AKMA’s Random Thoughts

Worse Things Happen at Sea

But this is bad enough. In the run-up to the choir tour, the organizing of which has consumed most of Margaret’s estimable energies for weeks, and in the middle of our friendly conviviality, Bea the Bichon has come down with a bacterial enteric infection. That spells “diarrhea” and “blood” and a massive burden of anxiety and guilt about leaving her behind for Jennifer and Pippa and (after them) a house-sitter who does not like cleaning up after dogs.

She’s stabilized now (Bea, that is), and has a prescription, and will in all likelihood be fine. Just one more thing.

Happy Birthday, Doc!

Count me in on the surprise party — It’s Doc Searls’ birthday, and I’m among those who are deeply thankful for his wise presence in this neighborhood of Blogaria.

Cosmic Convergence

We’re keeping busy here with the simultaneous almost-coincidental presence of three important people: Jennifer (whom I’ve introduced before, our semi-kinda-foster daughter), David (my now-former colleague and doctoral-school friend from way back) and Phil (another beloved friend from Duke days). David’s passing through, packing his house as he prepares to move to a new position at Hope College; Phil’s stopping by on a tour that involves working with the Ekklesia Project and leading several retreats before and after; and Jennifer is checking in for the summer visit. With friendships as rich and long-standing as these (which were sometimes mediated by digital media, way back, for instance, when Phil and I would establish peer-to-peer AppleTalk Remote Access connections and send messages by alternately changing the names of shared files), I have less time for blogging. . . .

Evensong for William Wilberforce

I finally finished the sermon for Evensong, with a good fifteen minutes to spare. The occasion for the sermon was the last Evensong of the summer before the choir leaves (with me) on a tour of churches in the U.K. and France (stopping in Rochester, Oxford, London, and the American Cathedral in Paris). The service commemorates William Wilberforce, an English abolitionist and social activist.

The readings were Isaiah 2:2-4 (the nations come to Zion, and wars cease) and Luke 10:1-9 (Jesus sends out the seventy disciples).

The homily goes like this:

If Jesus had given the disciples a choice — if he had laid out the options — which do you suppose that the disciples would have selected?

“Listen Peter, John, James, and you sixty-seven others, you may go out two by two, carrying no purse, no bag, no sandals, greeting no one on the road, remaining in the first house that welcomes you, eating and drinking whatever they provide. Or, you can go in houses of five, flying to England and France on a tour that’s been meticulously planned, with a suitcase full of clothes, and a thrifty but convenient budget of $200 for meals and used books souvenirs.”

Apart from the conceptual difficulties of explaining air travel to St. Peter, who was not known for being quick on the uptake, I expect we’d have a near-unanimous decision in favor of joining the choir tour. Although something might go wrong, some unforeseen fortuity may befall us, still the amount of time that the Tour Coordinator has put into making this a smooth and comfortable voyage just has to outweigh the attraction of wandering around Palestine barefoot, hungry, and broke, in a dirty tunic. Once we clarified for the disciples what a 747 was, I reckon that every single one of them would have chosen the choir tour option.

Which makes me a little edgy, because Jesus didn’t give his disciples the option of comfort and careful planning. That’s probably partly because the disciples must not give the impression of being first-century religious swindlers; if they were obviously not making any money on the deal, people could be confident that they were preaching out of faith, not greed. But it’s also partly because Jesus teaches us over and over and over again, because we can’t ever hear it well enough, that our eagerness for comfort stifles our praise of God. We attach ourselves to our comfort, and that attachment drags us down with chain we have made link by link, and yard by yard; we gird it on of our own free will, and of our own free will we wear it. We have the opportunity to stand with Jacob Marley, clutching onto the chains of our privilege and letting them shackle us in spiritual slavery — or of joining blessed William Wilberforce (before whose memorial in Westminster Abbey some of us will soon be standing), who took up his privileges and turned them round to drive open the doors of freedom for slaves in Britain, to shelter the poor and to make the the sound of the Good News of Freedom and abundant life heard all around the world.

Jesus commands us to travel light, sisters and brothers, lest our own comfort tangle us up with the slavers and usurers of this world, lest we become more concerned to protect our privilege than to proclaim the freedom to which Christ has called all God’s children. Jesus begs us to travel light, because we sing a gospel song so tremendous, so true, that no note, no syllable of our song may be muffled by selfishness. Jesus invites us to walk with the empty-pocketed disciples in order that our voices may carry a clear song of freedom to the ears of our sisters and brothers on the streets, in the alleys, in faraway lands where a slave wages build our sneakers and sew our clothes.

That song of freedom must be heard, and nothing may mute our voices: not the hesitancy of privilege, nor the pain of servitude. If we once have caught a glimpse of the day when swords are beaten into plowshares, when nations no longer lift up sword against nation, then for the love of God we will follow blessed William to the mountaintop, to sing out the truth by which many peoples can hear God’s word of instruction, that they may know and remember the notes of the song that rings out the great good news that right here, right now, in our very midst, the Kingdom of God has indeed drawn near.

Innovation Alert

Margaret got a version of the infamous Nigerian 419 spam-fraud the other night, but get this: it was from Sierra Leone! Almost got past us — what’ll they think of next?

Gearing Up

(a) for a homily tomorrow evening (Choral Evensong commemorating William Wilberforce);

(b) for an insightful, moving, mind-altering blog about identity, FOAF, privacy, integrity, theology, and James Bond movies (saw From Russia With Love, Thunderball, and You Only Live Twice this week);

(c) for a trip to the UK and to Paris, France, as chaplain of the St. Luke’s Choir of Men and Boys (41 men and boys, two women — one of whom is the tour director and one is the tour nurse) (download from the site at least their version of the Biebl “Ave Maria”);

(d) to compose an appreciative response to Jordon Cooper’s powerful plea for churches to engage with online technology (say Amen, somebody!);

(e) but I did remember to change Liz Lawley’s address in my blogroll and to link to her denunciation of the fraudulent management of “Grace Publications” and “Asian Journal of Information Technology.”

The Habitat EP

Margaret and I had dinner with Susan and Trevor last night at Alice and Friends, where we had a vegetarian dinner that couldn’t be beat. After dinner, over ice cream, Susan gave Margaret some chocolate-for-drinking from Mexico, and Trevor gave us a copy of The Habitat EP by several. It’s a great disk, and knowing Trevor and Jim makes it an extra treat; lots of people should flood the several site with offers to buy it, right away.

Snapster, Now!

Robert Cringely has an idea that may or may not ultimately be legal, but that would instantly change the complexion of the debates over copyright in music recording.

The beauty of Cringely’s proposal is that he’s writing on behalf of reality, the reality of a change in the structures that make necessary (or unnecessary) an industry for compiling and distributing recorded music. No doubt he looks forward to getting inexpensive, legal copies of his favorite performances — but the driving force for his argument comes from his frustration at the way that the music oligopolies are posturing and threatening to hold back technological change, in order to perpetuate a defunct business model.

I know nothing about investments, and I know nothing about the legalities of corporate “beneficial ownership.” But if Cringely has his way, I will take up every cent at my disposal to buy some of the shares he describes — not just for the music, not just for the investment value, but because he ought to be supported in his effort to force the so-called free market actually to make sense.

I came to Cringely via boingboing, where Xeni notes that Roxio Corp. owns the Snapster trademark. One may take that as a positive sign, since Roxio markets the Toast CD-burning software that would be especially useful under a Snapster regime, or one may take it as a negative sign that Roxio’s already in place to impede implementing such an idea. I don’care. Call it “Enrique,” or whatever — just get it started, and let the industries that hold music hostage get out of the way.

FOAFriend is Better

I don’t want to breach propriety by inappropriately assigning responsibility, or claiming more wit for myself than I actually exercised — but yesterday an IRC conversation proposed several refinements of FOAF categories beyond simply “friend,” “acquaintance,” and the various categories of relatives. (Because I communicate with a varied readership, I have excised some of the more — errrr — vivid suggestions.)

