Saturday, January 31, 2009
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Bill and Ted Still Excellent in the Age of Obama
My jaw dropped an inch when I watched Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure for the first time in more than a decade and discovered that it was set 21 years ago.
I could not have felt so instantly ancient if I had suddenly grown a beard the length of a Tom Baker scarf.
The world inhabited by the eponymous teenagers is devoid of mobile phones, iPods, Al Qaeda and Britney Spears.
It is dangerous to revisit the films which defined your first decades on earth but this bonhomie and imagination which pulses through Bill & Ted still crackles.
In fact, the zany optimism of the saga almost prefigures the euphoria kindled in the wake of Obama’s election.
The pitch of the story is simple – Ted’s father is going to send him to an Alaskan military academy if he flunks his imminent high school history presentation. This would end the dreams of rock stardom he shares with his best friend Bill.
All seems doomed until a mysterious visitor from the future gives them a time-machine in the shape of a phone box.
They jump through the centuries and collect historical figures as eclectic as Genghis Kahn, Joan of Arc and Abraham Lincoln.
Not only do the pair deliver the greatest history report conceivable, their music becomes the foundation of a utopian society which venerates Bill & Ted with the same honour today’s America gives to Lincoln.
What elevates this fundamentally daft jape beyond other low-budget adventures of the era is its wit and joie de vivre. Although the two heroes personify the “slacker” aesthetic which came of age in the grunge music culture of the 1990s, there is not an ounce of world-weariness or cynicism about them.
They are bonded by a simple belief in one creed: “Be excellent to each other.” They greet people of all time-zones with exuberance and encourage them to “Party on!”
The film refuses to portray lazy and hazy American society as either vapid or degenerate. Their dreams may not extend far beyond persuading Eddie Van Halen to join their band, but their commitment to friendship is an eternal good.
Just as Ted escapes exile to Alaska, contemporary America swerved away from sending that state’s governor to the White House at the last election.
Instead, they chose a man who exhibits the epitome of Hawaiian cool while somehow also possessing the gravitas and vision of a neo-Lincoln.
In the movie this president takes the stage and tells cheering students: “These two great gentlemen are dedicated to a proposition which was true in my time, just as it’s true today. Be excellent to each other.”
Obama this month said something strikingly similar. America is facing crises at every turn, but we will have reason to party if he can transform this time of challenge into a most excellent adventure.
I could not have felt so instantly ancient if I had suddenly grown a beard the length of a Tom Baker scarf.
The world inhabited by the eponymous teenagers is devoid of mobile phones, iPods, Al Qaeda and Britney Spears.
It is dangerous to revisit the films which defined your first decades on earth but this bonhomie and imagination which pulses through Bill & Ted still crackles.
In fact, the zany optimism of the saga almost prefigures the euphoria kindled in the wake of Obama’s election.
The pitch of the story is simple – Ted’s father is going to send him to an Alaskan military academy if he flunks his imminent high school history presentation. This would end the dreams of rock stardom he shares with his best friend Bill.
All seems doomed until a mysterious visitor from the future gives them a time-machine in the shape of a phone box.
They jump through the centuries and collect historical figures as eclectic as Genghis Kahn, Joan of Arc and Abraham Lincoln.
Not only do the pair deliver the greatest history report conceivable, their music becomes the foundation of a utopian society which venerates Bill & Ted with the same honour today’s America gives to Lincoln.
What elevates this fundamentally daft jape beyond other low-budget adventures of the era is its wit and joie de vivre. Although the two heroes personify the “slacker” aesthetic which came of age in the grunge music culture of the 1990s, there is not an ounce of world-weariness or cynicism about them.
They are bonded by a simple belief in one creed: “Be excellent to each other.” They greet people of all time-zones with exuberance and encourage them to “Party on!”
The film refuses to portray lazy and hazy American society as either vapid or degenerate. Their dreams may not extend far beyond persuading Eddie Van Halen to join their band, but their commitment to friendship is an eternal good.
Just as Ted escapes exile to Alaska, contemporary America swerved away from sending that state’s governor to the White House at the last election.
Instead, they chose a man who exhibits the epitome of Hawaiian cool while somehow also possessing the gravitas and vision of a neo-Lincoln.
