"Camus Can Do, But Sartre is Smartre"

So says Jon Lovitz in an episode of the Simpsons, but I'd suggest this is debateable. I've just finished reading "The Stranger" and it is a short, sharp, brilliant book. That said, it was a fairly depressing read, as the following quotes show:

"I was listening, and I could hear that I was being judged intelligent. But I couldnt quite understand how an ordinary mans good qualities could become crushing accusations against a guilty man."

"I did not feel remose for what I had done. But I was surprised by how relentless (the lawyer) he was. I would have liked to have tried explaining him cordially, almost affectionately, that I never had been able to truly feel remose for anything. My mind was always on what is coming next, today or tomorrow."

On the Desirability of Desire

For some reason, there are two predominant responses when it comes to the issue of what to do with our desires. The first response is to submit to our desires and to simply go with the hedonistic flow. The second response is to repress these desires, to subvert them and to deny that they even exist. For obvious reasons, neither of these responses is particularly helpful. The former is short-sighted and fails to look to the long term interests of ourselves and others. The latter is perhaps even more problematic, because by denying the existence of our desires, we deny the existence of our humanity and even that impulse that gives us reason for being. It is this latter response that I wish to look at, since I believe that it is probably more prominent in Christian circles.

Desire is usually associated with that mysterious entity known as the "spirit" and is the sign that we do not merely exist, but exist for a reason. Without desire, our lives would soon become meaningless and we would see no reason to get out of bed in the morning. Indeed the very fact that we do get out of bed in the morning seems to suggest that we acknowledge that our existence has a reason, even if we dolefully concede this point. It is something that most of us doing instinctively rather than in a pre-meditated fashion.

Of course, as someone who has struggled and struggles with depression, I am well aware of the fact that our desires wax and wane with the tides of the sea. Life does not always seem meaningful and there does not always seem to be a reason to get out of bed. Indeed, this is the most horrible thing about depression - not the idea that one is sad, but that one is unable to find reason and meaning in existence. Life becomes a continual state of ennui and existence becomes nausea.

I would suggest that our desires are indicative of our attempts to reach out towards God. They are our unconscious attempts to cry out to the cosmos in the pursuit of transcendence. Most of the time, the root of our desires are hidden in our natural appetites, whether it be hunger, thirst for knowledge, sexual frustration, or anger. Sometimes, in the pursuit of transcendence, these desires become disordered and we see fulfilling these appetites as a means in themselves, rather than a means towards a greater end. The answer, according to Thomas a Kempis, is self-control:

So it is by resisting the desires that true peace of heart is found, not by yielding to them. That is why there is no peace is the heart of a person who is ruled by his natural desires and prisoner to externals; but there is peace in the person who is spiritually alive and ruled by spiritual standards.

We should not be ashamed of our desires - they are a sign that we are beings who not only live, but are alive. But to be truly alive, we must not be conquered by our desires. Only when our desires serve as a means towards a greater end will our desires ever be fulfilled.

Waugh's Counter-Intuitive Catholic Apologetic

When I finished Evelyn Waugh's "Brideshead Revisited", I wasn't entirely sure what to make of the novel. Certainly, there is an element of tragedy involved - by the end of the story each of the characters seem to be rather broken as their ambitions and desires have failed to come to fruition. However, by Waugh's own admission, the novel "deals with what is theologically termed 'the operation of Grace', that is to say, the unmerited and unilateral act of love by which God continually calls souls to Himself". This being the case, it seems that the various tragedies that befall the characters are not meant to be the focal point of novel, but nonetheless play an important role in Waugh's theological argument.

The first thing that I noticed was that Waugh's depiction of the Catholic characters in the novel is often less than flattering. Each seems to be subject to fairly chronic personal failings. Sebastian, who is converted in his thirties seems completely incapable of beating his alcoholism. Brideshead is socially awkward and rather judgmental. Cordelia, the best intentioned of the lot, seems to be rather naive. But perhaps this is the point. Waugh is pointing out that the Church is a place for broken people; not for saints, but for sinners. In fact, Waugh seems to allude to the idea that it is only when people are brought low that faith begins to truly emerge.

The most charming element of the novel is the power of belief. Throughout most of the story, Julia is an incredibly skeptical lapsed Catholic, but the remnants of her faith remain, like glowing embers beneath the ashes. While she starts to consider that her religion may be true towards the end of the novel, it is only at the memorable deathbed scene of her father, recounted by the intensely agnostic Charles, when her faith is irrevocably restored:

'Now,' said the priest, 'I know you are sorry for all the sins of your life, aren't you? Make a sign, if you can. You're sorry, aren't you?' But there was no sign. 'Try and remember your sins; tell God you are sorry. I am going to give you absolution. While I am giving it, tell God you are sorry you have offended him.' He begin to speak in Latin. I recognised the words 'ego te absolvo in nomine Patris ...' and saw the priest make the sign of the cross. Then I knelt, too, and prayed: 'O God, if there is a God, forgive him his sins, if there is such a thing as sin,' and the man on the bed opened his eyes and made a sigh, the sort of sigh I had imagined people made at the moment of death, but his eyes moved so that we knew there was still life in him.

