Swarthmore Peripateo (Vol 4, Issue 1)

Volume 4, Issue 1 | Fall 2015

Peripateo The Swarthmore College Journal of Christian Discourse

Untangling Happiness and Joy

by Juhyae Kim

Also in this issue: Jesus Untamed: Reflections on Three Years of Worship in Chester

by Nathan Scalise

Leavening and Life after Swarthmore

by Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon

A Letter from the Editor Dear Reader, The rhythm of life at Swarthmore sweeps students into passionate, sometimes even feverish, activity. It is a frenetic lunging for the hours, minutes, and seconds that seem to melt away all too quickly in the heat of our pursuits. Rising cadences swollen with promise crest as every joint in our body strains desperately to keep tempo. And then, the music stops.

In the silence that follows, we might realize that the exhilaration of our active life has left our interior life sterile and frail. As the ringing in our ears subsides, we may become aware of another sound, so quiet as not to have been perceptible before – the sighing of a half-filled heart, restless and unsatisfied. For even when we find ourselves fully occupied with the demands of a crowded, everyday life, the deepest parts of our nature never cease in yearning for their own sort of nourishment.They crave the repose that we need to reflect upon the most salient questions of human life: Does my existence have a meaning? Will all that I am wither away in death? Is there a God? By drowning out these questions in the clangor of the world, we deny, at incalculable expense, the existential dimension of our being.

We, the staff of Peripateo, have opened our hearts to these questions and, in so doing, have found the life-giving love of Jesus Christ. We believe in one Triune God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the One from Whom all things come and to Whom all things shall return. We believe that Jesus Christ, true God and true man, was incarnate of the Virgin Mary so that, by taking on human flesh, human nature might see its salvation. For the sake of our sins, he suffered mortification and death on the wood of the Cross, a cruel and shameful crucifixion at the hands of those whom he loved. We believe that in his Resurrection on the third day he conquered death and sin, providing all people the hope of eternal life in his heavenly kingdom.

This common vision unifies us as we strive to nourish our hearts, our minds, and our souls, so that they might yield fruit for ourselves and for the world. Despite hailing from a variety of diverse backgrounds and Christian traditions, we have all laid claim, as did Anselm before us, to a “faith seeking understanding,” to a faith responsive to the demands of reason and an understanding ennobled in the light of faith. We invite you, dear reader, to join us as we grapple honestly and ardently with the questions written on every human heart.

As in semesters past, the expression of these questions and the pursuit of their solutions continue to assume a variety of unique and engaging forms. In “Leavening and Life after Swarthmore,” Maisie WiltshireGordon reflects on the relevance of the Old and New Testaments to the challenges of settling into postSwarthmore environments. Juhyae Kim highlights the contours of a distinctively Christian joy in “Untangling Happiness and Joy.”These essays, and all the others included in this semester’s journal, represent a sincere meditation and articulation of truths important to faith and to life.

Holding fast to the founding spirit and to the name of our journal, we invite you to “walk around in” the words enclosed herein. Find that stillness of spirit, the rest and repose of an unhurried breath. As you return to the bustle of everyday life, we hope you will carry these moments of quiet contemplation along with you.

Nicholas Zahorodny Editor-In-Chief

i | Letter from the Editor

IN THIS ISSUE On Faith and Docility 6

Essays & Ar ticles

by Greg Brown

Who Do You Say That I Am? 14 Pseudo-Dionysius on the Divine Names

by Nicholas Zahorodny

The Yellow Face 12 Ar t & Poetry Peter on the Water Colorful People

by Becky Griest

Matt Maher’s “The Love in 2 Between”: A Reflection on Christian Music

by Suness Jones

Untangling Happiness and Joy 10

by Juhyae Kim

Leavening and Life after 18 Swar thmore

by Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon

Jesus Untamed: Reflections on 20 Three Years of Worship in Chester

by Nathan Scalise

Reflections

Peripateo

The Swarthmore College Journal of Christian Discourse

Editorial Staff

Nicholas Zahorodny ’16 Nate Lamb ’17 Roy A. Walker ’16 Kelly Hernández ’18 Nathan Scalise ’16 Juhyae Kim ’19 Michael Broughton ’19 Matthew Olivencia ’18 Emily Audet ’18 Heitor Santos ’17 Sam Gutierrez ’16

Editor-in-Chief Executive Editor Business Manager Design Manager Editor Editor Editor Editor Design Design Photography Photography

Contributors

Greg Brown ’16 Becky Griest ’16 Suness Jones ’16 Juhyae Kim ’19 Nathan Scalise ’16 Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon ’13 Nicholas Zahorodny ’16

Who We Are

Peripateo seeks to reconcile faith and academia by

engaging religious issues through an intellectual lens.

We believe that the message of Jesus Christ has pow-

erful implications for our daily lives and the world at large. We aim to fuse creativity and intellectualism in this journal to invite readers into a thought-

ful discourse: what role does God play in our lives?

What are the ways that a Christian perspective both

compliments and complicates an academic one?

Contact us at swarthmoreperipateo@gmail.com.

Swarthmore Peripateo | 1

Matt Maher’s “The Love

Christian music, that is, music of person that looks for lyrical quality and

created with overt themes relating to Jesus Christ, often times carries stigmas related to predictable sounds and messages. Many Americans have grown numb to the same rhythms and chords applied to the simple and seemingly superficial words in mainstream Christian worship music. A song in this category that lacks lyrical variety is “Awesome,” in which the chorus goes, “Our God is awesome, awesome, awesome.” I will admit that there was one time, after letting my guard down after a long tiresome day, when that song helped me connect with God. Otherwise, I am the kind

2 | Matt Maher’s “The Love in Between”: A Reflection on Christian Music

exciting musical structure to accompany worship, or even just for easy listening. As someone who has invested time in developing a curated musical taste, and who used to shy away from the stigmas surrounding Christian music, I am here to encourage you to open the door to this genre. Furthermore, I would even say that some Christian music is accessible to believers and nonbelievers because it recognizes basic human needs, desires, and shortcomings. It offers confessions of failure, and hope to overcome problems that are common to many people. The Christian music genre is ex-

e

in Between”

A Reflection on Christian Music

by Suness Jones

pansive; it covers everything from gospel to alternative to techno, and I realize that asking anyone to embrace such a large genre is like asking them to jump into the ocean. To avoid drowning, let’s jump into a pond and swim around a bit. This pond is Matt Maher’s 2011 album “The Love in Between.”

Born in Canada, Matt Maher moved to Arizona to earn a music degree and study jazz piano. He was involved in music at a Catholic parish there, and became involved in youth ministry. Despite gaining fame from multiple world tours and playing for the last two popes several times, he continues to minister to Christian youth. The

sixth album in his career, “The Love in Between,” fuses rock, folk, and blues to create songs that talk about a real person striving to be better by following Christ’s teachings.

Songs range from loud, soulful gospel choirs to acoustic intimacy. In terms of lyrics, not all of the songs even mention Jesus, though they all draw from faith-filled experiences.

Maher’s lyrics bypass mainstream gospel preaching and doctrine teaching, and instead delve into a more personal realm of faith. He chooses to talk about failures and moments of despair, and then shows how Christ aided him in those moments. This is reflected in his raspy, bluesy voice that,

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at times, is outshone by a gospel choir in the background. His alternative approach to Christian music creates an entry point for anyone to begin listening to his music.

Instead of offering Jesus and filling in the rest, he illustrates “the rest” —the messiness of life— and Jesus comes forth from that.

The album progresses from sympathizing with human insecurities to inviting God into these broken places and offering hope in Jesus. I will touch upon the theology behind some of the songs and end with the last song, “The Spirit and the Bride,” which leads the listener to dwell on how Christ offers mankind peace and healing through the working of the Holy Spirit and the community of believers on earth.

The first on the album, “Rise Up,” is a call to be something more than what you are. The listener is awakened to the fact that there is something that can bring them up “when life has got you down.” Maher calls out to the parts of our lives that are vulnerable, that can fall apart and leave one “used up and worn out.” He recognizes the commonalities that all our lives share in virtue of their shared humanity. This places him at the level of the listener, saying that he can relate to their struggles and that he knows that God can come in and heal their wounds. A non-Christian could listen to this song and see it as general encouragement when he advises them to “look up,

Christian music is accessible to believers and nonbelievers because it recognizes basic human needs, desires, and shortcomings.

