Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

Archives for October 2012

Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. And a Musing on what the Arts are Good for

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midnight-in-parisI had a magical Sunday morning in Oxford, watching Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. I bought the DVD, because it was Woody Allen, without having read reviews.

And so I was particularly enchanted. Here was Zelda, as edgy and high-energy and fragile as Scott Fitzgerald depicts her in Tender is the Night. And charming Scott himself. Hemingway, talking in complex, monosyllabic sentences. Gertrude Stein, a brash, rich, arty lesbian who berates the artists and writers in her circle, comes across just as she does in the oddest autobiography/biography ever written, “The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas,” which Stein kindly wrote for her lover and companion, Alice!

T.S. Eliot appears, measuring out his life with coffee spoons. And artists—Dali, Picasso, Degas, Gaugin, and Cole Porter, Josephine Baker, and Luis Bunuel. The magic of a late-career director, free, liberated, confident and playful. Loved it!

* * *

 There were years in my twenties and thirties in which I immersed myself in the arts obsessively—in reading poetry, and novels, and essays, in haunting art galleries, and watching good films and now that my daughters are older and self-reliant I am so enjoying soaking up the arts again.

That’s one of the great gifts of the arts: Lethe. Forgetting everything. Forgetting time, sorrow, failure, undone tasks.

And that’s a great gift, isn’t it? [Read more…]

In which I trace my evolving views on Gay Christians

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lonnie_frisbee

Two years ago, I was in a small group at St. Aldate’s Church, Oxford, discussing Philip Yancey’s What’s so Amazing About Grace?

 Yancey wrote about his friend Mel White who was a Christian gay man, “Mel felt homosexual longings from adolescence, tried hard to repress those longings, and as an adult fervently sought “a cure.” He fasted, prayed, and was anointed with oil for healing. He went through exorcism rites read by Protestants and also by Catholics. He signed up for aversion therapy, which jolted his body with electricity every time he felt stimulated by photos of men. For a while, chemical treatments left him drugged and barely coherent. Above all, Mel wanted desperately not to be gay.”

Mel had suicide attempts, Yancey continues to write, and, like Lonnie Frisbee, “wild swings between promiscuity and fidelity. Sometimes he acted like a hormone-flooded teenager, and sometimes like a sage.”

Finally, “Mel concluded that his options narrowed down to two: insanity or wholeness. Attempts to repress homosexual desires, and live either in heterosexual marriage or in gay celibacy he believed would lead to certain insanity. (At that time, he was seeing a psychiatrist five days a week, at a hundred dollars a session.) Wholeness, he decided, meant finding a gay partner and embracing his homosexual identity.”

 Mel remained a Christian, and even [Read more…]

The Eagle, and Waiting to Discerning God’s Will Before You Act

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eagle

 

The eagle waits at the edge of its nest for the winds of the storm to gain velocity. Once the storm is strong enough, it spreads its magnificent wings, and allows the storm to carry it where it wills.

By waiting for the wind to gain velocity before it flies, “it can run and not be weary, walk, and not be faint.” It wastes not an ounce of energy.

* * *

I think we can avoid much wasted effort if we do not act until the winds of the Spirit are strong, until we are sure we are flying with the wind of the Spirit, not without it, or, heaven forbid, against it.

And this is a learned skill.

I have been impulsive and impressionable for much of my life, and this does not make me rejoice. I look back on wasted efforts; projects committed to impulsively and later abandoned; or grimly seen through but without much fruit. Things done that came to nothing.

It is perhaps the story of many lives, but it does not have to be.

I have noticed the enormous difference even in small things– like deciding if and where to go on holiday, and what to do there—when I pray about it, and wait for guidance. It leaves me quite disinclined to commit to things, if I have not heard God’s guidance on whether I should be doing them. I now do not like to go through a weekend, or a vacation day without checking with God to see what ideas he may have for my day!

* * *

 “Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor and the enemy of the people,” Ann Lamott says.  I have, for decades, allowed my writing life to be poisoned by the stress and sadness of perfectionism.

“What we want is not more little books about Christianity, but more little books by Christians on other subjects—with their Christianity latent,” C.S. Lewis wrote.

