One of my favorite theologians/philosophers is Blaise Pascal. He’s who I had in mind when I titled the blog, "Pensees of a Pastor". He was a French scientist who lived in the 1600’s and believe it or not he invented some things that we even use today like the syringe, the hydraulic press and the adding machine (ok, that’s so old school!).
There was a time when Pascal was religious, at least on the exterior. Then something happened. He had a Holy Ghost moment, a spiritual “aha”, that he speaks of as his point of conversion. He ended up writing "pensees", which is French for “thoughts.” So really his book is a collection of his thoughts with no particular order to it. Recently, there has been a renewed interest in Pascal – Thomas Morris, James Houston, and Peter Kreeft – to name a few who have tried to organize his thoughts to give it some order. What I love about this is that it gives some context to Pascal's famous "Wager". It really takes an understanding of what leads up to the Wager to truly understand it for what it is.
Pascal is considered by some to be the precursor to Christian existentialists. He wasn’t opposed to the rational proofs for God. He just thought it was more helpful to start with what you and I experience in life – what we feel, what we sense as intuitions. I’ve always thought that was extremely helpful in getting people who are not Christian to think about God because the very thing you can’t ignore is what you sense daily about you and about life.
One thing that interested me was did you know that the quote we attribute to Pascal, he never said? The quote is something like, “There is a God-shaped vacuum inside each person that can only be filled with God.” I’ve read his writings and that's not exactly what he wrote. My best guess is it was summarized from this Pensees… “What else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself.” [Pascal, Pensees #425].
So he said something close to it at least. Let me explain what Pascal is saying in this Pensees: Have you ever sensed that your needs are unending? You know how it goes… You buy an ipod and then a newer model with more gigabytes or wi-fi comes out. All of a sudden your ipod is so “ancient” Ugggh. I was happy once I bought it but now I really want the newer model! I have to be honest with you when I say that I’m never satisfied with what I have. It seems like my needs are unending, insatiable, like I’m on a path to consume more and more.
Here’s something to think about. What if that internal abyss you sense inside is not something that can be filled with anything temporal? What if the “hole” inside that you try to fill to get rid of the feeling is actually endless? That “hole” can only be filled with an endless person. Your deepest longings cannot be met by any “thing” or finite person, but by someone who by His nature is endless or eternal. What Pascal is pointing to is the "faint remembering" that we were once filled to the brim with someone infinite and immutable (unchanging) but this was radically changed at the Fall. This is simply one way in existence that we "sense" eternity. More on Pascal next week...
Monday, September 28, 2009
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
The wrong kind of curiosity
Have you ever noticed just how relentless the "news" is in providing us updates on everything and everyone famous? Certainly it is driven by an entertainment culture that voraciously feeds on the latest escapades of sports figures, actors and actresses, and "reality stars". Why do I have to sift through the news to get a picture of the health care debate and at the same time read about Octomom's latest escapades? What interest do I have in Sean Merriman's either virtuous or vicious behavior toward a certain reality tv star? Why do I care about what's happening with Jon and Kate? Why are the Gosselin's even important to talk about? Or maybe even more disturbing... in the end is the story in the newspaper because that's what we deeply care about?
I guess my point is not to say that you are completely evil if you have any interest in these kinds of stories. For sure, they even peak curiosity within me! The first question I have to ask myself is, "Why such curiosity about another's life, even misfortune?" Their life seems so compelling.
Thomas of Aquinas was the master synthesizer and organizer of theology. If you have ever read the Summas (which if you have a mind for theology they are classics) you begin to see just how brilliant he was. But on to Thomas' categorization of the virtues and opposed vices. I was caught off guard a bit with the vice called "curiositas".
What the early Christians identified was that this particular vice was opposed to learning as a good. They saw the development of the mind (and Thomistic thinking is pretty rational) in study as a virtue. It was learning for the sake guiding one toward flourish or live life as it was intended to be lived. This virtue of "studiositas" was connected to greater virtues such as modesty and ultimately temperance and humility. In other words, to be modest is in some way to be temperate and humble in life. That's something for us to think about today!
But the opposing vice connected to "studiositas" was called "curiositas". It was not the curiosity of learning, but curiosity for the sake of simply curiosity. It's the curiosity that is referred to when we say, "Curiosity killed the cat." What fascinated me was that Thomas connects this vice to immodesty. In other words, it was not immodesty in outward appearance but immodesty in the inner person. When one is curious just to know the facts about something, curious just to know what is largely irrelevant, or curious just to be titillated in some way, and none of this makes any appreciable difference in how one lives life, this is immodest. Just as one can be immodest in dress, one can be immodest in the ways that one spends time gathering information about. One can be immodest in terms of what interest them or what one cares about.
When people open themselves up to what is offered as "reality" today, they are actually living in non-reality in the sense that it teaches them very little on the skill of living their own life. While we might end up fascinated with the Gosselins, what appreciable difference does this make in instructing us how live in the present? Do we crave tabloid kind of news because we just have to know the details about someone else's life. Now here's the big question... is my craving, my curiositas related to the fact that I'm bored with my own life that I have to live vicariously through the "exciting" life of another? Is the life that God has offered to me that boring such that I have to find excitement in the life of another? That is the wrong kind of curiosity and is certainly an issue of the heart.
I guess my point is not to say that you are completely evil if you have any interest in these kinds of stories. For sure, they even peak curiosity within me! The first question I have to ask myself is, "Why such curiosity about another's life, even misfortune?" Their life seems so compelling.
Thomas of Aquinas was the master synthesizer and organizer of theology. If you have ever read the Summas (which if you have a mind for theology they are classics) you begin to see just how brilliant he was. But on to Thomas' categorization of the virtues and opposed vices. I was caught off guard a bit with the vice called "curiositas".
What the early Christians identified was that this particular vice was opposed to learning as a good. They saw the development of the mind (and Thomistic thinking is pretty rational) in study as a virtue. It was learning for the sake guiding one toward flourish or live life as it was intended to be lived. This virtue of "studiositas" was connected to greater virtues such as modesty and ultimately temperance and humility. In other words, to be modest is in some way to be temperate and humble in life. That's something for us to think about today!
But the opposing vice connected to "studiositas" was called "curiositas". It was not the curiosity of learning, but curiosity for the sake of simply curiosity. It's the curiosity that is referred to when we say, "Curiosity killed the cat." What fascinated me was that Thomas connects this vice to immodesty. In other words, it was not immodesty in outward appearance but immodesty in the inner person. When one is curious just to know the facts about something, curious just to know what is largely irrelevant, or curious just to be titillated in some way, and none of this makes any appreciable difference in how one lives life, this is immodest. Just as one can be immodest in dress, one can be immodest in the ways that one spends time gathering information about. One can be immodest in terms of what interest them or what one cares about.
When people open themselves up to what is offered as "reality" today, they are actually living in non-reality in the sense that it teaches them very little on the skill of living their own life. While we might end up fascinated with the Gosselins, what appreciable difference does this make in instructing us how live in the present? Do we crave tabloid kind of news because we just have to know the details about someone else's life. Now here's the big question... is my craving, my curiositas related to the fact that I'm bored with my own life that I have to live vicariously through the "exciting" life of another? Is the life that God has offered to me that boring such that I have to find excitement in the life of another? That is the wrong kind of curiosity and is certainly an issue of the heart.
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