4 | Matt Maher’s “The Love in Between”: A Reflection on Christian Music

when you search and nothing’s found.” It is no mistake that this first song is simple in its message and gives a gentle nudge of encouragement. This gives Maher access to a wider audience.

The next song, “Turn Around,” recognizes insecurities people face on a daily basis. Maher asserts that “wanting to be praised by all, needing to be first, finding all my worth in this world” are issues that consume humans. These are insecurities that many people face, and Christianity provides a way to deal with them. The order of the three lines in the chorus names problems and then invites Jesus into them. This is the introduction to the idea of being redeemed. It identifies changing course as the source of healing. The phrase “turn around” implies that Jesus may be right behind you.

Maher highlights how Jesus pursues his people and that if a person is feeling “lost” then they may have turned their back on Jesus. He says “love has come to you,” and assures the listener that they aren’t alone at all. He shows Jesus pursuing his people, which is a theme in later songs as well.

“Heaven Help Me” is an honest cry for help from someone who realizes they have messed up and can’t help themselves.

Maher doesn’t pretend that he is a perfect Christian. Instead, he claims the moments when he feels completely useless. Throughout certain parts of the song, and especially at the end, a gospel choir is singing “Heaven help me now” and “I believe, I believe, I believe” in the background. The choir may make it feel like a song you’d sing in church, but Maher maintains a rock and roll groove throughout the song. The moments where the choir sings are breakthroughs, both in the music itself and in the artist’s spiritual

life. It is as if their soprano voices are magnifying his cries for help, especially at the last line when he says, “I believe you can help me now.” Maher realizes the beauty in his struggles when he professes that he believes that heaven can help him, or more simply, that he believes in the power of Jesus Christ to save him.

The last song, “The Spirit and the Bride,” opens with a call to “anyone still standing at the shoreline” to say “come.” The “spirit” in this case is the Holy Spirit, and the “bride” is the Church, or community of believers. The people who are standing at the shoreline are considering if they should make the leap into the ocean of God’s mercy and grace. Maher is bidding those people, who feel lost or who have been hurt in some way, to ask the Holy Spirit to heal them. By including “bride,” he promises that Christians, the church that is the bride of Christ, will welcome newcomers into community along with the Holy Spirit. He names people by their hardships, from “hurting souls,” to “skeptics,” to “lovers who spent their love on a lie,” and even broadens it to “anyone who hears these word.” He invites them to ask for healing. It is interesting to note that he doesn’t ask these people to believe in Jesus outright, or to join a specific church.

Instead, he invites them to engage in a personal relationship with the Holy Spirit and Christian believers. In reference to the

community of Christian believers, he asks for “grace and peace” to come as they wait for Jesus to come back to earth. So, “for everyone who hears” this song, he asks them to jump into the ocean of healing and peace that the community of believers delivers to them through the Holy Spirit.

Maher communicates powerful beliefs about God in “The Love in Between” through personal experiences, sometimes without even saying the name “Jesus.” Subtle religious language allows for a wider point of entry for listeners who are looking for a different take on or who may not be comfortable with orship music. Using lyrics that engage with his experiences of feeling inadequate also soothens the impression that the person singing Christian songs is more advanced in their faith than the people to whom they are singing. He identifies his own faults and struggles, yet does not stop there. The ideas about redemption, Jesus pursuing his people, and a missionary Christian church resonate with people who may be on different paths in their faith. With lyrical diversity and creativity, Matt Maher offers the same message that most Christian songs communicate differently. Ultimately, he offers hope for people who struggle. He offers the Church with its community of believers; he offers the hope of Jesus Christ; and he offers the power of the Holy Spirit to change lives. r

Maher’s lyrics bypass mainstream gospel preaching and doctrine teaching, and instead choose to delve into a more personal realm of faith.

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G. K. Chesterton once said, “I don’t need a church to

On Faith and Docility

by Greg Brown

6 | On Faith and Docility

tell me I’m wrong where I already know I’m wrong; I need a church to tell me I’m wrong where I think I’m right.” Whatever being a Christian requires, it has to require something. It would be easy to explain one’s Christianity to the world if Christianity required nothing over and above the world’s expectations—but at the same time, Christianity would in that case become pointless, a credo without practical implications. It’s this aspect of Christianity that is simultaneously exciting and daunting. As Chesterton wrote elsewhere, “There never was anything so perilous or so exciting as orthodoxy.”1 I think the virtue toward which Chesterton’s claim points is that of docility. Today, the docile person evokes the image of a sheep; he apparently lacks conviction and is willing to be pushed around—in the case under our consideration, by an institutional church. One might worry, furthermore, that to believe something on faith is tantamount to believing it without reason. This might seem especially offensive in the case of a religion whose Messiah claims to be “the Way, the Truth, and the Life”—for how could one accord the appropriate respect to the Truth by believing in him without adequate reason?

Etymologically, however, docility just is teachability, that is, the readiness to engage in the sort of self-doubt requisite for learning. Understood in this way, docility is the proper response of the Christian to his existential situation—it’s a reliable way of assimilating oneself to what is true and of growing in virtue. Why this is so, I’ll argue, can be seen by looking at an account of knowledge sketched by Alasdair MacIntyre, and by applying that account to the Christian tradition.

Begin by stepping back, for a moment, to scrutinizing belief in general.

A belief is a mental state that seeks to conform to reality, or equivalently, seeks truth, where truth is understood in terms of correspondence to reality.

MacIntyre, while reflecting on Pope Saint John Paul II’s encyclical Fides et Ratio, argues for this conception of belief and truth.2 True belief, on this sort of theory, involves a kind of identity between “how things are” and “how one takes them to be” in the sense that “the words that would have to be used to specify the content of his thought are the same words that would tell us how things are.”3 A mark of the truth of my belief that I am typing, then, is the fact that the same words are used to express what I believe and what is the case (namely, that I am typing). The sort of identity that obtains might be called formal identity; there is no typing literally occurring in my skull, but some sort of sameness obtains between me and what is real, when I both type and believe that I type.

While it’s famously difficult to define knowledge, one can approach the topic of what makes belief warranted less ambitiously. MacIntyre thinks that any theory of truth “needs to explain why we cannot but take truth to be a good, so that ‘false,’ whether predicated of a belief, a judgement, a testimony, or a coin, or a friend, always has the gerundive force of ‘This is something to be rejected.’”4 A true belief is a good thing to have and to express, while a false belief is a failure qua belief. There is a performative fault in someone who asserts one of his beliefs without adequate ground to think it’s true; thus asserting a belief requires that one can honestly think it true, and this requires that the belief seems to have been formed by the right sort of receptivity with reality. MacIntyre writes, “When we take our assertions to be true, when we take it that their content is identical with how things are, we also take it that this is because our thoughts in the assertive mode have been made what they are by that same reality about which we are thinking.”5 Beliefs can be accidentally true, but to assert just is to assert that one’s belief is not accidentally true. Thus “the mind is receptive to external reality in such

a way and to such a degree that its judgments, at least on this occasion and concerning this subject matter, are true and true because of this receptivity.”6 Receptivity is fundamental in the proper formation of belief; beliefs ought to result from channels that make them receptive to reflecting the way the world is. What this amounts to in the case of basic perceptual beliefs—like the belief that I am typing—is plain enough. My visual apparatus is apt to yield states of beliefs with content formally identical, in the sense outlined above, to how things are.

The situation is more complicated when certain beliefs are not formed as a result of such straightforward perceptual mechanisms. This bears on the Christian’s epistemological situation, for the Christian has probably learned what he has about Christ from the Bible, from his parents, and from his church; though he might report seeing and hearing God, he has not seen or heard God as I now see my keyboard and hear the clack of its keys.

