to an
unknown god A Journal of Christian Thought at Berkeley
Volume 2 Issue 1 Spring 2009 unknowngodjournal.com
to an
Unknown God
Spring 2009
Cover: The Body
Culture
Altar to a False Image
10 Reasons for Passion
6
The Dangers of Sex Talk
12 Olympics, the Church, and Critique
8
Backyard Abolitionism
3
9
Body image, dieting, and the gospel John Montague Did you grow up with sex on the brain? Thessaly Eresos Batstone’s tour comes to Cal Whitney Moret
A Virgin’s Monologue Let’s get physical Brittany Tyler
Visuals Artwork Laura Ferris (26–27) Emily Fu (15, 22–23) Paul Haymon (facing page) Margaret Montague (4, back cover) Chris Turbuck (2) Andrea Wong (cover) Photographs Grace Ho (1) Advertisements Cliff Mak (5, back cover)
Following your heart is a rational choice Whitney Moret
Complicit by silence about an untouchable topic Lue-Yee Tsang
Church 14 Do We Have Assurance? Destined for damnation or deliverance? Matthew Horwitz
16 The Gravity of Sin One sin is one too many Hyun Lee
17 Thought Experiments and Snipers The urgency of evangelism Melody Liao
Reflection 18 Feeling Age Growing older and fully known Vicky Nguyen
19 Thanks to a Parachute Fighter pilot discipleship Alexis Eils
20 Learning from the Body of Christ Even the appendix has its role Lila Carpenter
Literary Poetry
21 A psalm that I know
Poetry
26 Pater, vide, vulnera mea tibi ostendo
For the director of music Lauren Gully
Good news for open hands Laura Ferris
poetry
fiction
22 We write like some sort of monster 23 Plane 1: Elisha Grace Kim poetry
24 Jambaism #5
28 Sundering Times On the violence of modern uprooting Lue-Yee Tsang fiction
29 Screwing Yourself
Your body is a temple: littering is strictly prohibited Daniel Kim
Short skirts and sunny days Ezra Justin Lee
poetry
Review
25 D-d-d-d-disability Cracked pots and God’s genetics Besorah Won
30 Unknown Sounds Paranoid Cocoon, You are My Sunshine, Singularity Elizabeth Segran
To An Unknown God is not affiliated with any church or other religious group, and opinions expressed in articles do not necessarily represent those of the editors. We are completely student-run and funded partly by the student body as an ASUCsponsored student publication. Funding is also provided through individual donations. Distribution is free while supplies last.
“Comforted by Jesus in the midst of the storm.” — paul haymon
To An Unknown God S�rin� • 2009 Dear Reader, It’s easy to circumscribe the relationship between God and Christians with abstract spirituality, to relegate it to a realm somewhere beyond. But when we say “Amen” and unclasp our folded hands, we open our eyes again to a broken world. Our most transcendent spiritual aspirations are mediated through the constraints of physical existence, membership in a world of sin, and the demands of the human body. Sometimes the body can seem like a curse or a distraction from leading a life of godliness. Sexual temptation plagues us, illness and disability limit us. Aging frightens us, and strivings toward physical beauty mask struggles with our own sense of self-worth. The body can easily become an idol. There’s a tension between temporal existence and the anti cipation of the afterlife. If there is life after death, shouldn’t we be more concerned with evangelism? How do we know we’re saved? Sometimes we forget eternity’s just a lifetime away. At the same time, our very salvation was accomplished through the body, here on Earth. We’re called to live like Christ, who carried the same burdens of temptation, sin, pain, and weakness that we do. Our bodies don’t merely carry our souls: we exist in our bodies – live, love, and serve through our bodies. The body is a gift, designed by God and intended for his glory. As Christians, however, we’re more than our individual bodies. We also represent the Body of Christ, his church. We can serve God by loving others individually, but we find strength in the world as a collective of God’s people. The church’s decisions, cultural practices, and teachings with regard to how we live in our bodies, then, have major consequences. With this issue, the editors of To An Unknown God invite you to ponder the Christian life as inscribed by time and physicality, both as individuals and members of the body. We encourage you to seek God’s will in a body weighed down by sin but stamped with God’s infinite love as a treasured testimony to his glory.
editors-in-chief Stephanie Chiao Whitney Moret
executive editor Laura Ferris
managing editor Lue-Yee Tsang
publishers Sarah Cho Shawn Wong
Assistant Editors Stella Choi Olivia Chou Alexis Eils Lauren Gully Grace Ho Daniel Kim Iris Tien Bethany Young
Staff & contributors Wayland Blue, Lila Carpenter, Cindy Chien, Thessaly Eresos, Emily Fu, Emily Harter, Paul Haymon, Matthew Horwitz, Grace Kim, Travis Kopp, Ezra Justin Lee, Hyun Lee, Melody Liao, Margaret Montague, Nathan Nakamura, Vicky Nguyen, Elizabeth Segran, Chris Turbuck, Brittany Tyler, Besorah Won, Andrea Wong
Editors Emeriti Stephanie Chiao
Whitney Moret
Cliff Mak, John Montague
Your throne, O God, is forever & ever. The sceptre of your kingdom is a sceptre of uprightness; you have loved ri�hteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.
Photograph by Grace Ho
Chris Turbuck (2006) WO O DC UT 18" × 12"
2 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
cover
Altar to a False Image
A Christian public health researcher’s work reveals the impact Christianity can have on how we approach eating, dieting, and body image.
D
r. Karen Hye-cheon Kim wants her patients to know two things, “God cares about your health and we cannot be healthy by our own strength.”1 Kim, an assistant professor at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, studies the relationship between religious beliefs and physical health, specifically obesity. She has also written articles about how faith can affect body image and mental health. For her innovative integration of faith and vocation, Kim recently received an award from InterVarsity. Kim’s work is interesting not just for the inspiring way she connects Christianity and public health, but also for what it teaches about the theology behind health and the body. Some of her recent research demonstrates that Christian messages about body and health are correlated with healthier behavior and a more positive body image.
Religion & Healthy Behavior Most of Kim’s research had been devoted to studying how religion impacts body weight, dieting, and exercise. Some of her early work showed that in the absence of explicit messages tying religious beliefs to healthy behavior, there is little correlation between faith and health.2 However, several recent studies by Kim and her colleagues have demonstrated the efficacy of faith-based weight loss programs.3 Kim and researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill selected three African American congregations in rural North Carolina. In partnership with pastors and congregation members, the researchers imple-
mented a program headed by lay church leaders and designed to take advantage of the churches’ strong existing social networks. After receiving training and education from professional health workers, lay leaders formed and led eight-week courses on health. Weekly meetings included Bible study, prayer, exercise, and education about health and food. Compared with control groups, the Bible-centered community groups showed significant weight loss over the eight week period. In addition, leaders and participants reported in interviews that they found the faith-based and community-centered aspects of the program to be encouraging and important for social support. They became accustomed to thinking of their struggle to eat healthily and exercise in moral terms and reported seeking sustenance in the Bible and prayer. These attitudes and the community framework reinforced messages about diet and exercise and accompanied significant weight loss during the eight-week period of the study. Religion & Body Image Kim has also done some research on mental health and body image. Past empirical studies have confirmed what is probably obvious to most Americans: idealized images of thinness popularized by the entertainment and advertising industries have negative effects on women’s perception of their body image.4 (Although men can also develop negative body images, the majority of studies focus on women.) As the authors of multiple studies report, women’s negative feelings do not stop with dissatisfaction about their weight or shape but actually rein-
writer
John Montague 1 InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, “Bosscher-Hammond Prize Winners Integrate Faith and Vocation,” press release, 8 January 2009, http:// intervarsity.org/aboutus/pressroom/ pressRelease.php?id=3794. 2 Karen Hye-cheon Kim and Jeffery Sobal, “Religion, Social Support, Fat Intake and Physical Activity,” Public Health Nutrition 7 (2004): 773–781; Karen Hye-Cheon Kim et al., “Religion, Social Support, Food-Related Social Support, Diet, Nutrition, and Anthropometrics in Older Adults,” Ecology of Food and Nutrition 47 (2008): 205–228. (The latter study found positive correlations between religious involvement and food-related behaviors only in older women.)
3 Karen Hye-Cheon Kim et al., “The WORD (Wholeness, Oneness, Righteousness, Deliverance): A Faith-Based Weight-Loss Program Utilizing a Community-Based Participatory Research Approach,” Health Education & Behavior 35 (2008): 634–650.
4 See, e.g., Lisa M. Groesz, Michael P. Levine, and Sarah K. Murnen, “The Effect of Experimental Presentation of Thin Media Images on Body Satisfaction: A Meta-Analytic Review,” International Journal of Eating Disorders 31 (2002): 1–16.
John Montague is a second-year law student at Berkeley. He is originally from Charlottesville, Virginia.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 3
(Above) “Loneliness No. 3” by Margaret Montague (2008).
5 Ibid., 12 (quoting J. Rodin et al., “Women and Weight: A Normative Discontent” from T.B. Sonderegger (ed.), Nebraska Symposium on Motivation, Vol. 32: Psychology and Gender (Lincoln: Nebraska University Press, 1985): 267–307).
