Calm and uproar

Wisconsin

“I’m not leaving for anywhere, am I?” says the Word of God. Imbed your home in him, place in safekeeping with him whatever you have from him, my soul—if only because you’re worn out by lies. Place in safekeeping with the truth whatever you possess from the truth, and you won’t lose anything. The things that have rotted in you will flower again, and all the afflictions that make you sluggish will be healed, and the things that are slack will be remade and renewed and hold together with you. They won’t drop you in the depths (where they themselves go), but will stand steady at your side and hold their ground in the presence of God, who also stands steady and holds his ground.

(St. Augustine, Confessions 4.16; Sarah Ruden, trans.)

Lately, I've been reading Sarah Ruden's translation of Augustine's Confessions, and it's made the book come alive in a way it never had for me before. The prose is beautiful, making Augustine's thoughts vivid, memorable, and - inevitably for 2020 - deeply cathartic. It's been an absolute pleasure to slowly take in, like reading a high-quality, meditative, contemporary novel (meant in the best possible sense). 

In my current mental space, it's impossible to separate the excerpt above from two previous literary moments in my life (Milton in college and T.S. Eliot in grad school). All three of these speak to one of the dialogues in the western tradition that I find most poignant: specifically, the interplay between identifying/pursuing the good life and coping with devastating loss. Especially during the past few years, I've been growing to appreciate how, for an overwhelming number of the authors in our tradition, the two are more closely linked than you'd initially believe them to be.

There is so little permanence in our lives, and it's something I think the world has been collectively experiencing in a profound way for the majority of this past year. Transience and wandering are recurring themes in the Confessions, and I love how Augustine touches on a paradox initially hinted at by Christ ("For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it," Matt. 16.25). By handing the promises God gives us back to Him for "safekeeping," we can be certain they will always be ours. We'll never lose the most important things in life.

Significantly, Augustine assumes that we develop this ethos by engaging with the written word. He identifies God's promises as truth, and truth can be found in Scripture. Immersion in objective truth is the best antidote to despair. (Sidebar: this doesn't necessarily involve going on some painfully-subjective pietist safari of color-coded bible study. I was recently shocked to discover that high-functioning low achievers like me can read the whole thing in a year if you do about 3 chapters a day. That's like 5-10 minutes of reading.)

I've had my share of disturbingly dark moments in recent years, but I'm starting to recognize the hand of God even in the "rock bottom" experiences, because they showed me how much I need Him. As Augustine says just a few sentences earlier, "the Word itself shouts for you to return, and there lies a place of calm that will never know any uproar, where love is not abandoned unless it abandons."

Sunday night Donne

Wilt thou love God as he thee? then digest,
My soul, this wholesome meditation,
How God the Spirit, by angels waited on
In heaven, doth make His temple in thy breast.
The Father having begot a Son most blest,
And still begetting—for he ne'er begun—
Hath deign'd to choose thee by adoption,
Co-heir to His glory, and Sabbath' endless rest.
And as a robb'd man, which by search doth find
His stolen stuff sold, must lose or buy it again,
The Sun of glory came down, and was slain,
Us whom He had made, and Satan stole, to unbind.
'Twas much, that man was made like God before,
But, that God should be made like man, much more.

(Holy Sonnet 15)

Having never read all of Donne's Holy Sonnets before (and they gave me English degrees!), I fell in love with his writing even more when I read this tonight. Apparently producing some of the most seminal, beautiful poetry in the English language just isn't enough if you don't casually throw it together by framing it in systematic trinitarian theology. In 14 lines he covers:

• Creation
• Theology proper (+ emphasizing orthodox distinctions)
  
• Anthropology
• Biblical covenantal typology
• The fall
• The incarnation
• Christ's exaltation and humiliation
• The atonement
• Double imputation
• Predestination
• Adoption
• Indwelling of the Holy Spirit
  
• Eschatology. 

Did I say this was in 14 lines? In one of the most complex poetic/stylistic traditions in the English language? And he masterfully weaves this together in the spirit of a devotional meditation on the love of God. I love the layers.

More two kingdoms

Another year, another VanDrunen book, another apt passage. This time on Christians and the public sphere. I can't prove it, but I'm starting to wonder whether he's been tracking the zeitgeist of my FB feed these past few months. Just throwing that out there.