In the movie this president takes the stage and tells cheering students: “These two great gentlemen are dedicated to a proposition which was true in my time, just as it’s true today. Be excellent to each other.”
Obama this month said something strikingly similar. America is facing crises at every turn, but we will have reason to party if he can transform this time of challenge into a most excellent adventure.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Updike and Barth
It's sad to wake up in a world today which is no longer home to John Updike. But as a great reader of Barth, the novelist knew what it meant to look forward to resurrection.
Here's a beautiful essay by John McTavish.
Updike told him: "I read Barth's address on Kierkegaard with the deepest interest; one of my theological heroes scrutinizing the other, and so diffidently scoring the essential defects, or limits, of him. Really, Barth's mind, so invariably earnest, always penetrates to some depth tonic for me; he makes me feel that rare thing, with authors, called love - one loves a man for thinking and writing so well."
Updike's poem, Seven Stanzas at Easter, burns with Barthian - and Christian - hope:
Make no mistake: if He rose at all
it was as His body;
if the cells’ dissolution did not reverse, the molecules
reknit, the amino acids rekindle,
the Church will fall.
It was not as the flowers,
each soft Spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
it was as His Flesh: ours.
The same hinged thumbs and toes,
the same valved heart
that—pierced—died, withered, paused, and then
regathered out of enduring Might
new strength to enclose.
Let us not mock God with metaphor,
analogy, sidestepping transcendence;
making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the
faded credulity of earlier ages:
let us walk through the door.
The stone is rolled back, not papier-mache,
not a stone in a story,
but the vast rock of materiality that in the slow
grinding of time will eclipse for each of us
the wide light of day.
And if we will have an angel at the tomb,
make it a real angel,
weighty with Max Planck’s quanta, vivid with hair,
opaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen
spun on a definite loom.
Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
for our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are
embarrassed by the miracle,
and crushed by remonstrance.
Here's a beautiful essay by John McTavish.
Updike told him: "I read Barth's address on Kierkegaard with the deepest interest; one of my theological heroes scrutinizing the other, and so diffidently scoring the essential defects, or limits, of him. Really, Barth's mind, so invariably earnest, always penetrates to some depth tonic for me; he makes me feel that rare thing, with authors, called love - one loves a man for thinking and writing so well."
Updike's poem, Seven Stanzas at Easter, burns with Barthian - and Christian - hope:
Make no mistake: if He rose at all
it was as His body;
if the cells’ dissolution did not reverse, the molecules
reknit, the amino acids rekindle,
the Church will fall.
It was not as the flowers,
each soft Spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
it was as His Flesh: ours.
The same hinged thumbs and toes,
the same valved heart
that—pierced—died, withered, paused, and then
regathered out of enduring Might
new strength to enclose.
Let us not mock God with metaphor,
analogy, sidestepping transcendence;
making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the
faded credulity of earlier ages:
let us walk through the door.
The stone is rolled back, not papier-mache,
not a stone in a story,
but the vast rock of materiality that in the slow
grinding of time will eclipse for each of us
the wide light of day.
And if we will have an angel at the tomb,
make it a real angel,
weighty with Max Planck’s quanta, vivid with hair,
opaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen
spun on a definite loom.
Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
for our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are
embarrassed by the miracle,
and crushed by remonstrance.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Taxing Times
In Scandinavia and Germany many earners have the option of paying a “church tax”. Despite the advance of secularism, surprisingly high numbers of people continue to do so and this funds innovative development projects.
Is there the potential to give British taxpayers the opportunity to pay a minimal extra percentage of their earnings into ring-fenced funds covering areas such as Aids relief, high culture and sport? Such an invitation to engage in collective and democratic philanthropy – at arm’s length from Government – could do more to foment a sense of national togetherness than a “British day”.
Such a system would also have the bonus in that no-one could dip into the cash to fund millennial domes. To not consider such a possibility is to assume that self-interests will trump idealism.
Is there the potential to give British taxpayers the opportunity to pay a minimal extra percentage of their earnings into ring-fenced funds covering areas such as Aids relief, high culture and sport? Such an invitation to engage in collective and democratic philanthropy – at arm’s length from Government – could do more to foment a sense of national togetherness than a “British day”.
