Wednesday 30 January 2008

Week 4 - Wednesday Class Reflection

Marx's idea that capitalism separates people from the products they produce and, therefore, there own since of identity made me think if there is something the church needs to be wary of here. While I disagree with Marx's theories, I wonder if sometimes the church separates people "producing" their own product of spiritual experience. In other words, we "outsource" our faith to the spiritual "professionals" who spoon-feed us weekly at church - cutting us off from personal experience. We live vicariously instead of intimately with Jesus. We need to be churches that create environments where we never cut off people from being "producers" of faith themselves.

Thursday 24 January 2008

Week 3 - Response to Denise's Blog

I'd like to respectfully disagree/think-through some of Denise's comments regarding the "emerging church" and Wednesday's discussion. I don't think the paradigm discussed Wednesday means the abandonment of tradition - hymns, creeds, etc. all have contributed greatly to the community and will continue to. Perhaps Denise you could comment back on what traditions specifically you are concerned will get lost? I would think our discussion might appeal to you as these smaller "Kingdom of God" community groups are really reaching back to the earliest of Christian traditions - namely, we live as a community like Jesus did in the world; with passion for justice, peace and proclamation. I don't see this as a threat to tradition - I see it as the fulfillment of our greatest tradition... one that tends to get lost.

Week 3 - Bevans, Ch. 3 (Models)

Models are "disclosive" of reality but not reality itself. They are helpful for understanding and thinking about things, but they aren't complete and should be augmented by other models. Bevans outlines different models of contextual theology. Anthropological is the most "left" position and countercultural furthest "right." Bevans advocates that each model can be used with the others. Some models work in certain contexts but may not be the best for others. The remainder of the book will focus on these models.

Week 3 – Barker, Ch. 6 (New World Disorder?)

It is widely believed we live in a period of sweeping globalized change. Economic structures are shifting in Fordism’s fall to Post-Fordism and shifting class structures. How are these structural shifts related to our identity within the culture that these realities influence? Globalization is not just economic but our symbols of meaning and values are increasingly globalized as well. Culture is not just being “exported” from the West to the rest of the world – the world is influencing an overall culture. Individual state’s roles are changing as they are not able to defend themselves and pursue economic autonomy – more authority is being given to “supra-states.” New Social Movements are replacing party politics?

Week 3 – Cobb, Ch. 3 (Theology and Culture)

Can we be open to the vitality of popular culture and “suspect of its congenital defects?” Tertullian view – what does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? Tertullian and Chrysostom see theater making normal life boring and perverting God’s creation. Augustine – aspects of culture should be put into the service of the church. Just because a pagan did something does not mean we should avoid it. Tillich = “Theology of Culture.” Church not always the ultimate bearer of truth – God reveals where and through whom God desires. After WWII, Tillich became less romantic about culture and the nature of people.

Week 3 - Wednesday Class Reflections

Today was the best class yet, by far. I'm so intrigued by this idea of smaller communities living in a "Kingdom of God" paradigm. I'm even more intrigued by how larger, existing churches could transform into something like this. Specifically, the implications for youth ministry would be huge. If we could encourage these types of communities to form, I think youth ministry, as we know it, would cease to exist. We would have a caring network of adults all caring for kids. That is not to say that youth ministry wouldn't continue to operate, but it wouldn't be a necessary "relational surrogate" as it is now. The adult relationships would be "hard-wired" into the structure of the faith community.

Tuesday 22 January 2008

Week 3 - Barker, Ch. 5 (Biology)

Culture and biology are inextricably interwoven. The science of our bodies, their origin and function affects the way we think, emote and behave. This, in turn, helps shape the cultures we live in. Our health and the way we define health penetrates to the core of who we perceive ourselves to be. This self-perception in turn affects everything from our beliefs about the world to our immune systems. These are complex systems that cannot be understood in reductionist ways - especially in our era of radically changing cultural demands and technology that create more stress and dysfunction.

Monday 21 January 2008

Week 3 - Monday - MLK, Jr. Reflections

I had the privilege of reading King's Strength to Love last quarter. Chapter one details King's belief that our love needs to be both tender and strong enough to stand against incredible opposition. Sounds basic enough until you keep in mind that this is a man who's earned the right to say it. My thoughts today go this incredible man whose non-violent revolution changed the course of our nation more than any other man in the last 50 years.

Friday 18 January 2008

Week 2 - Response to Harmony's Blog

Perhaps a disagreement/pondering for Harmony. Her statement that Jesus would be approving of mass communiction "as long as it didn't hurt anyone" is intriguing. I can't help but think, "It is hurting someone." As a youth worker, I see kids' blindspot to media's negative influence. I'm NOT saying it's all bad (maybe that's what Harmony is saying too), but I think Jesus would have harsh "millstone-esque" words for some media purveyors. Is it OK to ask, "Has media made us dumb?" LONG paper could be written here - but I think Jesus would have issues with how we are being affected and hurt by the "system" - often subconsciously.