For instance, what about “enemy of my enemy” (as in “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”)? Or, “Friends, but we're not talking right now”? Or “Ummm — ‘friends’ ”?
What about “In Your Dreams”?
“Friends who don't realize it yet, but they'll be pals soon because this is a ‘buddy’ film”?
“Don’t really care one way or the other”?
“I know I’ve met her but I don’t remember her name”
“Friends at the moment, until you steal my girlfriend”?
“She thinks we're friends but I’m just using her”?
“Not a friend, but useful connection”?
“We just say we’re friends with AccordionGuy until he finally gets a decent date”?

Contributors to this collection (apart from me) include AccordionGuy and rojisan — and if I left out some contributors, please let me know (and stand up and take credit!).

FOAF Day Two

There’ an explosion of energy on the FOAF front, due no doubt to the interventions of such power hitters as Joi, Marc, and Shelley. Joi may be the one who started the present rush; as the surge of friends-of-friends rushes past and we begin settling to figuring out what it all means, Marc and Shelley have begun probing some follow-up questions.

Marc is asking about nuanced expressions for friendship, acquaintance, relation, and so on. This seems an appropriate way of handling some delicate distinctions among human relationships, but almost ends up obliging users to say too much. I listed Marc as a “friend” when I was assembling my FOAF profile because, well, we’ve exchanged polite words several times online, and I was desperate for names I might include. Marc seems a cheery and relaxed guy, so I hoped he wouldn’t mind (and it seems he doesn’t —whew!); but he’d be reasonable to object that “friend” overstates our connection. If I thought we were best buddies, though, and he thought I was some guy, the RDF syntax of our relationship might be confusing, and sorting it out might entail some tensions and (perhaps unnecessary) hurt feelings.

Shelley points out that there may be something uncomfortable about specifying the precise texture of our relationships in an open online source. That, too. Although I’m content to support a loose, heuristic web of public relationships, a more fine-grained network could easily amplify the very tech-savvy Homeland Security Department (hey, they adopted Windows as their high-security OS) to find out more about us than we wish.

Meanwhile, Liz said something very provocative on the topic, but it slipped my mind and and I can’t find it on her blog. I may edit this part later to include Liz in the discussion.

Much as I appreciate the nuance that Marc’s entry seems to promise, I suspect that we might gain more meaningful, more fine-tuned information by looking at links: are they all one-way? do they seem to be mutual — that is, nearly-simultaneous — or do they alternate by direction at sporadic intervals? how do complementary links relate the two (do third-party linkers tend to emphasize her rather than me, or me rather than her)? Throw in even a crude whuffie system, and we learn a great deal from public information, learning that doesn’t depend on how each party inflects the word “friend.”

Margaret Reads the News

“Librarian Says He’ll Leave in Ten Days; Fighting Eases”

How cool is that? People are taking this estimable vocation seriously.

No, Margaret, that’s Liberian Says He’ll Leave in Ten Days. . . . .

Sociality

I don’t mean to be stand-offish. I like being social and connecting with friends, really I do. But I’m suspicious of Friendster; even though the kind friends who’ve invited me to drink the Kool-aid aren’t, I believe, trying to pick me up for a date, I’ve felt as though the enterprise tilted in that direction. And I honestly don’t need dating to think about right now.

But to show that I don’t think that I’m an island entire unto myself, I gave in to Marc’s bloggical suasion, and decided finally to follow up on the directions Dorothea gave me back in April and construct a Friend-of-a-Friend file. I poked around and came up with very few people whom I know who’ve gone FOAF, so I exaggerated a little on who was a friend. If you keep a FOAF file, please make it visible or accessible (I stole the icons from Marc’s page). Somehow I feel a little more comfortable participating in an open social network than in a proprietary net — especially given the personae of FOAF advocates.

Anyway, now I’m accessible via the FOAF explorer, the Add-a-Friend page, and my own little RDF file.

Masters of Our Domain?

No, this isn’t another blurb about fending off prostate cancer, it’s a hearty “Amen” to John Robb’s and Shelley’s admonition to all but the most casual web-publishers to obtain and maintain your own domain name, and to back-up your site regularly to media you control. This is a large part of why theDisseminary isn’ located on Seabury’s webspace; we couldn’t afford the chance that a Pharaoh would arise who knew not Joseph (as it were) who might summarily obliterate our work from the seminary servers. John’s experience of having been disappeared from his former address is a vividly illustrative case in point (his new address is at Mindplex, and I hope he has a secure future for that URL).

Blogspot is great, and TypePad looks to me as though it’ll turn out to be even greater, but if there’s even the faint prospect that you’ll ever be serious about web publishing, register a domain name and start from there.

Searching Adventures

Referrer logs show that I’m getting a moderate amount of attention from searchers who look for the name of a basketball player for the Lakers and other topics such as “identity” and, sadly, “rape.” Of course, the link that Goggle directs them to comes from a conversation last year between Margaret and me — nothing to do with the present struggle over consent or violence. Which will not satisfy their curiosity, but may alleviate some of the tension associated with these dreadful topics.

Another Noteworthy Argument

When I went to the review of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen in Newsweek, to which Larry Lessig’s blog pointed, I anticipated some illuminating remarks about what made the film so weak (I haven’t seen it; I’m just reflecting the preponderance of critical response that I’ve heard). I didn’t expect to see so simple and compelling a case for the importance of the public domain.

But Brad Stone lays it out: with a rich public domain, our cultural imagination expands and nourishes itself (and us); with a constricted public domain (in the name of, but almost never to the benefit of, creators), we all suffer from the artificial poverty of limited imaginative resources.

Stress

Does anyone else feel as though financial statements that don’t say exactly what they mean should be annihilated? I include, for instance, those medical insurance reports that say, in big letters, “This is not a bill,” but stipulate how much money they think you’re going to owe somebody, and tuition bills that list exorbitant sums that will eventually be eroded by government loans, accounting wizardry, and financial-aid-office legerdemain. I get panic-stricken when I receive a bill that’s greater than the sum of my checking account and savings, whether or not someone later comes along to say, “Oh, you don’t owe us all of that,” or “you don’t owe it all at once.”

Send me a note that says, “We need to generate a paper trail that accounts for expenses and income, so we’re sending you this note — but really, you’ll just owe us about half this amount, spread out over several months.” Please.

A Depressing Story Not Enough People Noticed

One of the members of the smart, committed, articulate team, Dan Gillmor, wrote a frightening column about the possibility that recent developments in the U.S. actually threaten an increased opportunity for vote-rigging. It’s very much read-it-yourself material; they won’t take away the right to a fair election if people can make the consequences of such decisions clear.

An Idea Margaret Doesn’t Need

I read the story about John Gilmore (from boingboing) being kept off his flight home from the UK because he was wearing a “Terrorist Suspect” button, and my eyes glinted. “Hey, I’m about to go on an international flight! Maybe I could get one of those buttons. . . .”

Margaret furrowed her brow and glared at me.

“Or maybe not.”

[Later: the site to which John Gilmore links has removed the offending button from its catalogue; evidently the publicity hosed their bandwidth. Anyone have it cached somewhere?]

An Idea I Need

Séb Paquet links to Norm Walsh’s note that he uses RSS as a calendaring device to maintain his to-do list. Mercy sakes, that’s just what I need; having a whole separate app for personal information (much of which I remember automatically — unfortunately, only much of which I remember automatically) seems a waste of CPU cycles.

If my to-do list and calendar were to appear in my news aggregator, though — Brent, this couldn’t be hard at all — that would change my life for the better.

Lost Chops

Back in high school, I bought a ten-speed bicycle. This was a big deal back then — it was the first wave of “racing” bikes infiltrating the US market, at least in Pittsburgh. I saved up the money I earned at the supermarket and bought a bicycle, a bottom-of-the-line Bottechia. As I picked up further jobs, I upgraded all the parts, so that after a year or two I had a significantly snazzier bicycle and had a pretty good touch for bike maintenance.

