Thoughts from the Axys

21st Century Gospel

2008-06-28T00:28:00.003-07:00

This is an edit of a post I made the day after watching Wall-E. I redacted it a few months later and am re-posting it now.

If you haven't already done so, stop reading this, stop doing whatever you are doing go out and buy Wall-E; it may be the most spiritual event of your life. That having been said it should go with no surprise that here forthwith may contain spoilers so if you have not seen the movie stop reading now.

I don't cry to often. It usual comes in random times and it is usually due to some feeling of inadequacy or despondence. I NEVER cry at movies. Maybe it is because I'm a guy or maybe I'm generally hard hearted. Wall E Made me cry. It was not just due to the expected but no-less-wonderful climax when all hope seems lost for earth's little savior and all it takes is the force of love to bring back that spark and curiosity into his eye. It wasn't just the "love conquers all" theme so clearly illuminated in the picture painted at that moment.

The story of Wall E, more so than any I have experienced in a long long while (if ever) belongs in a strata above most others yet is similar to all great stories at the very core. It short of human interaction for me it takes stories to remind me of express God's will for all of creation. Pixar and the Disney corporation has succumb the mountain of mediocrity and for my being created a 21st century Gospel.

The story represents creation's interconnectedness and co-reliance upon its inhabitants. Despite what the last 100 years has been like, what we are learning is that we as a unite of life are dependent. The people in Wall E represent the wrong path having gone been down. Then from the base comes a little Disposal Technician--Wall E. Jesus, Buddah, Moses, Mohmmad, call them what you want are represented in Wall E. What they mean to their movements is what Wall E means to the people in his movement. They are all prophets of life. Take away all the nomenclature each milieu gives the individuals, and you get one thing. A person pointing towards life and encouraging others to look in the same direction and do something about what they see.

For me the story represents hope for the future. No matter how horrible, chaotic, and distant life may get it is possible to return and ironically to find myself somewhere new. But it is up to us. The over-sized humans on that ship were given a second chance, a new beginning in their return from exile. They get a chance to join in recreating earth. That is the Logos, and that is Life. YHWH. Breath, wind, air, freshness, newness. It is really very difficult to put into words how much I inaudibly interacted with that movie. It was like there was a connection between my irrational self and the piece of canvas 15'x20 approximatley 30 feet away. I was overcome by a sense of hope and yet all I wanted to do was be bymyself and experience life with a free mind.

Please give some thought to the themes purposely or not so purposely, presented in the film. I believe stories can change ones' life. The story of Jesus has been touching lives for two-thousand years, not because of their historical accuracy but because of the level in which we can sympathize, relate, and appreciate the stories. It is those factors that give it meaning. An appreciation and understanding that goes beyond the historical and emerges into the ubiquitous flow of mankind's story. The story of Moses and the Israelites is older and in every way is our story. As blasphemous as it sounds I really feel this story is in line with those stories. Not replacing them, or superfluous to them, but as a peer with them. I don't think it is too horrible of me to say this since to limit the communicative abilities and relational desire of the Life cannot and will not be constrained to one medium location, time, or people group. Joining in the reintroduction to Life is the job of creation, and this film presents this idea beautifully. Wall E inspires us to be interactive with this process, and not be passive in it. We are part of it in one way or another and Wall E shows us the best way is to be a part of it completely and with no reservations.

Business 101: screwing the customer (Act I)

2008-05-02T00:16:00.001-07:00

Everyone hates school at some point (or all the time) in their life. Whether it be due to the drain caused by grinding away at assignment after assignment, a grand amount of time researching diligently (or major stress over a short amount of time researching) for a paper, or a stress filled few days of studying for tests. Sometimes though, one can hate school because of those whom are paid to teach the students. Those whose job it is, and who get paid by the student to generate an education. Some maybe most of these professors do not do their job well. There are some though who try their best and hardest to do as little for the student as possible.

I know a girl who has run into such-a-one.