Epistemic reliance on others, however, is not uniquely the province of the Christian or even of the religious. If we restrict ourselves to consideration of beliefs acquired through what could straightforwardly be described as perceptual experience, we still lack an account of how someone reading a chemistry or history textbook might acquire beliefs that he is warranted in asserting. The philosopher James Ross writes: The largest percentage of our knowledge comes to each of us through our habitual trust in the reports, research, and opinions of others whom we take (perhaps by an additional application of faith) It would be easy to explain one’s Christo be in a position to know. And we do not require that in tianity to the world if Christianity order to be in a position to know one must in every case be able to find out for himself. It would be a rare person who required nothing over and above the could claim to have found out or to have checked (or even to world’s expectations…It’s this aspect of have partially verified) any significant proportion of the things Christianity that is simultaneously he counts among his knowledge (unless he has adopted an unconventionally restrictive conception of “knowledge” or an exciting and daunting. uncommonly loose concept of “checking”).7 An empiricist might concede that a kind of faith is placed in such sources but insist that these cases are quite distinct from instances of religious belief, for one might believe a chemistry or history textbook because they probably contain the truth—and this, one knows from previous reliance on textbooks of various sorts. This response, however, is wanting, for it inevitably requires further reliance on the same sorts of sources of knowledge—for what confirmation has one that history textbooks do not lie, that does not rely on other human testimony?8 The phenomenon of believing someone on faith is more subtle.9 Scrupulous judgments of probability like those in which the thoroughgoing empiricist wants everyone to engage are rare in practice, indeed, because taken literally they amount to practical irrationality.10 St. Thomas Aquinas picked up on the practical rationality of faith in his commentary on Boethius’ De Trinitate: And since among men dwelling together one man should deal with another as with himself in what he is not self-sufficient, therefore it is needful that he be able to stand with as much certainty on what another knows, but of which he himself is ignorant, as upon the truths which he himself knows.

Hence it is that in human society faith is necessary in order that one man give credence to the words of another...11 In other words, according to Aquinas, the necessity of faith in one’s fellows is something like the necessity of property and exchange. In the strictest of senses, a community lacking the institution of property is possible, but in practice, owing to the limitations of man, some sort of institution of property

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is indispensable. Likewise, there are no epistemic individualists who pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Someone who attempts such an abstemious feat is epistemically irresponsible.

The necessity of property and of faith referred to here is neither logical (like “Every bachelor is unmarried”) nor causal (like “That which goes up must come down”); it is, rather, what Elizabeth Anscombe called “Aristotelian necessity,” that “by which something is called necessary if without it good cannot be attained.” 12 I have argued previously that the necessities on which the species-specific human good hangs provide the conditions for morally good human actions.13 It is in this sense that we can meet the worry raised earlier, that MacIntyre’s account of the propriety of belief meshes well with perceptual beliefs but not faith. For there is a real sense in which the person who puts his faith in those he sees as credible authorities is engaging in an activity that promises to beget beliefs receptive to the way things are.

The practically wise human being, then, will be disposed to place his faith in the rest of his community on a variety of isThe looming question, then, is sues. The looming question, then, is whether the practically wise human being might put his faith in such an archaic thing as a whether the practically wise hu- religious institution. Of course, there have been thousands of reman being might put his faith in ligious institutions, so how could anyone put his faith in just one? difficulty here is not, in my view, fatal, for the objection does such an archaic thing as a reli- The not properly appreciate the practical dimension of trust involved gious institution. in the above account of faith; the truth of one religion does not necessarily imply the practical irrationality of those who participate in others, nor does the existence of other religions imply that one lacks practical warrant to participate in the one.

The question of whether it makes sense to be a Christian is a complex one. I suspect that most modern persons require something of a “metaphysical rebirth” to accept Christianity, if only because it’s natural for someone growing up today to find Christianity not just evidentially unwarranted but obviously false and unscientific. My personal trust in the Catholic Church has been actuated by a number of other factors which, much as I’d like now to try, are impossible to summarize in any short space.

Suffice it to observe that the general principle of the Church’s authority to speak for and as Christ is its historic witness—classically the witness made by the Apostles and the Saints who devoted their lives to proclaiming God’s word, but also its ongoing witness through the present age.

Given that there is a God and that man was created in his image, I take it that the Church is necessary—necessary, that is, in the abovementioned Aristotelian sense.

There is a good which “hangs on” the Church: namely, our good, our salvation, and our attainment of God. Man is in such a state that the truth, both the “theoretical” truth and the practical, moral truth, is tough to get at—if not impossible to get at—on his own. If he’s honest with himself, he recognizes that epistemic individualism can be little more than a pretense; the Church promises a way by which this challenge can be met.

This returns me to my original theme. Chesterton, in the quote with which I opened, notices the distinctive point of religion, essentially a response to man’s lonely existential state. One corollary of man’s situation is that there will be some questions pertaining to his conduct on which he is “wrong.” Sometimes—though perhaps not often—he is both wrong and knows he is wrong. However, there will also be points on which, as Chesterton says, “I’m wrong where I think I’m right,” and there is where the Church is needed.

The proper response is not always, in my view, to start defending every dogma as though one now finds it obvious and patently intelligible. The difficulty in such an approach is the one that I outlined above: The truths of Christianity, if they’re anything at all, are most important as truths. The peculiar, culturally and historically contingent

8 | On Faith and Docility

existential situation of every human does not always make this sort of defense possible.

What does remain possible is adopting the attitude of docility, of teachability.

In a recent interview, the editor of First Things, R. R. Reno, was asked “whether American Catholics were not now ‘cafeteria Catholics.’” He responds along the lines of my present theme: We’re all at odds with some aspect of the Church’s leadership. It’s not possible for Rome to teach in a way that entirely satisfies the social, moral, intellectual, and spiritual needs of more than one billion people. There’s a hierarchy of truth that helps us understand why some things are obligatory, while others are recommended to us for our consideration. What matters most, however, is our spiritual disposition. Are we docile to our bishops and their fraternal head, the pope? Are we willing to see and learn what they want to teach us? Will we accompany them, to use one of Francis’ favored images?

The Church asks us to be docile. That’s my goal. I don’t need to agree with Francis in all instances, even most. But I need to be open to instruction. I need to try to see what he’s trying to get us to see.14 This is, I think, an important attitude to take. It is honest about the cultural prejudices that one inevitably brings into any encounter with the eternal Church; it finds space to give weight to that which is proposed by the Church for one’s spiritual good.

The docile spirit is embodied in St. Anselm’s motto, fides quaerens intellectum—faith seeking understanding. Ultimately, docility hopes for a unity of faith and reason, in which the doctrines that presently seem unintelligible become clear, though it acknowledges that complete unity may not be available on this side of eternity. In the meantime, docility simply requires that one give the teaching its due, that one regard it as something worth trying to understand, on the authority of that which proposed it for understanding. r Endnotes 1. Chesterton, G. K., Orthodoxy (New York: John Lane Company, 1908), pp. 185.

2. MacIntyre, Alasdair, “Truth as a good: a reflection on Fides et ratio,” The Tasks of Philosophy: Selected Essays, Volume 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 197-215. MacIntyre’s account might be called a “correspondence theory of truth,” but he argues that it is distinct from what is often called by that name. See ibid., pp. 198-200, and David, Marian, “The Correspondence Theory of Truth,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, url: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/truth-correspondence/.

3. MacIntyre, op. cit., pp. 200.

4. Ibid., 198.

5. Ibid., 201.

6. Ibid.

7. Ross, James Introduction to Philosophy of the Religion (Toronto: The Macmillan Company, 1969), pp. 79.

8. Johnson, David, Hume, Holism, and Miracles (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999), pp. 93-97.

9. Anscombe, Elizabeth, “Faith,” Ethics, Religion and Politics: Collected Philosophical Papers, Volume III (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1981), pp. 113-120.

10. Ross, James, op.cit., pp. 80.

11. Aquinas, Thomas, Super Boethium De Trinitate, trans. Rose E. Brennan, S.H.N. (Herder, 1946), III, 1.

12. Anscombe, Elizabeth, “On Promising and its Justice, and Whether it Need be Respected in Foro Interno,” op. cit., pp. 18-19; Foot, Philippa, Natural Goodness (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 15.

13. Brown, Greg, “Morality, Rationality, and Natural Law: A Response to John Lennox,” Peripateo (Fall 2014), pp. 21-28, especially 24-26.

14. Reno, R. R., “No More Tirades,” First Things, 29 September 2015

Swarthmore Peripateo | 9

Untangling Happiness

Growing up in a Christian household, attending Christian schools my entire life, and having an incredibly optimistic mother, I was often told that Christians should always be joyful. Many Christians made it a point to tell me that joy is more than just the fleeting emotion of happiness, but rather it is being content with what God has given us regardless of our circumstances. But whenever I heard explanations like this, I thought, “but Christians are humans.” We have emotions and are affected by our circumstances. We can’t be sad and happy at the same time, so how can we be sad and joyful at the same time? What exactly is the difference between happiness and joy?

