Go Palmer: "only in the face of...opposition has significant social change been achieved" (p. 170)!! Divided no more! Communities of congruence!! Going public!!! Alternative rewards!!!! Yes man!
Oh this leaves me yearning for the redder than red days of my post neo marxist youth. If I had a hammer! Sing on Pete, sing out Woody! Oh activist! Savio stirs the soul! Oh Debbs and Goldman, Horkheimer and Adorno, Lukacs and Benjamin, Trotsky and Gramsci show me the way! The material relations of production are deterministic but false and unstable--built on oppression! Yet fleeting is my dream recipe for systemic social change--Tantalus can stretch out only so far to the rising stream of water! Am I hopeless? a cynic? No, I hold to conversion, grace, and mystery. Though u-topia is "no place" we must have the ideal held out before our eyes. But of what shall it consist? Was Thomas More a hopeless cynic? NO! Nor Palmer. I'm not claiming realism in the face of lofty ideas. And Lord knows I shrink from cynicism masquerading as realism. Life is not so dark an affair--no matter what Altman might script. Yet forgive me if I balk at formula for programmatic cultural change, I hold for a different ideal: "where sin increased, grace overflowed all the more," (Rom 5:20) which alone can change hearts. And indulge a bit of critical engagement...
1. But wait, lo! Palmer offers the first step: individual choice to live an undivided--crescendo--life! But what--diminuendo--does that have to do with "finding a center for [my] life outside of institiutions" (p. 172)? Nary a benevolent institution on God's green earth?
Wait. "[go] beyond the institution to become self-critical" (p. 176)! Yes man, this is precisely it. WE MUST "Bethink ourselves!" in the words of Tolstoy. Theologians say "metanoia." And no change will come to pass without first delving into our heart where lives God. What (apart from conscience) will help us to know when we are acting in violation of our own integrity?
2. Give me folding chairs, a meeting hall, and folks that care and want to talk about ideas! I am delighted that Palmer acknowledges the need for exploring concepts, language, et cetera (p. 179). How about catacombs and clandestine worship--there's a community of congruence!
3. Go public indeed--write that Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Call out the white clergy. Bring into the fold but don't compromise the vision!
4. "the diverse rewards offered in this final stage...are reflections of the same elemental reward--the reward that comes from living an undivided life" (p. 188). Wholeness and integrity namely. It sounds like life in the Spirit, or the Reign of God. Consonance between God's will for the self, the world, relationships, and behaviors...not Utopia, but the Reign of God. And Jesus said it is at hand.
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Amen. I love your passion, Patrick. I am grateful for the opportunity to take this class with you.
ReplyDeleteI too enjoy your passion and critique Patrick. Since the start of the class you've brought a valuable energy to everything from acorn collection to spirited discussion.
ReplyDeleteYou embody what Palmer has been saying about good teaching: engagement, passion, the act of learning being most important. Your students are lucky and I wish my son had had the privilege. He is, however, an ARHS Crusader for life! (Beat the Padres!)
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