Something seems seriously wrong with some Toledo citizens' perspective on the relationship between the local civilian government and the national military. And it truly does frighten me.
I don't usually comment on local politics, but here's what's been going on the last several days. The Mayor of Toledo, Carty Finkbeiner, issued an order a few days ago revoking permission for a company of US Marines to conduct training exercises downtown in the business district. I gather that the exercises had been scheduled to take place for a while, and that Mayor Finkbeiner was not aware of it until the morning of that day. Forcing the US Marines company to cancel their exercises on such short notice I'm sure was an inconvenience for them, and perhaps rather discourteous of the city. The Mayor's lack of information regarding the matter prior to the day of (he says he read about the exercises that morning in the local newspaper) seems inexcusable.
However, what frightens me is (1) when and where these exercises were scheduled to take place (which is why the Mayor cancelled them, understandably in my view), and (2) the public's reaction to the Mayor's decision.
The company of Marines had planned to conduct exercises downtown beginning at 3:00pm on a Friday afternoon. The exercises would have continued all weekend. "The exercises were to include mock firefights, ambushes, and the firing of blank ammunition." There is more than one school in that neighborhood. So the exercises would have begun just as students were getting out of school and as school buses were doing their thing. Judging from the fact that the Mayor didn't know about the exercises until he read the paper in the morning, and from my general sense of how few people read the newspaper, I would not have been surprised had the exercises been completely unexpected for the students and the schools. I certainly wouldn't have wanted to be leaving school, or driving to the downtown library from our old apartment and into an apparent firefight. Some of the Mayor's defenders have suggested that someone might have had a heart attack when a gun went off. I can think of additional, perhaps worse things that might have happened. Personally I think it was irresponsible for the company of Marines to choose that location and that time to conduct their exercises, and irresponsible for whoever among the Mayor's subordinates gave them permission.
OK, so that's the first scary thing. Here's the second.
The way the local paper told the story at the beginning of the week (Monday, Tuesday, and today), the majority of Toledo citizens (who said anything at all about the matter) called for the Mayor to apologize. Some have even called for him to resign "before he embarrasses the city any further." The City Council has voted, according to today's paper, to issue a formal apology to the commander of the company. Defenders of the Mayor in his office have assured the public that he is loyal to the nation and loyal to the nation's military.
OK. First, why should the city officials have to apologize to the Marines for saying "no" to their request to conduct training exercises downtown? That isn't what downtown Toledo is for. (Nor, in my opinion, should it be!) The city has every right to forbid the Marines to train downtown. Now, I guess I can admit that some apology might be appropriate for the abominable lack of communication. But that really doesn't seem to be the issue for most "support our troops" happy Toledo citizens. They are questioning the Mayor's "loyalty to the military" and his "support of the troops". !!!
The thing is, as I see it, this country is run by civilian governments. What is important is that the military be loyal to those civiliain governments, not the other way around. If the civilian governments tell the military they are not allowed to fight a war, or not allowed to conduct training exercises in civilian space, the military has no right to complain.
The appearance that most vocal Toledo citizens do not see things this way, and expect all good citizens to be loyal supporters of the military frightens me. Our country seems to me to be far too attached to the military as a central feature of our life and identity.
Really this should not surprise me (and doesn't). We have to depend on our military because we have made ourselves dependent on it. Our military force is necessary to protect us from all the enemies we've made (in more than one sense, training and arming them, and giving them no cause to love us). And it is necessary to secure our quality of life by maintaining our international clout.
By trying to make the world afraid of us, we have made ourselves afraid of the world.
As I heard someone say several months ago, fear (terror) has become a part of our national identity. Being afraid is patriotic.
None of this is news. But if we now have to be afraid of our own military in our own cities, this is scarcely an improvement.
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"He Himself is our Peace." (Eph 2)
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Marines Fight with Toledo City Government
Monday, February 11, 2008
His Dark Materials 1
I read the first two Philip Pullman books (His Dark Materials series, vol. 1: The Golden Compass (US title)/Northern Lights (orig title), vol. 2: The Subtle Knife) over the weekend.
Here are a couple of observations:
- both novels become the most explicitly and provocatively theological in the last scene or two. These tend to be the most disturbing (for me) parts of the books. The rest of them could be generic (not using that term in a degrading sense) fantasy novels.