Week 2 - Cobb, ch. 2 (Cultural Studies)

Gramsci's hegemony helps us think through reciprocity of pop culture production and consumption. Great examples about how revolutionary voices are co-opted by the system it seeks to change (see Marley example). Style is how people shift producers' intentions (bricolage = "makeshift repair"). Poaching is taking culture and stealing its meaning to "topple existing power structures." Simulacrum - there are no realities, only images; and images of images. Can reality compare to the hyperreality we've created?

Wednesday 16 January 2008

Week 2 - Wednesday Reflection

"Where does Jesus fit?" was great. It leads me to the incarnation. God lowering himself from deity to humanity is a bigger "demotion" than anyone's lowering from high to working culture. The incarnation shows Jesus penetrates working class culture because, the God who could have lived in some palace, chose to hammer and sweat with the simple. But he comes to "high" culture because Jesus meets us as we are, affluent or not. Jesus doesn't stick his nose up at culture ala Arnold or Leavis, he redeems it - as he did all of humanity in the incarnation.

Week 2 - Barker, Ch. 4 (Linguistic Turn)

Language constitutes cultural meanings. Saussure pioneered "semiotics" - study of signs. Meaning developed in word grouping. Derrida = meaning never fixed but "deferred and supplemented." Deconstruction takes apart and seeks assumptions of text. Foucault – meaning = "Panopticon" - prison surveillance courtyard. Post-Marxism = class not merely economical but product of discourse. Lacan takes Freud = "phallus" = universal signifier. "Unconscious" where meanings are generated. Rorty says truth = human construct and not possible outside human "texts."

Tuesday 15 January 2008

Week 2 - Bevans, Ch. 2 (Issues in Contextual Theology)

Theologizing takes different expressions in different cultures. In the west - predominantly academic. India = best expressed through dance. Theologian = "midwife" that gives birth to the theology that people create.
Creation-based theology sees the world as generally good. Redemption-based theology sees the world as a mess and God needs to "replace" nature in grace.
What are criteria of orthodoxy? 1. "God is love." 2. Does it go against something basically Christian? 3. is it accepted by God's people? Schreiter = five helpful criteria -pp.23-24.

Week 2 - Barker, Chapter 3 (Ideology)

Arnold and Leavis defended high culture. Williams = more inclusive. Culture not from individuals but collective - shared meanings. Williams stressed anthropoligical approach that opened up study. Culture = "whole way of life." Who forms meanings - receivers or producers? Marxism = "economic mode of production shapes the cultural superstructure." Sony Walkman (shows textbook dating) - example of the circuit of culture. Production, Identity, Representation, Regulation, Consumption and back. Gramsci's hegemony - ruling class uses culture to gain "assent." Challenges = culture too varied to maintain any hegemony. Ideology: "the 'binding and justifying of ideas' of any social group requiring no concept of truth.

Monday 14 January 2008

Week II: Monday

One definition of culture included the word "organic" - something that arises without external interference; no "pesticides" are added - it arises naturally. I don't believe culture is organic. Having worked in broadcasting, I've seen how decisions are made. Manipulation happens. I realize media is only one element of "culture," but it is always assuming a larger role. I'm not claiming expert status but firmly believe media brings a sizeable application of "pesticides."

Wednesday 9 January 2008

Week I: Response to Annie McClaren Blog

Annie's thoughts about kids skateboarding at the church bring up a difficult topic: what do we do when two cultural realities conflict? Annie's argument (and mine too) as a youth worker would be - if we don't let these kids skate on church grounds, we are essentially telling them they are not wanted here. Meanwhile, the church is dealing with the cultural reality of the litigious society we live in. In other words, the church is thinking - if we do allow them to skate here, we open ourselves up to possible serious injury and negligence in injuring a child. This could result in a lawsuit and subsequent harm to the ministry of the church. Both viewpoints have some validity to them. I came from a church that had a kid rupture his spleen in a snowtubing accident - it was a double-tragedy. The kid was seriously injured and the church was sued and paid an enormous sum of money that hurt both the reputation and the ability of the church to minister because of financial difficulty.
Here's the big problem: The above conversation DOES NOT happen at most churches on this level. In my experience, there is no effort to really brainstorm as a team and determine, "What is the best way to do this?" Surely, there are creative solutions out there that would honor the needs of the church and its ministry, recognizing these kids, skateboards and all, ARE its ministry.

Week I: Wednesday

I have to admit to being excited and a little discouraged after today's class. Excited because I see opportunities for the gospel to be communicated in fresh ways through "family and relational lines" in our culture through organic movements. Discouraged in that it seems like trying to inject new DNA into an 85-year-old man. I come from a mainline background where this type of thinking is drowned out by the cacophony of trying to determine whether to serve decaf or caffeinated coffee on Sunday mornings and how to keep "insensitive" people from taking it into the sanctuary. Setting up intentional efforts to organically witness in our community's bars, coffee shops and bookstores seems a million miles away. My question: has any old mainline denomination really ever reinvented itself? Has any old mainline denominational singular church ever reinvented itself? I'd LOVE to see a model of it!!!

