Rain and the Rhinoceros

I recently acquired Creston Davis’ The Monstrosity of Christ: Paradox or Dialectic, which features articles by Slavoj Zizek and John Milbank and contains an introduction by Creston. If you’ve ever read Zizek you know how much he loves to rip into New Age spirituality. Here’s a gem from his article in the volume:

Postcolonial critics like to dismiss Christianity as the “whiteness” of religions: the presupposed zero level of normality, of the “true” religion, with regard to which all other religions are distortions or variations. However, when today’s New Age ideologists insist on the distinction between religion and spirituality (the perceive themselves as spiritual, not part of any organizationed religion), they (often no so) silently impose a “pure” procedure of Zen-like spiritual meditation as the “whiteness” of religion. The idea is that all religions presuppose, rely on, exploit, manipulate, etc., the same core of mystical experience, and that it is only “pure” forms of meditation like Zen Buddhism that exemplify this core directly, bypassing institutional and dogmatic mediations. Spiritual meditation, in its abstraction from institutionalized religion, appears today as the zero-level undistorted core of religion: the complex institutional and dogmatic edifice which sustains every particular religion is dismissed as a contingent secondary coating of this core. The reason for this shift of accent from religious institution to the intimacy of spiritual experience is that such a meditation is the ideological form that best fits today’s global capitalism.

Slavoj Zizek, “The Fear of Four Words: A Modest Plea for the Hegelian Reading of Christianity,” in The Monstrosity of Christ: Paradox or Dialectic, ed. Creston Davis (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2009) 27-28.

To avoid revolution means to take the side of the establishment. To say that the church should not meddle with the problem of open housing is to conclude that the house owner and the real estate agent, even if members of the churches, receive no concrete moral guidance from beyond themselves. To say that it is not the business of the church to second-guess the experts on details of political or military strategy, to have judgments on the moral legitimacy of particular laws, is to give one’s blessing to whatever goes on. Those who object to the church’s having something to say about economies, especially if that be critical of the existing capitalistic order, have no qualms about seeing the church on the other side of the economic question, or about economies having a say in the life of the churches.

John Howard Yoder, The Original Revolution: Essays on Christian Pacifism (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, 1971) 26.

Although the phenomenon commonly known as “liberation theology” is extremely diverse, there seems to be some common methodological threads running through the work of its proponents. What I want to highlight here is how self-proclaimed liberation theologians almost always identify experience as a highly appropriate methodological starting-point for theology. In particular, for many liberation theologians the experience of the poor, the suffering, the oppressed, is primary and methodologically fundamental. In much of the literature, the role of experience becomes such a priority that it is identified as the central criterion of adjudicating between good and bad theologies. If theology does not directly and explicitly address the plight of the poor and complicity of the rich in oppressive policies, than theology is seen as, ultimately, irrelevant to the poor, and irrelevant to politics. For much of liberation theology the emphasis is on the priority of praxis over theory. It does not assert that theory is unimportant, it is just simply accorded a secondary role. In the words of Jon Sobrino, “theology is a second act, within and in the presence of a reality.” Liberation theology is thus essentially reactive–it is a reaction, in the mode of reflection–on both the concrete experiences of an oppressed people and God’s revelation in Christ.

(Caveat: I am aware of the generalizations taking place in this post. Liberation theology is not univocal and I don’t want to treat it as such, but I’m trying to draw out some key elements that I’ve noticed in much of the literature).

Here’s my question: Doesn’t the role accorded to experience, as the primary theological category, appear deeply strange and problematic when liberation theologians watch it receive equally high status as it is employed to bolster the efforts of right-wing ideologues?

The debate, then, becomes centered on questions of experience–which quickly heads into who has the best evidence from the social sciences to prove, for instance, that collectivism works better than capitalism to relieve poverty, to create happiness and wealth, etc.

For those of us influenced by Barth, or more broadly what is some times referred to as “postliberalism” a la George Lindbeck, or for those influenced by MacIntyre or Milbank–even for those of us who have been influenced by Foucault and the geneaological tradition, we tend to find ourselves quite skeptical of appeals to experience to ground or frame theology. Interestingly, many of these thinkers also claim to stand firmly on the radical Left.

Let me be clear, when I say experience I do not mean to suggest that we really have a choice in the matter. I am not suggesting that we can somehow choose to not use experience in our theological reasoning. Of course, we are all shaped by and use our experience. It is totally absurd to think that we can reflect outside of our own particular history. What I am calling into question is something altogether different–it is the specific move made by much of liberation theology (a move which seems to me to owe more than a little to modern theological liberalism and therefore also to capitalism) that sees experience–or the natural–as more fundamental than revelation.

Again, I want to make clear that my concerns about liberation theology come from a very specific place. I am highly sympathetic to their concerns, but I am highly skeptical of their method at times. This became clear to me at this years AAR Consultation of Liberation Theology session. I’m not going to get into the details here, but I got the feeling that if this is the future of liberation theology it is doomed. If liberation theology works within a framework of modern theological liberalism it is finally a doomed enterprise. I say this because of my conviction that modern theological liberalism is disciplined by capitalist logic through and through, which is of course the very thing liberation theology seeks to resist.

