How small is your god?

Isaiah 40

Have you not known?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? 

It is He who sits above the circle of the earth,
And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers,
Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.  

He brings the princes to nothing;
He makes the judges of the earth useless.

 

This is written in the context of carving wooden gods, but it addresses a problem that was throughout the time of Israel - that their vision of the divine was always too small. Whether this was as small as a wooden doll or as small as the people of Israel, they always made God too small.

This passage ways that we are like grasshoppers. That sounds demeaning, but what I get from it is that we all look the same to the divine. Not pink, brown, rich or poor. And the "princes" and "judges" comment means that being PM or being on benefits doesn't matter from the divine perspective.

Our God is not the God of us. Of Quakers or Anglicans or Methodists or westerners or Africans or - whoever. This perspective is that the divine is for all humanity, every one of us. Even - especially - those who we disagree with.

Perspective is important - actually, in my reading of the Bible, so much is about perspective. That we - people - so often don't see things from the right perspective, we usually see the world and the divine-with-the-world far too small, far too local. We cannot see from the divine persepctive, but we need to understand that that is the right one to have. And to acknowledge that our perspective is - always - too small.

Should I stay or should I go?

 I have recently finished reading Brian McLarens book, "Should I Stay Christian?" This is a really fantastic book, very unlike any other I have read in the same vein. This is a review, but also a reflection on my response to it.

There are a few reasons why this book is much better than most that attempt to address why people want to leave Christianity. Firstly, There is the deliberate order that the book is written in. He starts by saying "No", then "Yes" and finally "How" - which means that he starts by facing the real problems with the faith from the start. So many other books start by explaining how good Christianity is, before then addressing some issues.

This leaves open the very real possibility that some people will read the first part, decide that there is no point in any more, and decide to leave. Against this risk, it clears the air of the problems, because he is clearly prepared to deal with them face on.

The second reason is that he doesn't use straw men to attack - like so often. I am sure you have seen the same (Richard Dawkins has a trendancy to do this) - where they dismiss problems that they have made up, that do not actually reflect the problems that most people have. McLaren addresses real problems, fundamental to Christianity, and explains why these should be good reasons for leaving.

This leads to the third reason for his book being so good - that he is totally accepting that people may come to the conclusion that Christianity is of no value and should be abandoned. If that is where you get to, he is quite accepting of that. The reasons to stay are also very open and genuine, none of the often seen reasons like "Because it is self obviously correct" or "Because you will burn in hell if you leave".

And maybe the best part of the book is the "how" section, because this considers the reality that people who stay will probably need to adjust their relationship to the church and their faith. In many ways, this is critical, because people who stay after having seriously considered leaving will need to adjust and change their relationship. It cannot stay the same.

It was many years ago now that I abandoned the term evangelical. What is peculiar is that my beliefs and faith have nuanced and modified, but are still very much in the realm of Evangelical Christianity, but I rejected the term because most of those using it were not people I had anything in common with. The political right who are hate preachers had taken the term and I had no desire to be associated with them. This was mainly in the US, groups like Westboro Baptist Church, but many others and others in the UK that associated themselves with these ideas. So I rejected the label.

Of late in the UK, we have seen all sorts of groups using the "Christian" label and promoting ideas that I cannot associate with. Examples include Christian Concern and the Christian Legal Centre - they were roundly criticised in the Alfie Evans case. Also senior politicians like Jacob Rees-Mogg, who claims and promotes his form of Christianity, but whose actions are not ones I consider compatible with my faith.

The problem with my initial position - that they are not Christian - is not a valid position to take. This suffers from the No True Scotsman fallacy, but also I have no desire to try to define what is Christian and what isn't. It is far too much responsibility and it is not what I want to do. So I accept that the label is one I am becoming less and less comfortable with.

So here it is: it may be that those who claim the title with views that I cannot accept are right. I have no problems with them claiming that their Christianity is right. But I want nothing to do with them or that faith, so I can dismiss the title of Christian. If they are Christian, I am not.

McLaren talks about stages of faith. Simplicity;Complexity;Perplexity;Harmony. I think, especially since I joined the Quakers, I am finding myself more into the Harmony stage. The stage where there is an acceptance of things. I am not there yet, but am embracing this more and more. My understanding of faith - my faith, and what it means, and what the nature of divinity is - is changing, in flux. Maybe flux is not right - that implies that it will settle to something new, and I am not sure it will. I think it is uncertain and will remain uncertain.

