Prodigal Kiwi(s) Blog

"Dear Christians, stop making [so-called Christian Values or 'Christian'] movies": Some Reflections on "True Grit".

I always look forward to a Coen Brothers film, and their latest, a western titled True Grit (a remake of the 1969 Henry Hathaway-John Wayne original “True Grit”) is no exception. I haven’t read a lot about it but theologian J. Daniel Kirk (author of the very good Romans Unlocked: Resurrection and the Justification of God) recently put up a post about his experience of watching it. 

Here’s an excerpt: 

“…Dear Christians, stop making movies. Stop writing books. Go ahead. Put your cameras down. Fold up your laptops.

Now, go watch True Grit, Ladykillers, and O Brother Where Art Thou?, and learn from Joel and Ethan Coen how to tell the Christian story in popular media.

The film begins with an invitation to recognize that the biblical world is operative here: a citation of Proverbs 28:1 from the KJV, “The wicked flee when no man pursueth.”

This raises all sorts of interesting questions–is there something especially apropos in this film’s particular bad guy being chased by a girl? Should we supply the second half of the proverb to epitomize our heroine, “but the righteous are bold as a lion”?

As is so often the case in Coen Brothers films, the place of God in the storyline is undergirded by the soundtrack. In this case, the music for Leaning on the Everlasting Arms provides the wordless motif. But again, are we supposed to supply the words ourselves? “What have I to dread, what have I to fear, leaning on the everlasting arms?” Cf. the Proverb quoted above…” 

You can read the rest here. 

Stanley Fish, in the NY Times also offers a commentary on the film, titled Narrative and the Grace of God: The New ‘True Grit’ (spoiler – it addresses the specifics of the film so if you haven’t seen it you might not want to read it.)  

“…Pieces of scripture don’t emerge from the story as a moral kernel emerges from a parable; they hang over the narrative (Mattie just sprays them), never quite touching its events and certainly not generated by them. There are no easy homiletics here, no direct line drawing from the way things seem to have turned out to the way they ultimately are. While worldly outcomes and the universe’s moral structure no doubt come together in the perspective of eternity, in the eyes of mortals they are entirely disjunct…” 

And finally, as was often the case last year, it was Barry Taylor, who though not raving about this film, did alert me to it originally. On “True Grit”, he writes: 

“…Like another couple of films that have come out recently, Winter's Bone and The Fighter, this one features a very smart and capable young person who overcomes a weak parent and a number of distasteful characters who stand in her way in order to see justice done. Mattie is precocious and verbally spouts legal terms at the drop of a hat. In fact, verbal jousting and gymnastics is what drives much of the film here. That may not sound like much, but it actually makes the movie spark at times and lends all the central characters a unique voice in the film that draws the viewer in….” 

You can read his complete post here. 

Also, I liked this Jan 30, 2010 story in the Bismark Tribune by Clay Jenkinson who took his 16-year old daughter to watch it. He expresses many of the sentiments I have for my own daughters and one of a number of reasons why I want them to grow to love great films, music and literature. Films, music and books that help them learn to see, live fully and freely, and negotiate life in all its darkness, light, and shades of grey. 

The Blanket that I Threw Over the Invisible Man

“…Writing allowed me direct access to my imagination, to inspiration and, ultimately, to God. I found that through the use of language I was writing God into existence. Language became the blanket that I threw over the invisible man, which gave him shape and form. The actualizing of God through the medium of the Love Song remains my prime motivation as an artist…”

He ends his lecture with these achingly beautiful sentiments wrapped loosely in paper of words:

"...I'm happy to be sad. For the residue cast off in this search, the songs themselves, my crooked brood of sad-eyed children, rally around, and in their way, protect me, comfort me and keep me alive. They are the companions of the soul that lead it into exile, the sate the overpowering yearning for that which is not of this world. The imagination demands an alternative world and through the writing of the Love Song one sits and dines with loss and longing, madness and melancholy, ecstasy, magic and joy with equal measure of respect and gratitude."

Nick Cave, musician/writer – from The Secret Life of the Love Song, a lecture delivered at the South Bank Centre, London, 1999. Available on CD or in written form (pages 2-19 of a total book of 451 pages + index).

