21st Century Pilgrim

C. S. Lewis = TACT

2009-10-01T10:27:00.006+03:00

I'm planning to relaunch the weekly

C. S. Lewis breakfast reading club
(also known as TACT)

in November as I move to Tehtaankatu. For more information, drop me a note. New members are welcomed too.

Facebook Killed Blogging

2009-09-27T12:13:00.005+03:00

Lately I've been wondering why I have so little motivation for blogging anymore. I came to the conclusion that Facebook is to "blame". Why? Because it has been an efficient way of keeping in touch with people and being up-to-date with what's happening with who. I will have to do some soul-searching and decide which course to take. If I keep my 21st Century Pilgrim blog, I'm pretty sure I need to invest more time and effort: increase both the pace and the level of quality of posts.

Brainstorming in Jyväskylä

2009-09-20T21:05:00.008+03:00

I just returned from a weekend spent in Jyväskylä, central Finland. It had been years since I last visited that beautiful city. My friend Jussi and I hopped on the Helsinki-Jyväskylä train on Friday and returned a few hours ago.

[Photo of me and Jussi taken by Jani Salokangas.]

Our mutual friend, Jani, who lives in Jyväskylä turned out to be the best of hosts. We ate well, listened to excellent music, took refreshing walks, and - the main purpose of our visit - held several brainstorming sessions together (a creative joint project). Jani lived in Tanzania for two years with his family: that's where we first met. Jani's wife, Laura, spent the weekend at her parents' place with their little girl, Noela, and let us guys take over the house.

Gone Hunting

2009-09-10T12:21:00.001+03:00

Gone hunting. Be back Sunday night. Friends, nature, game, and Internet detox.

Hyvejohtajuus Published

2009-09-08T11:04:00.007+03:00

Alexandre Havard's Virtuous Leadership (New York: Scepter Publishers 2007) was finally published in Finnish as Hyvejohtajuus (Providentia 2009).

The book publishing event took place at the legendary and elegant Cafe Aalto, downtown Helsinki. Approximately 100 people followed the panel discussion. Among the panelists were Alexandre Havard himself, who flew in from Moscow, the Finnish MEPs Timo Soini and Sari Essayah (from Brussels), and Providentia's economist Oskari Juurikkala. Jan Ahonen, as the interviewer and host, did an excellent job.

The topic of the discussion -- virtues, leadership, and their interplay in the modern society -- is very serious. Yet the panelists were able to discuss it in a very encouraging and positive way: not unfrequently were there roars of laughter. The host read exerts (is that the word I'm looking for?) from the book and asked a follow-up question, often a very pointed one, say, about the differences of men and women in leadership.

The panelists (from left to right): Oskari Juurikkala, Jan Ahonen, Timo Soini, Alexandre Havard, and Sari Essayah.

The contents pages and the introduction can be read online here. It can be ordered here. For those who pre-order the book, the price is 29,00 € (norm. 39,00 €), this includes delivery in Finland. I saw some people who ordered five copies. I wonder what they'll do with them?

Overheard in the Sauna, part 2

2009-09-07T09:00:00.002+03:00

I, my father, and our Teemu (9) had a sauna the day before yesterday. Our conversations ranged from hunting to birthdays.

My father: Teemu, do you know how old Vaari [my dad's father] would be today if he was still alive?

Teemu: No. How old would he be?

My father: 89. Who is going to bake a cake for him in heaven?

Teemu: God of course [Jumala tietenkin].

Overheard in the Sauna, part 1

2009-09-06T09:00:00.002+03:00

I, my father, and our Teemu (9) had a sauna yesterday. Our discussions ranged from hunting to birthdays.

Teemu [to Jason]: Who is older, you or Danny?

Jason: I am. One year older. Danny is 28.

My dad: Not yet, he'll turn 28 in November.

Jason: So Teemu, how old am I then?

Teemu: 29.

Jason: Very good.

My father: How old is Cathy?

Teemu: 26. And Simon is 30.

Jason: Good Teemu!

My father: How old is Mami [Lori, my mom]?

Teemu: Uhm... 80?

Hardware Score

2009-09-05T16:55:00.006+03:00

Cathy and Simon were at K-rauta, the hardware store, today.

They stroll around the busy store with their two children. Joshua (3) is running around and Kayleigh (0.3) is doing her thing. Cathy and Simon see lots of stuff for sale: tools, car parts, kitchen supplies, bathroom artefacts, like toilets.

One toilet in particular catches their eyes.

Joshua is peeing into it.

Overheard in Soukka

2009-09-02T21:47:00.012+03:00

My dad drove his grandson Benjamin to Soukka, where Benjy's second set of grandparents live. While they were waiting for the door to be opened, an elderly neighbor-lady took notice and started a conversation.

Neighbor-lady: How old are you?

Benjy: *Shily raises three fingers*

Neighbor-lady: And what is your name?

Benjy: Ben-ja-min.

Neighbor-lady: A great name! Benjamin, you must be bilingual. Do you speak Swedish as well as Finnish?

Benjy: Yes. And English, Swahili and Kenyan too. [Joo... ja myös englantia, swahilia ja keniaa.]

Hyvejohtajuuskirja.fi

2009-09-01T12:01:00.010+03:00

Sorry I'm boring, the Virtuous Leadership posts keep on coming. I promise to write something non-leadershipy after the book publication event is over.

Anyway, here's an excellent link with all the relevant information. You can also use the link to advertize the event that takes place at the legendary Cafe Aalto downtown Helsinki.

Exciting news: The book will also be published as a free ebook chapter by chapter during the following 12 months. So students etc. with a low budjet: keep track of the updates. Even an audio book has been planned (podcast).

Hyvejohtajuus: Alexandre Havard (Providentia/Otava 2009)

2009-08-26T15:36:00.022+03:00

The book I translated is finally being published. The publishing event is on September 7th (Monday) at 2.00pm downtown Helsinki at Cafe Aalto, the cafeteria designed by Alvar Aalto.

For those of you who understand Finnish, below is the relevant information that I copy-pasted from the invite.

Among the panelists are Mr. Alexandre Havard himself (flying in from Moscow), the Finnish MEPs Mr. Timo Soini and Mrs. Sari Essayah (flying in from Brussels) and representing Providentia is the economist Mr. Oskari Juurikkala.

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

KIRJANJULKISTAMISTILAISUUS

Alexandre Havardin Virtuous Leadership (New York: Scepter Publishers 2007) julkaistaan 9. käännöksenä suomeksi Hyvejohtajuus viikolla 37. Sitä ennen pidetään kirjan tiimoilta paneelikeskustelu.

Julkaisia: Providentia
Painotalo: Otava
Design ja taitto: Nordenswan & Siirilä
Suomentaja: Jason Lepojärvi
Myyntiin: viikolla 37

Tervetuloa aistillisen eleganttiin, Alvar Aallon sisustamaan Cafe Aaltoon kirjanjulkistamistilaisuuteen maanantaina 7. syyskuuta klo 14--15.30.

PANEELIKESKUSTELU

Mukana: johtajuuskirjoittaja Alexandre Havard, europarlamentaarikot Timo Soini (PS) ja Sari Essayah (KD) sekä taloustieteilijä Oskari Juurikkala (Providentia). Tilaisuuden juontaa toimittaja Jan Ahonen.

Teemana on johtajuus, hyveet ja niiden yhteispeli nykymaailmassa -- ts. "hyvejohtajuus". Aihe on äärimmäisen ajankohtainen myös Suomessa (vaalirahasotku, talouspetokset).

Yleisöllä ja lehdistöllä mahdollisuus esittää kysymyksiä. Tilaisuuden kieli on suomi.

ALEXANDRE HAVARD

Alexandre Havard (s. 1962, Pariisi) on johtajuuskouluttaja ja Havard Virtuous Leadership Instituten (HVLI) perustaja. Hänen kehittämänsä hyveisiin perustuva hyvejohtajuusmalli soveltaa klassista näkemystä ihmispersoonasta nykyajan organisaatioiden tarpeisiin.

Havard itse luennoi englanniksi, ranskaksi, espanjaksi, venäjäksi -- ja Suomessa asuneena jopa suomeksi.

KIRJASTA POIMITTUA

"Talousskandaaleja seuraa poikkeuksetta vaatimuksia valtiollisen sääntelyn vahvistamisesta, kaupan hallinnon reformista ja eettisten sääntöjen uudistamisesta. Näillä kaikilla on hyötynsä, mutta ne unohtavat jotain olennaista. Talouspetosten kyhäilijät ja muut lainrikkojat tietävät varsin hyvin, että se, mitä he tekevät, on väärin. Kyse on luonteenviasta." (JOHDANTO s. ix.)

TAKAKANNESTA

"Johtajuus on ensisijaisesti luonteen asia -- ei sen, mitä ihminen tietää tai osaa, vaan mitä hän on. Ihmisen luonnetta voidaan vahvistaa, sillä se on vapaan tahdon aluetta, toisin kuin temperamentti, joka on pitkälti jotakin synnynnäistä. Luonteen ytimessä ovat hyveet, toisin sanoen hyvät luonteenpiirteet, jotka näkyvät teoissa.

Hyvejohtajuus tarjoaa hyveissä kasvamisen metodologian jokaiselle. Johtajuus ei ole varattu vain jollekin eliitille, vaan se on monien kutsumus. Kirja sisältää esimerkkejä hyveiden ja johtajuuden yhteispelistä yhteiskunnan joka alalta: liike-elämästä, politiikasta, journalismista, koulutusalalta, uskonnosta, lääketieteestä ja myös vanhemmuudesta. Suomessakin asunut Havard mainitsee mm. saunan, Mannerheimin ja Helsingin Sinebrychoffin puiston."

KIRJASTA SANOTTUA

"Pidin kirjaa äärimmäisen kiehtovana, sillä se meni suoraan asian ytimeen: meidän tulee perustaa päätöksemme todellisuudelle, ja se taas vaatii todellisen käsityksen ihmispersoonasta."
--Francois Michelin, CEO emeritus, Group Michelin

LINKIT

Johtamisblogi hyvejohtajuus.fi.
Hyvejohtajuus Facebookissa.

Sleeping Guards

2009-08-15T17:52:00.012+03:00

(This is a Virtuous Leadership article originally published in Finnish here.)

A story about sleeping guards reveals a fundamental problem in society. What’s to be done when control and security measures fail? Character is making a comeback.

A friend of mine who works for the Finnish Embassy in Tanzania built a real sauna in his backyard with a view of the Indian Ocean. One morning he found footprints, dark boot-size stains, on the wall at the end of the long sauna bench. He figured that the night guards had been sleeping in the sauna, so he decided to inspect the following night.

He was right: he found not only a guard in the sauna, but two guards in fact. But he recognized neither of them. Why was this? It turned out that the men were the security firm’s internal inspectors whose job was to visit locations to make sure the guards were present – and preferably awake too. In other words, the guards whose obligation was to make sure the night guards weren’t sleeping, were themselves sound asleep in a Finnish Embassy sauna.

The morale of the story is quite significant. It reveals a certain societal problem that pertains to families, schools, jobs, entire states – and not only in Africa, but also in Western countries.

Control mechanisms fail

The guards are sleeping, and the guards guarding the guards are sleeping. What can one do in this situation? Send more guards patrols to inspect the guards guarding the guards? And what about when these, too, find a comfortable sleeping place, say, the Swedish Embassy sauna? Send another higher patrol to inspect the inspectors of the guards guarding the guards? Clearly this would be an absurd, ineffective waste of resources. Sooner or later we reach a limit.

What should we conclude from this? That security and control mechanisms and procedures are all a waste of time? Certainly not. But alone they do not suffice. There must be another way.

We must understand that the root of many problems in society is not a technical one, something that can be fixed or cured “technically”. The root is, in many cases, fundamentally a moral one. If leaders and people in charge are not people of good character, no level of security and control measures suffice. Everything can be bypassed. There will always be an “inspector” of some sort who will decide to go to sleep – or look elsewhere as others are sleeping.

Alexandre Havard explains: “The business scandals of our time invariably give rise to calls for increased government oversight, reform of corporate government, and revision of codes of ethical conduct. These things may have their place, but they miss the essential point. The perpetrators of corporate wrongdoing invariably know that what they are doing is wrong. And yet they do it anyway. This is a failure of character.” (Virtuous Leadership, New York: Scepter, 2007, p. xiv.)

Competing anthropologies

If we neglect our inbuilt pull towards evil – towards “sleeping” – we will try to fix our societal problems and dysfunctional human behaviour by social engineering and various control mechanisms. We forget a fact humanity has always known to be true: evil is intrinsic to human nature – as is goodness.

T. S. Eliot said that some people “dream of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good” (The Rock, New York: Harcourt Brace, 1934).

Nicholas Capaldi is right: a most alarming problem of modern Western societies is the widespread presence of the “failed or incomplete individual”. He writes:

“What really inhibits these people is a character defect, a moral inadequacy… What they end up with are leaders who are their mirror image: leaders who are themselves incomplete individuals and who seek to control others because they cannot control themselves.” (Decadence: The Passing of Personal Virtues and its Replacement by Political and Psychological Slogans, London: Social Affairs Unit 2005, p. 145.)

Back to character

Havard explains that these kind of societies and people replace virtues with political slogans and psychobabble:

“Tolerance, understood as moral relativism, replaces the virtue of justice, statistics and probability theory replace prudence, avoidance of nicotine and trans fats and other dietary fads replaces self-control, self-esteem replaces magnanimity, self-criticism replaces humility – and democracy replaces God” (Virtuous Leadership, p. 51).

The result is a pervasive boredom – to quote George Weigel, “not simply boredom of the day-in, day-out, quotidian sort but boredom on a transcendent, even metaphysical plane: a kind of boredom with the mystery of life itself”. A boredom that, in D. B. Hart’s words, “renders the imagination inert and desire torpid” (Virtuous Leadership, p. 51).

The homes, schools, companies and states that focus and invest in character building (without forgetting control mechanisms) exercise prudence and are the major players of the future. They have understood the reality of things and made decisions accordingly. Others still live and function in an illusion, and over and over again, will be surprised to find failing mechanisms and sleeping guards.

Finnish Police in Vancouver

2009-08-09T08:00:00.001+03:00

This was an interesting. The Vancouver Sun reported an incident involving Finland's police hockey team. The headline was: "Fight to the Finnish: Finland's police hockey team halts assault on Vancouver bus driver."

You can read the entire article here. Apparently the Finnish policemen, visiting Vancouver for a police hockey tournament, witnessed a busdriver being mugged. They run after the villain and pinned him to the ground. Vancouver Sun comments: "Surrounded by what looked like odd assortment of fair-complexioned, blue-eyed Canadians, the man was shocked."

"He was very surprised," said Det. Sgt. Antti Karhola. "He had no chance. We felt pretty good about that."

I'm sure they did feel good, considering that they had just been eliminated from the tournament in the first round. But mark my words: this will not happen to the Finnish National Team in the Vancouver Winter Olympics in 2010.

Office Space

2009-08-07T14:58:00.004+03:00

Great news. I got some office space from the Department of Theology that is in the heart of downtown Helsinki, on Aleksanterinkatu 7. The Faculty of Systematic Theology, my faculty, is on the 6th floor. I'm very happy about this, for it gives me an opportunity to study in a very productive and supportive atmosphere. In addition to fulltime research I will be teaching philosophy and ethics for a small group of first-year students. This will keep me pedagogically active, so I don't totally neglect my teaching vocation.

R.I.P. Näppä Pilvi

2009-07-24T13:18:00.005+03:00

We found a bird at our summer cabin, a tiny swallow (or marlet?), that had injured one if its wings. A healthy swallow is one of the fastest flying birds in Finland. We found it just as it was going to drown--it was slipping down a slope into the lake. At first it would jump out of your hands and spiral down to the inevitable crash. But soon it calmed down and began to enjoy our company. It would actually hop into my palm or sit on my shoulder.

Teemu and the girls took over and showed it much love. They even called animal rescue but could find no-one who would take it in. The little bird only lived for two days. Teemu was very sorry, the sobs were deep. But Julia found a little wooden cross (branch) and together with her friend Sini they built a grave with pretty flowers around it. The tomb was encircled with hay and straw, an obvious symbol, I think, for its heavenly nest. Näppä Pilvi--christened posthumously by Teemu--died July 23rd.

On Holidays

2009-07-16T16:26:00.003+03:00

There hasn't been a blog post for a couple days and neither will there be for the next couple of days. Over the next week I'll be on semi-holiday: Helsinki -- Nurmijärvi (2 days) -- Kerimäki (3 days) -- Tampere (3 days) -- Helsinki. On Friday the 24th of July my brother and his family are coming to Finland for 5 weeks.

Monkey Thieves

2009-07-05T18:31:00.010+03:00

We drove through the Serengeti National Park on our journey to Lake Victoria. We make a quick stop at the exit gates. Danny goes to show the documents to the park officials. He buys us drinks and chocolate bars, and we decide to sit down for a while before continuing on. A family of vervet monkeys seem to be interested in our car.

Tanzanian car inspection (=stealing our oil filter).

"Wait, I think he saw us..."

"False alarm. I'll move on the the bolts, you take the side mirror."

"I look goood."

We were enjoying this "car inspection". The monkeys were cute. But cuteness was part of their devious plan. For soon I hear Danny behind me shouting something, "Shooo!". I turn around and he says, "They took your snickers bar!" Apparently their cousins had been lurking behind as all along, just waiting for an opening. If Danny hadn't reacted quickly, I'm sure the little rascal would have my coke bottle in his other hand.

City Magazine: Ask a Catholic

2009-06-27T17:41:00.024+03:00

"City" is a Finnish metropolitan lifestyle magazine. Or that's the general image. In truth it's one over-extended restaurant and club advertisement with sporadic sex-related articles to lure in readers. ;-)

Anyway, recently they surprised their anti-religious readership by publishing an article "Ask a Catholic". Readers sent in questions, all were difficult ones and some a bit sarcastic, and Emil Anton, a young Catholic apologist, answered them.

Emil is actually a close friends of mine. His apologetics blog Hyviä uutisia (Good news) has hundreds of hits daily. This is quite impressive considering the articles are only in Finnish (although Emil himself speaks 20 languages, really, he's a polyglot-freak). Emil just published his first theological book, A Catholic Paul (KATT 2009).

City's article confirms my conception of him: Emil is not afraid of critical questions, even hostile ones. Here are some questions that he answers in the article:

Who gets into heaven? Do Catholics argue about it as we do in the Lutheran church?
Woman, 29

What does the "Devil's advocate" do and how can I become one? Is my gender an obstacle?
Devil's advocate(ss), 19

Why is it that we constantly hear of new paedophilia crimes committed by Catholic priests?
Gay sex legal, paedophilia a crime, 24

Every now and again one hears of Catholic priests who have started a family. How many percent of priests break their vow of celibacy?
Priests are hot, 25

How do Roman Catholics in Finland feel about Papal power? Isn't replacing God by one supposedly infallible person against both reason and the Scriptures?
Paptiti, 28

Considering the obtuse ban against contraception, why don't we see huge Catholic families ... with 16 children or so? How many children do Catholics in Finland have?
Woman, 34

According to the Catholic Church's teaching of the Eucharist, the bread and wine become Jesus' REAL body and blood. Not symbolically, that is. Do you really believe you are swallowing blood and human flesh? Wouldn't it be enough to look at it as a symbolic act of rememberence?
Gross, 24

The Catholic Church does not allow/recommend divorce in any circumstances. This can be fatal. What should you do if you spouse drinks and abuses you and it's obvious that he will not change his habits?
Glad I left, 33

What are the relations between Catholics and Jews? Are you ashamed of the Pope's actions in World War II, or was he infallible then too?
Woman, 32

I couldn't stop laughing after reading his answer to the Eucharist question. The comments are worth reading too. Although I wonder whether the most vocal atheist is actually a Christian just pretending to be an obnoxious atheist so as to downplay and embarrass the case of atheism. In case you missed the link above, the article is here.

Summer Courses for Men

2009-06-27T12:49:00.004+03:00

NOTE: DUE TO THE COMPLEXITY AND DIFFICULTY LEVEL
OF THEIR CONTENTS, CLASS SIZES WILL BE LIMITED TO 8 PARTICIPANTS MAXIMUM

Class 1
How To Fill Up The Ice Cube Trays--Step by Step.
Slide Presentation.
Meets 4 weeks, Monday and Wednesday for 2 hours beginning at 7:00 PM.

Class 2
The Toilet Paper Roll--Does It Change Itself?
Round Table Discussion.
Meets 2 weeks, Saturday 12:00 for 2 hours.

Class 3
Is It Possible To Urinate Using The Technique Of Lifting The Seat and Avoiding The Floor, Walls and Nearby Bathtub?
Group Practice.
Meets 4 weeks, Saturday 10:00 PM for 2 hours.

Class 4
Fundamental Differences Between The Laundry Hamper and The Floor.
Pictures and Explanatory Graphics.
Meets Saturdays at 2:00 PM for 3 weeks.

Class 5
Dinner Dishes--Can They Levitate and Fly Into The Kitchen Sink?
Examples on Video.
Meets 4 weeks, Tuesday and Thursday for 2 hours beginning At 7:00 PM

Class 6
Loss Of Identity--Losing The Remote To Your Significant Other.
Help Line Support and Support Groups.
Meets 4 Weeks, Friday and Sunday 7:00 PM

Class 7
Learning How To Find Things--Starting With Looking In The Right Places And Not Turning The House Upside Down While Screaming.
Open Forum.
Monday at 8:00 PM, 2 hours.

Class 8
Health Watch--Bringing Her Flowers Is Not Harmful To Your Health.
Graphics and Audio Tapes.
Three nights; Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 7:00 PM for 2 hours.

