The charm in tragedy, God and flesh, injustice

Sometimes I run up against a really bad, dark mood that I don't much want to get myself out of, and I always wonder what kind of masochistic streak in me keeps me here. At times it is fairly abstract - I don't quite know what makes me so depressed - and at other times it's a concrete sadness, for something relevant and real. I think, though, that there are a number of reasons I (I'll speak for myself - please let me know if you can relate) find these dark moods so appealing.
-First, I feel I deserve it: humanity sucks. I am bad. And even if I haven't done anything very bad recently, take a look at the world - there is obviously something very wrong for little me to have so much and much of it to have so little.
-Second, it feels very much real: humanity sucks. That is a fact that I am very much aware of, that I see every day in myself, in others, in the state of affairs, on the news, in pictures, in my conscience, in the direct contrast of my beautiful God. So I think that getting lost in that gives me a certain sense of stability; that is something I know I am reasonable in. (Of course, [to me] logically rejoice is also reasonable, when considering God's awesome-nicity.) So it's easy to feel sad, it makes me feel connected and not lost inside of myself and substantial, stable and tied down and not as if I'm about to float away in all of my ignorance.
These two points run together very much.

I don't think it's just me. Maybe I have my unique reasons (though I doubt that - I think many though not all can relate), but it seems that there is evidence of this bizarre appeal of tragedy and depression all over the place, at least in the world in which survival is not the only priority a person can afford to worry about. Looking at the States for example - why do we continue to produce movies and music and literature that make us cry? We love to prize on the relatability of tragedy to all humans; heartbreak and divorce and disappointment run as deep in the entertainment sphere (ironic the use of the word 'entertainment') as they do in the real world. More and more people are found sucked into themselves, with self-abuse and depression and drugs rampant. I guess it's also fascination with the abomination. Or perhaps this is partly the origin of fascination with the abomination.
It's interesting to me all the charm we find in tragedy.



Instinct lies in the gut. The most 'savage' (closest to animal?) of our human traits resides in our bodies. I find it interesting that also inextricably tied to our flesh is contrition, festering and eating away at our hearts and our guts - no doubt a God-borne sentiment if ever there was one. This to me is a distinct reminder of God as man.

And also evidence to His continuing use of material, Creation, flesh as tools in bringing us closer to Him. Which is, according to the Anglican perspective, what the Eucharist is. The lack of faith in the strange reality of Christ's presence in the Eucharist seems to me to be based in an underlying perspective that downplays material and Creation and God's involvement in that, that ultimately doubts the man of Christ, the word made flesh, the skin and bone and heart and blood of our Almighty, corpus Christi. God tied himself so irreparably to the flesh and humanity when He made Himself man - why is it utterly unbelievable that He would do that still today in a continued effort to bring us to Him? I don't mean to open discussion as to the validity of the Anglican perspective on the Eucharist (though if you'd like to, I won't stop you), only to offer this as some sort of chipping away at the standard of reasonable doubt that seems to have been built up against it.



It seems to me that the most valid and true injustice in the world is the suffering of children - they are innocent, they are blameless, they have potential. Humans are evil, but adults are more capable of knowing better. And as our bodies age (and our hearts grow colder), it seems we are only fighting fate in battling physical pain or deterioration. If the bodies were meant to grow so old they wouldn't decay so.

The picture is from our 2005 trip to Viet Nam - I miss it very, very much right now. I also miss the clear and poignant perspective I had and had to share, right in front of me, in Viet Nam.



Currently reading:
Harry Potter y la Cámara Secreta
The Count of Monte-Cristo
The Twilight Series

Currently listening to:
new Coldplay cd!
Abracadavers, The Classic Crime
this guy - jwoo. He's awesome!

I'm back: judgmentalism and nonconformity and Les Misérables.

GOODNESS, I haven't posted since February 11th. I just realized that was before Valentine's Day (when I started reading) and I feel Les Misérables deserves a place here even though I never got the chance to blog. I'm sure it will (re-)spark a lot of interesting material the second time I read it (this summer?), and when I have more time. Anyway, phenomenal book, Victor Hugo is one of my new favorite people ever. And the musical is great too.

I've been thinking about judgmentalism recently and here are my ideas: God says the judgement is His, and I am agreed. But there's no doubt there is some practicality in judging people in our walks here on earth - whether it be a friend in need of intervention, or character in a mate, or the charming man driving the big white van with no windows and some tasty candy. The fact is, oftentimes our very means of being better come through the inspiration of other people, and sometimes that inspiration comes with a little prodding, and I really believe that comes indirectly from God. So - we must not be ignorant or blind; that is impractical. It's important to recognize and point out sin in order to combat it.

