Fallen Into Knowledge

Carl Schmitt asserted that the most basic political distinction is that which divides friend from enemy.  This distinction, Schmitt was quick to point out, does not entail any animosity, but merely points to the boundary of our community:  Friends are part of the Us, whereas enemies are the Other, strangers, those who our outside our boundaries.

The Bar-Bar peoples.

This friend-enemy distinction has been leveraged by the church in a couple of related ways to establish the realm of the Other.  For one, it is sometimes used to draw lines across the category of those who call themselves “Christian:”  dividing between Protestants and Catholics, for example, in order to claim that one or the other is not properly “Christian.”

This distinction, or something analogous to it, also typically governs  how churches choose who to partner with for “ministry.”  We draw a line across groups doing humanitarian endeavors:  we consider partnering with christian organizations and typically don’t consider partnering with organizations who are not Christian.  Which is to say, we tend to apply the “do not be unequally yoked” language when deciding on ministry partners.  THese are not the only terms Christians have at their disposal, however:  we have another, “Neighbor.”  

Can we insert into this friend-enemy distinction the concept of “neighbor” such that we can conceptualize partnering with organizations who aren’t Christian - affirming and supporting their humanitarian mission without giving up our identity as Christians? 

The big news today, of course, was Barack Obama’s speech on race in America.  Let me say this first off:  it is a really good example of political speechifying. We have nearly forgotten how powerful political language can be.  Those who criticize Obama for only being able to talk pretty miss the point - that is the primary responsibility of a politician.  It must be remembered that this speech, which was so well done, is political; while I am sure that Obama really does believe these things, his language is aimed at securing for himself the office of the President of the United States.  I don’t mean by that to demean him, or that by noting this fact we can sweep his comments away.  In fact, I don’t want that at all:  eloquence like his is painfully absent from the American political landscape.

However, I do want to take notice of the way in which theological language is leveraged toward political, nationalist ends.  Obama is right that slavery is for America a kind of original sin; he is right that racism has been institutionalized and that America is still suffering the consequences of this division.  David commented as we talked about this speech this morning that Obama even appropriates language from Black and Liberation Theology in his analysis of race in America.  Obama’s speech functions as a sort of sermon: he embeds his analysis into a narrative of salvation.  He has a Hope and he has a Belief.  But his narrative of salvation from racism is the narrative of American prosperity, not the narrative of the Cross.  His hope is in the decency of americans to pull themselves up by the bootstrap, to manufacture for themselves salvation from the divisions that and scars that mark America’s national identity.  And here, by exchanging the narrative of American prosperity and goodness for the narrative of Christ’s Cross, this becomes idolatry.  The state cannot save us.

Also, by exchanging the narrative of American prosperity for the narrative of the Cross, Obama truly does repudiate Reverend Wright and any narrative of human fallenness which can only be reconciled at the foot of the Cross:

The Christian message on race is quite simply the gospel…”in this new creation we are neither Caucasian, African, Asian, male nor female, bond or free.  We are a third race.” How then did Christians begin to think of race as a third category?  According to Campbell, they did so when the emphasis in Christian theology began to be on humans rather than God.  Nothing is more indicative of such an emphasis than the presumption by modern liberal Christians that the race problem can be solved politically.  Such a presumption serves to legitimate the modern nation-state, which, ironically has been the primary agent for the categorization of people by race. - Hauerwas and Coles, “Christianity, Democracy, and the Radical Ordinary.

While I certainly welcome any move that truly does resist the oppressive and demonic forces of racism, I think that we must be careful not to get sucked in by the theological language of the state.  This is especially hard for American Christians to do:  American politicians are well practiced at employing such theological language for nationalist ends, and American Christians are equally well practiced at having their interests appropriated by the state.

Every year, some group places white flags in the park blocks to represent people killed in Iraq. This year the red flags represent US soldiers killed, the white flags each represent “at least” 5 Iraqis killed. The flags cover several city blocks.

