From Mike Lester (click for a larger version):
A federal holiday commemorating the birth of a major religious figure, and we’re not a Christian nation. No, this does not mean that we all believe the same things, but it does acknowledge our roots.
As an introduction for those of Western traditions or are unfamiliar with the Eastern Christian traditions, during our Holy Week this week I thought it might be useful to summarize what we do at our Church during this week and some of my thoughts and impressions during the week.
Tonight we celebrated the last of the three Bridegroom Matins services. Wiki informs us in the post on Holy Week (and the East) that tonight in Greece a significant (majority?) of the sex trade industry workers attend this service. Why? Well, while the service has other things which it touches on two major themes play back and forth throughout the service. The first of these keys on the event from Luke 7 with the Pharisee and the harlot, the second is Judas starting to unfold his particular role in the Passion narrative (and in a later parallel devotion in which Mary sister of Lazarus anointing Jesus feet with expensive perfume).
One of the striking things is the repetition and insistence of two points. The harlot’s sins where egregious (and she was repentant and was forgiven) but mine are worse … and while she has begged forgiveness … why have I not done the same. Specifically in one of the refrains sung, “Though I have transgressed more than the harlot, O Good One, I have not offered You a flood of tears ….” Toward the end, we sang a poignant and beautiful hymn which I will relay here (at least the text). Cassia is apparently the name appointed to the harlot (by the whom or what tradition I do not know).
The Hymn of Cassia
The woman had fallen into many sins, O Lord,
yet when she perceived your divinity,
she joined the ranks of the myrrh-bearing women.
In tears she brought You myrrh before Your burial.
She cried: “Woe is Me!
For I live in the night of licentiousness,
shrouded in the dark and moonless love of sin.
But accept the fountain of my tears,
as you gathered the waters o the sea into clouds,
Bow down Your ear to the sighing of my heart,
as You bowed the heavens in your ineffable condescension.
Once Eve heard your footstep in paradise in the cool of the day,
and in fear she ran and hid herself.
But now I will tenderly embrace those pure feet
and wipe them with the hair of my head.
Who can measure the multitude of my sins,
or the depth of Your judgments, O Savior of my soul?
Do not despise Your servant in your immeasurable mercy.”
It should be noted in the Matins services and in scattered throughout Orthodox liturgical prayer, canon, and hymnody great praise and honor is granted to those women called the Myrrh bearing Women who first came to the tomb and discovered it to be empty and met the angel therein. This harlot, this prostitute is granted the same honor and praise for far before his passion she too bore myrrh and tears as a precursor to those other women as well.
The Gospel reading was far shorter tonight, only John 12:17-50.
From President Obama’s speech today, regarding the economy:
Now we’ve got a lot of work to do. There is a parable at the end of the Sermon on the Mount that tells the story of two men. The first built his house on a pile of sand, and it was soon destroyed when the storm hit. But the second is known as the wise man, for when "…the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house…it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock." It was founded upon a rock.
We cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand. We must build our house upon a rock. We must lay a new foundation for growth and prosperity – a foundation that will move us from an era of borrow and spend to one where we save and invest; where we consume less at home and send more exports abroad.
(Hat tip: Erick Erickson) So just as Christ is the rock to build our house on, Obama creates an analogy with his economic policies. This is not a case of appealing to our religious beliefs or our consciences; many a President has done that. Foreign, domestic and even economic policy, may be justified by a President because of our moral values.
This, however, is different. This is drawing a parallel between the sureness of what we build on Christ with the artificial sureness of what we build on government. He’s not saying that these policies are right by appealing to religion. He’s saying that they are a rock to hold firm to. They are not.
(And what irony that he talks about moving away from borrow and spend right after setting world records in that field.)
Y’know, maybe all those folks have a Messiah complex about Barack Obama because he had one first.
As an introduction for those of Western traditions or are unfamiliar with the Eastern Christian traditions, during our Holy Week this week I thought it might be useful to summarize what we do at our Church during this week and some of my thoughts and impressions during the week.
Tonight is the second of three “Bridegroom Matins” services, held in anticipation not in the morning but in the previous evening. Matins is normally a morning service but during Holy week in anticipation this is moved forward to the prior evening. Jewish tradition held that the day begins at sundown. Liturgical tradition follows that, but as noted above “in anticipation” moves the Matins service at time at which in more ordinary times Vespers services would be held.
Read the rest of this entry
I’ve been on Spring Break vacation with the family this past week, so I didn’t have an Easter post before Easter. But here it is now.
Last September, a commenter at the Shire Network News podcast web site (the old web site, not the shiny new one) suggested that "the Bible is very clear that the Jews killed Christ". He went on to complain how Jews were all throughout the US in policy-making and powerful positions. I’d thought that sort of "Christ killer" epithet had gone out with the KKK, but apparently it’s still milling about somewhere on the fringe.
The contributors to SNN, who are mostly Jewish, discussing this a bit in an e-mail exchange, did not take serious offense at this since they understand that this is an extreme minority opinion in the Christian community. Nonetheless, I, the (as far as I know) token Christian in the group, wanted to give them some ammunition from the Christian scriptures in case they ever came across this again.
Firstly, technically speaking, Romans killed Christ; their cross, their nails, their manual labor. Shall we then blame all Italians? I think not.
Secondly, from another point of view, I killed Christ. If I had never sinned, He wouldn’t have had to die for me. I’m not the only person He died for, but my screw-ups were as much a part of it as everyone else’s. The "Christ killer" epithet is thus as appropriate to the accuser as the accused. Might as well accuse them of being human.
And thirdly, there are these words from Jesus Himself (from John 10:17-18), where Jesus is talking about Himself as the Good Shepherd.