Except I just said it's important to recognize sin. My problems in seeing judgmentalism come when standards aren't of morality but are of things such as popularity or intelligence or fashion sense or personal-annoyance-factor or taste in music. What an absolute waste of time. This irritates me the most when it comes from Christians - have you not decided, in your salvation, that ultimately the value of a life resides in its goodness? Is that not the very foundation of the word 'better'? To be more good?

Of course, people are made up of more than just their goodness and badness. Human relations involve many, many different things - popularity and intelligence and music taste and everything. So, sure, the basis of our interactions with people can involve these sorts of judgements. If I know that the carpool driver for Monday is in love with the Dixie Chicks, maybe Mondays I'll drive myself. If I can't stand the vocals of a band, I think it's fair not to buy the singer's solo album. This is reasonable.
What bothers me is seeing a life deemed worthless, deemed not worth our time or efforts or attention, or an attitude of apathy or indifference directed towards a person. It's interesting having the spectrum of friends I do - I see people rendered not worth a person's time on the basis of both 'lameness' and lack of intellect, of athletic ability or an exhibited lack of cleverness or grammatical intelligence. I think my biggest problem, personally, is when it comes to what I consider arrogance, a result I'm sure of my own.
It's easy to make excuses as to the reasons behind disliking people, or the nature of the judgment itself, or whatever it may be, and it is easy to deem some judgements more valid or more humane or less sinful than others. Whatever the case, I find that usually the excuses are entirely invalid and stem from biases of our own (based in the standards by which we view people and ourselves), and even if they are not they needn't be considered. We really should just like people.


Here are tidbits that never really formed into more than just s-o-c thoughts and spent a lot of time being part of an unpublished draft:

I'd like to tell all of the elitist indie-type crowd that true authenticity (I'd like to say genuinity but that's not a word) never comes with deliberation or derision. But I won't, for fear of becoming one of those people. Haha. Conformists are people too. (Cred to Sal.)


Nonconformity. I think that there will always be (maybe what I mean here is that in our society there is) a majority and a certain average we can stand ourselves up against, however much of a fantastic collective creation it is - it only exists because we continue to use it and refer to it and in effect continue its existence - there is always a standard citizen to which we are adding traits - be they 'sexual promiscuity' or 'passivity' or 'ignorance' - but it is unfair to accuse individuals of the society of 'conforming' to this standard. I might see this standard as at the center of 'society'; society isn't moving toward it, it's simply what society is moving toward. That is what gives it its existence. Individuals are drawn towards it perhaps because that is where they are born, because of its position. I think I might be contradicting myself. It's all so abstract. It's all just what we want it to be, or what we decide it is.

I'll grant the standard its alleged existence (though its existence is indisputable, valid or not, because we continue to recognize it) for the purposes of discussion: I believe that when a group of people gets together there is no avoiding the formation of some sort of common-ness. Connections must be made, bridges forged, some sort of comradeship formed, for the sake of the group's survival, and the group itself is formed for the sake of the individual, whose well-being is (or at least has become, in humans) contingent on group formation. We like being together, and now, after centuries, it is found that life sucks when we try to fight that.


Summer has begun, oh joy! (It reached 100º today, not so much joy.) School is out and I'm going to IIT come fall for those of you that read this and don't know. IB is over (thank the Lord), besides the pain it will probably inflict come score release in July, and I'm so happy to be getting back in the pool every day all the time and regaining my health in more ways than one. I should stop talking about me. Though I'll finally have money and will be able to buy all the cds on my list, YES! And books too. Good deal.


Currently reading:
Harry Potter y la Cámara Secreta (I'm finally having the time to get some Spanish back into my brain.)
The Count of Monte-Cristo, Alexandre Dumas (or will be soon, at least - thanks Hahee)

Currently listening to:
oh, gosh, I've been all over the place -
Copeland
New Amsterdams
Dear and the Headlights
Relient K
Melee

Monica's a jerk: loving, Invisible Children, NotW, going places.

Here's what I think:
It is not our job to make others unhappy. In fact, our job is quite the opposite. We are sent here not to be troublesome, not to pick at minor flaws, not to be unnecessarily bitter and mean; rather, we are put here to be more understanding, loving - to act in such prophetic empathy that we indicate Christ's life itself. We are human. We are sinners. Under that 'bitch's' or that 'asshole's' circumstances - with her upbringing, childhood, mental illness, heartache, genetic make-up, scars, everything - you would have done exactly the same thing. There is no special part of your soul that makes you more likely to do the right thing; there is no 'spark' in you that makes you good and other people bad. There is nothing about you - raw, stripped-down, bare you - that makes you better than any other person. If you do the right thing, it's because God has blessed you with the discretion and the motivation - a result of many things, an upbringing or a strong conscience or whatever. And when you do the wrong thing - because inevitably you do - it is not any bit excusable for the reason that you do the right thing most of the time, or do the right thing more than others do - or for the reason that you think you had justification or are somehow unique in a way most other people aren't.