Such a system would also have the bonus in that no-one could dip into the cash to fund millennial domes. To not consider such a possibility is to assume that self-interests will trump idealism.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
David: Life in the Presence
If King David were alive today he could be prosecuted for war crimes. If an accurate film of his life was made it would have an 18 certificate. It is a story of near-constant war, driven by jealousy, adultery, family breakdown and betrayal. It is laden with sex and violence. What is it doing in the Bible and what are we supposed to learn from it?
Is David a good role model? He sinned with Bathsheba, murdered her husband and raised sons who were ready to kill him and each other. In a culture where we search for people to imitate, should we be looking to David?
It is possible to read the Bible looking for secrets of a successful life, but the message of the Bible is not self-help. It is the revelation of God reaching down to help a helpless people. And in the story of David we see our own sinfulness, our jealousy, lust, anger and greed reflected back at us - and all the dreadful consequences. We know that if we could get away with murder we probably would.
In the story of David we see a God who loves sinners who seek his forgiveness. We need this forgiveness daily.
The key to reading the Bible narratives is to see God as just as present an actor in the events as any of the human beings. It is a daily challenge to think of God as someone other than a distant moral force, a watchmaker who set the world ticking and then went on his way. But in the Bible we encounter the violence and injustice of reality and also the presence of a God who refuses to look away when confronted with the worst outpourings of our sin. In Jesus, he will share in our sufferings to the point of death. In his resurrection he will unleash hope upon our planet that cannot be surpassed.
This is why we need to read these strange and scary stories from the so-called Old Testament. In reading each tale we see the glories and failings of our humanity dramatically demonstrated with a realism no news report can match. We also encounter the living God as the words describe his actions and His Holy Spirit makes the text live. We should take our sandals off when we open the Bible, but possibly put on protective visors.
Walter Bruggeman, describing the Reformer Martin Luther’s approach to Scripture, said: “[The] Bible is a voice of revelation not to be confused with, encumbered by, or contained in any human categories of interpretation that make the voice more coherent, domesticated or palatable.”
In the first verses of the story of David our typical understanding of God is challenged. We read at the end of 1 Samuel 15 that “the Lord was grieved that he had made Saul king over Israel.”
Can God feel emotions such as regret? Western Christianity has pushed for a conception of God in which he is almost static, beyond space and time and certainly not prone to such “human” feelings.
But throughout the Old Testament, such as when arguing with Abraham over whether to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, we meet a God who engages and interacts with his creation, who allows us to somehow share in shaping the future.
Yet he is also the sovereign God who chooses to transform the destinies of people. This is seen most explicitly in the love-motivated giving of the life of Jesus so that people who believe in him may have eternal life.
And in the story of David, God tells the prophet Samuel: “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king of Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king.”
God exercises his sovereign will in choosing David as the king. David never forgets this astounding lesson that the world is drenched in the presence of God. In times of joy and sorrow, glory and sin, David shouts psalms which express, fear, praise, repentance and hope.
There was no divide between the sacred and the secular in David’s life. Unlike Jonah, he knew he could not escape God. This is the example we should follow, recognising that that life is holy and God is near, regardless of whether we are at the communion table, the office desk or the operating table. Samuel said that in David the Lord had “sought out a man after his own heart”.
As soon as David is anointed king we read “the Spirit of the Lord came upon David in power”.
The spirit which moved above the waters creating the earth rushed into a sheep-tender in Bethlehem. When Jesus emerged from the waters of his baptism the spirit would descend on him, just as it would also anoint the first Christians at Pentecost.
At this point in the story there was no logical reason to expect David to rise to the highest rank of Government. Well, not if your conception of logic excludes the determined actions of God. But just as Yahweh worked to make David the leader of a united kingdom, so we should expect Him to work to complete his promises in our time. Is he creating a new people from every tribe, tongue and nation who are united in a perplexing love for one another? If so, this is one of the most exciting moments in history.
David lived in the utter confidence that God was more powerful than any human being. His eyes rolled when he saw his people standing terrified before the giant Goliath.
He strode forward with the words: “Let no-one lose heart on account of this Philistine.”
When he slung the stone from his sling which shattered the forehead of the giant, he knew he was doing so with the power of the creator of the laws of physics working through him.
The confrontation between Goliath and David mirrors the conflict we see every day as forces of greed and violence bellow and we struggle to keep hold of a faith in a God who has the power to rescue, redeem and transform.