Tuesday 8 January 2008

Week I - Barker, Chapters I-II (Intro and Central Problems in Cultural Studies)

Chapter I - Cultural studies are impossible to fully represent in one voice – Barker gives a good reminder that there is SO much here, this, or any, book cannot be completely comprehensive.
The concept of Hegemony – the ruling class seeks power gained by winning consent from the oppressed groups. Can happen in stuff like advertising, etc. Cultural studies will examine the way we become the kind of people that we are. Marxism and capitalism all come into play here – is there hegemony in the capitalist system of suppressing the proletariat?

The study of signs, or semiotics, is important for cultural studies. Saussure believes that cultures make meanings out of signs that have significance to their ways of being. Derrida believes signs have too many meanings to simplify it to Saussure's "binaries" and instead believes in a postmodern web of unlimited meanings. Anti-essentialism means truth is only known in specific cultures and places. It lacks "firm universal foundations." Postmodernism is an "anti-essentialism approach that stresses the constitutive role of unstable language in the formation of cultural meaning." Barker talks about ethnography, textual and reception studies as a means for methodology for cultural studies. Attention is given to how these can be difficult based on the biases present in the person doing the studies and the linguistic uncertainty with which findings are communicated.


Chapter II - There are a variety of problems in cultural studies including language, change, location, etc. Barker outlines the debate between political economy vs. cultural autonomy as "an unneccessary binary division." Meaning is the product of signs and social practices - I wish this author would give more concrete examples of what he's talking about! I am intrigued by the idea that audiences create meaning by how they "accept the texts." Cultural studies is complicated by globalization - how do we define traditional boundaries of cultural in a world with the Internet and corporate marketing?
Great point is made that control of the world political is no longer governed by a few - there is broad governance, making homogenous culture or any challenge to culture difficult to achieve any sort of sweeping change. I think it is hilarious that this author says "most cultural studies" writers are "cryptic" when he's basically so far told us that we can't really know anything because of postmodernist realities.
Interesting discussion about rationality and how it can lead to the desire to dominate. The argument is that rationality has not brought us progress, but oppression. Another problem listed is that of "culture and the body" - in other words, we are emotional creatures, not just rational ones, that are subject to "biochemical actions." Discussion on truth is interesting - honestly, I get so confused by this stuff. Just because I think it is "true and good" does not necessarily mean I'm right, but I see the huge need for cross-cultural understandings of truth. Confusion!!!

Monday 7 January 2008

Week I - Bevans, Chapter 1 (Contextual as Imperative)

Hmmm... Interesting stuff regarding the three "loci" of theological understanding. I agree that our theological perceptions are shaped by our cultures, but I'm pretty sure God is not shaped by those perceptions. Interesting line from Charles Kraft - "theology that is perceived as irrelevant, is in fact irrelevant." Problem here - I'm not convinced God's Spirit is limited to whether someone is culturally "hip" or not. This would seem to indicate that if someone "lags" in cultural understanding, the gospel message they might bring is irrelevant. I'm not sure I believe that because ultimately, I think God is moving, despite my astute ability to articulate God culturally. That doesn't mean articulating the gospel in a culture isn't important, but Kraft's forceful phrase is over the top in my judgment.

Good, interesting argument about great theologians work always being contextual - Luther hit the culture's need for "personal relationship" with God. What is the contextual "need" of our current culture?
Incredibly powerful example of the Masai culture in Africa where water poured over the head of a woman means that she is cursed to barrenness. What does one do with that when it comes to baptism?

Bevans argues there is growing dissatisfaction with theologies that don’t give voice to people – especially marginalized people. He makes the great point that there is no more impressive argument for contextualization is there than that God became a human. I like the quote, "A gift that cannot be recognized as such is hardly a gift."
Overall, I Agree in principle with Bevans points, but it makes me nervous that, in our desire to change and be relevant, we won’t communicate an accurate picture of the unchanging One. This takes incredible creativity and trust in God to lead us.

Week I - Cobb, Chapter 1 (Popular Culture)

I'm going to like this book. The historical background of the emergence of images and how those images have now been mass produced and shaped in our world is totally fascinating to me. I especially found the concept of "Disneyization" helpful. How the "highbrow" features of culture were "translated" into a consumable form for the masses by productions like "Fantasia." I couldn't help but think - "has the church 'disneyized' the gospel?" Lots of good conversation there over positive and potentially negative outcomes of applying that concept to the gospel. The definition of culture as a french word meaning to "cultivate the soil" was helpful for thinking through the term and how we think of it. Can't help but think of the movie The Matrix when reading about the Frankfurt School's thoughts about culture. The idea is that culture/media is the ruling class's effort to suppress the lower classes and "convince them they are happy with their lives..." I'll have to think on this one some more but this is FUN stuff.

Week I: Monday

Good intro today about how scholars, etc. are starting to treat cultural studies of our own culture in the same way that we have approached missiology to the rest of the world. I'm really excited about this class. As a broadcast journalist major in college, and sports broadcaster for seven years in Denver, I know what is going on through the minds' of people in the media industry. Critically dissecting what happens to our audience culturally will be interesting - especially because these types of discussions don't happen often (or ever) from the "producers" point of view. The biggest question is: What will audiences like? Anyway, I know there is more to the class than media, but I've got some big anticipation for that section!