And IMHO, it's just wrong. If the message of Jesus --or of any of the great religious founders-- could be handed out on a 3x5 card --or a Jack Chick pamphlet, which is not much different-- what are all those pages of the Bible about? To say nothing of those thousands of years of discussion and debate, of contest and accomplishment? It gives me some pleasure when I read of yellow dog Baptists whose compulsive search for the pure and original Gospel leads them to...Greek Orthodoxy. Lean and spare is not the same as original.
Maybe it's the Protestantism which, both very pro and somewhat con, has shaped so much of American culture. A lot of Protestantism operated under the illusion of the simple beginning which then devolved into the complicated recent. The heart of religion was to return to the uncorrupted, and therefore simple, origin.
Take these two images. The one above, a common sentimental manger scene. The one below, the Savior returning with blood in his eye. Simple message of love?
One of the repetitive faults of many Christians is to play the game and draw too strong a line between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New. The Old Testament God is famously moody, to put it mildly, while the God of the New, and his simple loving Son, is supposed to be, well simple and loving. I think that these two images, one which begins Advent (below) nd the other which is its culmination in Christmas, lead one to suspect that the Son is a lot more like his Father than many of his followers...and his post-believing right-thinking sentimentalists...would like to believe.
So much for simple.
2 comments:
Oh, man! What a (charming, entertaining) Scrooge! ...
1. Jesus could have said this, or perhaps is saying this from his grave: »If the message of Jesus --or of any of the great religious founders-- could be handed out on a 3x5 card --or a Jack Chick pamphlet, which is not much different-- what are all those pages of the Bible about? To say nothing of those thousands of years of discussion and debate, of contest and accomplishment?«
-Aquinas's Summa theologiae is a tremendous simplification, in a way. If all publication on the Summa had been forbidden, and only direct discussion and study, the theological realm would be both much "simpler" (more spare and lean, as you say) and much more "original." Less built-up system complexification and more understanding. Oh, I love that summa. I can well relate to Dante's simile of the Summa theologiae as Beatrice. Had Boston College simply assign'd us to read and study the Summa theologiae, I actually might not have graduated with zilch understanding of God and his deeds and being.
2. This trek seems to me to have mis-direction stamp'd all over it: »Baptists whose compulsive search for the pure and original Gospel leads them to...Greek Orthodoxy.« Now you argue that Jesus' appear'd in the "cultural space" open'd up by John the Baptist demanding adherence to the Philokalia? praying before ikons?
-True, if Jesus had seen Augustinian Christianity, he might well have repented He ever said even an oblique word of kerygma, and prefer'd the Greek East to the Lain West. This doesn't prove that the Greek East is His original 'message.'
-True, "Lean and spare is not the same as original," e.g. Jack Chick pamphlets. But bloated and convoluted is also not necessarily the same as the original.
3. The picture of Mary, Joseph and the Baby Jesus doesn't seem to me originally Protestant. I associate the artistic style with RC piety, e.g. the Holiness Cards I found one time in an old RC book and xerox'd and mail'd to you with some additional captions. The "protestant" sentimentalities of the new dispensation's "evangelicalism" may indeed exceed RC hagiography's sentimentalism, but sentimentalization and false-simplification (e.g. Thomas Jefferson's simplification) isn't an essentially protestant contribution in Latin Christendom.
Is Dickens, the creator of the "secular" Christmas a "protestant"? somehow related to salvation by grace through faith? sola scriptura? Admittedly, Luther seems to have been the first Christian Divine to promote the Incarnation festival as the most realizable of the Christian life (cf a previous blog post of yours in which you admit to never having experienced all that much resurrection after lenten mortifications, whereas you've always enjoy'd preparations for Christmas), but Catholic-culture countries weren't slow to import Dickensian Christmas stories, decor, practices.
P.S. Possibly, "the Savior returning with blood in his eye" IS a simple message of love. Difficult, harsh, even unwelcome, but also simple. Definitely not complex, although presumably the path/s of approach are complex (ascetic ideal, to numb the psyche). Also definitely not something the East with its smoke and mirror-ikons is eager to reveal. imho.
Being Jewish we always complicate everything. I know, Christians talk about our God as being harsh and uncompromising - we just shrug and say, whatever, we're still here worshiping our God, not the Christian version of how they think he should be.
But I've yet to meet a real religious Christian who doesn't see their God as very complex - the 'love' only tends to come from non believers.
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