflections on the future state of the planet in his sermons on "The General Deliverance" and "On the General Spread of the Gospel." He asks how the love of God toward all of his creatures can be compatible with the suffering we see around us. He views the pre-fallen animal creation as “more highly exalted in intelligence than they are today.” Therefore, it did not surprise Eve to hear the serpent speak. Humanity was the channel of conveyance between God and the creation. When this channel was blocked or broken the “brute creation” was plunged into the Fall along with Adam and Eve. The creation groans for deliverance and, though we don’t hear that groaning, God does. “He knoweth all their pain, and is bringing them nearer and nearer to the birth which shall be accomplished in its season.” Wesley takes Paul's vision of a renewed creation in Romans 8 very seriously, foreseeing even the possibility of animals being exalted to the present intellectual ability of human beings

Some have argued that the Western tradition up until Descartes believed that animals had souls. Wesley seems to hold this pre-Cartesian view, speculating that God might even give animals, in the redeemed order, the capacity to love him. "May I be permitted to conjecture concerning the brute creation? What, if it should then please the all-wise, the all-gracious Creator to raise them higher in the scale of beings? What, if it should please him, when he makes us 'equal to angels,' to make them what we are now, - creatures capable of God; capable of knowing and loving and enjoying the Author of their being? If it should be so, ought our eye be evil because he is good? However this be, he will certainly do what will be most for his own glory."

According to Wesley, God is concerned “every moment for what befalls every creature upon earth; and more especially for anything that befalls any of the children of men.” This may seem hard to believe considering the “complicated wickedness” and “complicated misery” we see on every side. Yet it remains true that all God’s wisdom is employed for the good of his creatures, both human and non-human. In the final analysis, the only satisfactory answer to the problem of evil for Wesley is that “It will not always be thus.” In a felix culpa fashion, he hypothesises that animals may also have something better ahead of them in the new heavens and the new earth. The creation of a new world, purged of everything that hurts or kills, is the only final answer to the problem of evil. Perhaps an eschatological scenario that includes the animal kingdom will help give us greater compassion toward animals.

In eschatology, we find some hope in the face of animal suffering. Believers are called to live out in the now, the principles of the world that is to come. Generally the Christian tradition has respected the body, since it is destined for resurrection. Paul, for example, argues against both gluttony and fornication (in 1 Corinthians 6:12-20), on the basis that the body will participate in the resurrection. Nothing should be done with the body in this world that would be inappropriate in the next. A similar respect needs to be learned for the environment and for non-human life forms, since these also will participate in the general restoration of all things in the new heavens and the new earth. As the eschatological community the Church is to give a watching world some glimpse of that world to come if it is to be faithful to its trust. Surely the ethical treatment of animals must be part of that witness.

Skull the Slayer #7

2009-06-24T13:10:00.007+10:00

From the Title Banner: "JIM SCULLY - five-year Prisoner of War in 'Nam. DR. RAYMOND COREY - frustrated physicist. ANN REYNOLDS - battling to make it on her own in a world that refuses to listen to her. JEFF TURNER - a runaway from the regimentation of life. Four losers lost in the Bermuda Triangle - four losers finding a new beginning in the untouched world of the prehistoric past." The Slings and Arrows Comic Guide refers to this series disparagingly as "Bonkers example of Marvel at its hippy best" and as "Ideological Quarrels in the Land that Time Forgot." The letters page looks hopefully forward to Skull the Slayer #200. This was wishful thinking at best because the series would be cancelled with the next number (#8) and the story arc finished off in Marvel Two-in-One #35 and #36. Here's the synopsis I provided for the Marvel Comics Database:

Jim Scully and his crew arrive at the Inca City of Gold led by the guide Villac Umu. Upon arrival Umu turns on them and they are captured by Viracocha the Supreme Inca. Meanwhile back in Florida, Jeff Turner's father, Senator Stoneface Turner is extorting Scully's ex-Nam nemesis Freddy Lancer to fly into the Bermuda Triangle and bring his son back. Lancer has secured a fleet of used jet fighters from an African war and a crew of mercenaries including a mean number called Newkirk. Lancer reveals that he is not only motivated by the money Senator Turner is paying him but also has a score to settle with Scully from their days in Viet-Nam. Back in the City of Gold, Scully and his friends are led to a towering ziggurat which looks suspicuously like a good place for human sacrifice. As the sun rises a shadow is cast from the ziggurat that triggers the opening of pits that swallow up Ray, Anne and Jeff into one pit and Scully into another. The imperilled three must face a pair of chained pteranodons with just enough reach to tear their heads off. Meanwhile Scully must go up against a four ton stegosaurus. Ann Reynolds decides she will dispatch the pteranodons with a grenade retreived from the corpse of a previous victim. The belt that Scully retrieved from a dead alien a few days earlier begins to glow brightly and increases his strength giving him an advantage over the raging stegosaurus. Seeing an opportunity to stage a coup, the High Priest Villac Umu pushes Viracocha the Supreme Inca into the pit with Scully and the stegosaurus. Oddly Viracocha begins to speak in colloquial American English which raises Scully's suspicions. Scully finishes off the stegosaurus which crashes through the wall into the next pit just as Ann detonates the grenade that kills the pteranodons. Viracocha then reveals that he is in fact Captain Victor Cochran, USN, "stranded thirty-one years ago and now resident Sun-God!" Next: The Sky Riders!

I liked Bill Mantlo's work on Rom and The Incredible Hulk, and this series seems to display more of his creativity. This is my first read of Skull and I give this issue 3 stars.

Imperfect Company

2009-06-23T17:23:00.005+10:00

David Millikan (pictured), Imperfect Company: Power and Control in an Australian Christian Cult(Sydney: ABC Books, 1991). This is a disturbing book. It shows the degree to which people will submit themselves to the spiritual authority of others even when those others are unremarkable, small-minded, pathetic individuals without any particular spiritual charisma. It narrates the story of the “Tinker Tailor” (TT) sect of sinless perfectionists that emerged out of Sydney Evangelicalism in the 1940s and continues to exert an influence over a small number of people even to this day. The harshness, brutality and breathtaking hubris of Del Agnew and Lindsay Grant is difficult to accept as anything other than evil, though Millikan wants to resist placing them in this category lest we exempt ourselves from the capacity to exhibit similar behaviours. The book displays much wisdom and argues for a balanced approach to spirituality that does not lead to dehumanization, unhealthy withdrawal from the world, or cultural iconoclasm.

While it is clear that the author wants to position himself in the broad stream of orthodox Christianity it is equally clear that he is an outsider to Evangelicalism and less than warm toward Evangelical faith. His analysis sometimes lacks sophistication and there are errors that betray a lack of deep familiarity with the literature on Evangelicalism and related movements (e.g. the word “Pentecostal” is consistently misspelled and the footnotes do not demonstrate much reading in Wesleyan theology or serious theological works on perfectionism.) There is also a good deal of guilt-by-association here. While the writings of Oswald Chambers, Hannah Whithall Smith and Andrew Murray may have a strain of mysticism to them that is at times “super spiritual,” many thousands of Evangelical Christians have benefited from reading them without falling into the kind of spiritual abuse of which the TT group is clearly guilty. One might gain the impression from reading this book that the Salvation Army held the same kind of extreme views as TT because it “maintains a commitment to perfectionism in their [sic] official doctrines.” Clearly the Army (and other historic churches in the Wesleyan tradition) should not be placed in the same category of aberrational religion.

The most disappointing feature of Millikan’s handling of the Evangelical tradition is his misreading and misrepresentation of John Wesley. His claim that Wesley “had claimed the status of perfection” (p. 174) is contrary to plain matter of fact. Wesley, in fact disavowed on more than one occasion that he lived up to the picture he drew of the entirely sanctified believer. He was willing (perhaps naively) to accept the genuineness of others’ testimony to that experience but never claimed it for himself. “Sinless perfection” was a term he strongly rejected because it gave the impression of an absolute state of perfection from which it was impossible to fall. In fact Wesley placed many important qualifications around the term that make it clear that the kind of perfection he envisaged was of a relative nature, in fact much like the description Millikan gives as the New Testament view of the matter on pp.178-180. Wesley did not exactly write the Twenty-five Articles of the United Methodist Church as Millikan states (p.181). They are his abridgement of the Anglican Thirty-nine Articles, the wording being drawn from the original. Nonetheless Millikan’s attribution of Article 12 to Wesley clashes with the statement that the founder of Methodism thought himself to be perfect - “They are to be condemned who say that they can no more sin as long as they lire here; or deny the place of forgiveness to those who truly repent.” In any case, Wesley did not see this article as challenging the possibility of a sinless life but the idea that a person may be a in a state where it is impossible for them to sin any longer.