I suddenly felt the longing for a sign, if only of courtesy, if only for the sake of the woman I loved, who knelt in front of me, praying, I knew, for a sign. It seemed so small thing that was asked, the bare acknowledgement of a present, a nod in the crowd. I prayed more simply; 'God forgive him his sins' and 'Please God, make him accept your forgiveness.'

So small a thing to ask.

The priest took the little silver box from his pocket and spoke again in Latin, touching the dying man with an oil wad; he finished what he had to do, put away the box and gave the final blessing. Suddenly Lord Marchmain moved his hand to his forehead; I thought he had felt the touch of the chrism annd was wiping it away. 'O God,' I prayed, 'don't let him do that.' But there was no need for fear; the hand moved slowly down his breast, then to his shoulder, and Lord Marchmain made the sign of the cross. Then I knew that the sign I had asked for was not a little thing, not a passing nod of recognition, and a phrase came back to me from my childhood of the veil of the temple being rent from top to bottom.

The remarkable thing about this scene is Charles' desperate desire to believe. After rejecting the Catholic faith on the basis of logic, Charles breaks down in this scene to pray to the God who may or may not exist. He finds himself swept up in the moment and starts to pray, almost against his wishes. When sanity is restored, Charles seems to be embarrassed about letting his guard down and returns to his agnosticism. However, this is not to be the last word, and some years later faith finally gets the better of him.

Some Appropriate Soul Searching Music

"Knockin' on Heaven's Door" by the immortal Robert Zimmerman.

Lectio Divina

On the weekend I was introduced to the spiritual practice of "Lectio Divina", a discipline that is said to extend back to Saint Benedict in the early sixth century. In essence, the idea is to read a passage of Scripture several times and then stop to reflect upon a word or a phrase that the Holy Spirit has brought to the attention of the reader. These reflection then lead to prayers the individual offers up to God. This is a process that is meant to transcend mere intellectual ruminations.

Reading through "Imitation of Christ today, I was struck by the words of Thomas a Kempis on the art of reading the Scriptures. He writes:

In the Holy Scriptures we must look for truth, not eloquence. All Scripture must be read in the spirit in which it is written and in the Scriptures we should look for what will help us, and not for subtle points.

Upon reflection, this makes perfect sense to me. Throughout history, the majority of the Christian population has been poorly educated and illiterate. In this sense, the idea that one can get to the deeper truth of Scriptures by clinically analysing sentence structure and grammar seems rather absurd. I suspect the authors of the books of the Bible weren't aiming for such nuances, given that they expected their message to be heard by and understood by a peasant community.

It seems to me that those who believe that they are theologically sophisticated because they analyse Scripture with what they believe to be precision miss the point completely. They are like scientists dissecting a frog - understanding the internal organs is interesting, but this doesn't change the fact that the scientist has killed the frog. Scripture is meant to be a living, breathing entity that speaks to the individual by the illumination of the Holy Spirit, not a dead entity that can conquered objectively. For these people, they want to tame Scripture and turn it into something that they possess and I suspect that the idea that Scripture may be bigger than they are might be far too confronting. Only when they subject themselves to the Holy Spirit will the Scriptures be opened up to them.

My Evangelical Readers Will Be Jealous of Me

I have observed over the years that many evangelicals bemoan the fact that they're no good at evangelism. Either they lack the confidence to share their faith, or they never find themselves in a position to explain what they understand to be the gospel. On Friday night, I got a chance to explain the evangelical understanding of the gospel, even without trying.

To set the scene, I was heading off for a weekend away with a Catholic group and was given a lift to the venue by a girl, along with another passenger. The truth got out that I came from an evangelical upbringing, had been happily evangelical until my early twenties and that I was not yet confirmed as a Catholic. After talking about my background for a little bit longer, one of the girls asked me why a lot of Protestants didn't consider Catholics to be Christians. I outlined the evangelical understanding of the gospel, explaining that a lot of Protestants get very hung up on the idea that Catholics don't believe in salvation by grace through faith and believe that this undermines the sufficiency of Christ's work on the cross. I must confess that I gave a fairly lucid description of the gospel too, which shows that I still haven't lost any of the touch that I had when I was an evangelical myself.

If struck me that evangelicals would get my opportunities to share the gospel if they took an interest in what other people believed and did so with an open mind. Of course, if one wanted to be really cynical, one could simply feign interest, as I suspect most evangelicals do. They could merely pretend they were interested and then press towards the goal. Of course, I suspect that one will get a lot more "opportunities" if they really are interested in the Catholic faith, as I actually am. That said, since there is no room for genuine two-way dialogue in the evangelical understanding of evangelism, contrived and fabricated two-way dialogue shall have to do.

