Have yourself a real little Christmas!

 

We are approaching Christmas, perhaps the refrain of a familiar carol still echoes in your heart: “Comfort and Joy, Comfort and Joy,” yeah, perfect!  Or maybe not, words and ideas tend to change over time, or rather what a certain word or idea means in a certain cultural context.  God doesn’t change, neither does the meaning of His words, but sometimes our ambient culture makes it a little hard to understand for those of now ‘late in time who behold Him come’ (yes, another carol reference!).  That famous chorus from God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen is a great example, even the title is odd to our modern ears, do these chronic party attenders need a nap?  Merry in this context means not only happy or delighted but also strong, great, mighty (like Robin Hood’s Merry Men), making the full title to mean something like ‘may God grant you rest, delight, and strength in Himself,’ which makes a bit more sense.

But what of comfort and joy?  Yeah, American comfort or rather comfortable: free of stress, trouble, annoyance, or discomfort is not the idea here.  Going back to the KJV and Handel’s Messiah, think Comfort ye, comfort ye, My people.  A lessening of sorrow, a hope in darkest night, an assurance that all is not eternally lost though mortal life is bitter and fleeting.  ‘They that sit in darkness have seen a great light!’  And Joy?  Not temporal, momentary, ephemeral, fleeting happiness as is the American ideal, but abiding, unabating Joy no matter our current circumstances.  Joy enough to willingly climb Golgotha’s Hill and bear the sins of all the world.

And that’s just one song, how about all of Scripture?  Here are a couple meme worthy verses I’m sure we all cling to or spout on occasion:

 

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11 Plans to be kidnapped by fleeing exiles and die a torturous death in a foreign land, plans to be reviled and ignored and threatened and imprisoned by those he was sent to help?  Not really the American ideal of that verse!

 

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28. But further on Paul proclaims: For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered. 8:36”. But throughout he’s also talking about how NOTHING can separate us from God’s love and our future glory even though life throws some pretty nasty curve balls our way.  But we don’t like thinking (or reading) about that sort of thing, that’s not what God really means is it?  How can He expect modern Americans to trust Him if this is His idea of love, glory, comfort, hope and joy?  Darkness, death, disease, sin, sorrow, misery, hardship, poverty, struggle, trial, malice, slander…ugh!  Comfort and Joy!  Let’s have another chorus, anybody?

 

Many people hate Christmas, or at least the saccharine, Hallmark movie extravaganza our culture makes of it.  Because nobody has that sort of life, except superficially, but we all think we want it so drive ourselves nuts trying to attain it or give up in despair that we are undeserving of it.  Modern Christmas music about santa and snow and stars and glitter and peace and sweaters and hippopotami clashes as badly with reality as anything worn to an ugly sweater party and that’s why we hate it.  We know it isn’t real, it isn’t deep, but we all don our fake smiles and grin at one another while stewing alone in our private sorrows and fears telling everyone, even ourselves, we are fine, when we most certainly aren’t.

But real Christmas music, real Christmas, isn’t that way at all.  All the old hymns are written in a sad, mysterious minor key while all the modern drivel is in a bold, happy major, there’s room in those old hymns for all the woes and fears of real life with joy and hope besides, but there isn’t any room in a ‘merry little christmas’ for anything but false ideals.  If we delve into those archaic words we find spears and sorrow and nails and sin and gloom and death, the very stuff we are dealing with daily, the very stuff Christ came to overthrow after wading through it Himself, the very reason He came at all.  We don’t like it, we don’t like to acknowledge it, we want to be happy now, we want to be comfortable Now, can’t He just make it all go away?  Can’t we live the Hallmark movie instead of this epic drama He’s trying to make of our life story?  We want a comfy, cozy hometown little flick and He’s sending us off to Rivendell with little hope of a ‘there and back again,’ a hundred mile journey on foot with no paved roads or state patrol or McDonalds or Holiday Inn while you’re eight months pregnant.