Millikan depends for his interpretation of Keswick teaching and its difference from Wesleyan teaching on a single source – a “series of notes prepared by Stuart Piggin in December 1989” with the rather loaded title A Terribly, Terribly Sad Business: Sinless Perfection in Australian Evangelicalism, 1938-43. (A reliable and well nuanced description of Keswick teaching is found in David Bebbington’s Holiness in Nineteenth Century England.) Piggin is a good historian, though his theological ability occasionally lets him down. I once heard him dismiss Charles Finney’s theology as problematic solely on the grounds that it was “Arminian.” This reflects his own Reformed theological position with its revulsion toward that system of theology once referred to by J. I. Packer as an “intellectual sin of infirmity.” (!) It would be more accurate however to speak of Finney’s theology as “Pelagian” since he denied the existence of inherited depravity and made perfection a simple matter of making the right choices. If this is “Arminianism” it certainly wasn’t Wesley’s Arminianism which affirmed the doctrine of depravity in very strong terms indeed. Whether drawn from Piggin or misread from him, Millikan characterises Wesleyan theology as teaching that there is no sin in believers (p.175). One could be forgiven for thinking this after reading some of Wesley’s earlier sermons influenced as they were by the “Zinzendorfian error” held by some of the London Moravians. But he very soon corrected this mistake and affirmed that, while perfection is possible in this life and the goal toward which every believer should strive, sin remains in the regenerate as something to be struggled against until it is finally rooted out (see for example his sermon On Sin in Believers)

In spite of these inaccuracies this is an important book that gives a salutary warning about how easily the highest religious ideals can become toxic. Sinless perfectionism does not appear to be any kind of threat in Evangelical or Pentecostal circles today. Nor do I think it was perfectionism as such that led to the spiritual abuse warned against here but a set of views still widely held among Pentecostals and Charismatics (and perhaps Evangelicals to a lesser extent). Some of these are identified in Millikan’s final set of conclusions. They include the untouchable status of church leaders who are understood to be anointed leaders who hear directly from God and whose decisions cannot be second-guessed by any kind of democratic process involving the laity.

"When the life of a group is dominated by the insights or “revelations” or “words of knowledge” or “prophecies” of one or a few people, and where these utterances are assigned a higher priority than the normal process of reading, discussion and reflection. This is by its nature dangerous. It denies those who do not have such “special gifts” the capacity to make the same level of decisions. Once such a division occurs within the life of a community, where a tiny minority acquires the unquestioned right to state the word of God, it puts the rest into a dependency relationship, which inevitably begins to cramp their growth to maturity. It also puts an excessive emphasis on the importance of special spiritual gifts." (p. 199)

There is also in such circles an unwillingness to submit theological insights to the wisdom of the ages and little sense of continuity with or accountability to the historic church and its great tradition. Intrusions into other people’s consciences and an attempt to control their responses along certain prescribed lines will always lead to an unhealthy kind of faith. Seeing the world as completely evil necessitating a withdrawal into the narrow confines of a supposedly pure community is a recipe for disaster. If one was to remove Lindsay Grant and Del Agnew’s quirky views on perfection from the equation and leave in these other features of unhealthy spirituality, the abuse would probably still have occurred. In any case such insights as Millikan makes throughout this book make it a valuable warning against extremism, in spite of its weaknesses in theological precision.

Recent Books Read on Holiness

2009-06-23T13:44:00.012+10:00

What follows are reviews of books I read in preparation for teaching an Intensive unit in April at Booth College called Doctrine of Sanctification: Biblical Perspectives.

Kent E. Brower and Andy Johnson, eds. Holiness and Ecclesiology in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007) is a good collection of scholarly articles from Wesleyan theologians, though like all such anthologies the quality of the offerings varies somewhat. I had considered this as a text for the unit but thought the title indicated too narrow a focus. As it turns out it probably would have made a worthy textbook. The material is predominantly biblical theology, so there is little by way of confessional theology here. Those looking for uniquely Wesleyan insights into the doctrine of sanctification are not likely to find them here. It's a pity in a way that we are seeing Wesleyan theologians doing such fine scholarly work but not, at least not in this collection, doing much more than apologise for the inadequacies of their own tradition. Where is the creative articulation of Wesleyan theology that reads the Scriptures in a traditioned yet at the same time open-ended way that will advance the tradition? It has often been said that Wesleyan theology is less "systematic" and more "biblical." If that is the case why are the most fruitful and creative Wesleyan theologians all systematic and historical theologians (Maddox, Collins, et al?). Is there a biblical theologian in the Wesleyan tradition? Tell me if you have an answer to that question because I'm still looking for a good textbook for this course!

Stephen C. Barton, Holiness Past and Present (London: T & T Clark, 2003). OK I haven't read all of this book, only the sections on the biblical material. It is clearly however a great collection of essays that indicates just how fertile a field is the topic of holiness in religious studies. It revisits classic theoretical treatments such as Rudolf Otto's concept of "the numinous," deals well with the scriptural material including the recent re-examination of purity laws and their significance, has some good historical essays including David Bebbington on "Holiness in the Evangelical Tradition," and some interesting ethical essays that ground the consideration of holiness in concrete situations. The most interesting insight for me was what Barton calls the "Dislocation and Relocation of Holiness." It shouldn't surprise us that with the arrival of Jesus the meaning of holiness should undergo a revolutionary change. In the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth, while there is direct continuity with Old Testament concepts of holiness there is also radical reinvention. For one thing the location of holiness is moved. “Holiness looks different now”; it looks like Jesus. In the holy character of Jesus there is a power present to make holy all who come within its influence. Craig Blomberg refers to this as “contagious holiness” and Kenneth Walters sees the heavenly realm encroaching upon the earthly realm in Jesus so that “where contact with God once meant destruction for any earthly being or object, contact with God in Christ now means sanctification and life.”

Consider here only two of the ways that the ritual impurity of the older code has been invested with an altogether new meaning in the teaching and actions of Jesus. The casting out of a legion of demons from the troubled man of Mark 5:1-20 “expresses something of the sanctifying presence of God in Jesus bringing a new sense of self, not only to the demonised man…but also – if only they would receive it – to a nation possessed by the demons of subjection to imperial Rome.” In the story of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37), “true holiness is shown to be a matter, not so much of separation from corpse impurity – the (no doubt legitimate) motivation of the priest and Levite in passing by on the other side…as of acting with compassion toward the poor.”

Though I have only really covered one of the four parts of this book, I look forward to returning to it for what I'm sure will be further worthwhile insights.

David Bebbinton, Holiness in Nineteenth Century England (Paternoster, 2007). Bebbington is perhaps the world’s leading historian of British Evangelicalism and the opportunity of engaging with his lectures on the forms of nineteenth-century Holiness teaching in England is simply too good an opportunity to miss. Though my primary interest in reading this book was in Methodist teaching, the other essays on Keswick, Anglo-Catholic and Reformed teaching provide a broader comparative context into which to place the Wesleyan brand of Holiness teaching. Highly recommended.

David Peterson, Possessed by God: A New Testament Theology of Sanctification and Holiness (Downers Grove: IVP, 2001). This book is an excellent treatment of the New Testament material on sanctification and I used it as one of the texts for the unit. However, I do feel quite ambivalent about its use in that context. While it deals admirably with all of the key texts on sanctification, providing good exegetical studies along the way, it is marred by an apparent need to criticise (and often unfairly) those in the Wesleyan theological tradition. The author will often portray Wesleyans as holding to sinless perfectionism overlooking the nuances of perfectionist teaching within the tradition. Ironically his own findings in discussing certain passages are sometimes fully in line with Wesleyan views. The book is also a critique of the author's own Reformed tradition, at least its Puritan heritage which has placed great stress on holiness as a mark of the elect. The characteristic Puritan stress on "progressive sanctification" (mortification and vivification) the author sees as unhelpful because it places, he says, an unhelpful burden on believers and obscures the completed work of Christ in their lives. Since the New Testament is primarily concerned with the positional holiness of believers we should place the stress on the instantaneousness of sanctification not its progressive features. Christ's death secures believers as the holy ones of God, set apart as belonging to him. That is a completed action that cannot be taken away from or added to. That is all good so far as it goes but Peterson does not do justice to the frequently found imperatives within the New Testament to "perfect holiness in the fear of God," to "live a life worthy of the calling you have received," etc. Believers are "saints" yes, but saints "called to be holy." Holiness in the New Testament must be understood as holding the positional and the experiential together. This was something Calvin certainly understood and it is a pity that this particular Reformed theologian seems to have departed from that emphasis here. I wish there were a book that did as good a job as this at interpreting the New Testament material on sanctification without the need to engage in an unnecessary and often unfounded polemic against Wesleyan theology.

John Webster, Holiness (London: SCM Press, 2003). This is a book of considerable depth despite being only one hundred pages long. Systematic theologians have not always been strong on the doctrine of holiness so Webster's contribution is very welcome. This is "confessional" theology, confident in God's Trinitarian self-revelation. It bears the characteristically Reformed and Barthian emphasis on what is usually called "positonal holiness" and also shares Barth's nervousness about the piety of the sanctified. Though its dominant note is positional holiness it avoids any antimonian implication by stressing the genuine godliness of the elect. As well as covering the Holiness of God, the Holiness of the Church and the Holiness of the Believer, perhaps the most fascinating chapter is the first on the Holiness of Theology itself. It will need to be read slowly, carefully, and thoughtfully, but this book makes a great contribution to contemporary discussion on the doctrine of holiness and is highly recommended. Facebook users can also read my colleague Adam Couchman's review here.

Michael Lodhal and Thomas J. Oord, eds. Relational Holiness: Responding to the Call of Love (Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill Press, 2005). This is a fairly lightweight book that is accurate in its central thesis that love is the organizing centre of the doctrine of holiness, but weak in that it does not provide a solid theological treatment of the topic. The stress on a Trinitarian view of holiness is welcome but not sufficiently developed here. The book is aimed at a general lay readership and is pitched reasonably well at that audience I suppose but both authors are capable of much more serious writing. It is a book typical of the crisis in the Wesleyan-Holiness churches over the doctrine of sanctification. Having given up on the simplistic formulas of nineteenth century second blessing formualtions of the teaching, no adequate substitute has yet been found. Much that is said here might be found in a book by an evangelical of any particular theological tradition or none. There are a few distinctively Wesleyan insights but the tradition still awaits a contemporary formulation of its core doctrine. The reading lists at the end of each chapter provide valuable clues for further reading. PS Does a book that is 140 pages long really need two forwards and two prefaces?

Kevin W. Mannoia and Don Thorsen, eds. The Holiness Manifesto (Grand Rapids: Eedrmans, 2008). I have only really dipped into a few of the essays here (those on specifically biblical themes) but thought I'd include it here as a significant new release in the field that will probably be worth revisiting. A more adequate review may follow a closer read.