She is an accounting major and is in a managerial economics class (req course) this quarter. An economics class which her professor seems to be trying his hardest to not actually put much effort into teaching. I reveal this because it he apparently has choosen to use an internet program called Aplia for their homework. Students receive homework from the program, as well as obtain scores from on the accuracy of the homework returned to the program. The professor's interaction with the program is slim to nill. The most interaction he has with their homework is in the form of receiving scores so he can painstakingly record them in the grading book for their class. Seeing as how the homework is worth 15% in this class one cannot flatly ignore it and hope to do well in the class. And oh wait--did I mention this program costs the student $35.00? Money out of their own pocket. Good beer money! This fee is on top of tuition and the rest of the obligatory fees that go along with it. Now I know what some of your are going to say. There are fees on top of tuition for art and science classes as well. This I know and I feel for your. But these are fees with precedent as well as far more necessary than in an economics class. Having to pay for supplies for art and science go back as far as the Middle Ages). But this is economics people! Bloody freaking economics. Its the psychology of the market thats freaking it. This professor is apparently so obtuse and hard hearted about doing actual work at his job, that he is not willing to to make up and correct homework himself. Other professors in other departments seem toget along organizing and grading homework for their classes. And believe me I really doubt the amount of grading that would have to go on for him exceeds at all that which those who teach English and History courses have to endure. One more thing. A bit more trivial but interesting nonetheless. The homework assigned by Aplia has no direct connection to what is tested on. What is tested on is the information provided in the book assigned for the class which is a heafty expense in itself. Anyway--I digress nor That is not the reason for this blog. The reason for the blog is the following:

The homework program had a certain amount of time one could try it out before one had to pay in order to use it. This time expired as of last sunday (April 26, 2008). This girl forgot to do her homework (which was also due that day) at her own faul, as well as forgetting to pay the fee. I am not aware of when she paid I only know she has at this point. the email I am about to describe may have been the reminder, or she may have done it inbetween the expiration date of her trial time and the email. That having been said it is the email that I am so enfuriated about and is the main point of contention. In an email Wednesday morning (April 29, 2008) her professor kindly informed her of her obligation to pay for the Aplia program.

He said, "No one gets a free lunch. You have to pay aplia 35 dollars. asap."

No salutation, no ending address, just those simple fourteen words. He seems to have taken his consideratness and tact lessons from our illustrious commander and chief. I have informed my friend she should forward the message along with her thoughts on the matter to the provost/vice president of the university. Upon that the possible failure for that to generate an appropriate response she she should forward it to the appropriate media organizations.

What are your thoughts on this? What do you think she should do? Do you feel the program is an appropriate use of money? Do you think it is a poor refection on anyone involved and who? (For the record, her complaints about the program to the chair went unheeded) If there is more information anyone would like before input is given I will be happy to oblige. I don't want to divulge the names quite yet (if at all), but I will keep those who (if any) read this up to date.

Oh, and about the title. If you haven't guessed why this blog is entitled the way it is I will spell it out. In response to hearing this story himself my father eloquently pointed out that it seems the one thing my friend is quite plainly being taught is how to screw the customer because this particular professor employed by this particular college at this particular university is doing just that.

I'm sure there is a lesson here. There must be a way in which I can see Deus curans ob flores. Perhaps that shall be Act II.

Historical Jesus VS revelation in other cultures

2007-04-28T12:44:00.002-07:00

This is not the epic post I promised Ben. That post is still in the works, this is a preface to and an email I sent with some minor additions.

Preface:
I cannot believe that God is only revealed to those in the 'far reaches' of the earth through our meddling. Often revelation does come through crooked sticks, but I would like to think God would find more meaningful and culturally appropriate ways of being revealed. I purchased a book for a book group I was briefly in. It is called The Meaning of Jesus by Marcus J. Borg and N.T. Wright. Both are 'Jesus Scholars' and wrote the book as a kind of point counter point work. Anyway, I wrote professor Borg who just this winter retired from Oregon State University about some ideas and "wrestling’s" I've been having. Here is the..