Listen to the shout of Goliath. We read: “He looked David over and saw that he was only a boy, ruddy and handsome, and he despised him. He said to David, ‘Am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks?’ And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. ‘Come here,' he said, 'and I'll give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field!’”
What are the giants that we confront today? Take a moment and think. Do we have the courage to shout a response like David’s?
He exclaimed: “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the LORD will hand you over to me, and I'll strike you down and cut off your head. Today I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the LORD saves; for the battle is the LORD's, and he will give all of you into our hands.”
David was able to encourage his people to win battles because he knew that the power and righteousness of God is the bedrock of all reality. The supposed might of the Philistine warrior could be toppled with a stone. We have seen the collapse of communism and the decimation of Wall St in two decades. Neither capitalism nor socialism nor any other ideology can provide a ethic or an explanation for the universe which trumps faith in a God who loves and guides. The message of the church is thus the same as David’s: Do not lose heart.
This gleefully gory story of giant-killing pits swords and javelins against the name of the Lord.
What are the forces we fear will define our lives in the way the Israelites trembled at the sight of swords and javelins? It might be the spectre of unemployment, a sense of guilt or shame, or perhaps anger at events in the past. Or maybe we are in direct engagement with people who are intent on evil? Persecution is a reality for millions of Christians throughout the world. But in being able to call on the name of the Lords we live in the hope of salvation.
David became a magnet for “all those who were in distress or in debt or discontented”. These people do not sound like Sandhurst or West Point material. But the disciples Jesus gathered were also a rambunctious bunch of volatile characters.
Paul told the Christians in Corinth in his first letter: “Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.”
God’s people may not look like the type of characters you would pick to fill a presidential administration, a boardroom, or an officer corps. But the image of God's coming victory is just as starkly different to our ideas of what it means to triumph. God’s kingdom will be one where all peoples share in his goodness.
We read in Isaiah 25:
On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
A feast of rich food for all peoples,
A banquet of aged wine—
The best of meats and the finest of wines.
On this mountain he will destroy
The shroud that enfolds all peoples,
The sheet that covers all nations;
He will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears
From all faces;
He will remove the disgrace of his people
From all the earth.
The LORD has spoken.
In that day they will say,
‘Surely this is our God;
We trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the LORD, we trusted in him;
Let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.’
David learned to cope with the wild uncertainty of how he would survive each day. In his encounter with the king of Moab we see him making practical arrangements while utterly depending on the activity of God.
He asked the king: “Would you let my father and mother come and stay with you until I learn what God will do for me?”
The heroes in the Bible are the people who live in such a way, alive to the presence of God. David’s future wife, Abigail tells him:
“[The] life of my master will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the LORD your God. But the lives of your enemies he will hurl away as from the pocket of a sling.”
Where is God hurling us in our lives? What is he building on this planet? Where is he carrying us? In the life of faith we quickly discover incredible knowledge about the identity of God and his work in history but we are simultaneously plunged into the mystery of his plans.
In our years on earth we stumble, sin, and sometimes act as if it was our job to discredit the Gospel rather than proclaim it. But God is the protagonist in this story of salvation.
We are like the birds riding on the back of the rhino. God is thundering towards his goal and we are invited to share the adventure.
Is David a good role model? He sinned with Bathsheba, murdered her husband and raised sons who were ready to kill him and each other. In a culture where we search for people to imitate, should we be looking to David?
It is possible to read the Bible looking for secrets of a successful life, but the message of the Bible is not self-help. It is the revelation of God reaching down to help a helpless people. And in the story of David we see our own sinfulness, our jealousy, lust, anger and greed reflected back at us - and all the dreadful consequences. We know that if we could get away with murder we probably would.
In the story of David we see a God who loves sinners who seek his forgiveness. We need this forgiveness daily.
The key to reading the Bible narratives is to see God as just as present an actor in the events as any of the human beings. It is a daily challenge to think of God as someone other than a distant moral force, a watchmaker who set the world ticking and then went on his way. But in the Bible we encounter the violence and injustice of reality and also the presence of a God who refuses to look away when confronted with the worst outpourings of our sin. In Jesus, he will share in our sufferings to the point of death. In his resurrection he will unleash hope upon our planet that cannot be surpassed.