The Spy Who Loved Me

2009-06-23T10:07:00.003+10:00

An unusual Bond novel because written in the first person voice of a woman. Perhaps more than any other Bond novel this is nothing like the film of the same name. Bond only comes into the narrative in the final act to save the heroine from a nasty fate at the hands of two viscious gangsters holed up in a run down motel in the Adirondacks. The suspense builds well and it's quite a page turner. Hitchcock always wanted to make a Bond film and this would have been the one for him to do, with its American setting, creeping claustrophobia and damsel in distress. This Penguin series has a cool (though racy) set of retro covers that draw on elements of the story. My copy came from the local IGA store in Kingaroy, Qld, so you never know what little treasures you'll find among the supermarket novels.

Wednesday Comics

2009-06-22T22:55:00.003+10:00

The following story from USA Today announces a very cool and creative development from DC Comics:

"Flying defiantly into a digital world, DC Comics will launch a weekly series of superhero comic strips next month, printed on full-size newspaper pages like the old-fashioned Sunday funnies. The 12-week return to newsprint, called Wednesday Comics, makes its debut at comic-book stores July 8 and will offer 15 different stories for $3.99 in a broadsheet format, 14 inches by 20 inches. (New comic books are released across the USA on Wednesdays.) Creators include John Arcudi and Lee Bermejo on Superman, Brian Azzarello on Batman, Adam and Joe Kubert on Sgt. Rock, Paul Pope on Adam Strange, Dave Gibbons on Kamandi, Kyle Baker on Hawkman and a pairing of Neil Gaiman and Michael Allred on the obscure hero Metamorpho. All 12 weeks of the Superman strip will appear in USA TODAY as well, beginning July 8 with a full-page installment in the newspaper. The remaining 11 Superman strips will be available each Wednesday at usatoday.com. "There's a certain romance to the history of the big old Sunday funnies that I wanted to try to recapture in Wednesday Comics," says DC art director Mark Chiarello. "Why not dust off the format and have a little fun?"

You can see samples of the high quality art that will grace the format here

Latest eBay purchase

2009-06-22T18:24:00.006+10:00

Hulk 112 January 1969 "The Brute Battles On", with HULK fighting for his life on an alien planet (shades of Planet Hulk) with Stan Lee script and Herb Trimpe art. The cover is relatively flat, good gloss, indents, a couple of creases and some wear on the right hand edge. The staples are tight and the inside pages are all fine. The overall grade a solid Very Good- (VG-) I'll write up a review later.

Do Animals Have Souls?

2009-06-22T15:11:00.003+10:00

Mark Twain once said that human beings have a lot to learn from the higher animals. Some of those things are perhaps expressed by Gary Kowalski’s description of his dog, Chinook.

"My dog has deep knowledge to impart. He makes friends easily and doesn’t hold a grudge. He enjoys simple pleasures and takes each day as it comes…he eats when he’s hungry and sleeps when he’s tired. He’s not hung up about sex…He never growls at the children or barks at his wife. So my dog is sort of guru. When I become too serious and preoccupied he reminds me of the importance of frolicking and play. When I get too wrapped up in abstractions and ideas, he reminds me of the importance of exercising and caring for the body. On his own canine level, he shows me that it might be possible to live without inner conflicts or neuroses: uncomplicated, genuine and glad to be alive."

Investigation of interspecies spirituality is new territory for most of us. But increasingly scientists, including psychologists, have begin to investigate such questions as whether animals dream, wonder, contemplate death, are conscious of themselves and others, have a sense of right and wrong, shame, loyalty etc. that go beyond the usual explanations of such things as purely instinctual responses devoid of what we humans call “reflection.”

The idea of progressive revelation maintains that, while God’s self revelation does not change, our human capacity to receive and understand that revelation does change. As the human race has learned to understand God more fully, it is claimed, such things as human sacrifice, polytheism, polygamy, racial genocide on religious grounds, etc. have been put aside as our apprehension of who God is and what he requires of us has enlarged. The Church once gave “biblical” defenses for the preservation of human slavery and the subjugation of women, arguments which no longer hold water today. Might it not be that the current discussion and theological reflection over the treatment of animals may be another stage in our understanding of God’s will and ways that necessitates a radical re-think on our part?

In 1988, the World Council of Churches, commissioned a theological consultation which issued recommendations concerning the church’s failure to teach respect for animals. “Freedom [from oppression and for life with God] should not be so limited [to humans] because other creatures, both species and individuals, deserve to live in and for themselves and for God. Therefore we call on all Christians as well as other people of good will to work toward the liberation of life, all life.”

Of course, a doctrine of “progressive revelation, whilst legitimate in the main, often betrays a “natural theology” bias that does not sit well with those who hold that Christianity is a “revealed” religion, and who affirm more classical views of biblical authority and direct inspiration. R. J. Hyland speaks for a progressive revelation stance when he maintains that God never condoned animal sacrifice but that “biblical writers wished to justify their practice by projecting their own violent nature onto God.”

If, on the other hand, as the classical tradition maintains, animal sacrifice was a practice mandated by God in the Old Testament, then the killing of animals per se cannot be wrong. Linzey places a more positive spin on animal sacrifice than does his fellow animal rights theologian, Hyland, claiming that animal sacrifice was viewed by those who practiced it, not simply as the destruction of life, but as the returning to the Creator that which was God’s gift. For God to receive the gift, it must have been assumed that the life of the animal survived beyond death. Thus, sacrifice affirmed the value of the life taken.

In Hinduism, a religion which now frowns on the unnecessary destruction of animals, animal sacrifice was originally widely practiced and was a key feature in the power of the priesthood over the devotees. Only the priest could offer the required sacrifices that would appease the gods. A remarkable shake up occurred in Hinduism when teachers such as Buddha and Mahavira, denounced the sacrifice of animals, in part as a protest against the Brahmin priests’ monopoly on religious power.

In a somewhat similar way, the Hebrew prophets of the same era, though not denouncing animal sacrifice as such, or for quite the same reasons as the Buddha, attacked the priestly system as corrupt and the sacrifices as useless if not accompanied by genuine heart religion. God would not accept the sacrifices of animals unaccompanied by a sacrifice of the heart. Such sacrifices were an abomination to him. Of course, in Jesus, the final sacrifice for sin has made the sacrifice of animals no longer necessary. A new covenant has been established, the final outcome of which is yet to be seen, in a new heaven and a new earth, spoken of by the prophets, in which “they shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain (Isaiah 11:9).” Whether or not animals have souls, as creatures of God, they are deserving of respect. All actions toward them must surely be at least informed by the holy mountain foreseen by Isaiah.

Apology

2009-06-21T18:49:00.003+10:00

Apologies to the several people who recently commented on this blog and waited in vain for their comments to be authorised. I had trouble with Google recognising my username after an old email address became defunct. (It's also partly for this reason that I have not posted here for many months.) I hope to get back here more often from here on in and I do appreciate all my readers. Thanks for your patience.

Schweitzer and Barth on Animals

2008-09-02T11:49:00.001+10:00

Two significant theologians with opposing views, Albert Schweitzer and Karl Barth, make important contributions to our discussion on animals. [The comparison of these two thinkers is drawn from Andrew Linzey. Animal Theology. (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1995), 4 –8.]

Schweitzer understood “self-devotion to the world to be self-devotion to human life to every form of living being with which it can come into relation.” I must show to “all will-to-live” the same reverence as I do to my own. This reverence for life is not, for Schweitzer, one principle among many, but the sole principle of the moral. Love and compassion, for example, are simply expressions of this reverence. Life is itself sacred or holy and must therefore be responded to with reverence.

The ethical person, for Schweitzer, “tears no leaf from a tree, plucks no flower, and takes care to crush no insect.” He places a worm found on the roadside back into the soil. He would rather suffer in a stuffy room when working by lamplight than open the window and see a mosquito perish when attracted to his light. He picks insects out of puddles to give them another chance at survival. Anticipating the ridicule such a stance may elicit from an incredulous world, Schweitzer responds, “It is the fate of every truth to be a subject for laughter until it is generally recognized.”

The seemingly impractical implications of such a position are moderated somewhat by the reminder that Schweitzer is concerned not to avoid injury to life under any and all circumstances, but when such injury if easily avoidable. “Beyond the unavoidable, I must never go, not even with what seems insignificant.” He tells us only “what reverence requires without the pressure of necessity.”

This reverence for life is not, for Schweitzer, obedience to moral law. It is more like a religious experience or approach to life. Paul Tillich in "Morality and Beyond" held that “a moral act is not an act in obedience to an external law, human or divine [rather it is] the inner law of our true being, of our essential or created nature, which demands that we actualise what follows from it…The religious dimension of the moral imperative is its unconditional character.” This reminds me of C. S. Lewis who, somewhere, states that concepts of “right” and “wrong” are not discussed in heaven; they are laughed at! Those who dwell in heaven need not make some considerations because they act in accordance with their true nature, in ways that are appropriate to redeemed existence.

Karl Barth is the only theologian to have given Schweitzer’s position serious critical reflection and rebuff. He accepts that Schweitzer’s concern is by no means laughable but very serious, and the problems he raises very important. “Those who smile at [Schweitzer’s compassion for even the tiniest creature] are themselves subjects for tears.” Barth, however, has three criticisms of Schweitzer.

1. Barth rejects Schweitzer’s idea that vegetable life deserves the same careful reverence and respect as animal life. Each animal is a unique and separate being, whereas the use of plants is a use of its surplus material (eg the consumption of fruits and vegetables), which does not totally destroy the existence of the food-bearing plant. One cannot eat a dog without annihilating it. One can, however, eat an orange without annihilating the orange tree.