6 The book is J. J. Brumberg, The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls (New York: Random House, 1997). 7 Karen Hye-Cheon Kim, “Religion, Body Satisfaction and Dieting,” Appetite 46 (2006): 285–296. 8 Positive religious coping included methods such as looking for a closer relationship with God in times of trouble.
force negative feelings about themselves. One author stated the problem particularly well: “For many women, weight is a quick and concrete barometer by which to measure oneself and one’s worth – how well one is doing as a woman.”5 The author of one book even argues the modern world has replaced spiritual attainment with physical beauty such that, instead of suffering to achieve greater piety, we now sacrifice ourselves on the altar of our own idols of beauty.6 Hypothesizing that religion may provide an alternative measure of worth, Kim has examined the relationship between religious beliefs and body satisfaction.7 Her empirical study found a significant relationship between prayer, religious commitment, and “positive religious coping”8 and greater body satisfaction. Those women with strong faith commitments and
4 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
practices were more likely to be happy about their bodies and less likely to engage in unhealthy dieting. Body Image, Health & the Gospel Kim’s studies confirm that the gospel can – and should – play a crucial role in conversations about physical health and body image. Her published studies show only correlations, but some careful thought reveals that the gospel teaches several important truths about these issues: unhealthy behavior is not merely a failure of discipline; body image is an idol; and the love of Christ provides the best source of strength to overcome these struggles. First, overeating and lack of exercise are not simply failures of will power, nor is “lack of discipline” the true sin at work here. Kim and Sobal
(2004) hypothesize that emphasizing teachings about the body being a temple of the Holy Spirit (I Cor 6:19) may lead to healthier lifestyles when Christians realize that God cares about what they do with their bodies. This is true, but focusing too much on the moral importance of healthy behavior without thinking enough about God may result in a series of rules imbued with moral authority: “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!” Paul condemned these laws, noting, “Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence” (Col 2:23). What does have value in restraining sensual indulgence? Paul instructs us that we are to set our minds and our hopes on Christ, putting to death our earthly desires (Col 3:1–5). In practice, the power to overcome these temptations – and they are temptations – lies in a real relationship with God and not in sterile rules. But this real relationship does not come by sitting back and thinking about it; it comes by putting into practice spiritual disciplines such as prayer, meditation, spiritual friendship, and service. We must commit ourselves to God, not to asceticism. Second, our culture’s fetishization of the ideal body image is just that: idol worship. Idol worship consists of acts of devotion performed for the benefit of some false deity. Christians must stop offering sacrifices to this unholy god. For example, conversations that glorify the body over the rest of the person must cease. People should not measure themselves or their friends by their weight and should stop objectifying others by paying homage only to their outward appearance. unknowngodjournal.com/freemarket
Mark your calendar for
Free Food, Music & Stuff @ the
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Paul tells us that we need to be careful about what thoughts consume our minds: “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable – if anything is excellent or praiseworthy – think about such things” (Phl 4:8). Thinking about other things – such as focusing on our own unworthiness in the sight of the world or imagining that we will be happy if only we attain a certain figure – can have powerfully negative effects on our attitudes and spiritual lives. This knowledge should make us more careful about how we spend our money and our time: buying magazines, shopping for clothes, or focusing on advertisements that teach us to glorify the body will likely contribute to our idol worship. Finally, women and men need to understand that a person’s true worth comes not from beauty but from her position before God. The gospel teaches us that all have sinned; we are all equally broken and nothing we are or do makes us worthy. We are unworthy indeed. Yet we are utterly loved. We have all the acceptance we need in the love of Christ, and this fact gives us strength and confidence in ourselves. We can see both overeating and obsession about body image for what they really are: attempts to achieve satisfaction from something other than God. They will fail. Yet God remains ever-loving. Kim’s research successfully integrates her faith and her profession and reveals God’s power to change even the most hollow aspects of our culture. The gospel can unwind the lies with which we strangle ourselves, and it gives us the power to change even our most harmful thought patterns and deeply-rooted sins. •
As a community, we have many more resources than we do as individuals. Share the things you don’t need, and everybody comes away with more. Bring: clean, used clothes; used books; used appliances; small furniture. Extra donations go to Goodwill and local homeless shelters. First Pres Plaza Peace out.
Saturday
May 9
12–4pm
FreeMarket Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 5
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The Dangers of Sex Talk
I
f you grew up within an evangelical Christian community, chances are you were raised to have
sex on the brain.
No, I’m not maintaining that Christians bring up their children to be oversexed, but rather that sexuality is a pivotal part of discourse within the church. The relentlessness of this discussion of sexuality is disturbing in many ways. It perpetuates the notion that our identity and our relationship with God is inextricably tied to what we do with our bodies. This kind of worldview is damaging and based on a distortion of the truth. Of course, I am not the first to notice the church’s obsession with all things sexual. Michel Foucault, the French philosopher, observed that since the 18th century, the church has contributed to the proliferation and intensification of discourse on sexuality. The church is invested in categorizing sex acts to determine whether or not they are morally acceptable. Thus, it determines that heterosexuality is acceptable while homosexuality is not; marital sexuality is acceptable while pre-marital sexuality is not; vaginal intercourse is acceptable while sodomy is not. Debates continue about how to make sense of more ambiguous sexual practices. For instance, in teen Bible studies, it is common to discuss whether or not masturbation is a sin. While these conversations about sexuality may be worthwhile in their own right, their frequency and centrality within the church’s discourse is alarming. This fixation with sex causes Christian children to develop a sense of self and a relationship to God that is inordinately connected to their sexuality. The church devotes extensive time and money to educating its younger members about appropriate sexual behavior. From the moment that sex education is taught in schools, the church launches its own counterattack to ensure that children have an alternative approach to their sexuality. The principles taught include abstinence from all sexual activity until marriage and an approach to dating driven by the goal of heterosexual marriage. This message gets repeated regularly through late childhood, early adolescence, and young adulthood. 6 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
by Thessaly Eresos
In 1993, the Southern Baptist denomination launched an extensive international campaign called “True Love Waits” devoted to encouraging sexual abstinence among teenagers. By signing a covenant, Christian youth promised God, their churches, and their future spouses to stay physically “pure” until marriage. The campaign provided a range of activities and paraphernalia to motivate young people to persevere in the fight to preserve their virginity. Those of us within evangelical circles will remember the ubiquitous True Love Waits rings designed to constantly remind their owners of their vow. Teaching abstinence is not the only issue to which the church has devoted considerable resources. The evangelical movement has been the driving force behind campaigns against abortion and gay marriage – issues that relate to sex, albeit obliquely. The fight against abortion is no doubt about the sanctity of life, but it is also about controlling sexual behavior – the act that leads to procreation. Gay marriage is no doubt about the sanctity of marriage, but it is also about delegitimizing homosexual intercourse. Christians have felt it necessary to register their opinions about sexuality through legislation. Many advocate reacting to the preva lent promiscuity and sexual deviance within American society by lobbying for the criminalization of such behaviors – or their conse quences. Thus, Christians continue to battle on in the culture wars. This ongoing struggle against sexual immorality was evident in the recent presidential election. A large proportion of voters in America selected candidates based on their policies relating to sexuality: What were their views on teaching abstinence in school? Were they pro-choice or pro-life? Did they support gay rights? It is difficult to ignore the central position that sex and sexuality have within Christian discourse. But are there consequences to this fixation? Some would argue that Christians are merely responding to a sex-crazed culture. Others would point out that an obsession with sexuality is part of the human condition, a remnant of our animal nature; therefore Christians and non-Christians are equally prone to being preoccupied with sexuality. There is per haps some truth in these positions. However, they do not tell the whole story. While it is quite possible that everyone has sex on the
brain, the relentlessness of the church’s sexual discourse can have damaging consequences on a young Christian’s identity and relationship with God.
T
he constant reiteration of sexual discourse has profound psychological effects on children growing up within the church. It leads them to believe that sexuality profoundly defines them. Foucault suggests that Christian ideology perpetuates the idea that our sexuality reveals truths about who we are. In other words, Christians talk about sex as a means of gaining insight into a person’s identity and perhaps more importantly, as a measure of a person’s relationship with God. Christian children develop a particular ontology that asserts that their relationship with God is inextricably tied to what they do with their bodies. Within this framework, it is very easy for children to develop misconceptions about their sexuality that will haunt them for years to come. For example, they may mistakenly connect physical purity with spiritual purity. Throughout discussions of abstinence, preserving one’s virginity is often described euphemistically as remaining “pure.” “Pure” is a loaded term: it means to be free of contamination and pollution. Thus, to lose one’s virginity before marriage is an irreversible act that makes the body impure, unclean, and dirty; by extension, such sin pollutes the soul. The problem, of course, is that most Christians will not remain sexually pure until marriage. Statistically, 88.4% of women ages 20–24 have engaged in vaginal sex. The percentage is slightly higher for men. Polls reveal that the figures are identical among Christians and non-Christians. For the majority of Christians who will have sex before marriage, this act of sexual indiscretion will have a profound effect on their life and will likely impact their relationship with God. If abstinence is emphasized as a way to prove your commitment to God, it makes sense that many Christians become self-flagellating or alienated from the church after a moment of sexual weakness and compromise. I have encountered many Christians who have felt that God somehow loves them less because of their trans gression. After years of hearing about the repulsiveness of sexual impurity, Christians do not feel like the church is a safe place for the sexually broken. While there are many reasons a young person may turn away from the church, I do not think it is a coincidence that many abandon the church at around the same age they have their first sexual experience. If a person’s sexuality becomes a benchmark by which to measure spiritual progress, it is easy to judge the moral and spiritual status of others. Christians are notorious for their lack of compassion towards those who do not abide by their standards of morality. Historically, Christians have asserted that the sexually immoral are also spiritually unclean, and as such, subject to God’s rancor. This kind of rhetoric has been toned down recently, but the general
Q
After years of hearing about the repulsiveness of sexual impurity, Christians do not feel like the church is a safe place for the sexually broken. sentiment continues to circulate. Those of us within the church who have homosexual tendencies constantly feel judged as spiri tually inferior. Whether this judgment comes from the pulpit or from a latent sense that other Christians do not accept us, the result is a feeling of estrangement that leads us to find community elsewhere. The discourse on sexual immorality within the church is largely designed to be preventative. We receive sermons and directives about the consequences of sexual sin as if such sins hadn’t already occurred. For those of us who have already transgressed in some way (the larger percentage of the population, if we believe the statistics), these messages are not particularly helpful. For the women who have had abortions, the men currently involved in sexual relationships with other men, or the college freshmen who recently lost their virginity, the church does not seem an appropriate place to mourn, heal, or feel accepted. The irony of this situation is mind-blowing. The truth of the gospel is that we are all equally broken, whether or not our sins are inscribed on our bodies. Jesus himself was particularly kind to the sluts and the whores of his time. He offered them an abundance of compassion that led to their healing and rehabilitation. Through his example, he demonstrated that salvation does not come through the adherence to moral codes, but by grace. An overemphasis on sexual behavior is perhaps just another way of saying that works, and not faith, will save us. But more significantly, Jesus did not spend all his time talking about sex. He spent the greater part of his ministry denouncing the wealthy and the proud. Imagine what would happen if the church actually followed his example – if Christians spent less time and money fixated on sexuality and instead devoted their resources to feeding the hungry and healing the sick? What kind of world would we live in then? • Thessaly Eresos is not the author’s real name. The author is a UC Berkeley graduate student. Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 7
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Backyard Abolitionism writer
Whitney Moret
The movement to end slavery starts here.