This afternoon Pippa and I spent a couple of hours adjusting the brakes, the seats, and various other characteristics of the bikes we picked up yesterday morning. Both bikes need new brake pads and tires, but on the whole, Margaret’s is in pretty good shape. Mine is entirely adequate, but the frame is smaller than would be ideal, and it pulls to the left noticeably. My own body, however, is way out of shape, and the effort of recovering my sense for bike repair, then bicycling around to test-drive the new acquisitions has left me feeling achy and old, dealing with new versions of technologies that should be well familiar.

Dean Allen Owns Me

In what can only be construed as the gravest of lapses in judgment, Dean Allen seems to have bought Blogshares in my humble publication. Compounding the folly of that investment, though, he has bought into the blog at my former address, which I expect will not appreciate in value (although what I know about anything even vaguely resembling financial markets is easily surpassed by what Margaret knows about cricket).

In the course of exploring this otherwise inexplicable phenomenon, I discovered that this very blog has a separate Blogshares ownership and valuation. Moreover, whereas the past blog had a middlin’ kind of value, it looks as though the Disseminary blog is rather expensive. So I reckon that Dean ought to get out of the dead-end Seabury shares and invest in Disseminary shares, if he can. Heck, I’d give him some if I had any myself, which I don’t think I do.

Of course, one result of all this is that — Allen being a moralist of the strictest sort — now he would never ever mention me in his blog, since that would affect the price of shares he owns. There’s no particular reason for him to refer to goings-on here in the first instance (I’m at something of a loss to figure why he bought in; maybe the shares were a joke birthday present, the online equivalent of a Talking Bass); theology, metablogging, and my family aren’t topics that typically engage his interest. (If he wanted to donate some design services to the Disseminary, though, we’d ecstatically accept the offer.) But the SEC of Blogshares would probably extradite him from Pompignac straight back to Toronto if he added to the value of his investment by using his influential site to leverage my status upward. So, one more prominent blogger guaranteed not to link here.

They Hunt in Packs

Today, at the St. Nicholas’ Church Rummage Sale, we bought a couple of bicycles for the older generation, to go with the bikes that Josiah and Pippa already have. (Ours are matching yellow, although Margaret’s is in nicer condition. We’ll have to spruce them both up eventually; the brakes pads are pretty hard and dry, and my front wheel pulls a little to the left.)

So now, for the first time in family history, we can all go for a bike ride. As Si would say, “Beware!”

Disseminary Prospects and Blogroll Maintenance

Trevor and I divvied up a bunch of responsibilities the other day, and we’re sending out invitations to a bunch of scholars who may be able and interested in joiing forces with the Disseminary. Now we just have to wait out the return messages. . . .

And for the first time in months, I’ve begun adding to my blogroll a number of sites I visit (or aggregate) regularly, but hadn’t bothered to enumerate. I doubt I reached all of them, but it’s a start.

Killer Analogy

Mitch Ratcliffe has summed up in a resonant analogy an op-ed piece by Paul Krugman (NYT, registration required, sorry), and in so doing has handed presidential candidates an analogy that ought to fly, that should make sense to people who aren’t ready to spend a lot of time analyzing the details of Bush’s economic policies:

“President Bush is running the country like Enron.”

Put that in a few mass-market media spots, and see how the voters respond.

Top Five

Last night, one of the main topics of dinner conversation (we ate out at Las Palmas to celebrate the committee decision) involved the relative merits of the theme songs to James Bond movies.

Now this is a matter of great moment if you, as most of the members of this family, think that James Bond movies are among the signal achievements of late twentieth-century Western culture. I am always tempted to play the classicist curmudgeon — “Oh, they don’t record ’em like they used to” — but I had to admit that “Die Another Day” and “The World Is Not Enough” were two of my favorites. Margaret prefers “Nobody Does It Better”; Pippa likes “Goldfinger” (though the overblown trumpet sound bothers Margaret) and “Diamonds Are Forever.” Si mentioned that “Live and Let Die” is good, but especially in the cover version by some irreverent young whippersnapper band. We appreciate Tom Jones’s rendition of the Thunderball theme.

“You Only Live Twice,” sung by Nancy Sinatra, received some positive attention. Though we like Shirley Bassey’s Bond themes, we thought the Moonraker theme was downright lame (but then, Moonraker isn’t that strong a Bond movie).

We couldn’t even recall the theme songs from the Timothy Dalton movies. We were relieved to realize that we hadn’t even thought about Sheena Easton in years. And we all like the Moby remix of the main Bond theme.

(Drums Fingers Patiently)

So, one of my functions in life is to explain and encourage flexible uses of weblog software for a variety of purposes, and as part of that endeavor I would like to demo and describe BloggerPro and TypePad (link corrected —thanks, Liz, for catching m,y copy-and-paste glitch), with some sense of what the services will cost. Unfortunately both services are not accepting new accounts just now, and it’s not clear to an outsider how either one will ultimately turn out for users (especially naive users). I’m not asking that TypePad beta-testers write in to assure me how cool it is, or BloggerPro users to express themselves about the past and present of that service (since it8’s evidently going through an overhaul). It’s just inconvenient timing, and it’s particularly awkward to present this stuff to potential users while saying, “Well, I don’t know how much it’ll cost you or exactly what you’ll be able to do — but someday it probably won’t be too expensive and I think it will be a great service for you to adopt.”

One Step Onward

The faculty committee this afternoon voted to recommend to the full faculty that the faculty recommend to the trustees I be promoted to full professor.

That tortured sentence gives a sense of the number of processes yet to unfold, but this one was necessary, and it went smoothly. The committee explicitly signaled approval for my scholarship and my technology work, and indicated that they hoped Seabury could arrange my responsibilities so as to take full advantage of my strengths. That’s a very positive sign, and I’m very honored by it — even more so if they actually implement that aspiration. But they were open and trying to connect with me, and that felt very encouraging.

Planning Ahead

We’ll be spending three weeks in the UK at the beginning of August, and (as you may imagine) I’m interested in locating ahead of time as many wireless hotspots as possible. So if you have any recommendations of wifi access points in Rochester, Oxford, and London (Barbican or near St. Paul’s), please let me know.

Or you may just want to not tell me, so you can enjoy a few weeks’ silence from this quarter. . . .

Next Step

My review committee meets this afternoon. Details later.

Orpington Report

Both my wonderful sister-in-law Jeanne (and her partner Gail) and my beloved friends Hilary and John keep chickens. In fact, Chicory — one of Jeanne and Gail’s chickens — just had four wee chicks, we hear (congratulations to all concerned). This doesn’t sound like a distinctive cause for thanksgiving, especially since we’re too far away to hit them up for fresh eggs, but I truly appreciate what they’ve done for us. If not for Jeanne and Hilary, I’d never have experienced the delight of reading through the names of different varieties of chickens.

Under what other circumstances, for instance, would one have the opportunity to refer to a “Silver Dorking”? How do shaggy residents of Gdansk feel about chickens being called “Bearded Polish”? Is there some connection between Transylvanian Naked Necks and the abusive epithet “redneck” (some naked necks are, after all, red naked necks)?

One could go on indefinitely, but my favorite — the kind John and Hilary were thinking of buying — sounds like the name of a sportswriter from the golden age of reporting: “And now, baseball headlines from our man at the All-Star Game, Buff Orpington. . . .” Someday I’m going to write a novel or a screenplay, and Buff Orpington will be a character in it.

Evening Mass

Some of the resident students are arranging weekly mass for the community this summer, and tonight was my turn to preach and celebrate. We prayed for Ann and for my cousin Daniel, for Jim and for many other of our friends who are un- and underemployed, who are injured or troubled or burdened.

I had a hard time clearing my head to focus on preparation, and it was only for a tiny congregation, so I’m not sure how this turns out — but if I show you only the sermons that seem just-right, you get an incomplete picture of my ministry. So I’ll append tonight’s sermon anyway.

Some days you roll out of bed, knowing that you’re all about feeding the lambs and tending the sheep. And other mornings, nobody better look at you funny, lest you decide to destroy and overthrow.

And neither of those moods comes with a gilt-edged, red-letter certificate proving that the Holy Spirit endorses your attitude.