I wanted to come to a better understanding of this Christian concept of joy.

In order to explore this, I decided first to compare the differences, if there were any, between the ways some Christians and non-Christians describe joy and happiness.

If Christians define joy as something more permanent than happiness, how do people who do not identify as Christian define it?

Is there a distinction?

When I asked a close friend who does not claim to be religious how she defined joy, her first response was that she does not use the word very often. Happiness was the word she would use in most cases. So I asked her if this was because joy sounded too archaic for everyday use or because she thought the two words held different meanings. Her reply was that joy was similar to, but rarer and more momentary than, happiness, so she simply didn’t have many occasions to use the word. According to her, joy is special yet fleeting. It’s the immediate feeling of elation after experiencing

10 | Untangling Happiness and Joy

an amazing event such as getting accepted to a dream school, having a newborn baby, or being offered a lucrative job. Happiness, on the other hand, is the common, steady state of being cheerful.

The way she distinguished joy and happiness was almost the opposite of how a Christian might distinguish them. Instead of joy being the constant variable and happiness being fleeting moments of emotion, joy is the temporary feeling and happiness is continual. But in both cases, joy is perceived as the thing with greater power. For many Christians, joy is a separate concept altogether that exceeds the emotion of happiness, while for people like my friend, it is simplya stronger emotion than happiness.

With this in mind, I was reminded of an explanation of joy I heard from a pastor that could make sense to anyone: joy comes from realizing that you have in your possession the thing you value the most in your life. This thing can be anything.

For instance, a child may value a certain doll the most, so having that doll in her possession will give her joy. But as she grows and her values change, she finds joy in having other things such as a certain pair of shoes, an acceptance letter from a college, or a relationship with someone she loves.

It is important to keep in mind that this thing we value may be temporary or permanent. Thus, the state of joy can fade quickly or last forever. When it fades rather quickly, a non-Christian may perceive it as a distinguished moment of joy. On the other hand, Christians tend to perceive it as the brief emotion of happiness. So what about when it lasts forever? Can it even last forever? This seems to be where the difference between happiness and Christian joy

and Joy

by Juhyae Kim

becomes clear.

In the example of a child valuing different things as she grows up, none of the things listed are permanent. They are bound to become barrel as time passes. And since what she values the most keeps jumping from non-permanent thing to nonpermanent thing, it is impossible for her to constantly feel joy. She feels it, then loses it once she starts valuing another thing that is not already in her possession. Thus, joy becomes the fleeting elation that occurs at the moment an individual gains something they treasure. And it’s generally difficult for most people to find and value something that is permanent.

For Christians, however, the case is different. A Christian’s greatest value in life is knowing that he or she is a part of God’s family and has a relationship with him through Christ. If we trust that this relationship will remain permanent, and if it is what we value the most in our lives, it makes sense for us to be joyful at all times.

Consequently, having other good things in life would result in temporary, conditional happiness, but not joy. Joy should be rooted in the fact that we have been reunited with God; it is not affected by worldly circumstances. Yes, Christians will feel devastated and terribly heartbroken at times, but these emotions cannot crush the deep peace of knowing that one day, regardless of what happens to us on earth, we will be with God in paradise.

In John 16:20 & 22, Jesus says to his disciples prior to being arrested for crucifixion, “I tell you the truth, you will weep and mourn over what is going to happen to me, but the world will rejoice. You will grieve, but your grief will suddenly turn to won-

derful joy… So you have sorrow now, but I will see you again; then you will rejoice, and no one can rob you of that joy.”1 The disciples would be grief-stricken by what was happening to Jesus on earth, but once they witnessed his resurrection and understood that he had secured their salvation, nothing in the world could rob them of the joy of knowing that they were saved.

Christians today experience this same joy, which is different from merely feeling happy about becoming a child of God and then quickly letting other things in life become more important.

Joy for a Christian is knowing God and understanding how we are permanently connected to him. It is the opposite of letting worldly circumstances pull us into devastation with no hope. It is also not to be confused with the positive emotions that we feel when God allows our lives to progress smoothly.

I know I still haven’t completely wrapped my head around this concept, and I definitely need to work on living it out.

But at the end of this investigation, the difference between happiness and joy has become a bit clearer to me, and I have come to a slightly deeper understanding of verses that tell me to “always be joyful”2 and that say, “when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy.”3 Christian joy rises above happiness, sadness, and all other emotions because its source is found not in this temporary world, but in the everlasting God. r Endnotes 1. John 16:20 & 22, NLT 2. Thessalonians 5:16-17, NLT 3. James 1:2-3, NLT

Swarthmore Peripateo | 11

THE YELLOW FACE

by Becky Griest

these are special moments, that we face towards God’s love, together, golden vessel filled by sun.

Son.

As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit—just as it has taught you, remain in him. I John 2:27

12 | The Yellow Face

PETER ON THE WATER

“Lord, if it is y o u tell me to c o m e t o y

o

u”

the man in the middle of the boat, determined, rowing

at considerable speeds

towards.. what he needs to accomplish to be P eter

sees, a lighted figure coming t o w a r d h i m ease and peace. seeing l o v e.

how the sun shines always in my lifetime.

I just want to soak, every cell with light never gone. always giving I just had to look up.

Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus “ You of little faith,” Jesus said, “why did you doubt?”

COLORFUL PEOPLE

people, towards God, toward light, towards love. it gives us the love in our bones that lets us move. we receive.

Swarthmore Peripateo |13

Who Do You Say That I Am?

Pseudo-Dionysius on the Divine Names

by Nicholas Zahorodny

Thoughtful individuals, both within and with-

out the faith, may be forgiven for experiencing perplexity in their encounters with common Christian descriptions of God. Often times, such perplexity is formally stated in the form of a paradox, generated between the divine attributes and one’s experience of the world: If God is all powerful, all knowing, and all loving, then how is it that the shadows of evil, suffering, and death continue to plague humankind? At other times, the paradox is internal to the concept: How can God be indivisibly one and yet, without contradiction, also three divine persons? Such paradoxes emerge, in many cases, on account of the difficulty of fully comprehending the concepts invoked, especially when such concepts, like omnipresence and omniscience, do not feature in everyday life. To be present and to have knowledge are familiar enough, but attempting to extend these concepts for applicability on an infinite or unbounded plane falls far beyond what is familiar. The temptation to discard the divine attributes as meaningless or to dismiss the concept of God on a charge of incoherence ought, however, to be resisted.

One must, of course, consent to address the problem with subtlety. And since the Hellenization of early Christianity, theologians have attempted to address these theological problems with the philosophical subtlety that they require, connecting language, metaphysics, and epistemology to develop a deeper understanding of the divine names. Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagate, a theologian writing in the fifth and sixth centuries, produced two tracts The Divine Names and Mystical Theology that address these difficulties directly. A synthesis of Christian and Platonic thought, his writing is as lyrical as it is penetrating, and that later theologians as influential as St. Thomas Aquinas have cited Pseudo-Dionysius frequently testifies to the importance and the insight of his work.

In this article, I will draw from Pseudo-Dionysius’ approach to articulate more precisely the problem of divine predication and to outline its solution. In brief, the problem of understanding the

14 | Who Do You Say That I Am?

divine names is the problem of discovering how a superhuman significance could possibly dwell within a language that has developed squarely within the boundary lines of human realities and human concerns. In developing a creative, yet principled approach to this problem, Pseudo-Dionysius allows both the transcendence and the immanence of God to guide his thinking, such that, on his account, the semantic relationship between human and divine descriptions, properly understood, comes to reflect the deeper, metaphysical relationship between God and the world.

Such an investigation is hopeless, of course, if God so outstrips human language that all names must fail radically as descriptions of the divine nature. In this case, bestowing titles on God might primarily be an emotive act, expressing honor, reverence, and awe, as would be fitting for creatures inferior to their creator.