Email:
Dear Professor Borg,
Hi my name is Tommy Ball and I am a student at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington. I am getting my undergraduate degree in Medieval Studies as a Student Faculty designed major, and hopefully History as well. I just picked up your, and professor Wright's book The Meaning of Jesus and have read only some of it, but from what I have read I am very surprised because many things I have read in the book are things I have thought about.
I feel like I have started to go through the process you went through in noticing how the modern worldview can polarize the Jesus and really most events, and concepts in the Bible. I have been lately very much influenced by Michale Frost: founding Director of Centre for Evangelism & Global Mission at Morling Theological College in Sydney; and Rob Bell the teaching pastor at Mars Hill in Grand Rapids Michigan. My dissatisfaction with the church began with the way in which it presented itself, but now it has since morphed into the kids of issues you raise in your book in seeing the Jesus presented as two different ideas. At one point I was almost prepared to throw out the requirement for there to be a historical Jesus completely, and am still not convinced there is a need in regards to the heart of the gospel. I say this because the little I know about how much obvious Jewish culture went into the gospels I feel is quite lost on those that teach pastors how to be pastors. I could be wrong, and maybe you know this better than I. I'm not certain much understanding of the Jewish culture in which the gospels and other books of the New Testament is conveyed at Seminaries. I see this as a problem.
Knowing the small bit of undergraduate level information I know about the time immediately preceding the early church and late antiquity I see the immediate danger that comes in not understanding the culture that exists around a specific text when one wants to understand said text. I also feel that many strange ideas that the Roman Catholic Church gets may well be a result of that as well as folk traditions that morph and graft themselves to the Christian tradition. I wonder if possibly later generations took the text they depended on, and interpreted it as if it were having been written in their context, and that this was the way in which they contextualized it for themselves thus making strange ideas make sense. I worry this happens today. I also worry that we take the concepts and images given to us by the Medieval church as the accurate ones--blindly and thus miss a cornucopia of wonderful ideas and concepts that could be presented by the gospel writers.
As I said earlier I haven't finished the book so my apologies if my question is later answered in the book. Do we need the historical Jesus? I think of this with a rudimentary idea of what Paul says in the beginning of Romans when he says that God has made himself known through his creation. Does not making knowing the historical Jesus for any kind of deeper connection with God limit God? Maybe my question walks too close to the edge away from Jesus and closer to the silly question of evil, but I think it is important to question how God might be revealed in other cultures, and the possibility that that revelation may not be through a white missionary with a Gideon Bible.

Translating the Gospel, By Mike Frost

2007-03-13T23:11:00.000-07:00

Here is the link to an article by Mike Frost called Translating the Gospel. It is about contextualizing the Bible to where people are preaching it, and its importance. It unfortunately only gives examples at the end as to how it was done IN the Bible as opposed to how to do it today. I suspect if you were to buy the book mentioned in the article you would be given some ideas. For now I'm only posting the link, and have sought permission to post the article itself and am waiting for a reply. Enjoy!

http://www.cegm.org.au/resources/translating%20the%20gospel.htm

2007-03-13T22:44:00.000-07:00

This is a debate in New York as to whether or not America is too damn religious. If you have an hour an a half to kill, and a computer with you, listen to the whole thing, or you can download the mp3 edited version which is significantly shorter.
Enjoy!

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7422542

Hear the Full Debate

Listen to the Unedited Debate (1 hour, 34 minutes)

Read Bios of the IQ2 Debate Panel

NPR.org, February 16, 2007 · As if it weren't provocative enough to hold a debate on religion in America, panelists in a recent debate were tasked with answering the following: "Is America Too Damn Religious?"

The event was part of a series of Oxford-style debates called Intelligence Squared U.S. Produced in New York City by WNYC, it is based on the Intelligence Squared program that began in London in 2002. Three experts argue in favor of the motion; three others argue against it.

In a vote before the debate, about 67 percent of the audience agreed with the motion. After hearing the debate, more than 70 percent agreed with the motion, roughly 24 percent were opposed and about 5 percent were undecided, concluding that America is in fact "too damn religious."

Highlights from the debate:

FOR THE MOTION