The Arrow's Path

Getting back to my series on soteriology (it's been a long week), one of the major theories in Christian soteriology, or how God's saving action works to save us, is the doctrine that goes back to the early centuries of the notion of "There is no salvation outside the Church." The Latin phrase, if what to get all really fancy, is  Extra ecclesiam nulla salus.  Needless to say, much ink and blood has been spilled over the centuries parsing this little number. As always, one has to look at the historical context of any catch phrase or theological doctrine to make heads or tails of it. To try to divorce any distilled doctrine in isolation is a hazardous undertaking because nothing in theology exists in isolation to other theological or philosophical concepts. It's like a big tapestry. If you try to pull one of the threads and examine it apart from the over-arching tapestry, you are not going to get very far and might end up unraveling the whole thing and ruining ...

I apparently created something of a sensation this week in Omaha. I was up there on Tuesday for my job, and happened to catch a radio segment on one of the AM news radio stations when the program DJ was interviewing a member of the Korean War Veteran's Association. It was a particularly good interview retrospective on this former vet's memories of Korea , etc. The DJ in question is more a comedian and right-wing political talking head, but occasionally he does some interesting interviews or talks about local Nebraska politics like interviewing the Omaha mayor or what have you. If I am up in Omaha, I will at least tune in to see if he has anything interesting to say. Well, a few days later, I wrote the DJ a short e-mail, thanking him for having this gentleman on his show. Both my grandfathers and my great uncle were in the Korean war, and so hearing this old guy reminded me some of them, all three of whom are long since dead now. My great uncle in particular came back from Korea...

What the Catholic church teaches on the issue of how we are saved (soteriology) is extremely complex. To get a grasp on it, one has to basically look at it from the standpoint of really three different time periods that had some very different cultural and theological worldviews: 1. What was taught and/or assumed to be taught in the Middle Ages (Anselm and Thomism), 2. What was taught in the Council of Trent (which was responding to the Protestant Reformation), 3. What was taught through and in the wake of the Second Vatican Council. I will try in the coming days to devote at least one or two blog posts explaining each of these time periods. One really does have to get a grasp of the historical backgrounds and conflicts of the various eras to begin to unravel why the Church teaches what it teaches. It can be confusing and a vast sea of teachings and seemingly conflicting theological ideas and suppositions, but there is a method to the madness. Before I get to that, however, I posi...

As I talked about in my previous post on The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and Aslan's harrowing of hell, i.e. the Witch's Castle, I made reference to the concept of soteriology. I can tell it is an obscure theological term because blogger.com's auto-correct is having a meltdown every time I try to type it here. It was getting so adamant, in fact, that I actually started to doubt myself and double checked my dictionary to make sure I was spelling it correctly, which I was. So, what is soteriology, exactly? Soteriology is one of those 50 cent words you learn in seminary that some denominations get all bent out of shape over. I have seen screaming arguments over the topic before, both in real life and certainly in the online world. (Twitter, I am looking at you, you human sewer!) If you want to get technical, soteriology literally comes from the Greek words of σωτηρία sōtēria "salvation" from σωτήρ sōtēr "savior, preserver" and λόγος logos ...

We've reading CS Lewis' The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe  to our daughter the last week. I freely admit it's one of my favorite works of literature. Most people immediately think of Aslan's death on the Stone Table as the perfect Christian allegory about Jesus. While a powerful scene, and indeed one of my favorites, I think most people miss the allegory in the next chapter that I would argue is perhaps CS Lewis' allegorical masterpiece, more so than even the Stone Table scene. The scene, of course, begins in the Easter morning scene where Aslan is resurrected in front of Lucy and Susan, much like the women at the tomb in the Jesus story. The true allegorical storytelling magic, I think, actually begins after that. Lucy and Susan ride on Aslan's back to the Witch's Castle to free the Narnians who had been turned into stone by the evil White Witch when she is in her full power. Aslan of course goes round and breathes on all the stone statues bring them ba...