Sites to visit: http://www.notforsalecampaign.org http://www.slaverymap.org http://www.free2work.org
Whitney Moret is a fourth-year sociology major and co-Editor-in-Chief.
N
ear the end of the Not For Sale Campaign’s recent Backyard Abolitionist Tour event, a young woman approached the campaign’s founder, David Batstone, for post-graduation guidance. Not For Sale is a movement directed toward fighting human trafficking, and Batstone’s inspiring talk encouraged students to use whatever skills they have to combat slavery. The woman expressed her struggle to find a way to both do justice on a sociological level and spread the gospel. Batstone explained that he chose to live the gospel by fighting human trafficking. Despite good intentions, the desire to do justice can be as much of a fetish as the seemingly more worldly desires for money, comfort, and success. Justice is glorious. But is it the glory of God we seek, or our own? On a campus laden with theories on what’s wrong with the world and swirling with causes meant to fix it, a passion for setting things right reflects a deep desire for meaning and direction, especially for privileged students. But really, injustice is dirty, ugly, or even tediously boring, and addressing it doesn’t guarantee worldly glory. Doing justice is a matter of humility and surrender instead of personal grandeur because our sin is part of the very injustice we seek to dismantle. Modern slavery is shocking. It reduces humans to their bodies, often as sex workers or house slaves, and the profit those bodies can produce. It is one of the fastest-growing industries on the planet. Among the 27 million slaves around the globe, most are women and children – trapped, voiceless, and powerless. There are thousands of slaves in the United States too. The Bay Area, in fact, is a major hub in the global trade of human beings.
8 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
How can we make change? Batstone proposed that each one of us can find ways to use our skills, interests, and mere membership in the global economy to fight human trafficking. As Batstone put it, trafficking is “a global problem that starts right here in Berkeley.” As students and Christians, we are located in two of what Batstone calls society’s six main spheres of influence: the faith community and academia. We can use academic research to provide data necessary for real-world interventions. We can advocate for legislation that provides protection for slaves already trafficked into the U. S. Already, Not For Sale has had major successes in changing federal legislation. Closer to home, we can change our consumption patterns to promote justice. We can buy products made by companies that pledge not to use slave labor and demand that companies promise to monitor their supply chains. With a few mouse clicks, at free2work.org, we can identify which corporations offer freelymade products, and which don’t. Responsible consumerist practices proved revolutionary in “green” branding over the past few years, and Batstone contends that “freely-made” products can be the next revolution. Companies have already started changing their practices to meet consumer demands. Being part of the movement may not be glorious; it may simply mean buying a different brand of chocolate. But fighting slavery is an immediate, real way to do justice in the world. It requires discernment, conscious decision-making, and even sacrifice. It is not our egos that are at stake in saving the world, but the lives and wellbeing of God’s children. And there is nothing more glorious in this world than status as a child of God. •
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A Virgin’s Monologue
I
t’s going to offend you,” my mother predicted, after I told her my plans to attend a performance of The Vagina Monologues (VM). After the show, which I much enjoyed and appreciated, I remembered her comment. I wasn’t offended by the Monologues; if anything, I was a little offended that she thought I’d be offended. But I can’t really blame her. Stereotypes originate because they are based on some truth, and it’s true that plenty of Christians disdain the body. But despising the human physical form is not Christian at all. Sadly, I think many of us Christians subconsciously buy into the Gnostic position that says the body is evil. It took the VM for me to realize my own heresy. The VM seeks to empower women to love their bodies. Various individual women approach the microphone and share their experiences discovering their anatomy and exploring their sexuality. While I may not refer to my body with the same terminology the performers used, I did not resent anything that was said. The show does not intend to universalize female sexuality or prescribe certain forms of behavior, but rather to give voice to many women’s individual experiences. It is not persuading women to start having rampant sex, but rather to “know thyself ”… physically. This is definitely not a high priority for most Christians, because we struggle to disassociate the body’s sexuality from lust. But there is a whole spectrum between Puritan and prostitute that it’s high time we explore. I personally was not able to relate to most of the women’s experiences in the VM. So, was it corrupting me to hear their stories? I don’t think so. It is important for women to have a venue in which to channel their feelings and other/selfperceptions. The VM is revolutionary because women were, for a long time, not free to speak
of such issues publicly. I actually felt like most of the women’s descriptions of their bodies are right in line with Christian theology. They celebrated the design of their bodies, appreciating each intricacy. We should view our physical form as a masterpiece, because we have a relationship with the Artist. The Gnostic religious tradition denies a physical resurrection, because it claims that materiality is the work of an inferior and malevolent deity. By contrast, Christians believe that we are going to inhabit our physical bodies for eternity…if so, we’d better learn to love ’em! I recently read an ethnography about AfroBrazilian Christian women. In Brazil, racism is very prevalent, and many women are ashamed to be dark; marrying someone “lighter” is seen to be a step up in society, and a favor to one’s children for “whitening” them. The author discovered, however, that these norms were not present in the Church. His interviews with many of the black Christian women revealed that it was not until they converted that they finally felt comfortable in their skin. Christianity “made available a new set of ways to praise the black woman.” This is because they believed the message that God had created them in His own image and thus that they were beautiful just the way they were. Why do many of us Christians in the United States struggle to accept this same message? I think American cultural attitudes toward the body have colonized our minds, and we need to reclaim them. This was why the VM was created. Though their stories had no overt spiritual edge to them, these women still praise the beautiful Creation of their bodies. We Christians can learn from the VM to celebrate our bodies without objectifying them. •
writer
Brittany Tyler
John Burdick, Blessed Anastacia: Women, Race and Popular Christianity in Brazil (New York: Routledge, 1998), 135.
Brittany tyler is a fourth-year Development Studies and anthropology major from Long Beach, California.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 9
culture
Reasons for Passion writer
Whitney Moret
How can we bridge the ancient divide between passion and reason? 1 Emotional Competency. http:// emotionalcompetency.com/emotion. htm.
2 Vergano, Dan. “Study: Emotions Rule the Brain’s Decisions.” USA Today. August 6, 2006. http://www.usatoday. com/tech/science/discoveries/200608-06-brain-study_x.htm.