This humility, combined with a love of God, should motivate us to love other people. Not to judge them, or be continually annoyed by them, or idealize them, or to think they're stupid, but to love them. Loving people does not equal talking behind their backs or acting mean or making snide remarks or calling them stupid or judging them, ever.

How do we forget so easily that we are to love?
If you're so convinced they are wrong (Bill and Ann), if you are so intent on changing them, you should remember that you're not going to change people if you don't love them. That's just not the way it works.
And there's not much point in it any other way.


It's occurred to me that you don't have to be going somewhere to be doing something worthwhile. As a senior in high school, I'm tired of 'going places'. I'm ready to settle down a bit, and start doing the things I want to do. Because, after all, I could die before I get old. And I want to have something done by then.

Which is not to say I'd like to stop making progress. On the contrary, I'd like to start. Because, you know, you can't make any progress when you're always working towards leaving the place you're in.

My little brother ordered some stuff off the Invisible Children website and it came in the mail today (and by today I mean somewhat recently - this post has been a draft for a while). (I love that kid. He definitely figured many things out much earlier than I ever did - he's twelve.)* What he bought was a t-shirt and bracelet. What he got was a t-shirt, bracelet, about four boxes, a DVD, lots of cardboard and foam, some pieces of paper about what he bought and about some more stuff, and also lots of cool colors and stuff. The excessive use of the word 'stuff' in this paragraph (count: 4, I think) was unintentional, but I think it provides an accurate implication as to the thematic focus on 'stuff' here. The Invisible Children organization has sure got it right. When I send my money to them, I really just want stuff. I might act as if I'm trusting them to give my money to people in Uganda that need it, but that's just a fallacy because what I really, really, deep-down-inside want is some nice, squishy non-biodegradable packaging material. And (I'm speaking to the people who run Invisible Children here) make sure you hire at least one more designer because you decorated the DVD case (note the use of a box! Not even just a DVD slip like NetFlix uses!) just fine but the outside of the box was just a little dry for my taste - try some more color!

Ultimately, though, Invisible Children people, I'm impressed with you. You're doing a fine job. I really respect all the money you put into production and salaries and stuff. You even put an extra piece of cardboard around the DVD box in case it fell open or something. That, on top of all the styrofoam - you can never be too careful! And here's the kicker - I went to your website, to check out your financials, and nobody will ever guess what I found. More colors and neat designs and emotionally swaying pictures and stuff!! Right there, on the annual report. So, thank you. I really feel, here, that I have "become part of the story".

Interesting to me that an organization cannot motivate our society to give money to a people without any without exploiting our flashing-lights, smoke-and-mirrors materialism - they have to make cool videos and provide the option of neat clothes and make it attractive to lure us in. I'm disgusted by all parties. Myself included and above all.

(I understand that this was unnecessarily caustic. Invisible Children, I really don't hate you, I promise.)

*Placing groups of parenthesis right exactly next to each other except for a measly period and space is the new cool, if you didn't know.


Speaking of materialism, who knows the brand Not of This World? This is a brand marked by the fashions of the time - trendy, changing, tight - with a Christian message. I don't really have anything against this brand or anything, but it kind of bothered me when I noticed that its chosen, official Bible verse is Colossians 2:8: "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ." What is this organization doing if not catering to the world? If not trying dearly for manipulative persuasion? - "Christians can be cool, too! You don't have to be unpopular to be a Christian. Look! I believe in Jesus and belong to the world, and am desperately clinging to this fallen nation."



I am an idiot. I just had one of the most humbling experiences of my life. I am an idiot. I got done writing the bit on Invisible Children, and then went back and read my bit on loving at the beginning of the post, and what a punch in the gut. I am such an idiot. I think I'm gonna publish this anyway, just so everyone knows what a jerk I am.


Currently reading:
the Bible
Death of a Salesman (or, rather, should be reading - it's for school)
the latest issue of PopSci, yay!
nothing. :(

Currently listening to:
Jon Foreman (guess what: his song, "White as Snow" -> Psalm 51)
Wavorly (guess what: their song, "Sleeper" -> Ephesians 5:14. I think.)
Something Corporate
Esterlyn