So, I am trying to lower the bar–which is the best way to write well.

Apart from “little  books,”–and I have just finished one which is with editors–I am trying to discipline myself to write more “little blogs,” 400-500 words (rather than my normal 800-1200 word blogs)– a single thought, a single insight, a single blessing, slight perhaps. I will write these on the off-chance that what spoke to me might speak to others.

Christian bloggers can play a prophetic role if they record what they hear the Lord saying to them. For He might be saying the same thing to others too, and perhaps our little blog is one way in which he will speak to our readers. Perhaps. God willing!

 

On Vaughan Roberts’ interview, and the Case for Gay Christian Marriage

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 I read this poignant interview with Vaughan Roberts, who has been the widely respected Rector of Oxford’s most conservative evangelical church, St. Ebbe’s since 1991, and felt saddened.

Roberts discloses his continuing personal battle with same sex attraction, though refuses to identify himself as homosexual…

To quote, “if we have turned to Christ, we are new creations, redeemed from slavery to sin through our union with Christ in his death and raised with him by the Spirit to a new life of holiness, while we wait for a glorious future in his presence when he returns. These awesome realities define me.”

He has remained celibate and single. “Evangelicals say that clergy should uphold the Bible’s teaching that sex is only for heterosexual marriage in their teaching and lifestyle, both of which I do.”

And Vaughan reports that he remains “faithful to the Bible’s teaching that the only right context for sexual intercourse is in a marriage between a man and a woman.”

                                                      * * *

Roberts, as far as I can tell from my own reading of the Bible, is quite correct in his statement in this interview, “The Bible presents only two alternatives: heterosexual marriage or celibacy.”

But… but… but… Are we worshipping Christ or the Bible?

What is the Bible? I believe it is divinely inspired. I believe it is trustworthy and true. I believe it is wise. I believe it is beautiful. I believe we can know God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit through its words. I believe reading and obeying it can lead us to the heights of the joy, wisdom and holiness which it’s possible to reach this side of eternity.

But I believe other things too. I believe—well, know—the Bible is a historical document. It is both a product of its times, and has eternal wisdom just as Jesus was both a first century Jew who celebrated the Passover; worshipped at the synagogue, and a radiant, transcendent person with wisdom and blessing for all men of all times.

As our understanding of the Bible evolves, we continually decide which statements were for all time, and which were written to the men and women of their time. We no longer believe slaves should submit to their masters; instead we work for their freedom. We—well, many of us—no longer believe women should remain silent in church. Instead, ashamed that the church should lag behind the world in justice, fairness and equality, we work for the ordination of women as bishops.

And as our understanding of psychosexuality evolves, we no longer believe that people choose their sexual attractions. For socio-biological reasons not fully understood, some are attracted to their own gender, and completely unattracted by the other. Changing this innate orientation is increasingly understood to be difficult, near-impossible, and psychologically dangerous. The 30,000 member British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy recently announced  that it was unethical to try to.

As Vaughan Roberts sums it up in this interview, “A small proportion of people, including Christians, find that they remain exclusively attracted to the same sex as they grow into mature adulthood. God has the power to change their orientation, but he hasn’t promised to and that has not been my experience. Research suggests that complete change from exclusively homosexual desires to exclusively heterosexual ones is very rare.”

                                                      * * *


Is same-sex marriage a sin? Will it cut married gay people off from the grace, mercy and fellowship of God?


David was known as a man after God’s own heart. He had multiple wives, multiple concubines, lust driving him to adultery and murder. Yet he plumbed the depths of an intimate relationship with God so thoroughly that just reading his Psalms is a prayer.


Many (most?) of the heroes of the faith in the Bible fell short of the glory of God sexually—think of Abraham with his wives and concubines, or Jacob or Solomon.


But that did not cut them off from an intimate relationship with God–from seeing God in the flesh as Abraham did in his theophany in Gen:18, or Jacob’s vision of heaven and earth connected with angels ascending and descending between them, or Solomon’s dream-theophany in which God promises him wealth, honour, long life, and wisdom in the bargain.