A
ccording to the various online incarnations of the Myers-Briggs personality tests I’ve taken, I am a “rational.” This is good news, and I’d be disappointed if I were anything else. I mean, wouldn’t that make me irrational? I, being rational, use logic to make the means I use fit the ends I pursue. The irrational person, I reasoned, bypasses the whole “thinking” part of decision-making altogether, and emotion is no basis for a decision. Erratic and easily manipulated, those who navigate their lives according to an emotional compass remain at the mercy of external conditions. In looking over reports on my own personality, I couldn’t help but be pleased that I had scored on the correct side of that ancient divide between passion and reason. This sort of logic has given emotion a terribly bad rap these days. Even the term “emotion” has a certain gooey-ness to it. It’s certainly less reliable than, say, “instinct.” Conceptually, however, the two terms aren’t too different. Furthermore, scholarship on the workings of the brain seems to indicate that emotion isn’t so divorced from rationality as we may have assumed. Not only does emotion operate in partnership with rationality, it, like our conceptions of reason or instinct, can be trained and used for God’s service. Emotion is unfairly discounted as irrational, devalued by intellectual-types, and sorely missing from our understanding of God, who not only expressed strong feelings throughout the Old Testament, but, in the form of Christ, subjected himself to the winds of human experience and all the emotions, rational or otherwise, that come with it. Clear-headed thought may seem distinct from the gut-churning, heart-pumping, tearjerking distractions of a fit of emotion. The
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human brain, though, remains obstinately complicated and its functions refuse to be compartmentalized so neatly. Study after study confirms that decision-making is, ultimately, an emotional process. If we think of rationality as the suitability of a means to a given ends, emotion is what signals the link. “There must be a goal at stake for an emotion to be aroused. The more important the goal the stronger the resulting emotions. Most emotions are simultaneously accompanied by stress which also results from progress toward or away from the goal.”1 How do we recognize when something is illogical? We sense it. Psychologists call this sense “cognitive dissonance,” and it is an emotional experience of disharmony that motivates a rational reconciliation between contradictory ideas. Neuroscientist Antonio Damasio reports that “people who lack emotions because of brain injuries often have difficulty making decisions at all.” He goes on to conclude: “What makes you and me ‘rational’ is not suppressing our emotions, but tempering them in a positive way.”2 Damasio describes emotions as a means of storing the meaning of previous decisions to provide the motivation for future ones. Emotions, then, are key to good decision-making, and can be quite measured, regular, and reliable. So if emotions are compatible with our faculty of reason and functions as a useful resource, we must consider how to best utilize them for God’s service. I suggested earlier that the term “instinct” holds more currency as a legitimate source of intuition than “emotion.” Instincts come from basic survival mechanisms and can be developed for practical ends. Think Hatchet. Drop a kid off in the Canadian wilderness for a while, and before long he’s fighting bears and catching fish with his bare hands. Instincts are
practical and consistent. They save you when you only have a split second to decide whether you should run away from the bear or whether you can take him down. Emotions can be developed in the same way, and for similarly practical ends. God gave them to us because he created us in his image, and, throughout the Bible, he demonstrates how emotions should be used. Training our emotions to make good decisions and to fit God’s model requires the same kind of discipline as training our brains to perform well on exams. We find guidance in God’s explicit verbal expressions of emotion, his behaviors throughout the Old Testament, and the life of his human Son. God’s feelings run the gambit from sadness to love to holy anger. Although he has powerful feelings, God does not have “off-days” or mood swings. We can always count on his constant love. God’s is not mechanical love, but passionate love infused with feeling. According to the prophet Hosea, God’s love is that of a parent. God is disappointed, hurt, and angry with Israel, his people and his disobedient children, but nonetheless, he never fails to love them: How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, Israel? How can I treat you like Admah? How can I make you like Zeboiim? My heart is changed within me; All my compassion is aroused. (Hos 11:8) On a more material level, Christ was just as susceptible to all the forces we associate with emotional volatility and irrationality as any other human being. His emotional repertoire was just as rich and varied as yours or mine. When his friend Lazarus died, he wept ( Jn 11:35–36). Sometimes he wept to grieve with his companions, and sometimes he faced his sorrow alone (Heb 5:7). Sometimes, he was angry. In Mark 10:14, he snapped at his disciples for sending the children who sought his presence away. There were times when Jesus was tired, and in Gethsemane, he was afraid.3 When he was overcome with his emotions, Jesus offered them to God the Father in prayer
Emotion is unfairly discounted as irrational and sorely missing from our understanding of God, who not only expressed strong feelings throughout the Old Testament, but, in the form of Christ, subjected himself to the winds of human experience and all the emotions that come with it. and faith for direction. When Christ waited with the disciples in Gethsemane, he told them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death” (Mt 26:38). Then, he began to pray. He asked the disciples to keep watch with him, but they were tired. How should they cope with their weariness? “Watch and pray so you will not fall into temptation,” Jesus told them (Mt 26:41). In response to his own feelings, Jesus prayed that he would fulfill God’s will. He advised the disciples to do the same. It’s not easy to let go of all the mental babble of a given moment and really focus on God and his will for us in prayer. Prayer is work that requires emotional and spiritual discipline. It takes dedication to develop an “instinct” to surrender one’s will to God and pray. The beauty of prayer, though, is that it’s a conversation, a chance to both listen and speak to God. And the humility and surrender that come with listening are also an opportunity for us to offer our feelings to God and invite him to change them and use them. What’s so beautiful about Jesus’ life is that it was so filled with feelings we can understand. The relationship between God and Jesus was that between father and son. It’s easy to think of an all-powerful, immutable God as impervious to pain and emotion. God, however, is neither remote nor cold, but full of the passion of a loving father. We can connect with him on an emotional level and better serve his purposes for our lives not by sacrificing our capacity for rationality, but by offering our feelings to his direction and training them into accordance with his perfect example in Christ. For a Christian, it’s the most rational choice. •
3 “Humanity and Emotions of Jesus.” Bible, Prayer, Homily Resources. http:// www.frtommylane.com/bible/enjoying_the_bible/07_nt.htm.
Whitney Moret is a fourth-year sociology major and co-Editor-in-Chief.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 11
culture
Olympics, the Church & Critique writer
Lue-Yee Tsang
2 To many Chinese people, including myself, the only “tact” sometimes seems to be that of silence. For the sake of harmony, then, we often acquiesce to what seems to be the consensus.
1 Not complying with or questioning the régime seems to be at odds with Hu Jintao’s vision of a “Harmonious Society” (和諧社會). More high-profile opposition to the Party’s actions tends to be put down as disorderly or evil.
* Except those times when you try to convert people or whatever. Then Christians like it.
I
’m ethnically Chinese, but not Taiwan ese, nor mainland Chinese, nor assimilated American – I happen to be Cantonese with relatives mostly from Hong Kong. My concerns, then, are chiefly about neither Taiwan Straits issues nor the West’s interests. Given the prejudices on the field, I ask that the reader set aside for a moment what he believes that I think and ought to think. Last spring and summer I was troubled by the response of Chinese Christians in America to the 2008 Olympic Games to be held in Běijīng. Since this was a city that had been the capital of two dynasties in China, many Chinese naturally felt vindicated before the world as members of a people no longer held in the contempt of the early 1900s. Yet while we were willing to accept the world’s respect, in our sense of triumph we were unwilling to hear its concerns, instead labelling these as ignorance and hatred against the Chinese people. Suddenly, in our minds, all that didn’t line up with the Communist Party’s vision of national unity was illegitimate: for many this included the existence of unregistered churches, dissidents working in China against the régime’s abuses and concerns about the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners.¹ This response was almost exactly replicated by Chinese people in the church. I took exception and boycotted the Olympics, believing it conferred unmerited legitimacy. Now, I was entitled to my own opinion, many of my Chinese brethren in Christ believed, but only as long as my decisions were private – because, of course, faith was just something in the head or the feelings, whose mention must never be imposed on anyone.* For saying anything in hopes of bringing issues to people’s attention, I’d face their censure. What I held, people believed
12 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
to be an overly politicized position: I opposed the Olympics being held in Běijīng because the régime in mainland China was known for egregious human rights violations and had broken promises it had made as conditions for being Olympic hosts. But this “politicized position” was trumped in public by another position that was no less political: that the régime in Běijīng properly represented China. Indeed, I heard that in some Chinese churches people wanted to show the Olympics on church time, not realizing that was itself a political statement (mis) representing the nature of the church as part of the city of God, which, though in the world, is not beholden to the world’s means. Is it wrong, then, to have “no tact” ² in saying something that must be heard, that corruption, lies, and human rights violations cannot be ignored? Or will the world, and the church, prefer that we all keep our judgments to ourselves to now corrode our minds in the realm of pure thought, now lie silent and still – all while saying we should refuse to judge? Accurately or not, one judges another; then he is judged for judging, and he judges back for judging for judging: this is just what happens. Such is the price of silence, unless a man shall instead lie to himself and be before the eyes of his own heart a hypocrite of the second order, posturing to himself that he thinks nothing of what clearly does trouble him. Grand indeed! So will the church flood itself with the warm, welcoming, vibrant colors of urine and blood and shit: it may look nice when it says nothing nonconformist and so appears to embrace “�������������������������������� ��������������������������������� diversity,���������������������� ”��������������������� but it doesn’t actually serve the interests of peace and beauty. But no, I suppose none of it matters: no tragedy, no injustice, no evil matters if we’re to have “peace” while fulfilling our sole mission of con-
verting the world. For isn’t that what rolls off the tongues of all those Christians who talk about China? Whether we’re Chinese or not, all we seem capable of saying about it is that God is to be praised for numbers, for statistics, for sheer population of souls being daily converted to the gospel of converting more people so that all can escape to heaven, never mind the problems of the real world. After all, God makes 1 × 10⁴ new believers daily in China! ³ A church consisting of numbers doesn’t need much thought: if Chinese who believe in the gospel are numbers, no one needs to give any thought to what a ThreeSelf church is and what an unregistered “house church” is and what lies in between,⁴ nor to what can head the church, nor to what orders are unjust for all, nor to what constitutes authority that must be obeyed. Has the gospel anything to say about other matters than “saving souls,” or is it a message unrelated to this world entirely? Is the “pure and simple” gospel about not really having anything to do with this Earth because it doesn’t matter because we’ll magically be raptured and escape to heaven without having anything to do about Earth but tell people how to escape to heaven? The message of the gospel is of Christ’s coming and resurrection: does it impinge on the world’s destiny? Biblical redemption is redemption for fulfilment of the mandate in Genesis to fill the earth, govern it under grace (Gen. 1:28ff), and enjoy God in it, all to his glory. This deals with real nitty-gritties of “the present evil age” (Gal. 1:3–5) and real moral needs and real prohibitions. By grace we are chosen (Eph. 2:1–10): we are wholly unworthy of this mission, in which we of our own diseased nature have no qualification or ability to partake, and of whose fruits we would be too corrupted to receive without tasting dust and ashes in our throats, as the creature Gollum chokes on the elven waybread lembas in The Lord of the Rings⁵ (i Cor. 11:23–31). We must realize: Yes, the church isn’t a temporal civil polity. And true, it isn’t a means of Enlightenment progress. But neither is it a way to escape the material world with its injustices and suffering. St Paul calls it the body of Christ (Eph. 3:4–6; 4:15–16), something as substantial as the bread and wine we take in holy Communion, as
real as the body and blood of Christ we’ve taken when we’ve eaten the bread and wine in faith. So we don’t look bitterly upon the duty of being for the world the proleptic glimpses of God’s kingdom (ii Cor 3:12–18), because bearing hope isn’t a burden. Instead, we know Christ’s body and blood, the Christian’s waybread, is for us to take gladly by a power outside of ourselves, by a word not our own, for the purpose of the world’s consummate redemption. The church is the presence of God’s kingdom on earth: it belongs to God and no one else, even as Christians submit to their temporal authorities.⁶ I call on the Christian world to make useful critique of prevailing theory and practice. “All nations are equally sinners” is no critique, only a withdrawn, pale wraith of one: a barren cliché if ever there was one. America’s problems don’t negate China’s troubles. The church must be willing to have a controversial position, not for its own sake but for the sake of rightly representing God’s sense of justice and mercy even when no one else sees it that way. Failure to mount a substantial critique that gets beyond time-honored, tame clichés about “not being judgmental” is failure to articulate any but an impoverished gospel that tells people how to escape into a disembodied heaven: this would truly be, as Karl Marx said, the “opium of the people.”⁷ So what are the gospel’s consequences for China, as for this earth? Is China’s worth limited to the role of populating the catholic church with converts? If good Christians make good businessmen in China, is the message of Christ simply to be appropriated into the dealings of money and matter by serving as the basis of commerce? What’s the spiritual significance, in the Christian view of well-being, of Olympic-sized extravaganzas? of ethnic strife? of the laogai (勞改) system? ⁸ of a regulatory regime that kept news of melaminetainted milk under wraps until after the closing of the event of nationalistic pride? ⁹ We may not have the answers, but we cannot hide the questions and so deny that the world has any need of being saved. Will the church have what it takes to be an effective outpost of the kingdom of heaven here on earth? I believe our Lord will be gracious. •
Lue-Yee Tsang (曾履義) is a fourth-year Linguistics major. He attends Crossroads Christian Fellowship, which is affiliated with Chinese for Christ Church in Berkeley.