"...society actually has a problem with sadness. They don't like sadness. They try to cure sadness, and actually I don't believe that sadness is necessarily a bad thing. i think its something thats an essential part of our character, especially an artistic character..." Nick Cave, quoted in The Moose and Nick Cave: Melancholy, Creativity and Love Songs, an essay written by Tanya Dalziel in "Cultural Seeds: Essays on the Work of Nick Cave edited by Karen Welberry & Tanya Dalziel, p. 194

And this from a review of Greg Garrett’s We Get to Carry Each Other: The Gospel According to U2, Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville, KY, 2009; 141 pp.: 9780664232177 by Gareth Powell (formerly part (perhaps still is) of the MOOT community in London before going to Pembroke College, Cambridge - if I’m not mistaken) in the January / February 2011 issue of the journal Theology. 

“…One is also left wondering why so much attention continues to be devoted to U2 when so much could be done on other more religiously ambiguous artists such as Nick Cave, who, in a manner akin to Wordsworth’s, stands at a critical distance from Christianity, yet treats its theological questions with genuine sophistication…”

While I have an extremely high regard for U2, I agree with this reviewer’s “wondering”. As proof of the potential, albeit limited from a specifically theological perspective, I’d direct you, by way of an example of the possibilities, to this brilliant collection of essays Cultural Seeds: Essays on the Work of Nick Cave published by Ashgate in 2009. Or to this recent post (on this blog) – reflecting a more theological example. Or, for more on the themes of the religion and the bible, see this 1997 online interview by Jim Pascoe with Cave – Awash in a Bleak and Fishless Sea. 

Finally, here's three podcasts that were connected with the 23rd May to 19th July 2009 Nick Cave exhibition at the Western Australian Museum - an interview ( Mp3 - downloadable) with curator of the exhibition (Janine Barrand) about her experience of visiting Nick Cave at his home in the UK, a telephone interview with Cave (Mp3 - downloadable) himself on the exhibition, and the exhibition podcast tour with its curator. The latter two can be found here.

 

Transformative Change / Rilke & Newman

Paul writes – Blogging friend Mike Todd highlights a book I haven’t come across before, plus a couple of quotes from it. The section on “change” and “change leadership” is quite a big section in my library – not always sure why… but the subject of organizational and personal change/growth/formation does interest me (or is it rather about challenge and invitation?). Especially an alive issue for me as I’ve just made a deep change in terms of employment – change - 4-months short of 25-years with one employer. Now in-between jobs. 

One of my favorite change quotes is the following one from John Henry Newman:

“…To live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often…” 

And this from Mike’s post. You can read his complete post here. 

"Incremental change is usually limited in scope and is often reversible. If the change does not work out, we can always return to the old way. Incremental change usually does not disrupt our past patterns--it is an extension of the past. Most important, during incremental change, we feel we are in control...

Deep change differs from incremental change in that it requires new ways of thinking and behaving. It is change that is major in scope, discontinuous with the past, and generally irreversible. The deep change effort distorts existing patterns of action and involves taking risks. Deep change means surrendering control."

Robert E. Quinn, Deep Change (p. 3) 

Thanks Mike. 

And to end, a quote from Rilke, not so much about change, but another insight into the transformative / formational journey: 

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”

 

Debating Justification at the Dawn of the 21st Century

Paul writes – Michael Gorman directed me to a useful summary by Andy Johnson of justification as it is articulated by Gorman himself, NT. Wright, and Douglas Campbell. 

Here’s an excerpt from Johnson’s summary: 

“…Last year yielded a trio of important works on Paul’s understanding of justification: N.T. Wright, Justification: God’s Plan and Paul’s Vision (InterVarsity Academic, 2009); M.J. Gorman, Inhabiting the Cruciform God: Kenosis, Justification, and Theosis in Paul’s Narrative Soteriology (Eerdmans, 2009); and D.A. Campbell, The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul (Eerdmans, 2009). Since each stands in varying degrees of tension with the “traditional” Protestant view of justification, I will begin with a brief review of it and then summarize the major emphases of each of the three works. I will then highlight some of their similarities and differences and conclude by pointing out some of their advantages over the traditional view… 

…One might “map” the emphases of each of the approaches discussed above as follows: 

• Traditional View: Individual and Declarative.
• Wright: Declarative and Covenantal.
• Gorman: Covenantal and Participatory.
• Campbell: Participatory and Apocalyptic 

This “map” (suggested to me by M. Gorman) is admittedly oversimplified. There is more overlap than it indicates (e.g., Gorman’s and Wright’s proposals are also “apocalyptic,” albeit not in the same way as Campbell’s). However, it accurately reflects the primary categories each proposal chooses to accent.