This is why we need to read these strange and scary stories from the so-called Old Testament. In reading each tale we see the glories and failings of our humanity dramatically demonstrated with a realism no news report can match. We also encounter the living God as the words describe his actions and His Holy Spirit makes the text live. We should take our sandals off when we open the Bible, but possibly put on protective visors.
Walter Bruggeman, describing the Reformer Martin Luther’s approach to Scripture, said: “[The] Bible is a voice of revelation not to be confused with, encumbered by, or contained in any human categories of interpretation that make the voice more coherent, domesticated or palatable.”
In the first verses of the story of David our typical understanding of God is challenged. We read at the end of 1 Samuel 15 that “the Lord was grieved that he had made Saul king over Israel.”
Can God feel emotions such as regret? Western Christianity has pushed for a conception of God in which he is almost static, beyond space and time and certainly not prone to such “human” feelings.
But throughout the Old Testament, such as when arguing with Abraham over whether to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, we meet a God who engages and interacts with his creation, who allows us to somehow share in shaping the future.
Yet he is also the sovereign God who chooses to transform the destinies of people. This is seen most explicitly in the love-motivated giving of the life of Jesus so that people who believe in him may have eternal life.
And in the story of David, God tells the prophet Samuel: “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king of Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king.”
God exercises his sovereign will in choosing David as the king. David never forgets this astounding lesson that the world is drenched in the presence of God. In times of joy and sorrow, glory and sin, David shouts psalms which express, fear, praise, repentance and hope.
There was no divide between the sacred and the secular in David’s life. Unlike Jonah, he knew he could not escape God. This is the example we should follow, recognising that that life is holy and God is near, regardless of whether we are at the communion table, the office desk or the operating table. Samuel said that in David the Lord had “sought out a man after his own heart”.
As soon as David is anointed king we read “the Spirit of the Lord came upon David in power”.
The spirit which moved above the waters creating the earth rushed into a sheep-tender in Bethlehem. When Jesus emerged from the waters of his baptism the spirit would descend on him, just as it would also anoint the first Christians at Pentecost.
At this point in the story there was no logical reason to expect David to rise to the highest rank of Government. Well, not if your conception of logic excludes the determined actions of God. But just as Yahweh worked to make David the leader of a united kingdom, so we should expect Him to work to complete his promises in our time. Is he creating a new people from every tribe, tongue and nation who are united in a perplexing love for one another? If so, this is one of the most exciting moments in history.
David lived in the utter confidence that God was more powerful than any human being. His eyes rolled when he saw his people standing terrified before the giant Goliath.
He strode forward with the words: “Let no-one lose heart on account of this Philistine.”
When he slung the stone from his sling which shattered the forehead of the giant, he knew he was doing so with the power of the creator of the laws of physics working through him.
The confrontation between Goliath and David mirrors the conflict we see every day as forces of greed and violence bellow and we struggle to keep hold of a faith in a God who has the power to rescue, redeem and transform.
Listen to the shout of Goliath. We read: “He looked David over and saw that he was only a boy, ruddy and handsome, and he despised him. He said to David, ‘Am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks?’ And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. ‘Come here,' he said, 'and I'll give your flesh to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field!’”
What are the giants that we confront today? Take a moment and think. Do we have the courage to shout a response like David’s?
He exclaimed: “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This day the LORD will hand you over to me, and I'll strike you down and cut off your head. Today I will give the carcasses of the Philistine army to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel. All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the LORD saves; for the battle is the LORD's, and he will give all of you into our hands.”
David was able to encourage his people to win battles because he knew that the power and righteousness of God is the bedrock of all reality. The supposed might of the Philistine warrior could be toppled with a stone. We have seen the collapse of communism and the decimation of Wall St in two decades. Neither capitalism nor socialism nor any other ideology can provide a ethic or an explanation for the universe which trumps faith in a God who loves and guides. The message of the church is thus the same as David’s: Do not lose heart.
This gleefully gory story of giant-killing pits swords and javelins against the name of the Lord.
What are the forces we fear will define our lives in the way the Israelites trembled at the sight of swords and javelins? It might be the spectre of unemployment, a sense of guilt or shame, or perhaps anger at events in the past. Or maybe we are in direct engagement with people who are intent on evil? Persecution is a reality for millions of Christians throughout the world. But in being able to call on the name of the Lords we live in the hope of salvation.
