An element of the divine comedy

I’m currently reading up on a book called “Dystopian Fiction East and West: Universe of terror and trial” which I’m really enjoying at the moment to be honest. The chapter I’m on starts by detailing the contents of Plato’s “Republic” and the vision of a perfect society where “law and reason” reign and the poets who live by “pleasure and pain” are exiled from the fabled land, it likewise mentions a similiar work by Thomas More written in the 1500’s detailing the island of “Utopia” in which similiar things happen. The author then goes on to mention how just as Plato attempted to dispel the concept of tragic from the Republic so did the Soviet Union in it’s conception and indeed the removal of such things from it’s future.

The author then goes on to comment on how Marxism simply tried to simply suppress the tragic as there was no room for it amongst the pride of scientific principles and that Christianity (she mentions the book of Job and his plea for justice) puts it’s hope amongst the greater narrative of the divine comedy. The Christian scheme of resurrection and redemption which Marx critiqued for enabling religion to function as the “Opiate of the Masses”. Marxism saw itself as a mechanism, a means to fulfill the gradual (‘evolutionary’ even) enlightenment of all people into a leisurely, classless and just society, Christianity on other hand follows the line of entropy as it dances along the arm of a clock and the process of time.. the indication that things get worse as time goes on, not better. However both have this eschatalogical or view of how things will end despite Marxisms apparent secularism. However they show the massive divergence in their view of things.. in this instance Marxism is utopian in looking towards what is required for a brighter future, dystopia offers a tragic warning of how things will become in the current situation, however both utopian and dystopian literature ‘attempt’ to point to something better or an awareness which tries to comment on the current time with a view which is echatalogical in nature.

The reason I’m reading this is because I’m hopefully going to be examining life under Burmese oppression for my dissertation. Burma is the worlds second most heavily censored country in the world and boasts one of the largest armies in Eastern Asia.. and yet has no enemies, the army is at war with the civilian population of the country. The Generals in charge of the military junta are politically unschooled and fear any challenge to their power or more expressly their ideology.. so any divergence or hint of anything going in the direction of a pluralistic or democratic way of life between the components of society is fiercly oppressed. I’ve already been looking at the U.S.S.R and it’s approach to things.. and how that could be compared to Burma’s ‘modus operandi’ but I’m also now examining dystopian literature to see what that has to say on the topic..

But to be honest I’m really fascinated by the whole concept of the tragic and this referral to the Christian worldview. Even the crucifixion of the Christ is an element in the tragic worldview of Christians, it really is at the core of what we believe. Pilate asked “What is truth?” and didn’t bother to stick around, he instead trusted or if anything relented to the justice of Rome and I guess that is compliant with the Soviet’s view as it was with the tower of Babel. The Christian concept of joy is intrinsically linked with that of hope.. I think it was in some movie because I don’t remember hearing this when I read the original myth but in the tale of Pandora, after she opened the box and unleashed evil and suffering on the world at the bottom of the box was hope. It isn’t something immediate and it’s out of our hands but we hope that God will rescue and redeem this existence.

This book then goes on to talk about the divergence of purely tragic literature like Oedipus and King Lear (or much of Shakespeares work) with dystopian literature.. in the tragic.. the individual becomes aware of his place in ‘existence’ and the absurd nature of that existence and yet by his sacrifice or often just his or her awareness we see a divergence from the way of the world… an elusive ‘another world’ just beyond the horizon, in dystopia the main character is often purely a victim. I think this touches on something I read by a guy called G.K  Chesterton, he said something like “there are two types of death.. the martyr and the suicide.. one dies to this world.. the other is crushed by the world” (or something like that).

I remember watching an interview with a Journalist and a Burmese dissident, the old guy was on a breathalator or something but wanted to meet the journalist to tell him about what was going on he then said something like “This time when they come to pick me up after you leave I won’t come back, not this time I know that.” and even though he knew that and for all we know was taken away he believed in something, what happened to that guy was tragic no doubt.. but he was witness at the same time to the hope of a deliverance.. admittedly a literal deliverance of Burma.. but I think this struggle is written into us as human beings it’s right there at our core. Deliver us from this absurd existence, this way of the world, this way of ourselves. I think that is starkly different to something like.. I dunno the message given in something like Taxi Driver.. however I think that film says a lot of interesting things about human nature.