Class 9
Real Men Ask For Directions When Lost.
Real Life Testimonials.
Tuesdays at 6:00 PM, location to be determined.

Class 10
Is It Genetically Impossible To Sit Quietly While She Parallel Parks?
Driving Simulations.
4 weeks, Saturday's noon, 2 hours.

Class 11
Learning to Live--Basic Differences Between Mother and Wife.
On line Classes and role-playing.
Tuesdays at 7:00 PM, location to be determined.

Class 12
How to be the Ideal Shopping Companion.
Relaxation Exercises, Meditation and Breathing Techniques.
Meets 4 weeks, Tuesday and Thursday for 2 hours beginning at 7:00 PM.

Class 13
How to Fight Cerebral Atrophy--Remembering Birthdays, Anniversaries and Other Important Dates and Calling When You're Going To Be Late.
Cerebral Shock Therapy Sessions and Full Lobotomies Offered.
Three nights; Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 7:00 PM for 2 hours.

Class 14
The Stove/Oven--What It Is and How It Is Used.
Live Demonstration.
Tuesdays at 6:00 PM, location to be determined.

Virtuous Leadership Blog

2009-06-19T00:00:00.000+03:00

Our Virtuous Leadership Blog www.hyvejohtajuus.fi (in Finnish) got a new layout. Go check it out! We publish virtue and leadership related articles weekly; links to thought-provoking leadership articles weekly; a Guestbook Article monthly; and news from time to time.

The next big thing will be the Finnish translation of Virtuous Leadership called Hyvejohtajuus (Providentia Leadership and Otava kirjapaino 2009), which will come out later this summer. Will keep you posted.

Mad Mustang Driver

2009-06-17T17:06:00.006+03:00

The other day I got the opportunity to test drive the new Ford Mustang GT coupe. I believe it is the only one in Finland at the moment. My friend Simon won the car (for a test drive, that is) and asked me to join him. Although the "prize" smacked a little of a direct marketing plot (for a fast-cars car rental shop), driving the thing was much fun. I just may have exceeded the speed limit, for a second... Below is a picture of the car. The one we drove was pitch black. I still think that the Audi A5 is the most beautiful sports car out there. It doesn't look fragile like most sports cars do, and it is suprisingly spacious inside.

True-to-being Memory

2009-06-08T08:00:00.000+03:00

(This is a Virtuous Leadership article originally published in Finnish here.)

A leader has a good memory. By memory (Lat. memoria) I mean much more than just our natural ability of recollection. Neither am I referring to some “mnemo-technical” capacity not to forget.

A good memory means above all “truthful” memory. Josef Pieper calls it “true-to-being” memory.

This means that we remember real events and real things as they were and are, truly, not as we would like them to be. Whereas a truthful person speaks the truth, truthful memory remembers the truth.

An obvious truism?

Does this sound obvious to you? Let’s think about it.

A young boy whose tendency to exaggerate, by the time he’s an adult, has got out of control… A young couple who never seem to agree over the details of past arguments… A leader whose autobiographical memoir is a petrified epitome of self-admiration…

Truthful memory is not a truism!

At the heart of wisdom

According to Thomas Aquinas truthful memory is the first prerequisite of prudence. It is the cornerstone of wisdom. It is easy to see why this is so.

Prudence, the virtue of the decision maker, springs from the ability to grasp reality. Prudence seeks to base all action and decisions securely on reality. Reality is the objective world – the real things, events and experiences – in which we live.

But the truth about these things, events and experiences, the truth about the world, is “contained” in the truthful memory.

The pitfalls of “bad” memory

This is actually an important observation. For if truthful memory is the cornerstone of prudence, untruthful misconstruing memory is the stumbling block of prudence.

Josef Pieper writes: “Nowhere else is the danger so great as here, at the deepest root of the spiritual-ethical process, the danger that the truth of real things will be falsified by the assent or negation of the will.”

He continues:

“The peril is the greater for its beings so imperceptible. There is no more insidious way for error to establish itself than by this falsification of the memory through slight retouches, displacements, discolorations, omissions, shifts of accent. Nor can such falsifications be quickly detected by the probing conscience, even when it applies itself to this task.” (Prudence, ch. 2.)

How to train our memory?

Before I introduce a few practical guidelines it is important to remember that, if the fault lay in the foundation, mere white-washing the walls will not suffice.

Again Pieper: “The honesty of the memory can be ensured only by the rectitude of the whole human being which purifies the most hidden roots of volition. Here it becomes apparent how greatly prudence, upon which all virtue depends, is in its turn dependent at its very fundaments on the totality of the other virtues.” (Prudence, ch. 2.)

Alexandre Havard writes: “At the heart of the virtue of prudence is the relationship of a leader’s character to his ability to grasp reality. In other words, the relationship between being and perception, between what we are and what we see.” (Virtuous Leadership, p. 68.)

“The good man judges each class of things rightly, and in each the truth appears to him” says Aristotle (Nichomachean Ethics, III, 4).

Havard elaborates: “The proud man, on the contrary, judges as true whatever flatters his pride; the intemperate man, whatever may grant him power, money, or pleasure; the small-minded man, whatever justifies his cowardice or laziness.” (Virtuous Leadership, p. 68.)

Read Aristotle’s quote and Havard’s comment again but replace the word “judges” with remembers.

We see, interpret and remember things through the lenses of our character. By strengthening our character, in other words by strengthening our virtues, we develop our memory purified by truth.

Practical advice

Because memory is at the heart of prudence, much what applies to the training of prudence in general applies to the training of memory as well. Steps (1) and (2) are from the Virtuous Leadership article “Prudence”.

1. Avoid rationalizations at all costs.

To rationalize is to twist objective data, consciously or unconsciously, to make them fit our pre-conceived notions. Rationalization is a psychological process that distorts reality until it accords with our passions and interests.

2. Recognize and put aside your prejudices.

Rationalization has roots in cowardice. Prejudice stems from ignorance.

Overcoming prejudices requires the training of the virtue of humility, that can be called “the habit of living in the truth”.

Stephen Covey explains: “One of the characteristics of authentic leaders is their humility, evident in their ability to take off their glasses and examine the lens objectively… Where there are discrepancies (prejudice, ignorance, or error), they make adjustments to realign with greater wisdom.” (Principle-Centered Leadership, p. 20.)

3. Practice objective testing.

Heidi Robert’s Virtuous Leadership Guest-article “A Pound of Prudence” includes to practical advice which support the practice of truthful memory as well.

Roberts writes about emotionally charged signals.

“Emotional signals have the tendency of disfiguring the interpretation, making it selective and adjusting emphases in accordance of the receiver’s preferences… One can practice objectivity by, for example, trying to remember the details of a certain event, such as a conversation, without emphasizing the emotional response.”

Much depends on our ability to “adjust our emotions so as not to allow a single emotionally charged message to wholly usurp our thoughts”. Or our memory, for that matter.

Confessions of leaders

Earlier I mentioned the sugar-coated autobiographies. To counterbalance their influence I can wholeheartedly recommend an autobiographical classic that was published recently, about 1600 years ago.

Reading it will confirm in your mind the truth of the platitude “There’s nothing new under the sun”. I’m talking, of course, about St. Augusine’s Confessions.

As the title implies, the confessions are far from being sugar-coated. It is the exemplar of the development of truthful memory. The reader is in for a full treat.

Further reading:
St. Augustine, Confessions.
Heidi Roberts, “A Pound of Prudence” (in Finnish 2009).

Ngorongoro Camo Zebras

2009-06-07T08:00:00.000+03:00

This zebra is preparing to jump. We have completely stopped the car to enjoy the episode. There are several other zebras behind this one waiting for their turn.

The zebra, unlike most animals, cannot trust its hide coloring for protection against the probing eyes of the predators. The zebra's defense lays in numbers. The black and white stripes, easily visible against a green background, may distract the predator, make it difficult to single out an individual member from the pack, especially when the pack is on the run.

Ngorongoro Water Buffalos

2009-06-04T14:21:00.004+03:00

On our drive to Lake Victoria through the Ngorongoro and the Serengeti National Parks my brother and I, because of the dense morning fog, failed to see the Ngorongoro Crater and its famous black rhinos. We were at the gates of Ngorongoro at six, when they open, and the fog hung heavily during our careful 20km/h drive up the spiraling mountain road. By the time the fog gave away, at around nine, we were already past the crater area.

But it was an experience in itself. Visibility was horrible, so we took our time -- where the road ended a steep deadly drop began, 30 meters or 300 meters, you couldn't tell. Our windows were open so that we could hear the morning sounds and breathe in some of that crisp morning air. Every now and then a group of water buffalos (or zebras, as you will see in the next post) would appear out of nowhere. The warm-blooded buffalos seemed to steaming and exhaling smoke in the cold air. Anyone who has seen these beasts knows what power they weild.

Suomi kutsuu

2009-05-28T10:23:00.010+03:00

(Photo: somewhere between Arusha, TANZ, and Nairobi, KEN.)

Time's up, Suomi kutsuu (Finland's calling). On Monday I fly back to Finland. Unfortunately I won't make pit-stops in Ethiopia and Sudan as promised by my original itinerary, because the flight operator just cancelled that route. So instead I'm flying via Switzerland and Germany. It actually works better for me, since the layovers are shorter and I'll have one long uninterrupted night flight.

There will be no more posts till Finland since my to-do list prior to my departure is crammed. In fact tomorrow morning I'm flying to the island of Zanzibar, thus far one of my favourite places in East Africa, for the weekend. It will be the last field trip before returning to Finland. I'm going with my brother and a Finnish-Canadian Fida-worker from Uganda, who is holding an HIV-Aids workshop in Dar es Salaam this week. We plan to visit some Zanzibarian spice factories and locate Freddy Mercury's childhood home.

In case anyone is wondering, VALMET is a Finnish company (VALtion=State's METalli=Iron). My late grandfather owned a Valmet tractor. When you start seeing Valmet signs in some bush in the middle of Africa, you know it's time to go home. (Although I doubt the reference is intentional, probably the shop owner just saw it somewhere.) That, and a phone call from Finland saying the beautiful Finnish summer has begun, settles it. See you soon.

Serengeti and Lake Victoria

2009-05-21T20:44:00.003+03:00

Tomorrow morning my brother and I are leaving for a five-day roadtrip. Our final destination is Mwanza, a city on the coast of Lake Victoria, quite near the Ugandan and Kenyan borders. Fida has a large youth center there which I will be able to visit.

We have decided to drive through the Serengeti national park, which is on the way. I've been to the Mikumi national park but never to Serengeti. Apparently the wildebeests and zebras etc. are migrating. If we're lucky (or if we're told the real-time coordinates), we'll stuble upon them in herds of thousands. Ngorongoro, the crater famous for its black rhinos, will have to wait for another time, as it would double the entry fee and cost us an extra day.

We'll be back on Tuesday. The following weekend I'll fly to Zanzibar for a mini vacation, just before returning to Finland on the 1st of June. My time in Africa is soon over. Six months has gone past quickly.

Virtuous Leadership -- Hyvejohtajuus

2009-05-20T07:00:00.003+03:00

Inspired by Alexandre Havard's magisterial book Virtuous Leadership (Scepter 2007) and our leadership center, European Center for Leadership Development, a few friends and I created a blog in 2008, www.hyvejohtajuus.fi ("virtuous leadership" in Finnish).

We publish Weekly Articles on virtue, leadership, and everything in between. In addition to these weekly articles by our regular writers, a Guestbook Article is published monthly by a visiting guest. Thus far we've had doctors, businessmen, writers, teachers etc. submit though-provoking articles. Ever since we launched this project a little over a year ago our readership has grown exponentially. Those of you who read Finnish, I can heartly recommend the site.

Our regular contributors are:

Oskari Juurikkala: An economist and a lawyer, Oskari is doing his PhD at the moment. His interests include theology and philosophy. He's also a talented musician.

Santiago Martinez: An MBA and political scientist, Santi is a Spaniard who has lived in Finland for nearly 20 years. He runs a developmental organization with close ties to Kenya.

Jussi Ruokomäki: A web consultant and specialist, he works for Smilehouse, one of the biggest (or the biggest) e-commerce companies in Finland. Jussi is married to Hanna and they have a 3-year-old son, Oskar, who is my godson.

Jason Lepojärvi: That would be me. I'm a teacher of philosophy and theology, but for the next few years I'll be concentrating on my dissertation on love.

In addition to us four, a fifth regular contributor has just joined us, Markku Lepojärvi: He is the principle of Albertinkoulu, the school for the hearing-impaired in Helsinki, a foster-father of three, a biological father of another three (myself included), and a young grandfather of four.

Here are the relevant links:

Hyvejohtajuus.fi
European Center for Leadership Development
Virtuous Leadership (the book, soon to be published in Finnish)
List of articles (2008-2009)

Safari Game

2009-05-18T20:53:00.009+03:00

(Benjy with Oskar, my godson, in December 2008 in Dar es Salaam)

I'm babysitting again. Danny and Sirkku are entertaining their Finnish guest, who flew in from Sri Lanka, in the night clubs of Dar es Salaam.* Babysitting is much fun, because the kids are so lovely and easy. Daniella, after her late night snack (usually porridge or noodles), falls asleep peacefully at around seven-thirty or eight. Benjy stays up longer, till about nine.

Tonight we were supposed to play the "Safari Game" (safarileikki) again. You know, pretend your car breaks down during a safari, climb to the nearest baobao tree (=sofa) for safety, shoo(t) off the wild beasts circling around, and eventually call a friend to pick you up with the helicopter... But poor Benjy fell asleep on the sofa, at eight-thirty, before our car broke down.

*Just kidding. They're at a restaurant enjoying a civilized discussion.

Benjamin, Benjamin, Benjamin

2009-05-16T07:00:00.001+03:00

As my time here is approaching its end, I find my self missing little Daniella and Benjy - a little prematurely. After all, I haven't left! Oh well, I guess this is not uncommon.

This has got to be one of the best pictures I've seen of Benjy. It was taken about five months ago, courtesy of Hanna Ruokomäki who visited us with her family.

Benjy is extremely smart and multitalented. I can't wait to see him grow and find his vocation. It's exciting, what will he be? What kind of choises will he make? On the other hand, he could remain a little boy indefinitely. I doubt the grand-parents would object.

Can You Fit a Plane in the Trunk?

2009-05-13T07:00:00.001+03:00

Indeed you can. While traveling around Tansania you become the witness of some of the most funny scences (and sometimes the not-so-funny ones, like car crashes).

Hmm...how can we get this Cessna from here to there?
Hey, I know! How'bout we take off the wings and put them on the roof, and stick the chassis in the trunk?
*Murmur of agreement*
Abdullah, you are wise.

Notice me with the camera? The mirror broke when someone tried to rip it off. Many mirrors have the car register number carved on it, as you can see, but sometimes even that doesn't keep the thieves at bay.

Daniella, Daniella, Daniella

2009-05-10T07:00:00.000+03:00

Happy little girl, eh?

One Sunday afternoonn, Daniella's dad dressed her up all nicely.

While he took photos, her uncle made faces.

Disorientated Bat

2009-05-07T07:00:00.007+03:00

One morning we woke up to see a bat hanging upside down from our garage roof. Apparently this fella was a bit disorientated. Not only because it wasn't spending the day in some sea-cliff cave like the rest of his friends, but also because he stayed in that garage, without moving, for three days and three nights. The reason for this is that the garage light was on nonstop, so our poor doubly disorientated bat probably thought it was a very, very long day, and kept waiting for the night to arrive. It did arrive in the form of a power-out and the bat was not seen anymore.

In the evenings you can see tons of bats: they fly out of their hiding places in long, unbroken formations that last for hours. Although these bats are considerably larger than their Scandinavian cousins, we're literally pounds away from the dog-size screaming devils I saw in the jungles of Malaysia.

Scuba Diving Course

2009-05-05T07:00:00.002+03:00

It would have been smart to take a Swahili course at the beginning of my stay here in Tanzania. But I was way too busy with everything, mostly with my studies. However, I have now completed all the courses I intended to and I ran out of books.

But it wouldn't be wise to do a language course now, just before leaving again for who knows how long. So instead I have decided to take the PADI open water diving course. It's something I've wanted to do since I first tried out snorkeling in the Similan Islands in Thailand.

Africa needs God, says Atheist

2009-05-03T07:00:00.007+03:00

Matthew Parris, the columnist for Times magazine and former English politician, published a controversial online article some time ago titled, “As an Atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God”. You can read it here.

His main argument is this.

“Missionaries, not aid money, is the solution to Africa's biggest problem – the crushing passivity of the people's mindset.”

Parris, who as a boy lived in Malawi, explains.

“Anxiety – fear of evil spirits, of ancestors, of nature and the wild, of a tribal hierarchy, of quite everyday things – strikes deep into the whole structure of rural African thought. Every man has his place and, call it fear or respect, a great weight grinds down the individual spirit, stunting curiosity. People won't take the initiative, won't take things into their own hands or on their own shoulders.”

What exactly does he mean by this?

“How can I, as someone with a foot in both camps, explain? When the philosophical tourist moves from one world view to another he finds – at the very moment of passing into the new – that he loses the language to describe the landscape to the old.”

But he tries to give an example: the answer given by Sir Edmund Hillary to the question: Why climb the mountain?

“‘Because it's there,’ he said. To the rural African mind, this is an explanation of why one would not climb the mountain. It's... well, there. Just there. Why interfere? Nothing to be done about it, or with it. Hillary's further explanation – that nobody else had climbed it – would stand as a second reason for passivity.”

Christianity is offered as the antitode to the African tribal collectivism/passivity. But Parris seems to misrepresent Christianity as being purely individualistic.

Although it is true that Christianity stresses the importance of the individual person, who was made in the image of God, the individual person finds his self and purpose in relationships. Above all with his Creator, and secondly with other human persons.

In the Bible God's relationship to mankind is expressed as Father to children and Bride to Bridegroom. The Christian God is not an Absolute solitarity, but a Love Community between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. And man is made in this image, not in the image of absolute individualism.

I would be very interested in hearing what others thought of the article. What do you think, did he misrepresent the African rural mind? Or did he hit on a certain truth?

Last Month in Africa

2009-05-01T07:00:00.001+03:00

Five months has gone since I arrived in Tanzania on December 1st of last year. It's been a wonderful experience. Although I wouldn't vouch for my hosts, it feels like time has gone by quickly. My return flight, June 1st, is more exotic than usual: Dar es Salaam - Addis Ababa - Khartoum - Frankfurt - Helsinki. This will be my first time in Sudan... Hey, it could be worse, as in Darfur.

As you can see from the photo, I'm very happy. I'm also a bit tanned, so at least I won't immediately get a sun-burn in Finland (sic). (Photo by Jani Salokangas, whose daughter has placed her hand gently on my shoulder. I didn't cut her out, I swear, her dad did.)

Grilled Seafood

2009-04-28T07:00:00.002+03:00

As we live beside the sea, there are a lot of local fishermen doing their thing from dusk till dawn. They work very hard, sometimes they don't catch anything, sometimes their nets are full. Some time ago Danny bought two kilos of fresh, king-prawns directly from the fishermen. They got a higher profit than normally, but they did all the cleaning up for us. They were big. We grilled them and they tasted delicious.

Unfortunately I don't have a picture. These photos are from Good Friday, our Easter dinner. The one above was taken by Jani Salokangas who came over with his family. It's not lamb, it's beef tender-loin with big chucks of onion, with chicken and baked potatoes. Danny was (and is) the Grill Master. We've been using the grill much more at the new house.

Grandpa in the Trunk

2009-04-25T07:00:00.001+03:00

Some time ago my parents visited us here in Tanzania. They had been invited by Fida International to participate in a one-week Disability Forum Seminar in Northern Tanzania, Tanga. Naturally, the prospect of spending time with the grand-children was attractive too.

I stayed at home in Dar es Salaam as the rest of the family drove up to Tanga for the week. It was quite crowded in the car, so Vaari (Grandpa) got his own little space in the trunk, literally. Getting in and out was a bit challenging, but apparently the "seat" itself was quite snug.

Mystery Bird

2009-04-22T07:00:00.001+03:00

My "office" is a roof-sized terrace on top of my brother's house. I spend hours there each day, reading, writing, drinking coffee. Or just chilling, shooting crows, contemplating. The senery is superb: turquoise ocean, white beach, fishing boats, palm trees, and a multitude of different kinds birds.

One of the most beautiful birds that live in the near vicinity is the King Fisher. I still haven't caught it on camera. But there's another bird too, a very pretty one, that is almost always in sight. Here is a couple that were flying around our neighbor's roof top. Who can tell me what bird it is? I cannot recognize the species.

Maisha Poa

2009-04-19T14:07:00.007+03:00

Maisha Poa (engl. The Good Life), a Fida-sponsored centre for street children in Nairobi, Kenya. I had the privilege to visit it a while back. Paula Konttinen (in photo) is one of my brother and his wife's collegues. A native Kenyan, Paula Konttinen has studied and lived in Finland for several years, speaks fluent Finnish and, as some of you guessed, is married to a Finn.

Maisha Poa's mission includes empowering youth by way of education and work. One project which is still on the experimental level is artefact-production, bags, boxes, and cards from hand-made paper. The paper is made from elephant dung, and I was shown the process. Hopefully soon they can start making a profit. For those of you who speak Finnish, click on the photo and check out the label text on this bag.