 

But that is how we know Scripture is true and God is real, when we instinctively know all the sugar coated garbage we culturally associate with Christmas only causes indigestion and cavities but imbibe it still yet shrink from the depth and scope and wonder of the Truth.  How about all those ‘heroes’ of the faith recorded in Hebrews or whom we celebrate in Sunday School?  Real, fallible, unwilling, foot dragging people with foibles galore but God still used them to accomplish His will and He can and will still use each of us, for His glory and our good, but we need to listen and obey, not run off to Tarshish when God sends us to Ninevah, like silly Jonah who thought he was smarter than God.  He delights in taking the foolish things of the world and using them to overthrow the wise, popular, respected, cool, and strong things of this benighted world.  A shepherd overthrows a giant and becomes King, a penniless child will overthrow sin and death forever, what can’t He do?

 

But we’ve got to let Him.  God pointed at Moses and Moses says send Aaron.  Gideon keeps making excuses and testing God.  Jonah thinks he can outrun God in a boat.  The demons believe and shudder but don’t change their ways.  Sarah and Zechariah both laugh at the thought of the elderly becoming biological parents.  What impossibilities have we laughed at, run from, shrugged off, ignored or reinterpreted?  It is the original lie, straight from the serpent, “did God really say?”  Yes, yes He did!  We don’t have to like it, or agree with it, but if God said it, He means it, and it doesn’t change or fade with time or culture or distance or popularity for God Himself is unchanging.

 

We must accept it as Truth, for that is what it is, despite our personal feelings or failings on the matter, or reject it, we can’t alter it, distort it, ignore it, reword it, reinterpret it to comply with our opinions and preferences or those of our culture.  Well we can, people have been doing that for as long as there have been tongues to lie or words to twist, but we can’t do that and truly call ourselves Christians.  For what is a Christian: a true follower of Christ.  Not a fan, not an expert, but a follower, one who gets off their butt and follows, an active pursuit of Jesus, not just a comfy seat and mental acknowledgement, we’ve already admitted the demons do the same and they certainly aren’t His!  

 

And what does Jesus say is required to follow Him: They will know we are Christians by our Love.  Love God, Love Neighbor, even love your enemies!  If you love Me you will keep my commandments.  Love is probably the most abused word in the English language.  I’ve heard it said the Inuit have 200 words for snow, true or not, we only have one word to describe everything from our feelings for food, sports teams, activities, our romantic interest, good friends, pets, kids, distant relations, books whatever, certainly pizza and grandma are not on the same footing in your mind, or so I can only hope, but such is our limited vocabulary.

When God says Love, He means doing the best for the beloved, no matter the cost or convenience to the lover and no matter what the beloved thinks about it, it may be downright unpleasant to both but love is costly, sacrificial, if it doesn’t cost you anything it ain’t real love.  We as a culture are very fond of niceness, but true, heartfelt, charitable kindness is rare.  Nice is just fake love, sort of like a Hallmark movie being thought an epic on the scale of Lord of the Rings.  It makes us feel good about ourselves and that’s what matters, we really don’t care about that other person at all, just how they make us feel about ourselves.  Real Love asks how can I benefit that person even though it will cost me something and probably be of no material benefit to myself.

Yeah, it is hard, but it is also real!  You want real peace, real joy, real comfort, you need to get off the couch and follow, not just like it on Facebook or say all the right things to all the right people.  We need to lose this cultural mentality of ‘have it your way.’  If your idea of god complies with all your wishes and whims, it doesn’t require anything of you but to be content and happy, it’s an idol and if you look closely you might even discover that it is actually you you are worshipping, and you’ve reinvented Jesus to justify your own preferences and opinions. Whereas the real God made you, not you Him, He has revealed Himself to us in a certain way and anything that contradicts that is wrong, false, and heretical.  We are made in the image of God, not He in our image, though we’ve been trying to reimagine Him since Eden.

But He came into this broken story and lived a man Himself, He not only made us and everything else, but He has personally redeemed all creation, including you!  You don’t have to like what He says or agree with it, but if you truly want to follow Him, you have to do it.  His ways are not our ways, and happily so, else we’d be living a shallow hallmark movie rather than a grand epic.  That’s why we hate Christmas, and good gospel preaching, it reminds us of the things that truly matter, the things we don’t want to embrace or even think about, like taking up our own cross, daily!, and following Him, but we know in the end it is the best way, the right way, the only way that is worth walking, no matter how painful or scary or tedious it might turn out to be.