2. Reverence and responsibility properly belong to human-to-human relationships. Consideration of animals is serious but secondary.

3. Schweitzer does not appreciate the moral distinction between animals and humans because he does not grasp the meaning of the Incarnation. God “reveals, entrusts, and binds” himself to the rest of creation through taking, not plant or animal, but human form.

Schweitzer's view then seems more Hindu with its affirmation of the value of all sentient beings as part of the life force of the universe, and Barth's more Christian, with its idea of a covenantal bond between God and humanity established through the Incarnation.

Animals Rights, Vegetarianism etc.

2008-08-25T11:27:00.005+10:00

In Animal Theology, Andrew Linzey, of Oxford University, a leading theologian and ethicist who has written extensively on the rights of animals asks three questions: 1. Should we show reverence, or respect, to animals? 2. Do we have a responsibility to animals? and 3. Do animals have rights? He proposes that all three questions should be answered in the affirmative.

Linzey condemns the close confinement of animals in intensive farming methods, such as the use of battery hens, as follows: "Animals have the right to be animals. The natural life of a...creature is a gift from God. When we take over the life of an animal to the extent of distorting its natural life for no other purpose than our own gain, we fall into sin. There is no clearer blasphemy before God than the perversion of his creatures...Confining a de-beaked hen in a battery cage is more than a moral crime; it is a living sign of our failure to recognize the blessing of God in creation."

What about vegetarianism? According to Linzey: "It will be obvious that humans can live healthy, stimulating and rewarding lives without white veal, pate de foie gras...or cheap eggs...The Christian argument for vegetarianism…is simple: since animals belong to God, have value to God and live for God, then their needless destruction is sinful. In short: animals have some right to their life, all circumstances being equal...There were doubtless good reasons, partly theological, partly cultural and partly economic, why Christians in the past have found vegetarianism unfeasible. We do well not to judge too hastily, if at all. We cannot relive others’ lives, or think their thoughts, or enter their consciences...But what we can be sure about is that living without...‘avoidable ill’ has a strong moral claim upon us now."

Vegetarianism was the first dietary practice of the original creation (Genesis 1:29). Permission to eat animals was given after the flood but restrictions were placed on which animals could be eaten (kosher laws). According to Rabbi Abraham Kook, the Old Testament includes the goal of eventually restoring humanity to a vegetarian diet (Isaiah 11:69). It seems to me, however, that the major problem for Christian vegetarians, who maintain that there exists an ethical imperative to avoid meat eating, is that Jesus ate meat. A simple syllogism demonstrates this problem. Jesus was without sin. Jesus ate meat. Therefore, eating meat is not sinful. Even if we assume, as Linzey suggests, that Jesus ate no meat at the Last Supper, it would surely be too great an assumption to suggest that a Jewish boy growing up in an ordinary Jewish home had never eaten lamb at the Passover! In any case, we know for sure that he ate fish at breakfast on the beach with his disciples after he had risen from the dead. Linzey’s attempts to escape the implications of a meat-eating Saviour for Christian vegetarians are valiant, but ultimately unsatisfying.

The Bible expresses wonder at God’s creation, found often in the Psalms, Jesus spoke of God’s concern even for a single sparrow, and Isaiah envisions a time when the lion will lie down with the lamb. Paul sees, in Romans 8, the whole creation (which must includes animals) having been subjected to frustration through human sin, and that same creation participating, in some sense in the glorious liberty of the sons of God yet to be revealed. Yet it has to be admitted a biblical theology of animals is not enunciated in any systematic way in Holy Scripture. Interestingly, the Hebrew phrase nefesh chaya (“a living soul” or “creature”) is applied in the Old Testament to animals as well as to humans (Genesis 1:21-24). God is said to have established covenants with animals as well as with humans (Genesis 9:9-10; Hosea 2:18-22). All of this indicates a significant place for animals in the divine order.

In the next post we will consider Albert Schweitzer's and Karl Barth's contributions to this discussion.

Crewsick Pictures

2008-08-19T17:16:00.004+10:00

From Sept 1st the Boy Wonder will be a full time employee of Creswick Pictures where he will work as a film editor. Check out their website. I'll think you'll be suitably impressed by the clients they have,such as Disney, Buena Vista etc.

http://www.crespics.com/

Praise the Lord for answered prayer and for this great inside track into the industry Jesse loves so much. Good on you Jess. We are proud of you and very happy for you.

Dad

First Thoughts on an Animal Theodicy

2008-08-18T11:41:00.004+10:00

A few years ago I was intrigued by a question put, by Dr. Carl Schultz of Houghton College while we were team-teaching an Intensive an intensive at Kingsley on "Human Suffering and the God of Love." My paraphrase of his question, as I recall it, is as follows. “Why do we limit our subject matter to human suffering? What of animal suffering? To some people it is a more acute question for the problem of evil, since, while we may conceive of some greater good coming out of human suffering, in terms of some ‘higher end’ such as character development, this would not be the case with animal suffering.” For many people the problem of animal pain is the worst aspect of moral evil, precisely because animals are not moral beings. [This why when watching a battle scene in a movie we might find yourselves saying when a horse is killed, “Oh not the horses! They haven’t done anything wrong!”] Earlier than this, I was struck by a suggestion, in 1997, during a course on John Wesley’s theology at Asbury Seminary, in Wesley’s sermon The General Deliverance that in the new heavens and the new earth God may grant the lower creatures something akin to the rationality and consciousness currently existing in humans. What I would like to do over the next few posts is survey some of the current thinking on the consciousness of animals, and on “animal rights” among philosophers and theologians, and then ask what all this might mean for theodicy.

Philosophers have led the way in this discussion; theologians have been much less vocal. Andrew Rowan, Dean of Special Programs at Tufts University’s School of Veterinary Medicine in the USA has observed that “within the last fifteen to twenty years contemporary moral philosophers have written more on the topic of human responsibility to other animals than their predecessors had written in the previous two thousand years.” This is certainly a new trend since philosophers have usually avoided the subject of animals very carefully. Albert Schweitzer famously compared the place of animals in European philosophy with a kitchen floor scrubbed clean by a housewife who is “careful to see that the door is shut lest the dog should come in and ruin the finished job with its footprints.” If we accept that “moral education…is about finding within us an ever-increasing sense of the worth of creation...” then this must include a sense of moral awareness regarding the place of animals within creation. The Christian faith, while often thought to provide a rationale for the exploitation of animals for human use, also provides some material that challenges this world view.

It cannot be denied that traditional views have led to some outrageous treatment of other of God’s creatures beside ourselves. The traditional view might be represented by Joseph Ricaby, SJ when he states that “Brute beasts, not having understanding, and therefore, not being persons, cannot have any rights.” When Robert Mortimer, formerly Anglican Bishop of Exeter, was asked to defend fox-hunting he stated that it reinforced “man’s high place in the hierarchy of being.” The Dictionary of Moral Theology published in 1962 stated “Zoophilists [lovers of animals] often lose sight of the end for which animals were created by God, viz., the service and use of man…moral doctrine teaches that animals have no rights on the part of man.” More recently the 1995 Catholic Catechism has stated that “animals, like plants, and inanimate beings, are by nature destined for the common good of past, present and future humanity,” and “they may be used to serve the just satisfaction of man’s needs.” Of course, the idea that animals exist only for the benefit of humans predates Christianity. Aristotle held, for example, that since “nature makes nothing without some end in view, nothing to no purpose, it must be that nature has made [animals and plants] for the sake of man.” The question of whether animals have rights and whether we should eat them will be the subjects of the next post.

2008-07-08T12:14:00.013+10:00

Announcing the launch of Crucible - a completely free on-line journal of peer-reviewed articles and other resources on Christian life and thought

If you like, you can read my review
of Will Willimon's Proclamation and Theology

Go to http://www.crucible.org.au/

God's Gonna Cut You Down

2008-07-07T20:28:00.005+10:00

AMELIA EDEN SAGE

2008-06-27T12:01:00.011+10:00

Well it's official - Sarah and Brad are parents and Lynda and I are grandparents, due to the birth of Amelia Eden Sage at 8.01 pm on Thursday 19 June 2008 at Kingaroy Hospital. These are some of the first pictures taken in the delivery room about 10 minutes after birth - two of Amelia, then her mum, then me, than Aunty Sophie, and finally Aunty Ellen.

HALT PREMIER AND MUCH BIGGER NEWS!

2008-06-27T11:45:00.008+10:00

The Boy Wonder's film, HALT, finally premieres at 7.30 pm this Monday 30 June at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (Federation Square). It was to be cast and crew only but it is now open to the generel public - $10 admission. Click here to check it out. Sorry about the late notice but I am in Queensland right now celebrating much bigger news - the birth of our first grandchild, Amelia Eden Sage, born to Sarah and Brad on 19th June weighing in at 7lbs 5 ozs. Pictures to follow soon.

Nazarene Rap

2008-04-28T10:08:00.001+10:00

A little bit of self-mocking from the Nazarenes. Reminds me a little of my Kiwi Wesleyan friends from cession who gave us a smokin' verison of Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing" at Lake Taupo one year - "When I get that feelin' I need Wesleyan healing.." Any chance of a video reprise guys?