Obligatory Update and Photo

2009-04-16T20:10:00.002+03:00

I've been home alone since Monday. Everything's gone extremely well. I put in 8 hours of intense study and writing each day and take it easy in the evenings. Today I saw a movie with Ellam, The Fast and the Furious 4. Not really my "thing", if you know what I mean, but Ellam is into characterless fast pace action movies. (I'm exaggerating.) After finishing this post I intend to walk upstairs to the roof terrace and enjoy a Cuban cigar. The moon is spectacular tonight and it will light up the beach and ocean brilliantly.

I have to finish writing soon, because my battery is dying -- the electricity is out after several days of unproblematic current, and I don't want to use the oversized generator. Anyway, this is just an obligatory update. And this photo is the obligatory photo for the grandparents. Yes you, Grandma and Vaari, Mummi ja Pappa.

Daniella and Benjy love dogs, as you know, although they are also a little afraid of them. In this picture Daniella is meeting Sheba, the blind dog I blogged about last week, for the first time. Daniella is very courageous, as you can see. (I on the other hand am a bit apprehensive, hence Sheba's tight collar. I have a firm grip of it with my hidden right hand, just in case).

Blind Shepherd

2009-04-11T21:59:00.004+03:00

This is Sheba. She is our neighbors' German Shepherd. They have another dog, Spot, a white Jack Russell named after the black patch on her back. When you take Sheba (and Spot) with you for a walk or a jog on the beach, Sheba will place herself between you and anyone in the vicinity, a fellow jogger running towards you or any person chilling at the beach. If someone comes too close, Sheba will gently push them away (while on the move). What makes her special is that she is blind.

Shooting Crows

2009-04-09T19:11:00.008+03:00

Domestic Tanzanian crows are fine birds. They're like Indian black crows (in the picture) but a bit larger and have white chests. Their Indian cousins, however, are a true menace. Originally imported from India for their "handy" ability to keep the streets clean, or so the story goes, they are simply everywhere nowadays. They're noisy, arrogant, and like most crows extremely intelligent. They're also egg-thieves, as we say in Finnish, for they destroy the nests of smaller birds.

So Danny and I found a new hobby. Crow-shooting. We have an airgun (or bee-bee gun) which we borrowed from a friend. Whoever has used an airgun knows that it's nearly impossible to hit a flying bird. But of my "hits" 25%, three crows in total, have fallen from the sky. I won't say what my total count is though... Danny made an incredible shot today. He hit a flying crow from 15 meters in the eye. But I won't post an illustrative photo for fear of losing friends.

Babysitting Benjamin

2009-04-08T20:17:00.003+03:00

Danny and Sirkku went to have dinner with a few Finnish colleagues from Fida International. There's a nice restaurant just half a mile from the new house called Mediterranean. I decided to stay at home with Daniella and Benjy. Quite soon after her parents had left and after her late-night noodles, Daniella fell asleep peacefully. Benjy and I stayed up to watch movies.

But lo and behold, Sirkku and Danny returned home early! They made it to the restaurant, but no one else ever came. Apparently the rain earlier today had been so heavy that many roads were still cut off completely. So the other Finns enjoyed a meal in a separate restaurant closer to town while Danny and Sirkku spent quality time together at Mediterranean. And me, what did I have for supper? Fresh prawns, bought directly from local fishermen off the beach (and then grilled) in the backyard. No complaints here.

What is Worship?

2009-04-04T15:15:00.005+03:00

Part I, Part II, Part III

This is an article on the nature of worship. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan's five-part marathon history of the development of Christian doctrine. Reference 4:45 would mean book 4, page 45.

-- -- --

To begin with, we should be careful with liberal uses of the word “worship” when addressed to saints. Historically it has been used for a lack of a better word before “veneration” became the proper word to express a devotional disposition towards saints.

But some, like Jean de Gerson, went as far as to straightforwardly suggest “adoring” Mary and saluting her as “the goddess of love” is “not going too far” (4:41-42). This, to me, blurs the distinction between “adoration” and “veneration” and undermines the “absolute qualitative distinction” between God and man that was mentioned above.

“Superstitions and abuses” concerning, for example, the relics of saints included “trafficking” and selling them (3:179), historically called the sin of simony. “Idolatry” included treating a creature with greater honor than is his due, namely, said Socinus, “honor that is clearly divine, and requiring from him those things that can and should be requested from God alone” (4:329). It is not explained what kind of honor is “clearly divine”, so this begs the question – yet again.

But elsewhere we find an instance of what can be requested from God alone: it was “essential to avoid … the notion that saints conferred grace” or that they “could rescue souls from hell” (4:261).

But it was as essential to avoid the opposite extreme too, “the hoary objection that the veneration of the saints was idolatrous” (4:261).

The potential threat of devotional practices to the integrity of monotheistic worship has not, of course, gone unnoticed. Counter-measures against excesses of devotion have taken many forms. Above all it has been necessary to remember where the true origin of saints’ honor lay.

The opening verse of the Latin version of the last psalm read: “Praise the Lord in his saints” (Ps. 150:1, Vulg.) and what this meant, explained Bernard of Clairvaux, was that “if I discern something in the saints that is worthy of praise and admiration, I find, when I examine it in the clear light of truth, that though they appear to be admirable and praiseworthy, it is Another than they who is really so, and I praise God in his saints”

The saints’ virtues had their origin in God, not in the saints themselves (4:177). Furthermore, saints are venerated “not for their benefit, but for ours,” since “the saints have no need of our honors, nor do they gain anything as a result of our devotion” (4:176).

One Catholic friend of mine, a layman, offered a few possible symptoms, concrete examples that would imply an unhealthy disposition towards saints. Among these were: “one does not pray directly to God anymore”; “does not understand, that the role of the saints is to direct us to Jesus – see Mary’s advice at the wedding at Cana: ‘Do whatever he says’ (John 2:1-11)”; “is attached to a saint but forgets God”; and “neglects the sacraments and the reading of Scripture through which one gets to know Jesus.”

Clichtove’s treatise from the sixteenth century, The Veneration of the Saints, traced the development of the practice of veneration, Pelikan comments, “with such balance and care that, despite Protestant attacks, it continued to serve as a model” (4:260) for a considerable time. Through a proper veneration of the saints, Clichtove urged against critique, the glory of God was not diminished but magnified (4:261).

(We find an echo of this in the order of loves. The type of love that pertains to Christian love is charity or agape, divine self-sacrificing love, the word John used when he said that “God is love [agape]”. When we love, agape, our neighbor, we love them through God, who is the source of love, and we love God through them, who are images of God, provided the order of our loves is proper. In this way Christ’s two commandments form one “great commandment”. They are two sides of the same coin.)

All we can take away from the above is that “worshipful adoration” of God means worshiping him for his own sake; whereas “worshipful respect” of saints means honoring them not for their own but for God’s sake.

In light of the degree/quality distinction, this, strictly speaking really amounts to neither. They’re not different qualities of worship, nor are they worship of different degree. Rather, there’s a difference in one’s basic attitude and understanding of why one worships. Does one worship the object for its own sake or for the sake of something beyond the object?

One could say that if this – one’s basic attitude – is really what we are looking at, if this is the only distinction, it is no wonder that the “accusation of idolatry and the response to it struck at a deep and sensitive point in Christian belief” (2:127). But, as with sacrifice, one’s basic attitude may make a greater difference than we may think. To this too, then, I shall have to return later.

From degree to quality: sacrifice and “basic attitude”

Let’s recap again. Here is the crux of the problem set in a historical context:

“From Augustine’s City of God came the explanation of the fundamental difference between the cult of the saints and the Pagan practices to which Protestant critics were comparing it. The ‘adoration’ paid to the Creator pertained to him alone, the ‘adoration’ of saints was that appropriate to God’s creatures; strictly speaking, ‘the church does not adore saints … but honors them.’ Christ was the only ‘Mediator of redemption,’ but the saints were ‘mediators of intercession.’” (4:261.)

It is probably clear by now that I find this distinction of “adoration to God only” and “veneration of saints” only partly helpful. It differentiates between the object of honoring, but it does not substantiate as to how the acts of honoring differ except as far as their object goes. So Augustine’s “explanation” begs the question. Over and over again I have pressed for a difference in the acts themselves, not only in their objects.

But we haven’t said all that can be said about “sacrifice” as a constituent of worship.

I said earlier that sacrifice belonged to both worship and veneration, if – but only if – the difference between them was only a difference of degree. And in this case sacrifice had to be defined vaguely as “something” that could be offered to both God and man. But, as it is, theologically sacrifice is defined as something that belongs to God solely. And in this case, what follows is that the difference between worship and veneration is not, after all, merely a difference of degree, but of quality as well.

Everyone agrees that “the merit of salvation” (4:261) belongs solely to Jesus. There is such a sacrifice which belongs to worship only. We are talking about the sacrifice for the atonement of sins. Offering such a sacrifice to a creature rather than to the Creator would be idolatry. And asking for forgiveness of sins from a creature rather than from the true God would be idolatry.

The cult of the saints did not imply that “the church offers sacrifices to the [saints], but only to the one God, the God of the [saints] and our God,” explained Remigius of Auxerre centuries ago (3:176). The only one to whom Christ could “offer the sacrifice of his passion,” said Robert Pullen, “was the One whom he was obeying by his suffering” (3:139).

It is the “sacrifice of his passion” (3:139), the “body of Christ” (3:136). The Catholics believe that in the Eucharist the power of Christ’s once-for-all sacrifice – for Christ is not, to be sure, “crucified” each time anew – becomes manifest. (For Christians who don’t hold onto the sacrificial character of the Holy Communion such talk is likely to sound odd, if not blasphemous.)

But it is not only Christ’s suffering that is sacrificed to God only. Worship implies the “sacrifice” of each person’s life to God, understood as “a total commitment” to him only.

One Catholic friend of mine, a priest, explained what “a total commitment” meant for him. A worshipful disposition toward God includes at least the following (which, he was at pains to emphasize, can never be said of a saint): “acknowledging that the recipient of worship is the Creator and thus the rightful Lord of every creature”; “’letting God know’ that he is the rightful Lord of one’s being”; “knowing that you have been created and accepting it, and the voluntary transformation of this knowledge into worship”; “the coming together of humility and freedom in forming your inner attitude”; and “worshiping God unreservedly, that is, obeying him unreservedly.”

In Catholic tradition “worship” is clearly sacrificial in character, whereas other “types of reverence” which are directed to the saints are non-sacrificial. Of the latter, a further distinction is made between ordinary reverence (“dulia”) to saints in general and a higher form of reverence (“hyperdulia”) to Christ’s mother. This said, my friend said that it was important to remember that “hyperdulia” was not a “third” form of reverence in between sacrificial “adoration” and non-sacrificial “dulia”, but it belonged fully to the category of “dulia”.

We finally come to the end of this article. We shall close with saying something about the “basic attitude” which, as noted earlier, affects a difference between worship and veneration. But earlier I questioned its significance: I asked whether “mere attitude” can make the crucial difference.

But at the end of the day, when all outer criteria for evaluating the “purity” of one’s worship fails, isn’t one’s attitude – largely hidden from observers and fully seen only by God – at the heart of this issue after all?

Does not one’s attitude make all the difference in one’s spiritual – and moral – life? What happens outwardly is not unimportant, but it is secondary; an echo of what takes place in the soul. Isn’t one’s attitude what distinguishes murder from accident, authentic friendship from selfish manipulation – and worship of God from self-love (the story of the praying Pharisee)?

What is Worship?

2009-04-03T19:16:00.003+03:00

Part I, Part II, Part III

This is an article on the nature of worship. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan's five-part marathon history of the development of Christian doctrine. Reference 4:45 would mean book 4, page 45.

-- -- --

Historical attempts at differentiation

Now, I must admit that as far as my central questions are concerned, Pelikan’s monographs offered me no new insights, though they frequently employed the terms “worship” or “adoration” and “veneration” – and even attempted to differentiate between them. Well, the monographs didn’t need to as they were books on the development of dogma, not books on basic theological questions. The author must presume that the readers know the answers to elementary theological questions, like “What is worship?” (or as for my other article, “Why is doctrine important?”). I didn’t. I don’t.

It truly was a challenge to sail through the 2,000 pages on the lookout for clarity, especially when the author often used “worship” and “veneration” interchangeably (see, for example, 2:96-99, 106). This was very odd. Why would he do that? I doubt that a theologian of his caliber would not distinguish between them in his private thinking, so it must be presumed that he was trying to faithfully follow the belief of his sources as it chronologically developed.

For early on in the chapter “Images of the Invisible” in the second volume we get the first (yet still minimalist) definition of worship: it is “paying honor” (2:103). The definition, though welcome, is unfortunately not very helpful, for it does not explain what “paying honor” means – and surely one can “pay honor” to both God and people, so “paying honor” belongs to veneration as well as to worship.

But later, a need for clarification and distinction becomes clearer. Eastern theologians made it clear that “it was one thing to pay proper respect [τιμή] to the saints, quite another to address worship [προσκύνησις] to them, and yet another to portray them in worshipful images” (2:112). But this distinction too, though welcomed, remains one of mere terminology, for “paying proper respect” and “addressing worship” are not defined.

Eventually the question that bothers me was raised in a straightforward manner. The italics are mine:

The orthodox “were obliged to set forth a theory of worship that would protect the uniqueness of the worship of the true God and yet permit other acts of reverence”.

When iconoclasts argued that “there is only one kind of worship, not many kinds,” the orthodox replied that “this is true of the worship of adoration [λατρευτική]” but that the worship of mortals “was nevertheless permissible by analogy and derivation from the single worship of God”. There was a “worship of adoration, which we pay only to the God who is by nature adorable”, but there was also a worship paid to “the friends and worshipers of God” for his (God’s) sake, because of “their derivative divine nature; this included both angels and saints”.

“Adoration pertained only to God, but either by love or by reverence or by law one was also bound to other to whom one paid worshipful respect. This distinction was grounded in biblical evidence about worship paid to creatures by men whose adoration of the one true God was beyond reproach.” (2:126.)

But even the distinctions above pertain only to the object of the reverential act, not to the act itself.

But as said, “adoration” in its technical sense as distinguished from “veneration”, could be offered to God alone. Saints could be venerated and even glorified, but only God could Anselm of Canterbury (who thought God was present even in the holy cross) “adore, venerate, and glorify” (3:132). One theologian said that “[e]ven though the saints are [sometimes] called ‘gods,’ they are not worshiped; only Christ is called ‘God’ and is worshiped” (3:55). “Believing in Christ,” said another theologian, meant “venerating and loving the Logos” (whereas “believing Christ” meant simply affirming “that he speaks what is true”) (3:4). If the “preexistent Son of God incarnate” was not in Jesus, “the worship of Jesus would be idolatry” (3:248).

“[W]hile the worship paid to the icons was one of honor rather than of adoration,” explained Cyril of Alexandria, “the worship paid to the Eucharist was one of adoration rather than merely of honor, because the presence in the Eucharist was that of the Lord himself” (2:291). If Christ, who was present in the Eucharist, was not true God, “there would be no reason to venerate the elements [of the Holy Communion] as the worship of the church did” (3:200). The elements were “adored”, but “such worship, addressed to a mere symbol of the body of Christ, would be idolatrous” (4:55).

Idolatry is precisely what it was (and is), according to Protestant critics of the practice.

But everyone agreed on this point, however: we are not to “adore or worship anything except the true God” (3:68) and “[t]he catholic faith is this … that we worship one God in Trinity” (3:19).

As for veneration, of all the saints Mary was “the woman who uniquely deserved to be venerated”, said Bernard of Clairvaux (3:162), one of her most ardent devotees. Her unique relationship with Christ was the basis of her uniqueness.

“Expressions of devotions” or “devotional expressions” to her (3:171), and in her honor, could include, say, the praying of the rosary and the commemoration of events in her life, like her birth, the “immaculate conception”. It was fitting that “veneration and prayer” should be addressed to her – which Pelikan calls “such worship of the Virgin” (making my head spin because of yet another “liberal” use of the word “worship”).

Not every theologian even during the Middle Ages was happy with the growing cult of Mary, but most were (3:178-179).

Yet Mary was not God. “The absolute necessity for a qualitative distinction between Christ and Mary,” Pelikan explains, “served as a restraint” (4:40; also 3:165-168) on the tendency of going too far, on “possible excesses of devotion” (3:176).

In search of concrete criteria

If find these “possible excesses of devotion” very interesting. Not from a (Protestant) polemical point of view, but from the point of view of establishing possible criteria for distinguishing between “true worship of God only” on one hand, and “idolatry” and “proper veneration of the saints” on the other. You see, there must be a way to differentiate and evaluate.

Let me expalin. In science, there is such a thing as “pseudo-theory”. Pseudo-theory is a theory or belief system, which cannot be refuted. It cannot be refuted, not because it is a “perfect theory”, but simply because it is eternally flexible: whatever you throw at it is absorbed and interpreted in its favour.

Marxism has been thought to be one such theory. Literally whatever you say in attempt to criticize it, it can respond by saying: “Well of course, that’s exactly what we should expect if Marxism was true.” If you say “White” it will reply, “Of course, white is what was to be expected.” But saying “Not-white” will give you the exact same reply, “Of course, not-white supports our theory.” How can one argue constructively with such responses?

Some social sciences, too, like sociology and social psychology, are sometimes dangerously close to being (at least partly) pseudo-scientific or mere tautology, as Alisdair MacIntyre has shown (After Virtue 1981). And the theory of evolution has been receiving a lot of flak lately for precisely its pseudo-scientific aura.

But the point here is not this or that theory of science, but only to acknowledge that the “cult of the saints” too, in order to make any sense, needs some criteria for knowing when “veneration” has become “excessive” (and in what way) or when it has turned into “idolatry” (worship of creature). Without such criteria the practice of veneration saints is “pseudo-scientific”, so to say.

“Superstitions and excessive credulity in the cult of saints” (4:248), it goes without saying, is to be shunned, but this advice is totally useless if it is not explained what such “superstitions” and “excessive credulities” could possibly be!

Well, what could they be?

What is Worship?

2009-04-02T13:23:00.010+03:00

Part I, Part II, Part III

Some time ago I posted an article titled "What is worship?" I asked for comments and through email got several, from both Protestant and Catholic friends. The Catholics were more active. So, in response to my (slightly) increased understanding I have re-written the article. What follows in as extended, I hope both in length and in substance, version of my original article.

References are to Jaroslav Pelikan's five-part marathon history of the development of Christian doctrine. Reference 4:45 would mean book 4, page 45.

-- -- --

There was one question that loomed large in my mind as I read through Pelikan’s monographs. In fact there were two, but the second – “What is the point of dogma?” – has been discussed in a separate article. Both questions are theological questions that seem simple. Almost too simple to entertain seriously, but when further reflected on, they prove to be absolutely fundamental for a Christian, whether layman or theologian. I was hoping to find, if not proper answers to them, at least a satisfactory articulation of the questions themselves. The one I must discuss here is:

What is worship?

Indeed, what is worship? What exactly do we mean when we say we “worship” God?

We Christians believe that worship is the proper response of creature towards Creator. We believe that worship is the primary calling of man in relation to God. One could say that love is this primary calling. Yes, for our purposes here worship and love may be treated as one. Both overlap each other, and both are prerequisites for happiness in the truest sense (“human flourishing”).

We also believe that the object of worship must be the “true God”, not our construction of him, otherwise we worship and idol (in other words we are “idolizers”). Also, not only the object of worship but worship itself must be “true” or “right”, otherwise it is imperfect at best and meaningless at worst (making us unjust towards our Creator to whom, and only to whom, true worship is due).

Now, what constitutes worship? Or, put another way: How does worship towards God differ from a proper disposition towards other things, like people?

Catholics and Orthodox make a distinction between “worship” and “veneration”. The first, when applied to God is proper, and when applied to creatures (mainly to the saints and foremost to Mary) is not only improper but also a mortal si. The second, when applied to saints is proper, and when applied to God is either proper or meaningless apart from worship.

Thus far this distinction, however, is only object and of terminology. Where lays the “real” difference in the act itself, the difference in terms of “substance”, the difference that counts, the difference that can be experienced and observed in reality?

Or is what is “given” in worship and veneration the same, but just directed to different objects? Or if not, then what, exactly, is reserved for God only that is constituent to worship and not veneration?

Difference of degree or quality?

Let’s assume there is a real difference between worship and veneration. Is the difference a difference of degree or a difference of quality? To use an analogy, is veneration a mild electric current which, as it grows stronger, approaches worship (difference of “degree”), or is veneration a mild electric current and worship something quite different, like fire (difference of “quality”)?

What, then, if the difference is that of degree?

In traditional theology of love we speak of an “order of loves” (ordo amoris/caritatis). Loving objects in the proper order and in the right way is the (or a) key of right worship.

Is this backed by Scripture? It would seem so. The disciples asked Jesus of the proper “order of commandments”.

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31.) Implicit in Jesus’ answer is an order of loves: the most important thing is to love God, and secondly, you must love your neighbor as yourself.

Since we have treated worship and love as partly interchangeable, what follows is some kind of “order of worship”. “Proper worship” would be “a proper order of worship”: God merits our highest form of reverence (which we call “worship”), and lesser things merit a lower form of reverence (which we call “veneration”). The right order is the “measure” and difference of proper worship and veneration. If the order is wrong, worship and veneration become corrupted in some sense.

So, we’ve established an order of things. What else can be said? By connecting worship to love and by establishing an order of worship we’ve found part of the answer to our question. But, the core of the question still remains: What, exactly, is worship (or love)?

Jesus provides another key when he says that: “If you love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15) and: “The person who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me” (John 14:21). This is helpful. Love/worship is doing the will of God. (Here I am not going to ask if obeying, “works”, is merely the fruit of love, “faith”. I take it that they are organically connected.)