- the metaphysics of the universe, if taken seriously, seems rather new age-ish. A variety of "traditional", spiritualistic beliefs and practices are accommodated, while there is a blanket rejection of authoritarian religion. Certain shamanic practices and folk Daoist divination practices (fortune telling sticks) are recognized as authentic ways to communicate with a genuine supernatural reality.
SPOILER WARNING!
IF YOU INTEND TO READ THE PULLMAN BOOKS YOURSELF AND DO NOT WANT TO HAVE CERTAIN BACKSTORY INFORMATION REVEALED DO NOT CONTINUE READING!!
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I started to worry (from the perspective of an absorbed reader sympathizing with the main characters) as soon as it became clear (in the second book) that the so-called "aletheometer"(sp?) was not so much a scientific instrument used to directly measure reality and to tell you what is true, but a medium for communication with personal supernatural beings (self-described angels), and also when the aletheometer began to give instructions (without much information or explanation) instead of information.
Immediately I want to ask--should we be trusting what these beings are telling us to do? Are they good? Do they always tell us the truth, really? There is clearly an agenda driving the orders they are giving to the character(s) using the aletheometer, but they are not terribly up front about what that agenda is.
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At the end of both books the things that the angels and the adults on their side seem to say sound very typical of what the Enemy would say in a Christian fantasy like say Perelandra or That Hideous Strength, or perhaps in something like Screwtape Letters or the Great Divorce. At one point toward the end of the second book, some fallen angels say that every scrap of progress toward freedom, wisdom, enlightenment gained by humanity has been torn from the reluctant grip of "the Authority", who wants to make human beings obedient and humble. The war against the Authority is painted explicitly in terms of repeating the rebellion of Adam and Eve, only to a greater degree.
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The Church is certainly not good in this universe, and the Authority behind the Church may be no better. But really it does not sound to me that the opposition is any improvement. I feel reconfirmed in an Anabaptist/Christian pacifist emphasis on the distinctive message of Jesus. The kingdom of God is recognized not just because of what colors it flies, but beacuse of how its troops fight. Jesus does not wage war by killing an "acceptable" number of human beings as a "necessary sacrifice", but by letting himself be hung on the cross. The power of the resurrection does not require any "lesser evils" to be committed in order to be released and made effective. The means--love of enemies and paradoxical, nonviolent meekness--not the ends, distinguish good and evil in a strong pacifist NT theology.
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More spoilers ahead!
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There also seems to be something approaching inconsistency in (1) the apparent blanket opposition to Authority (personified in "the Authority", identified as "God", the "Creator", the Authority behind the Church) and (2) the main characters' movement away from using the aletheometer as a tool to further their own agenda and toward letting the aletheometer set the agenda. My hope/prediction right now is that eventually the main characters will choose not to submit themselves in obedience to the fallen angels, but for now it seems that the main character considers her own move toward being less headstrong, and having more faith in the aletheometer and what it says to do as a virtue.
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"He Himself is our Peace." (Eph 2)
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Road Hazards
This was Thursday evening's lesson, in two parts:
(1) Why you should not hit potholes that are 4-8in deep with a circumferance bigger than your wheel's contact with the road at 25-35mph.
(2) Why it is convenient to have switched a few short weeks before to an auto shop located halfway on the route between the university and one's apartment.
"He Himself is our Peace." (Eph 2)
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
activities
I've been brushing up on my Buddhism lately, preparing for World Religions lectures.
I've found occasional (relatively rare) terminological errors in the first edition of Neighboring Faiths already this semester (for example, the term "advaita", which means "non-dualism" is used where "avidya", which means "ignorance" should be on p. 198). I found my first mistake in Dr. Corduan's Pocket Guide Tuesday in the middle of lecture. I had gotten a little ahead of my prepared notes toward the end of class, and was writing the Ten Precepts up on the board from the table in the Pocket Guide. The copy I have has "Do not sleep in high or wide beds" as #8 (observed by monks and laity on special days), and also as #9 (observed by monks only). According to Neighboring Faiths, the missing one is "do not decorate yourself or use cosmetics", and I think that should be in with the laity-on-special-days group instead of the one about beds.
The Fisher text I'm having my class use (which I continue to appreciate because it says things I would probably not) says there are only five precepts, ignoring the other half altogether.