On Common Grace and the Non-Elect

2008-04-21T12:04:00.011+10:00

I recently read one of Richard J. Mouw’s Stob lectures, "Seeking the Common Good," given at Calvin College in 2000, (He Shines in All That’s Fair: Culture and Common Grace. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001, pp. 75-88). The central question Mouw is asking is whether or not Calvinists should engage with wider society in seeking the common good of all, even when it is recognized that the “all” is not solely made up of God’s elect. He quite rightly challenges the attitude of some Calvinists in boycotting this sphere and argues persuasively for a full engagement with human culture. So far, so good. All very commendable. But the reason this is a problem at all for Mouw’s audience is that it is a very Calvinist one indeed. One's understanding of his argument hinges on understanding what Calvinists mean by “common grace.” Common grace is what makes it possible even for the non-elect to enjoy a cool glass of water on a hot day or sit under a shady tree. If we fall over and break our leg an ambulance will come along and take us to the hospital. God causes such rain to fall on the just and the unjust, on the elect and the non-elect. But for Calvinists this grace does not in any way contribute to a person’s salvation. Here is where “common grace” differs from “prevenient grace” as held, for example, in the Wesleyan tradition. Prevenient grace is God drawing all people to salvation (whether or not they ultimately come – the offer at least is genuine.) Common grace on the other hand is given to all but only the elect may be drawn to God. This is made explicit on page 82 when Mouw defines common grace as …”the teaching that God has a positive, though non-salvific, regard for those who are not elect…” This is exactly the difference between prevenient and common grace. The first has the aim of salvation, the second does not. It surprises me that Mouw quotes the Reformed theologian Herman Hoeksema without any attempt to defend his outrageous claim that “All of the non-elect…are the enemies of God, and God ‘hates His enemies and purposes to destroy them, except them he chose in Christ Jesus.'” (pp. 82-83) It’s certainly an understatement when Mouw follows this up with the admission that “this does not seem to comport well, however, with Christ’s command to love your enemies.”! It’s a good article and a timely word to Calvinists (and all Christians) of the need to engage culture. But it is marred by a view of God which hardly matches the God of love set forth in the Bible who is "not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance."

Tabor on the Radio

2008-04-21T10:58:00.004+10:00

Some of my Tabor colleagues appeared on John Cleary's Sunday Night programme on ABC Radio a couple of weeks ago. You may like to have a listen to Wynand de Kock (Principal), John Capper (Dean) and Leanne Hill (student and Dean's PA) discussing Tabor, Kingsley and theological education in general.click here and have a listen.
John Capper, Dean of Tabor College.

Free Will and Predestination

2008-03-10T10:56:00.008+11:00

Last night I had the opportunity to discuss predestination and free will with David Hohne of Moore College on John Cleary's (at left) Sunday Night programme on 774 ABC Radio. You can download a podcast or listen online by clicking here. I love any opportunity to talk theology in the public square. We had what I thought was a very interesting discussion though I felt that David was hesitant to be drawn into a discussion of the substantial differences between Calvinists and others. Of course, we Wesleyans have to believe in free will - we have no choice; we're Arminians!

Free At Last!

2008-03-06T15:34:00.003+11:00

Thank God for You Tube! If you have never taken the quarter of an hour needed to listen to Dr. King's I Have a Dream speech, you cannot really be said to understand the nature of the modern world. Do yourself a favour and watch it.

[There was a] man from Atlanta, Georgia
By the name of Martin Luther King
He shook the land like rolling thunder
And made the bells of freedom ring today
With a dream of beauty that they could not burn away
Just another holy man who dared to take a stand
My God, they killed him !
- Kris Kristofferson

The Mist

2008-02-29T16:47:00.012+11:00

Well the Oscars are over, and I may get around to a blog entry on the four (out of five) "Best Picture" nominated films I saw over the course of two days last weekend. But first let me recommend a great overlooked film - Frank Darabont's The Mist. When I first heard about this my response was kind of "yeah, whatever." I had seen The Fog and it was awful (though the John Carpenter original I hear tell is a lot better). But when I heard that this was a Frank Darabont film, I thought I'd give it a try. After all, the man who made The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile, knows how to make a good movie out of a Stephen King story, right? Well, my instincts were right and this is one of the best creature features I've seen in a while. Even Thomas Jane is good in this (didn't know he had it in him).

Frank Darabont at work behind the camera (left)

You would think that a film with a premise like this would be filled with Hollywood cliches. A small town near a military base is covered by a dense fog and people begin to be picked off by prehistoric tentacled monsters hidden in the fog which have been set loose as a result of the military experimenting with inter-dimensional portals. The remarkable thing is that Darabont gets his actors to behave in ways that you could imagine people would behave in a situation like that instead of acting like Hollywood stereotypes. The slow building of suspense as the townspeople in the local supermarket begin to realise that something is amiss is brilliantly carried off and a masterpiece of direction.

Marcia Gay Harden's religious fruitcake "Mrs. Carmody" is a bit of a cheap shot, I guess (why are religious people in movies so often dangerous and crazy?) but her mania provides the Lord of the Flies scenario that sees the grocery store inhabitants revert to their most savage and primitive of survival instincts. A sacrificial victim is needed to appease the blood lust of the monsters and Mrs. Carmody is happy to provide the victims. Renee Girard's concepts of "mimetic violence" and the "scapegoat mechanism" are at work here. A sacrificial social order based on violence is the only thing that can secure salvation for those trapped in the mist enshrouded supermarket. Or is it? Thomas Jane's David Drayton and his little band of dissenters beg to differ and make their escape prefering the monsters in the fog to the ones in the grocery store.

A warning-the ending of this film is very downbeat. By the final act, you feel like you really need the payoff of a happy ending but it doesn't come. This shows a lot of restraint on Darabont's part as he makes good on his intention to be faithful to the original story, even at the risk of alienating the audience. Four stars from me.

On Burning Heretics

2008-02-29T16:38:00.003+11:00
I've been reading any interesting post by Stumac over on In the Moment about the bad behaviour associated with battles over theology. I think we find this kind of thing so hard to deal with partly because we view heresy so differently from the ancestors. We tend to see it as an intellectual infirmity - the person isn't thinking straight. They, on the other hand, saw it as a moral fault - the willingness to believe a lie. Actually the New Testament seems to assume this pre-modern concept. It's interesting to note that in the Book of Revelation it is not only the false prophet who is thrown into the lake of fire but also "all those deceived by him." Hang on isn't being deceived something amoral, something "not my fault"? Perhaps not; perhaps I allow myself to be deceived because of some inner fault that is willing to believe a lie.

The other difference between us and earlier generations of Christians is that because religion was previously so much a part of society (especially from the late medieval/early modern period) a heretic threatened the very stability of the social order. Today a heretic can hold whatever false doctrines he or she wants and it doesn't bother us at all because we live in a free and liberal society, in a world of complete freedom of religion. Every suburban Kingdom Hall is evidence that this system works very well. But to a person in, say, Luther's Germany, a heretic such as Michael Servetus (just as an example) was considered not unlike the way we might consider a terrorist - a person whose view threatened the safety of society and who needed to be prosecuted for his religious views for the good of the whole.

Now, I am not trying to make excuses for the atrocious act of burning and torturing heretics. It was as unChristian then as it would be today. But understanding these people's context and the way they acted as people of their time helps us understand a little better the actions they took (even if we still believe they were wrong). I'm glad we no longer burn heretics - these days we make them bishops.

The Apology

2008-02-14T19:59:00.006+11:00
Kevin Rudd in Darwin during the election campaign (AAP: Alan Porritt)

Yesterday the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, made history with the following speech. I'm sure you've already heard it and read it, probably more than once, but I wanted to post it here because many of my international vistors (hopefully some of my Australian History students from Houghton Down Under, may not have got it elsewhere. Mungo Macallum has complained that it should have been written by a poet, but he is one, so he would say that. OK so it may have been written by a parliamentary team of speech writers but it is historic, and it is just, and it is a solid foundation for a shared future.

"Today we honour the Indigenous peoples of this land, the oldest continuing cultures in human history.

We reflect on their past mistreatment.

We reflect in particular on the mistreatment of those who were Stolen Generations – this blemished chapter in our nation’s history.

The time has now come for the nation to turn a new page in Australia’s history by righting the wrongs of the past and so moving forward with confidence to the future.

We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.

We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country.

For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry.

To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry.

And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry.

We the Parliament of Australia respectfully request that this apology be received in the spirit in which it is offered as part of the healing of the nation.

For the future we take heart; resolving that this new page in the history of our great continent can now be written.

We today take this first step by acknowledging the past and laying claim to a future that embraces all Australians.

A future where this Parliament resolves that the injustices of the past must never, never happen again.

A future where we harness the determination of all Australians, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, to close the gap that lies between us in life expectancy, educational achievement and economic opportunity.

A future where we embrace the possibility of new solutions to enduring problems where old approaches have failed.

A future based on mutual respect, mutual resolve and mutual responsibility.

A future where all Australians, whatever their origins, are truly equal partners, with equal opportunities and with an equal stake in shaping the next chapter in the history of this great country, Australia."

Halt Teaser Trailer

2008-02-12T15:32:00.001+11:00
Here is a teaser trailer for the Boy Wonder's current short film project (still in post-production as we speak).

Sermon for Transfiguration Sunday (3 February 2008)

2008-02-10T08:54:00.000+11:00

One of the most popular themes in reality TV is the “make-over.” A person is transformed from an ordinary looking person with not much style or dress sense into a stunning, sexy, smartly dressed man or woman through the magic of the make-over team. A variation on the theme is plastic surgery shows where a disfigured person undergoes radical changes to their face and/or body through surgical intervention. The highlight of the show is when friends and loved ones all gather and the person is revealed for the first time in all their transformed glory. Tonight sees the return of TV’s The Biggest Loser where people are transformed from being morbidly obese to being, well…not morbidly obese. Viewers will sit through the entire series in order to get to the final episode when the contestants will stand in all their reduced glory – transformed and transfigured by their experience of diet and exercise.