Continuing with the degree paradigm, we can add sacrifice as one constituent of worship/love. It is remembered that agape, the love which “God is”, is self-sacrificial. Now, what is sacrifice? This is a difficult question, and though I will address it here and again at the end of this article, an exhaustive answer cannot be offered.

But our presuppositions imply that if worship belongs to the degree category, and if sacrifice is constituent of worship, it follows that sacrifice also belongs to the degree category (if not also to “quality”). From this it follows that, if the “order” is right, sacrifice can be directed and offered both to the Creator and to the creature. This makes sense: humans often “make sacrifices” for each other, especially for spouses and children, and we commend them for that.

But we have to return to the sacrificial character of worship later: it might be the crux of the question.

We left many important questions unanswered. But, if the difference between worship and veneration is that of degree, at least we’ve established a few things. We know that worship, veneration, and love are all intimately connected. Their legitimacy or illegitimacy depends on the proper order of their objects. Worship of God implies doing God’s will. Lastly, worship is sacrifice (whatever that is).

So, when we say that we “worship God”, if our words are backed by our whole being, we are saying at least the following: that we love him, that we love him above all else, that we love our neighbors as ourselves, and that our love is sacrificial. We understand that we haven’t said what “sacrifice” is, and we understand that worshiping God requires knowing him (we cannot worship what we don’t know – worship and love require the right object).

Home Alone Again

2009-03-31T18:19:00.004+03:00

As the internet has been down for several days now, there's no photos in this post unfortunately. (I am at an internet cafe without my USB memory card.) My parents arrived to Dar es Salaam last Friday, which was nice. On Sunday the whole family - my parents, Danny and Sirkku, Benjamin and Daniella - left to Tanga, which is up north near the Kenyan border. They're participating in a one-week Disability Forum.

I had just visited Tanga, so I had decided to stay at home. We just moved into a new lovely house, so it was a good idea for someone to 'keep watch'. I have enjoyed my time alone. During the daytime I get a lot of work done. In the evenings I will have a beer and perhaps enjoy a Cuban cigar on the roof terrace, and just look at the stars and listen to the Indian Ocean greeting the star-lit beach with endless waves. But come weekend, it will be wonderful to see everyone again.

Christian Churches and Same-Sex Marriage

2009-03-24T16:57:00.007+02:00

As everyone knows, the question of same-sex marriage is dividing the Christian churches. Anglicanism may be the nearest to blessing same-sex marriage and right to adoption, but Lutheranism, at least in Northern Europe, is not far behind.

As far as the Lutheran State Church of Finland is concerned, I predict it will follow Anglicanism’s lead within the next five to ten years. This will result in a break within the church, which will be of much greater caliber than when women’s ordination was introduced (1986), because the nature of the issue is one of (biblical) morality and not of church structure.

On the other hand, the Catholic Church, the Orthodox churches, and (most of) the Free Churches (Pentecostal, Baptist, etc.) are no way near blessing same-sex marriage. Against unrelenting critique from without and within Christendom the Catholics and Orthodox have held on to male-only ordination, so it is unlikely that these churches will ever succumb to the demand to bless same-sex marriages.

My intention here is not, however, to dwell on individual churches’ position in this heated debate, but rather to (1) mention the very dissimilar approaches between mainstream Lutheranism and Catholicism and (2) discuss a possible reason for how such different approaches can exist in the first place.

At the heart of this discussion is the relationship between human nature and human action, or being and doing.

Human nature vs. human action

Catholic teaching emphasizes the difference between “homosexuality” (noun) and “homosexual acts” (verb). It is possible that in some cases a person’s “homosexuality” is a voluntary decision: not determined by an inbuilt “necessity” but more the result of repeated homosexual acts and behavior resulting in homosexuality itself which, upon retrospect, may falsely seem to have been there “all along”.

However, as far as I understand the Catholic Church’s teaching, it admits that in some cases the opposite is true: a person may, from a very young age, be sexually attracted to one’s own sex in such a profound way that there is reason to believe homosexuality, at least in these cases, is inbuilt.

So far, most would agree. But this is where mainstream Lutheranism (and by the way, secularism) parts ways with Catholicism.

Mainstream Lutheranism holds that, since (or when) homosexuality is inbuilt in one’s “nature” (part of one’s being), homosexual acts and behavior are only natural and thus should not to be condemned.

Catholicism, however, does not arrive at the same conclusion. Catholics emphasize that involuntary homosexuality (noun) is not sin; but voluntary homosexual acts (verb) are. This means that, in theory and in practice, a bishop or even the pope could be a homosexual provided he does not lead a homosexual lifestyle. Every Christian has a “cross” to carry; for some Christians their cross includes coping with a homosexual tendency.

For a modern mind that does not distinguish between human nature and human action, such reasoning sounds downright absurd. For it the idea of homosexuality itself not being sinful but homosexual acts being sinful is unintelligible and unacceptable. Either both the nature and the behavior are sinful or, which is more probable according to them, neither is sinful.

What is behind such vastly dissimilar positions as regards the relationship of human nature and human action?

Tendency to sin vs. sin proper

I think I have traced one reason that allows for such a radical disagreement. I’m sure it’s not an exhaustive reason but it may be profoundly suggestive. It involves Christian anthropology (view of man) in relation to the doctrine of justification (salvation of man), or the doctrines of sin and grace.

The Joint Declaration on the Doctrine Justification (1999) by the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation was an ecumenical triumph. The Declaration stated that the centuries-old mutual condemnations the churches had proclaimed on each other in the aftermath of the Reformation over the question of justification did not apply to the agreement reached in this document. After many years of intense theological discussion both parties were able to proclaim that they agreed on the more fundamental parts of justification, and that the still remaining disagreements were not divisive.

The “still remaining disagreements” are of special interest here. In the “Appendix” to the Declaration added by the Catholic party are listed a few items that, said the Catholics, still divided the churches. One crucial point concerned the state of the forgiven Christian.

The Catholics stressed that, after repentance and forgiveness, a person is not sinful anymore; although the tendency to sin remains, condemnable sin proper does not exists until the person gives into the tendency to sin by actively sinning.

Traditional Lutheranism, on the other hand, stresses that the Christian is simultaneously both-sinner-and-justified; the tendency to sin that is always present is sin, just as sin proper is, although perhaps in a different way. Hence we are always sinning in one way or another, knowingly or unknowingly.

(Depending on which side one adheres to, the opposite side seems “unrealistic” and one’s one position “realistic”. Either the Catholic position is “falsely optimistic” or the Lutheran position is “falsely pessimistic”.)

Homosexuality reconsidered

Now, returning to the topic of homosexuality (noun) and homosexual behavior (verb). It seems that there is a certain parallel between it and the question of justification. The disagreement in the general question of justification allows for the disagreement in the particular question of homosexuality.

As regards justification, from the Catholic point of view the tendency to sin is not sin proper, only sinful acts are; but from the Lutheran point of view the tendency to sin is sin proper. This is the fundamental presupposition dividing the two. Hence, as regards homosexuality the Catholics are able to say that a homosexual tendency is not sin, only homosexual acts are. Lutherans, on the other hand, cannot make this distinction. For them it follows that either both the tendency and the acts are sinful or neither is.

And so, argues the mainstream Lutheran, we have two choices: (1) if the homosexual tendency is sinful, it means that the homosexual person remains sinful until he or she is healed from this tendency; (2) but if the homosexual tendency is not sinful, it follows that neither are the homosexual acts that spring from this (non-sinful) condition.

In a world where Christians are being encouraged (sometimes indiscriminately) to “love homosexuals”, it is only understandable that compared to the first grimmer option the second option looks more authentically “loving”. And so the State Churches fluctuate behind the States towards this latter “solution”.

For the Catholic Church, however, (1) and (2) are not the only options. In fact they are both false options.

For Catholics “loving the homosexual” does not differ from loving any other person. And loving a person means first acknowledging that some tendencies, though not sinful as such, are nonetheless disordered and unhealthy, and then encouraging the person not to “live out” these tendencies, but rather to seek transformation through intimate correspondence with grace.

-- -- --

Disclaimer: the “Lutheranism vs. Catholicism” juxtaposition above is not entirely accurate. Not only are there Lutherans who fall into the “Catholic” camp and Catholics who fall into the “Lutheran” camp, Northern/Western Lutheran churches tend to be far more “liberal” than, for example, their African sister churches. Also, as far as the question of homosexuality goes, my guess is that most Free Churches feel more comfortable with the “Catholic” position than the “Lutheran” position, even if in other questions the opposite is true.

Kawe-beach, Here We Come...

2009-03-20T07:00:00.007+02:00

Due to several reasons my brother and his wife have decided to move. This means that I, the PhD-Nanny, will be moving also. Starting from today the next few days will be spent driving between the old house and the new house, packing, unpacking, cleaning, and so on. Thankfully we have a lot of formidable help.

The old house and its location have a lot of perks (like the swimming area in the picture above). But the new house ... well, let's just say that it's quite incredible too. Once the move is over and we've all settled in, I will post some photos. The view from the roof-size terrace, for example, is impeccable. From the edge of the backyard begins the beach, a white sand buffer separating the house from the blue, awe-inspiring Indian Ocean with a few tropical islands in the horizon.

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-19T06:00:00.004+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

Love as the Fulfillment of Doctrine

Simeon the New Theologian thought some monks needed to hear that “asceticism without love is in vain” (2:258). The same can be said to apply to doctrine: without love, true meaning and fulfillment of doctrine escapes us.

“Do not,” Simeon admonished his brethren, “try to describe ineffable matters by words alone, for this is an impossibility… But let us contemplate such matters as activity, labor, and fatigue… In this way we shall be taught the meaning of such things as the sacred mysteries” (2:258).

Just as doctrine is incommunicable apart from liturgy, doctrine is incommunicable apart from love. Love in action is the most appropriate way to articulate a truth that defies positive verbal formulation.

The “doctrinal explanations” of scholastic and speculative theology cannot do justice to mystical theology, because the ecstatic love that “consists in the experiential perception of the union of the soul, with God as its supreme object and goal, can in no way be communicated [tradi] through doctrine,” as Gerson put it (4:65).

Still it is essential to remember that there exists a tradition that does not separate, though it may distinguish between, “scholastic theology” and “mystical theology”; I hope to cling to this tradition. Doctrine needs to have experience as its “companion” (4:65).

But doctrine can “protect the experience”. For exacmple, as in the case of the mystical experience of union with God which, on the subjective level, can sometimes compromise the uniqueness of both God and the individual person (4:66). In this sense “mere practice” isn’t sufficient either (5:151-152). The truer the theology, the truer the experience.

However, in another sense the “right order of things” is “first do, then teach”, to quote Bede (3:13), for as earlier theologians have said, practice was the basis of theory. Gregory of Nazianzus’s epitaph of Basil the Great read, “his speech was like thunder because his life was like lightning” (5:55). This has served as a good guiding line for those who have wanted to hold on to the right relation between doctrine and life: thunder follows lightning.

Maximus distinguished between “commandments” and “doctrines”, and said the former were the prerequisites for the latter (2:8-9). Whatever the precise nature of the relation, at least this much is sure: the connection between orthodoxy and moral obedience has always been “a close one” (3:24).

Isidore of Seville’s comment about faithful preachers serves as a salutary model for all Christians in all times: “a shining example both in doctrine and in life,” for “the former without the latter made a man arrogant while the latter without the former made him useless” (3:13).

It is a shame to end this essay in a paradoxical accent. But the nature of things has not permitted any other way.

“The invisible things of God,” according to Hugh of Saint-Victor, “can only be believed, but cannot in any way be comprehended.” They transcend all analogy and likeness, whether of soul or of the body, and therefore “their very substance is the faith by which they are believed” (3:215). Or, as Balduinus said, faith was “the certain apprehension of unchangeable truth”, a comprehension that “exceeds all the experience of the senses and transcends all the conjectures of human reason” and that deserved to be called “knowledge” in the fullest sense (3:215).

Jean the Gerson’s approach was: “seek, through reasons based on the true faith, to understand the nature of God” and at the same time “hold principally to the love of God … without lofty inquiry” (4:63).

Doctrine is inadequate and inevitable; I must not inquire and yet inquire: Hier stehe ich und kann nicht anderes.

How to Eat an Elephant

2009-03-18T09:20:00.003+02:00

This dialogue was from this morning. I was outside reading a 1000-page theological brick and I exchanged polite "goodmornings" with a South African elderly couple.

Couple: Are you studying?

Jason: Yup. I've been quite effective, but it feels like I'm slacking or "skipping class" because of the wonderful atmosphere here -- sun, warmth, birds, you know.

Couple: Do you know what the Africans say about how to eat an elephant?

Jason: No...

Couple: One bite at a time.

Jason: Thanks, I'll try to keep that in mind.

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-18T06:00:00.003+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

Liturgy as the Fulfillment of Doctrine

There may be satisfactory answers to the questions in this essay, most of which have been left open. Some answers may even be expressible in words (the topic of the previous post)!

Whatever the case, it must be admitted that even the best answers and formulations do not suffice. This is consoling, for I am lacking the best answers and formulations.

For, as it is, undoubtedly some “nuances”, say, of christology are unintelligible to us “simple” people. But fortunately what is said of icons applies to liturgy in general: they are “books for the illiterate” (2:132). When words fail us, liturgy and love in action take over and fulfill what mere words, by themselves, were never meant to fulfill.

Throughout Pelikan’s monographs liturgy has been a main source (see e.g. 2:6); and throughout my essays I have mainly ignored it, as well as the “powerful monastic movement” (2:5-6) and several other important and intriguing elements in the history of the development of Christian doctrine. But now liturgy comes into play.

Earlier it was said that the central obligation of the church is the “communication of what has been granted” it (2:31). Liturgy (worship) is uniquely “the summit toward which the activity of the church is directed and at the same time the fountain from which all her power flows”, as was stated at the Second Vatican Council (5:295).

Maximus’s reminder of the words of Scripture can be considered valid to theological words, too: “every word … is a forerunner of the more perfect word to be revealed … in an unwritten way in the Spirit” (2:31). “The heart” of all major churches, not only of the Syrian Jacobite Church to which this Hage’s expression originally refers to, “beats in its liturgy” (2:51). And Nicephorus’s formulation of the liturgical action of “their priests” can be generalized to encompass all liturgical action and participation: “they express the form of the orders of being that transcend this world” (2:134).

Worship has a special function in “theology”, for it can convey the knowledge of the unknowable (2:135). Liturgy is “participation in divine mysteries” and “completely manifest knowledge” (2:136).

Some dogmas are always “liturgical” rather than “dogmatic” in their fundamental character. Such a dogma, preeminently, has been the Atonement (2:137-138), even more so than the doctrine of the Incarnation (5:268). These belonged more appropriately to the “rule of prayer” articulated in the ritual rather than the “rule of faith” articulated in dogmatic theology (1:339).

Although it is true, as Newman said, that all dogmas and creeds “have a place in ritual, they are devotional acts, and of the nature of prayer, addressed to God,” (5:268) whatever the metaphors employed to the doctrine of atonement – satisfaction, deification, sacrifice – they all “spoke in the accents of worship” (3:129-144).

And as for the Holy Communion or Eucharist, perhaps “no theological theory … can adequately express this mystery, which is best apprehended by and through the worship of the church” (5:298).

Everything comes together in liturgy. Pelikan summarizes: “The place that brought together the scholarly exegesis of Scripture and the devotional recitation of Scripture, the technical dogmatic vocabulary of the erudite and the inarticulate affirmation of the simple, was the ‘melody of theology’ in the liturgy” (2:137).

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-17T06:00:00.004+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

The Relation of Words and Reality

So, there’s a difference between “real” assent and mere “notional” assent. There is also a difference between agreeing and disagreeing “really” or merely “verbally”.

Words seek to express in human language a reality that exists independent of them. Much of theological thinking – and dispute – requires as constant awareness of the relationship of words to reality. For, as history has repeatedly shown, oftentimes the thinking – or disputing – revolves around “mere words” without truly reaching the reality that is at stake.

We are told to avoid an “excessive preoccupation” with terminology (5:34), and to make sure our discussions and disputations are not “merely a dispute over words” (3:22). Anselm urged that we avoid “a quarrel about words” and stick to the substantive issues (3:230). Many stalwart theologians, such as Peter of Lombard and Duns Scotus, would consign much of theological dispute, even over the Filioque, to the category of “logomachy”, to mere dispute of words (5:34).

Everyone would agree that some differences did not pertain to dogma at all and that ways of speaking did not affect salvation. But some differences of Christology are “not merely of terminology but of doctrine” (2:57).

The controversy, for example, over whether original sin had become part of the “essence” of human nature is, most agree, “more than a quarrel over terminology” (5:35). Beyond some “methodological differences” in Trinitarian doctrine lay some “ultimate, metaphysical differences in the doctrine of God itself” (2:193). A fideist caution against logomachy can easily become an attack on doctrine itself, as in the case of Milton who questioned the entire Trinitarian orthodoxy (5:34-35).

Peter of Abelard said that although Mohammed “confesses that [Christ] is the messenger of God, the Word of God, and the Spirit of God, he does not understand or confess by the terms ‘messenger,’ ‘word,’ and ‘spirit’ what we do” (3:244).

Words are important for they point towards “something that seriously qualified” them (2:30), to the “fundamental content” of dogma (3:204).

I must, however, confess that I am lost in a hermeneutical mesh and swamped in a theological thicket.

For I cannot understand what, exactly, do we mean when we say that something is (or is not) of “fundamental content”, pertains to “the dogma itself”, conveys the “essence” of the thing, and so on.

All ways of explaining the difference between “real difference” and “difference in terms” seem to beg the question: What, precisely, constitutes this difference? How do words, even so-called “orthodox” ones, relate to the reality they seek to express (especially as this reality is, at times, nearly incomprehensible to begin with)?

Thus “clarifications” that appear (and portray) to be lucid and informative reveal, when considered more carefully, a fermenting series of serious problems of meaning and distinction. As in: “Theologians continued to recognize that the fundamental content of the dogma of transubstantiation was the doctrine of the real presence, rather than a particular philosophical definition of substance and accident” (3:204).

What an amalgam of ambiguities! What does “fundamental content” here mean? How is “real presence” less philosophical than a(nother) “philosophical definition” of the mystery?

It has sometimes been suggested that the difference between philosophical language and theological language is that theological language “contains the essence” of the reality it seeks to express. Unfortunately I have, to this day, no idea what this means.

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-16T06:00:00.002+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

“Hierarchies” of Doctrine

In addition for some kind of authority and criteria to settle the proper limits of doctrine, another thing seems to be certain as well. There seems to be some kind of “hierarchy of doctrines”, both as regards their complexity and their salvific value. These two may, or may not, coincide.

As far as complexity goes, the mysteries of the Trinity and of the Incarnation loom high up in the scale. One could say that their indirect, if not direct, role within the mystery of salvation is also extremely prominent. Perhaps only the doctrines of Redemption and with it the Atonement should be stressed more, although these cannot be comprehended without their proper relation to the Trinity and the Incarnation. And we should not forget the doctrines of the Resurrection or Ascension either…

Are, then, all so-called “levels of importance” fallacies?

Perhaps as far as the central Christian doctrines are concerned, one cannot set them in any hierarchy of importance. For they are all interdependent, organically springing from the same meta-mystery which is God himself and the drama of Creation.

But many have believed – and still do – a “domino theory” (5:57), according to which even the slightest alteration in orthodox doctrine has devastating effects, either immediately or eventually.

Without, for instance, a correct interpretation of the Eucharist, thought Durandus of Troarn, the integrity of the Christian faith was compromised and “the entire discipline of the Christian confession will perish” (3:185). Augustine taught that “who wants to be saved, must think this way about the Trinity” (2:191); for Bernard of Clairvaux the doctrine of the Trinity was not a speculative construct, or an exercise in dialectical subtlety, but “a soteriological necessity” (2:146); the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed stated, “This is the catholic faith; unless one believes it faithfully, one cannot be saved” (5:32).

In short, some doctrines are “a precondition for obtaining the salvation that is promised by religion”, as Harnack put it (5:268).

There are “fundamental truths” and “secondary truths”, and fundamental truth can not be ignored except “at cost of salvation” (5:57). But nearly everyone, albeit with varying criteria, affirms some form of distinction between “articles of faith” that pertained to salvation and “articles of doctrine” that do not (5:28).

The “lesser” articles of doctrine are not to be believed for salvation, but “for the integrity, connection, and neatness of someone’s theological system” (5:28). It is not wrong to defend “the truth and purity of doctrine, though within appropriate limits” (5:29).

“Faith” in these doctrines – whether salvific or non-salvific – has been defined in various ways. Faith refers either to the act of believing, to the content of what is believed, the basis of justification, to trust, to virtue, or to any combination of the aforementioned. Whatever the case, some form of distinction between “real” faith and “notional” or “conceptional” faith has always been held.

In fact, Newman uses precisely there terms. This is how he summarized his definition: “a dogma is a proposition; it stands for a notion or for a thing; and to believe it is to give the assent of the mind to it, as it stands for the one or for the other” (5:267). Therefore “to give a real assent to it is an act of religion; to give a notional [assent] is a theological act,” by which the “real assent” of religious faith takes intellectual form (5:267).

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-15T06:00:00.003+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

Setting the Scope of Doctrine

Church fathers of the caliber of Leo have asserted that “the birth … of Christ … passes understanding,” and therefore asked “what is it that these new scrutinizers of the secrets of God suppose that they understand” (3:17; see also 3:73).

In the face of such skepticism, whether warranted or not, one is forced to ask: Whom among us and by what criteria can acknowledge the limits and proper scope of doctrine, the line “that cannot be passed”?