But we’d rather dither and drag our feet and admit Jesus is a nice guy and we like and admire him and maybe we’ll follow someday, like we’ll eventually go to the gym or call that old friend, someday.  But Today is the day of salvation and no other!  Are you in or out?  If you are going to follow, then get going, and if not, then at least be honest with yourself and God and say it isn’t for me and get out of the way that others may pass and you not cause a traffic jam.  In the end it is His will that will triumph and in submitting our own to His, so too shall we, but we will never win in pitting our wills against His, the question is will we make that decision, one way or the other, or just float along through life, vexed and uneasy but never finding resolution or knowing quite why.  The Christian life isn’t easy or comfortable, but in the end it is the life truly worth living, all else is mere existence.

 

The long awaited review of The Boy Who Lived

 I tried to jump on the Harry Potter bandwagon back in college, half a lifetime ago, I got halfway through book 6 and gave up, not because it was a difficult read or I wasn’t used to reading long books (hello Wheel of Time, gave up that one too after about 9 books!), but rather I found it depressing and not all that interesting.  Lately I was staying with friends and had nothing to read, she had the series so I gave it another go.  The first three books are okay, but obviously the first work of a young writer, Rowling hits her stride in book 4 and never looks back.  She has great characters in almost everybody but the title character!  After all that time traipsing around in Harry’s head I don’t know much more about him than that he’s a generic angsty teenager, which I already have plenty of experience with in my own kids except they have a personality too, it is a sad day when Neville is more personable than Harry! The plot sort of meanders hither and yon, while there are some unique plot points, many feel trite or completely random, and ironically the characters themselves admit that most of it is luck.  The world building is intriguing but shallow, sort of like the scenery for a play, cool at a distance but no actual depth.  And the whole series the mood is very depressing and angsty, moody and uncertain, it is always November and never May!  Can’t we see Harry have even a happy couple of months, maybe one uneventful game of quidditch?  But my biggest issue with the series is its indifferent metaphysics, what the heck drives the characters, powers the world, does anything mean anything?  Star Wars has the force, Lord of the Rings and Narnia are Christian spinoffs, Wheel of Time has a complex dualistic Ferris wheel, Spider-Man has pseudoscience, but what drives Harry Potter, teenage angst?, dumb luck?, the modern bureaucracy? 

It is one thing to write a silly little story with no depth or deeper meaning and leave the philosophy, religion, and metaphysics well out of it, but it is quite another to delve into life and death, morality and ethics, the soul, the supernatural, etc with no thought or direction at all given to the underlying worldview.  But it is secular post modernism you proclaim, no it is not, we have right and wrong, good and evil, where does that come from?  Professor Umbridge and the Dursleys are secular post modernists, they define their own reality, but outside the bureaucracy everybody else seems to have set ideas about an external right and wrong.  While we have a few mentions of churches, a couple bits of scripture, and celebrate Christmas and Easter, this is not a Christian book, the only mention of any sort of deity is surprised ejaculations referencing the first person of the Trinity without any sort of belief or reverence.  You can’t be a secularist and admit you have a soul (major theme in the last book).  But you can’t be a deist and have no idea who or what your god is.  If you are going to deal with serious topics, you should do it in a serious way, but there is no depth, no meaning, no purpose, no reason to keep going, which is why I gave it up in the first place.  The mood is so bleak because we are depending on luck to get us through, there is no hope, no purpose, no reason we should expect things to get better, no point in living even if they do.  No, I was not happy with this series, it is trying to be Lord of the Rings, but instead of echoing the gospel and the Hope therein, rather we have something based upon the gospel according to modern, post Christian man, a superficially happy mishmash of cultural relativism but with no meat and no depth and no meaning.  While many are ravenous for real depth, they rave about these books thinking they are the real thing, little knowing it is diet soda masquerading as the real thing.  But so shallow is our cultural understanding of anything, few are those who realize splashing in the shallows doesn’t mean you understand the ocean’s depths; their feet are wet so they must be expert seamen.