3 Spengler. “Christianity finds a fulcrum in Asia,” Asia Times Online. 7 Aug. 2007. http://atimes.com/atimes/China/ IH07Ad03.html. 6 By not failing to report crime, for instance, and by protesting injustices. 4 The “Three-Self Patriotic Movement’’ is a number of churches ruled by the Communist Party. Many churches believe it’s wrong to allow the church to be essentially part of the temporal civil power apparatus, so they remain unregistered with the Běijīng régime. This often doesn’t sit well with the Party: if the world is to change, they want it to be under their direction.
7 Karl Marx. From the Introduction to Toward a Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right (1844). Selected Writings, ed. Lawrence Simon. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1994. 28.
8 laogai: in China, a system of labour camps, many of whose inmates are political dissidents. The name comes from Chinese, meaning “reform through labour,” and is recorded in English from the 1990s. A Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, ed. Elizabeth Knowles. Oxford University Press, 2006.
5 J.R.R. Tolkien, “The Passage of the Marshes,” The Two Towers. 9 See Wu Zhong, “China struggles to cap milk crisis,” Asia Times Online. 24 Sept. 2008. http://atimes.com/atimes/ China/JI24Ad01.html.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 13
church
Do We Have Assurance? Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life; he does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. — John 5:24, RSV writer
Matthew Horwitz
Does belief in Christ guarantee our salvation? An exploration of faith and its relationship to soteriology in the New Testament.
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an we, as followers of Christ, be certain of our salvation? Or, put another way, are we assured eternal life in heaven by virtue of our Christian faith? Since the Protestant Reformation, a significant number of Christians have answered this question with a yes. And not without reason: many passages of Scripture ( Jn 5:24; Rom 10:9–11; and Acts 16:31 in particular) appear to support the position that faith in Christ is an unshakable guarantor of salvation. In approaching this issue, however, we must first define our terms. What is belief? In coming to hold a belief, we have arrived at a particular cognitive state. In the broadest sense, beliefs are expressions of the human attempt to apprehend and make sense of existence. To have a “right” belief is to see the world for what it is; anything less is a distortion of reality. Questions of truth and falsity are at stake, thereby making belief a primarily intellectual exercise. Of course, Christianity is different from philosophy and the empirical sciences in that its object is divine revelation, which, by definition, cannot be reached through reason alone. Invariably, our faith is rooted in an encounter with Christ: we see and hear the evidence of his presence on earth, and we trust in those whom he has sent as witnesses. Thus, through trust, we come to faith. This is not, however, an irrational event. Ultimately, we owe our belief in Christ to supernatural grace. At the same time, this grace acts on the intellect, giving us the ability to grasp
14 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
what would otherwise be impossible to believe. Therefore, our faith as Christians can be considered a function of the intellect moved by grace. But the question remains: what does it mean to have saving faith? Proper scriptural exegesis inevitably compels us to look at John 5:24 in its original language. The words ‘believe’, ‘believer’ and ‘belief ’ used in the passage render the Greek word pistis and its derivatives. There are two important points to be made about this word. The first concerns its tense. The specific word under consideration is pisteuôn, the present active participle of pistis. This tells us that belief is not something that occurred once in the past and has been cemented forever: it is, rather, a continuous activity (“believing”). Christ does not say that he who has heard his words and believed in him at one point in the past can, at the present time, be assured of eternal life. No, belief is rather something precious to which we must cling. We have passed from a state of unbelief to a state of belief – and now we must stay there. The second point concerns the multiple meanings attributed to the word and its place in the early Christian context. Pistis, according to Strong’s Greek Dictionary, means first and foremost “to have faith” as previously described, but pistis can also be understood as the act of “entrust[ing]” or “commit[ing]” oneself to someone or something. This connotation, almost entirely lacking in the modern English equivalent, makes perfect sense in the context of first-century Judaism. Reading the Hebrew Scriptures, we see Israel falling away from God time and again. Yet the issue here is one of allegiance rather than belief understood as intellectual assent. Israel was unfaithful, worshiping idols rather than the one true God. Yet this un-
faithfulness was not disbelief in God, but disobedience to him: infidelity rather than skepticism. There are two ways, then, to understand belief as the term is used in John 5:24. Intellectual assent and allegiance are distinct because they have different centers of action: the former is based in the intellect, while the latter encompasses the entire person, heart and mind, body and soul. Both facets of pistis share the same object – God – and the same quality of impermanence. While we may be fairly certain of our present belief in Christ, the same cannot be said of our future belief. Always present is the danger that we may fall into despair, or else be led away from God by sin. In either case, we would be rejecting the grace Christ merited for us on the cross. We cannot, then, know the state of our soul in its last hour, and thus we cannot have absolute assurance of our salvation. For many Christians, it is a terrifying prospect that one day we may find ourselves judged and found wanting; that, having called out “Lord, Lord” all our lives, we will ultimately be told, “I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers” (Mt 7:23). For many, assurance of salvation is, above all, a matter of self-assurance. But is this an accurate view of God? Should we live in fear? To answer this question, we must consider the nature of God Himself. On Christmas Day of 2005, Pope Benedict XVI reminded us of one possible answer to this question with the release of his first encyclical, entitled Deus Caritas Est, “God is Love.” There, Benedict speaks of the nature of God, made fully visible to us in the person of Jesus Christ: In the Old Testament, the novelty of the Bible did not consist merely in abstract notions but in God’s unpredictable and in some sense unprecedented activity. This divine activity now takes on dramatic form when, in Jesus Christ, it is God himself who goes in search of the “stray sheep,” a suffering and lost humanity. When Jesus speaks in his parables of the shepherd who goes after the lost sheep, of the woman who looks for the lost coin, of the father who goes to meet and embrace his
prodigal son, these are no mere words: they constitute an explanation of his very being and activity. His death on the Cross is the culmination of that turning of God against himself in which he gives himself in order to raise man up and save him. This is love in its most radical form (¶ 12). The parable of the prodigal son says much about the nature of God; it also strikes close to home for me. Raised in a Christian household, I lost my faith at age twenty. For various reasons, I had come to fear God and saw myself as destined for damnation; I also chafed at the moral obligations placed upon me as a Christian. For more than half a year, I did not even attempt to pray. I wanted nothing to do with God. The summer of 2005, after several months of unbelief, I spent six weeks traveling the length of Japan. One day, walking through the old capi tal city of Nara, I happened upon a church – a rare sight in a country with fewer than three million Christians. As I looked up at the edifice, which sat at the top of a hill, the thought struck me that I should go inside and pray. I resisted, however, and kept walking, leaving God and the church behind. Modern Nara is not planned on a grid pattern, so I found myself lost only a few minutes after leaving the hillside. The city’s streets twist and loop around, and within half an hour I ended up at the same hill, looking up at the church. Taking this as a sign, I decided to go in and investigate. The church was open, and there, subdued at last, I knelt before the Lord and prayed. Not until almost two years later did I once again come to consider myself a Christian without reservations. But I look back on that day in Nara as a turning point in my understanding of God: a just God, yes, but also a loving Father, who runs to meet his wayward children, who gives the sinner and apostate a second chance. I cannot know with certainty that I will, in the end, be saved, that I will persevere to the last. What I do know is this: God loves me, deeply and passionately, as he loves each and every human being. Indeed, he is love personified. In this truth, we have all the assurance we shall ever need. •
(Above) “He never leaves” by Emily Fu. in the cold. in the clouds. in the flash. in the rise. and in the warmth. He is in every season, and He is behind the whole process.
