Week 9 – Outline Revision/Thoughts

After reading this last chapter out of Cobb, I’ve thought about the common idyllic imprint shared by humanity that he referenced from the research of Russian artists Kolmar and Melamid (:276). If in fact this “blue landscape” that most people seem to find common as a possible paradise, this “understanding of God” or his place for us after death could be a connection to those who seek it in the backcountry as opposed to the art gallery. Peter Jackson brought this to life in Lord of the Rings trilogy, and Jane Tompkins has noted the Eden-esque nature of the pristine, untouched and untainted by sin landscapes of a westerns opening camera shot. (:268 ) These things can be a means of connecting to a subculture of people who live in these envrions from time to time.

Week 9 – Response to Darren (Week 9. . .Life Everlasting)

Darren brings up an aspect of our faith that Cobb intonates that has long been left behind in modernism: the ghost or spirit that connects us to the other worldly. Last quarter we talked about the “middle realm” that has been discarded in a modern faith that has been shaped by a science discourse or worldview. We are drawn to the aspects of ghosts, I believe, not just because we long for an understanding of the next step for us, but because there must be something between here and there, now and then, that we can find to help give meaning to life. The story Cobb told of the Cambodian tradition rings similar: what are the creatures or activities that we have neglected in modernity that operate in the micro/local context spiritually, and not just the macro/YHWH/heaven context?

Week 9 – Theology. . .Culture: Cobb; Chp. 9

In his closing offering around culture and a means of approaching it from a faith perspective, Cobb explains the role of popular end-of-all-time accounts (usually by an alien form of some kind), visual arts, and film/TV as a look into western society’s view of the afterlife.  Although he offers insights and articulates true things, I’m not sure that these things are not altogether foreign to the people of Jesus.  What would be significant, in my opinion, would be some examples of communities who,after once identifying some aspect of culture that points us toward YHWH, were able to make the connections and provide some direction to another community or subculture towards greater faithfulness in YHWH.  Perhaps that wasn’t the scope of this text…

Week 9 – Monday

In the understanding of genealogy offered by Foucault, those who have power dictate meaning, and that can be traced back through time to determine what factors brought us to the “normal” or “universal” understanding of the meaning of a subject today.  It would seem that this would be closely tied to deconstructionism, and offers a great deal of critique about those meanings that oppress or are problematic in our contemporary situation.

Week 9 – Wednesday

After watching Merchant’s of Cool and seeing the utter capitalization of youth, I was struck with the irony of vocation in the midst of the documentary. These exec.’s are making bank on the backs of youth, and these same exploited youth will try to get “successful” jobs just like these high powered brokers of manipulation. To think that money is actually transferred in a manner like this that people have a vocation is another topic altogether. Someone needs to turn on the lights…

Week 8 – Final Outline, First Draft

Final Paper Outline

I. Space/Place in the Wilderness

a. Space/Place in “civilization” as separated from each other

b. Space/Place in backcountry/wilderness as the same

i. Adventure WV of West Virginia University

c. Space/Place in church/Trinity Episcopal Church

i. How is space/place identified at Trinity

1. The “holy”, the place of worship, “exclusive” house of God

ii. Noting masculinity of workplace vs. femininity of home

d. Genderfication of space/place in backcountry

II. Anthropological or Syncretization Model to engage community

a. Listening

b. Responding

c. Engagement

III. Church community

a. Space/Place in the story of God as it relates to wilderness settings

b. Church’s view

i. Western Church/Global church

ii. Space/Place and genderfication at Trinity

iii. Trinity Locale in Morgantown, West Virginia around the outdoor       community

Week 9 – Models…Theology: Bevans; Chp. 9

The counter cultural model is not anticultural, but instead recognizes that culture, context, social location, etc. is born from humans and subsequently intertwined with sin. This model seeks to interact within cultural forms, signs, etc., yet will call out, live, and speak into those aspects which are not congruent with the culture of God. This last model presented returns in some way to the attributes of the translation model with strong roots in the story of YHWH and his interaction with others through history. I suppose my question here is, although applicable for some of the other models, how does a community come to see and understand it’s missional call to particpate in the mission of God? The Missio Dei is the work we’re about, but we continue to see a community of Jesus interested more in measuring their spiritual formation than identifying where YHWH is at work in their midst…

Week 8 – Response to Michael Huang (Bevan’s Chapter 8…)

Michael echo’s those concerns that are quite dangerous in the Transcendental model, to be sure. However, his statement that “Perhaps this model is best suited toward very local theologies–in fact, perhaps this model is the best place for individual pastors to begin when working with particular congregations. . . .” strikes me as curious. Aside from the larger social location of any given pastor/community of his work, my perception is that very local theologies may be one of the aspects of a life of faith that has gotten so little attention by Christendom. The theologies of the jobless steel worker families in Western PA, vs. the power broker who lives in Manhattan, are going to be very different indeed. Now I can’t read Michael’s mind, nor do I presume to know his further thoughts around this in so narrow a forum, but I also observe an intonation towards another model or mode of community after the pastor “begins” with this mode. If this is indeed Michael’s belief, I wonder why so? What is the “more suitable” manner or contextual theological model with which to continue?

Week 8 – Models…Theology: Bevans; Chp. 8

Bevans here offers a model that is rooted not in knowing, practice or culture as the foundation for our theological engagment, but of identifying our own context (read: individual and self aware of ancestory, gender, geo-political space/place, etc.), and where the involvment, story and character of YHWH intersects through Jesus in the world around us in said context. It is in fact, a danger to found something that may slip into hyper relativism or paralyze one from acting out at all.  However, it speaks to the larger issues and context for doing theology: the Bible is not the revelation of God, but the Holy Spirit who opens up our understanding to the reality and character of the “triune” God. It bespeaks of a bit more broader approach than the translation model, say, which may carry presuppostions with it to it’s contextual efforts.

Week 8 – Theology…Culture: Cobb; Chp. 8

After proposing that redemptive violence, music (as rock/roll roots, protest songs, love songs, and songs of the mystical), and film offers us the themes of salvation that culture has identified, he finishes with the self-fulfilling desires of the west for happiness in therapeutic means.  “Sin no longer means making selfish choices that harm others but instead is about not putting oneself first.”  And those of us who follow Jesus, are we any different?  We read books, go to seminars, here variations of the prosperity gospel from the pulpit, etc.  I wonder how many of us, myself included, are here at Seminary to fulfill that which we want our happiness longs for in vocation?  Perhaps there needs to be a distinction between what is self fulfilling and what is faithful, or at least a some reflection on seeing both the sin and grace in the gray areas of our desires/actions.