The Modern Vision of Music

 It has often baffled me how Taylor Swift can be the voice of our culture and multiple generations, but then I went to a junior high choir concert the other day, the band played a song apparently written by someone with mental health issues and meant to inspire people against suicide, which was sadly appropriate as after the song selections for the choir I was feeling rather depressed and nihilistic.  I remember singing one or two such songs back in my own early choir years of similar persuasion but this time it was every...single...song!  We at least had a few Disney or show tune pieces in there, my elementary aged daughter has an upcoming concert with several painful (but chipper) childish ditties, but why was the junior high selection so extremely awful?!  The better question is what does one sing about when the whole point of our existence is pointless?  We are a culture and society happily building legos on the deck of the capsizing Titanic!

Music throughout time and history, culture and place has been a language, an art, an expression of feelings, sentiments, events, myth, legend, history, story, notions, and the essence of being far beyond what simple words can say.  But like real art, Modern Music has replaced music as it should be.  Now it is a discipline without rules, without borders, without meaning, a banana duck taped to the wall of life!  The hum of my fan has more meaning than any random song of modern selection.  I can understand why the kids weren't enthused to be singing (not that they are enthused about anything not of their own choosing!) about looking into their own souls for meaning (if they have one), finding all their future in dreams and hopes centered on a chaotic, meaningless universe, and finding all their purpose inside themselves and in their own visions.  Ye can be gods!  Yes, and what petty, miserable gods we be!  No wonder a vocal artist with mediocre talents who mostly whines/sings about her pointless life and relationships is the epitome of our culture.

Some guy calling himself 'The Preacher' wrote about this a couple thousand years ago, and his book is still a best seller, so it isn't just a modern phenomenon, but something that wrings the heart of every mortal under heaven.  John Lennon's 'Imagine' is the grand hymn to this worldview, and just as despair inducing as any of the lesser songs presented by our local student vocalists.  We don't need to imagine, we live, as functional materialists, in a world where we assume 'there is no Heaven and no Hell,' but the problem is, nothing means anything in such a world!  Our whole existence is based on the random fluctuations of subatomic particles set off at the explosion that began Stuff, (did you know hard core secularists are Calvinists!?) and nothing means anything because there is no meaning, point, or purpose, yet some deep part of ourselves demands there must be.  So either the secular realists are wrong or some deep part of our being is.  Back before the heady days of advanced scientific discovery, The Preacher remarked, 'God has set eternity in the hearts of mankind,' now obviously he didn't understand astrophysics or subatomic particles so what can he know?

But then what do all these all knowing scientific philosophers know?  How is it Order arose from Chaos, or Something from Nothing, why isn't Chaos increasing to the point of Vacuum instead of being held in check that Order and Life can exist?  Why does my deepest yearning turn towards Something, Meaning, Purpose like a compass needle to the North Pole?  Why am I discontent in the 'Son of Man' revealed in Phil Collins' "Tarzan" soundtrack (catchy music, but if you actually dissect the lyrics there's nothing there!) but find boundless hope, desire, and interest in an itinerant Jewish carpenter of the same title who rode into Jerusalem on a donkey some two millennia ago?  The crowds that hailed Him as King wanted the same things we brilliant moderns demand: I want it my way.  They killed Him a week later because He  said that wasn't the point of life at all, ironically fulfilling the entire point of this reality!

But our songs are still about nothing, as are our sad little lives, but they don't have to be.  I am in no way saying that music is in any way artistically good or bad based on the meaning or contents, but rather that it can be intrinsically pathetic, even with the most catchy beat in the known universe, if it doesn't mean anything.  I will be the first to tell you that there are some (lots actually) of really horrible Christian attempts at music out there, but I'd rather sing a 45 minute chorus of the worst Christian song I can think of than listen to 2 minutes of the inane drivel that passes for modern music (okay, maybe a little longer if it is Bon Jovi but only if you are working out to it and not really contemplating the lyrics), just like I don't own any modern art pieces, unless you count where the kids have left marks on the wall.  But I'll leave you to choose the soundtrack to your own life, be it 'Amazing Grace,' or 'Imagine,' and your workout will proceed accordingly!