The words “God is Life, God is Light, and God is Truth” would not, despite their appearance, effectively predicate anything of their subject; instead they might translate into an insubstantial “Yay for God!” With God so far surpassing mortal ken, the divine names would not lead to God, or express knowledge about any aspect of his Nature. At the inception of The Divine Names, Dionysius frames this question himself: “[If God] cannot be reached by any perception, imagination, conjecture, name, discourse, apprehension, or understanding, how then is our Discourse concerning the Divine Names to be accomplished, since we see that the SuperEssential Godhead is unutterable and nameless?”1 At this juncture, one confronts a choice between two undesirable options. Either God becomes unknowable, a nameless stranger floating impossibly high above the world, or else God becomes lowered to the level of human intellect, suffering a diminution of his transcendent and unbounded glory.

Such a dilemma would prove intractable if God had sealed Himself away from the world, leaving man to search him out without the aid of mark or sign. A finite creature like man could not,

ated world, which must, as all creations do, reflect something of its Creator. Dionysius writes, “[God] contain[s] all things beforehand within Itself, after a simple and uncircumscribed manner through the perfect excellence of Its one and all-creative Providence, and thus we draw from the whole creation Its appropriate praises and Its Names.”4 To indulge, somewhat prematurely, in analogy, all of creation is described here as pre-existent in the mind of God, not unlike the way in which the finished form of a statue might preexist in the mind of a sculptor. Through the action of divine Providence, God draws all of creation to a likeness with the model that pre-exists in him. Hence, the inspired authors speak according to reason in likening some parts of creation to their creator and, in so doing, applying them as names.

Having established that the names possess some significance, however, is a minor victory. It still remains to uncover exactly what sort of significance such names might have. In order to pose the problem more precisely, it will be help to consider it as it arises in an example. At the beginning of the Holy Gospel according to John, the evangelist refers to God as logos, translated “mind,” “reason,” or, perhaps most famously, as “word.” Let us consider the middle name, “reason.” Through reason, human beings examine the validity of arguments, infer conclusions from premises, and construct valid arguments of their own – reason is discursive. A successful course of discursive reasoning can lead individuals proceeding from sound premises towards knowledge of the truth. The objects of human reason include mathematical entities, abstract qualities, and, most generally, propositions. Although more could certainly be said about the nature of reason, perhaps it is possible already to examine an intuitive claim about the meaning of this name: human discursive reasoning reflects divine reasoning, which proceeds in the same way and with the same objects, except infinitely more effectively. God solves each and every problem instantaneously, without difficulty or error.

Photo by Heitor Santos

under such conditions, possibly approach a revelation of the infinite. Fortunately, the Infinite God gifts to man, and to all of creation, a revelation of himself: “while dwelling alone by Itself, and having there firmly fixed Its super-essential Ray, It lovingly reveals Itself by illuminations corresponding to each separate creature’s powers, and thus draws upwards holy minds into such contemplation, participation, and resemblance of Itself as they can attain.”2 The question arises, then, as to the nature of this illumination.

Leaving aside a personal revelation through mystical experience, Dionysius locates God’s self-revelation in two sources, the Holy Scripture and, in a secondary sense, the Book of Nature. Of the two, however, Holy Scripture must predominate: “We must not then dare to speak, or indeed to form any conception, of the hidden super-essential Godhead, except those things that are revealed to us from the Holy Scripture.”3 For Dionysius, such reverence is not mere pretense. Holy Scripture represents the most direct selfrevelation of a transcendent, otherwise wholly unsearchable God. For man to rely on himself would be for him to fall into the yawning chasm between his own finitude and the infinite nature of his Creator. Holy Scripture provides a certainty, otherwise unattainable by man, that a given starting point of investigation into the divine nature, that is a divine name, leads forward toward truth.

It happens, though, that the inspired authors of Holy Scripture apply a surprisingly diverse set of epithets to God. Dionysius mentions a number of more straightforward, or at least more conventional, names: Good, Wise, Eternal, Lord of Lords, and Creator of Ages. Yet he also mentions a series of names that cry out for further explanation, citing passages of Holy Scripture wherein authors refer to God alternately as “Fire,” “Water,” “Dew,” “Cloud,” and “Archetypal Stone.” In such cases, Dionysius observes, the Spirit has moved the inspired writers of Holy Scripture to draw from nature in describing nature’s God. This second, subsidiary source, the Book of Nature, encompasses the whole of the cre-

Swarthmore Peripateo | 15

However, the picture that emerges, of the context of sensible reality, through di- into a problem of ambiguity. That crucial God as a sort of superhuman, a more intel- rect sensory acquaintance and through the similarity in which the analogy consists, ligent Einstein, lowers God uncomfortably application of their intellect, at varying de- for “Reason” and for many other terms, reclose to man and, in doing so, raises more grees of abstraction, to sensible objects. As mains unclear. issues than it resolves. Discursive reasoning, a result, a familiar notion emerges, applicaIn understanding the “human standard” and additionally the solving of a problem, ble in the same way to a variety of different to which Dionysius refers, one must obrepresents a sequential process that oc- objects. Consider, as an example, the term serve that in many cases even such analogicurs, however rapidly, in time. These two “vast.” Although wastelands, skies, deserts, cal predication is parasitic on the human elements -sequence and time - contradict oceans, mountain ranges, and outer space experience of the sensible world, and on the at least two other of the divine attributes, all differ significantly, one can apply the operation of the intellect upon it. Insofar namely the changelessness and the eternity term “vast” in the same way to each. Such as the familiar notions of most descriptive of God. For an entity to undergo any se- predication, conveying the same sense in terms developed with primary reference quential process entails its transition from diverse cases, is called univocal predication. to physical realities, the extent to which one state to the next, impossible in a beNevertheless, there arise instances in and direction in which they can stretch, ing that remains always the same. Similarly, which differences in kind can grow to such even analogically, depends on that reality. temporal processes cannot unwind for a a significant degree that univocal predica- Whereas analogical predication avoids the being whose mode of existence does not tion becomes impossible. The mind, espe- complete incoherence of univocal predicacontain a temporal dimension. So, rather cially the mind of a particularly wise and tion with respect to God, it remains only than illuminating the divine nature, the contemplative individual, might be de- partially a success. Dionysius, therefore, straightforward application of this name scribed appropriately as vast. Yet the mind urges the reader to seek out a transcendent only throws it into confusion. If such is is not vast in the same exact sense that the sense of words, more befitting for the interthe fate of “Reason,” one can only shrink sea is vast; with regard to the sea, “vastness” pretation of divine names. back from the thought of titles like “Water” denotes a spatial property, whereas with What, though, could be meant by a and “Cloud.” To state the problem more regard to the mind, “vastness” denotes a “transcendent sense?” Dionysius illustrates generally, if one predicates names or quali- property that is unequivocally non-spatial. his intention with an example, beginning ties of God in the normal way, with, as discussed above, a passage then one reaps, though hoping Either God becomes unknowable, a namefrom Holy Scripture: “The foolishfor knowledge, only contradicness of God is wiser than men.”6 less stranger floating impossibly high above tion and incoherence. Yet, for In this passage, the divine author the world, or else God becomes lowered to reasons earlier discussed, such predicates foolishness and wisdom names must lead, through some the level of human intellect, suffering a dimi- of God. Dionysius, then, sets himmethod, towards truths about self about the ambitious task of nution of His transcendent and unbounded clarifying not just one name, but God. Sensitive to this problem, glory. a title, “Foolish Wisdom,” subject Dionysius attributes confusion to a compresence of opposites. of this nature to a misuse of Confronted with this dilemma, language. In order to examine his expla- In order for the application of terms like Dionysius invokes the transcendent sense: nation clearly, it is worth quoting him at “vast” to communicate anything meaning- “Speaking, then, in a transcendent manner length: ful about the mind, they cannot be under- of this ‘Foolish Wisdom,’ which has neither We misinterpret things above us by our stood to apply in the same way. With such Reason nor Intelligence, let us say that It is own conceits and cling to the familiar no- a wide difference in kind, predication must the Cause of all Intelligence and Reason, tions of our sense, and, measuring Divine proceed analogically, so that the same de- and of all Wisdom and Understanding.”7 things by our human standards, we are led scription possesses different senses depend- The transcendent sense, then, reaches beastray by the superficial meaning of the Di- ing on the nature of its object. Although a yond the way in which God’s nature revine and Ineffable Truth…the act whereby commonality exists between the ocean and flects both halves of a binary, and touches the Intellect communes with the things the mind, such that the same word might upon the point at which God grounds its that are beyond it transcends its intellectual apply to both, this commonality holds by terms. It does not attempt so much, as the nature. This transcendent sense, therefore, similarity of particular properties rather analogical does, to predicate a property of must be given to our language about God, than by their identity. When one interprets God; rather, it aims to assert a much more and not our human sense.5 a divine name “Reason” analogically, one foundational sort of the relationship beStated otherwise, human beings develop avoids the problem of univocity, namely tween a property and its divine subject. In the meanings of their descriptive terms in incoherence, but stumbles, at least at first, the normal case, any substantial being, a