According to John Dreibelbis, we clergy tend to be conflict avoiders; many would prefer just to leave fissures alone, and hope that they spontaneously heal themselves. That squares with my experience; and I imagine John has some material on blame-shifting and self-justifying behavior, too. “I’m beginning to look bad, so it’s time for me to pull you down. You believe I was called as a prophet from the womb, so I’ll build you up and plant you.”

I don’t know anyone whom God has called to be a conflict-avoider, though, nor a full-time destroyer nor a full-time planter. In a mixed world, we, most of us, bear a mixed vocation, and our vexation comes from figuring out when we should tear down and when we build up, especially, especially when that which needs building is something we really dislike, or that which needs tearing down is something we cherish. We need wheat over here, but the tares are actually pretty appropriate in meadows; we need flowers in the West Garth, but not on the athletic field over yonder to the north.

When God forms us in the womb, God forms each of us differently, consecrating us differently, to serve different nations and to feed different flocks. God even forms us, sometimes, to wrangle against one another in order that our struggles may bring God’s truth more clearly to the light. Here is grace, hard grace though it be: we receive the strength to persist in a truth of which we are as sure as life itself is sure, yet without the guarantee that would ratify our conviction as the one, official, exclusive, transcendent Way.

In such a vale of complexities, Jesus calls us not to be always right, always (dare we say) correct. We don’t have that option. I dare say, though, that any breaking that God calls us to do should come without the gratifying sense that we’ve shown those bastards; and any building up we do should come without the unqualified rejoicing that our side has prevailed. Humble alike in firm prophetic critique and patient pastoral consolation, we may hope that our ministry bears a steady witness to a peace that passes human understanding, that escapes human imposition — and in that hope go forward to with the trepidation that befits mortals who speak words God has placed in their mouth, praying that grace will heal those whom we injure, that grace will overturn those wrongs in which we participate, that grace will bring us froward and fearful ministers with all our sisters and brothers, to that new creation in which the abundant of life in God’s presence reveals anew the peace and justice and truth in whose image we were formed, from before all ages. Amen.

several Performance

Trevor’s band “several” will be playing this weekend at Mennofolk 2003, and to cash in on celebrate the occasion, they’re releasing an EP CD (I already gave Trevor a hard time about what makes a CD an EP; it’s just a CD with fewer selections, right?, not different in kind from a CD with many selections).

Go to the several site and download “12 Fires of Harold” for a preview (unless, of course, you work where Gary Turner’s penpal spends company time polling packets to make sure no one enjoys working at his or her business). Spread the word.

Call For Technologians

Well, I forgot to mention Dale Lature yesterday, and Bob “No Web Presence” Carlton volunteered, as did Dave “C & E” Rogers, and at this rate we can requisition a decent-sized Headquarters building — kinda like the old firehouse they rehabbed in Ghostbusters, but with wifi.

Technology for Congregations Part Two

In yesterday’s post and the comments that hang thereon (again in response to interlocutory friend Danya), I ventured toward a description of what congregations ought to be doing online. Before I get to that stage, though, I should add a note or two about the “why” part of the enterprise.

Namely: almost every congregation already has a web presence of some kind or another. The phone number is probably available online. A denominational center lists the address, phone number, and leaders’ names. Congregants may refer to their congregation online. News reports mention congregations. A parish that decides to disregard the Web isn’t therefore absent from the Web — it’s ceding the Web to what others say about the congregation. Moreover, it’s practically putting a “We’re clueless and uninterested” sign out to potential congregants who use the Web to sound out spiritual homes. “Please go away and don’t bother us” doesn’t communicate a congregational ethos I’d commend to anybody.

Although the community’s relation to any given congregation usually begins and ends with the facade and signposts, that same congregation can offer a sense of its identity and ethos that radiates through the walls by constructing a web site that reflects those characteristics. Resist the temptation to devise an illusory ideal identity! That’s not only not conversational, it’s manipulative and self-defeating. Anybody who spends a few days in the bosom of Congregation Simchat Torah or St. Willibrord’s Church will find out, without much effort, what the congregation’s priorities and sentiments are like. It’s the on-way, broadcast model of communication: since no one’s likely to buy air time to run commercials that say, “Don’t believe what Congregation Simchat Torah says about itself!” boradcast advertisements tend toward a sales pitch rather than mutual learning.

The more candor you can turn loose on a congregational web site, the better people will know the congregation, for better or worse; that exercise alone may make it worth building a conversational web site. If it turns out that the conversation turns acrimonious, if it engages nobody’s attention, the congregation benefits from knowing that. I don’ suppose that a congregational web site only serves its function if it’s a dainty, pretty, happy representation of the community. Indeed, (again), I hope that no congregation would devise such a site unless they turn out to be a dainty, pretty, happy community. Starting a congregational conversation online opens up a tremendous means for collective self-discovery.

If the site includes writings from congregational leaders, they’l benefit from feedback from both congregants and community. At the same time, visitors will have the opportunity to learn what the leaders of St. Willibrord’s have to say; maybe it would be worth coming to the synagogue to meet them, or ask them about the spiritual dilemma you’ve been wrestling with.

That all entails standing out in public, with all our charms and deficiencies, and taking the accolades and brickbats that come from letting the world know what we’re really about. That may be risky — and I’ve talked about that already, and will revisit the topic — but this is not a new risk, it’ a risk the roots of which have been hidden by the relative difficulty of finding out in person about our congregations. I think that would make a good Part Three.

Thunder and Truth

It’s too early in the morning for me to be writing about important things, but once the rest of the world wakes up, I’ll probably be overtaken by daily business. Since a thunderstorm woke me (arousing fears of another basement flood), I’ll put my pre-dawn consciousness to work trying to answer the Tutor’s fierce challenge (in the best sense) to my integrity.

The question, if I understand it well, involves how a postmodernist (and I seem to be shackled with that category description, however uninterested I am in it) dares speak of truth and justice, or of truth and lie in a moral sense, to paraphrase the fool-prophet from whose shadowlight philosophy has yet to distinguish itself.

“What is the final cause of postmodern discourse? Moral evasion.” Yes, possibly so; when one can appeal to no Final Absolute to resolve the vexed problems about good and evil, power and weakness, truth and lie, one can readily use a heightened awareness of ambiguity and complexity for the end of distancing oneself from the tenor of one’s words and actions. “It depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is,” after all; so many microtones of possibility that it’s hard to come to rest on any given assessment. Like Zeno’s arrow, the crass postmodern can never reach the target of moral evaluation.

The final cause of postmodern discourse need not be exhausted by evasion, though. The opposite polarity finds justification in postmodern discourses as well (and the Tutor acknowledges such). While the crass postmodern shrugs and says, “Evasion happens,” the earnest postmodern declines the moral shortcuts of projecting local prejudice onto the transcendent horizon of absolute moral values in order to justify drawing and quartering strange, unwelcome sojourners. This orchestration of postmodern discourse persists not to eradicate responsibility, but to radicalize it (cue the echoes of the ghosts of existentialisms past — phantasms because in their individualism (or nihilism), they sentenced their own projects to death, and cut themselves off from the heritage that could pick up, sustain, and transform their insights). The postmodern flanking maneuver demystifies the supposedly-disinterested appeal to Higher Authority and cuts off the cadences that might prematurely allow a Rove, Rice, or Bush to displace accountability away from their own discernments and judgments.

So, I name Clinton and Bush “liars” not because I have access to some metaphysical authority by which I (and I particularly) can adjudicate truth from lie — but because everyone must stand for something (even if it be no more than a Brand, or self-indulgence, or Folly). If these men publicly claim adherence to a discourse of power made perfect in weakness, of resolute truth making its vulnerable way in a world of lies, of peace that passes human comprehension, then in the name of that discourse I charge them with misrepresenting their actions and their rationales for their actions.