Two Visions of Womanhood: Louisa May Alcott and Taylor Swift

 I'm not sure who, in all the grand expanse of time and space, will have the greater influence upon the hearts and minds of ensuing generations of blossoming young ladies.  Alcott wrote 'Little Women' back in the aftermath of the civil war and it has endured as a classic novel and in a variety of modern movie/TV adaptations to the present day.  Swift is everywhere, physically and audibly and electronically, you literally can't get away from her (love it or hate it) unless you go Amish.  The pair doesn't have much in common, save as a potential voice and guide to present and future generations of girls deciding who and what they want to be when they grow up.  And most modern gals are more than a little bold in proclaiming their favor, perhaps worship, of one far more than the other!  The vision of what each poet, even be they prosy, casts upon the waters is a stark contrast of what it is to be a woman, in any age of the world.

I will be honest and upfront, I know little of either's history, character, or life and have certainly never met either!  I have never liked Taylor Swift, even back in her country days when she was crying on her guitar, I dubbed her 'whiny teenager girl' and that opinion has not changed in two decades.  All I know about her is her lyrics, the same for Alcott, I've read Little Women a few times and really tried to read Little Men but got bored and gave it up, and that's the extent of my expertise in either genre!  What is it to be a woman (and no, we are not going to get into the gender debate here, though Jo in the book is mad she isn't a boy, so there you go!), now or ever?  I don't believe Swift presents a reasonable version of womanhood, but rather basic, base humanity (sex or gender doesn't matter): what it is to be a basic, human individual in a self-obsessed culture.  This is why she resonates with so many in this modern age: she speaks their language, she's preaching to the choir.  The only difference is she's a mega-star, a modern god, and they aren't, but they could be, right?  She gives them a perceived voice and a hope that they can be like her, a sort of modern Jesus.

Alcott presents a stark difference.  Her novel is also very basically human, and she too focuses on the self, but in a starkly different way.  While Swift elevates selfishness, personal feelings and opinions, and individual desires to the level of holy writ, Alcott presents us with a vision of those same traits controlled, conquered, subjected to the individual's will for the good of self and others.  There is suffering and darkness in both visions, Swift vociferously fights against everything that says she can't be who and what she wants to be, Alcott gently teaches self-control, patience, discipline, forgiveness, mercy, grace, perseverance, and kindness.  Swift is angry and bold, Alcott sad and gentle, but both are passionate in their view of womanhood and what they see as the true meaning and purpose of life and what, in the end, truly makes us happy.

In one of her songs, Swift scorns the 'Sarahs' and 'Elizabeths' of her day, who she claims sit in the pews judging her.  This is just bad storytelling!  Sarah, the wife of the Biblical Abraham, was pretty patient with her lot through many tragic and strange tales, and was barren for 90 years to boot.  Elizabeth certainly deserves no such scorn, the mother of John the Baptist, she too childless most of her life and scorned by her neighbors because of it, but she likewise showed patience and endurance with her grievous lot.  Swift utterly misses the simple fact that a true Sarah or Elizabeth would never scorn her as they themselves have been scorned, they might be grieved by her choices and apparent unhappiness with her life, but these gentle, patient, caring women would never judge her for it (this is not to say that there are not some who do and would, but that is not the nature of the women she chooses to mock).  Rather, it is more likely Swift's own conscience or some deep inner voice that is uneasy with her choices and this uneasiness makes her want to mock that which is good, right, or traditional because it makes her unhappy to have such a standard.  But should we throw out traditions and standards just because they make us unhappy or should we ask why we are unhappy and why the standard or tradition is there in the first place?

This is what Alcott does, she presents a family of four teenage daughters and their mother struggling with war, poverty, an absent father, personal suffering and tragedy, and their own personal hopes, wishes, and desires.  Each daughter is an individual who grows, fails, struggles, and progresses through life, her choices impacting the lives of all those around her as well as her own self.  This is also what Swift misses, in her world, she alone matters, but in reality and in Alcott's book, our personal actions and ideas impact others and the world we call home.  It isn't just about my happiness, but rather for the good of others, and therein, at least so Alcott deeply implies, lies my own happiness as well.

