Saturday, May 29, 2010

The Demi-God and Dido





It came to me as I sat in that theater that the culture of the West was most definitively returning to the model of the Greco-Roman. The movie had several themes running through it, echoing the same themes seen in seventy-five percent of the films pervading cinemas across the US.


There are two that encapsulate all others. The first is that of the demi-god. Whether it is Tony Stark or Peter Parker, these heros seemingly reflect the old legends of Hercules, Aeneas, Achilles, Hector, and other like demigods. In short, the heros of these films are people who come to find their inner god. They burgeon this inner god through technology (or magic) and intellect, and reach completion by acquiring such power as only God is supposed to have. This is then amalgamated with the same sinful nature that led to the ultimate death of the Greco-Roman hero, and likewise to the destruction of the Hollywood hero, though the film rarely ever confesses such a fate. They have not yet discovered that power without holiness kills.


The second theme is that of the family. These same Hollywood demigods are loners. They, like the old Greek gods, have given up the holy model of sacrifice: the father sacrificing himself for the mother and child, the mother sacrificing herself for the father and child, and the child rising up to call them both blessed. The Hollywood heros, however, still luxuriate in something that seems to be a sterile sexuality. They each have their Dido, and if they are lucky, their Helen, but their union never portrays the commitment of selfless love, and thus never brings forth the contentment that is birthed from giving, not receiving. Their supposed love does not bring forth the fruit of love, the child, and therefore it is not lovely.


These are the evidence of secular individualism. They are what characterized the culture of the Greeks and Romans once they deserted the hearth and the home for domination. Education became idolized above relationship. In this educational system men like Socrates taught a breaking up of the family in favor of the government. Thus the fertility of the home was replaced for the impersonal institution, the fruit of true loveliness superseded for the sterility of selfish passion, the holiness bound up in divinity exchanged for the Greek role models of vain conceit and corrupt power.


This culture self-destructed. So shall ours.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

The Logic of Love



In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God. (John 1:1)

It is the same Word, or Logic, that spoke the world into being in Genesis 1.

The same Logic, or Testimony, is one that he ordained in Jacob as a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children (Psalm 78:5), and again, (Psalm 119:88), Quicken me after thy lovingkindness; so shall I keep the testimony of thy mouth.

It is the same Testimony, or Witness, spoken of in John 3:33, He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal that God is true.

The Witness, or Truth, of which Jesus said: Ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning. (John 15:27)

That Truth, or Faith, that is the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6). And in John 17, when that Logos, that Word, speaks: Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. And again: For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.

That Faith, or Knowledge, for which the Apostle Paul said: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. (Ephesians 4:13)

That Knowledge, or Love, which is God: for he that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love (1 John 4:8).

And that Love, for which the Apostle Paul said: We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak. (2 Corinthians 4:13)

And that love, that knowledge, that faith, that truth, that witness, that testimony, that logic, that word…they are actions. Our obedience declares these truths. We love Jesus because He first loved us. We seek to know Him so that we might understand the power of His grace. We faithe in Jesus because He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. We bear testimony of that which we have witnessed: the Truth of what He has done in our lives, the lives of those around us, and the lives of those past, revealed to us by that Spirit of Truth, the Paraclete. We do not believe blindly. We do not take 'leaps of faith'. We believe because of the Logic of His ways and of His words, for His ways and His words are the life and light of men (John 1:4).