David became a magnet for “all those who were in distress or in debt or discontented”. These people do not sound like Sandhurst or West Point material. But the disciples Jesus gathered were also a rambunctious bunch of volatile characters.
Paul told the Christians in Corinth in his first letter: “Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.”
God’s people may not look like the type of characters you would pick to fill a presidential administration, a boardroom, or an officer corps. But the image of God's coming victory is just as starkly different to our ideas of what it means to triumph. God’s kingdom will be one where all peoples share in his goodness.
We read in Isaiah 25:
On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
A feast of rich food for all peoples,
A banquet of aged wine—
The best of meats and the finest of wines.
On this mountain he will destroy
The shroud that enfolds all peoples,
The sheet that covers all nations;
He will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears
From all faces;
He will remove the disgrace of his people
From all the earth.
The LORD has spoken.
In that day they will say,
‘Surely this is our God;
We trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the LORD, we trusted in him;
Let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.’
David learned to cope with the wild uncertainty of how he would survive each day. In his encounter with the king of Moab we see him making practical arrangements while utterly depending on the activity of God.
He asked the king: “Would you let my father and mother come and stay with you until I learn what God will do for me?”
The heroes in the Bible are the people who live in such a way, alive to the presence of God. David’s future wife, Abigail tells him:
“[The] life of my master will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the LORD your God. But the lives of your enemies he will hurl away as from the pocket of a sling.”
Where is God hurling us in our lives? What is he building on this planet? Where is he carrying us? In the life of faith we quickly discover incredible knowledge about the identity of God and his work in history but we are simultaneously plunged into the mystery of his plans.
In our years on earth we stumble, sin, and sometimes act as if it was our job to discredit the Gospel rather than proclaim it. But God is the protagonist in this story of salvation.
We are like the birds riding on the back of the rhino. God is thundering towards his goal and we are invited to share the adventure.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Richard Lewis on Marital Happiness
I keep thinking the rug is going to be pulled out from under me. I still think this is a practical joke and she has a million affairs and is married to someone in Italy. She keeps saying no, but I haven’t seen her in a few days.
RL
The Re-Revolution
Politicians of every hue in each of the world’s democracies are devising “rescue packages” to try and save their nation from economic pulverisation.
But beneath the calls for emergency nationalisation of banks and flailing businesses a deeper debate is stirring which could shape the future of government as we know it.
What are governments for? What are MPs and other representatives actually elected to do?
What should the Government run? Which areas of life should it stay well away from? Peter Mandelson is confronting sceptical MPs who oppose his part privatisation of Royal Mail.
There is a certain irony that at a time when the Government is buying giant stakes in banks it is considering selling a share in one of the most iconic British institutions – how many American tourists go home each year with a miniature red postbox in their suitcase?
This flashpoint illuminates the dilemma facing British politicians.
The Conservatives redefined the role of government in Britain by privatising electricity and water suppliers, energy producers, an airline and a telephone service.
Britain entered a new reality in which Government set the standards providers of essential services had to meet but there was no expectation that civil servants would try and run these major organisations. It was no longer considered nefarious for the people in charge of vital bodies to seek to make a profit for shareholders.
This was a transformation of what democratic accountability was all about. Any politician who sought to roll back the revolution risked appearing like a contemporary Canute.
Tony Blair’s scrapping of Clause Four freed the Labour from a commitment to “common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange”.
In the past decade the private sector has played an ever greater role across the UK in building and maintaining schools and hospitals. The argument has been that commercial investors in a project bring cash that the Government would have to fund either through taxation or borrowing.
The message was: Privatisation is good for you, and the private sector brings hitherto unknown levels of efficiency and enterprise to an organisation; your rights will be protected by Ofcom, Ofwat, Ofgem and a galaxy of other regulators.
But the efficacy of this mantra has been sorely tested by the apocalyptic effect of the credit crunch. Suddenly, the ability of the private sector to tap into a reservoir of credit and pump cash into infrastructure projects is mightily challenged.
An even more agitating thought is entering the minds of people as they wait for privatised trains to arrive: Do commercial operators actually deliver a better service?
Communism failed to usher in a utopia but the sacrificing of principle for profit in the sub-prime mortgage fiasco has tilted the world’s economy in the direction of disaster.