The New Testament word "transfiguration" may be translated by our English word, "metamorphosis." It is used four times in the New Testament and is translated twice as, "transfigured," (Mark 9:2; Matthew 17:2 - the transfiguration of Jesus on the mount) twice as "transformed" (Romans 12:2; 2 Corinthians 3:18 - the transformation of believers into greater degrees of Christlikeness). The linking of these Gospel passages with Paul’s letters is important. It shows that we are to share in some way in the glory of Christ. C.S. Lewis once said that if we could see the creature God will make of our neighbour we would be tempted to bow down and worship him.

The First Sunday of Epiphany the text is always about the baptism of Jesus where the voice is heard from heaven: "This is my son, the beloved; with him I am well pleased." Today is the last Sunday, and a voice again says, "This is my son, the beloved; with him I am well pleased." Eugene Peterson paraphrases these words: "this is my son, marked by my love, the focus of my delight." This reassurance was needed by Jesus and needed by the disciples as Jesus is about to enter into the final journey to the cross. Wednesday is Ash Wednesday the commencement of the season of Lent, when we are called to fast and to undergo a season of self denial and repentance in preparation for Easter. At such a time we need the revelation that we are given here. Often we are told in sermons that we must change. How often have you heard someone say in a prayer. ”Lord may we leave this place changed people.” I wonder if that is really the answer.

In Cecil B. Demille's final film, The Ten Commandments, Moses emerges from Sinai (an event recalled in today's Old Testament reading) looking very different from when he went into the cloud. It works in its own way I guess but it also looks a little comical. It comes off as a clever makeup job but it’s unintentionally humorous as no reason is given why a previously younger looking Moses has now emerged from his encounter with God donning a full flowing beard and looking about 40 years older! I don’t know how many sermons I’ve given on the transfiguration – a lot. But when I look in the mirror I see the same old me. We too often come away from a sermon on the transfiguration asking ourselves what we need to do to change. It is not what we do that leads to change, it is what we see. What Peter, James and John saw on the mountain that day, certainly changed them as their writings bear witness.

The sad thing about make-over shows is that the people who make such transformations to their exterior self soon revert to their older careless ways and are just as slovenly and overweight as when they began. A make-over is only skin deep. It is not a make-over we need but laser surgery. This Lent as we adopt our Lenten discipline and focus on Christ let the emphasis not be on the discipline but on the focusing. May God grant us to see a new vision of Christ’s glory so that “all of us, with unveiled faces [see] the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, [and are] transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” Amen.

Another False Prophet

2007-11-26T13:29:00.000+11:00
Well, Danny Nallia's prophecy did not come to pass. Not only has John Howard not been re-elected but Peter Costello has declined the leadership challenge (didn't see that one coming). I went to the Catch the Fire blog to see Pastor Danny's response to all this but so far nothing has been posted. It was interesting, however, to find the following "prophecy" from Kenneth Copeland (pictured left) given on 26th October 2007 which Catch the Fire described as "further confirmation of Ps. Danny’s prophetic word given on 11th August 2007 regarding the Federal Election on the 24th November 2007."

“God’s man in Australia [John Howard] stood up and publicly declared Australia a Christian nation! ‘If you want to come here and join us in our Christian faith you are welcome here but don’t think you can come in here and try and force some other religion here on us and don’t think you are going to tell us how to believe God and who we are going to worship.’ He publicly did that, now this is no time for that man to be defeated. Well he’s not going to be. Amen. He is Lord to the glory of God the Father. He is Lord to the glory of God the Father. He is Lord over Australia! It has been announced! Amen.”

So should we now apply the following scripture (Deuteronomy 18:20-22)?

20 But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, is to be put to death. 21 You may say to yourselves, "How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the LORD?" 22 If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously. No one should be alarmed.

The problem with these guys is that they want to act like Old Testament prophets, anointing "kings" and king's successors and presuming to bring God's word to the whole nation, but they don't want to play by the rules that applied to those same Old Testament prophets.

Liturgy and Ethics

2007-10-11T13:08:00.001+10:00
"One reason why we Christians argue so much about which hymn to sing, which liturgy to follow, which way to worship is that the commandments teach us to believe that bad liturgy eventually leads to bad ethics. You begin by singing some sappy, sentimental hymn, then you pray some pointless prayer, and the next thing you know you have murdered your best friend."
— Stanley Hauerwas, The Truth About God: The Ten Commandments in Christian Life, p.89

"We don't take the issue of liturgy anywhere near as seriously as we ought to do. I believe that the bad taste in liturgy and hymnody demonstrated by so many modern congregations should be every bit as troubling to us as their weak ethical and doctrinal standards... Beauty, goodness and truth stand or fall together. The aesthetical crimes that one witnesses in the evangelical subculture — look in the trinket or art areas of your local Christian store to get a sense of what I am referring to — are indicative of a rottenness in heart of the movement itself. The narcissistic aesthetic of much of the subculture of evangelicalism, seen in the appeal of kitsch and of art that involves little more than its own self-projections, is evidence enough of a serious departure from Christian orthodoxy."
- Alastair from alastair.adversaria.co.uk

Is This Man God's Preferred PM?

2007-10-08T16:16:00.001+10:00
Danny Nalliah of Catch the Fire Ministries has recently released a "prophecy" claiming that God told him to go and anoint Peter Costello as Australia's future prime Minister. I kid thee not. Read the "prophecy" at Crikey.com. Last time I looked we went to Holy Scripture for guidance and not to extra-biblical revelation. Danny Nalliah likens himself to the biblical Samuel anointing the next king of Israel. Give me a break! He claims, "I will boldly declare that Prime Minister John Howard will be re-elected in the November election (if the Body of Christ unites in prayer and action) and pass the leadership onto Peter Costello sometime after." Notice the way he worms out of the implications of his prophecy NOT coming to pass (which by Old Testament standards would be his being stoned to death). It is only "if the Body of Christ unites in prayer and action" that the prophecy will come to pass! So in the end it is all about Pelagian self effort. Apparently we must "be willing to pay the price to see Australia come back to Jesus." Come on folks, we can do it if we just get together, pray hard enough and vote Liberal!

Is it the supposedly "Judeo-Christian values" of the Liberal Party that are behind our involvement in the war in Iraq which has seen conservatively 70-80,000 innocent civilians killed? We certainly should support the right to life of unborn children but what about the right to life of living children in Iraq and Afghanistan? Are they of less value? More die every day and the coalition government refuses to withdraw the involvement of our troops. Why do we persist in thinking that "Judeo-Christian values" only relate to matters of personal morality? To state that 60-70% of Labor Party members hold to "totally anti-Christian, extreme left wing ideologies" is outrageous. What planet does this guy live on? Is he saying they're all Communists? The Labor Party is about as centre-right as any party can be without being the Liberal Party!

As for Labor "supporting homosexuals" what are we supposed to do? Hate them? Marginalise them? Why shouldn't gay people have the same civil rights as other people? Perhaps we should put them all in special enclosures or make them wear a little symbol so we can identify them and single them out for special treatment. Rudd has made it clear that under a Labor government there will be no change to the Marriage Act that defines legal marriage as a union between one man and one woman for life. The Christian community does not believe that homosexual practice is in keeping with Christian moral and ethical teaching. That is our affair, and we have our own house to keep in order, but we can't enforce that teaching on the general population, any more than we can make it a law that all Australian citizens must attend church! Let's face it friends, we live in a liberal democracy, not a theocracy or a Puritan commonwealth!

I'm prepared to go on record to say that, in spite of Pastor Nalliah's "prophetic word," I for one will not be voting Liberal in the federal election and I certainly will not be spiritually blackmailed into doing so by a self appointed prophet. I cannot vote for a government that supports an unjust war, that refuses to engage in a genuine act of reconciliation with indigenous Australians, that places economic prosperity ahead of justice, and imprisons refugees in contravention of international law, all of which are contrary to "Judeo-Christian values."

For those who think I am slandering Pastor Danny with this post, you need to know that I have already made all of these comments on his website.

Iron Man

2007-09-12T13:35:00.001+10:00
Forget the Spider-Man and X-Men franchises, the one to watch for is Marvel's next release - Iron Man. The use of Black Sabbath's classic "Iron Man" metal riff in the trailer, when the prototype grey suit makes its first appearance, is just perfect but hang in there for the final version of the suit. All my misgiving about the casting of Robert Downy Jr. as Tony Stark are laid to rest - he's perfect in the role. The relocation from Vietnam to Afghanistan is clever and gives the project a contemporary resonance where it would otherwise be a period piece. This movie will make you hate yourself for throwing away all of those old Iron Man comics. Check out the trailer here

The Jammed

2007-09-03T14:50:00.002+10:00
Last Wednesday night I attended a charity screening for Project Respect of The Jammed, an Australian film, written, produced and directed by Dee McLachlan, about the trafficking of girls for use in illegal prostitution. It's a confronting film that reveals the ugly side of Melbourne and is a reminder that it is often upper middle class people who benefit from this evil trade. It makes you wonder how many more boutiques and galleries run by chardonay sipping socialites are built on the back of such exploitation and cruelty. It is certainly a film that makes you feel ashamed to be a part of that 49% of the human population that exploits members of the other 51% with such heartlessness. You can visit the film's website here. I heard about this screening through the Stop the Traffic campaign, a movement to put an end to the buying and selling of people for profit. Project Respect is an advocay group that work to protect women in the sex industry from violence and exploitation. You can read The Age review of the film here. Unfortunately, due to a technicality the film is not eligible for an AFI award which is a real tragedy because it is certainly deserving. If you've seen the film, and you think it has value, I encourage you to vote for it in the IF awards instead.