But it is still what I used to consider Christian. I would still accept the creeds, even though I might not want to say them, not least because words are insufficient. But I have no wish to associate myself with those who preach and practice hate, whatever name they claim. So for now, maybe, I am a Quaker, a person of faith, a seeker of truth. The names matter less now than they did. The truth is the important thing.

Eugenics

 I have just finished reading the book Superior by Angela Saini, and heard her talk at Greenbelt, covering the same areas. It is a superb book, but also it is frightening.

What I found really interesting is that it helps to join up all sorts of related areas - starting from racism, something that we see more and more in the world.

Now I should say that that, until recently, I thought eugenics ideas had die out in the middle of last century, at or after the second world war - for reasons that are clear as I explore the meaning of eugenics. I was wrong, and that was disturbing.

Now - what is eugenics? Well, it is (simplisticly speaking) the idea that we should be breeding humans to produce the very best of humanity, in a similar way that we breed our farm animals to produce the very best. This was a result of the ideas of evolution initially produced by Darwin, and the term was created by Francis Galton, a relative of Darwin (I should point out that Darwin himself did not support the idea).

What is interesting is that, for the early part of the 20th century, these ideas were broadly acceptable and discussed openly. Selective breeding, producing humans as good as is possible, seemed like a good idea. Until, of course, Adolf Hitler adopted the idea and sought to eliminate all those who were not "good enough". Most of the movement died out after that, but no entirely.

The problem with eugenics is not actually Hitler. The problem is far deeper than that - the problem is that to pursue such a plan, you need to define what the best humans are. And this is where the problems really start.

The root of race was the division of people into what were random racial categories - all based on skin colour - I am reminded of the Sunday School song:

Jesus loves the little children
All the children of the world
Red and yellow, black and white
....

Hang on - yes that is it - the four racial groups - red (native Americans), yellow (Orientals), White (European) and black (Anyone with dark skin - African, Indian, native Australian). There are two fundamental problems with this:

Firstly, this division by skin colour is completely unscientific. In particular, the range of those who are covered under "Black" is a huge range, comprising many different skin colours and many unrelated people. There is as much difference across that range as there is between any two skin colours, speaking biologically. If you are wanting to divide people by their biological origins, skin colour is a very poor proxy - and the more we explore and discover about DNA relationships, the more we realise that there is no proxy, not way of dividing people. When it comes down to it, we are all the same, we all share the same DNA structures.

It is also the case that those in England - as an example - are almost certainly descended from people whose skin was dark. Of course, people in the UK are all immigrants from somewhere - none of us are "native" - the islands have been invaded from the North and the South, and the people here are mixtures of a range of peoples. Of many different skin colours as well - and all sorts of eye colours and hair colours and other genetic properties. We are a wild mix.

Secondly, of course, the racial groups were put into a heirarchy. Unsurpisingly, the whites were at the top - for no obvious reason, except that we were the ones making the lists. The heirarchy was mainly about "how like white Europeans are these people".

What continued to strike me was that the way we divide people is always biased. We argue about IQ tests - but these are not universal. They have to be adjusted for different cultures, and over time. an IQ score is not an eternal value (and the average for any cultural groups is, by definition, 100 - it only measures your position compared to the average). Often we talk about the scientific advances and technology that we in the west have made - ignoring the fact that these are not universal indicators of "success". Because we value these things over others - over an appreciation of nature or of community - we claim these to show that "we" are better than "them".

And so eugenics - in the various forms it crops up in neoliberal discourse - is ALWAYS a vile and disgusting concept, always a power thing, seeking to put "me" as being worthy of living and "them" as not. And the divisions that a eugenics mindset generates - races - are putely social ideas, with no actual basis in any sort of fact. We are all one race, we are all human. Those who seek to claim otherwise will have none of my time.

The Labour Files

I finally got around to watching these - they are available on Youtube (1, 2, 3, 4) and I felt that there was something needed saying.

For those who don't know, this is a series of 4 programmes from Al Jazeera revealing details of papers leaked form the labour party. In particular, they relate to the antisemitism claims around Jeremy Corbyn and many others.

It is worth bearing in mind that Al Jazeera is a Quatari owned and driven news organisation, that will have its own biases and reasons for promoting specific ideas and issues. It should not be considererd truly independent, although it has proven itself over the last few years to be a reliable news source.And the material presented here does reflect what others have said about the party.

At the same time, I am trying to be as generous as possible towards the leadership and senior members of the party - give them the benefit of the doubt, if I can.