*     * *


I’ve lived in Oxford, England, for ten years now, and I think its best churches, with the best worship and preaching, are its evangelical ones. I have never met or heard of an openly gay person in them, and—I may be wrong—doubt they would be welcome except as potential “conversion”-fodder.


And that is a shame. We cannot make Christ a heterosexual preserve. He came for all men.


And equally, I believe we should not, cannot make marriage a heterosexual preserve.


Marriage, when it works, is a uniquely wonderful relationship, a mixture of all C.S. Lewis’s Four Loves—of Storge or affection, Philia, or friendship, Agape or unselfish love and Eros, sexual or erotic love.


I am, and always have been, heterosexual, and believe I always will be–but to be honest, if I were single, and if I were to feel this powerful draw to another woman, a mixture of storge, philia, agape and eros, I strongly doubt it would be sin to live with her. I doubt Christ would frown on it.


If people harassed my conscience with the seven verses in the Bible which, as Vaughan Roberts says, disapprove of homosexuality, I would cast myself on the mercy of Christ and in Martin Luther’s phrase, Sin Boldly. God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, sin boldly, and let your sins be strong, but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world. We will commit sins while we are here, for this life is not a place where justice resides.   [Letter 99.13, To Philipp Melanchthon, 1 August 1521.]

                                               * * *


Promiscuity is sin; it is idolatry, among other things—seeking pleasure or escape in things other than God, and in a way which is harmful both to yourself and your partner.


But can a loving committed same-sex relationship be sin? As you see, I was repeatedly pressed on this point in the comments section when I wrote about the Chick-fil-A controversy, and appealed to Christians to define themselves by what they were for, not what they were against.


But perhaps, sin is not mathematical. Our human courts recognize this when they hand out different punishments for the same crime—a lighter sentence to the abused spouse who stabs the persecutor in madness and self-defence than to the spouse who cold-bloodedly poisons her spouse for the insurance money and legacy.  An abusive, dysfunctional family background is taken into account in sentencing.


So too, there is no impermeable algorithm for sin; a Divine Judge who sees our hearts and our weaknesses decides. And “just and true are all his ways.” And when we are in his hands, we are in good hands, for he was known as “the friend of sinners.” He noticed, approvingly, the prostitutes and tax collectors storming into the Kingdom ahead of the righteous ones (Matt 21:31).


He will look at the people involved, not the letter of the law just as our best human judges too. He will not be bound by the letter of the Bible, he will look at our circumstances and our hearts.


If I were gay, I would not choose a lifetime of solitude and grimacing and bearing it, because of those seven verses which condemn homosexuality. I would trust the mercy and goodness and understanding of the Jesus revealed in the gospels who made me exactly as I was, formed and fashioned me in my mother’s womb.

               * * *


Would a homosexual who made a decision to live, in a monogramous, committed and sexual relationship, be welcome in an evangelical church just as he was?


Not in any evangelical church I have worshipped in. And some of these churches have had splendid worship and inspiring preaching.


Perhaps this is the greatest injustice we evangelicals have done to the homosexual community—we have denied them full participation in the Christian community.


But Christ is Lord of all. He is too great a treasure to be for heterosexuals only. The very thought would appall him, he who of all men was the most inclusive, who was always seeking the least, the last, the lost, the outcast, the sinner….

                                                  * * *


Oh, the immense relief with which Luther realized that the Catholicism he had been taught was limited. With what relief he turned to Christ!


I await an evolving theology which presents Christ as he is, Lord and God of all, of those who are born heterosexual, and those who are born homosexual, and in which we can all always worship him together without casting immense burdens of shame and guilt and judgement on gay Christians, burdens none of us would be able to bear.


On Writing and Ambition and Some Thoughts from C.S. Lewis on Both

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So I have found myself a finalist for “The Tweeter of the Year,” an award from The Christian New Media Awards Conference.

I wondered if I should even mention it. But yeah, I am a bit pleased, for to be ambitious for one’s writing is natural–and why act deny it or be hyper-spiritual about it?

After all, nobody sets out to blog aiming to be the least-read, least-followed, or the very worst blogger in the whole world.