I really like this book..

Oscar Romero

 

Oscar Romero

Before I became a Christian I was sympathetic to some of the notions of the faith but I couldn’t reconcile the “opiate of the masses” mantra that came with a lot of the marxism I learned towards at the time. I heard about the idea of liberation theology though and a guy in the 1970’s, a bishop who represented a church who did not confirm to the role as an ‘ideological state apparatus’.

Just after I became a Christian I went travelling round Peru. I wasn’t bothered enough at the time in all honesty to take a bible but I did take a book called the ‘violence of love’ which was a collection of homilies  or talks given by Oscar going right up to the one he was giving when he was assassinated. I didn’t agree with everything in it but I think it actually changed my life, I read it about three times whilst backpacking in Peru.

The thought of him just popped into my head a minute ago so I thought I’d just read about him, I then thought i’d share it with whoever might read this thing.

—

In 1980, in the midst of a U.S. funded war the UN Truth Commission called genocidal, the soon-to-be-assassinated Archbishop Oscar Romero promised history that life, not death, would have the last word. “I do not believe in death without resurrection,” he said. “If they kill me, I will be resurrected in the Salvadoran people.”

On this 20th anniversary of his death, the people will march through the streets carrying that promise printed on thousands of banners. Mothers will makepupusas (thick tortillas with beans) at 5 a.m., pack them, and prepare the children for a two-to-four hour ride or walk to the city to remember the gentle man they called Monseñor.

Oscar Romero gave his last homily on March 24. Moments before a sharpshooter felled him, reflecting on scripture, he said, “One must not love oneself so much, as to avoid getting involved in the risks of life that history demands of us, and those that fend off danger will lose their lives.” The homily, however, that sealed his fate took place the day before when he took the terrifying step of publicly confronting the military.

Romero begged for international intervention. He was alone. The people were alone. In 1980 the war claimed the lives of 3,000 per month, with cadavers clogging the streams, and tortured bodies thrown in garbage dumps and the streets of the capitol weekly. With one exception, all the Salvadoran bishops turned their backs on him, going so far as to send a secret document to Rome reporting him, accusing him of being “politicized” and of seeking popularity.

Unlike them, Romero had refused to ever attend a government function until the repression of the people was stopped. He kept that promise winning him the enmity of the government and military, and an astonishing love of the poor majority.

Romero was a surprise in history. The poor never expected him to take their side and the elites of church and state felt betrayed. He was a compromise candidate elected to head the bishop’s episcopacy by conservative fellow bishops. He was predictable, an orthodox, pious bookworm who was known to criticize the progressive liberation theology clergy so aligned with the impoverished farmers seeking land reform. But an event would take place within three weeks of his election that would transform the ascetic and timid Romero.

The new archbishop’s first priest, Rutilio Grande, was ambushed and killed along with two parishioners. Grande was a target because he defended the peasant’s rights to organize farm cooperatives. He said that the dogs of the big landowners ate better food than the campesino children whose fathers worked their fields.

The night Romero drove out of the capitol to Paisnal to view Grande’s body and the old man and seven year old who were killed with him, marked his change. In a packed country church Romero encountered the silent endurance of peasants who were facing rising terror. Their eyes asked the question only he could answer: Will you stand with us as Rutilio did? Romero’s “yes” was in deeds. The peasants had asked for a good shepherd and that night they received one.

Romero already understood the church is more than the hierarchy, Rome, theologians or clerics—more than an institution—but that night he experienced the people as church. “God needs the people themselves,” he said, “to save the world . . . The world of the poor teaches us that liberation will arrive only when the poor are not simply on the receiving end of hand-outs from governments or from the churches, but when they themselves are the masters and protagonists of their own struggle for liberation.”

Romero’s great helplessness was that he could not stop the violence. Within the next year some 200 catechists and farmers who watched him walk into that country church were killed. Over 75,00 Salvadorans would be killed, one million would flee the country, another million left homeless, constantly on the run from the army—and this in a country of only 5.5 million. All Romero had to offer the people were weekly homilies broadcast throughout the country, his voice assuring them, not that atrocities would cease, but that the church of the poor, themselves, would live on.