16 | Who Do You Say That I Am?

horse, a vine, and so on, stands in relation true Being in the Creative Originals.”8 In its ascent it contracts its terminology, and of priority to its properties – the bold-spir- a way, then, this passage elaborates on the when the whole ascent is passed it will be itedness of a horse cannot exist absent the points raised above. Dionysius observes totally dumb, being at last united with Him horse, nor can the vine’s winding shape ex- that a source or a cause contains, in a sense, Whom words cannot describe.”9 Affirmations of God might, if carefully qualified, ist absent the vine. The trannot mislead one about the scendent sense of the divine God is called foolish for inconceivably outstripping Divine Nature, even if innames express that God and capable of capturing its full his Divine properties stand human wisdom, for causing it, and thus only in a reality, but negative theolin a sort of super-priority to transcendent and excessive sense, for lacking it. ogy, Dionysius claims, acall properties analogous to tually leads the soul up to his own. All such properties, union with God. For as one in a word, exist only insofar as and to the extent that they first exist in its effects within itself, but that it does not soars to meet God in contemplation, terhim. As both its originating and sustaining simultaneously exist as the subject of most minology that is defective gradually falls cause, God therefore stands prior to all hu- of these effects. To take another example, away, until even the most basic concepts or man wisdom, hence the transcendent sense the heated coil filament of an incandescent attributions, themselves still admitting of of “Foolish Wisdom.” bulb can illuminate an entire room but does some defect in describing a transcendent One might complain, however, that such not also illuminate itself. Or rather, the God, fall away as well. After one comes to a solution only solves half of the problem. wire, as the source of light, is most intensely an understanding of these negations, one is The divine nature may comprehend wisdom illuminated and, for this reason, most ob- left with nothing, with the Darkness that is in this way, but to suggest that foolishness scured. So, one might identify God as the God dwelling in Unapproachable Light.10 also has its source in God seems absurd. source of human wisdom and yet as lack- Of course, the sense in which one grasps Yet Dionysius assures the reader that “the ing human wisdom, not for being beneath God cannot be the same discursive sense in lack of Mind and Sensation must be predi- human wisdom but for being its ultimate which one grasps a concept, or any other cated of God by excess and not by defect… progenitor. Hence, God is called foolish for abstract entity, for “It transcends all affirthe Mind of God embraces all things in inconceivably outstripping human wisdom, mation by being the perfect and unique an utterly transcendent knowledge and, in for causing it, and thus only in a transcen- Cause of all things, and transcends all negation by the pre-eminence of its simple Its causal relation to all things, anticipates dent and excessive sense, for lacking it. within Itself the knowledge of them all.”

For Dionysius, then, one seeking knowl- and absolute nature – free from every limiOnce again, Dionysius negates in order to edge of God through his divine names tation and beyond them all.”11In one sense, break the stranglehold of familiar notions, must understand these names analogically then, man cannot even negate sufficiently to impress upon the reader that divine Wis- and, even more importantly, in their tran- to reach down to the bottom of everything, dom and human wisdom are of such differ- scendent sense. Yet because of his recog- where the simplicity of the divine character ent orders that there can be no admixture nition of the finitude of human language, resides. In another sense, however, he has of the two in God. In referencing God as Dionysius did not consider this sort of cleared his intellect, as far as humanly posa cause, however, Dionysius demonstrates affirmative predication, or via positiva, to sible, from every degree of falsity, freeing his belief that any further elaboration on constitute the highest sort of investigation the soul and its spiritual sense to bask in the this point requires an understanding of the into the divine nature. If the transcendent unoccluded, super-essential ray of its God. transcendent sense. The foregoing sections sense of “Foolish Wisdom” embodies both r defined the transcendent sense with respect an affirmative and a negative dimension, to affirmations of God, but to what could then one might characterize Dionysius as Endnotes the transcendent sense refer in cases like valuing the negative dimension much more 1. The Divine Names, Dionysius 59 this one, where the predicate is instead ne- highly. This negative dimension in the tran- 2. Dionysius 54 gation. Further elaboration from Dionysius scendent sense of the divine names shades 3. Dionysius 51 will prove helpful in this respect: “We do into an apophatic theology, or via negativa, 4.Dionysius 63 not say that the fire which warms and burns that consists in expressing truths about 5. Dionysius 147 is itself burnt or warmed. Even so if any one God through negation, and of this mode 6. Dionysius 147 says that Very Life lives, or that Very Light of theological inquiry, Dionysius writes, 7. Dionysius 148-149 is enlightened, he will be wrong…unless… “in the present treatise [Mystical Theol- 8. Dionysius 75 he were to use these terms…to mean that ogy] [the course of the argument] mounts 9. Mystical Theology, Dionysius 198 the qualities of created things pre-exist, af- upward from below towards the category 10. Dionysius 198 ter a superlative manner as touching their of transcendence, and in proportion to 11. Dionysius 201

Swarthmore Peripateo | 17

Leavening and Life after Swarthmore

by Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon

I.

In August 2013, three months

after graduating from Swarthmore, I moved to Houston. I grew up north of Chicago, and nearly all of my extended family is on the East Coast. But I’d taken a job developing math curricula for a non-profit, work I was excited to do. I didn’t study abroad at Swat. Houston would be my cross-cultural experience.

“I live here but I’m not from here,” I used to tell people. I didn’t plan to stay more than a few years. The only furniture I bought was a twin bed (I’d eat dinner sitting on the floor). I commuted exclusively by bicycle: as a way to resist Houston’s driving culture, but also because I felt a car would tie me down. I wanted to be ready to leave as soon as the time came.

I don’t think my situation was uncommon. Many of my classmates spent a year or two at their first jobs and then moved on to grad school or pursued other work opportunities. But how do we use that time well? What deserves your attention when you feel like you’re just passing through?

II.

Luke 13:20-21 Again he asked, “What shall I compare the kingdom of God to? It is like yeast

that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough.”

Taken alone, there’s a lot to say about this passage from Luke. But, with varying degrees of nuance, most readings identify the central thrust as something like this: “The Kingdom of God is radically transformative.” Just a small amount of yeast can totally change the character of the dough, taking what’s there and turning it into something better than it could be on its own. When the love of God gets into the world, it has that kind of transformative power: transforming what’s there to make it better.

But I’d like to suggest that there’s another level of complexity here. And it comes into view only when we take the passage as part of a pair. The mention of yeast begs us to examine the most important story about yeast in the Bible: Exodus 12:11 This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the Lord’s Passover.

12:39 The dough was without yeast because they

18 | Leavening, Roots, and Life After Swarthmore

had been driven out of Egypt and did not have time to prepare food for themselves.

The bread in Exodus is unleavened because God’s people are on the run. After years of slavery and oppression—after witnessing the murder of their children—the Israelites finally have a chance to escape.

There’s no time for elaborate preparations.

They make what food they can and set off in the middle of the night, hoping to heaven that they’ll never have to return.

So what happens when we look at these two passages side by side? In Exodus, we see a yeast-free escape from oppression: a quick getaway with no time for leavening. Later, in Luke, Jesus tells us that the Kingdom of God is like yeast itself. What does the lens of the first passage shows us about the second? I think it’s this: in the Kingdom of God, there’s time to put yeast in the dough.

By saying that the Kingdom of God is like yeast that a woman works through the dough, Jesus is saying that it’s like not Passover. It’s like not packing up all your belongings and making a quick exit in the dead of night. It’s like not having to escape.

Or, in positive terms: It’s like being able to invest in our communities, taking the time to stick around and watch the dough rise.

Sometimes we have to run away, of

course. The Kingdom of God is here, but not all-the-way here. There are still things to escape from, still people in circumstances they’d leave if they could. Exodus is the story of a people who didn’t have time for yeast, not because they didn’t want to invest in their communities, but because they were enslaved by that community. We weren’t ready for yeast in Exodus: because we were leaving; because we were on the road.