I have not blogged at all for quite a long stretch. It has been over half a year. I think that might be the longest continuous stretch since I started this blog many years ago. I have not given up on this blog entirely. I am finally coming out of a very dark time in my professional life. I have finally come to the realization that my vocation to the priesthood is pretty much dead. As many of you know, I decided to step down from the ministry in the Episcopal church over five years ago now for various theological reasons I will not drag up here. That is over and done with. I had hoped to pick up the mantle of ministry again in my new spiritual home, but after five years of getting stabbed in the back over and over again and not even given the time of day by bishop after bishop, I think it is time to finally say that while I have not completely given up on the idea, I've pretty much given up, barring some miraculous Divine intervention. I just am not really open to putting myself i...

I do not consider myself poor, but I work basically a blue collar job now, not that there is anything wrong with that. I come from a long line of army grunts, tradesmen, and grease monkeys. Sometimes, I look back at the life I have had and the choices I have made and wish I had a job that paid a bit more, or that I had enough money to own this or that big ticket item. I think most people probably have moments like that at some point in their lives from time to time. Americans always want more stuff. It's just a part of our culture for good or for bad (probably mostly bad.) As some of you may know, I do some freelance work for a small orphanage/children's ministry in Uganda. It is a long story, but basically a friend I know runs it out of the goodness of her heart. She takes in kids she largely finds in her neighborhood outside of Kampala. She can tell you some heart breaking stories about some of these kids. She found one living in some tires in basically a city dump, havi...

I picked up a book at the local library a few weeks. It was number 3 of 3 I checked out that day. It was a last minute while waiting for my daughter to pick out her books kind of grab. From the cover of it (it had a rather dated cover), I was dubious but for whatever reason caught my attention. They say never judge a book by its cover, but I think that's hogwash. I very seldomly enjoy books that don't have a good binding or cover artwork. If the artwork is flake, then the book usually is too. The name of the book was Nagasaki: Life After Nuclear War by Susan Southard . The cover had this real 80's looking panorama of modern Japan in yellow letters. It was kitschy looking, but like I said, it piqued my interest. I don't know why I grabbed it, as it had the vibe of "heavy handed anti-war hippie" panache written all over it. I usually don't go in for that sort of thing, particularly since I had another book I had really wanted to start reading in the pile, ...

25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?” 27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” 28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.” 29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?” 30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem Tennessee mountain holler to Jericho Alabama, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest Protestant minister happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite Community Organizer, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. ...

There have been some interesting culture events that have happened over the weekend. There was a political rally in Charlottesville, Virginia that ended in a crazy person running over a bunch of pedestrians, killing one and injuring several. The rally was under the banner of "Unite the Right" and was sponsored by various groups that the media/political intelligentsia have labelled the "alt-right"-which I am not exactly sure what that terms means exactly. It is sort of an omnibus boogeyman term for everyone in the supposed "alternative right" in the country that seems to encompass neo-Confederates, Neo-Nazis, Southern Nationalists, the Klan, and any other assorted racist goons, regardless of type or ideology. Having grown up in a Southern county that is historically very economically depressed and had for many years an active Klan presence (they used to have a lodge building at the county seat and march during parades and such), I have been amused at the ...

I would also be remiss if I did not comment on the Gospel reading for Sunday . It is also a very powerful reading of the storm on the sea of Galilee. Jesus comes walking up to them on the water, and the disciples, which on the surface seems somewhat hilarious, think he's a ghost on the water. This is not, however, an unreasonable assumption on the disciples part, however. I was amazed when I was in Galilee. We got to go on a boat out on the Sea of Galilee. There are very steep extinct volcanoes that on on the northern end of the Sea of Galilee. Volcanic rock is black in color. So, these black mountains in the background reflecting off the water is very creepy indeed. I was out on the water on a fairly clear, summer day, but even then, it was a weird feeling, like these dark mountains hovering in the distance. I can only imagine during a rain storm what a truly dark and foreboding place that must be. To get a small taste of sailing on the Sea of Galilee, here is a little video ...