I may be wrong; Clinton may honestly have thought that he and Monica weren’t engaging in sexual relations, and Bush may have thought that Saddam and Osama were conspiring to unleash terroristic mayhem on the civilized world by transporting yellowcake uranium from Africa to Iraq (and that when his State Department and CIA advisors indicated that this wasn’t the case, and then turned out to be right, it was their fault he didn’t believe them in the first place). Maybe — though that concession churns my viscera. If they acted from integrity, from their love of a truth that escapes capture and manipulation, and I’m answerable for my accusation now, to my sisters and brothers, and ultimately, to my Judge, who will discern my failings not by any standard that Bill Bennett can compile into a best-seller or GWB can cite as his favorite philosophy, but by a truth whose transcendence obscures it from mortal audition.

Does that exculpate apologetic statesmen of a compromising kind or academic theologians with postmodern proclivities? No; truth brooks no evasion, whether by cheap qualifying or orotund asseveration of absolute authority. My characterization of truth and lies rests on the consistency of the speakers’ claims day-to-day with their lives, with their professed ideals, with the trust the claim from their loved ones and their constituents. I am unconvinced that either Clinton or Bush can provide convincing rebuttal to the charge that they knowingly misrepresented themselves and their actions.

Does that falsify my postmodern credentials (not that I care for any)? Show me how; but before you devote any energy to the task, decide whether it’s worth stripping me of rags for which I care not, in order to indict me for falling short of a consistency to which neither I nor the God to whom I bow, holds me.

Quatorze Juillet

I almost forgot — Happy Bastille Day, everyone! OK, all together: “Allons, enfants de la patrie, le jour de gloire est arrivé! . . .”

It’s also the feast day of Dominican hero Humbert of Romans, an early Master General of the Order who contributed a vita of St. Dominic, some works on Dominican polity, and a Treatise on Preaching. Luckily, Humbert was French, so one can probably converge the holidays to some extent.

League of Exemplary Technologians

OK, the movie is reputed to be something of a disappointment (though Si liked it) — but I thought this morning about how helpful it would be to form a community of Cluetrainical, technologically-conversant, theologically- and congregationally-aware practitioners who could advise congregations about matters technological. I’m thinking of people like Jordon (of course), Mary Hess, Jim Rafferty, Trevor and me (for starters — not meaning to exclude anyone). If only we could get together, talk through some common interests and convictions, and set some founding premises for advising people about the intersection of congregational life and technology, social software, Web presence, and so on. . . .

Technology for Congregations

A long time ago, Danya asked me to expatiate on what Trevor and I say about using technology for building community and congregations. I don’t want to blow the gaff on our whole presentation, but it will be helpful to sketch some of our spiel in order learn more from visitors here (which we then can pass along to the folks to whom we present stuff). Besides, it’s only fair to blog some of this out when we learned so much from other bloggers.

So, point one of the presentation as I envision it (Trevor and I operate in very different, complementary ways) is, simply, “A way to connect with people.” A “way,” not a place, because I’m fussy about that. I won’t highlight that fuss in a presentation, but I observe it anyway. It’s a way to connect, as distinct from “getting a message to”; that is, a well-made congregational web presence provides a means for visitors to communicate back to the congregation. It’s not just a TV-radio-newspaper advertisement, classic one-way media. It’s opening up a conversation.

It’s a way to connect with a lot of people, and here I’ll brandish whatever statistical leverage I lay hands on at a given moment. Moreover, these multitudes are part of constituency that churches are typically very weak at connecting with.

It’s a way to connect with people who are already interested in something about your congregation. They’re not at your web site because you interposed a commercial between two segments of their favorite Seinfeld episode, or because you bought a couple of column inches next to a news report about the new organ at Such-and-Such Church. They deliberately sought out your web site. That makes a huge difference, and a fabulous opportunity to communicate with them.

It’s a way to underline what might be interesting (or unattractive) about your congregation. If you’re representing a high-church, Anglo-Catholic congregation online, your site should make that evident, in order better to connect with potential Anglo-Catholics, and to avoid frustrating ardently Protestant worshippers.

It’s a way to communicate what a congregation is all about to a public that often doesn’t sense the opportunity for or interest in finding that out. But that would modulate to Point Two, and I’ll save that for tomorrow (or whenever).

Bespectacled Bloggers

As Shelley pulls back the veil of plastic to reveal her self-portait in Legos, I’m struck by how many of us Lego bloggers seem to wear the same glasses. (I take it that Euan is the one without specs; or wait! Looks like Gary, whom we know from his webcam to be visually-challenged, is sans lens in this tableau.)

Waiting, now to see what theatrical spectacular Steve casts Shelley in. Maybe we’ll have to wait till the next time he opens some of that delicious-sounding blueberry ale.

16 Words

I was repulsed by Bill Clinton’s leering shenanigans, his bald-faced lying to his spouse (oh, and to the American public, if they matter), and to the legal system he was sworn to uphold.

That being said, at least he had the decency to leer. George Bush’s straight-faced sanctimonious hogwash offends me every bit as deeply, and more so when I recall that Clinton was trying to excuse what he had some basis for regarding as a fundamentally private matter (I disagree, but that’s not to the point at the moment). Bush, on the other hand, made a point of emphasizing lies dressed up as facts, claims that senior members of his administration knew were untrue, and he emphasized them as part of his futile effort to convince the world that Iraq represented an immediate threat to the safety and stability of the world. He lied not only to his family and his constituents, but to the whole world. And so far as we can tell, he is unabashed; his main line of defense has been to insist that the end justified the means. Oh, and to scapegoat the man who was trying to dissuade him from lying, for not trying hard enough — then to say he had full confidence in him.

Condaleeza Rice has argued that this tempest concerns only the teacup’s-worth of sixteen words. It seems like only yesterday that Bush’s partisan allies were making an even bigger fuss over the single word, “is.”

Author, Author

Anyone who’s ever written a book will know just how miserably harrowing a process it can be. One of my books involved dealing with an editorial department that would have given nightmares to much better authors than I. When the proofs came back, they were so grimly mutilated that I could hardly look at them; in the end, Margaret had to check the last chapter or two — I just couldn’t hack it any more. Another still gives me the willies, and some editorial decisions on that project live on to blot my scholarly escutcheon, though I fought hard to override them.

So our blogsister Shelley is much to be acclaimed for seeing through to publication her latest book, Practical RDF. We’re throwing our hats in the air, shouting “Huzzah,” and wondering what impractical RDF would be like.

No, don’t tell us — it was just a rhetorical question.

“Writer”?

Trevor and I are on a tippy-toe alert lookout for functional alternatives to Microsoft Word. ClarisWorks Appleworks is Carbon, not Cocoa, and it feels crufty. I’ve been watching Mellel, which I like because I root for underdogs and because its developers seem to have their heads screwed on straight, but Mellel doesn’t support the keyboard shortcuts that I’ve gotten so used to over a dozen years of word processing — command-I for italics, and so on. In fact, Mellel has relatively few keyboard equivalents of commands, which is tough on me since I’m trying to be a good boy and not abuse my right thumb. (Maybe it’s AppleScript-able to use keyboard commands; hmmmm.)

Whoops! As if to illustrate his behavior relative to editing posts, AKMA commits a colossal blunder, then has to figure out what to do about it. Mellel does seem to obey the “italics” key command, and maybe some others (though this isn’t documented anywhere I can find). Well, Mellel just leaped out ahead of the pack. I have the feeling there’s something else I wish Mellel did — open Word .doc documents, for one thing — but it certainly does use keyboard shortcuts.

OpenOffice will presumably be great once it operates under OS X rather than the *nix-native windowing schemes; sorry, I won’t give up my typefaces. (Addendum: “This application is stable enough to be used in production environments where you do not require tight integration with Mac OS X fonts, imaging, and user experience” — my emphasis. Boy, I wish their version for Aqua were ready!)

Now, Nisus brings to the public Nisus Writer Express, which does use familiar keyboard shortcuts, and which opens Word-format files (huge plus). Moreover, it comes with a one-year free upgrades promise. I’d be happy to jump right onto NWX, except they shipped version 1.0 with no footnoting. Maybe it’s a tactical decision: they’re thinking that not so many academic types use word processors. Whatever the reason, there’just absolutely no way I can pay for a footnote-less word processor. I couldn’t even do it if they gave a date by which time they promise to offer footnoting. Show me the footnotes, fellas, and I’ll be tempted to show you the money. Even then, I’ll be worried about relying on a developer who figures that they can afford to release a writer’ tool without one of the fundamental functions that [at least one constituency of] writers need.