The three books have much in common that challenge the traditional Protestant view of justification, including their rejection of its view of first-century Judaism as “legalistic,” with individual guilt being the primary problem the gospel addresses. In connection with this, they reject Luther’s understanding of the “righteousness of God” (dikaiosynē theou), maintain that the disputed phrase “faith of/in Christ” (pistis Christou) in several key Pauline justification texts refers to the faithfulness of Christ, and hold that justifying faith is (more or less) christologically determined. Hence, such faith is a “thicker” reality than simple trust or belief, as in the traditional view. Faith includes belief, but also enduring trust in the face of suffering and active fidelity to God…” 

You can read the full post here.

Also, here, you'll find Andrew Perriman's take on justification.

 

My Most Significant Movie Experiences of 2010

Paul writes – My top movie experiences of 2010. Not all movies on the list were released in 2010, but the following films are the ones that I watched during 2010. 

1. The Insatiable Moon directed by Rosemary Riddell (feature film directorial debut)
2. Departures directed by Yojiro Takita
3. A Prophet directed by Jacques Audiard
4. The Edge of Heaven directed by Fatih Akin
5. Head-On by Fatih Akin
6. I Am Love directed by Luca Guadagnino
7. The Hurt Locker directed by Kathryn Bigelow
8. Seven Samurai directed by Akira Kurosawa
9. Inception directed by Christopher Nolan
10. Five Minutes of Heaven directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel
11. Certified Copy directed by Abbas Kiarostami
12. My Year Without Sex directed by Sarah Watt (see also director interview - extras)
13. Bright Star directed by Jane Campion.
14. Disgrace directed by Steve Jacobs
15. Up in the Air directed by Jason Reitman
16. Shutter Island directed by Martin Scorcese
17. Elegy directed by Isabel Coixet
18. In the Mood for Love directed by Wong Kar Wai
19. Last Life in the Universe directed by Pen-ek-Ratanaruang (see also director interview - extras)
20. The Secret in their Eyes directed by Juan José Campanella
21. Revanche directed by Gotz Spielmann 

Update

My friend and Movie Critic Gareth Higgins' "favourite ten" posted by him on the 25th January can be found here.   

James Hollis: Underneath the Midlife Crisis

Paul writes – Reconnecting with the theme from this recent post, I realized that I don’t appear to have written a post highlighting an excellent interview (audio / Mp3) with one of my favourite Jungian analysts James Hollis PhD. Very remiss of me given that I first heard it in Feb. 2010, and we’re now nearly in Feb. 2011. Hollis teaches at the Jung Centre of Houston and is a distinguished faculty member of the Saybrook Graduate School in San Francisco. 

Excerpt from interview, which you can hear / download here. 

[Interviewer]: Jim I've known people who have said, "I'm having a mid-life crisis - an early mid-life crisis. I may only be 25 or 30, but it certainly feels like a mid-life crisis." And then people who are quite a bit older, maybe they are 60 and saying, "Maybe I've having a delayed mid-life crisis." So, what is the mid-life crisis? Can it happen at any age or is there a specific period in life where we say, "Oh, that person is truly in a mid-life crisis?"

Jim Hollis: Well, I think we have crisis any time that the map that we are carrying, either the conscious map or the unconscious map that we've inherited from our family and culture. Whenever the map doesn't quite fit the terrain, we're going to feel disconnected or confused or disoriented. That can happen to any person at any stage of life. Interestingly enough, the majority of the people that I see in therapy are in their 50's and 60's. So they're still going through the question of recovering a sense of personal authority. You know, "What is true for me and how do I live that in this world?" That's an ongoing task. Many times this surfaces at what we might chronologically call mid-life, between 35 and 50, because at that time, one has become conscious enough to have an ego strong enough to really look at one's life and say, "What's going on here? And even when I've done the right things, why does it not feel right or why is there a discord within my relationship or my work?"