In the book, the daughter Amy is rather selfish and vain, thinking only of her own wants and desires, completely blind to the sacrifice and suffering of others.  As the book progresses, she learns some of these virtues, never perfectly but she is a happier and better creature because of it.  Swift is much like poor Amy at the beginning of the book, but unlike the character, she has yet to progress beyond that meager starting point.  Alcott's vision of true womanhood isn't about being happy or rich or popular or having a boyfriend but rather of truly loving those in your life, growing as an individual, working and sacrificing for the good of others as well as yourself, putting your own opinions, wants, and desires on the back burner to the needs and good of others and submitting humbly to reality and truth, persevering patiently when things don't go your way rather than berating the system.  And these poor, overlooked, overworked little women discover true happiness.  There is even a rich neighbor and a rich aunt, who look into this happy little nest and wonder at their own unhappiness when they have so much more stuff but so little real love.

Swift wants sacrificial love from others but doesn't understand that it is impossible to receive if one is not willing also to give it, for love can only be given away, it can never be demanded or forced, and the more you give, the more you have!  She has all the influence of Jesus, but none of His love or teachings, but then He wasn't very popular with the Swifties of His own time either and their gospel hasn't changed, neither has His!

Tales from the perilous realm: An overlooked bit of Tolkien

 While many LOTR fans are silently dying inside thanks to such catastrophes as Rings of Power and The Hobbit, they have always had the classic books to fall back upon.  I've finally decided to read the Silmarillion (on the library wait list!) but whilst searching for that book, I ran across a collection of short stories and poems by the infamous author.  While I didn't make it through Roverandom, some of the other bits of story and nonsense are pretty good, though I almost felt I was reading George MacDonald at times. I haven't finished yet, but certainly an interesting bit of side salad for Tolkien fans discouraged by modern interpretations.  It also gives a primordial writerling hope, that if one considered a master of the craft can publish such stuff, perhaps there is hope for the least of us as well.  But what is even more interesting is the subject of all these little stories: mere mortal glimpses of Faerie, something hardly noticed in the epic seriousness of the great tomes, but with all the flitting and impish mischief of fairy children playing hide and seek amid the garden flowers but all the mystery and splendor of the mountain heights wrapped in shadow and snow and mist in the dawning.  And it is the same glimpse one finds in MacDonald, Lewis, Chesterton, and L.M. Montgomery: humor and mystery and sorrow and awe and wonder and joy.  The very heart of a Child of the Kingdom.

It is the something missing in this age of mere information, much of it wrong.  We only want to know the what of the moment, having no time for the why or the how thereof.  Information scans through our brains like data through google and we skim what we like, discarding it almost as soon as we notice it, never finding 'the answer' but merely fretting ourselves sick with what we might not know or in knowing it a moment too late.  We don't know how 'to be still and know.'  We gorge like pigs at a trough, uncaring of what we swill down, only that we must get our share.  But these pretty little books are a journey, a slow unveiling, a call away from the hustle and bustle and nonstop busyness and 'in the know' of our daily grind.  A call from the Shepherd to go out into the hills and be.  To watch the sun set and hear the birds sing, to contemplate the ocean's breadth and wonder what might dwell in its hidden depths.  To ask what lurks on the far side of the moon and what it would be like to dance among the stars.

We want to be our own gods, the source of all things, to define reality as we would have it, but we are fooling ourselves and making our lives miserable for no gain: mice running on a wheel, no better off for running harder, longer, or faster, for you always end where you begin.  But Faerie is calling, for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear, to step off the highway of modern life into the forgotten, misty lanes that run 'East of the Moon, West of the Sun.'  For 'not all who wander are lost,' for they are on a Journey indeed.  Forget everything modern and shiny and new, seek out the twilight, the shadows, the wooded edge of the meadow, the misty fields and silent stars, fireflies and mountains and Saturn and the dappled green of a spring morning under shining leaves.  Be still and know, Know as ye have ever been Known.  When the Deep cries out to your Deep, will you hear its resounding cry?  For to such belong the Kingdom!

