Grace

I read in the bible of a being that, with “truth and grace”, came into our world. What exactly does it mean that Jesus came in “truth and grace”? What exactly is grace? The sphere of Christendom I have grown up in has defined grace as “unmerited favor” or another odd, but no less abstract definition. But Jesus came in “truth and grace” or, rather, “truth and grace came through Jesus.” Either way, somehow I think I’ve missed the point. Grace is not some abstract concept. It might explain why the other more liturgical denominations speak of “means of grace.” 

Means of grace: word and sacrament: visible, tangible. 

Jesus brought grace into this world via Incarnation. Incarnation: real, visible, malleable, tangible, felt, and not off in the world of concepts alone. A conceptual understanding of grace demands nothing of us, has no long lasting effect. Grace is not for one time, one conversion. 

Rather, it is for all time, always reforming, always converting, and always being felt. And if it is not tangible and real it seems meaningless and lacking. 

Grace is...real and maybe it’s too real for our own comfort and maybe that’s why we put grace in the world of ideas because if it’s a reality found in the physical world, then it demands something of us. In fact, it is all around us. 

Flesh: Introduction

I am nothing more than skin and bones, flesh on muscle on whitened bone.

I am from earth and to earth I will one day return.

My body, our bodies, are brittle, and subject to breaking.

"The flesh is weak," spoke the wandering teacher. If only he had known how very true those words are and continue to become. Little things, like the cutting of skin, the purging of the food from one's body, loathing oneself (a spiritual reality in a fleshy manifestation), the bodies we posses and find ourselves in are weak indeed. What significance does the flesh have? In light of the earthiness by which we are bound and developed what purpose does flesh have? To what end?

Christianity has often felt the lack of flesh in its theology. Flesh is important to the biblical narrative, in fact, I would argue, more important than the soul. Or, rather, souls are so tightly woven to flesh that separation is nigh impossible. The series here, hopefully, will be able to show how flesh refers not only to my body and its parts but to a different reality beyond that which we can see and touch and smell and feel and ultimately quantify. As well, I hope to show the the bible as a whole is a fleshy book, concerned primarily with things of the earth rather than mysticism or some sort of spiritualism.

The general outline will look like this:

1) Preliminary Thoughts on Flesh
Attempt to explain what I am referring to when I refer to flesh as well as teasing out what I see as the differences between "body" and "flesh".
2) Word about Flesh
What scripture has to say about flesh.
3) Word as Flesh
Scripture as flesh in Jesus.
4) Flesh Redeemed
Flesh saved from its abuse

(Very) Brief Thoughts on Privilege and the Oppressed

1. Privilege does exist but what constitutes an inappropriate use of privilege or speaking from a point of privilege is often ambiguous and poorly defined. 

2. Privilege is not the end all be all. In fact, too often it is used in such a manner so as to shut down any further dialogue. Acknowledge that one is speaking from a privileged perspective and move on. 

3. God is not preferential to the poor/oppressed. Yes, his/her's heart is for the poor but the precedent is clearly one of grace to all, privileged and oppressor, broken and oppressed alike. 

4. Privilege is too often spoken from those who are, shocker, privileged. 

Ergo, privilege is ambiguously/poorly defined by the privileged and hoisted onto the unprivileged/oppressed in a manner which may or may not be appropriate. 

Disbelief is Fidelity

It is not so much that I disbelieve all that is put under the banner of Christianity, my particular opiate of choice, but rather that I do not believe it enough. I have friends who believe more consistently than I and in some sense the easiest answer to why I don't believe as they do is: they are wrong. Or, more bluntly, their version of God is wrong. But that isn't right either. I refuse to believe consistently in some regards if only because I like to think I'm caring for others. My love for the Other demands I disbelieve that which my religion demands I believe.

Quotes

“They all think any minute I'm going to commit suicide. What a joke. The truth of course is the exact opposite: suicide is the only thing that keeps me alive. Whenever everything else fails, all I have to do is consider suicide and in two seconds I'm as cheerful as a nitwit. But if I could not kill myself -- ah then, I would. I can do without nembutal or murder mysteries but not without suicide. ” The Moviegoer, Walker Percy 

Part One of a Series on Death of God Theology: Eucharist as God's Perpetual Death

"You are sacrificing Christ all over again," or so the objection to real-presence in the Eucharist goes.

  The objection states that we continue to re-sacrifice Christ on the cross. Guess what? It's true, we do. In fact, we do so in many ways. But the taking of the Eucharist is an important, institutional, global and very visceral way in which we declare God is dead. God is no longer out there. God's death, if it means anything, means that God is no longer Other. God is not the Object but the Subject. As Heidegger states:

“If I take death into my life, acknowledge it, and face it squarely, I will free myself from the anxiety of death and the pettiness of life - and only then will I be free to become myself. ” 

By the eating of God, if you will, we face God's death and free ourselves. We take his death into ourselves in a very real sense. By re-sacrificing Christ we continually destroy the Other. We continually embrace the world we have all around us (yes, that is a reference to The Orphans) and live in a Spirit inhabited world. Thus, the common evangelical complaint gets turned on its head and can be embraced.

This is part one of an ongoing series as I read more about death of God theology/radical theology.
 

Glory, Abused

The glory of God is the new Law. No longer are we enslaved to the Law of death. At the present we are enslaved to the Law of glory. Whatever one does is to be done to and for God's glory and instead it turns into a vicious cycle of guilt and demand. The death of Jesus speaks to us now, forming us, with the realization that on the cross God has already been glorified. In partaking of the cross (through Eucharist and Baptism and faith) we find ourselves partaking in the once and final act of glorifying God, the last need to do so has been placated and filled full. We are free to live in grace and folly.