And secondly we've been out there doing it long enough to begin to see patterns. And we realize that something is going on here. Sometimes people don't really stop and ask, "What is this about? Who am I, apart from my roles? And what is it that I really want to do with my life?" So therefore it will go underground and pop up in some other place. So it's an ongoing life experience, but by mid-life, we've often had enough experience by then to realize that something is going on here and there's a discrepancy between what I expected for my life and what I'm actually experiencing… 

…We develop all kinds of patterns of avoidance: simple avoidance, procrastination, suppression, repression, projection onto others, distraction. We live in a culture that allows people to avoid themselves by distraction and various forms of disassociation…”

It really is well worth a listen irrespective of whether you’re in the midst of a “midlife” crisis or not. 

Also, out of interest, one of the best little books I’ve read on my Christian’s should read Jung is The Living God and our Living Psyche: What Christians Can Learn from Carl Jung (Eerdmans / 2008) by Ann Belford Ulanov and Alvin Dueck. Ulanov co-wrote the very good Primary Speech: A Psychology of Prayer (1982).

 

Reflecting on Marriage – Wendell Berry

Paul writes – Today a poem on marriage by one of my favorite and most insightful US poet/writers Wendell Berry (via here): 

Over the Edge 

To tell a girl you loved her - my God! -

that was a leap off a cliff, requiring little

sense sweet as it was. And I have loved

 

many girls, women too, who by various fancies

of mind have seemed loveable. But only

with you have I actually tried it: the long labor,

 

the selfishness, the self-denial, the children

and grandchildren, the garden rows planted

and gathered, the births and deaths of many years.

 

We boys, when we were young and romantic

and ignorant, new to mystery and the power,

would wonder late into the night on the cliff's edge:

 

Was this love real? Was it true? And how

would you know? Well, it was time would tell,

if you were patient and could spare the time,

 

a long time, a lot of trouble, a lot of joy.

This one begins to look - would you say? - real?

I can't say why, I'm not sure, but I want to couple it with a brief reflection on failure by my good friend Maggi Dawn. a person I'm really hoping to have a long conversation and a meal with in 2011.

Update - 28th January 2011

I wanted to record another quote I came across in a commentary wrapped around Denise Levertov's wonderful poem, The Ache of Marriage. It gets at the reality Berry's poem navigates. Anyway, the quote I wanted to record is one I read a few years ago, but had forgotten until today (extracts from an essay - author unknown - give a "taste" of what Levertov is getting at in the poem)

Rilke writes: "...It is also good to love: because love is difficult [think too of the opening sentence of M. Scott Peck classic The Road Less Travelled "life is difficult..."  - Paul]. For one human being to love another human being: that is perhaps the most difficult task that has been entrusted to us, the ultimate task, the final test and proof, the work for which all other work is merely preparation..." (Rilke: excerpt from the equally classic Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke. Translator. Stephen Mitchell. New York: Vintage Books, 1997).

 

Defending Constantine: In Conversation with John Howard Yoder

Paul writes – Andrew Perriman highlights a book I hadn’t heard of, but will be interested in reading: Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom. Published in 2010. Its author, Peter Leithart “…takes aim at the received wisdom that Constantine's establishment of Christianity as the religion of the Roman Empire was a political co-optation that made the church the creature and justification of the imperial state. He reads the original ancient, the seminal secondary, and lots of other sources to contend that Constantine was a believer and a conciliator who sought theological agreement for the political stability it brought. Contra the influential interpretation of Anabaptist theologian John Howard Yoder, Leithart maintains that when Constantine is understood in historical context, his disestablishment of pagan religion opens a place for a Christian understanding of sacrifice and of the significance of the kingdom of God…”

Andrew makes some useful comments and intends reviewing it in more detail. Meantime he includes within his post a link to a review by of the same book by Stanley Hauerwas. 

Hauerwas writes: 

“…I think Leithart has written an important book that does more than help us to better understand the complex human being who bore the name Constantine. More significantly, Leithart's criticisms of Yoder's account of Constantinianism is one that Yoder would have appreciated and taken seriously. For unlike many who criticize Yoder, Leithart has actually read him appreciatively. He understands that even if Yoder does not get the "historical Constantine" right, that does not mean Yoder's case against Constantinianism is mistaken. The history matters, Leithart makes clear, but how it matters is finally a theological question…” (Hauerwas’ full review here).