Matthew Horwitz graduated from UC Berkeley in 2006 with a B.A. in Psychology. He currently resides in San Leandro.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 15
church
The Gravity of Sin writer
Hyun Lee
• •
Hyun Gu lee is a programmer at Electronic Arts. He graduated from Stanford University with a degree in computer science.
S
uppose that in all history, there is only one sin to be forgiven. Does the forgiveness of this single sin require the death of God’s Son? Does he have to traverse the same difficult, bloody path up to Calvary? Even for a minor sin? The answer is a resounding yes. St. Aquinas, the great medieval theologian, calls sin an infinite offense to God. Humans, who are finite, are unable to repay this infinite debt. Only Christ, who is both human and God, can repay it. Here’s another way to look at it. The magnitude of a single sin isn’t just measured by itself, but also according to whose laws it has broken. For example, suppose you have a roommate and you take turns doing dishes. One day, you decide that your time is better spent playing video games. Not doing dishes violates the rules that you and your roommate have agreed upon. The consequence of not doing dishes is that your roommate may make your life a living hell. Compare this to cheating on a test, or robbing a bank. Cheating on a test violates the rules of the university; robbing a bank, the laws of the land. Getting caught cheating on a test has a more serious effect than not doing the dishes; robbing a bank may land you in prison. When we sin, however, we are defaming the name of God. We can imagine, then, how much worse the consequences will be for violating his law. The single sin can be anything: lying, lust, pride. They are all functionally equivalent in breaking peace between the sinner and God, leading the sinner to death. They are all a form of idolatry, of valuing something else more than God. Do we truly know the gravity of a single sin against a perfectly holy and righteous God, of its deadly effects, and what Christ had to endure to atone for it?
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Tim Keller, pastor and renowned Christian apologist, uses the following illustration. He once was talking with a nonbeliever who said she could not believe in the God of the Bible. She questioned why God couldn’t just simply forgive us, instead of sending his Son to die on the cross. Keller answered, “What does it cost your God to forgive you?” He went on to explain that in order for there to be true forgiveness, someone has to pay the price. For example, someone steps on your toe. Who pays for it? You can choose to forgive that person and pay for it yourself by enduring the pain. Or you can let that person know in a not-so-gentle manner about their clumsy behavior. Our sins are against an infinite God. Now the payment required for sin to be forgiven is proportional to the magnitude of the sin, which is determined by who exactly has been sinned against. It follows, then, that our sins require an infinite payment, which we have in Christ. We cannot understand how marvelous this forgiveness is when we do not see the gravity of our sins. We cannot see the gravity of our sins if we do not recognize whose laws we have broken, whose name we have defamed. So let us take sin seriously. When John the Baptist came to prepare the way for Christ, his message was entirely about repentance for the Messiah’s coming. The parable of the Pharisee and the Publican (Lk 18:9–14) tells us that those who confess their sins and humble themselves before God are the ones whom God accepts. Furthermore, it is those who know the weight of their transgressions who can humble themselves and receive forgiveness, who can behold death and seek life. Let us recognize the nature of sin, that we may put to death our old sinful selves and live in Christ, and he in us. •
church
Thought Experiments & Snipers
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y housemate, an adamant atheist, relentlessly searches for loopholes in Christianity but has never been able to convince me with his arguments. So it came as a shock two weeks ago when he formulated a thought experiment that shamelessly puts Christians on trial. It runs as follows: Suppose you are a pedestrian taking a midafternoon stroll down the street. Scanning your surroundings, you notice that everyone has his head down, seemingly unaware of the other pedestrians. You then spot a figure standing in the window of an abandoned apartment complex. He has a sniper rifle aimed at a man waiting for the bus a few blocks down. You shudder as you see the red dot emitted by his aiming device jolting about on the back of the man’s head. In this scenario, would you call out to the man to alert him if doing so had no consequences – besides for the sniper, who would temporarily lose his target? The morally upright person certainly would. If you choose not to alert the man, however, there are two possible reasons:
1 You are not a moral person. 2 You do not believe the sniper is really there. I thought I saw where this was going and mentioned something about the bystander effect, a psychological phenomenon where individuals fail to intervene in an emergency situation because they assume that someone else will help out. My housemate responded that in the thought experiment no one besides you was aware of the perceived threat. He then applied the thought experiment to Christianity. He noted that Christians are the individuals who perceive the danger of the “sniper” – the danger being eternal damnation. The man
waiting at the bus stop is a nonbeliever, and the pedestrians on the sidewalk are a mix of believers and nonbelievers who are for various reasons unaware of the man’s predicament as he waits for the bus. His logic, then, is as such: if you so-called Christians believe in hell as a place of eternal damnation, the final destination for nonbelievers, it is your moral obligation to boldly proclaim the good news left and right. There should be no justification by the bystander effect. But this doesn’t appear to be what’s happening. Why not? The thought experiment gives two explanations: 1 Christians have no morals. 2 Christians do not perceive hell as a threat. I was struck that he, a non-Christian, was blatantly telling me that evangelism should be on the forefront of my mind. In my defense, I pointed out that the two conclusions were insufficient. Maybe Christians are constantly reaching out to nonbelievers by inviting them to fellowship or loving them in ways that don’t involve barraging them with the gospel. Or perhaps only certain Christians are equipped with the gift of evangelism. But who am I fooling with these excuses? I am the bystander. While avoiding hell should not be the motive behind following Christ, hell is a horrible reality that many people now face and will face in the future. By failing to take death seriously and to evangelize, not only do I perpetuate ignorance of the Truth, but I also serve as an accomplice to another’s damnation. I also am not loving my neighbor as myself. These are matters of utmost concern: it is a shame that they could ever be taken lightly. •
writer
Melody Liao
How a nonChristian convinced me that evangelism should be on the forefront of my mind…
Melody Liao is a third-year public health major from the neighboring city of Albany.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 17
reflection
Feeling Age
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writer
Vicky Nguyen
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Vicky Nguyen is a thirdyear English and applied mathematics major. She attends Cal Christian Fellowship of InterVarsity.
ne of the most unpleasant, disturbing things a young girl can feel is her own aging – to feel the indestructibility of youth falter ever so gradually, to feel the carefree days of physical vitality wane. Most disturbing is the knowledge that once we lose this unnamed force, we lose it forever. Age creeps up on us, first as shadows under our eyes, then in the sagging skin of once-defined cheeks. Our physiques slowly bow toward the ground until we become masses of sags, wrinkles, ripples, and lumps. But we don’t wake up one day, look into the mirror, and find we have become old – old, that terrible word – but instead, one unremarkable day after another, we come to dress to match our bodies, altering our makeup to suit these aged faces, changing even how we move. We don’t bound out of cars when the doors are opened for us but step out slowly, marking each limb and making sure not to overstretch that weak ankle. Instead of spontaneity and adventure, we crave peace and comfort. How can I describe this dread of slowing down and losing my youth? This is my third year at Cal, and after three years of enjoying Berkeley’s embrace of originality and adventure, I am slightly disturbed that I have started to feel that no, I do not want to wear this ridiculous outfit today, I’d rather dress comfortably. And what is this absurd exasperation that only old people are supposed to feel about the flightiness, the naivety of teenagers, this annoyance? How old must I seem to them, and how young they seem to me, particularly when I listen to them talk about their religious experiences. I see in their testimonies a dissatisfaction with themselves or the world, even as in their eyes there dances the idealistic hope that there is a solution to all their problems. But in my own mir-
18 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
ror, I see eyes with weariness etched in the folds, and behind them, I can see disappointment in Christianity and its ambitious promises, calculated hope, and months and months of waiting on Him. I can hear the older women clicking their tongues already, telling me I’m still young, not even twenty-one. That somehow, feeling our bodies age comes with all sorts of benefits, like maturity, wisdom, husbands, relaxing walks in the park. Perhaps they will think, dismissively, that young people are not to write about age, that they know nothing about age. But young people do feel the slowing force of youth fading. Gradually. I too am aging, but can I deny that the years past have yielded gifts of the most precious, lovely kind? Do I dare to denounce the fulfillment of long-awaited promises, true sorrow, true joy? Everyday I rejoice inwardly that I better understand what love is, or at least better recognize its complexity and depth. A passage comes to me often, providing strange consolation: “When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known” (I Cor 13: 11-12, NIV). Our bodies age, and our spirits age along with them. And, gradually, we come step by step closer to becoming “fully known.” I realize I am still young and still enjoy the energy of youth. I also recognize that I am getting older and growing into the person that, three years ago, I wished I would become. I hold in my age precious gifts that could only be refined by years. My love of life is different from when I was seventeen, but I still love to live, and truly, part of living is this strange sensation of age. •
reflection
Thanks to a Parachute
S
everal decades after the Vietnam War ended, a man named Charles Plumb and his wife were at a restaurant when a man approached their table and said, “You’re Captain Plumb.” Plumb responded, “Yes, sir.” The man continued, “You flew jet fighters in Vietnam. You were on the aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk. You were shot down. You parachuted into enemy hands and spent six years as a prisoner of war.” Plumb asked, “How in the world did you know all that?” The man replied, “Because I packed your parachute.” Plumb was shocked. This was a man who he had probably passed by daily without even noticing. Yet this nameless, faceless sailor had packed the parachute that had saved Plumb’s life. “I guess it worked,” the man said. Beaming, Plumb replied, “It certainly did.” How many people in our lives have packed our parachutes without us even knowing it? And what do we do once we’ve met that unnamed sailor, once we’ve begun to realize how our parachutes have been packed? We go right back out and pack others’. We look at those around us, those we find easy to love and those we find difficult to even like, and we try to spread the love that we’ve been granted. As God loved us, so we must love one another ( Jn 13:34). As His disciples, we pay it forward. A year ago, I took a class with someone I’d known in high school. I had never considered him a close friend: in all honesty, I found him annoying. After class he would usually rush off to the library or a meeting, which I found to be a relief. But one day, he didn’t have any
prior engagements after class, so he asked if he could walk home with me. As we were nearing the dorms, the conversation turned serious. He began discussing his sister and how her recent decision to drop out of college had caused a major schism in the family. When we reached the entrance to my building, he seemed to pause, aware that we’d reached my destination but not quite ready to stop talking. In the back of my mind, I really just wanted to go up to my room and relax after a busy week, but instead, something pushed me to ask him if he wanted to go somewhere to talk some more. We ended up talking on a bench outside of his building for almost an hour. He talked; I mostly listened. When he’d said everything he wanted to say, we exchanged good-byes and went our separate ways. I didn’t think much of it, but later that night he sent me a message. He wrote, “It meant more to me than you know.” I realized that God had placed me in that situation for a reason, that I had packed his parachute and hadn’t even been aware of doing it. Situations like that remind me that I don’t necessarily have to know what I’m doing to make a difference – I just have to be open to who or what God places in front of me. We may not always know what packing another’s parachute looks like. We may never know if we’ve made a difference – we may not even make a difference at all. But the goal is not to serve as some extravagant extension of salvation or to gain recognition of our efforts. The goal, rather, is to love. Because whether or not the parachute I pack saves a life, it was sewn from the same fabric that saved mine. •
writer
Alexis Eils
How many people in our lives have extended God’s love without us even knowing it? How many people have we walked by without understanding their importance in our lives? And how do we pass on this favor?