After watching the first two episodes, I had learned a lot. Which is always good! In particular, there is a very complex issue around what "anti-semitism" means. In practice, there are two definitions that are used by different groups:

1. Any criticism of or negative action towards Jews or the Jewish state, for any reason.

2. Criticism or negative action toward Jews simply for their Jewishness.

In the gap between these, there is Zionism. This is the belief that Israel has a right to their historical national boundaries, and should be permitted to enforce these at any cost.

It is in this Zionist stance that becomes really challenging, not least because there are many Christian groups who would argue for this position. And a Zionist position will tend to make people use the first definition of anti-semitism above.

I, of course, do note agree with this position. I lean towards the latter. And - just for clarification - these are not intended as formal definitions, just expressions of the dividing issue. If you want more details, then there is a lot of material online about the IHRA definition and examples, which are at the heart of the Labour party disputes. The basic working definition is fine for me, but the examples include any criticism of Israels Zionist desires, and that is where I would disagree.

Still with me? Well done. Now the problems with Corbyn (and many others) was that he was definitively NOT anti-semitic according to version 2, the one I agree with. However, he was opposed to the Zionism of the Israeli state, and this brought the allegations on his head. Because there were parts of the party - driven, eventually, by Keir Starmer, who wanted to adopt the IHRA definition in total.

If I am generous, it may be that they saw a definition by a well respected international group, and believed that this is what should be adopted. That such a declaration would be the clearest and most uncontraversial definition ("uncontraversial" and "anti-semitism" in one concept is not something that is ever going to work). The generous answer is that this was simple naivety by Starmer and his supporters.

Except that I do not believe that Starmer is that stupid. I would totally believe it of the leadership of the Conservative party, that they would naively accept something like this without any real idea what it was about, but I don't think Starmer is made of the same stuff at all.

Which means he is an explicit supporter of Zionism, and was seeking to root out any opponents from the party. Which meant rooting out the left-wing from the party.

This takes a different turn in the last two episodes. What we see here is explicit and systematic bullying from the leadership of the party, desperate to win votes, power and influence. And to win this at any cost, it would seem. By eliminating the political left from the party, they were hoping to win the votes from the centre right - and, if some comments are to be believed, keep most of the left because they have nowhere else to go. Which is the arrogance of the party.

And yet, this is where I try to be generous and broaden my horizons. And consider that the station may have more problems where it has evidence of issues with anti-islamic behaviour (whereas the Tory party loves Muslims, of course, as long as they are not seeking access to this county and they have oil).

But this is not necessarily positive, because what I see is that both of the major parties have the same problem - they are desperate for votes at any cost, and seek power for their own purposes. There is a core problem in our political systems, that the voting system does not hold the parties to account. In the end, they both seek to get votes to put them in power. But they do not want to use their power for the good of the people, but for their own benefit.

Yes, this has been presented explicitly in the Labour party, but this is not a Labour party problem. This is a problem with the system, the entire political infrastructure in this country. Until we change this more fundamentally and radically, nothing will really change.

The Labour Files have revealed something very dark in the party, but the party is actually reflecting a wider problem in the political state that we are in

Spirituality and Music

At Christmas, I had a book about drone metal and spirituality, which was a fascinating read. 6 months later, this is a much deeper reflection on the wider issues around this.

Now, just to do this properly, I will start by defining terms. This is not just about drone, but wider, however, it draws on experiences recently attending a gig with two drone bands. This will therefore be a longer post than usual, seeking to explore the wider understanding. I have also seen some interesting techno artists at Bluedot, which also feeds into this.

Spirituality

This is a difficult question as to what this means. Especially coming from a Quaker perspective, because we don't really like to define this. In a broad sense, and for this post, I am defining this as a sense of connection to an "Other" a "numinous". An understanding of a wider reality. This is deliberately broad, and covers a vast range of experiences.

And specifically, this was my experience with the gig I attended. The band - Nadja - make a lot of noise, and it is all-enveloping. And as part of this, I found that I experienced something very special - a real sense of being enveloped by the music, held by it, and transported by it. That was a spiritual experience.

Music

This is actually as complex a question as the spirituality one. And the answer will be as challenging to define.

Most formal definitions of music would include the elements of Melody, Harmony and Rhythm. This is where is becomes difficult, because some drone music has none of these. Well, sometimes there some rhythm, but that is usually all. And lyrics are scarce and utilised as another instrument, rather than as words to sing along with.

While one of the bands I saw did have some interaction - the singer came into the audience to scream into her mike. But there are a lot of bands of various forms (not just drone) known as shoegaze which is explicitly not interacting with the audience. It is - for these - about the music, not the performance, although the actual performance of the music is a different experience to just listening at home.