It is useless to go on quoting Sirach’s admonition when, indirectly, it confirms the justification of our inner compulsion to theologize. How, then, can we decide if and when articulation of a mystery is possible and to what degree?

The outcome of Luther’s consideration of predestination, among many later Lutherans, was an admonition to “keep silent about the question as a possible source of either despair or presumption” (4:219). “Reverent silence to mystery”, in this case to the mystery of the divine will, can be considered laudable. However, if Scripture (or reason) has indeed revealed something relating to this question of God’s will (or any other question), such an admonition would “defraud the faithful”, as Calvin said it did, of something necessary and useful (4:219).

Regardless of the final answer to the particular question of God’s will, “laudable silence” does imply that there exists also such a thing as “unwarranted silence” or even “dangerous silence”. Hence, we return to the truth of the inevitability of doctrine.

In the face of “a mystery that is incomprehensible until the time of revelation,” a healthier attitude is what Calvin, quoting Nicholas of Cusa, called “learned ignorance”. The “appropriate response” to mystery is neither to pry into “what the Lord has left hidden in secret,” nor on the other hand to keep silent about “what he has brought into the open,” but to “pay attention to the word of God with awe and wonder” (4:231).

In one sense this sounds like good advice. But in another sense it does not help us one bit with our question of the scope of doctrine. For in order to follow this advice we need to, first, properly locate this “mystery”, then distinguish if it truly is “left hidden in secret” or if it “has been brought into the open”, and all on the basis of the (supposedly clear) “word of God” in Scripture. For the question remains, what doctrines fall into each of these two camps?

Theologians have tried to make a list of the “too difficult questions”. Bullinger said there are three: the two natures of Christ, the fall and the origin of evil, and the mystery of the will of God in predestination (4:231). These are certainly great mysteries, but surely not even Bullinger thought Sirach’s warning absolutely forbid the contemplation of these questions, but rather just served as a certain caution against “going too far”?

But again we are begging the question and arguing in circles, for the question remains: What is too far? And on what basis?

As of yet, we have no criteria for understanding what it means to say that “of course it is impossible to pry into ‘the inner secrets of God’ himself or to understand his mysterious will” (4:331).

One thing seems to be certain. Apart from every person's right to speculate privately, everything is pointing towards the need of some form of authority to settle these questions for the church. All easy fixes, such as a naive reliance on Sirach’s admonition or on “Scripture” and their irresponsible application, simply beg the question.

If some dogmatic questions are to be “ruled out of court” or “outlawed” (2:67) as “illegitimate” for either being “offensive” or for some other reason, there must be objective criteria and a body of authority capable of implementing these criteria. The same applies for doctrines and questions that are “legitimate”.

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-14T06:00:00.003+02:00

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-13T06:00:00.003+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

The Inadequacy of Doctrine

Doctrine relates to mystery; and mystery relates to the transcendental, what is above human reason.

Scripture, true to this fact, “spoke in a way that was not literally accurate, in order to enable its readers to grasp what transcended literal accuracy” (2:14), and “differed from later systematic theologies by refusing to [quoting Bushmill] ‘make up any formula of three or four lines’ that would attempt to encapsulate”, for example, the person and work of Christ (5:266).

“The knowledge of God was a knowledge of the unknown and the unknowable, in continuity with the witness of Scripture and the teachings of the fathers” (2:36). For Grundtvig dogmatic tradition was “not a part of the divine word separately from that which is written, but the content of Scripture itself as apprehended … by the church” (5:254).

The God to whom doctrines referred transcended philosophical categories, too.

According to Jacob of Edessa, even the terms used by the fathers and the councils – such as hypostasis and ousia – were inadequate (2:54).

In fact, all language was inadequate, biblical or philosophical or what not.

“Abstract or ‘spiritual’ language about God was not less figurative and ‘symbolic’, and hence no more literal or accurate, than concrete and physical metaphors were,” as Nicholas of Cusa recognized with special clarity (4:67). Each of the doctrines “pointed beyond itself to something that seriously qualified it”, and true “theological mystagogy” transcended dogma (2:30).

Scripture itself admonishes us: “Seek not what is too difficult for you, nor investigate what is beyond your power. Reflect upon what has been assigned to you, for you do not need what is hidden.” (Ecclus. 3:21-22).

This admonition of Sirach “not to seek what is too difficult for you” was embedded in the tradition of medieval thought (3:99). How is this possible considering that the high middle ages are considered the hay-day of speculative theology?

Upon closer look the admonition, in fact, allows a certain “investigation”. Erigena and Maximus, his spiritual master, both took it not only as an allowance but as a command to investigate (3:99). For investigation itself is, surely, the only way to know what is “too difficult” and “beyond our power” or “hidden” on the one hand, and what is “assigned to us” on the other.

Paradoxically, only by investigation can we find and set the limits of investigation.

Erigena, even as a “mystical theologian”, warns us that a conception, say, of transcendence beyond all existence, can make the name “God” meaningless (3:102). So-called negative theology which stressed the unknowability of God “refused to pry into the mysteries of the divine being”, admittedly, but it produced “a concentration on that which could be known” (2:259). It was the goal of Gregory of Palamas to protect both the unknowability and knowability of God (2:269). (Here we could ask, do dogmas pertain to what is “known” or “unknown” in God, but this is probably a false question.)

True theology is simultaneously both “negative” and “sublime” (2:32). Theology or doctrine is inadequate; but it is also inevitable.

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-12T06:00:00.003+02:00

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-11T06:00:00.002+02:00

This is an essay on the nature of doctrine. References are to Jaroslav Pelikan’s monographs on the development of Christian doctrine. Reference (3:241) would refer to volume 3, page 241.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

-- -- --

Doctrine is “Important”

“The Christian life must begin first of all with doctrine, from which faith flows,” wrote the Anabaptist theologian Balthasar Hubmaier (4:4), and most Reformers would have agreed. Henrich Bullinger, the German-Swiss Reformer, stated his axiom: “Doctrine is the most important thing, which stands out above all others” (4:4). Luther went so far as to say that some doctrines, foremost the sacraments, were so vital that whoever erred on them, “in even one point,” was to be avoided (4:178).

The Catholics and Orthodox of course agreed on this primacy of doctrine. It was pointed out at the Council of Trent that for the Protestant Reformers, too, the primary concern was the (supposed) “wrong teaching” of the church, from which the “wrong conduct” proceeded (4:247). In stressing the importance of, say, sacramental doctrine, the Catholics could be at least as adamant as Protestants (4:293).

John Henry Newman admitted that “from the age of fifteen, dogma has been the fundamental principle of my religion; I know no other religion; I cannot enter into the idea of any other sort of religion”; and he had never had any serious “temptation to be less zealous for the great dogmas of the faith” (5:267).

Clearly, then, doctrine (or dogma, as I will use these two interchangeably) is and has always been supremely important.

In this article I will not trace the development of this or that specific doctrine, but rather concentrate on “doctrine” itself and seek to better understand its significance. Where lays its importance? Individual dogmas shall come into play only in reference to this broader question. Doctrine is defined as “what the church believes, teaches, and confesses on the basis of the Word of God” (1:1).

The central theme of this essay, as stated in the title, is “the inadequacy and inevitability” of doctrine, its inherent limits and proper scope respectively.

In order to do justice to such a broad theme I shall have to consider doctrine from various angles: doctrine’s relation to mystery; what exactly constitutes the limits and proper scope of doctrine; doctrine as a “map”; the possible “hierarchies” of doctrine; and its fuller “comprehension” and fulfillment in faith, and – primarily – in worshipful liturgy and in love in action.

Throughout the article the reader will be asked to keep in mind the question (which is entertained in this series but ultimately not answered): What is the relationship of dogmatic formulations and the reality they seek to formulate? In what way can it be said that dogma “reaches” or “conveys” the reality it seeks to articulate?

The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine

2009-03-10T21:53:00.003+02:00

Over the next nine days I will publish a nine-part series on doctrine titled "The Inadequacy and Inevitability of Doctrine".

I know, I know: it sounds like a very boring and long series. For the majority of people, boringly long is what it probably will be. Come back in about two weeks for more exciting posts.

But for the weirdos who find the topic interesting (or for those of you who'll read just about anything to kill time or to escape obligations) prepare for a marathon series starting tomorrow.

1. Doctrine is “important”
2. Doctrine and mystery
3. The inadequacy of doctrine
4. The inevitability of doctrine
5. The scope of doctrine
6. “Hierarchies” of doctrine
7. The relation of words and reality
8. Liturgy as the fulfillment of doctrine
9. Love as the fulfillment of doctrine

An Update With Photos...

2009-03-06T16:25:00.003+02:00

...can be found, not here, but here. Since my brother and his family already updated their blog, I see no point in dublicating the stories told there. Whew, saves me a lot of trouble.

Some highlights from our trip from Dar es Salaam through Tanga and Moshi up to Nairobi, Kenya, and back:

Sirkku ran the Kilimanjaro half-marathon during our pit stop at Moshi, near Arusha just a few hours away from the Kenian border (photos provided).
You can, indeed, fit a Cessna plane into the back trunk of your car (photo provided).
"Overseeing" a problematic two-hour tire change under the scorching sun without any sun tan lotion is possible, but not advicable (photo provided).

The Present Economical Crisis...

2009-03-05T19:06:00.003+02:00

...forces difficult decisions. In the organisation of this picture André will probably be made redundant.

Dar es Salaam -- Tanga -- Nairobi

2009-02-25T09:00:00.008+02:00

(click photo to enlarge)

We're off to a one-week roadtrip tomorrow morning. The plan is to visit a few Youth Centers both in Tanzania and Kenya, so this is a worktrip. I'm a hired Nanny.

We leave Dar es Salaam at the break of dawn and drive north to the city of Tanga, just at the Kenyan border. There we'll spend to days and meet with some friends. On Saturday we'll continue north-west and make a pit-stop in the city of Moshi near Arusha, and continue across the border up to Nairobi on Sunday. Two days in Nairobi and then a two-day drive back to Dar with one pit-stop in Moshi.

No posting until next week, that is. But then my brother's in-laws arrive from Finland for a two-week holiday, so it'll be a happy reunion and I'll post some cool photos.

Closed Because It's Not Open

2009-02-24T06:00:00.005+02:00

A few days ago I posted a note "Overheard in Africa". Of course it should've been titled "Overread in Africa", because it included two incredible notes I have seen here in Tanzania.

Anyway, in the aftermath of that post I dared my (ex-)collegue Pia from Länsi-Auto Areena -- since 2009 renamed as Barona Areena -- to tape a note with

"The Arena is closed at the moment because it is not open"

on the entrance door.

Lo and behold, I just received an email supported by empirical evidence that proves I should be more careful about what I wish for -- or dare people to do.

Pornography -- Nectarines or Stealing?

2009-02-20T09:48:00.015+02:00

Inspired by my friend Jussi Ruokomäki's column on pornography, I am here republishing an article I wrote many years ago. It was published in a Christian forum and thus it includes Scriptural language that some non-Christians are perhaps unaccustomed to. But the central theme is universal, creed or no creed.

Pornography -- Nectarines or Stealing?

Someone once said, “God created time but man is the author of stress.” The same seems to apply to the distinction of sexual desire and lust.

Sexual desire, a beautiful and powerful gift from God, is one reason why lovers are joined and families established. Our perversion of it, lust, is one reason why lovers are separated and families destroyed.

Since you began reading this article it is probable that you either (a) belong to the vast majority of modern-day people who are infected with an attraction towards sex-words, or (b) you are battling the deceit of pornography yourself, or (c) know someone who is, or (d) any combination of the aforementioned.

It must be admitted at once that times today are highly unfavourable for those fighting sexual temptation.

Outdoors, “innocent” lingerie advertisements are on every street-corner, and indoors (after a few blocks’ walk), thanks to high-speed internet connections, any genre of pornography imaginable is just a few mouse clicks away.

Circumstances have also changed as regards the general outlook towards pornography. If you dare protest and challenge the status quo, you are often met with the murmur, like a monotonous broken record, of the beauty and legitimacy of “sex” and “art” and “freedom”.

One Christian author who was accused of harbouring “some Puritan prejudice against sex as something shameful” denied the charge. He wrote, “If I object to boys stealing my nectarines, must I be supposed to disapprove of nectarines in general? Or even of boys in general? It might, you know, be stealing that I disapprove of.”1

Nectarines, like sex and art and freedom, are all godly concepts. But that is obviously not the issue here.

The Effects of Pornography

Counsellors around the world speak in unison when they report the number of clients suffering from porn-addiction growing at an alarming speed. That is the first thing pornography does: it enslaves.

The symptoms of addiction are well known. With every gratification the satisfaction diminishes but the crave increases. The cycle leads to shame, helplessness, isolation, and eventually to despair.

The second thing pornography does is it distorts reality. By surgical and computer enhancement women are turned into something they are not, and by advertisement it is made sure that men develop a taste for the distortion. The sex industry – often also called, tragicomically, “adult entertainment” – is built on deception.2

The third thing pornography does is it destroys a woman's (often a wife's) self-esteem. This is not surprising considering the distorted model of a woman’s figure (and sexual appetite) that the pornography industry has conjured. But this only partly explains the wife’s anguish.

The other part is what one author calls “an affair of the mind.”3 The impact of pornography is similar to that of infidelity – and, as we will read later, according to Scripture, infidelity is its rightful definition. (And singles sometimes believe the fallacy that lust is left at the altar. It is not.)

Fourthly, pornography devalues sex. This is how a former porn-addict sees it: “Pornography provides a one-sided relationship [that consumes the] God-given energy that’s planted in us to move us towards … our spouse. Sexual release through pornography separates us from our spouse.”4

Relationships require more time, more energy, more commitment, more vulnerability, more trust.

Fifthly, pornography is expensive. According to statistics, pornography purchased by Christian men is most often destroyed within 24 hours after it has been viewed.5 (But in addition to great contentment, Christian men bring great fear into the heart of the pornography industry: they know that by pulling out our money we could severely cripple it.)

The list of pornography’s perils is endless. Pornography kills careers; pornography feeds organised crime; pornography destroys women in the sex industry; pornography may lead to other forms of sexual immorality; pornography addiction can be passed (fathers awake!) to the next generation.

Most importantly, pornography grieves the heart of God -- and kills a testimony. This we need to examine more closely.

A Biblical Perspective

I once read somewhere that the definition of “man” is “to be tempted”. We can cautiously laugh at this. It is important to understand that temptation is not sin.

Men are visual beings. Samson’s first recorded words in Scripture are, “I saw a woman … [and] she look[ed] good to me” (Judg 14:2-3). This may have been legitimate admiration of beauty. But when later we read that Samson went to Gaza and “saw a harlot there, and went in to her” (Judg 16:1.2) we know that “saw” meant “was tempted” and “went in” meant “lusted and fell”.

As regards pornography, sin begins the moment we wilfully decide to give in to temptation. We may be consoled by the fact that Samson, who “lusted and fell” several times, was eventually greatly used by God. Even David, who had a man murdered to cover up his sexual sin (Sam 11:22-24), was “a man after God’s own heart”.6

One man who – since the Apostles – has influenced Christianity more than any other, remembers his prayer of younger years: “Lord, give me chastity and continence, but not yet.”7

As we can see, “no temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man” (1 Cor 10:13a).

But let's not belittle Scripture’s warnings. Some of the strongest passages deal with sexual immorality. Here is one: “But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when the lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when the sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.” (Jam 1:14-16.)

“Death?” I hear someone ask incredulously. On the question of whether or not salvation can be lost, we Christians are of different opinions. But as regards the particular sin being discussed, many deaths have been mentioned already. The death of freedom, the death of reality, the death of wives’ self-esteem, of marriages, of families, the death of finances, the death of careers, the death of individuals’ personhoods, the (ever increasing) death of Christian testimonies.

When we study this list it is perhaps not difficult to understand how pornography grieves the heart of God.

The most loving words in history were uttered by Jesus. But he could be equally frightening: “Whoever looks at a woman lustfully has committed adultery with her in his heart” ( Mt 5:28). We now understand the connection between pornography and infidelity.

But there is never justified reason for discouragement. There is forgiveness out there; and there is hope of victory. Before considering practical steps we need to acknowledge that temptation won’t go away. Our nature is corrupt and Satan won’t give up. After tempting Jesus, Satan left only to return at “an opportune time” (Lk 4:13).

Battling pornography – and battling sin in general – involves losses. Battles may be lost, but with Jesus the war campaign as a whole is glorious in victory. Though apart from God’s grace our efforts are futile, God’s will is that, by our will, we may participate in the campaign.

Virtue – say, fortitude against sexual sin – is not developed instantly. Virtue develops habitually. After each fall, get up, repent, and try again. And again. And again. Forever. Never give up.

Breaking the Cycle

Scripture is full of practical advice on how to decrease the number of falls. Job made “a covenant with [his] eyes never to look lustfully at a woman” (Job 31:1.2). If you sense that lust is near, look away. With pornography, lust is the starting point, so do not look at all.

Timothy was told to “flee from youthful lusts, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart” (Tim 2:22).This is a double-advice: it tells us what not to do and what to do instead.

We may ask, “What glory is there in fleeing?” Fleeing is standing firm. In fact, fleeing is often the most difficult – and thus most respectable – response to temptation. One priest put it this say: “Don't be such a coward as to be brave!”

If your stumbling block is late night television and your virtue (habit) of self-control is not strong enough, get rid of your television. Most likely a great source of distress is the internet. If you truly “need” it, if it is vital for your work and correspondence, have a powerful filter installed (by someone else).

We are bombarded from every direction, but there is much that we can do to defend ourselves. A key element is to understand what pattern of temptation-and-fall we go through, and then to take the necessary precautions.

“If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell” (Mt 5:29). “God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, that you may be able to endure it” (1 Cor 10:13).

Counter-offensive is equally powerful. The truth is that we are not immune to outside influence. But we can decide what we are influenced by.

Our mind, which is the origin of all actions, continuously entertains a number of thoughts. When it is full of thoughts, say, G, O, and D, thoughts S, I, and N will find it difficult to enter.

Paul told Timothy, “Pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” This is exactly the point Paul is talking about when he, in his (confident and joyful) letter to the Philippians, concludes, “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is right, whatever is good, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things” (Philip. 4:8).

Bringing sin into the “light” is also vital for healing. Secrecy empowers sin. The “light” is God, yes, but it must also include Christian friends and family; perhaps even a counsellor. Knowing that one is not alone is consoling as well.8 Shame is a small price for freedom.

The anguish people who battle against porn-addition cause their loved-ones is great. But the anguish of the addict is immense. Family members and friends may want to remember that they can offer much-needed support by love and forgiveness.

Pornography users are both victims and culprits. Because they are victims they need support and love. Because they are culprits they need forgiveness. Forgiving is not condoning.

I hope that reading so far has fuelled the reader’s urge to fight relentlessly against pornography – firstly, in their own life, and secondly, everywhere else.

References
1. C. S. Lewis, We Have No ‘Right to Happiness’, paragraph 21. Lewis was, in fact, referring to adultery. He felt that “[e]very unkindness and breach of faith seems to be condoned provided that the object aimed at is ‘four bare legs in a bed’. It is like having a morality in which stealing fruit is considered wrong – unless you steal nectarines.”
2. Pornography is also often called “adult entertainment”. The actual etymology of the word ‘pornography’ is perhaps more revealing. Pornos, a Greek word, means “a prostitute and the sexual activity with such a person”, and graphe, also Greek, means “writing” and includes images. Another tragicomic new word is ‘gentleman’s club’. According to my Webster’s Encyclopaedic Unabridged Dictionary, a ‘gentleman’ is a “civilized, educated, sensitive, and well-mannered man.” Replacing strip joints with gentleman’s clubs is using an oxymoron.
3. Laurie Hall, An Affair of the Mind.
4. Henry J. Rogers, The Silent War, book 13, chapter 2, paragraph 3.
5. Henry J. Rogers, The Silent War, book 13, chapter 1, paragraph 17.
6. It is a horror to know that David nevertheless paid for his sin with the death of his child (2 Samuel 12:14).
7. Augustine, Confessions, book 8, chapter 7, paragraph 2. Augustine continues, “For I was afraid that you would answer my prayer at once and cure me from the disease of lust, which I wanted satisfied, not quelled.” Confessions is one of the first Christian spiritual autobiographies, and Augustine’s moment of conversion is one of the most well-known.
8. Actually, “not alone” is an understatement, as pornography addiction is already an epidemic.

Overheard in Africa

2009-02-16T13:12:00.004+02:00

Everyone knows that the English language, in the hands of Chinese, is eternally flexible and entertaining. But English à la Tanzanians comes very close. Here's two examples that I've seen. There are many more.

A note at the airport of Zanzibar:

Our air station is under rehabilitation exercizes. We apologize for inconvenienting you.
--Management

A note on a bank door:

The bank is closed at the moment because it is not open.
--Manager

School Massacre Prayer

2009-02-11T06:00:00.001+02:00

Now I sit me down in school
Where praying is against the rule.
For this great nation under God
Finds mention of Him very odd.
If Scripture now the class recites,
It violates the Bill of Rights.
And anytime my head I bow
Becomes a federal matter now.
Our hair can be purple or orange or green,
That's no offense, it's the freedom scene.
The law is specific, the law is precise,
Prayers spoken aloud are a serious vice.
For praying in a public hall
Might offend someone with no faith at all.
In silence alone we must meditate,
God's name is prohibited by the State.
We're allowed to cuss & dress like freaks,
And pierce our noses, tongues & cheeks.
They've outlawed guns; but FIRST the Bible.
To quote the Good Book makes me liable.
We can elect a pregnant Senior Queen,
And the unwed daddy, our Senior King.
It's "inappropriate" to teach right from wrong,
We're taught that such "judgments" do not belong.
We can get our condoms, & birth controls,
Study witchcraft, vampires & totem poles.
But the Ten Commandments are not allowed,
No Word of God must reach this crowd.
It's scary here I must confess,
When chaos reigns the school's a mess.
So, Lord, this silent plea I make:
Should I be shot, My soul please take.