Alexis Eils is a secondyear psychology major from Danville, California.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 19
reflection
Learning from the Body of Christ writer
Lila Carpenter
My experience volunteering in San Francisco changed how I understand my place in the Body of Christ.
Lila Carpenter is a freshman at Berkeley and is originally from Santa Cruz, California.
F
irst C orinthians 12 describes the Body of Christ as made up of people with varying but specific gifts, talents, and abilities, just as a human body is made up of many unique but interdependent parts. When considering my place in the Body, I always thought that my lack of gifts and talents made me an expendable organ – like the appendix. An experience over winter break, however, transformed my view of my role in the Body of Christ. In January, students from my church participated in an urban outreach program through Center for Student Missions (CSM). On our first night, we took a “prayer tour” of San Francisco. The Single Room Occupancies – $700–$900 per month, 10 × 10 rooms that often house an entire family – in the Tenderloin were just three blocks from Bloomingdale’s and the gold-leafed town hall. This juxtaposition of poverty and luxury seemed unjust. Where was God amidst this darkness? Throughout the week, I realized that His light shines through people and groups like CSM that function as the Body of Christ. At Medshare International, an organization that ships medical equipment overseas, sorting dozens of boxes and hundreds of supplies, transporting bags of food at the Second Harvest Food Bank, and working through Project Open Hand delivering hot meals to people with AIDS, the other volunteers and I served as the arms and muscles of the Body. When we worked with kids at the Bay Area Rescue Mission, I especially connected with a nine-year-old, Juanita. During homework time I assumed she would finish her page of simple addition and subtraction easily. After finding that 1+2 = __ problems produced as much erasing as writing, though, another volunteer and I taught her tricks like counting on her fingers or count-
20 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
ing cookies. By the end, she could do the problems quickly, sometimes even without cookies or fingers to help. With Juanita, my partner and I worked as the brains and hearts of the Body of Christ. For one of my favorite projects, we broke into groups to “meet the needs” of disadvantaged people without gifting money. With ten dollars, my group and I walked from Golden Gate Park into the city, where a man named Doug asked us for spare change. When we offered to buy him something else he might want or need, he requested a pocketknife to “keep the bad spirits away,” but we settled on buying him a carton of cigarettes. Pieter, a college student in our group, had a smoke with him while Doug recounted his life story. Something as simple as sharing a cigarette became an act of love. Waiting for Doug and Pieter to finish their cigarettes gave us a reason to spend more time with Doug. We were the ears of the Body of Christ. Christ’s followers all make up his Body, and one becomes an indispensable and immeasurably useful part of it by receiving Jesus. When Jesus was on earth, he loved the unloved and cared for the neglected: now, as his Body, we are called to do the same. What the 14 volunteers did with CSM revealed how God can use us despite our lack of abilities. Putting the Body in motion can mean buying soup for a homeless person or sharing a cigarette and stories with someone you pass every day. For me, being part of the Body means carrying new socks in my backpack to give out when I’m asked for money. My ideas were backwards when I thought that I was an expendable part of the Body because I did not have a lot to offer. The Body does not come from our good works; our good works come from being part of the Body. •
Poiesis
Creative production, esp. of a work of art; an instance of this.
Lauren Gully A psalm that I know: Sheared fur carpets, Even-toed ungulates, Ruminant cud chewers, Ewes, rams, tups, Wethers, fleece, lamb, Meat, mutton, mammal – The Lord is your shepherd.
• Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 21
Grace Kim
We write like some sort of monster We write like some sort of monster, shade of the wet caverns beneath us, grinning imperceptibly up at us, patient, patient as time in its humor. We stalk the groundswell above impatiently. Birds fly out from the caverns – we hunt them. We grasp them in our mouths until they bleed their wisdom out for us. We write like monstrous shadows moving frantic while runestones in the caverns lie. God does not know us, God does not know us, God does not know us, but God alone knows us, in our dust.
22  To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
Plane 1: Elisha A plane moves outside, and the air moves around it A plane moves through the air outside and the sound of the air moving hits each ear – drum and skeleton, some things to rattle childishly (my voice, for one) A plane moves through the air, unknowing, unblinking, and relentless, and the sound of the air pressing skims through each sphere, cold, and reaches every molecule eventually (I suppose) and ear and fickle heart and lemon made of sun, and a plane moves through the stainless light like a bone in a brittle seawash skimming lightly down the shore.
“You’re right, God, we can’t do it on our own. We can’t run on broken legs. We’re so glad You are not just a tool we have to carry, like everything else we tried to use to get around. We look to You and trust that You won’t just prop yourself under our armpits and tell us to limp around as best we can; You want to become one with us! Yes, You will be the wings by which we soar.” — EMILY FU
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 23
Daniel Kim
Jambaism #5:
Your body is a temple: littering is strictly prohibited.
Birth The body is new, fresh Here Meeting the Earth On Earth, Child Trying to innocence, learning Reach Becoming bona fide Its potential. Youth Feet for walking on water. experience, adventure Hands for healing. Finding the Truth Head for thinking Teen And the heart? dynamic, risks Beating to the Struggling in between Song of life. Adult Until ambition, safety Questions, second thoughts, Discovering the result Touching the void: Middle age Why am I here? crisis, regression My body a temple for what? Entering a cage For whom? Seniors Help, I cry wisdom, nostalgia The body is Reaching the end; meeting the Savior. Leaving. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Honor God with your body.
24 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
poetry
Besorah Won
D-d-d-d-disability Yeah, she knows what it means to be rejected. Hell, even God rejected her. Side stares and whispers down the aisles at church, With dumbed-down baby language, they speak to her in coos. Fear and pity, the lens of believers. Ignorance a defense? Please, She’s heard better. They think she’s silly, they mouth over her head (she doesn’t understand) Her cries to the Lord, such cute gibberishasdflkasdfj, Awwwwww, let her be.
The LORD said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD?” — Exodus 4:11
Mangled, burned, and scarred; Madness in mind, deception inside, Critters of genetics gnaw at her spine. But is this the place for the foot, for the hand, for the missing hand? If he is the eye, and they are the body… Well, she read the ad in the Book, she thought she was invited, Where do the cracked pots go, Sir? What part of the body… the body, the body of Christ? Genetics. Eugenics. Genocide of the sexless. Home is no home when body is nobody. Predestination, sovereignty, error of God? Blame my father, my mother, the sin of some other? Yes sometimes no, sometimes glory to show Samson his eyes, Jacob, touch of a hip Opened her eyes to the descendents of – men waiting, hoping, seeking water to stir Mud, trees, and rivers, miracle garments to touch – Christ. Will and desire, purpose and grace Loving, merciful Creator and Savior. Rejected by man, though the man became man, Damnation in genes? Genealogy preaches better, better Better the body, than soul to burn forever And ever be glory when heard that Fearfully wonderfully, in precision made, She is part of the body, the body, the body of Christ. Amen. For the inheritor and beloved child of God.
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. — Psalm 147:3
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 25
I. We were talking so long she had clicked on the emergency lights to warn the passing cars. She reached out her hands over the steering wheel, her wrists close together as if they were tied. “I had this image in my head,” she said and cupped her hands, “my open hands were in a bowl and they were full of jewels. I told God – God, these are the desires of my heart.” She wasn’t smiling, but there was a sud den beauty to her expression, as if she saw those stones gleaming in her dark hands.
III.
• II. Philosophy only consoles if poets lie. They must lie about so many things. We have to stop them! Let’s kill them all! Everything makes so much sense now!
26 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
Laura Ferris
Pater, vide, vulnera mea tibi ostendo For Eli and my Vivian •
V. I don’t think we need another reminder that life is hard. I think we know that already. Sometimes I think we need to be reminded of the unseen things we hold out in open hands.