Michael Novak, the Catholic neoconservative theologian comes to town on Wednesday, October 29 to deliver a lecture at 7:30 p.m. entitled, “Career or Calling? Business as a Vocation” at the Thornton Auditorium of Terrence Murphy Hall on St. Thomas’ downtown Minneapolis campus. It is free and open to the public.

Novak is one of the most painful theologians to read, and I’m sure it will be worse listening to him spout off on how capitalism and America are God’s gifts to the world. In his perspecitve, America is not quite the kingdom of God, but it is damn close. Novak has been a staunch supporter of U.S. involvement in Iraq, Afghanistan, and indeed all over the world, militarily and economically.

If you want to join me let me know! It will be great fun!

Even though the best hope of the poor on earth lies in the universal spread and deeper development of democratic capitalist systems, much fresh thinking is needed to deepen the present intellectual and moral foundations of democratic capitalist societies. . . .Within a Jewish and Christian horizon, the road toward an earthly approximation of the kingdom of God streches very far into the future. There is no danger of confusing sin, imperfection, and suffering that characterize democratic capitalist societies with the kingdom of God. For humans, given their liberty, do often what they should not do, and do not do what they should. What can at least be said, though, is that no existing alternative seems more adequately suited both to eliciting human creativity and to deflecting human weakness into watchfulness. It does the former by adding to the tinder of talent “the fire of interest,” and the latter by assigning private interest to be a sentinel to public good.

Michael Novak, The Catholic Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (New York: The Free Press, 1993) 60-61.

In his brilliant work The Two Churches: Catholicism and Capitalism in the World System Michael Budde argues that Catholic anticommunism in the twentieth century was instrumental in bringing about U.S. Catholic nationalism. Despite their differences both liberal and conservative Catholics in America shared core values and beliefs that were passionately in opposition to communism. Catholic anticommunism was reinforced by American anticommunism. In a very real sense, “the bulwark of both true Americanism and authentic Catholicism” was anticommunism. As Budde states, “Communism, to the Catholic leadership of the 1950s, represented both the oppression visited on Catholics behind the Iron Curtain and a threat to the prosperity and freedom the Church had come to enjoy in the United States” (79). As many scholars have pointed out, the election of John F. Kennedy in 1960 represented “the fully Americanized status of Catholics” (80).

In the 1980s two major pastoral letters issued by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response and Economic Justice For All: Catholic Social Teaching and the U.S. Economy , do offer a critique of the policies of the U.S. government and American society. As Budde points out, however, these letters should be read from the perspective of U.S. Catholic Nationalism which limited the impact of the letters and “guided the ‘prophetic’ movements of the Catholic hierarchy” (87). Interestingly, as Budde points out, although both letters include a theological evaluation of the issues at hand drawing heavily from scripture and the Christian theological tradition, when it comes to application and consideration of public policy there is a distinct epistemological shift that employs natural law language. In other words, the theological language of the first sections are “translated” into more “neutral” language so that the letters can appeal more to “all people of good will” as opposed to only Christians. Many conservatives criticized the two pastoral letters for being unpatriotic and naive on issues of economics, but Budde argues that in fact the pastorals “gave the bishops yet another opportunity to demonstrate their patriotism, their political acumen, and their belief in a capitalist world economy. U.S. Catholic Nationalism, rather than being undermined, stands affirmed and as definitive of the U.S. Catholic mainstream” (89).

Budde provides four reasons why this is the case: 1) the bishops assume from the outset that the U.S. is a force for good in the world. There is no effort to question U.S. economic or political imperialism. 2) there is no structural analysis of U.S. power and prosperity. “Rather than examine capitalism, the bishops seek to hide behind an economic agnosticism that is ‘pragmatic’ in nature” (89). 3) the bishops give a “nonconflictive, functionalist picture of U.S. society, focusing on questions of the “common good” without addressing questions of class-divisions and contradictory interests. 4) in the epistemological shift or translation of biblical/theological reflection into natural law discourse potential conflict with secular power is minimized. The sections are so poorly integrated that the biblical/theological reflections of the first section “look like religious gloss on an essentially nonreligious document” (92).

Budde concludes that the documents heavy reliance on natural law is the bishops’ attempt to speak to the problems of secular society. It is thought that theological discourse is too “sectarian” and cannot be used to appeal to a pluralistic society. Budde writes, “In weighing the tasks – dialogue with the faithful or dialogue with secular power – the bishops have chosen the latter as more important. Dialogue with the faithful on matters of economic justice, were it done seriously and without regard to secular opinion, would open the Church to renewed charges of ’separateness’ or ‘un-American-ness.’ Dialogue with secular power, particularly on terms amenable to that power, enhances the respectability and American-ness of U.S. Catholic spokesmen – another step ahead in the history of U.S. Catholic Nationalism” (93).

I’ve mentioned this movie before, but P.T. Anderson’s new film There Will Be Blood is really a masterpiece.