Carl Schmitt’s conflict with liberalism lies in liberalism’s insistence on the “rule of law”  At the core of liberalism stands the assertion that law is prior to sovereignty, that a system of laws can be made to govern human society.  Schmitt thinks not: human life is too unpredictable, and can never be subsumed under a set of laws, no matter how complex.  At the end of the day, sovereignty is never located in law but in a person.  Schmitt’s famous “state of exception” is focused on just this point: the sovereign is not just the one who makes the decision concerning the exception, but the sovereign also emerges / is revealed by it.

For Christian Theology, political and otherwise, the status of Jesus as King subordinates Law -   Jesus is truly Lord of the Sabbath.

Schmitt finds the “rule of law” (and, consequently, liberalism) problematic because of the ways in which law constrains human relations.  Human relations, when mediated by Law, are mechanized; and humans are thereby objectified.  We catch a glimpse of this in the Mark 2, when Jesus and his disciples are innocently plucking grain on the Sabbath.  The disciples are grist for the law’s operation: insofar as they are recognized by the law, insofar as they are found under the law, they are recognized as lawbreakers.  Just as the doctor cannot diagnose “health” (so the truism goes) so also the Law does not recognize Justice or Goodness or Mercy - or even Subjects at all - but it can only capture deviants.  Thus, to be included in the law is to be a lawbreaker.  On the other hand, to be included, found, under a king is to be a Subject.

Sorry about the paucity of posts. (Alliteration!)

Read this instead. In short, members of congress were challenged to eat as if they relied on food stamps: they were challenged to limit themselves to $21 worth of food for a week. 1$ per meal. Perhaps all elected officials should experience poverty, at least for a bit.

Ted Kulongoski, Oregon’s governor, also took up the challenge

Tonight I watched Al Gore’s, “An Inconvenant Truth,” and after watching it I declare that you should also watch it. His presentation is convincing and interesting: I can see why people have reacted favorably to the movie, and the version of Al Gore contained within. This, certainly, is not the same person that we saw as a politician.
Perhaps.
As I was watching, I couldn’t help wondering if this version lf Al Gore wasn’t merely absent from the political arena, but, rather, wasn’t welcome. Let me explain. (more…)

Article Here.

Currently they are making $165,200 per year. So, certainly a raise is long over-due, right?
Meanwhile, national minimum wage has stayed at $5.15 per hour for 10 years. That works out to $9,888 a year for a full time near-slave.

Another Advent Reading, this time from Mary’s Song (Luke 1:46-55):

His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly;
He has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.

The Oregon State house has voted to do away with the whole CIM / CAM nonsense:  a view that will undoubtedly make the educator friends that I know very happy.

This is interesting: a visual graph of just where your taxes go.
It is sure to generate some thought; like, why does the dept. of defense (read, military) get over half!?
anyway, check it out
deviantART: Death and Taxes

This taken from the linked (funny) interview below:

Q: I hear one of the balls will be reserved for troops who have served in Iraq or Afghanistan.

A: Yes, the Commander-in-Chief Ball. That is new. It will be about 2,000 servicemen and their guests. And that should be a really fun event for them.

Q: As an alternative way of honoring them, did you or the president ever discuss canceling the nine balls and using the $40 million inaugural budget to purchase better equipment for the troops?

A: I think we felt like we would have a traditional set of events and we would focus on honoring the people who are serving our country right now — not just the people in the armed forces, but also the community volunteers, the firemen, the policemen, the teachers, the people who serve at, you know, the — well, it’s called the StewPot in Dallas, people who work with the homeless.

Q: How do any of them benefit from the inaugural balls?

A: I’m not sure that they do benefit from them.

Q: Then how, exactly, are you honoring them?

A: Honoring service is what our theme is about.

The New York Times > Magazine > Questions for Jeanne L. Phillips: It’s the President’s Party