[Written by a student from Columbine High]

Linda and Henrik: Engaged!

2009-02-09T06:00:00.002+02:00

My lovely friends Linda and Henrik ("Henkka") have got engaged. Our circle of friends rejoice! I've known Henkka for a millenium, Linda for a decade or so, and Henkka and Linda have dated for a century. Apparently the idea is to have "a small wedding on a beach somewhere". I wonder if they're trip to Australia and the Far East a few years ago influenced this decision. The photo above is from Finland and the photo below (I think) is from Australia.

Holy Communion---Wine or Juice?

2009-02-06T13:48:00.026+02:00

It is a well known (and laudatory) fact that Christ's first miracle was turning water into wine. It also a well known (and lamentable) fact that throughout history some Christians have been trying to un-do this miracle by turning wine back into water.

One expression of this “undoing the miracle” is the rejection -- against the 2000 year Christian tradition -- of using wine for the commemoration of the Last Supper which we call the Holy Communion, the Lord's Supper, or the Eucharist.

(The greatest of Christian heresies, Islam, went even further: it forbid wine altogether. I am using the word “heresy” in the technical sense: Mohammed, in his conversion from heathenism to Islam, learned his knowledge of “Christianity” from heretical monks and incorporated Jewish elements into his faith.)

The driving force behind an attempt to “undo Christ's miracle” is, unsurprisingly, not altogether Christ-ian. In some instances it echoes an anti-Christian prejudice. Although Scripture speaks univocally against misuses of wine, it is as unanimous in its approval of wine itself. Christ himself, our Lord and God incarnate, both made and drank wine; Paul adviced Timothy to mix wine with his drinking water to help him recover from some stomach problems; and so on.

I hope there's not too many unfriendly critics who think that I and other Christians who object to using juice instead of wine are “upset just because they can't have alcohol”.

The “paradox of puritanism” is that by denying something that is actually justified, the negative consquences outweigh the positive.

One negative consequence of adopting juice instead of wine is -- and this is pretty hard to explain but I'll try -- the making of the Holy Communion even less meaningful and profound than it already is in some churches.

It sends the message: We can change our customs, especially our customs that deal with bodily functions and outward signs, however we want to -- because after all, the Christian life is “spiritual”, not material. The Holy Communion is “only spiritual”, baptism is “only spiritual”, and so on.

This is not Christian at all. According to Christianity, a man has -- no, he is -- a soul and a body. You can distinguish between them conceptually, but in reality they are inseparable, man is a composite being, not a dualistic being. The soul is not the “good” part and the body the “bad” part, as Hinduism, Buddhism and early Christian heresies (Gnosticism and Manicheanism) teach. Man was made “good”, body and soul.

The “flesh” (as opposite of “spirit”) has never in authentic Christian understanding referred to the body -- “flesh” refers to fallen man in his totality, body and soul, insofar as he is opposed to God.

Similarly, the “world” (as opposite to “the kingdom of God”) has never in authentic Christian understanding referred to the creation -- “world” refers to the structures in creation and our societies insofar as they are against the will of God.

Of course, if a church does the other extreme -- replaces wine not with juice but with vodka -- the results would be as catastrophic. But in a different way: instead of Muslim puritanism we'd have alcoholism to deal with. Forced absolutism and alcoholism both spring from a certain “abuse” of alcohol.

So, as with everything, better just to follow Christ and avoid both extremes.

Thankful For Housework

2009-02-05T12:39:00.005+02:00

I used to gripe about the job of doing household chores
But thanks to television news I don't gripe anymore

In every land and country there are people in despair
So now all of my household chores I do with loving care

The dishes and the pots and pans I do on aching feet
I gladly do because it means we have enough to eat

The sheets I change the beds I make no longer do I dread
Because of this it means that we sleep in a nice warm bed

Vacuuming and dusting scrubbing dirty floors and walls
Means there's a roof above my head so I don't mind at all

And then there's dirty laundry endless baskets to attack
But that just means my family has enough clothes on their back

That's why I'm thankful for housework, I'm blessed abunduntly
Compared to others in the world I see on my TV

Home Alone

2009-02-04T17:12:00.006+02:00

My host family left to Uganda today. They will return on Sunday. That means that "baba mkubwa" (big daddy) has the house to himself and can party all he wants! Instead of getting up at seven and studying till five in the evening, I can get up at seven and study for as long as I want - even to nine in the evening if I want to. Later, I might treat myself with a glass of whisky and a game of darts with my friend Jani (on the left).

ECLD goes Wikipedia

2009-02-03T06:00:00.002+02:00

An update on our "Virtuous Leadership" project:

The Wikipedia articles

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandre_Havard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtuous_Leadership

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Center_for_Leadership_Development

have been created.

Several translations (e.g. French, Finnish) are already complete, but we intend to wait before publishing them. We need to work further on the English files first.

What is Worship?

2009-02-01T06:30:00.002+02:00

I thought that a Sunday would be a proper day to ask a basic question that pertains to all Christians, whether layman or theologian. The question is:

What is worship?

As I read volume two, The Spirit of Eastern Christendom, of Jaroslav Pelikan's five-part history of the development of Christian doctrine, there were two questions that loomed large in my mind. The other one which I won't discuss here was “What is the point of dogma?” Both this and “What is worship?” are theological questions that seem simple. Almost too simple to entertain seriously, but when further reflected on, they prove to be absolutely fundamental for every Christian. I was hoping to find, if not proper answers to them, at least a satisfactory articulation of the questions themselves.

Indeed, what is worship? What exactly do we mean when we say we “worship” God?

We Christians believe that worship is the proper response of creature towards Creator. We believe that worship is the primary calling of man in relation to God. One could say that love is this primary calling. Yes, worship and love may be treated as one. Both overlap each other, and both are prerequisites for happiness in the truest sense (“human flourishing”). And happiness includes (but is not limited to) eternal happiness.

We also believe that the object of worship must be the “true God”, not our construction of him, otherwise we worship and idol (in other words we are “idolizers”). Also, not only the object of worship but worship itself must be “true” or “right”, otherwise it is imperfect at best and meaningless at worst (making us unjust towards our Creator to whom, and only to whom, true worship is due).

Now, what constitutes worship? Here’s a sub-question: how does worship towards God differ from a proper disposition towards other things, like people?

Some distinctions

Catholics make a distinction between “worship” and “veneration”. The first, when applied to God is proper, and when applied to people (mainly to saints, “our forefathers in faith”) is not only improper but also a mortal sin. The second, when applied to saints is proper, and when applied to God is either proper or, when not accompanied by worship, meaningless.

Thus far the distinction, however, is only of terminology. Where lies the “real” difference, the difference in terms of “substance”, the difference that counts, the difference that can be experienced and observed in reality? What, exactly, is reserved for God only that is constituent of worship and not of veneration? In other words, what is the heart of worship?

Is the difference between worship and veneration a difference of type or a difference of quality? To use an analogy, is veneration a mild electric current which, as it grows stronger, approaches worship (difference of “quality”), or is veneration a mild electric current and worship something quite different, like fire (difference of “type”)?

If the difference is that of quality, “proper worship” would be a “proper order of worship” – God merits our highest worship, and lesser things merit lower worship. In traditional theology, such an “order of loves” (ordo amoris) is very common. But if the difference is that of type, we need to clarify more precisely what these two types – worship and veneration – are. I will not discuss the type option here.

An “order” of loves and worship

What, then, if the difference is that of quality?

We have treated worship and love as nearly synonymous. What follows is an order of love. Loving objects in the proper order is the (or a) key of right worship.

Is this backed by Scripture? It would seem so. The disciples asked Jesus of the “proper order of commandments”. “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:29-31.)

Implicit in Jesus’ answer is an order of loves: the most important thing is to love God, and secondly, you must love your neighbor as yourself. The right order is the “measure” and difference of proper worship and veneration: if the order is wrong, worship and veneration become corrupted in some sense.

We must remember that the type of love we are here discussing is charity or agape, divine self-sacrificing love, the word John used when he said that “God is love [agape]”. When we love (agape) our neighbor, we love them through God (who is the source of love) and we love God through them (who are images of God) provided the order of our loves is proper. In this way these two commandments form one “great commandment”. They are two sides of the same coin.

Faithfulness and sacrifice

So, we’ve established an order of things. What else can be said? By connecting love to worship and by establishing an order of love/worship we’ve found part of the answer to our question. But, the core of the question still remains: What, exactly, is love (or worship)?

Jesus provides another key when he says that: “If you love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15) and: “The person who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me” (John 14:21). This is helpful. Love (or worship) is doing the will of God. (Here I am not going to ask if obeying, “works”, is merely the fruit of love, “faith”. I take it that they are organically connected.)

Continuing with the quality paradigm, we can add sacrifice as one constituent of love/worship. It is remembered that agape is self-sacrificial. Now, what is sacrifice? This is a difficult question, and I will not attempt an answer here. But one thing can be confidently stated. Our presuppositions imply that sacrifice belongs to the quality category (not to “type”), because sacrifice is a constituent of love/worship.

From this it follows that, if the “order” is right, sacrifice can be directed and offered both to the Creator and to the creature. This makes sense: humans often “make sacrifices” for each other, especially for spouses and children, and we commend them for that.

Summa summarum

We left many important questions unanswered. But, if the difference between worship and veneration is that of quality, at least we’ve established a few things.

We know that worship, veneration, and love are all intimately connected. Their legitimacy or illegitimacy depends on the proper order of their objects. Love/worship of God implies doing God’s will. Lastly, love/worship is sacrifice (whatever that is).

So, when we say that we “worship God”, if our words are backed by our whole being, we are saying at least the following: that we love him, that we love him above all else, that we love our neighbors as ourselves, that we live by his will, and that our love is sacrificial.

We understand that we haven’t said what “sacrifice” is, and we understand that loving God requires knowing him (we cannot love that what we don’t know – worship/love requires the right object).

Any extra light from Pelikan?

Now, I must say that The Spirit of Eastern Christendom offered no new insights to the question of worship. Well, it didn’t have to as it was a book on the development of dogma, not a book on basic theological questions. The author must have presumed that the readers know the answers to elementary theological questions, like what is worship. I didn’t. I don’t.

In the chapter on icons, “Images of the Invisible”, Pelikan uses “worship” and “veneration” interchangeably (see e.g. pp. 96-99, 106). That is very odd. Why would he do that? I doubt that a theologian of his caliber would not distinguish between them in his private thinking, so it must be presumed that he is trying to faithfully follow the belief of his sources as it chronologically developed.

For early on in the chapter we have the only (yet still minimalist) definition of worship: it is “paying honor” (p. 103). The definition, though welcome, remains a mere verbal one and begs the question: What, then, is “paying honor”? But later, a need for clarification and distinction becomes clearer. Eastern theologians made it clear that “it was one thing to pay proper respect [τιμή] to the saints, quite another to address worship [προσκύνησις] to them, and yet another to portray them in worshipful images” (p. 112). But this distinction too, though welcomed, remains one of mere terminology.

Attempted articulation

Eventually the question that bothers me is raised in a straightforward manner. The italics are mine.

The orthodox “were obliged to set forth a theory of worship that would protect the uniqueness of the worship of the true God and yet permit other acts of reverence”. When iconoclasts argued that “there is only one kind of worship, not many kinds,” the orthodox replied that “this is true of the worship of adoration [λατρευτική]” but that the worship of mortals “was nevertheless permissible by analogy and derivation from the single worship of God”. There was a “worship of adoration, which we pay only to the God who is by nature adorable”, but there was also a worship paid to “the friends and worshipers of God” for his (God’s) sake, because of “their derivative divine nature; this included both angels and saints”. “Adoration pertained only to God, but either by love or by reverence or by law one was also bound to other to whom one paid worshipful respect. This distinction was grounded in biblical evidence about worship paid to creatures by men whose adoration of the one true God was beyond reproach.” (p. 126.)

Yet the exact difference between “worshipful adoration of God” and “worshipful respect of saints” remains unclear. All we can take away from these clarifications is that “worshipful adoration” of God means worshiping him for his own sake; whereas “worshipful respect” of saints means worshiping not for their own sake but for God’s sake.

In light of the type/quality distinctions above, these really amount to neither. They’re not, strictly speaking, different types of worship, nor are they worship of different quality. Rather, there’s a difference in one’s basic attitude and understanding of why one worships. Does one worship the object for its own sake or for the sake of something beyond the object?

Question left unanswered

If this is really what we are looking at, it is no wonder that the “accusation of idolatry and the response to it struck at a deep and sensitive point in Christian belief” (p. 127).

Cyril of Alexandria rejected any “adoration or worship of them [images of saints]” (p. 284) but from this we cannot make out whether Cyril took adoration and worship to mean different things or the same thing (in either case, he rejected it). And since no explanation has been offered as to how the different kinds of worships differ concretely (mere use of different words does not count), even these potentially helpful passages shed no new light on the problem:

“The worship paid to them [images] was an act of ‘honor [τιμή],’ not one of ‘adoration [λατρεια]’” (p. 291). “[W]hile the worship paid to the icons was one of honor rather than of adoration, the worship paid to the Eucharist was one of adoration rather than merely of honor, because the presence in the Eucharist was that of the Lord himself” (p. 291).

Elementary Math

2009-01-31T08:03:00.006+02:00

How much is 300,000 euros divided by TWO?

300,000 / 2 = ___________

(Hint)

(Answer: 0 euros.)

An Unforgettable Dinner

2009-01-26T00:01:00.011+02:00

If ever the platitude "a picture speaks more than a thousand words" applies, it does so here. What in the world is happening in this picture?

We'll, we've been on the deserted island for way over a month by this time. Almost everyone's lost a lot of weight. The competition that preluded this (brim-)full-course meal involved oily liquid, as those of you with keen eyes can notice. We had to transfer a lot of melted butter in our mouths. Anyway, the two best competitors (Markku on the left) were entitled to -- get this -- a four-hour Roman style dinner on the beach under the evening sun, accompanied by a private chef (I don't know where they got him from), real chairs, a grill, and -- get this too -- the remaining competitors chained to a bench a few feet away from the table. They had to witness the entire feast without a bite (we offered the meal to them, but the production crew didn't allow it). The women -- Jasna, Mira, and Elena -- were really good sport about it. In fact they gave us some culinary suggestions.

And boy did we have a lot to choose from. You can see rye bread, white bread, cheese and other toppings, eggs, beef and pork and chicken in various different forms, olives, potatoes, sausages (HK sininen all the way from Finland!), fish (silli etc.), rice, sauces, most fruits you can name, and so on. For drinks we had water, beer, red wine, white wine, mineral water, club sodas, and (naturally) whisky and brandy. For dessert -- well we started the whole meal with strawberry ice-cream so it wouldn't melt, but in addition to that we had chocolates (managed so smuggle a few for the women), cakes, and Cuban cigars.

Every fifteen minutes we'd take a "break" (=run into the jungle, our bodies weren't used to food), and all through the next night I wanted to throw up but refused to on grounds of "not wasting it". Really, an unforgettable experience. One of the many we experienced during those 44 incredible days (summer of 2005).

In the Air and Under Water

2009-01-24T00:01:00.006+02:00

This is what it looks like when a three-year-old boy falls into water from 10 feet. How did he ever get that high? Uncle Jason threw him, of course. The first picture looks cool but kind of scary. But the second picture, a closer shot, reveals that the patient -- Benjamin -- is fine. He's more than fine!

Reflections on Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition"

2009-01-22T06:00:00.003+02:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

Two more items remain to be discussed in this last part. The first involves “forcing categories of later thought upon earlier eras” and my inability to understand what the author means by this. The second is a weakness in his analysis of Boethius’ Consolation of Philosophy – a weakness which does not, however, cast a shadow on the author’s expertise but rather serves as a gentle reminder (to any reader in awe with his theological and literary finesse) that no one is perfect.

“Mind Your Century”

Pelikan habitually reminds us, the readers, and himself, the historian, “not to superimpose later categories of thought” to earlier centuries.

For example, as regards the doctrine of the Eucharist, this means that “the effort to cross-examine the fathers of the second and third century about where they stood in the controversies of the ninth or sixteenth century is both silly and futile” (p. 167). Later: “It is incorrect … to attribute to Augustine either a scholastic doctrine of transubstantiation or a Protestant doctrine of symbolism, for he taught neither – or both – and both were able to cite his authority” (p. 305). On another topic: “It is too facile to dismiss this [the theory of the indwelling Logos] as ‘Pelagianism before Pelagius,’ for it did not really fit into the categories of the Western development” (p. 285).

On one hand, the principle of “not superimposing later categories” and the principle’s implementations above sound reasonable. Yet scruples against this principle remain, to some degree.

For we clearly cannot mean that earlier generations could have nothing to say about later generations’ interests, or that later generations cannot (and should not ex principio) seek the opinion of earlier generations. Is not much of theology “bound” (or aided) by this way, in that it seeks the faith of “our forefathers in the faith”?

My question, therefore, is: What are the ground rules for deciding when it is possible and when it is not possible to do so? If Pelikan follows some clear-cut methodology, he does so silently, and neither my skill nor time allowed its explicit recovery.

Boethius and his Consolation of Philosophy

For those of you who don't know him, Boethius was a Christian philosopher who lived in the 6th century. He was tortured to death in 525 by the king of Ostrogoths. His Consolation of Philosophy is one of the timeless world classics.

Unfortunately this last part must be updated later. Here in Dar es Salaam (where I'm writing), I do not have C. S. Lewis' The Discarded Image. In it he explains, as a literary historian and critic, why he does not believe that Boethius wrote his Consolation of Philosophy in prison, as many - or most - have supposed.

Consquently, if it can be showed that it is doubtful that Boethius wrote it in prison, the question posed by perplexed Christians and excited secular philosophers, "Why would Boethius, in the hour of his death, find consolation in philosophy, and not in theology?" becomes irrelevant.

It's not that he doesn't find consolation in theology (or simply "faith"); it simply means that he - as a free Christian writer - wanted to write a book on the consolation of philosophy. Writing a book, "The Pleasure of Movies" does not mean you don't think books are pleasurable. In fact you may think books are more pleasurable than movies.

Reflections on Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition"

2009-01-20T06:01:00.025+02:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

Open Questions, #1: Mystery vs. doctrine

In my earlier essay on Bernhard Lohse’s A Short History of Doctrine, I mentioned the relationship of “doctrine” and “mystery” as one question that intrigues me, and to which I hope to find some light during the course of the new studies I have undertaken. What do we mean when we say, for instance, that “doctrinal formulations do not seek to ‘unravel’ the mystery”? So, naturally, as I flipped through Pelikan’s pages I was on the lookout for glimpses of light. None were forthcoming, unfortunately.

For a split second I thought I saw something in Gregory of Nyssa’s treatment of the mystery of the Trinity:

“Even Gregory of Nyssa, philosophically the most brilliant and bold of the three Cappadocians, stopped short of providing a speculative solution for the relation of the One and the Three [within the mystery of the Trinity] or of the distinctions between the properties of the One and those of the Three.”

Gregory’s fundamental axiom was, in his own words: “Following the instructions of Holy Scripture, we have been taught that [the nature of God] is beyond names and human speech. We say that every [divine] name, be it invented by human customs or handed on to us by the tradition of the Scriptures, represents our conceptions of the divine nature, but does not convey the meaning of the divine nature in itself.” (p. 222.)

So, doctrines (“our conceptions of divine nature”) do not touch the mystery (“convey the meaning of that nature in itself”). Why, then, do we bother speaking about it? And where, if anywhere, is it possible to reach the “nature in itself”?

Does Pelikan offer a tentative answer in the end of his treatment of the mystery of the Trinity?

“Gregory of Nyssa was willing to look for rational supports in his reflection on the One and the Three; but if none were forthcoming, it was most important to [quoting Gregory himself] ‘guard the tradition we have received from the fathers, as ever sure and immovable, and seek from the Lord a means of defending our faith.’ The dogma of the Trinity was enshrined in the liturgy and, if one read them aright, documented in the Scriptures. Now it was the task of theology to defend it, to reflect upon it. In one sense, the dogma in of the Trinity was the end result of theology, for it brought together many of the themes of the preceding development. But in another sense, it was the starting point.” (p. 223–4, italics mine.)

I am still left puzzled and frustrated. However, as I glance at the content pages (disposition) of volume two, The Spirit of Eastern Christendom, the titles of some chapters leave me hopeful: “Knowing the Unknowable”, “Images of the Invisible”, and “The Mystic as New Theologian”. We'll see.

Open Questions, #2: Free will vs. predestination

Another question I was hoping to find answers to was the ever frustratingly difficult doctrine of predestination – predestination in general and Augustine’s beliefs about predestination in particular.

But I left the building in exactly the same condition I had entered it: lost in a doctrinal maze and openly grudging the ambivalence of Augustine’s treatment of this difficult topic.

My experience of reading Augustine’s City of God is similar to that of Pelikan’s. It seems frustratingly ambiguous. Sometimes Augustine seems to side with free will; but soon after he’ll put forth a strong doctrine of double predestination.

Pelikan writes: “As part of the apologetics in his City of God, Augustine sought to distinguish the Christian-Pauline understanding of predestination from pagan fatalism, arguing that the decisions of the human will were part of the ‘order of causes’ included in the divine prescience. But even in this book he came eventually to include the human will in the order of effects of the divine predestination.” (p. 297.)