I love this quote from the movie:

Ladies and gentlemen? Ladies and gentlemen. Thank you so much for visiting with us this evening. Now, I’ve traveled across half our state to be here and to see about this land. Now, I daresay some of you might have heard some of the more extravagant rumors about what my plans are; I just thought you’d like to hear it from me. This is the face. There’s no great mystery. I’m an oilman, ladies and gentlemen. I have numerous concerns spread across this state. I have many wells flowing at many thousand barrels per day. I like to think of myself as an oilman. As an oilman, I hope that you’ll forgive just good old fashioned plain-speaking. Now, this work that we do is very much a family enterprise- I work side by side with my wonderful son, H.W.- I think one or two of you might have met him already. And I encourage my men to bring their families, as well. Of course it makes for an ever so much more rewarding life for them. Family means children. Children means education. So wherever we set up camp, education is a necessity, and we’re just so happy to take care of that. So let’s build a wonderful school in Little Boston. These children are the future that we strive for and so they should have the very best of things. Now something else, and please don’t be insulted if I speak about this – bread. Let’s talk about bread. Now to my mind, its an abomination to consider that any man, woman or child in this magnificent country of ours should have to look upon a loaf of bread as a luxury. We’re going to dig water wells here. Water wells means irrigation, irrigation means cultivation. We’re going to raise crops here where before it just simply was impossible. You’re going to have more grain than you’ll know what to do with. Bread will be coming right out of your ears, ma’am. New roads. Agriculture. Employment, education. These are just a few of the things we can offer you, and I assure you ladies and gentlemen, that if we do find oil here, and I think there’s a very good chance that we will, this community of yours will not only survive, it will flourish.

Daniel Plainview pitching his oil company to the people of Little Boston in Paul Thomas Anderson’s film There Will Be Blood.

It is common in American liberal culture to find an appreciation for “the great world religions.” The “enlightened” of our culture (i.e. those disciplined by our university system) realize that to progress as a society, to achieve the world peace for which we all seek, we must learn to “appreciate” the diversity of cultures and religions of our world. This is perhaps most evident in the American desire to travel the world. In order to become “well-rounded” we must travel to see and experience other cultures. Almost all American universities offer “travel abroad” programs in order to expose us to the diversity of life on earth, so that we can become better human beings. Sadly, the selling point of many times church “mission trips” is the chance to travel the world and experience other cultures.
Of course, in some ways globalization offers us the “experience” of other cultures right in our own neighborhood. For instance, we experience what appears to us as Latin America every time we eat at Taco Bell. Or, in urban areas we have access to “authentic” cultures -we can visit China town, etc. and experience a form of China.

So, it seems that, provided we have money, globalization has given us access to the world. “We have,” to recall the old song, “the whole world in our hands.”
And so we do Yoga Thursdays, we eat sushi on Fridays, and buy Amish furniture on the internet on the weekends. Of course, those who have the most money have the ability to travel and experience the real of what Taco Bell attempts to simulate for us. There is a deep sense in which Taco Bell does not offer us enough and so we must travel.

Recently my wife astutely commented to me, “Why do rich people always have Buddhas all over their homes?” Of course, it is not all that uncommon to have a Buddha statue placed near an Eastern Orthodox icon, for instance.

Global capitalism offers us nothing less than the freedom to consume the world. It is often said that the problem with global capitalism is that this “freedom” is only offered to those of us with “capital.” There is, of course, much to truth to this. However, with the expansion of the free market to all the ends of the earth, more and more people (even the poor) have access to other cultures, in the form of a Taco Bell or a Starbucks.

Global capitalism gives us the freedom to consume the particular and then if we are savvy we find ways to commodify, to project, our digested experience onto the world. Global capitalism thus marks the obliteration, the flattening out, the annihilation of the particular, the local, the cultural. In its place it creates a new universal language that is built on an ethic of consumption that drives out old forms for new forms.

Global capitalism is nothing less than an all out war against all particularity. Thus it is the new universal; it is the new global God.

Last week my wife and I went out to see my favorite director, Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film, There Will Be Blood. I have to say I think this my favorite of his films so far and it is profoundly relevant as it exposes the disastrous human costs of capitalism epitomized in the oil rush.

I have been openly critical of some of my friends choices to go to Alberta in order to “cash in” on the great Canadian oil rush. In my criticisms I am not attempting to place myself on some higher moral ground, for I am well aware that I am complicit in the current human destruction of the earth. However, I still strongly discourage my friends to resist the desire to pay off university debt by means of exploiting the earth’s resources. It is my hope that St. Stephen’s University would become a place that fosters the kind of growth in students that would render active participation in economic exploitation, war, and environmental degradation unintelligible.

Recently, an environmental group called Environmental Defense reported that “Canada’s massive oil sands are the most destructive project on earth.”
According to a Reuter’s article the report noted that “excavation of the oil sands in the western province of Alberta — home to the richest petroleum deposits outside the Middle East — is producing vast amounts of greenhouse gases and poisoning local water supplies.” According to the article “The Alberta provincial government says it has issued leases for 4,264 oil sands projects covering 25,065 square miles . New projects costing more than C$100 billion are on the books for the oil sands region and production is expected to triple to 3 million barrels a day by 2015.”