I intend to visit the local Zen center sometime soon...not that I've been good about making time for visits lately! Several students are planning on visiting a Shin Buddhist meditation group that meets in the off-campus interfaith center over the next few weeks. I'm having them make their own plans instead of coordinating official class trips, and I'm also recommending that they communicate with each other to go in small groups. I guess I haven't emphasized the *small* enough. One student told me yesterday that she had thirteen who expressed interest in going with her to the meditation group. I told her that two groups of six--or better, only three or four at a time--would probably be a better idea. Maybe I should have offered to straighten their logistics out for them, but I didn't--I expressed my confidence that they could sort it out among themselves.
I applied for the summer reading teaching job today. I have already gotten excited about it, while processing for my short-answer question (Why do you want to teach at the Institute again this summer?) and looking at some memos about curriculum changes.
I wish I had more emphatically mentioned the importance of love of reading in my essay question, now that I think of it. It probably came across that I was only thinking of reading skills as a pragmatic necessity for succeeding in life. But I can sort that out in a telephone interview, hopefully.
The high school curriculum is going to revolve around reading and discussing one of my favorite books; much more challenging than the novels we've had them reading previous years. I'm really excited about that.
Today is Ash Wednesday. I will probably post some reflections on the significance of Lent, and my own plans for Lenten observance (some of them are rather kooky) this year at a later date. Blessings!
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"He Himself is our Peace." (Eph 2)
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Intertwining of Movements within "Younger Evangelicalism"
I want to draw your attention to two articles in the Feb 2008 issue of CT. I'll start in this post with just one.
Intertwining of Movements within "Younger Evangelicalism":
ancient-future, new monasticism, emergence, Anabaptism, Catholicism, and Orthodoxy
First, the cover story "The Future Lies in the Past", which is one writer's take on the ancient-future movement. "Ancient-future" was a new term to me only a few months ago; I think I saw it first in a conference advertisement in CT. It typically has to do with evangelicals who are interested in patristic studies, and who emphasize the relevance of the church fathers to the contemporary church.
The article talks about the movement positively, indicating that ancient-future scholars are less naive than they once were. Rather than "viewing the early church by moonlight", at a recent conference Joel Scandrett articulated an awareness of pitfalls from within the movement:
(1) Anachronism: Naively interpreting the tradition in light of
contemporary assumptions;
(2) Traditionalism: Being unwilling to see the flaws in the early church's
traditions;
(3) Eclecticism: Selectively appropriating ancient practices without regard
to their original purposes or contexts.
In his book Younger Evangelicals an early leader of the movement, Robert Weber (recently deceased) identifies
three phases of evangelicalism since 1950, each dominated by a different
paradigm of church life and discipleship. Each group continues in some
form today, but the first two have been superseded by the third: "traditional"
(1950-1975), "pragmatic" (1975-2000), and "younger" (2000-).
Traditionals focus on doctrine-or as Webber grumps, on "being
right." They pour their resources into Bible studies, Sunday school
curricula, and apologetics materials. The pragmatics "do" church
growth, spawning the culturally engaged (and hugely successful) seeker-sensitive
trend, with full-service megachurches and countless outreach programs.
Currently, the younger evangelicals seek a Christianity that is
"embodied" and "authentic"--distinctively Christian. In this they follow
Stanley Hauerwas's and William H. Willimon's widely read 1989 manifesto, Resident Aliens: Life in the Christian Colony, which calls the church
to reject individualism, consumerism, and a host of other modern malaises.
What was interesting to me was that the writer of this article associated "emerging" evangelicalism, interest in Catholicism and Orthodoxy (including recent evangelical converts to these communions), the new monasticism, and evangelicals attracted to the counter-cultural 16th century Anabaptist tradition. I don't think he meant to melt all these different movements into the same pot--anyone should recognize their diversity. But they do overlap--in me, for instance, and in others in my age bracket I know at my small urban Mennonite church. And they may be driven by common or at least similar frustrations and dissilusionment with the Fundamentalists (capital "F", meaning the "traditional" or doctrinally-focused group within American Protestantism) and the consumerist evangelical megachurches from which evangelical Protestant Christians in our generation are coming.
Anyway, I strongly recommend taking a look at this article, if you can get your hands on a copy of the issue. Please leave comments and let me know what you think.
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"He Himself is our Peace." (Eph 2)
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