Another not so joyous ride through the apocalypse

 I just finished reading 'Vivian Applie and the End of the World,' and the one thing I will say for it is that I actually stuck around til the end.  I've really tried to read modern books the last few years but most just sputter out in the first quarter or so.  There are a few exceptions, this one I kept waiting for something to happen, mostly they just drive around and mope, and then the book ends without really getting anywhere.  It is doing an excellent job for the genre though, Left Behind did a great job of making an entire book about nothing so you'd have to read three or four to actually have some semblance of a bad plot.  The premise was an interesting one: some mega-cult that seems like a cross between the Mormons and the worst of the prosperity gospel televangelists with a hearty dose of patriotic deism has pretty much taken over American culture promising an imminent rapture while weird climactic shifts are playing havoc with the weather setting the stage for a seemingly pointless road trip across post-rapture America.  This was written a long time pre-covid and was first published in the UK.  Having survived that minor apocalypse, I had a hard time believing the US economy could function as it does in this frivolous tale, how does a burger chain stay supplied or gas stations stay open?  How do you reliably get gas or cash to pay for it?  How do you still have cell service?  Why does a US teenager sound like a Brit?  Have you really driven across South Dakota in May?  Where is the rest of the world in the middle of this global but local crisis?  What is the point of this book?

I don't like most of the characters, the ones with promise have far too short a role or are left in a drug induced coma for the majority of the book.  There is plenty of death and danger and emotional angst but it's as easy to forget as driving over the next hill.  Nobody has a heart or feelings or any attachment to anybody or anything.  While we are shown the dangers of fundamentalist belief, secular nihilism isn't shown to be any more useful or comforting, nothing means anything so why should we care about any of it?  There is only a small dusting of plot near the end and then it just ends, there is a sequel but I don't really care at this point.  I kept reading hoping there would be a point, unless the point is to show me there is no point?  There's a little humor but way too much circling the drain and pointless drama.  The author makes a point of not stereotyping people but most of the characters are sadly stereotypes with no depth or interest or complexity, maybe it is a silent commentary on the plight of the modern soul, but this book is certainly lacking one.

Is it trying to be the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, That Hideous Strength, the anti-Left Behind, a secular dystopian Jane Austen, or what?  It does a great job of showing the futility of extreme cult groups, hippie communes, and secular nihilism but it gives you nothing to cling to, no hope in a maelstrom of meaninglessness.  If it is a social commentary it is lacking in comment or clarity or I'm not bright enough to discern it.  If it is humor, it is of a morbid and vapid sort.  If it is high adventure or youthful frivolity it is certainly frivolous but rather drab in quest and scope.  If it is about character and personal growth, sadly the main character's suicide or tragic death might have been preferred.  If it is to show the insipidity and heartless individualism of modern Americans, then the climate change tsunami cannot wash away our sins too soon, for we are all of us deplorable beyond reach of redemption or forgiveness.  If it is to warn about the dangers of fanaticism for any cause, it was a clarion call that went unheeded, for the pandemic was a far better teacher.  

I did appreciate the book's minor attempts to respect religious belief in non-fanatical cult situations, but it was sort of a ho-hum half hearted attempt, as was everything in this tale.  I really was left wondering what the point of any of it was, maybe the point is there is no point?  The point was to point out the futility of everything in modern life?  If this is modern life without a firm belief in anything, then I could not write a better argument for true and abiding faith.  There are little hints and tidbits that the main character longs for just that, but her own cynicism blinds her to anything and everything, even her own deepest feelings and longings.  This book does a great job pointing out the futility of everything but it leaves you with nothing to fill that gaping hole in your heart, which a far wiser writer once said is eternity placed within the hearts of men, a thing we cannot fill with temporal and transient what-nots, a thing that can only be filled with something bigger still, or rather Someone.  

That's what this book is looking for, it is a search for belonging, for True Love, for real redemption and purpose and meaning, a yearning for Home and Peace and real Joy.  But every discovery, every relationship, every new mile only yields disappointment and discouragement, for we're looking for love in all the wrong places, nay we have mis-defined love.  Love is doing what is best for the beloved, no matter the cost to oneself whether the beloved likes it or not.  Perhaps that is the point of this book: that longing, that search, the futility of it all in chasing after the wind.  It is a modern Ecclesiastes perhaps?  I'd stick with the original, at least that will point you towards the Answer rather than just heaping up the questions.