What the...? of the Week

2007-08-31T17:02:00.001+10:00

Loose Lips Sink Ships

2007-08-30T12:35:00.001+10:00
There is a lot of loose speaking in our worship that doesn't help maintain a proper Trintarian emphasis. For example, there is a lot of what the old theologians used to call "confounding of the Persons." "Dear Father, we thank you Lord, that you died on the cross for us..." Now, of course, the Father did not die on the cross, but the Son. Sometimes you will hear a prayer like the following: "We thank you Father Lord that Lord Jesus you came Father God and helped us Lord to see, Jesus, that we are never alone Father..." and so on. As well as confounding the persons, this prayer borders on blasphemy because in using words like "Father" and "Lord" as a substitute for "um or "ah," as the person collects his or her thoughts, the speaker uses the Lord's name "in vain" (i.e. in an "empty" or mindless way). My advice here would be to slow down, speak more slowly, engage one's brain before one's mouth, and think about what is being said instead of prattling on a like a nervous nanny.

With only two exceptions, prayer in the New Testament is always offered TO the Father, IN THE NAME of Jesus, and THROUGH the Holy Spirit. (The exceptions are when Stephen is being stoned to death and he looks up to heaven, sees Jesus and prays, "Lord Jesus receive my spirit" and the prayer at the end of Revelation, "Even so, come Lord Jesus.") I am not aware of any prayer in the New Testament made directly to the Holy Spirit. This does NOT mean that prayer directly to Jesus or the Spirit is wrong, but that the general biblical pattern seems to be a Trinitarian one in which the Father is addressed on the basis of what Christ has done and with the
authority that lies behind his name, and (since we don't know how to pray as we ought) the Spirit helps us in our weakness by interceding within us, empowering and enabling our speech.

Of course God looks at the heart and I don't mean to say here that when Christians pray in a theologically loose way or in a way not quite "proper" or not fully Trinitarian that those prayers go unheeded or that God says, "Go directly to hell; do not pass Go; do not collect $200." (Monopoly players know what I'm talking about.) God is patient with us, of course, but congregational leaders have the responsibility of modelling best practice.

Sadly, many Christians are functional unitarians (there is one God and his name is "Jesus") or "binitarians" ("God and Jesus" with no Holy Spirit to be seen). Some people say Pentecostals focus too much on the Spirit in their worship but the way I see it the tendency among both Pentecostals and Evangelicals is the same, and that is, to be one of the two options I've just given.

The Gloria Patri doesn't get used among us much anymore and in a way that's a pity because it enshrined a Trinitarian doxology in every service. "Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit; as it was in the beginning, is now and shall be forever. Amen." Even without the use of the Gloria Patri we can still ensure a Trinitarian shape to our prayers - don't confound the Persons, never use "Father," "Jesus" or any other of God's names as a "filler," and frequently close with "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."

Trinitarian blessings (benedictions) also help as do Trintarian hymns and songs. However, Reginald Heber's "Holy,Holy, Holy" (as great as it is) is not the only Trinitarian hymn out there! I love the final verse of "Now thank We All Our God" - "All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given; The Son and Holy Ghost, supreme in highest Heaven; The one eternal God,whom earth and Heaven adore; For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore." This can be separated from the rest of the hymn as a stand alone Trinitarian doxology that could be sung, for example, as a response to the Psalm or other Bible reading. Don't be fooled into thinking that just because a song has "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" in the lyrics that it is Trinitarian because it ain't necessarily so. Some songs are quite theologically incoherent (that is, they don't "co-here"). For example, consider the chorus "How Great is Our God" which says "Father, Spirit, Son / the Godhead Three in One / the Lion and the Lamb." This seems all wrong to me. Firstly, the only reason to change the order of "Father, Son, and Spirit" is to make the rhyme work - "Son" has to rhyme with "One." The placement of these words is not just traditional but deeply theological in its ordering. The Father begets the Son, the Spirit proceeds from the Father (or from the Father and the Son if you accept the Nicene formula). Also the address to the Triune God (Father, Spirit, Son / the Godhead Three in One) suddenly shifts without warning and without reason to an address to the Son (the Lion and the Lamb) as if the same persons were still being addressed, which they are not because only the Son is "the Lion and the Lamb." Call me a liturgial fundamentalist if you like but I think the way we address God in worship is an important matter that deserves serious reflection.

By the way, you may wonder why I have chosen the images I have used here. I believe they reflect one of the most disturbing things about contemporary worship trends. Though two of the images here show very large groups of worshippers, each person seems wrapped in his or her own personal bubble of worship intimacy. The three young women in the third photo each have their eyes closed, communing with Jesus, their "personal" Saviour, each with her own microphone. In none of these photos is any one person present to any other person. They do not face each other, they do not engage. They are transcended beyond others to a private space shared only between God and themselves. If God is a Being whose very existence is a reciprocal, relational one, you would think our worship would reflect that reciprocity by being more communal than personal and ecstatic. You would think.

The Siege of Krishnapur

2007-08-27T16:53:00.000+10:00
My friend Paddy tells me that if a book doesn't get him interested within the first 50 pages or so he lays it aside and moves on to something else. Now Paddy is the most voracious reader I know so he has to do something to limit his intake. But if I had applied his recommended practice to a book he actually loaned me recently, namely J. G. Farrell's Booker Prize-winning The Siege of Krishnapur (1973), I would have missed out on something very special. Frankly the first part of the book just didn't capture me - the courting intrigues of a bunch of British gentlemen and prissy English ladies prancing around courting in British India in the 1840s wasn't exactly my cup of tea. The tension builds however as the inevitable uprising of the Sepoys and the consequent siege approaches and you begin to see that Farrell has gone into painstaking detail developing these self assured characters because he plans to pull the rug out from underneath them as their civilization comes crashing down around them and they are reduced to the most primitive of survival instincts. The humour in the midst of the horror serves to unmask the pretensions of the British class system and all its racist assumptions as they are played out in the colonial setting.

The novel has been meticulously researched to gain historical detail and accuracy, including consulting the diaries of the actual participants. Depending on Owen Chadwick's magisterial two volume work The Victorian Church cannot be faulted. Yet for all this Farrell's "padre" does seem to be a mere caricature. I'm sure there were such pathologically obsessed clergymen in the Victorian era but I doubt if they could be said to be typical. Since he serves as a metaphor for a bankrupt Christianity in the novel I assume he embodies everything about the faith that the author dismisses as puerile and ridiculous.

There is also a deep sadness and cynicism at the heart of the book, given shape and form in the person of The Collector. He begins the novel as a man with an overwhelming sense of the fitness of all things, and an (admittedly displaced) confidence in the rightness of the "civilising" project in India. He serves as the moral centre of the book as, after surviving an attack of cholera, throughout the darkest days of the siege he is a pillar of strength to the survivors and the only person whose head remains well and truly screwed on. Yet the horrors of the siege leave him something of a nihilist. Neither science nor technology nor religion nor British culture nor anything else could overcome the invincible stupidity of humanity. In the situation of violent death, desperate privation, and gradual starvation all that seemed previously to give the world meaning is stripped back to the most base of survival instincts. Human beings prove after all to be no more than a fortuitous course of atoms thrown out on a dung heap of rotting corpses for pariah dogs to scavenge. Since the Collector's portrait is the most sympathetic given in the book, one wonders whether the character doesn't embody the author's own viewpoint.

In some ways the book is typical of novels of the 1970s with its post-colonial empire bashing. It is hilariously funny and horrifically ghastly at one and the same time. Thanks Paddy for a great recommendation. The obsessive compulsive behaviour that drives me to finish every book I start even if it seems a chore stood me in good stead on this occasion.

Dylan in Melbourne

2007-08-20T16:59:00.000+10:00

I enjoyed my seventh Dylan concert on Sunday night. Tragic, I know. Dylan is known to play the occasional bad show but I can honestly say I've never been disappointed and Sunday was no exception. The Frames were a good support act, and obviously chuffed to be invited to tour with his Bobness. I can only describe them as a kind of Irish Wilco (who by the way I saw with the Boy Wonder at the Palais earlier this year but never got around to reviewing. Suffice to say it was a brilliant show). I thought it was very cool they way the Frames wove a Van Morrison lyric into one of their original songs. They played only four or five songs. We were here, after all, to hear Bob and no support act is ever asked to give an encore.

Bob took the stage in his usual black with a broad brimmed cowboy hat which he never took off looking for all the world like a gunfighter from a B grade western totin' a guitar instead of a gun. The band kicked into a ragged version of "Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat," a little out of tune and pretty loosey goosey. They seemed to take a few numbers to really tighten up, and were at their best on the new songs from Modern Times. When they were good they were very, very good, with moments of real rock 'n roll brilliance. Dylan played three numbers on guitar and then stood at the keyboard / Hammond organ thingy for "Just Like A Woman" and stayed there for the duration. This annoyed me at the Melbourne International Music Festival a few years back but this time it seemed right. After all, Bob started on piano in his high school band playing Bobby Vee and Buddy Holly covers, and plays piano on piano based songs sprinkled here and there over the whole body of his work. Anyway, even behind the keyboard he still has the rock 'n roll gunslinger moves.

I can undertand why some people, just don't "get" Dylan and leave one of his concerts scratching their heads or even feeling ripped off. If they don't know his body of work well, they are certainly not going to understand the words he growls, spits out, grunts, and distorts with his strange vocal gymnastics, even when his voice is WAY up at the top of the sound mix as it was last night. And then he has that strange way of leaving it to the very last part of the measure before throwing in all the lyrics all at once without a moment to spare. A teenager behind me during the demand for an encore called, out "Play a Bob Dylan song!" Apparently he hadn't recognised any of the songs in the set, even though it contained such Dylan standards as "Just Like a Woman," "Don't Think Twice It's Alright," and "Highway 61 Revisited." (For those who want the complete set list click here.) In a way this is a real tragedy because it means that people miss out on moments of genuine lyrical brilliance. In "Spirit on the Water," the frailty and elusiveness of love is expressed so well in the lines, "I'm pale as a ghost holding a blossom on a stem. You ever seen a ghost? No. But you have heard of them." Whether he's frowning on those who are "sucking the blood out of the genius of generosity" or bragging about himself having "sucked the milk out of a thousand cows," this is poetry not be missed.