For the context here, music realy covers any aural experience. Probably a positive one for at least some people. Even though my parents might say "You call this music?".

To add to this, a lot of techno is heavily dependent on rhythm - although that is often also played with. And often little or not melody or harmony.

So, worship songs then?

Let me make one point firstly, that is probably contraversial, but I feel very strongly (which means that there is a very good chance that others feel the same).

Most of the music that we consider "spiritual" isn't. It is words put to music, and so often the purpose of the music is to lend a background to the words. Whether this is hymns played on an organ or songs played by a band, the music is not the important part. In fact, if the music is too prominent, there will probably be complaints that the band are "performing". This applies to great classical works too - those mostly considered very deeply spiritual includes words - singing.

Often, when we sing songs and hymns, while the words are considered important, we often sing them without really engaging with them. This is why songs can be really good for remembering information. We remember, but don't engage with the meaning of the words so much. It means that whether the information or idea is correct, we will embrace it. That is part of the power of music and songs, that we can absorb the words easily.

It is important to remember that, just because an expression rhymes doesn't mean it is good theology.

This sounds obvious, but I have seen so much theology that seems to think that word-plays make for good theological ideas - sometimes, they do, but that is when someone has worked to make an easily-remembered phrase from a truth.

A lot of the music traditionally associated with "worship" consists of "tunes" - either hymn tunes or song tunes, often designed to be straightforward to learn and/or play. Which does not necessarily make for good music. Songs are great for learning and remembering. But not always for anything deeper.

Songs without words?

For me - spiritual music is just music, without words. I am not down on words, but they serve a different purpose for me. 

The problem for me is that I want to - need to - engage with the words and understand them and process them. But when there are no words, but there is music, I can let it flow through me, take me on and move me. Music engages with a different part of the brain, and that part of the brain engages with our emotions. 

For grabbing and engaging, for taking you to another place, doing without the words means that you can engage with the emotion of the music instead, the feel, the other-ness.

Spirituality and music is complex.And so often, in church environments, because there is a clearly defined place for music, we don't explore this any deeper. And, of course, in Quakers, we typically have no music at all (which is fine for me, because I get my music injection elsewhere). But maybe we miss out, because we don't have ways of exploring spirituality and music - we dont have the discussions either, because they are not seen as specifically relevant.

And why is this on a Quaker blog?

Always a relevant question! But I think there are good reasons for this.

When I look at words, when reading, learning, exploring, I focus on the words. There is an intensity of word-focus there. Within Quakers, our silence is also intense. We do have words, of course, but they are also brief and intense in intent. The ultimate focus that the silence gives us is the purpose, and anything else comes out from this intensity.

But the music I love most is also intense. And, I think, for me at least, it is this intensity that helps me to engage with the more, the other, and so inspires my spirituality, my sense of the reality of the other. And I think - to an extent - this is why I could no longer stay in a church where the music was not inspiring. Rather - where music as a concept was not really given prominence.

What do you do?

 ,,, in a Quaker time of silence?

It is sort of a strange question, but the church is marked by doing things that we need to have explained to us. We stand to sing (because you can sing better standing); you sit, kneel or stand to pray, because of all sorts of different reasonings; You sit and listen to sermons, maybe you take notes, maybe you occasionally shout "Hallelulia".

And even in silence, there is - in most traditional churches - some direction. Two minutes silence "to remember those who have died". Silent retreats, where there is usually some input to consider on and work ones brain around.

In most churches where there is an expectation of new people, it is common to give some direction as to what book to look in, or that everything in projected - with directions.

But when you go to a quaker meeting, I was given a leaflet to explain a little bit of what would happen. But there is no real direction as to how you spend the time of silence. And - actually - that is quite good in many ways. Not least, because it takes some time to understand the nature and the meaning of a meeting.

So what should you do in a quaker silence. The answer is - as always - whatever you want, but this is some insight into what I feel is a way of using it. There are a number of stages that I find I go through.

Firstly, there is a time when you need to settle into the meeting, the silence. Some people will turn up to church early to quieten down before the service starts, and this is what the first part of a meeting is about. Settling down, maybe dealing with the issues you bring to the meeting or the distractions that have given you an issue, and let them disappear. That can mean giving them over to the divine for a period, before trying to deal with them later.

I find that next, something from the week tends to remain, and that seems to be my focus for the meeting. Not always, but often that is at least a starting point. Sometimes I stay there, and that is quite enough.

Of course, sometimes, someone will minister. Ministry is usually at least a chance to reflect on what I was thinking, and give a different direction to it. And sometimes, of course, it is unconnected to what I was thinking, is no help to me at all! Which is the way of meeting sometimes.