Some really great passages are presents in the Sunday lectionary this week. One of my favorite Old Testament passages has Elijah, having fled from Ahab, hiding out in a cave in a mountain. In a wonderfully vivid but minimalist story telling, Elijah is visited by wind, storm, earthquake, and fire...all the good primal elements. The catch line is "And God was not in the fire" or "God was not in the wind. God is found in the what is sometimes translated as a 'small whispering sound.' The words in Hebrew are  דַקָּֽה׃   דְּמָמָ֥ה  ק֖וֹל, literally 'a still small voice.'  The term can mean silence, but a voice has to make some sort of sound, so translators are usually at a loss as to how exactly to translate the it correctly. Some translations do say "the sound of sheer silence" but the word voice/sound is clearly also used. It's intentionally ambiguous. Regardless of whatever Elijah was hearing, the point is he heard God from this sound o...

So, sinister tall guys wearing Hawaiian shirts while holding bouquets of flowers in mason jars get really strange looks in lobbies.

Sunday is the Feast of the Transfiguration. This is one of those Gospel stories that makes modern Protestants and others in the "historical Jesus" debate really go bonkers if they view Jesus as little more than a nice guy moral exemplar. If you have issues with the Trinity in any real sense other than as some weird theological abstraction, then this also makes you a bit twitchy. For those who think the Early church made Jesus more "divine" as time went on, then this story really gets you going. Imagining Jesus in his true form apart from his humanity is a bit troubling if we picture Jesus as just a nice guy who died tragically or as some misguided rabbi floating here, there, and everywhere. I am including here some pictures I took from the top of the Mount of the Transfiguration. You interestingly have to pile in at the bottom of the mountain in buses run by Muslims who jobs are to ferret tourists up and down the mountain. It's quite the gut wrenching windi...

Good stuff to listen to if you have a car ride coming up...

I was amused when I came across this bit here  (also here ), basically proving that there is also Junk Science out there just like there is Fake News. This was obviously a spoof, not trying to pass itself off as real science, but this is a major problem. Just last night, I was watching a documentary on Netflix that seemed legit about the science of dogs, or what we understand about how they interact with the world. I started getting a bit skeptical when the narrator started going on in a very polite, scholarly sounding way about how "everything we thought we knew" about the subject was wrong. That is usually code word for "sensationalism in the guise of journalism science is about to follow." I hoped I was wrong, but they were positing some interesting ideas about dog psychology (still not convinced that is actually a thing, but for sake of argument, I will go with it.) The first half of the show seemed logical, even if I disagreed with a few of the premises. ...

 I did something I usually tend not to do anymore: went to see a movie by myself in a theatre. I have really been wanting to see the new war movie, Dunkirk, since the trailers came out around Christmas time last year, if memory serves. I like a good period film, and being a history major who took several courses on military history, the Miracle of Dunkirk has always been a particular interest to me personally.  Honestly, I don't know quite what to make of this film. It was not bad, but I would not necessarily say at this point that it was particularly good either. I got home and my wife asked about what the plot was. I had to think for a minute, and basically, this is what I could come up with, "It was about...a bunch of men standing in lines on a beach and getting evacuated. That's about it."  If you like edgy minimalism in a war film, you might like the film. It was not particularly violent, though there were some intense naval scenes. So, if you are expectin...

About the only thing the Revised Common Lectionary and the Catholic Sunday Mass readings have in common this week is the reading from Matthew 13: 24-43 . Interestingly, if it the Catholic Mass readings that have the entire passage without redaction, and the RCL omits several verses from the middle of Chapter 13. There are several good parables there, continuing last week's theme of sowing and growth, although the twist this week is more on the harvesting of the wheat from the tares at the final judgment. The opening parable of which very clearly says the tares are sowed by the enemy, and Jesus clearly labels the enemy as the evil one when queried about the meaning of it by his disciples later on in the passage, which is typical of Matthew to have Jesus clearly explain the meaning of the allegorical parables. Other gospels tend to leave the interpretation more open ended. There are any number of allusions or allegorical interpretations a preacher could pursue or use, given the par...