IV. I wanted to find them. When the world is gray the sky is closed, but I still thought I could find them. I read the books and I found their images and hung them alive in my head. I never told anyone that I loved them except in whispers – Oh how I longed for them purely, so distant and so tenderly. How did he know? Did I sigh? Did my head tilt to the side like a bird and did they fall into sight? He knew. “Unicorn lover! Unicorn lover! Unicorn lover!” he sang. “I am not,” I keened; I lied, but my soul wouldn’t fly away. So I ran: up in the trees I wept. I hate him I hate him I hate him I hate him.
Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 27
Lue-Yee Tsang
Sundering Times In false promise I’d fain have drunk Th’ immortal milk of man’s peaches. I kissed thy cheek, charging self In holy love. Here I swore ’t, Cut a covenant, to succour thee and t’ uphold: Thou ’rt my kin, Christ’s by faith. I told the tale, with tears in my lungs, Asking my memory: Have I in this time Been useful to you? As the years slip by, I see them release the swarms of locusts Laying waste the lands barren, But a wet welkin wails moisture That falls until Takla-Makan:* Vapours all, vaults empty, Watered as if dry, dreaming of bounty: After a battle, the old, ossified, Fallen bodies lie buried in mud.
* The sandy cold desert in the Tarim Basin of East Turkestan in China, whose name means something to the effect of “go in and you’ll never come out.” Sometimes, when rain falls, it evaporates before it reaches the ground.
28 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
Yea, bones grow weak, blood dyes Fields with carmine, and craven men Chase these rubies, rioting for glory; ink blots, blood spills: And so for renown they seek to move Their seats and roofs – t’uproot themselves! I’ve not done this, but nothing makes A split to see: seas churning, Peoples raging, I’m pulled from the earth Will or not, my wind spent out On breathless rocks, rent my voice From the air of my throat. Throttled is reason And drowned in gall, drunk the people To swallow Earth in swollen caprice. How turns the mind? In tryfling demands. I leave, I pass: plans are vanquished T’ outrageous flight in flighty times. A sad farewell, a silent death. But we lift Death’s end; love unquenchable Hides our hearts, to hope until The faded world flower like Eden, Grace-gladdened in glory anew, When God unites beneath and above, All things in him, in heav’n and in earth, A peace thrust through in painful birth.
fiction
Screwing Yourself
R
oger doesn’t use the internet because he actually doesn’t need to. He has porn in his mind. And honestly, he didn’t feel too guilty about turning it on last night, even though his church friends say that he probably shouldn’t be doing that kind of thing if he wants to be a good Christian. He now sat in his room atop his sweaty, ruffled blanket, and he had been awake for 30 minutes already. And his teeth weren’t even brushed. Still in his baggy pajamas, he sat there quietly musing about why he seemed to be so in love with sex – about both the real kind with other people and the kind with one’s own hands. And though he wasn’t feeling too guilty about punching the clown the night before, he still didn’t feel quite right about it. So his conscience was a little uneasy. Roger tried to sit calmly and meditate, the way his yoga teacher had instructed him. But his thoughts were a storm, so he quickly gave up. He couldn’t quite understand how you were supposed to think about nothing when in meditation. His teacher made it look easy but his mind swelled with myriad thoughts. Thoughts swam in his head about why the hell God would make humans into such sexual beings if he didn’t want people to explore things as freely as they wanted. He thought that God could be a withholding jerk sometimes. He remembered when he asked his pastor about the issue, he told him that sex within the constraints of marriage was a beautiful, good, and liberated thing – a metaphor for the unity of Christ and his Church embodied in physical form. This was easy enough to believe. But Roger couldn’t quite make the connection to how understanding this metaphor would help him deal with his burgeoning sexual urges so he
could better be a good little Christian. Maybe he wasn’t trying hard enough to understand; he didn’t know. The Christian self-help books hadn’t helped much either. Their attempts at romanticizing “waiting for marriage” and abstinence seemed too oblivious of what it really felt like to be the proverbial horny schoolboy. One of them even talked about how good Christian men should not masturbate since it’s essentially the same as “screwing yourself,” in the most literal sense. These calls to action, or sexual inaction, one could say, had not diminished the sexiness inside of him often raging for release. Had the writers of these books ever even been to his sexy little college town on any given warm sunny day? Sunny days usually meant more skin: lower-cut shirts and higher skirts. Those days were the hardest to keep his wandering eyes to himself. Roger tried praying to God, asking him for help to understand. He felt a little humiliated while praying because last night was itching at his insides. He finally got up and slowly slinked himself to the bathroom. While brushing his stiff teeth, he looked outside through the bathroom window and saw that there was hardly a cloud in the sky. It would be a warm, sunny day. •
writer
Ezra Justin Lee
EZRA JUSTIN LEE is a fourth-year undergraduate who wants to study poetry.
For more information, contact us at: unknowneditors@gmail.com
Be sure to check out our blog: http://unknowngodjournal.com
•
review
Unknown Sounds “I like my indie with a dash of melancholy…” reviewer
Elizabeth Segran
Cotton Jones, Paranoid Cocoon Label: Suicide Squeeze Released: 27 January 2009 Michael Nau and Whitney McGraw, members of the erstwhile indie-folk band Page France, have turned their focus to a side project. The duo has called their new band Cotton Jones, a name that captures the simple charm of their music. Paranoid Cocoon is a soothing album, but it mostly paints various shades of melancholy. One song, “Some Strange Rain,” perfectly encapsulates the feeling of sitting by a window, watching the light drizzle of springtime in San Francisco. One of the most beautiful duets on the album, “Gone the Bells,” is about living through the loss of love: “I was looking for your heart, through the flowers in the park, for hours in the park… In a dream, in a dream, all the beautiful things.” Who hasn’t been there? The band has some identifiable influences. The Doors feature noticeably in their music, as do The Grateful Dead. There is also an undercurrent of old-time, folksy, country music, particularly in songs like “Blood Red Sentimental Blues.” This music evokes mountains and cloudy skies. The overall sound is homespun and unpolished, as if Nau and McGraw made this album in a wood cabin with chickens outside. (Chickens actually make an appearance in one song.) This album is full of angst, but it is not pessimistic. Ultimately, it’s about emerging into the light a little stronger. The album ends cathartically with “The Changer,” where Nau and McGraw, voices entwined, sing: “Everything has turned around, been waiting for a little change, and when it finally came, I just waited for another. You know I’m a changer, the re-arranger, I’m always a stranger.” Paranoid Cocoon is about letting life wash over you – always aware the sadness just makes the good times sweeter.
Copeland, You Are My Sunshine Label: Tooth & Nail Released: 14 October 2008 Elizabeth Segran loves music! She is also writing a dissertation that applies radical feminist ideas to ancient Indian love poetry. 30 To An Unknown God | Spring 2009
Copeland has produced four strikingly different full-length albums since it emerged in 2003. Aaron Marsh, the band’s front man, has experimented with
various styles over the years, ranging from garage rock to catchy pop to emo. Throughout, however, Copeland has maintained an introspective quality coupled with unashamed expressions of emotion. This latest offering is their most accomplished, because the band manages to showcase what is unique about their sound. Marsh’s voice is full of yearning and unfulfilled desire. Daringly, he sings almost entirely in falsetto – a move that lends this album a fascinating, androgynous quality. This time around, the lyrics focus on life in the raw. “To Be Happy Now,” as its title suggests, is about fighting for your own happiness. “Strange and Unprepared” is an ode to ambivalent emotions: “I never feel good or bad, only strange and unprepared.” As always, Copeland shines brightest in love songs. In keeping with the rest of the album, the songs describe the bittersweet aspects of love. “Chin Up” talks about the sadness that we conceal for the sake of those we love: “Back to when we started, losing who we were, everybody knows that, you’d break your neck, to keep your chin up.” In “Not Allowed,” Marsh sings about self-sacrifice: “I’ll burn for you now, ’cause you’re mine, and you’re not allowed to feel nothing. Careful, I may fall apart for you now, make you cry, but I’m not allowed to be sad.” Despite what may sound like desperately sad lyrics, the overall flavor of this album is not depressing at all. In fact, there are times when it sounds downright cheery, as if it were dappled in sunshine. The title of the album captures this paradox: like the classic American song “You Are My Sunshine,” bubbly rhythm gives way to somber words.
Mae, Singularity Label: Tooth & Nail Released: 14 August 2007 Mae is already a familiar name to fans of the emo pop-rock genre. Since signing with Tooth and Nail in 2001, they have produced two albums – Destination:Beautiful (2003) and The Everglow (2006) – both characterized by lightness and innocence. In 2007, they moved over to Capitol Records, and with this shift have come changes in their music. Their third EP, Singularity, is edgier and harder. Part of this evolution is the result of two new members, Josiah Schlater on bass and Robert Smith on keyboards. These guys, who are also part of the band Tokyo, bring to Mae their indie background and a willingness to push the band into new territory. Elkin’s voice is also noticeably deeper on most of the tracks, which lends the band a sound that is resonant and more mature. The single, “Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own” almost has a metallic quality to it. Still, the band holds on to its fondness for hooks that keeps it firmly in the realm of pop-rock. Some songs are completely addictive. The two middle songs, “On Top” and “Waiting” don’t get old even when you’ve hit the repeat button multiple times. The songs are still largely lighthearted, treating even difficult issues blithely. In “Just Let Go,” Elkin croons, “There’s an old oak tree / We can swing and sway / Throw our guards away / You’re so far away.” Mae doesn’t break much new ground in this album, but fans will enjoy the gradual development and unfolding of this band’s music. • Spring 2009 | To An Unknown God 31
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