But the Kingdom of God is for a time when we’re not leaving. It’s for a time when we get to stay, get to see what happens, get to be part of what happens. Yeasted bread is the food of a free people—people who don’t need to escape in the dead of night.

It’s the food of people putting down roots.

When you add yeast, you say: we’re staying here; we’re making something together. I have time for you; I have time for this.

III. I knew I didn’t want to stay long in Houston. I kept my belongings as minimal as possible and never stayed more than 8 months in an apartment, preferring short leases.

And my relationships? My community?

If I’m honest, a lot of it was like unleavened bread. I had matzah friendships: quick to make and better than nothing—but also

dry, brittle, insubstantial.

But not every friendship was like that.

Sometimes some leavening made it in: with my coworkers, the church choir ladies I sang with every week, the friends I made in small group.

And when I took the time to put yeast in the dough—when I wasn’t planning my exodus—that’s where I saw the Kingdom of God. I found it in long conversations with my colleagues about girls and STEM; I heard it when the choir ladies shared stories of their own first years after college; I felt it when my small group prayed for a friend of mine from home.

It turns out that rootedness isn’t actually a function of how long you stay in one place. It has to do with how you live when you’re there. I learned to invest in relationships, talking to people about what mattered to them. I got involved with the Houston storytelling community, doing my best to learn from and contribute to the cultural life of the city. I knew I wouldn’t be in Houston forever, but I was here now.

I left Houston in May and moved to Boston: a city I love with people I love, with public transit and boats in the harbor and trees that change color. And I think I might want to stay here for a while.

But whether it’s one year or ten, I’m learning to ask: Am I making unleavened

bread in this relationship? Or am I really putting something into it, and asking God to do the same? Am I planning to stick around to see it rise?

IV. I mentioned that most readings of the Luke passage essentially amount to, “The Kingdom of God is radically transformative”—and I certainly think that’s true. But to see that radical transformation, we have to add yeast to the dough. We can’t have one foot out the door, ignoring the place where we are because we wish were somewhere else. Even if we’re not there long, we need to invest the time we have if we want to see God’s Kingdom at work.

Unleavened bread is an important part of our history: it’s the story of God delivering his people from slavery. But the promise of the Kingdom—the promise that both is coming and has now come—is that in Christ we’re free; we don’t have to escape.

We have time for yeast.

That doesn’t mean staying in one place our whole lives. It doesn’t mean committing to just one community. But it does mean learning to say: I don’t have forever, but the time I do have, I give freely. I won’t be here my whole life, but I’m here now. And I’m choosing to make leavened bread.r

Swarthmore Peripateo | 19

Jesus Untamed

Reflections on Three Years of Worship in Chester

by Nathan Scalise

10 || To Give or Not Reflections to Give 20 Jesus Untamed: on Three Years of Worship in Chester

For most of my time at Swar-

thmore, I have worshipped at the Salvation Army in Chester. My faith has been greatly shaped by becoming a part of that community. Through worshipping, teaching, and spending a summer running a music camp there, I have become familiar with the other congregants and with some of their experiences. As a white man from a small, rural town, being involved in a largely black, urban community has been eye-opening in many ways. Additionally, I have come to see ways in which Jesus’ teachings, which often relate to, or are directed towards, people who were around the bottom of the social hierarchy, have a profoundly different resonance in the context of the Salvation Army in Chester than they do in a community like Swarthmore. At Swarthmore, when I read scripture in groups, our questions are often interpretive. We ask what a passage means. This is good, and interpretation is important. But in the act of interpreting a text, it is often implicitly assumed that the text does not mean what it says. It would be more accurate to say that the text does not only mean what it says, and this is much of what I’ve experienced directly at the Chester Salvation Army.

At the beginning of his ministry, Jesus proclaims release to the captives1, and later calls his disciples to visit those who are in prison.2 One week, when the Major was preaching about Joseph in prison3, he said, “Now, I’m not gonna ask you all if you’ve been to prison, but I know that most of us have either been there or love someone who has.” He paused meaningfully and added, “Because that’s the way our justice system works,” in a tone of voice that made it clear that he knew how the deck was stacked. I was a bit taken aback, and the immediacy of Jesus’ teaching in this context struck me.

“Prison” and “the captives” were not abstract

concepts. Major often talks about visiting his favorite uncle in prison, and one of the members of the church who I’ve worked closely with has been to prison. There was no discussion of what Jesus meant by “prisoners,” but rather, the church took “prisoners” to mean literally mean “prisoners.” In removing an interpretive step, Jesus’ teaching acquired an immediate applicability.

This doesn’t mean that Jesus is only talking about people who are literally incarcerated, but to ignore or neglect that meaning is to miss a significant layer what is being said.

Similarly, when one of the congregants, who’s already lost one foot to disease, praises God because she thought she was going to lose the other one too but now it looks like the doctors were wrong and she’ll get to keep it, it gives a striking perspective to Jesus’ words about it being better to enter the kingdom of God with part of the body than for the whole body to be cast into hell4. When it comes to physical death, we understand what it means to cut off a part of the body to preserve the rest of it. With respect to spiritual death, the question can get murkier, but it need not always do so.

Moreover, when Jesus talks about hell, it’s often in reference to “Gehenna,”5 which was basically the burning garbage dump at the edge of Jerusalem. It has a decidedly clearer meaning to people who live next to an incinerator. In Chester, it’s not necessary to imagine what an endless garbage fire would be like, because there’s one down the street. Furthermore, it’s well established that the fumes from the incinerator are fairly toxic. Nobody puts a toxic garbage fire in their backyard if they have the money and the power to make sure that it goes somewhere else. So, the reason that the incinerator is in Chester is related to larger structures of power. Bluntly put, in Chester oppression is literally in the air you breathe,

which adds a more visceral element to the power reversals in Jesus’ teaching.

Consider, for instance, the story of the rich man and Lazarus.6 Lazarus experiences poverty and physical affliction while he begs by the rich man’s door. The rich man feasts daily and dresses in fine clothes.

When they both die, Lazarus is taken up to “be with Abraham” (i.e. go to Heaven) while the rich man is sent to Hades (Hell) to be tormented. When the rich man begs Abraham to have Lazarus help relieve his agony, Abraham answers that there is an unbridgeable chasm between them. Looking at that story from Chester, the real life implications of the reversal are so clear that they barely need to be explicated. They are so clear that as someone who goes to school with effectively unlimited food (feasts daily) and doesn’t have to worry about clothing (dresses in fine clothes) the story is downright terrifying.

Jesus talks about counting the cost of discipleship and tells disciples to take up their cross and follow him.7 In most of the Christian contexts I’ve been in, this is often framed in terms of the things that one might have to pass up, frequently some measure of social popularity or material prosperity, which makes sense because this is one of several passages where Jesus says that his disciples must give up their possessions. I’ve often heard the idea generally framed as giving up the life that one has imagined. In the words of an InterVarsity speaker on the topic of following God’s will, “It might mean that God leads you to a different neighborhood than you would’ve picked and when your friends come over they’re like ‘Oh, row homes are cute.’”

When I heard that, I was very taken aback. Much of the congregation in Chester would be praising God if he led them to a row home. It’s not uncommon to see peo-

Swarthmore Peripateo | 21

ple in tears asking God to lead them to an apartment or thanking him for giving them a place to sleep at night. About a year before I started going to the Salvation Army, bullets came through the window during a service. The Major has gotten death threats.

When Jesus tells his disciples to “take up your cross” and follow him, what he means might actually be as stark as what he says.

He uses examples that explicitly include material and relational wealth as well as physical life in the realm of what we may need to give up. But, the magnitude of what he’s asking can be lost in a context where the “cross” is transformed into a metaphor for something like living in a row home.

Such a view implicitly reduces Jesus to another man who wants to separate people from the contents of their wallets. But Jesus cannot be paid off. Jesus doesn’t ask his disciples to give up their fishing boats just for the sake of it. He calls them to follow him and implicitly to give up anything --material or not-- that gets in the way. Allowing material prosperity to be the lens through which one reads the gospel can obscure that call in all its magnitude.