Finally, the Christian’s attitude should be charitable, compassionate, and cheerful. If Christians are truly confident in God, as just discussed, they must show charity to their neighbors, for faith works through love (Gal 5:6). They should overflow with the compassion of their Lord (e.g., Col 3:12; cf. Matt 9:36, e.g.). Christians are often quick to view people of different political opinion as their enemies. In some cases, they may indeed be enemies, yet love for enemy is a chief attribute of Christ’s disciples (Matt 5:43–48). It is deeply unbecoming when Christians complain incessantly about the state of political affairs, especially Christians who enjoy levels of prosperity, freedom, and peace that are the envy of the world. It is easy to be angry about losing one’s country—as if any country ever belonged to Christians. It is easy to demonize political opponents—as if Christians themselves are not sinners saved entirely by grace. It is easy to become bitter—as if “the lines” had not “fallen for [them] in pleasant places,” as if they did not have “a beautiful inheritance” (Ps 16:6). Christians have become heirs of a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus they say, “My heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices” (Ps 16:9). Those who are heirs of new creation are truly the most blessed of people, and while they wait for their Lord’s return they have opportunity to love and bless all of their neighbors, even those who do not respond in kind, and to do so with a joyful spirit.

(Politics After Christendom, pp. 168-169)

Law and memory

Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time onward until His enemies be made a footstool for His feet. For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also testifies to us; for after saying,

“This is the covenant that I will make with them
After those days, says the Lord:
I will put My laws upon their heart,
And on their mind I will write them,”

He then says,

“And their sins and their lawless deeds
I will remember no more.”

(Hebrews 10.11-17)

Characteristically for Hebrews, this passage comes in the midst of a discussion of Christ's role as mediator of a new, better covenant for us. I like how the author describes what takes place during this process, particularly in the parallelism he draws out concerning memory and double imputation. In "renewing our minds," God permanently fixes righteousness in our memory and heart. Meanwhile, He promises to forget our sin. We now remember righteousness, and He discards the memory of our sinfulness.

Staying alive

At some point during the last few months, the thought occurred to me that this business of living in quarantine during a global pandemic is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to read Boccaccio's Decameron. It was always a text I was interested in, particularly for the influence it had on Chaucer (and to go rather niche, Marguerite de Navarre), but I'd never felt drawn to it until now. My husband has several preexisting conditions which make Covid 19 more dangerous for us, and so the sense of isolation, uncertainty, loss, and - in the cases of New York and Italy, horror - feel like common experiences linking this to the past. From what I understand, Boccaccio is considered an important source for our information on what the Black Death was like, and although our current pandemic is thankfully a much less severe phenomenon than his, it's eerie to see all the parallels between what happened then and what is ongoing now. I always thought that quarantines and large-scale diseases were inherently old-fashioned things, and it just seems so bizarre to be living though one today.

Anyway, one significant theme throughout the stories in the Decameron is the question of how we grapple with the devastating consequences of sin in the church - whether institutionally in leaders or personally in laypeople. Recent years have been a challenge in this arena for me, between getting caught in the middle of an ecclesiastical disaster and witnessing the increasing polarization of Christianity in politics. I've seen hatred on both individual and corporate levels that I never realized was possible in the church, especially in the response to the current pandemic. All of that tends to get you feeling pretty hopeless about the present state of affairs, but, as you see in the late medieval church, widespread sin is nothing new for us. During the first day of Boccaccio's collection, there's a story about a Jewish businessman who converts to Christianity after visiting Rome, and his explanation for it seemed as timely as ever.

After Abraham had rested for a few days, Jehannot asked him what sort of opinion he had formed about the Holy Father and the cardinals and the other members of the papal court. Whereupon the Jew promptly replied:

'A bad one, and may God deal harshly with the whole lot of them. And my reason for telling you so is that, unless I formed the wrong impression, nobody there who was connected with the Church seemed to me to display the slightest sign of holiness, piety, charity, moral rectitude or any other virtue. On the contrary, it seemed to me that they were all so steeped in lust, greed, avarice, fraud, envy, pride, and other like sins and worse (if indeed that is possible), that I regard the place as a hotbed for diabolical rather than devotional activities. As far as I can judge, it seems to me that your pontiff, and all of the others too, are doing their level best to reduce the Christian religion to nought and drive it from the face of the earth, whereas they are the very people who should be its foundation and support.

'But since it is evident to me that their attempts are unavailing, and that your religion continues to grow in popularity, and become more splendid and illustrious, I can only conclude that, being a more holy and genuine religion than any of the others, it deservedly has the Holy Ghost as its foundation and support. So whereas earlier I stood firm and unyielding against your entreaties and refused to turn Christian, I now tell you quite plainly that nothing in the world could prevent me from becoming a Christian. Let us therefore go to the church where, in accordance with the traditional rite of your holy faith, you shall have me baptized.'

(Boccaccio, Decameron, pp. 40-41)

Thankful that God grows and nurtures the church despite its best efforts.