“If some day they take away the radio station from us . . . if they don’t let us speak, if they kill all the priests and the bishop too, and you are left a people without priests, each one of you must become God’s microphone, each one of you must become a prophet.”

By 1980, amidst overarching violence, Romero wrote to President Jimmy Carter pleading with him to cease sending military aid because he wrote, “it is being used to repress my people.” The U.S. sent $1.5 million in aid every day for 12 years. His letter went unheeded. Two months later he would be assassinated.

On March 23 Romero walked into the fire. He openly challenged an army of peasants, whose high command feared and hated his reputation. Ending a long homily broadcast throughout the country, his voice rose to breaking, “Brothers, you are from the same people; you kill your fellow peasant . . . No soldier is obliged to obey an order that is contrary to the will of God . . . “

There was thunderous applause; he was inviting the army to mutiny. Then his voice burst, “In the name of God then, in the name of this suffering people I ask you, I beg you, I command you in the name of God: stop the repression.”

Romero’s murder was a savage warning. Even some who attended Romero’s funeral were shot down in front of the cathedral by army sharpshooters on rooftops. To this day no investigation has revealed Romero’s killers. What endures is Romero’s promise.

Days before his murder he told a reporter, “You can tell the people that if they succeed in killing me, that I forgive and bless those who do it. Hopefully, they will realize they are wasting their time. A bishop will die, but the church of God, which is the people, will never perish.”

So there was this guy from Iceland..

Sigur Ros

And he.. met sigur ros! He runs a coffee shop and somehow for some reason some of them walked in; they got talking and he told them he uses their music in worship settings and they were like, “ok..” so he asked if they would play for him and a few others in a small setting as they worship.. and they were like…. you know what.. that sounds pretty cool.. but then the icelandic guy was in england somehow even though he had no money, talking to me in southampton.. and it was all little bizarre. I mean, I think he literally had no money, I’m not sure what was going on with the coffee shop in that situation.

Recently though, I realise that I find myself in the position that… I have this faith… but naturally I tend to avoid.. structure or anything.. and I find it hard to connect with ‘big stuff’ as a result. Thats ok with me, I don’t know if thats ok with the God or not, but I just realised when I met a bunch of crazies this last weekend that.. somewhere down the line I got involved in something absolutely nuts.. which is all about hanging out with people.. and hanging out with God and.. we call that love.. and we like.. try and fix broken stuff because God fixed us and so we’re part of the kingdom of God.. which is a ‘way’.. or something which is more a series of actions and responses rather than a place… because the place God is in.. is in.. us? If we want him that is, even if all we want is a bit more love in our lives.. thats good too.

I also met these guys called the triibe. The triibe, beat things really hard as a way of talking to God.. they shout random stuff too, and it sounds pretty good actually. It made me think that to connect with God we really, really just have to put ourselves in this place where we forget about anything else but God and how he relates to us and the peoples/places we know.. and it’s like “God I’m here! Can we hang out?” and these guys who make up this triibe are talking to marxist professors in america now about God and hanging out with him which is nuts.

Northwood HQ

Today though I found out my friend Martin the out of work priest from london is going to court in two day’s time for protesting outside a military base over Iraq and Afghanistan awhile back and then refusing to pay fines.. nothing major bad would happen.. he says like, prison for a bit week or so but (that would sound pretty bad to me)… he really thought it important and I guess if you think somethings important you pay the price associated with it.. he’s pretty deep and.. pretty challenging in an ordinary sort of way…

So.. that was my weekend.. and it just all seems a little bit bizarre in retrospect. In a good way though I think..

I don’t do anything like these crazy people I’ve met but, that’s ok because I don’t think these people are doing anything but trying to find an authentic expression of who they are, how they relate to the world, to people and to God and the situations we sometimes find ourselves in. It just makes me think what a crazy world we’re part of sometimes.

Crypto-fascist

Is.. according to the urban dictionary a word to describe a ‘hidden supporter’ of fascism. Fascism in turn is something which it seem’s not a lot of people can agree on.. but is what for simplicity’s sake could be called an authoritarian form of goverment (among other things). I knew a guy once who called himself a national socialist, he was pretty hard to get on with.. but I then later found that Hitler’s Nazi Party in Germany had considered itself a national socialist party.