So, to my evangelical friends who are disappointed that they struggle to "share the gospel" with others, consider this: I've probably explained the evangelical gospel to more people than you lately - and I haven't even tried ...

The Run is (Probably) Over

Well, it looks like the end. So far I've blogged every day this year, making 152 days in total. In doing that I've probably sacrificed quality for the sake of quantity - but people don't seem to appreciate quality anyway, do they? Not like in the good old days, it seems. That said, I'm going away to Kurrajong this weekend for a Catholic retreat and probably won't have an internet connection. Well, it's been a good run while its lasted.

Maybe there are some computer heads out there who could set up a program that will "auto blog" for me at twenty-four hour intervals? Or is my belief in the idea of perpetual blogging simply one of my immaculate conceptions based on nothing but an assumption?

C.S. Lewis on the Reformation

The process whereby ‘faith and works’ become a stock gag for the commercial theatre is characteristic of that whole tragic farce which we call this history of the Reformation. The theological questions really at issue have no significance except on a certain level, a high level, of the spiritual life; they could have been fruitfully debated only between mature and saintly disputants in close privacy and at boundless leisure. Under those conditions formulae might possibly have been found which did justice to the Protestant–I had almost said the Pauline–assertions without compromising other elements of the Christian faith. In fact, however, these questions were raised at a moment when they immediately became embittered and entangled with a whole complex of matters theologically irrelevant, and therefore attracted the fatal attention both of government and the mob. When once this had happened, Europe’s chance to come through unscathed was lost. It was as if men were set to conduct a metaphysical argument at a fair, in competition or (worse still) forced collaboration with the cheapjacks or the round-abouts, under the eyes of an armed and vigilant police forced who frequently changed sides. Each party increasingly misunderstood the other and triumphed in refuting positions which their opponents did not hold: Protestants misrepresenting Romans as Pelagians or Romans misrepresenting Protestants as Antinomians [emphasis mine].

- C.S. Lewis, English Literature in the Sixteenth Century (Excluding Drama), Introduction, p37

From the Road to Brideshead

I finished "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac. The book took me a while to get into, but by the time I had finished, I felt the journey worthwhile. I must admit that I felt a little bit ambivalent about the "hero" of the story, Dean Moriaty. He has a number of fatal flaws, the most prominent of these being his womanising tendencies. But at the time he is certainly not a malicious character, doesn't hold grudges and is warm toward all those he comes into contact with. Still, it is his irresponsibly that ends up alienating him from those around him and ultimately causes his downfall. What I found fascinating was the fact that I felt tremendously sorry for him, even though what happened to him seemed to be poetic justice.

Having finished "On the Road", I've now started "Brideshead Revisited" by Evelyn Waugh. So far I've read the prologue and the first chapter and the novel offers a lot of promise. One thing I am interested in is whether the novel is meant to be semi-autobiographical. I know that Evelyn Waugh was received into the Catholic Church in his late twenties and the book is about the protagonist's attraction to an aristocratic and eccentric Roman Catholic family. Perhaps I shall have to research that later, but it might be a good idea to read the book on its merits for the time being.

Catholic Gathering Tonight

I've been back from my "Branches" meeting earlier this evening about half an hour ago. I would suggest without doubt that it was the most interesting night yet. The talk was about "Brokenness and Healing", but perhaps what intrigued me most was the story of the speaker's conversion from Protestantism to Catholicism. Although people never give me enough details to satisfy my unquenchable thirst, I do know that it was a long journey. From the time she starting flirting with Catholicism to the time when she eventually became Catholic was almost five years.

One of the reasons I found her story so interesting is that it had many similarities to mine, both in her upbringing and by the fact that she was exposed to overzealous evangelicalism in her university days. She also pointed to being strangely drawn to the Eucharist. Upon reflection, I can say this is also true for me. The only major difference is that I that while my mother is Protestant, she would be supportive of my decision should I one day decide to become Catholic. I sense that there was perhaps a time when this may not have been the case, but it seems that her faith have significantly developed since then, just as mine has.

I should point out that it has already been a long journey for me. Some three years ago when I was still living at Ashfield, I discovered that their was a "Perpetual Eucharistic Adoration Chapel" open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week at the nearby suburb Belfield. Sometimes, when I would get depressed at night, or could not sleep, I would get in my car and drive the three or four kilometres down to the chapel. Often this would take place at crazy times like three in the morning. When I got to the church, sometimes I would just sit down and reflect, sometimes I'd pray, and sometimes I would read my Bible.

I must admit, I'm not entirely sure how these middle of the night visits led to me deciding to look further into Catholicism, but I'm glad that they did. I can't say for sure that I will become a Catholic, but even if I don't, I'm quite grateful to God that he has been able to help me establish a newfound respect for these special brothers and sisters in Christ. This is something I know I shall never lose.