Another point that is often made is that the disciples whom Jesus chose were profoundly unqualified. I would note that most of the disciples were, from an In Chester oppression is literally in the experience and education perless qualified than air you breathe, which adds a more vis- spective, almost all modern clergy. At ceral element to the power reversals the Salvation Army in Chesin Jesus’ teaching. ter, the two main qualifications for any given task are being present and being willing. I devised, organized and ran a summer music camp there the summer after sophomore year. I had no training as a music educator specifically or even more generally in education. I had never come up with an activity schedule. I had never managed collaborations with multiple organizations or worried about things like making sure people had child abuse clearances. But none of this mattered-- I was there, I was a trained musician, and I was willing to learn, serve, and follow where the Spirit led. Similarly, a significant portion of the church has experienced homelessness, incarceration, or both.

When I first went to the Salvation Army, my own prejudices and ideas stopped me from seeing a lot of them as people who

22 | Jesus Untamed: Reflections on Three Years of Worship in Chester

could handle substantial ministries. I wondered how the church could grow without an influx of people who could lead. But, with more time, I have seen that they are present, they are willing, and God has used them in astounding ways. I had believed, implicitly, that God was no longer working in the same way as in the gospels.

At the Salvation Army in Chester, I have experienced a willingness to follow the leading of the spirit that is unlike anything else I have encountered. The first Sunday when I was back at the start of my sophomore year, we cancelled the service and went door to door in an affordable housing development handing out fliers inviting people to a community day with carnival games, inflatable bounce-houses, and free food. Hundreds of people showed up. Another week, there were only about a dozen of us in church, and there were more than a dozen members of the congregation in the hospital. The Major decided that this called for a prayer meeting, and he started taking apart the rows of interlocking chairs at the front of the sanctuary so that we could make a semicircle around the alter.

For most of the next two hours, he would tell us about what was going on with someone who was sick or otherwise in need of prayer. We would pray for them and sing songs chosen from a set of simple choruses used to go with prayer in the Salvation Army. I have rarely been so convinced of the power of prayer and the presence of the Holy Spirit; several of the people for whom we’d prayed were back in church the next week.

A few weeks before fall break, Major started preaching on the story of Joseph in Potifar’s house.8 He started talking about how God blessed Joseph even though he was in slavery and it really resonated with the congregation. It resonated so much that he preached on Joseph again the next week, when he talked about temptation and Potifar’s wife trying to seduce Joseph. This, in turn, resonated and the next week, Major declared that he felt the Spirit was leading him to preach on the story of Joseph and he was going to do so until the Spirit told him otherwise. He preached on Joseph for six consecutive weeks, and the Spirit clearly moved through his preaching on that story.

There was never any indication of when he

would stop until he came in and preached on another story. It was just as evident that the Spirit had been what led him as it was when he stayed on Joseph for six weeks.

As a church musician who works in multiple Christian communities, I’ve heard a lot of people use the phrase “We’ll just see how the Spirit moves” as a euphemism for “I have no idea what’s going to happen here musically and I have no time to fix it.”

Now, as a music major, I will say that the music at the Chester Salvation Army is far from polished. Furthermore, as a worship leader, I would never repeat songs to the extent that we do in Chester. But, there is something profoundly powerful in starting a service without knowing what we’re going to play and in responding to the way that the Spirit is moving in the room and in the testimonies that people in the congregation share between songs. For instance, when someone thanks God for healing or asks God for healing, we’ll sing something about God as a healer and people really get into it. Furthermore, because we repeat songs so often, most of the congregation really knows them well. Most of the songs also don’t have a fixed form, so we’ll repeat things as long they’re resonating; sometimes, we’ll pass a mic around and let people sing what the music major in me would call objectively bad solos, but it’s so obvious that this is worship that I don’t care because it is beautiful. Sometimes we’ll just switch from one song to another without any kind of break or plan, because that’s where the Spirit is leading and because the joy that permeates worship at the Chester Salvation Army cannot be contained by a song form or plan.

All Christian communities that I’ve encountered aspire to be led by the Spirit. That being said, as the son of pastor who’s been deeply involved in church for my whole life, in most places, the Spirit seems to lead in an awfully predictable way. This isn’t to say that the Spirit isn’t moving in those settings, but I’m inclined to think that something as powerful as the Holy Spirit isn’t always going to do what I expect. At the Chester Salvation Army, the Spirit leads in directions that are consistently surprising. Often, the directions seem outright foolish--like going door to door or choosing the songs in the worship set on the fly.

Despite this, it works. God shows up and shows up powerfully in the worship and in the lives of the people I’ve met in the congregation. It is I have rarely been so clear that God is the source of power of prayer and that change because what we do would not work without the Holy Spirit. divine aid.

In the midst of what is likely to be my last year as a part of the Chester Salvation Army, I am struck by how my involvement there has changed me. Viewing the teachings of Jesus from a different perspective has left me with the belief, at once terrifying and reassuring, that he actually meant what he said. The demands of Jesus are often stark and jarring. But when the disciples respond to those demands by saying “Then who can be saved?”, Jesus responds by saying, “For mortals, it is impossible, but for God all things are possible.”9 Through my experiences at the Salvation Army in Chester, I have seen God do things that looked impossible. I have come to see that Jesus does not need to be tamed, and I am grateful that this applies as much to his promises as to his teachings. Jesus demands a lot, but he also equips, he also heals, and he is indeed present always, as he promises to be.10 Allowing Jesus to mean what he says is difficult, but in doing so I have found a closer bond with God and a deeper joy than I ever experienced through trying to tame him. r

convinced of the the presence of

Endnotes 1. Luke 4:18, NRSV 2. Matthew 25:31-46, NRSV 3. Genesis 39:20-23, NRSV 4. Matthew 5:27-30, NRSV 5. This is the word that’s translated as hell in the Matthew passage I referenced earlier, among other places. In Roman times, animal carcasses and dead criminals were likely among the “garbage” being burned.

Gehenna also has other implications as a spiritually cursed and burning place because of stories in Hebrew Scriptures that make it the likely site of child sacrifice.

6. Luke 16:19-31, NRSV 7. Luke 14:25-33, NRSV 8. Genesis 39, NRSV 9. Matthew 19:25-26, NRSV 10. Matthew 28:20, NRSV

Swarthmore Peripateo | 23

PERIPATEO CONTRIBUTORS AND STAFF Michael Broughton ’19 Michael is a freshman from Detroit, Michigan, with academic interests in Neuroscience and Arabic. He firmly believes that chocolate chip ice cream is the best ice cream.

Juhyae Kim ’19 Juhyae is from St. Louis, MO, and is planning on majoring in Linguistics. She misses her dog and probably spends too much time watching puppy videos online.

Becky Griest ’16

Becky is a senior Biology major. She enjoys painting (especially with her fingers) and spending time in nature. She hopes to graduate this coming semester and keep living after college!

Matthew Olivencia-Jacques ’18 Matthew is an Engineering and Political Science double major. His blank stare is his most powerful weapon.

Maisie Wiltshire-Gordon ’13 Maisie’s feet appear six times in the first issue of Peripateo.

Suness Jones ’16 Suness Jones is a bucolic California girl with a penchant for the natural. She spends her free time immersed in the avian community.

Emily Audet ’18 Emily is an Arabic and History double major from Massachusetts. You want a revolution? She wants a revelation, so listen to this declaration.

Roy Walker ’16 Roy is an Economics major and Statistics minor. He believes that matter can be created and destroyed. That’s why he studies econ.

24 | Peripateo Staff and Contributors

Nate Lamb ’17 Nate is a minimalist.

Heitor Santos ’17 What?

Greg Brown ’16 Greg wins some and he loses some. He never frets, and always says it ain’t so.

Nathan Scalise ’16 Nathan is from Brewster, Massachusetts and is currently searching for the 25th hour of the day. When not running or eating, he basically lives in the Lang Music Building.

Nick Zahorodny ’16 Nick is an Eastern Rite Catholic and a double major in Philosophy and Economics. He loves to set his alarm clock to ring at 5:30 AM on Saturdays mornings.

Kelly Hernández ’18 Kelly is changing her major again. Her favorite animal is an aeloid nudibranch -- Google it!

‫לָה‬

Selah.

Pause. Breathe. Think of that.

‫סֶלָה‬ May the path rise to meet you and surround you with good yet to be done.

May your hands grasp onto love and establish peace.

And when you are weary, may the Spirit overflow its banks and bathe your feet in grace.

Selah

‫סֶלָה‬

‫סֶלָה‬