AKMA Watch?

If Mark set up a site that tracked the changes in my weblog, it’d be pretty boring. I say this without intending to jab at Shelley or Dave, or to applaud Mark. I read all their blogs, and benefit from them.

It’s a different way of blogging. I do change posts when I feel it needed, though I try to keep that to a minimum. I don’t see Mark’s cataloguing Dave’s changes as a moral issue; after all, Dave published all those versions of his blog in the first place (if Mark were sneaking onto his site and siphoning off pre-release drafts, that’d be a different story). I can understand Dave feeling an uncomfortable spotlight — but Dave surely recognizes, by now, that his choice to blog from the hip will engender particular responses from people whom he addresses. I’m not claiming that Dave shouldn’t blog spontaneously and edit afterward. It’his blog; he can do with it what he wants. It does seem odd that if he prefers to edit online, in public, rather than offline, he objects to somebody’s noticing.

I haven’t said anything about intent; I don’t have an intent-o-meter, so I’m keeping out of that one.

Neither Mark nor Dave cares what I think about this brawl, so I won’t waste what little wisdom I have in trying to think up a way out. It’s a shame, though.

Another Aspect of Digital Identity

I gave in; once I clicked to the build-yourself-in-Legos site (via frizzylogic, who found it on boingboing, image float code courtesy of Mandarin Design, to which I always go because I turn out to be too lazy to type it myself, even though I remember it adequately by now), I couldn’t not see how close I could get. And on the whole, I think this is pretty close. Clerical collar added via Photoshop.

Oh, and I did subscribe to Scott McCloud’s “The Right Number” online comic, for 75 cents total (over 3 25-cent issues). The registration with BitPass micropayment service was painless; I bought five dollars’ worth of credit with my Paypal account.

The comic itself is handsome and ingenious, and actually involves questions of digital identity (in a certain sense). Each frame expands from the center of the frame before, and McCloud has (usually subtly) provided visual cues that justify a rectangle at the center of the frame. The premise is pleasingly ingenious; the art is strong, mostly monochromatic blue (though with a few effective accents in red). The point-of-view doesn’t draw readers out of expectations that so far remain complicit with cultural androcentrism, to the extent that this will no doubt seem “no big deal” to most readers — still, someone with McCloud’s insight ought to, and may be be planning to, take readers out of the assumptions that they take for granted.

Academic Life

The delayed process for my review for promotion took a step ahead today as I met with my external reviewer, my distinguished neighbor to the south, David Rhoads. We had a long, warm, very constructive conversation. The full committee is scheduled to meet next week.

One Continent Down, Several to Go

I just added another coup to my iChat AV trophy list; last week, I chatted with Pascale in Washington, D.C. (with one-way video), and today I chatted with Euan in England (and pining for the Scotland I heard in his accent).

Which continent next? South America? Asia, Australia? I don’t think I know anyone with a Mac in Antarctica. . . .

I’m Never More Serious Than When I’m Joking

Margaret and I haven’t watched television for years (we do own one), but back in the olden days we used to watch the PBS Mystery! series avidly. Vincent Price was the host, then Diana Rigg; we watched Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Roderick Alleyn, Tommy and Tuppence, Adam Dalgleish, Inspector Morse, Jane Tennison — but our favorite was the short series of mysteries featuring Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion. I love the theme, with lead actor Peter Davison humming in the background. We both love Campion’s self-deprecating folly, and Campion’s manservant Magersfontein Lugg is superlative. We finally found a couple of Campion DVD’s in the Evanston Public Library, and we’re in bliss.

What Do You Think?

Fred Clark has a lovely post that identifies something that had been fluttering at the margins of my attention for years. He cites the U.S. media’s peculiar proclivity to treat public-opinion polls as news, as though (to quote his example) it’s just as important to know what Americans think is the capital of Australia as it is to know what the capital of Australia actually is. Reporting about the perception of the news crowds out the reporting the news. . . .

(Later) Jordon Cooper also points to this phenomenon — evidently a third of the American public thinks that the army did discover weapons of mass destruction. . . . That’s reported as news, but the news venues don’t devote significant extra effort to dispel the illusion. (After all, that might contribute to the furore over the left-wing control of the media.)

Another Voice Against Political Lying

Joan Chittester, well-known writer on spirituality, makes her case simply and directly. Either President Bush and his minions lied to the world, or they took calamitous action on the basis of intimations whose soundness they did not firmly establish.

(link via Tripp, whose own version of the link is munged.)

Blogging and Clergy

Last week David asked about the risks of clerical blogging, not in terms of stalkers and children, but in terms of misunderstanding. I did bring this up, and used as a case in point a screenshot from a former student’s blog (with permission). He didn’t anything specifically wrong; someone just misunderstood something he wrote, big time, and all kinds of mayhem evidently ensued.

There’s no simple answer. But you knew I’d say that.

One fundamental law of the universe dictates that there’s no way we can, by virtue of our diligent commitment to thoughtful preparation, sincere goodwill, and the best intentions, prevent people from misconstruing stuff we say. “No one,” as Margaret’s and my all-time favorite documentary intones, “is safe from disaster.”

That doesn’t make the Web fundamentally different from real life. I’ve said really mortifyingly stupid things in front of classes, and some pretty dumb stuff in front of congregations (I save the stupidest for teaching). The Web is different in the number of people who may notice, the fact that those are words you chose to display to the world right on your web page, and the fact that (courtesy of the Wayback Machine) my stupid remarks on a weblog can live on as long as some device can read HTML. Yeah, that’s different.

But that difference conceals the extent to which many of us have grown accustomed to speaking carelessly in public, and subsequently covering our exposed posteriors by saying, “You know what I meant,” as though that were a golden Get Out of Trouble Free password. I’ve heard more clergy than I care to remember (not David, who expresses himself pretty carefully and whom I definitely do care to remember) just shrug off some ill-thought-out blunder as par for the course. Sadly, they were right.

Seaburians know that I harangue students about writing skills. This is one reason. Clergy are professional communicators (among other aspects of their job descriptions). Few people come to ministry out of a desire to write in public, to give (homiletical) speeches. Many, many students resist the premise that they should take advantage of their seminary time to learn to communicate more precisely and effectively. My interest is not exclusively academic — clergy write constantly, for newsletters, sermons, formal letters, ecclesiastical politics, casual memos — and they can save themselves a mountain of grief by learning to say what they want to say, clearly and deliberately.

Not everyone has to be as hyperbolically careful about what they say as are some folks (I, for instance). But (a) we ought certainly to do the best we can, not giving ourselves a pass by blaming people who misunderstand us when we write ambiguous, poorly-composed, just plain wrong-headed stuff for public consumption; and (b) when we write casually, we ought to write in a full awareness that what we say can and will be used as evidence against us.

Margaret says, “ ‘Accountability’ is the word of the year around here.” That’s the kind of thing she means. Try not to say anything on a blog that you wouldn’t mind your mother (or that cranky curmudgeon in the congregation who fights everything you propose) reading. And if you genuinely say something quite innocent, then you probably have a rich enough track record that you can show what you really meant, and it wouldn’t hurt humbly to apologize anyway.

One more time, with feeling: apologize anyway.

Blogging doesn’t change the risks of speaking in public. Blogging doesn’t make clergy more likely than ever before to say something silly, to reveal something that ought to have been held more discreetly, to say something carefully that observers still misunderstand. Blogging doesn’t change these, but makes them more visible; it makes us more accountable for what we say, and I’m inclined to think that’s good.

Music Alert!

If you can’t get enough of Daler Mehndi — and who among us can, Margaret perhaps excepted? — you’ll absolutely want to click on one of the video links at this Korean page (you can guess which link it is, right? The second set of links?). The link comes courtesy of Scott McCloud, whose new online comic “The Right Number” (part one) is available for micropayments. Scott’s been fighting for micropayments for ages, and tomorrow I’ll probably register with BitPass just to encourage Scott.