The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.
So here’s Jesus saying that He himself is responsible for laying down His life, blaming no one else. He not only specifically absolved those physically crucifying Him, He absolves us of the guilt of being sinful with regards to that being the reason He made the choice. He laid it down of His own accord; no one forced Him to do it. The God of the universe had a choice to make, and He made it, and the guilt that might be associated with it would go the way of all guilt for sin; as far as the east is from the west.
And, of course, He did say he would "take it up again". The power is all HIs. He is Risen!
A blessed Easter to those who celebrate that festival today. The following link is a performance (in Old Slavonic) of a well loved Paschal (Easter) song The Angel Cried. It is sung in many if not most Slavic Orthodox churches during the season between Pascha and Pentecost. I love singing it (and look forward to it on our Easter/Pascha starting next week), and I hope you too enjoy listening to it. In SATB arrangement it even has a decent tenor line, which is alas all to often not the norm.
The Angel Cried
The angel cried to the Lady Full of Grace:
Rejoice, rejoice, O Pure Virgin! Again I say: Rejoice!
Your Son is risen from his three days in the tomb!
With Himself — He has raised all the dead!
Rejoice, rejoice, O ye people!
Shine Shine! Shine O New Jerusalem!
The glory of the Lord has shone on you!
Exult now, exult and be glad, O Zion!
Be radiant, O Pure Theotokos,
in the Resurrection, the Resurrection of your Son!
For those unfamiliar with Orthodoxy, the term Theotokos is commonly used for Mary. It means literally “birth giver of God”, in the late antiquity there were controversies whether the term “Christotokos” (birth giver to the anointed one) vs Theotokos should be used. We use that term frequently and in doing so affirm that the term Theotokos is correct.
Recently I suggested returning to reading through an excellent book on marriage. Hopefully, for the foreseeable future, I’m going to be blogging my way though in exhaustive detail through the book Wing to Wing, Oar to Oar: Readings on Courting and Marrying
Leon Kass, by virtue of his tenure on the President’s Committee on Bioethics has become a somewhat polarizing figure. I had the distinct pleasure of having him teaching a class at the U of Chicago some few years ago in a class on .. of all things, ethics and science. He was (and still is) an amazing discussion leader. His ability to “sum up” and hone in and restate the jumbled thoughts of undergraduates. His wife Amy was even more sought for her courses by those Humanities and Social Thought undergraduates.
This book is not what one might expect. It doesn’t put forth any particular viewpoint in any obvious way. The majority of this book comprises a collection of essays or short excerpts bequeathed to us as part of the heritage of Western civilization. For example, contributing essays or excerpts are drawn from: Darwin, Erasmus, Keirkegaard, Homer, Herodotus, Shakespeare, Franklin, Tolstoy, and Frost. The structure of this book is as follows, after a short introductory remarks, the readings and discussions are drawn up in seven larger/basic sections:
In each of chapters, each of the readings is introduced by a very short (page or less) introduction explaining the context of the reading selected, why it was selected and perhaps some assistance in understanding how the writer operates if the dialectial methodology is unfamiliar to most, e.g,. the formalized dialectical methods of the scholastics as is used in the example drawn from Aquinas. Read the rest of this entry
Today’s discussion arising from Monday’s link post, frequent commenter took exception to the linked analogy from Joe Carter’s Commonplace. Mr Carter quotes from a interesting essay in Policy Review. Mr Carter quotes:
Today’s prevailing social consensus about pornography is practically identical to the social consensus about tobacco in 1963: i.e., it is characterized by widespread tolerance, tinged with resignation about the notion that things could ever be otherwise.
My (liberal/progressive) commenters objected tacking two tacks. JA defended pornography as harmless (or a good?). What harm can pornography cause after all, it only “leads to erections.” However pornography is indeed harmful. It is harmful in that it corrupts our relationships. A young man may argue and perhaps even convince his lover that this habit of his is in no way harming his relationship with his young (beautiful) spouse or lover. After all he loves her but is only engaging in behavior that doesn’t touch their relationship by engaging in viewing pornography. However … that plays out a little differently 20 or 30 years down the road. When the images he views are of women 30 years younger than his beloved. When she views the women he views and sees differences between herself of her past and her present body image that can certainly cause pain … and damage relationships. Ms Eberstadt (the author of the Policy Review piece) notes:
Indirect evidence from other sources, such as divorce cases and reports by clergy and therapists, also suggest that pornography can cause harm. Consider the increasing role played by internet pornography in divorce proceedings. According to a meeting of the American Academy of atrimonial Lawyers, for example, 62 percent of the 350 attendees said that the internet had been a significant factor in cases handled that year — and that was in 2002, well behind today’s levels of pornography consumption. Numerous pastors and priests and ministers and therapists have reported that pornography use is now the leading cause of marital trouble and breakup they encounter as counselors.3 If we accept that marital breakup itself causes distress to both parties as well as to any children involved, then pornography’s potential cast of victims appears to widen significantly by virtue of that fact alone.
So it seems clear that far from being harmless it it seems clear that harm does come from porn.
The other commenter Mr Boonton offers a different tack. He views porn and tobacco as not analogous because:
I think the analogy breaks because tobacco is basically exogenous while porn is endogenous. Tobacco is a foreign substance introduced to a subject that causes the body and mind to create a physical addition and also generates long term health problems.
But one problem with that is that pornography and sex in general, like tobacco, certainly can become an addictive behavior.
For Christian readers, the very notion that many (possibly including commenter JA here) who would defend pornography as “a good thing” this short podcast by Khouria Matthews-Green is relevant.
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