Augustine received opposition from orthodox theologians to his doctrine of predestination even during his own lifetime:

“Fundamentally, the objection was that Augustine had resolved the paradox of inevitability and responsibility at the expense of responsibility, and that he glorified grace by belittling nature and free will. [Quoting Faustus of Riez] ‘If you pay careful attention, you will recognize clearly and abundantly how through the pages of the Scriptures sometimes it is the power of grace and at other times it is the assent of the human will that is asserted.’ Grace and freedom stood in antinomy… which ‘the rule of the church’s faith’ did not permit to resolve at all. It was a violation of the rule of faith and of the teaching of the fathers to teach, as Augustine did, that God called only the elect in accordance with his decree.” (p. 320.)

According to Faustus of Riez, the Augustinian doctrine was not merely novel and heretical, it was finally heathen. It was a “fatalistic theory”. It spoke a great deal about grace, but “in the name of grace [Augustine] preaches fatalism”. “But fatalism,” Pelikan comments, “even under the guise of the Christian doctrine of predestination, would lead to conclusions that any Christian would find repugnant” (p. 320).

It is this fatalistic shadow that has worried so many Christians thereafter, and which any account of predestination - be it Calvinist or Catholic - must seek to overcome.

In times of theological “battle fatigue” I am tempted to say in unison with Faustus, “the rule of faith does not allow its resolution”, or with Cassian – paraphrased by Pelikan – “[b]y the goodness of the Creator there still remained the capacity to initiate the will for salvation. The mistake was to reduce the complex and diverse operations of God to a single formula such as Pelagian synergism [human free will and divine providence work together] or Augustinian predestinarianism [divine providence predestines other to heaven and others to hell].” (p. 324.)

Pelikan concludes, “the paradox of grace, which had lain at the center of Augustine’s theology, was not resolved” (p. 328), but “Augustine’s anti-Pelagian doctrine of grace became the official teaching of Latin Christianity” (p. 329).

Yet “[m]uch of Western theology since ... has oscillated between these two poles [notions of human merit and initiative vs. strict providence], and we shall have to write its history (to paraphrase Whitehead’s epigram about Plato) as ‘a series of footnotes’ to Augustine” (p. 330).

It may be worth adding, that in many ways “Augustine managed to hold together what Augustinians have often tended to separate” (p. 306).

Reflections on Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition"

2009-01-18T06:00:00.004+02:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

Though much of what I read in Pelikan’s first volume was familiar content-wise, I did learn a few new things. The first concerned the “parousia” (Christ’s return to earth), the second involved the surprising chronological relationship of some major doctrines (infant baptism, virgin birth, original sin), and the third regarded the Byzantine emperor Justinian (482/3–565) as “a theologian”.

The delay of Christ's return

The first generation of Christians was expecting the imminent return of Christ within its own lifetime. When it became apparent that this would not happen, they were very much “shocked” – or so I have always thought. But Pelikan says this is not the whole truth.

“It would be a gross exaggeration of the evidence to describe the eclipse of the apocalyptic vision as ‘catastrophic’ for the generation that followed the apostles. Any such description is based on too simplistic a view of the role of apocalyptic in the teaching of Jesus and in the life of the church. Nor is it corroborated by later texts, for one looks in vain for proof of a bitter disappointment over the postponement of the parousia or of a shattering of the early Christian communities by the delay in the Lord’s return.” (p. 123–4.)

What the texts do suggest is “a shift within the polarity of already/not yet and a great variety of solutions to the exegetical and theological difficulties caused by such a shift” (p. 124).

What is more, the evidence suggests that the hope for Christ’s return did not eclipse as quickly and as completely as some theologians have indicated in the past. Lastly, there is “striking evidence not only that the millenarian hope continued in the church after the apostolic age, but also that, probably from the beginning, it stood in tension with other descriptions of the reign of Christ, which were not as privy to the details of the timetable for this reign.” (p. 125.)

Why do we believe this?

Then to the second piece of new understanding I received. I, like presumably many other Christians, have always thought (subconsciously or consciously) that the doctrines/teachings of the virgin birth of Jesus and of infant baptism developed upon a prior understanding of the fall and original sin. Human nature carried the consequences of Adam’s fall (original sin), and thus, because Christ was a perfect (sinless) human being, he had to have been vouchsafed from original sin (hence the virgin birth) and mankind could be cleansed of it through baptism (hence infant baptism).

Pelikan, however, argues that this is not the case: first came the practice of infant baptism and the belief in the virgin birth, then came the speculations and teachings about the fall and original sin.

“Two themes from the cultus [life and practice of the church] probably deserve to be singled out for their bearing upon the dilemma of Christian anthropology: the confession of the virgin birth of Christ and the practice of infant baptism.”

He continues: “Both themes were present in the life and language of the church before they were ever exploited for their anthropological import; at least there appears to be little or no warrant, on the basis of evidence available now, to argue that they were derived from a previously defined theory of the fall and original sin. But given their increasingly secure place in cultus and confession, they became the premises from which conclusions could be drawn about the fall and original sin.” (p. 286.)

Emperor of Byzantine, Justinian I

Third and last on my “something new” list is Justianian I, emperor of Byzantine. I must confess that I knew nothing of him prior to my engagement to Pelikan’s monographs.

Least of all did I know that he could be described “[i]n many ways [as] the most representative spokesman for catholic orthodoxy in the East” (p. 341). Not only because he was a “Christ-loving Christian emperor”, but because – and here Pelikan quotes H. Beck – in Justinian, “as hardly ever again in a Byzantine emperor, politics, administration, and theology are combined” (p. 341).

Some may find this description appalling and sinister; I find it inspiring.

Other authoritative sources tell me that he is considered a saint in amongts Eastern Orthodox Christians, and is also commemorated by the Lutheran Church.

Reflections on Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition"

2009-01-16T06:00:00.013+02:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

The ethical element

“Faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love” – to which Pelikan adds, “[yes] love, and not faith, certainly not doctrine. The church is always more than a school”. But “the church cannot be less than a school” either (p. 1).

Here one thinks of people emphasizing God’s “unknowable depth”, his “unknowability” as it were. Theology which describes God in terms of “what he is not” is called “negative” theology (apophatic theology). “God is not a person in the same way that we are,” it is said. Yes, it is true, God is much more than a person; but he is not less than a person. True negative theology is fully aware of this, as C. S. Lewis points out in a humorous analogy in his essay “Transpositions”.

Theology and ethics are inseparable (p. 1), just as “faith” and “works” are inseparable. One may add: also, just as “intellectual” and “moral” virtues are inseparable. Inseparable does not, however, mean indistinguishable: you can talk about one (theology, faith, intellectual virtues) without the other (ethics, works, moral virtues).

Much early defense of Christianity was not doctrinal, but ethical in nature. For example, one of the most widespread accusations against the “new sect” (Christianity) was the charge, “most impious and barbarous of all, that we eat human flesh” or “loaves steeped in blood”, as one early defender of Christianity, Theophilus of Antioch, explains (p. 28). The basis of this accusation was the language used by the Christians to describe Christ’s presence in the Eucharist, or Holy Communion, suggesting literal cannibalism.

Ambrose, in his dispute with Symmachus, defended Christianity on the basis of its “antiquity of morals”, not years (p. 35).

Pelikan summarizes: “Concerned as they were with ethical questions as much as with doctrinal issues, the apologists also sought to prove and defend the superiority of the Christian ethic” (p. 38).

How is the Church holy?

The church was holy because Christ was in it; therefore it was called “the spouse of Christ” or “the body of Christ”. “[T]he holiness that was the gift of the indwelling Christ also had to be an attribute of the members of the church” (p. 157).

Susanna, “a figure of the church” for Hippolytus, exhibited the freedom of sins that belonged to the true holiness of the church and of its members. Cyprian, too, saw the story of Susanna as an allegory of the church and its purity, both moral and doctrinal. Yet Cyprian and Hippolytus became involved in grave doctrinal controversies about the holiness of the church and of its members. Cyprian’s conception, which was “more profound and more complex”, became the norm for mainstream Christianity to this day.

Pelikan quotes Hamel: “For Hippolytus the church is the holiness of the saints, whose holiness is guaranteed by the unconditional purity of its members from sins of the flesh. But according to Callistus [echoing Cyprian], the church does not lose its character as ‘church catholic’ even when unworthy members remain within it.” (p. 158.)

In later years, in the name of their demand for holiness, the so-called “Donatists” felt obliged to separate themselves from the vast body of those “who called themselves catholic Christians” (Donatists wanted to claim the title “catholic” to themselves). “[F]or there could be no fellowship between the church of Christ (the Donatists) and the synagogue of Satan (the catholics)” (p. 309). But again, the guiding principle of Cyprian was ratified anew, this time reworked by Augustine to meet the challenge of the new schism.

Outside the mainstream

Another major schism (dispute within the church) was between the so-called “Montanists” and the catholic Christians. My sympathy, in a reserved fashion, for Montanism and for Tertullian was reawakened as I read Pelikan’s treatment of them. Montanism’s center was moral, not doctrinal.

“Montanism asserted that the gifts of the Spirit were absent in the church on account of its moral laxity” (p. 100–1). “This would be the quality in Montanism,” Pelikan explains, “that attracted men like Tertullian”, a former spokesman and ardent defender of catholic Christianity. “Not for its theological novelty, if any, was he drawn to it, but for its moral zeal” (p. 101).

“Outside the Mainstream” was one of the most informative and exciting chapters in this first volume. However, I cannot remember reading whether Tertuallian’s “Montanism” was discovered during his lifetime or at a later date. Was he excommunicated or did he die a saint but be remembered a heretic? In addition, though Montanism did part company with the church in the doctrine of the Trinity (see p. 104), it was not clarified in what way, exactly, was Montanism’s view of charismata (“the gifts of the Spirit”, above) found wanting.

Pelikan himself concludes: “The history of the church has never been altogether without the spontaneous gifts of the Holy Spirit, even where the authority of the apostolic norms has been most incontestable. In the experiences of monks and friars, of mystics and seers, as well as in the underground religion of many believers, the Montanist heresy has carried on a sort of unofficial existence.” (p. 108.)

Could one add to the list, “in the experience of Pentecostals and charismatic Catholics”? It would, indeed, be very intriguing to find a well-done comparative study between the history and teaching of Montanism and of the modern Charismatic movement.

Reflections on Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition"

2009-01-14T06:00:00.012+02:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

What is Dogma?

What is dogma or doctrine? Dogma is what is “believed, taught, and confessed” (p. 3).

By relating what is confessed to what is taught and believed, the author seeks to take account of how doctrines have developed. Without setting rigid boundaries, he identifies what is “believed” as the form of Christian doctrine present in devotion, spirituality, and worship; what is “taught” as the content of the word of God extracted from the witness of the Bible and communicated to the people of the church through proclamation, instruction, and churchly theology; and what is “confessed” as the testimony of the church, both against false teaching from within and attacks from without, articulated in creed and dogma, polemics and apologetics (p. 4).

The relationship between what is believed, taught, and confessed is subtle – and sometimes impossible to unravel. “[D]octrine has developed back and forth between believing, teaching, and confessing” (p. 5).

Pelikan offers a salutary critique of modern Protestant histories of dogma. “Since most of Protestantism had concluded its confessional development by the middle of the seventeenth century, there could not be a history of Protestant dogma, but only a history of Protestant theology.” Furthermore, “their [Protestant dogma’s professed histories’] arbitrariness becomes especially evident in the terminus ad quem assigned to the study: the last (or the latest) council or confessional document of a particular branch of the church” (p. 4).

One thinks immediately of, for example, Lohse’s A Short History of Christian Doctrine and its concluding chapter on the German Lutheran “Barmen Declaration” (1934).

What history of doctrine is not

This said, Pelikan agrees with Lohse that history of doctrine is not to be equated with the history of (speculative) theology.

“Christian doctrine is the business of the church,” he says (p. 3). If the historian forgets this, he “runs the danger of exaggerating the significance of the idiosyncratic thought of individual theologians at the expense of the common faith of the church” (p. 3). The history of doctrine is not to be equated with the history of X (X being “interpretation/ hermeneutics”, “the church”, “ecclesiological politics” or whatever, see p. 61), but X may affect the former, and it is the task of the serious historian to determine when and in what measure it does so.

In speaking about the opposition to “the Nicene faith” after 325 AD, Pelikan writes: “The story of this opposition has been told often, though not always well. Many accounts of the development of doctrine during the half-century from Nicea to Constantinople lose themselves in chronology and political history. As we indicated [earlier], the political history of these decades is in many ways more important – and in most ways more interesting – than the doctrinal history. Yet a development of doctrine there is, and one which can (keeping as much of the chronology in view as can safely be determined from the documents) be traced in its own terms.” (p. 207.)

This, too, is a revealing instance of the author’s methodology which, despite its self-imposed limits, does not downplay the importance of non-doctrinal influences.

Augustine, one of my favourite theologians – both intellectually and as a person – receives a superlative-filled praise which, however, ends with a salutary qualification. What is genius compared to doctrine?

“[T]here is probably no Christian theologian – Eastern or Western, ancient or medieval or modern, heretical or orthodox – whose historical influence can match his. Any theologian who would have written either the Confessions or the City of God or On the Trinity would have to be counted a major figure in intellectual history. Augustine wrote them all, and vastly more. He was a universal genius.” (p. 292.)

But then the qualification: “Yet genius is not so rare as all that – and, more importantly, not so pertinent as all that to the history of the development of Christian doctrine as that which the church believes, teaches, and confesses on the basis of the word of God” (p. 292–3).

Reflections on Jaroslav Pelikan's "The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition"

2009-01-12T10:28:00.019+02:00

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100–600) is the first volume of Jaroslav Pelikan’s five-volume history of Christian doctrine, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine. Jaroslav Pelikan (1923–2006) was the Sterling Professor of History Emeritus at Yale University and the author of numerous volumes on the history of Christianity.

His The Christian Tradition is truly a massive project, written in clear understanding of its challenging magnitude, as the very first (sober) sentence of volume one’s preface attests: “The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition begins the publication of my history of Christian doctrine, which I hope to complete in five volumes within the next decade” (p. ix).

New quotation system - easy to read

This first volume is based on a study of the primary sources in the original languages – Greek, Syriac, and Latin. The most striking, most original, and most welcomed methodological trait of the whole series is – from the point of view of the average reader – the total absence of not only references to sources within the text but also of all footnotes whatsoever.

The author uses a system of marginal annotations, a system I hope catches on in future monographs too. It serves the interest of both the scholar and layman simultaneously, “without intruding the apparatus of erudition on the reader who is not interested (not yet interested or no longer interested) in the footnotes” (p. x).

The author's strengths

The author’s command of English is excellent, making reading both easy and exhilarating. The dialogue, say, between Greeks and early Christian apologists is at times hilarious, but Pelikan masterfully shows it to be relevant to the development of doctrine (see, for example, the chapter "The Christian Dispute with Classical Thought"). As an example of the author’s style, here is a most clever, apt, concise, and humorous ending to his treatment of the Trinitarian so-called homoousios-homoiousios debate:

“By saying that Christ was ‘of the ousia’ of the Father and ‘like [the Father] in ousia,’ they were, he [Athanasius] continued, ‘settling themselves in opposition to those who say that the Logos is a creature.’ And this was finally the doctrinal interest for which homoousios had been a symbol – coined by the Gnostic heretics, dictated by an unbaptized emperor, jeopardized by naive defenders, but eventually vindicated by its orthodox opponents.” (p. 210.)

The author’s primary sources are, in addition to the ordinary apologetics and "against heresy" material, liturgical and exegetical in nature (see p. 11). He does not “psychoanalyze” the authors of his sources, thank God. He shows wholesome reserve, as psychoanalyzing is, indeed, a questionable tool, especially when wielded across the distance of several centuries.

(As a side note, I will have to make a decision regarding the approach I will take in my own dissertation on John Paul II’s and C.S. Lewis’ conceptions of love. Biographical treatments are undoubtedly needed, and contrary to Pelikan and his subject matter, I and my “subject matter” share closer proximity in time. Although both men, Lewis and John Paul II, left behind a considerable body of personal material (in form of texts), caution must be used as I analyze it.)

Continuing with the author’s strengths, it must be stated that he shows remarkable impartiality and objectivity when dealing with sensitive questions – and this characteristic stands out even without counter-examples, such as Bernhard Lohse, still lingering in my memory. Pelikan, it seems, has refused to borrow “Lohse’s Lutheran lenses”, and nothing in the first volume comes even close to a blatantly one-sided statement, such as Lohse’s, “All the appeals to tradition cannot alter the fact that nowhere does tradition count for less than it does in the Roman church” (History of Christian Doctrine 1985, p. 211).

I was aware of Pelikan’s biographical background and the major transition in his later life. However, without this knowledge, there is little in this first volume that could betray his personal denominational affiliations.

"Church catholic"?

The only exception to this was the expression “church catholic”, which appeared over and over again (e.g. p. 123) and by which I take him to mean the “early Christian mainstream church”. The word order – “church catholic” instead of “catholic church” – stands out.

Why would he use such a clumsy (and revealing?) word order? To make an ecclesiological point (“the early Christian church is not the so-called Catholic Church”)?

If so, it is at the expense of proper English – after all, the volume is named The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition and not The Emergence of the Tradition Catholic – and perhaps invites suspicion of feelings of inferiority. Similarly, I find it amusing that we modern Protestants or non-Catholics insist on saying the Roman Catholic Church instead of simply the Catholic Church (meaning, “Rome has no exclusive rights to the word ‘catholic’!”).

In the next part we move on from more general observation to the substance of the book, to dogma itself and a few interesting dogmatic themes.

Dialogue in a Dream

2009-01-10T06:00:00.001+02:00

I saw some intense dreams the other night. But as I awoke, I could not remember anything about them. Except for one short dialogue between a man and a woman. They obviously knew each other very well. The woman was sad, because she felt the man did not love her.

Woman: "I love you! Why don't you love me?"

Man: "You're in love with me. You don't love me. I'm not in love with you. But I love you."

Maralyn Mathias (In Memoriam)

2009-01-08T06:00:00.003+02:00

A very wonderful woman, Maralyn Mathias, past away last Sunday, 4th of January 2009. For the past 18 months she was suffering -- or living -- with ALS disease, a fatal neuromotorical illness which slowly shuts down all bodily functions. The congnitive function or intellect is usually spared, and Maralyn's blog which she kept during her illness is a remarkable proof of this.

Jesus, thank you for Maralyn and Jim. Embrace her, and comfort and strengthen him. Be with their family.

Below is the last post she wrote just before her death which was published posthumously by her family.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Thirsty for Jesus

[Written early on New Years Day 2009]

Water is essential to life, and even though food will no longer propel down my throat, I’m still drinking. Amazingly, I don’t feel hungry … but I am thirsty, and I’m drinking as much as I possibly can. Without divine intervention, I will get to heaven some time within the month.

These 18 months since my ALS diagnosis have been the worst and best of my life. Worst because of my deteriorating body … best because of my relationship with Christ.

And I’m beginning to see my friendship with Jesus like water when I’m thirsty … so essential to life. He is the real “living water” referred to in John 4:1-26.

I have many lovely friends, but I’ve never before known a Friend SO close. Every day we have smiled, laughed, and cried together. And he has comforted me. I’ve asked his opinion, and he has nodded one way or the other. His close friendship has given me many new perspectives on this earthly life that I had never considered before. He’s been closer than my skin.

This intimate friendship was essential to the writing of this blog. He nudged me and said, “Don’t plan ahead” (totally contrary to my nature). “Let me teach you as we go. I will pick the topics. Just trust me! I’ll show you what to write.”

Let me tell you, for a “Type A” girl, that was tough … at first … until I saw that he really would supply the ideas and insights. It’s been an amazing ride. So if you’ve been blessed by this blog, thank him!

The only thing that makes me sad is realizing that this intimate friendship with him has been available to me all throughout my life, and I never chose it until now. I missed it … big-time! I guess I was always so busy with my lists, projects, plans and events that I was too occupied to be open to such an idea. Oh, I did my devotions, but so often because I knew I “should.” That’s a different thing. Now I long to be with him, to feel his hug, to hear his voice, to see his smile. It’s so different.

Here’s a piece of motherly advice: Don’t wait until you have a terminal illness to seek a true friendship with Jesus. He’s ready! It takes setting aside some less important things. It takes listening. It takes openness. But it’s so worth it! I hope you become literally thirsty for Jesus.

Soon I’ll be in heaven, and it will be great to see the scenery, gardens and mansions. It will be great to hear the singing and see what’s on the banquet tables. BUT! I can tell you, the thing I’m most looking forward to is meeting my Best Friend face-to-face for the very first time. I’m trying to imagine the thrill...

Postscript: Seventy-two hours after writing this, Maralyn Mathias peacefully left this earth to meet her Lord. Her ability to swallow had stopped shortly after completing the above paragraphs. Nevertheless, she remained alert and even communicating with her husband, Jim, and other family members until her final 20 minutes of life. Her last breath was drawn at 10:35 a.m. on Sunday, January 4. She was 59 years old.

Her memorial service will be held on Saturday, January 10, at 10 a.m. at Christian Life Fellowship, Port Edwards, Wis. Visitation will occur at the church on the previous evening (Friday) from 4 to 7 p.m. and again on Saturday morning starting at 9 a.m.

A scholarship in Maralyn’s name will soon be established at Continental Theological Seminary in Brussels, Belgium, where she and Jim served 1987-2000. The specific account for receiving memorial gifts (in lieu of flowers, please) will be announced shortly by e-mail to all subscribers of this blog.