The time after is then, often, very productive, because I am wrestling to thoughts together. Sometimes there is some other "distraction" - something that occurs around the meeting house (or home) that gives me this other direction.

What I find is that, sometime around 45 minutes, there is a point of completion (for me). I find resolutions to the thought I have had come, but also, there can be other ministries - or maybe I have worked through to something to minister myself. What I find most intriguing is that the best ministry often comes 40-50 minutes into meeting.And the timing of meeting them becomes really important.

Anyhow - that is the anatomy of silence for me. There is more to it, but I find it interesting to consider the flow and progress.

Quakers, Spirituality and Drone Metal

 Now there are things that don't often go together, but I feel that should. I do need to explain first.

I should also point out that this post is coming out of reading a book by Owen Coggins  about spirituality, mysticism and drone metal, which is a very academic - but very interesting - consideration of this overlap. And, in the midst of reading this, I went to head Divide and Dissolve, a new drone metal band. 

Actually, whenever I try to explain what drone metal is, people make faces at me, and tell me how terrible it sounds, so I will address it in different ways.

Drone music as a whole - it can be applied across varieties of music - does not really comform to the usual assessment of music, which is usually driven by the three parts of Rhythm, Melody and Harmony. In that, id doesn't have a strong or consistent rhythm, there is usually no melody and harmony is also only present in very broken or distorted ways.

Drone metal in particular very much has a focus on volume, and because of this, the whole process of listening to drone metal is experiential. That is, you don't really "listen", because that is not how you interact with it - you feel it, you are enveloped in it, it is a whole body experience, not just a hearing experience.

There is also an interesting visual experience. I have not been to that many drone concerts (OK, just one, but I have another one in the calendar), but Coggins explains more about the visual aspect of a concert - especially by bands like Sunn O))) (pronounced just sun, and one of the leading drone metal bands) - which is less watching the musicians, and more seeing the towering speaker systems. In fact, there is a view - outlined in Coggins - that the real instrument on a drone metal performance is not the guitar, but the amplifier.

So how does all of this relate to spirituality? Well, mainly that there is a drive to force you to experience the sound, and the performance. People say that they have experiences while listening that are not dissimmilar to deep spiritual experiences - being elsewhere, encountering a reality that is different to the normal one.

The nature of the music - the all encompassing experience, the way that it utterly removes a chance of remaining untouched, or unconnected - is important. It refuses to allow other random thoughts, or distractions. It is so all-encompassing that it forces a review of the world. Like other spiritual practices, it takes you out of yourself.

Another interesting aspect is that drone metal usually it produced by a downtuned bass string with fuzzy distortion. This means, in lay terms, the bass string(s) (sometimes all of the strings) are tuned to be lower than usual, so it doesn't have quite the tightness and sharpness it normally does. Also the effects are used to make the note very fuzzy - so that even the natural harmonics that you would get are often not present.

The effects of this are to make the sound very earthy. It means that the music has a tendancy to ground you, to make you feel part of the earth (that may well be shaking!). In fact, as Coggins points out, there is a lot of imagery around this genre that focuses on weight and solidity - and this whole experience gives a sense of our connection to the earth, the planet. There is something deeply spiritual in that - it is not a fly-away form of spirituality, it is about our existence as part of the planet we spin on.

Incidentally, in case you thing this is all very strange music, bear in mind that Pink Floyd on "Shine On" start with several minutes of a single note with some guitar on top of it - a style that is close to a drone style. And John Cage's As Slowly As Possible is being played on a church orgen in Halberstadt over an estimated 600 years. So others have toyed with these ideas. It is only in fully fledged drone metal that the intensity and volume are also added to make the experience even more immersive.

But can I relate this to Quakerism in any way? Well, at Christmas, I did describe a meeting as like a drone version of other churches 2 minutes silence. But it is more than that. The spirituality of drone metal is an all-embracing sense of connectedness, sense of earthiness, and presence-with-non-presence.

There is a spirituality in meeting that is not always easy to understnad or appreciate. It took me several meetings before I started to understand what the silence was about, what it meant to be there. When you first hear drone metal, if you are not used to it, there is a sense of it just being noise (like a meeting is just silence).

Spirituality in drone metal, as well as in a quaker meeting, is about being both in the here and now, and in another place. It is the sense of connection with "here" and "elsewhere" is the essence of the spirituality. It is the connection with the numinous, the divine, that is so important as Quakers. But it is this connection with the "other" that many people find in drone. That is spirituality.