 The thing I considered strange then was I always thought Marxism and Fascism two quite distinct.. and opposed ideologies. How wrong I was! (I’m going somewhere with this, honest) Marxism is a system intended to deliver ‘justice’ to the working classes. The belief that the needs of society are put over the needs of the individual, and the individuals desire for ‘capital’ of his or her own. It is also many other things but this is what I wanted to say on it.

National Socialism by contrast then looks at ‘class’ and broadens it to the ‘nation’. The delivery of ‘justice’ and rights for those of the nation group. I found a quote by Himmler which best captures the attitude.

 ”Whether nations live in prosperity or starve to death like cattle interests me only in so far as we need then as slaves to our culture… whether ten thousand Russian fenales fall down from exhaustion while digging an anti-tank ditch interests me only in so far as an anti-tank ditch for Germany is finished.”

 The question I want to then pose to anyone who might be reading this is to think on some things regarding Marxism and National Socalism before continuing.

-Marxism if concerned for a concept of Justice for the oppressed working classes requires a preconcieved concept of justice. Where might this come from?

-National Socialism likewise requires a concept of justice, however this concept appears to differ in some sense. How so?

-Both definitions of justice seem to be redefined or atleast restricted to either a nation group or a class and suggest a pre-existing desire to change things.

-Both these institutions are by a result of their thinking atheistic (though some would argue this isn’t a given)

So.. I guess the thing is here is.. why should anyone concern themselves about justice unless it concerns the self.. or unless they are moved by some moral obligation? Without a infinite point of reference (something like God) how are finite expressions (like measures of justice, terror, mercy etc.) given any lasting value? If it is we then who define these from the moment when we reject God it is quickly visible why National Socialism is viewed as an authoritarian regime.. why should an individual like Hitler define what is right and wrong for a nation when his value is of insignificance anyway? and more so, his view is just as insignificant as anyone elses!

Now the fascism and the thinking behind Hitlers third reich has always been tied together with Friedrich Nietziech and his work concerning the concept of ‘The Will to Power’ . In the absence of God, we must become God’s ourselves and define our own existence, to control others and to rise over notions like pity, mercy or justice because such things no longer exist.. or did not exist ever. In short.. I’m looking out for me and me only. Yet we all feel the pull to our own ‘tribe’ be it our family or subculture (and boffins say this is something to do with our evolutionary heritage). So it’s “me and my tribe are all that matter”.

 Ever heard someone say do something for your country only to have someone reply what’s my country ever done for me? (Or words to that effect?) I think it’s the same thing. Why care about stuff which doesn’t concern you? Most politicians will be dead by the time Global Warming does it’s worst.. and I quite like my standard of living.. why should they care.. why should I? I’m only interested in now and me, me me. Damn the ‘future generations’ who gives a monkeys?

The link in with today is Nietzsche although not so often talked about now is one of the first “Post-Enlightenment” thinkers. One of the first or even ‘pre-’post-modernists. It might not be popular.. or some might not care but it isn’t a massive streach to see how the ethics which make something like Hitler so bad are so evident in our own lives.. and our own society today. Hitler simply defined what was right and good for Nazi Germany aswell as all that was bad and wrong for it too. Don’t we belong to tribes or groups which make these same claims in our ’search for meaning’. Hitler just seems bad because his notion of Good and Bad were just so different to what we now consider ‘normal’. So unless your in my tribe.. why talk to me of justice? You don’t know what it means!

But.. what if there really was truth, justice and other such things? What if there was a true truth wether we liked it or not? That we could share an understanding to then communicate and act on our communal existence beyond the confines of any one persons definitions?

Just some thoughts.. I just don’t how any of this is possible without something like God. Without him or whatever you think of him as, what is actually the point? We’re already dead we just don’t realise it yet.

 But I think with Jesus you know he showed us a way and lived like there was meaning in his life. The only person who used those shared values and didn’t say “No! Me and my tribe only” but..

“I command you to love each other the same way that I love you. And here is how to measure it- the greatest love is shown when people lay down their lives for their friends. You are my friends if you obey me. I no longer call you servants, because a master doesn’t confide in his servants. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the father told me. You didn’t choose me. I choose you. I appointed you to go and produce fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. I command you to love each other”