Queen and Princess

2009-01-07T06:00:00.002+02:00

These pictures say it all. It is clear that the Queen and Princess of my host-family have a sublime bond between them. I cannot wait to see what kind of person Daniella grows up to be. She has a strong will and a robust mind. And yet she is vulnerable and gentle at the same time.

Discussion Continues...

2009-01-05T06:00:00.001+02:00

The first of my three political theory questions that I posted some time ago has received several new comments.

Do contribute to the discussion, everybody! This is a joint venture.

Click here.

A New Year in Africa

2009-01-04T06:00:00.000+02:00

This is a short obligatory update. The year 2009 began, for me, in Tanzania. I have been here for one month now. It feels like it just fly by. Five more months of efficient work and play to look forward to. I function and work so much better in a country where the sun rises and sets early. It's been 4 years since I went to bed and got up as early as I do now, willingly.

Some time ago I found out, to my relief, that I was indeed accepted into the University of Helsinki. My dissertation plan (comparative study on two Christian giants' conception of love) was ratified at the same time.

The next four years will be spent in love. Reading about love, writing about it, talking about it, thinking about it, and - to the best of my abilities - living it.

Triple Party 2009

2009-01-01T10:34:00.004+02:00

Yesterday was a great day. We had three reasons to celebrate: Benjy turned 3 years, Daniella 1 year, and history (since Christ's birth) 2009 years. (It's incredible how well Danny and Sirkku timed their kisses.)

Oskar (on the left), is going on his first ever safari this weekend, to Mikumi National Park.

Safari, in Swahili, means simply "a trip". But Oskar's safari will include some amazing animals, too.

The Evolution of Christmas

2008-12-22T00:01:00.007+02:00

The meaning of Christmas has changed over the years. Instead of a dry three-page essay on the (d)evolution of Christmas, here's a simple three-point illustration.

Big Bang (1AD-ca.1700AD)
"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have life everlasting." (John 3:16)

Reptilian Age (1700AD-2000AD)
"Give some, take some. Be nice, take more."

Homo Modernicus (2000AD--?)

Not "Hot" In Swahili

2008-12-21T16:06:00.009+02:00

It's +33 degrees Celcius in Dar es Salaam, but it's not hot. Well, not in Finnish anyway. Hot in Finnish is kuuma. Unfortunately, kuuma is also a Swahili word meaning something quite different -- it's a part of human anatomy, woman's anatomy to be more precise.

So all the Finns here say it's lämmin (warm).

To spice things up further, the Finnish No onpa kuuma! means "Wow it's hot!" But no onpa, when one says it quickly, sounds a lot the Swahili word namba which means "may I have?". Summa summarum: shouting No onpa kuuma! in public (like in a restaurant during peak hours) will raise a few eyebrows and cause a chainreaction of chuckles.

Bernhard Lohse's History of Doctrine (3 of 3)

2008-12-16T10:14:00.000+02:00

“Who do you say that I am?”

A Short History of Christian Doctrine opened with Jesus’ famous question: “Who do you say I am?” (Mt. 16:15). In the final paragraph we return to this question:

“Thus today’s generation in the church, no less than the former generation, is faced with the task of giving through its witness in word and deed an answer to the question which the Lord once directed to the disciples, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ The answer to this question must be given in a new way. But if it proceeds from faith it will be given in unity with the faith and the confession of the fathers.” (p. 246-7.)

The Revised Edition, however, does not end here; as said, the author adds a short account of the Second Vatican Council. This accounts ends with a similar paragraph to the one quoted above. It is, in fact, nearly identical, making the slight alterations ever more visible. The reading experience ends in an approving smile.

“So the task placed before the contemporary generation of the church is not less than that of its predecessors. In word and deed it must give an answer to the question that the Lord at one time put to the disciples: ‘Who then do you say I am?’ The answer to this question must be given in new ways. But when it issues from faith, it must issue from the unity of faith and the confession of the Father.” (p. 249.)

The smile is, however, soon superseded by a thoughtful expression. One question, above all, was left unanswered.

Dogma vs. divine mystery?

It was not, indeed, the responsibility of the book to give an answer to it, although the question itself virtually leaped from the pages. At various points the relationship of dogma and divine mystery was mentioned, but not clarified.

For instance: “[T]he basic decisions of the Trinitarian controversy and the christological definitions of Chalcedon are alike in this, that in neither case was any attempt made to unravel the mystery of God. What was attempted was the reformulation and confession of the inherited faith of Christianity vis à vis the questions which had been raised.” (p. 99, italics added.) And: “[T]he ancient church with its dogmas did not want to plumb the mystery of the divine person”, but “that it meant to confess its faith with reference to certain newly raised problems” (p. 230, italics added).

It may be asked: What is the difference? Where and how does one draw the line between “confessing the faith dogmatically” and “unraveling or plumbing the mystery”? This overarching question can be broken into smaller questions: What is mystery? What does “plumbing” or “unraveling” mystery mean?

The relationship between dogma and mystery is one of the numerous questions that profoundly intrigue me and to which, pray, some light may be added during the new round of theological studies I have enter.

Bernhard Lohse's History of Doctrine (2 of 3)

2008-12-14T00:12:00.004+02:00

Lohse's Lutheran lenses

“Augustine emphasized the element of certainty of salvation. Of course, he could not teach this in the way in which Luther did… However, in comparison with the tremendous step forward… such defects a minor” (p. 117, italics added). We are still a thousand years away from the Reformation, but already these early notes hint at what is to come.

Later, the author discusses the theological differences between Luther and Melanchthon. Luther was aware of them, yet, the author explains, “because of his magnanimous disposition, he did not take them seriously except in a few instances” (p. 183, italics added). In vain does one search for signs of premeditated irony in this judgment!

Alas, it seems that the true hero of the symphony of the history of dogma is impervious to criticism: “The advantage in choosing Luther, of course, is that one then has a theology with, in depth and integrity, is perhaps without equal in the history of the church and in the history of dogma” (p. 184, italics added). Even giants such as Augustine and Thomas Aquinas fall short “in depth and integrity”.

Lohse's anti-Catholicism

Every now and then one of the dissatisfied cords are introduced. Perhaps the most straightforward is: “All the appeals to tradition cannot alter the fact that nowhere does tradition count for less than it does in the Roman church” (p. 211). The reference is, of course, to the three new dogmas formulated by the Roman church: the immaculate conception of Mary (1854), papal infallibility (1870), and the bodily assumption of Mary (1950).

It would be very unfair to say that this is characteristic of the author, but at least as far as Roman Catholicism is concerned he occasionally fails to heed a “magnanimous disposition”. As in the following manner: “Not until the beginning of the sixth century did theologians begin to accept the idea of a bodily assumption of Mary. The leading motive in this connection was the notion that such an assumption would be ‘fitting.’” Then the pun: “On this basis, of course, a multitude of things can be proved” (p. 213).

It would have been only fair to clarify why they thought it was “fitting,” for the main reason, even if false, was (and is) not an arbitrary one. If, as the Roman Catholics believe, Mary was indeed vouchsafed from original sin and its effects on the basis of her son’s merits, Mary ought not to have suffered a bodily death, which, according to traditional theology, was (and is) the result of original sin. In this way, the second Marian dogma follows from the first Marian dogma “fittingly”.

It was, however, the finale of the purported-melody-turned-noise that proved too much to bear. Let what is to follow serve as the finale of my criticism as well.

“It must be pointed out,” says the author, “that Luther, as well as the other Reformers, did not intend to form a new church.” So far, so good. But then:

“Their intention was, rather, to reform the whole church, to cleanse it from ‘papistical’ additions, and to reshape it accordingly to the Word of God. During the sixteenth century this attempt was made at various points. As a whole it was unsuccessful, insofar as the Roman church rejected the Reformation. This is the reason Protestant churches came to be established.” (p. 185-6, italics added.)

Two points must be raised here. Firstly, as the Reformation means, in the last analysis, precisely the “attempt at cleansing of the church from ‘papistical’ additions, and reshaping it according to the Word of God”, the author ends up presenting a meaningless tautology: “As a whole [the Reformation] was unsuccessful, insofar as the Roman church rejected the Reformation.”*

Secondly, how is “This is the reason” to be understood? It clearly connotes certain guilt, and as such is historically a rather one-sided, naive claim. We can easily see how even the pettiest sect can wield such an argument in their favour. If, on the other hand, the pejorative connotation was merely accidental, “reason” remains an ambiguous concept and renders the argument logically problematic.

Part 3 of 3 here.

*I guess if the emphasis in on the Roman church rather than on rejected, the statement is not tautologous.

Bernhard Lohse's History of Doctrine (1 of 3)

2008-12-12T17:08:00.013+02:00

This three-part post consists of a few selected reflections on A Short History of Christian Doctrine: from the First Century to the Present by Bernhard Lohse, who, at the time of this Revised American Edition (1985, trans. by F. Ernest Stoeffler) was Professor of Church History and Historical Theology at Hamburg University in Germany.

The “ebb and flow” of theology, i.e. the law of undulation between opposite extremes, especially in the chapters on the doctrines of the Trinity and of Christology, produces a certain dizziness in the reader, as I knew by experience it would. A roller-coaster affects the head and stomach, be it theological or secular in nature.

In avoidance of further disorientation and of merely reproducing the minute details of the development of this or that dogma, in this paper I shall instead make a few more general observations – observations, which are not totally free of criticism. “Lohse’s Lutheran lenses”, so to speak, distorted my view.

What is dogma/doctrine?

The author opens the book with two splendid quotes, one from Jesus in Matthew’s gospel and another from Maximus the Confessor. Respectively, “Who do you say that I am?” and, “Keeping silent about dogma means denying dogma.” Jesus asked his disciples who they thought he was. Their answer to this is the seed of all further Christian confession, for they must confess over and over again, and this can be called the history of Christian dogma.

Partly in order to capture a broader conception of ‘dogma’, Lohse leaves out infallibility as an unnecessary (Roman Catholic) attribute. His guiding principle, which is restated throughout the book, is commendable: “If it is not a characteristic of dogma that each age is concerned not merely with adding yet another insight to those of the past but with apprehending anew the totality of the Christian faith, this is true also of the present age” (p. 238-9). “New dogma” is not simply “added”, but it influences the whole faith and requires anew a total commitment.

Unfortunately Lohse feels he needs to juxtapose this insight with the Roman Catholic position, or what he takes to be it: “If it is apparent anywhere it is apparent in the history of the Reformation that the affirmations of the Christian faith are not a depositum fidei [treasury of faith] entrusted to the church, but that in each new instance they demand a total commitment” (p. 158-9). And: “[T]he idea that something new is merely added to earlier confessions simply does not accord with the facts of history” (p. 16).

As a non-Catholic what concerns me here is that the Roman Catholic view seems misrepresented. In fact, what the author offers as the “better” understanding could easily serve as a precise description of a modern-day Roman Catholic theologian’s understanding of depositum fidei and the task of the Magisterium and the Holy Office:

“It is not enough, therefore, to insist upon the continuity of the history of dogma: it must also be emphasized that in every epoch the totality of the Christian confession again hangs in the balance. Progress in the history of dogma does not mean simply that the treasury of Christian insight grows; it means, rather, that in every new day and every new situation everything that was inherited must be won anew.” (p. 17.)

Interestingly, the author states in the very beginning of his preface to the Revised American Edition that “many changes have taken place … as regards my won attitude to certain aspects, particularly insofar as modern Roman Catholicism is concerned” (p. ix).

What, exactly, there aspects are and how, exactly, has his attitude changed is not elaborated on. Content-wise the new edition leaves the original unaltered; the anti-Catholic undercurrent (to which we return later) prevails. That the new edition includes “an account of the significance of the Second Vatican Council” (p. x) is a mild overstatement, as this “account” consists of a mere page and a half. The only unambiguous appraisal offered within it concerns the Council’s “remarkable opening toward the other churches” (p. 248).

Dogma vs. speculative theology?

The new preface does, however, include a most salutary principle that, I felt, Lohse held to faithfully throughout his study: “If it is true that the history of dogma is not to be equated with the history of theology, the time is not yet come to incorporate the latest theological developments into a history of dogma” (p. x).

Barth, Bultmann, Tillich, and many others are not credited with special attention, and no account whatsoever is given to movements such as the theology of the death of God, the theology of revolution, the theology of liberation, black theology, process theology, or feminist theology. From the point of view of a history of dogma the time is not ripe for an assessment of their significance, although church history or the history of theology may consider them integral.

The dividing criteria is founded upon the concept of dogma: “Dogma is more that this or that opinion of one or the other theologian; rather, dogma is what the church believes, teaches, and confesses on the basis of the Holy Scriptures and in dealing with specific contemporary problems” (p. ix). The author keeps well within these limits. I can attest in sync with Review and Expositor that his treatment is “distinguished for its clarity and selectivity” (back cover).

Interpretation vs. criticism of dogma?

The history of dogma is not to be equated with the history of theology. We may add, and the author does add, that “the history of dogma and the criticism of dogma should at least be methodologically separated; they must not fuse into one” (p. 18). “Not criticism, but interpretation of dogmas, is the task of the historian of dogma” (p. 19).

Up to the Reformation era the author succeeds remarkably well in light of this self-erected principle. Especially uplifting was his account of figures posthumously credited with the dubious title of “heretic”. They are not demonized: even the wisest can believe error, even dangerous error, and yet be driven by authentic pastoral concern, for instance, in the case of Origen (p. 45-8) or Pelagius (p. 106-110). But as we approach the beginnings of Lutheranism, “the cleansing of the gospel”, a change in tone can be detected.

The new tone, upon careful listening, betrays two opposite cords: a satisfied one and a dissatisfied one. The former is attached to the person of Luther and the latter to Roman Catholicism in general and the Council of Trent and recent mariological developments in particular. Unsurprisingly these two opposite cords do not produce, in the ears of the listener, a satisfactory melody, but a rather dissatisfactory noise. I had to struggle to remain sympathetic toward the composer.

Part 2 of 3 here.

All is Well in Africa...

2008-12-08T18:24:00.007+02:00

...Well, at least as far as I am concerned, that is. One major reason behind my wellbeing is the fact that my nephew, Benjamin, and my niece, Daniella, are so adorable. Daniella, the little princess, can walk! She is barely 11 months old. Benjy's vocabulary is extensive and he is a very brave boy. I guess our honeymoon is over, for the other day Benjy asked his dad: "When is Uncle Jason going back home?"

Posting will be more sporadic in December. I'm trying to cut down on time spent on the Internet -- which is not that difficult considering that I arrived without a personal computer to a land that has a somewhat unreliable network. (Isi: Ruokomäet tulee 17. päivä. Toisin sanoen on vielä reilu viikko aikaa löytää mulle läppäri, jossa toimii ainakin Word...)

Tomorrow To Tanzania

2008-12-02T15:14:00.003+02:00

This is my last day in Finland. I fly tomorrow morning. Ethiopian Airlines... will take me from Frankfurt to Addis Ababa and from Addis Ababa to Dar es Salaam. Better that than Somalian Airlines, I guess, but the adventure might begin sooner than planned. (Experience with Ethiopian Airlines, anybody?)

I've been so busy with all the preparations, the move, the dissertation plan, the ECLD seminar, etc. that I haven't had much time to think about it that much. Little by little it's sinking in. The darker the weather outside becomes (I'm looking out at grey sky and grey lousy-excuse-for-snow) the wider my smile. I'm super excited. In two days I will see these two little children, Daniella and Benjy. Benjy: Jasu-setä tuo sulle sulkaajoulukalenterin! [Trans. Uncle Jason is bringing you a chocolate Christmas calendar!]

100 Things My Parents Taught Me

2008-11-24T00:01:00.004+02:00

I've compiled a list of one hundred good things my parents taught me over the years, either consciously or unconsciously, by word or by setting an example.

25 things my Mother taught me...

1. how to cross-stitch
2. to think about the meaning of words
3. about generosity
4. to ask questions
5. how to give someone a massage
6. how to get the thread through the needle
7. to listen to music
8. how to iron clothes
9. how to drive to Siuntio [a town near Helsinki]
10. how to clean the bathroom
11. how to wash dishes
12. to appreciate Bev Doolittle's art
13. how to use a baseball glove
14. to remember to take my key
15. how to make a snow man
16. to drink coffee with chocolate cake
17. how to tell the (digital) time [TV guide]
18. how to eat with chop-sticks
19. how to make my bed
20. how to decorate a Christmas tree
21. how to floss
22. to bring my friends over
23. to ask for big things [virtues] in prayer
24. nine ways to pronounce "Caipiroska"
25. how to fill up the gas tank

25 things my Father taught me...

1. how to hunt for wild game
2. how to fish
3. about the effect of a sincere apology
4. how to gut a rabbit
5. to enjoy a sauna
6. that there's no need to cuss
7. how to paddle [canoe, not rowing boat]
8. about simplicity [economy wise]
9. to not talk to my children about their mother disrespectfully
10. how to tie my ice-skates
11. how to drive a tractor
12. to eat porridge
13. to drink coffee with sandwiches
14. how to light a fire
15. how to weild a knife
16. to tell jokes [alas!]
17. how to say "shithead" in sign language
18. to pray behind closed doors
19. how to use a chainsaw
20. that Alabama is a state
21. that water expands as it freezes
22. not to stress about money
23. that relatives are always welcome
24. how to use the laminating machine
25. how to tie a tie

25 things they both taught me...

1. to foster an interest in and a respect for nature and animals
2. about the importance of a personal relationship with God
3. to talk about things
4. to taste everything
5. how to play the piano [I wish!]
6. about the magnificent sport called ice-hockey
7. to apply for jobs
8. how to read
9. to enjoy reading books
10. not to measure things in money
11. to enjoy watching "funniest home videos"
12. to drink with moderation
13. to enjoy traveling [wasn't very difficult]
14. that God can do miracles
15. how to properly pack a suit-case
16. creativity
17. an appreciation of the American Indian culture
18. to prefer public transportation if possible
19. to take care of personal hygiene
[20-25]: Looking forward to see what these will be!

25 advices I should've listened to...

1. "Don't slouch." [tall man's problem]
2. "If you have nothing good to say, don't say anything."
3. "Go to sleep."
4. "Get up early."
5. "Stay away from porn."
6. "Don't take more than you can eat."
7. "Get off the computer."
[8-25]: I can't remember, I wasn't paying attention.

(Next post: 100 vices my parents taught me ... just kidding!)

Top Gear: Mika Häkkinen as Driving Instructor

2008-11-22T00:01:00.003+02:00

This was brilliant. Mika Häkkinen, the two time F1 world champion, taught James, the co-host of Top Gear, how to race. Watch clip (11 mins): link here.

I laughed so many times. Mika and James' dialogue is hilarious at times. Here's an example.

James [in the passenger seat]: "Are you thinking through these corners or do you just feel it and you know?"

Mika [behind the wheel]: "No. Honestly what's going on is that we are going really, really slowly."

James [in disbelief]: "Are we?"

Mika [as serious as a Finn can be]: "Yeah."

There's only one disclaimer: in Finland we don't drink "hot raindeer blood". Otherwise the analysis was quite accurate. Enjoy the clip!

Virtuous Leadership

2008-11-20T00:01:00.010+02:00

Updates on two Virtuous Leadership related projects:

(1) Virtuous Leadership blog

The blog Hyvejohtajuus (Virtuous Leadership in Finnish) a couple of good friends and I launched a little over a half a year ago is doing great. We can see from the visit statistics that readership is steadily growing. At start it was mostly our friends and acquaintances. Now, more and more people are finding it, and, what is important and encouraging, they are returning to it every week (the articles are published weekly).

We have four regular contributors - an economist/lawyer, an engineer, a political scientist/business major, and a theologian - and a monthly Guestbook-article is written by specialists of various fields. The articles, both the regular articles and the Guestbook-articles, deal with leadership and ethics in various fields like economics, family, education, politics, religion, and - perhaps most importantly - the ordinary life.

The articles are in Finnish because we want to promote discussion in Finland and in Finnish (virtue ethics, though ancient wisdom, is not familiar to the Finnish society at least as far as terminology goes).

Here's a few published topics: "Marketing - Virtue or Vice?", "On Forgiveness", "Disturbing Fatherhood", "The Secret and Gift of Joy", "The Profile of the Healed", "How To Strengthen Virtues?" etc.

We have some extremely interesting Guestbook-articles coming up. I personally can't wait.

(2) Virtuous Leadership translation project

Alexandre Havard's Virtuous Leadership is being translated into a dozen or so languages, Finnish included. I've been lucky to be a part of the Finnish translation team.

The translation has been ready for some time, but we want to make it perfect so we've been proof-reading it over and over again.

Let's see how things take off. I'm very optimistic. Virtuous Leadership is a jewel, but we want to pass the blessing around so that everyone can benefit from it.

December Departure: Dar es Salaam

2008-11-18T00:01:00.004+02:00

(Sirkku and Danny, Helsinki 2008)

It's official now. I'm leaving to Tanzania on the 3rd of December. I already bought the tickets. I'll be back in June. The idea is to study hard (in December I'll know if my dissertation research plan is ratified) and spend time with Danny and Sirkku and their kids.

I'm very excited! But organizing everything before I leave is going to be challenging. I'd happily meet with anyone who wants to have coffee before I leave. Just call or drop me a line.

Big Brother Joshua

2008-11-14T11:32:00.001+02:00

This must be one of the cutest photos of my nephew, Joshua. The little baby seems very content, wrapped around both a warm blanket and Joshua's caring arm. Joshua even dressed him/her in his old baby outfit, a camouflage body that has "You Can't See Me" in yellow. One can tell that Joshua is himself surrounded by loving parents and family. How else could a two-year-old read this adorably?