A reformation of government could be coming which may transform the political landscape in the months and years ahead.
But beneath the calls for emergency nationalisation of banks and flailing businesses a deeper debate is stirring which could shape the future of government as we know it.
What are governments for? What are MPs and other representatives actually elected to do?
What should the Government run? Which areas of life should it stay well away from? Peter Mandelson is confronting sceptical MPs who oppose his part privatisation of Royal Mail.
There is a certain irony that at a time when the Government is buying giant stakes in banks it is considering selling a share in one of the most iconic British institutions – how many American tourists go home each year with a miniature red postbox in their suitcase?
This flashpoint illuminates the dilemma facing British politicians.
The Conservatives redefined the role of government in Britain by privatising electricity and water suppliers, energy producers, an airline and a telephone service.
Britain entered a new reality in which Government set the standards providers of essential services had to meet but there was no expectation that civil servants would try and run these major organisations. It was no longer considered nefarious for the people in charge of vital bodies to seek to make a profit for shareholders.
This was a transformation of what democratic accountability was all about. Any politician who sought to roll back the revolution risked appearing like a contemporary Canute.
Tony Blair’s scrapping of Clause Four freed the Labour from a commitment to “common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange”.
In the past decade the private sector has played an ever greater role across the UK in building and maintaining schools and hospitals. The argument has been that commercial investors in a project bring cash that the Government would have to fund either through taxation or borrowing.
The message was: Privatisation is good for you, and the private sector brings hitherto unknown levels of efficiency and enterprise to an organisation; your rights will be protected by Ofcom, Ofwat, Ofgem and a galaxy of other regulators.
But the efficacy of this mantra has been sorely tested by the apocalyptic effect of the credit crunch. Suddenly, the ability of the private sector to tap into a reservoir of credit and pump cash into infrastructure projects is mightily challenged.
An even more agitating thought is entering the minds of people as they wait for privatised trains to arrive: Do commercial operators actually deliver a better service?
Communism failed to usher in a utopia but the sacrificing of principle for profit in the sub-prime mortgage fiasco has tilted the world’s economy in the direction of disaster.
A reformation of government could be coming which may transform the political landscape in the months and years ahead.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Thursday, January 08, 2009
New Foundations
In a matter of weeks the Middle East will be home to the world’s tallest skyscraper.
The Burj Dubai is at least 700m high and construction teams are close to completing the engineering marvel.
This transformation of the skyline of the oil-rich city contrasts bleakly with the images of devastation in Gaza. Foreign policy experts scratch their heads when asked to identify any chink of hope that the peace process can be revived.
In the heady days of 1993 when PLO leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin shook hands in the White House Rose Garden optimism ran as wild as despair does today.
There was talk of a Palestinian state becoming the Singapore of the Mediterranean, home to highly educated workers and hi-tech industries. Could there be a better metaphor for the death of this dream than the destruction of a United Nations-run school in Gaza this week?
On Christmas Eve the controversial but hugely influential Harvard political scientist Samuel Huntington passed away aged 81. His most famous work was the best-selling 1996 epic The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of World Order.
He predicted that in the aftermath of the Cold War the world would be defined by competing “civilisations”. Instead of fighting over ideologies – such as Communism or Nazism versus capitalist democracy – the conflicts of the future would be cultural clashes.
Specifically, he anticipated confrontation with Islam. The terrorist attacks of September 11 pushed the ageing professor into the limelight and he became regarded as a contemporary prophet.
Huntington was a strong critic of the United States’ ambitions to remake Iraq. Imperialistic attempts to impose western values would not result, he argued, in the emergence of liberal democracies.
The fact that Palestinian voters chose to back Islamist party Hamas in free elections again appeared to vindicate his viewpoint. The Bush administration’s belief that all people have a natural instinct to embrace freedom seemed naive when contrasted with the warnings of the Boston sage – even though a liberal reader will frown when reading of his concerns about immigration into the United States.
To expect Gaza to one day resemble Holland is ludicrous but it would be tragic for the incoming Obama administration to privately conclude that the ethnic and religious infernos of the Middle East are beyond hope.
Sadr City, Beirut and Gaza will not become bastions of western individualism, but communities, clans and families of any background do have the right and the desire to live free from fear of assault, disease and hunger.