Number Nine Confession of Faith

Dream, dream away
Magic in the air, was magic in the air?
I believe, yes I believe
More I cannot say, what more can I say?

Says It All

Today the Onion really is the finest news source, and satire the most reliable window on truth: for instance, the headline (and story) “Bush Asks Congress for $30 Billion to Help Fight War on Criticism” (thanks, Halley).

If the funding is approved, the Bush Administration will act swiftly to shore up numerous areas of vulnerability. Among the actions: ensuring that the White House is defended against verbal snipers, safeguarding the president's past illicit actions from biographical weapons, and sealing off the largest sources of domestic criticism by securing and patrolling the nation's newsrooms

Doubting AKMA

The minute I saw this — even before Chris emailed me to tip me off (what, you think I don’t check the EGR blog every day, several times a day?) I knew I wanted to blog about it. The matter of faith and doubt and certainty and truth and all that stuff has been bouncing around my thought-bin for weeks, and Chris’s claim that “real theologians don’t doubt it” must occasion a reply.

I’m going to start tonight, but will finish tomorrow. I was afk — away from keyboard — almost all day.

The very most important point, though, is that a tremendous amount hinges on how one uses the words “doubt” and “believe.” Once the topic of religion comes up, these typically get cast as opposites: either one believes that Jesus was born of a virgin, or one doubts it, and the “believes” side gets cast either as the heroic saints or as the credulous buffoons depending on whether you took the red or the blue pill, and likewise doubters get cast as damnable heretics or unfettered free-thinkers. As my Seaburian readers know to expect me to say, “it’s all more complicated than that.”

I will proceed to speak mostly of myself, for several reasons. One, I do not want to make windows into anyone else’s soul (to paraphrase Queen Bess). Two, I’m readily available as a discursive object. Whether one likes me or not, I’m out as a theologian, and am therefore accountable to you all to articulate the ways that these topics affect me. In other words, if I know anything about anyone’s believing and doubting, it’s my doubts and beliefs I know about. . . .

(Resuming in the morning) I have never quite understood the “either doubting or believing” dichotomy. Do I doubt the fundamental dogmas of the catholic faith? Well, yes, in a sense: I can’t imagine what it would be like not to entertain doubts about such peculiar claims as that a dead man became alive again, or even that a non-substantial transcendent being created and will consummate this perceptible world. I say this not to scorn anyone whose belief is so steady as to regard these claims as self-evident — simply to confess that I don’t have the faculty of imagination to guess what it would be like so to regard them. Every other morning I stagger into the bathroom, look at my plain reflection in the mirror, and ask whether I’m not an arrant charlatan, teaching such transparent humbug to trusting students. (Of course, this is before I’ve had my morning coffee, which does wonders to restore my faith in Providence.)

Am I then a doubter? I may well be mistaken, but I think not. I certainly don’t commend to others a persistently dubious way of life. At considerable risk of self-congratulation, I construe that diurnal doubt as part of my vocation, as somebody who’s called to think hard about complicated questions. These are among the most complicated of questions, hence I try (with my limited resources) to think as hard about them as I can, and that involves taking seriously the possibility that the whole vast endeavor of Christian faith, indeed possibly of every sort of non-materialist metaphysical thinking, is an elaborate form of wish-fulfillment no more rooted in reality than buying lottery tickets. At least one lottery ticket will eventually win the grand prize; we have no guarantee that any metaphysic will do as well. I take that possibility with the utmost seriousness, and wrestle with it deeply and regularly.

Readers may then be surprised to hear how vexed I feel when preachers and theologians commend the wisdom of heresy and doubt. I’m quite well aware that sensitive, thoughtful people dissent from the church’s teaching; I don’t question their integrity or intelligence, both of which seem confirmed by the delicacy I observe in doctrinal formulas. Every other morning, I wonder whether they’re right.

On the other hand, though, “believing” involves something other than simply swallowing a shovelful of codswollop. If it be admitted, for the purposes of argument, that the church’s dogmatic tradition involves claims that defy plausibility on first examination, that does not imply that those claims are untrue; and the “for the purposes of argument” clause may cover over a richer sense of plausibility than my first-light-of-day ruminations allow. “Believing” entails more than assent to propositions; it entails a commitment of one’s life and energies to a particular way of construing the world, and in that fuller sense of believing I have no choice but to follow the way of Jesus Christ.

If I were to claim to be a Buddhist, I would be only a shallow, romantic self-styled Buddhist, enamored of the iconography, ethic, and metaphysics, but entirely ignorant of and detached from what it really takes to live a Buddhist’s life in this world.

If I were to claim to be an atheist, I would be a dishonest atheist. I would still pray, fear, and live in a way determined by what I have learned from the saints, only without their faith — an utterly shabby atheist.

If I were to claim to be an agnostic, I would still be misrepresenting who I am; I’d be a hollow believer who was hedging his bets by claiming less than he actually senses to be true.

If I were to claim to determine for myself what’s true or false, what’s credible or implausible, I would arrogate to myself far more authority than I can justify by my wisdom or my practice. I haven’t the insight to assess the truth on my own power, or the virtue to exemplify the truth in my own life. I would believing and living as an unacknowledged parasite on others’ faith and virtue, and my conscience would betray me.

As it is, all I can call myself is a Christian, and one who is trying gradually to live more fully into the truth of what that entails.

And that involves acknowledging my accountability to claims about truth and the appropriate way of life, claims that do not originate from me or My Pontifical Authority. As a Christian, and especially as a Christian theologian, I am only mediating, participating in, representing, articulating claims that others have made more fully, more satisfactorily than I. I don’t presume to teach Paul, Macrina, Chrysostom, Augustine, Julian, Dominic, Catherine, Newman, and the whole communion of the saints without admitting their primary role in having taught me. As their heir, I have a freedom and obligation to question some of what they have taught; the Spirit isn’t through with the church yet, and by raising and pushing at topics like the church’s understanding of gender and sexuality, of peace and violence, of coercive authority and servanthood, of the relation of Jesus’ disciples to the children of Israel, I may be an instrument by which truth is clarified (whether that truth is what I advocate or not).

A couple of short concluding observations. First, this sort of belief is at least as much a matter of believing in the church’s teaching as it is just believing what the church teaches. I believe in Chris, and in you, honest reader — which involves my being accountable to you for what I say and do, and your being accountable to me (to the extent that you’re willing). I believe in the church: I’m fundamentally accountable to God, as God has been made known in the church.

Second, I resist heresy or the romanticization of heresy. In the words of Meister Eckhart, “I am able to err, but I cannot be a heretic, since one has to do with the intellect and the other with the will”; or in its Anabaptist form, “I may be wrong, but I cannot be a heretic, since I am asking you to correct me.”

Third, I fully recognize that I may be grievously wrong about everything. My belief means, for me, identifying those among whom I must be counted wrong. I cannot so think or act as to be separated from the saints who have taught me who I am, whose I am. That’s what I believe.

Fireworks Photos

I took a mountain of pixels-worth of photos of fireworks last night, and have just gotten around to uploading them to my dot-Mac home page here and here. Shooting fireworks (photographically) is mostly pointing the lens and letting the pyrotechnician do the complicated part; this ain’t high art, such as some of our neighbors produce, but it can be intriguing to see the difference between what the the eye perceives and what the camera detects. I’ll try to plug them in the Creative Commons “Attribution - Noncommerical - No derivs” license; we’ll see what the dot-Mac template permits. (Ha! I sneaked the license in around the safeguards dot-Mac seems to establish to protect me from doing what I want to do.)

Triumph!

Today, Pippa asked Margaret and me whether she might try to ride Josiah’s old bike. “Are you sure?” we asked; “You’ve never tried a bicycle without training wheels before.” Oh, yes, she was sure. So we adjusted the seat, got the phone ready to call the emergency room, and held the handlebars as she mounted the bike.

In a couple of minutes she was riding quite across the back yard, and needed a more expansive field for her explorations — so we walked her to the athletic field a few blocks away, and she took off (despite the soft earth and thick grass.