A Tale of Two Novels and the cure for both: The Worm Ouroboros and The Once and Future King

 I just finished the Worm Ouroboros and as it is a big, epic book, it put me in the mood for more tales of yore, namely rereading The Once and Future King (and if you've seen Camelot or Disney's The Sword in the Stone, you have actually sampled a section of this curious work!).  I called the Worm Ouroboros a christianized myth as it were, not Christian in the sense that it is anything like Narnia or Tolkien's epic, but rather that it is the result of an education founded in the christianized classical thought that resulted when Rome fell and the myths spouted by a collection of Galilean fishermen took hold of popular thought and culture.  Perhaps it is more a medieval epic than it is an odyssey, but what struck me as just plain wrong was the end.  Throughout the book is an epic struggle of mythic proportions against the powers of darkness, the cost to the seeming demigod heroes is immense but even more is the utter wickedness borne by those of common birth, who die in their thousands unnamed and unmourned, with only a little side note on their utter misery at the hands of the villains.  When finally the good has conquered, rather than rejoice that peace has been won, and little thinking that another great evil will no doubt arise from some corner unlooked for, our heroes mope about that their playmates have been overthrown and thus has all glory ended, and when given the chance, they happily renew their age old pledge of violence against their now eternal foes, never blinking an eye to ask what the common farmer, whose sons will die nameless on sea or land, while his daughters and wife are ravished, his holdings burned, and he himself brutally murdered, will think upon the matter, as long as these great ones can have their eternal glory.

Enter the modern Arthurian saga that dares to rethink the ancient tale, exploring in full the idea that Might does not make Right, that glory for its own sake is wrong.  That Men are the only species that routinely goes to war against itself for no better reason than that they don't agree over some silly matter none can remember once the blood starts flying.  Neither of these books are written from an orthodox Christian perspective, indeed, Once and Future makes plenty of sly jabs at religion and God while still stealing from its ideals to make its point.  Worm glories in Man's quest for personal glory whereas Once and Future bemoans his fallen and selfish nature somehow hoping some earthly king, himself a fallen man, can overcome it.  The cure to both is a good dose of Tolkien and Lewis and Chesterton who all wrote and lived during the same era, namely during and after the two world wars.

Worm envisions a bloody and dark future wherein death and destruction and evil is borne by all men for the glory of a few.  Once and Future ponders over what life might be like could man but overcome his inherently selfish nature, finding no satisfactory answer but 'maybe tomorrow!'  Both inevitably sad pictures of humanity serving or saving itself.  Both an endless and meaningless cycle of personal ambition and trying to overcome it, only to fail and raise up a new sort of tyrant instead, the futile fulfillment of the hopeless worm eating his own tail.

The myths of Tolkien and Lewis and Chesterton are the cure for this dismal miasma, this stark gray utopia that is neither morning nor evening but always a bitter November day.  We need not a circle but a cross!  The dragon is not content to eat his own tail but rather wishes to consume the whole world and all reality besides.  There is an everlasting glory but it is not found in our personally vanquishing the worm but rather in following the only King Who can, and we die not nameless minions, unmourned, uncounted, rather has He our names graven upon His very heart, his very hand, and it is He that died in our stead, not a glorious Captain in war but rather an innocent criminal in shame.  And when He brings His promised peace, it will not be boring or pointless, but will grow from glory to glory, forever, for His glory is to be our own!  We can neither save ourselves or win eternal glory to ourselves that last more than a sunrise, nor match even the glory of a simple flower that fades within a day.  But He who wrought both Day and Night, lilies and Men, has glory to spare, for He is the true master of the Serpent that has for a while proclaimed himself King, and of the mean little potentates of all the ages that likewise think they rule the world, but are merely gnats in all the long ages to come.

Both books are interesting and intriguing and thought provoking, but neither gets it right when it comes to true glory and the source thereof.  Tolkien's great epic pushes back the darkness at great cost and most certainly never wishes for its return, though he has characters enough that wish for glory for its own sake, rather it is his noble vision of a lasting glory from beyond the world's shores that makes this epic so beloved and remembered when the other books are becoming almost obscure, though no less epic in scale or excellent in execution, it just happens that Tolkien and Lewis and Chesterton's tales happen to be true, and in our heart of hearts, this is indeed what we desire, no matter what our lesser thoughts tell us at any given moment.  Forego despair and never ending darkness, embrace the True Light of the World and never again fall into abject and utter night, or worse, an unending gloom with never a star to light again the way!