While Andrew notes: “…Leithart concludes the section by stressing the unprecedented nature of the problem with which both the emperor and the church were confronted. On the one hand, a Christian emperor had to work out how to reconcile his political responsibilities with his conviction that the security and integrity of the empire were firmly in the hands of the one true God; and on the other, a victorious church, convinced that the faith of the martyrs had been vindicated by the conversion of Constantine, had to work out how to “integrate the emperor into the church” (183)…”

You can read Andrew’s full post here. The Englewood Review of Books also has a lengthy review of Leitharts's book and a written response to that review by Leithart. You can can find the review/response here. Both are well worth a read. Finally, here's a Nov 2010 written interview with Leithart.

Updates (after Jan 26, 2010 - NZ time)

Andrew Perriman - Peter Leithart: Christian Empire, Christian Mission. 

The ‘True Story’ of Arthur of Ponsonby Arriving on DVD Soon

Paul writes – Mike Riddell on The Insatiable Moon film blog lets us know that the DVD of my “movie of 2010” is out on DVD in New Zealand in April. Mike details that the feature will be supported by  “…a range of special features: trailer, behind the scenes interviews, outtakes, deleted scenes, an image gallery and closed captions for the hearing impaired…” 

You can read the rest of the post here.  Also worth reflecting on is Mike’s recent post on “truth”. The insights apply to more than just movies. Here’s an excerpt:

“…This Way of Life reflects on the lives of Peter and Colleen Karena and their children, while The Insatiable Moon is based on the life of Arthur of Ponsonby. In this sense, they are both ‘true stories’. While the former uses documentary footage to construct a riveting drama, the latter employs dramatic performances to represent a reality grounded in history. Both seek after truth – but always the hidden truth buried in human lives.

This raises the question of what truth is, and how it relates to cinema – a question to be considered not only in relation to documentaries but also dramas. It’s an under-recognised fact that the camera always lies (despite the aphorism to the contrary). The very act of framing limits perspective in an intentional way – restricting the field of vision for a purpose. It leads the viewer to see in a certain way, cutting out what is judged to be peripheral in order to focus on that which is deemed significant. Editing of course adds another layer of interpretation, when the inherent story of the film is brought to the surface – a process which applies as much to ‘factual documentary’ as to feature dramas…”

A fresh way of thinking about Mid-Life and a spirituality that grows throughout life

Paul writes – One of the highlights of 2006 was attending a three-day workshop and chatting over a cup of coffee with US Franciscan monk Fr. Richard Rohr. Negotiating “mid-life” is in a many ways a significant transition period in ones life – it’s a period of re-formation and of opening up depth in ones life and relationships. Rohr is a helpful guide from within the Christian tradition. Other helpful voices (a good number from the Jungian tradition) include the likes of James Hollis (through this “middle passage” we move from “misery” to “meaning”), Robert Johnson, or Mark Gerzon (mid life transitions us from “crisis” to “quest”). While, the enneagram and the like can also often very helpful tools in this transition. 

All that really serves as a brief introduction to the fact that Rohr has a new book out in March / April. A 240-page hardcover from Jossey-Bass. It’s titled Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life. 

The publisher writes: 

“In Falling Upward, Fr. Richard Rohr seeks to help readers understand the tasks of the two halves of life and to show them that those who have fallen, failed, or "gone down" are the only ones who understand "up." Most of us tend to think of the second half of life as largely about getting old, dealing with health issues, and letting go of life, but the whole thesis of this book is exactly the opposite.  What looks like falling down can largely be experienced as "falling upward."  In fact, it is not a loss but somehow actually a gain, as we have all seen with elders who have come to their fullness.  

Explains why the second half of life can and should be full of spiritual richness

Offers a new view of how spiritual growth happens loss is gain 

This important book explores the counterintuitive message that we grow spiritually much more by doing wrong than by doing right…” 

Contents 

Invitation.

Introduction.

1. The Two Halves of Life.
2. The Hero and Heroine's Journey.
3. The First Half of Life.
4. The Tragic Sense of Life.
5. Stumbling over the Stumbling Stone.
6. Necessary Suffering.
7. Home and Homesickness.
8. Amnesia and the Big Picture.
9. A Second Simplicity.
10. A Bright Sadness.
11. The Shadowlands.
12. New Problems and New Directions.
13. Falling Upward.

Coda.

Notes.

Bibliography.

The Author.

Index.

Can be pre-ordered from Amazon.com (here). You’ll find a related article by Rohr here. It’s titled: The Two Halves of Life: How did we get them so mixed up? Also, this US Catholic Feb 2010 interview (PDF) with Rohr under the general title: “Don’t Miss the Second Half”.