I guess it is this familiarity with Dylan's work that gives fans at his concerts (no doubt the vast majority in attendance alongside of those in the minority who may simply be there to "check out the legend") a certain satisfaction in their esoteric knowledge. In "Spirit on the Water" when Bob sang, "Ya think I'm over the hill," the crowd yelled back, "Nooooo!". Then, "think I'm past my prime," and again, "Nooooo!" Finally, "Let me see what you got / we can have a whoppin' good time." Crowd: "Yeeaaahhh!!" Priceless. They knew those words were coming and they were ready for them.

The highlight for me was "I Believe in You" from his Gospel album Slow Train Coming, the last song at the end of the set before the encore, and sung with so much passion. It's the song of a loner who stands apart, or is ejected, from the crowd because of his personal faith in Jesus. He ended the song in an interesting way, repeating the opening lines of the verse, "they ask me how I feel and if my love is real"...and then it just ended abruptly, the final word being spat out with what sounded like venom and disgust. "How dare they ask if my love for God is 'real'!" I'm probably reading too much into it but I couldn't help but think of the Christians who need Dylan's faith to fit into a conventional mould they can approve.

Then there was a long, long wait before the two-song encore. At the end, a touching moment when the lights came back up and the band were all huddled in the centre free of their instruments, Bob at the front, as they received a standing ovation from the capacity crowd. Bob reciprocated with a single hand uprised in salute, then both arms upraised as he basked in the glow of adoration for a second or two then they turned and walked off, Bob 66 yrs. old, frail, skinny, and somehow vulnerable but a giant and a legend still.

Dylan fashion watch: Bob wore this hat at the Melbourne concert but with a black coat.

Here's a live TV performance of "Cry Awhile" from about 5 years back. This song wasn't performed at the concert but it still gives a bit of a taste of what Bob is like live.

Teenage Affluenza

2007-08-08T16:31:00.000+10:00
Ellen and Jasmine will be doing the 40 Hour Famine in a couple of weeks. Please watch this video and consider sponsoring them or another person you know who is participating, or even doing it yourself.

And The Winner Is...

2007-08-06T21:17:00.000+10:00
Well, the results are in and the winner of The Great Batman Cover Artist Competition and worthy reciepent of Action Comics Annual #10 is...
anniemareerose with the following scintillating entry that hovers on the brink of decision several times and then finally arrives at Detective Comics #355 (Sept 1966) by Carmine Infantino and Mike Giella. Those stingy tightwads at Marvel send out No Prizes but we send the real thing and it's winging it's way to our winner as I speak. Here is Annie's winning entry. To see the cover images she discusses click here.

"I must agree with Ross, both the Wagner covers do great representations of batman, the monster men (06) cover, batman atop the building/roof etc, wing like cape cropped so the ends are just cut out, perfect, particularly the way it folds over...

The 2nd wagner in the post, the colors are brilliant, they meld perfectly, the gold in the buildings and the belt, just a few colors, but striking nonetheless, excellent use of color. its tough to choose between this and the other standout red and black cover done by Kubert, however his portrayal is too sinister for my liking, I prefer him composed, with the air of being able to snap into those 'sinister' moments but this wagner has him staunch, so stoic - great, great framing...

however, a strange one, initially dismissed, however, over the last few days, it has lingered in my mind, this time i differ with ross, lets look at the 1966 cover (#355 [pictured left] Now the graphics aren't particularly detailed, as in, demanding attention, they are a bit 'thin' even, yet, theres something special about the manner in which batman dangles there, hes almost 'faking', as if at the crucial moment he will surprise us all and give the hooded hangman all his worth, there's life in his eyes, i like it. I think thats my no.1 tough with the wagner 2 and the 07 cover, but something, just wins me over.

annie's top 4.

#1 (355)
#2 (627)
#3 (665)
#4 (825)"

So there it is , the much maligned (by the readers of this blog anyway) Silver Age work of Infantino and Giella is deemed the best depiction of the Caped Crusader on display here. Old school wins the day.

The Difference Between Melbourne and Sydney

2007-08-01T17:11:00.000+10:00
For those people who read my last post and wondered if there really were that many differences between Melbourne and Sydney you need to look at the "most viewed articles" comparison between the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald (with thanks to James Garth from whose blog I stole the image):

By the way I'm a Sydney person born and bred myself, but happy to be a Melbourne person by dint of my vocation.

A Swearing Apostle and a Swearing Priest

2007-08-01T16:13:00.000+10:00

In Mark 14:66-72 a precocious servant girl gives an apostle some lip and he doesn’t respond very well at all. In fact, Peter denies any association at all with Jesus. Poor old Peter is standing by the fire trying to warm himself and all of a sudden he’s being attacked on all sides by complete strangers, the whole thing being egged on by a snotty little servant girl who should have known and kept her place. Didn’t she know that children were to be seen and not heard? She’s a slave for goodness sake, and a girl as well! Who does she think she is anyway? She calls him, “one of them,” and says he was “with the Nazarene.” People standing around picked up the idea and joined in the fun, throwing a kind of racial slur in as well. “You are one of them, for you are a Galilean.”

Ever been called “one of them”? Galileans were considered hicks, out of town yokels. Over in the U.S., if you live in the state of Virginia the people in West Virginia are hillbillies, but if you live in West Virginia it’s the other way around. We tend to think of Tasmanians as a bit backward but since I went there last week I’ve had to change my estimate of them. They’re really quit nice. In fact an antique dealer asked me if I was from the “north island” meaning the mainland. Perhaps in his mind it was we mainlanders who were a little backward. Don’t get me started on the differences between Queenslanders and Victorians or Sydney people and Melbourne people. Dame Edna recounts how when as a child she sucked the milk shake through the bottom of the straw it made a gurgling sound and her mother said, “Don’t do that dear. Sydney people do that.”

Here Peter has his association with Jesus thrown in his face and three times he denies the connection. First he says, “I don't know or understand what you're talking about.” The second time we don’t know his exact words only that when the girl said, “this fellow is one of them” he denied it. His third denial was very explicit, “I don't know this man you're talking about.”

And then comes verse 72, which must be one of the most dramatic moments in all of biblical history, perhaps in all history. When the rooster crowed the words of Jesus suddenly came back to Peter. “Before the rooster crows twice you will disown me three times.” And he broke down and wept.

Peter began to "call down curses” and “swore to them” that he didn’t know Jesus. I couldn’t help thinking of Father Geoff Baron, Dean of St. Patrick’s Cathedral who was stood down from his position this week after swearing at skateboarders and issuing racial slurs at them as they were hoolaginising around the cathedral precincts.

Here is an excerpt from the coverage in The Age yesterday:

Dean Baron said he had “snapped” and regretted it. “The shame that I feel and the embarrassment, I can't really describe,” he told Southern Cross Broadcasting. “It was outrageous behaviour, I let myself down terribly badly, that's quite clear and I've also brought scandal and shock to other people.” He said he had been provoked when the teenagers, who were skating on the cathedral steps, called him a paedophile. “I can't excuse it, I wouldn't even try to; I don't know why I said those things. “It might be linked up in some way that so many priests are considered to be paedophiles and here I was being called one.” However, Dean Baron said he would not apologise to the teenagers he abused. “I have the impression that that particular gang of skateboarders, they take a particular delight and joy in reducing people to grovelling measures as I was, that's their goal, that's their aim. “So I don't think I owe them an apology as such, I apologise to all who were scandalised by my behaviour.”
[Reko Rennie, “Swearing Priest Suspended,” The Age (July 31st 2007), 3.14pm.]

There is more than a little of Peter’s betrayal in the Dean’s actions, but also more than a little of Peter’s sorrow and repentance. If this were the end of the story it would truly be tragedy on the level of Judas’ betrayal. Who knows what pits of despair Peter would have spiralled into? But, as we know, this wasn’t the end of the story. After he rose from the dead, Jesus met Peter on the beach for breakfast and gave him three opportunities to affirm his love for him. “Peter do you love me?” “Yes, Lord, you know I love you.” Three times this exchange took place and in this trinity of absolutions the whole sorry mess was washed away.

This is how it is. The tragedy of our denial of God through our sin is met by the generosity of God’s affirmation of us, through the generosity of God’s forgiveness. That is true for Peter, for Father Baron, for the skateboarders who mocked him and called him a paedophile, for those who laughed at the “silly old priest” on You Tube, and for you, and for me.

Calvinist Romance

2007-07-17T14:50:00.002+10:00

Baby Got Book

2007-07-13T16:29:00.001+10:00

Protestant Icon 2

2007-07-13T15:05:00.002+10:00
Here is my second Protestant icon - this one a kind of ascension portrait -"The Apotheosis of John Wesley " from the Methodist collection of the John Rylands Library at the University of Manchester. "Blessed in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints."

Protestant Icon 1

2007-07-13T10:18:00.000+10:00
Orthodox and Catholic Christians have plenty of icons both metaphorical and actual. We Protestants tend to settle on metaphoric icons only. If we were to write icons who might we include? This is "Martin Luther King of Georgia" by Br. Robert Lentz, OFM, ©1984. The text reads "How long shall justice be crucified and truth buried?" Tell me who you think deserves to be an icon.

While Bashir Lies Darfur Dies

2007-07-11T09:03:00.000+10:00