Pippa, the champion of the world.

It’s About Time

You know, I’ve received about 748 copies of the notorious Nigerian “419” spam email letter, but I just got another one, and. . . golly, what if OVIEDO BASKO really does need my help? Maybe I’ll empty our bank account and send it to him. . . .

For No Good Reason

I was thinking about hazard symbols this afternoon. Specifically, I was thinking of the stick figures that represent human beings on hazard signs. I wondered whether there was a set of international guidelines for representing humans in peril, and perhaps a library of standard figures that one might adapt for idiosyncratic warnings. It’s not that improbable, and maybe there is such a thing lurking in corners toward which Google didn’t point me.

But I didn’t find the repository of hazard-stick-figure specifications. I did determine that there hasn’t been a popular band called the “Stick Figures,” according to the All Music Guide (if you start one, you’re hereby obligated to send me copies of all your singles and albums, MP3 format acceptable). And I found some intriguing examples of warning-sign illustration, including this alert to make sure your legs are fully attached to your body when approaching an octopus. I also ran into this warning sign that entirely stumped me. What does that mean? “Warning: cricket bats”? “Danger: bottles”? (It turns out to mean that there’s compressed gas somewhere around, but I’d have figured that out only after having blown myself to smithereens.)

So anyway, I’ll probably waste some time one of these days, working out some liturgical hazard signs such as, “Praise music,” or “Thurible in use,” or “Long-winded preacher,” or “Whale’s-belly low-church” or “Burr in preacher’s bonnet about controversial issue will probably occupy preponderance of sermon, prayers, announcements, and any other place he can work it in.” Stay away from that last one — it’s brutal.

Blessed Are The Bullies

I heard this on the news last night, but sleep (blessedly) put it out of my mind until I saw Fred Clark’s post. Look, let’s grant for a moment what boggles my mind: that conscientious citizens think there’s justification for conquering Iraq in order to expel its barbaric ruler, even though the governments that led the charge persistently lied about their rationale for the invasion.

Let’s grant that Bush’s expensive battleship photo-op really did build morale, rather than just generate poll numbers.

Let’s grant that people rarely gauge public statements about other people’s inadequacies in moderate, carefully measured words — so Bush may not be as dull-witted as some insiders and attentive outsiders suggest.

What earthly justification can anyone offer for courageous military hero son of a military hero George W. Bush hazarding the lives of volunteers and their civilian allies? “My answer is ‘bring them on.’ ” I hope the occupying forces remember Bush’s brave words.

What She Said

When David Weinberger came to visit Seabury, he asked what Trevor and I mean when we allude (in our Disseminary materials) to “open source theological education.” Like true scholars, we shrugged and pointed to our source, Mary Hess: “It was her idea.” Since then, Mary has posted an elaboration of the kind of thing she meant by that expression, so here’s what Mary said. She even cites the Cluetrain, David.

The Disseminary isn’t exactly what Mary’s talking about, but we’re on the same wavelength, I think. And I’m not linking to her just because she said kind things about me to my dean at the American Theological Librarians Association — although I was touched to hear that.

Fear

One of the most arresting dimensions of yesterday’s discussion about digital technologies, congregations, and community raised the question of fear. “Dare we put children’s pictures on the net?” (Evidently, pictures of children signal “friendliness” in a way that makes them almost mandatory for church websites.) A whole panoply of related satellites orbit around the same topic, and I want to respond with appropriate caution and respect, but also with a sense of proportion about real risks (online and in the physical aspects of everyday life), and with due attention to the malignant effects of letting our lives be shaped by fear.

(The irony of this topic is that the Seabury Institute’s most recent brochure promotes the theme of being “Fearless Leaders.”)

One aspect of this fear is the coupling of two elements. First most participants in the sessions were not well-acquainted with the social ecology of online interaction; that engenders a predictable dread of strangeness. Second, Trevor associated the fear response with “replacement panic,” my phrase for the irrational supposition that online interaction will utterly displace physical interaction. I was skeptical about that connection at first, but gradually Trevor persuaded me.

Of course, another aspect of the fear involves the publicity that particular incidents generate. If one stalker picks up one child because he saw the child’s picture online, we hear shocking news leads and see boldface headlines; if millions of children whose photos have been posted online at any of numerous photo-album sites play outside without disturbance, nobody reports it. “Millions of Children Safe Tonight — Details at Eleven!” Moreover, children are — if I understand correctly — in at least as much jeopardy just walking to school, or the store, or the playground as they are smiling from a church web site. That’s not even counting all the destructive effects of consumerism, ideological chauvinism, peer-group homogenization, and other environmental dangers to which parents subject children constantly, without experiencing convulsions of remorse.

Again, practice common-sense protection: if someone calls up and says, “Say, what’s the home address of that cute 8-year-old girl on your web site?” you don’t just tell him “123 East Avenue.” But if children face a significant increase in the hazards of life from having their picture appear in a church web site (and here I trust that we’re talking about a smiling face beaming out in a Christmas pageant, not cheesecake poses with home phone and address included), someone should let me know before I place children at risk by encouraging their congregational leaders to relax.

Because I really do believe, until somebody sets me straight, that the fears of the online jungle are overstated. Children have always been at risk of playground kidnappings, and credit-card users have always been vulnerable to stolen numbers. This is an unfamiliar social ecology, but not a social ecology that’s fundamentally more or less dangerous than the ones we’e used to (except to the extent that we act unwisely on the basis of our unfamiliarity with the Web).

I suspect that promulgating a culture of fear generates far more devastating effects on our communities and children than does posting pictures on the internet. It’s an uphill battle to build communities of trust and mutual accountability when our we respond to new ideas by viewing them as dangers from which we need to be protected. Be wise as serpents, yes; but be innocent as doves, too. I think that’s what he said.

Awwww, Gosh

Well, Trevor and I did our little demonstration of how stepping up to the plate in online media stands to benefit congregational leaders, and we seem to have gotten the point across. Certainly the students who’ve talked to us (or left comments) have been very enthusiastic. When Trevor has time, we’ll have to sit down and map out our spiel so that we don’t reinvent this every time. There certainly aren’t too many Episcopal congregations that are already totally on top of online communication — we could help a lot by taking our show on the road.

But not for right now. I just showed Margaret the draft of my review of Elaine Pagels’s new book, and we’re going to talk through some of her comments.

Talking to Clergy

Trevor and I are leading this morning’s class in Seabury’s Doctor of Ministry program; among other things, we’re demoing blogs.

Pondering

How long do you think it will take before the cost of securing digital texts, art, music, video, and so on — before the cost of protecting old-fashioned copyright exceeds the cost of the work itself? At that point, what are we protecting?

Tiers for Adjuncts

If blogs really brought Trent Lott to his knees, if they get Howard Dean nominated, maybe the unquenchable embers of academic inequity will flare up to burn away the baneful impediments to full academic employment for so many Blogarians (especially, in this neighborhood, Rana, Ryan, and the Invisible Adjunct). In the comments to last night’s post, Dorothea observed that this “seems like an extension of the two-tier system” whereby tenured faculty get the marrow, and adjuncts get the knucklebones. (Who’ guess I’m a vegetarian?) My tedious response — sorry, really, to repeat myself — is that I’ all for raising adjuncts out of their inequitable servitude; I simply refuse to blame high-salaried academics simply for receiving high salaries. If, for instance, the brouhaha concerned their relative silence on the salaries of adjuncts, then I’d speak right up on the side of the adjuncts.

But speaking of the endless class war in academia, Naomi has posted “Top Ten Reasons You Should Go To Grad School After All, Especially In The Humanities” (she’s serious). She wants some constructive suggestions on her manifesto, so go give her a hand.

On the home front, tomorrow I trade Si to Heather for the weekend, and Margaret and Pip come home from their two-week road trip. Trevor and I have a presentation for the Doctor of Minstry class at the Seabury Institute, on Technology and Congregations (I’m desperately trying to remember all the great points that our spring speakers series raised). But tonight my brain isn’t working any more, so I’ll hope things come together in the morning.