We write to be read, and to inspire and delight, and naturally we are pleased if we succeed in that aim.

* * *

The blogosphere is full of affirmation, and encouragement. Blogging has been a life-changing experience for me.

However, those Best of… Lists, while encouraging to those on it, as I have occasionally found myself, are discouraging—even a sock in the stomach–to those not on them. And the latter category includes most bloggers and writers.

The editor, Ted Solotaroff, says uncertainly, difficulty and doubt are as much part of a writer’s life as snow and ice are part of an Eskimo’s life.

It is the fact of anything competitive that everyone will NOT win more than they win; that no one can win ‘em all; that top bloggers or best writers lists change each year.

As Ted Solotaroff said in his brilliant essay “Writing in the Cold,” writers who survive and thrive must somehow learn to keep rowing, to not only not stop writing, but to somehow derive energy and resolve and inspiration from discouragement and failure itself.

Ah, a seemingly impossible task!!

* * *

As a Christian writer, here is how I deal with writing setbacks.

1 First of all, I consider my call. Am I indeed called to continue writing and blogging?

The answer is Yes.

It is my one gift, and I must continue.

(Both writing and blogging are such crowded fields, fraught with discouragement, that I now believe one should not embark on them unless one really loves them.)

2 Secondly, I hand it over. Hand over the success or failure of this enterprise of writing.

Surrender it to God. That gives me much peace.

3 Thirdly, I ask for God’s blessing. Visualize myself and this little blog of mine in the force field, the waterfall of God’s blessing.

4 Fourthly, have a little strategy session with God.

Am I using my gifts to the best advantage, writing about the things I can best write about? Is what I am saying genuinely helpful to my audience Are there simple tweaks which might increase readership? Any ideas for things to do differently?

If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. (James 1:5). It’s true! Often amazingly simple but fruitful ideas will emerge from these sessions.

5 And then, convinced that I am indeed called to continue writing and blogging, that I have surrendered it to God, that it has his blessing, and that I am seeking the most time-effective and strategic way to write and blog, I continue rowing!!

* * *

And here are some thoughts from C. S. Lewis on ambition.

Ambition! We must be careful what we mean by it. If it means the desire to get ahead of other people . . .then it is bad. If it means simply wanting to do a thing well, then it is good. It isn’t wrong for an actor to want to act his part as well as it can possibly be acted, but the wish to gave his name in bigger type than the other actors is a bad one . . .

What we call “ambition” usually means the wish to be more conspicuous or more successful than someone else. It is this competitive element in it that is bad. It is perfectly reasonable to want to dance well or to look nice. But when the dominant wish to dance better or look nicer than the others – when you begin to feel that if the others danced as well as you or looked as nice as you, that would take all the fun out of it – then you are going wrong.

And here is a letter Lewis wrote to his long-time friend Arthur Greeves who was struggling with being rejected by a publisher.

From the age of sixteen onwards I had one single ambition [to succeed as a writer], from which I never wavered, in the prosecution of which I spent every ounce I could, on which I really and deliberately staked my whole contentment: and I recognise myself as having unmistakably failed in it.

…The side of me which longs, not to write– for no one can stop us doing that, but to be approved as a writer–is not the side of us that is really worth much. And depend upon it, unless God has abandoned us, he will find means to cauterise that side somehow or other.

…Think how difficult that would be if one succeeded as a writer: how bitter this necessary purgation at the age of sixty, when literary success had made your whole life and you had then got to begin to go through the stage of seeing it all as dust and ashes. Perhaps God has been specially kind to us in forcing us to get over it at the beginning. At all events, whether we like it or not, we have got to take the shock. As you know so well, we have got to die. Cry, kick, swear, we may: only like Lilith to come in the end and die far more painfully and later.

…I would have given almost anything—I shudder to think what I would have given if I had been allowed—to be a successful writer…I am writing as I do simply and solely because I think the only thing for you to do is absolutely to kill the part of you that wants success.

(The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis, Volume 1, Ed. Walter Hooper (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2004), pp. 925-927).

 

(Revised October 5th, 2013)