If the West does want to help put out today’s fires, it should quietly and humbly seek to strengthen institutions which can provide justice, health and education. With these foundations, the people of Gaza may one day build a tower of their own.
The Burj Dubai is at least 700m high and construction teams are close to completing the engineering marvel.
This transformation of the skyline of the oil-rich city contrasts bleakly with the images of devastation in Gaza. Foreign policy experts scratch their heads when asked to identify any chink of hope that the peace process can be revived.
In the heady days of 1993 when PLO leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin shook hands in the White House Rose Garden optimism ran as wild as despair does today.
There was talk of a Palestinian state becoming the Singapore of the Mediterranean, home to highly educated workers and hi-tech industries. Could there be a better metaphor for the death of this dream than the destruction of a United Nations-run school in Gaza this week?
On Christmas Eve the controversial but hugely influential Harvard political scientist Samuel Huntington passed away aged 81. His most famous work was the best-selling 1996 epic The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of World Order.
He predicted that in the aftermath of the Cold War the world would be defined by competing “civilisations”. Instead of fighting over ideologies – such as Communism or Nazism versus capitalist democracy – the conflicts of the future would be cultural clashes.
Specifically, he anticipated confrontation with Islam. The terrorist attacks of September 11 pushed the ageing professor into the limelight and he became regarded as a contemporary prophet.
Huntington was a strong critic of the United States’ ambitions to remake Iraq. Imperialistic attempts to impose western values would not result, he argued, in the emergence of liberal democracies.
The fact that Palestinian voters chose to back Islamist party Hamas in free elections again appeared to vindicate his viewpoint. The Bush administration’s belief that all people have a natural instinct to embrace freedom seemed naive when contrasted with the warnings of the Boston sage – even though a liberal reader will frown when reading of his concerns about immigration into the United States.
To expect Gaza to one day resemble Holland is ludicrous but it would be tragic for the incoming Obama administration to privately conclude that the ethnic and religious infernos of the Middle East are beyond hope.
Sadr City, Beirut and Gaza will not become bastions of western individualism, but communities, clans and families of any background do have the right and the desire to live free from fear of assault, disease and hunger.
If the West does want to help put out today’s fires, it should quietly and humbly seek to strengthen institutions which can provide justice, health and education. With these foundations, the people of Gaza may one day build a tower of their own.
Thursday, January 01, 2009
Happy New Year!
Is that sound the hoofbeats of apocalyptic horses or just the central heating packing up?
Has there ever been a year which has started with so many people wanting to stay under the duvet? Why don’t humans come with a hibernation switch so we can sleep through economic earthquakes?
Barack Obama will enter the White House in a cloud of goodwill but even his most ardent fans must acknowledge that he can’t revive the fortunes of the red squirrel.
In a sense, 2009 is the year of low expectations. Any manager who stays a millimetre out of the red will be guaranteed a hearty backslap (if not a bonus).
But the next 12 months will be punctuated with the anniversaries of people and achievements that transformed our very understanding of reality. Could it be that the grey gloop of 2009 Britain is not a sea of mediocrity but the perfect breeding environment for an evolutionary leap of inspired genius?
There will be the twin celebrations of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the passing of 150 years since the publication of On the Origin of Species.
There is no need for this to be a High Noon shoot-out between atheists and creationists. For a moment we might be able to gaze out beyond the tangled chaos of the credit crunch and see the beauty and mystery woven through the cosmos.
It is also the 500th anniversary of the birth of theologian John Calvin whose work has had a comparable impact on Christianity as Darwin’s has had on biology.
Thirtysomethings will feel suddenly old when the 20th anniversary of the shattering of the Berlin Wall is marked. A conflict which periodically threatened to escalate into a nuclear holocaust ended not with a war but German families hugging – it should inspire hope that the cultural fractures defining contemporary geopolitics can heal.
Abraham Lincoln, born 200 years ago in February, possessed the genius and wisdom to bind up wounds that could have killed America. His nation has grown into an imperfect and battered superpower but it still possesses promise and potential no other country has matched.
Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon 40 years ago in July. His footprints are still on the lunar surface and remind us that AIDS need not remain incurable or fossil fuels essential.
The 800th anniversary of Cambridge University is proof that great institutions can guard and grow art and science, regardless of the ravages of folly, fanaticism, pestilence and war which routinely sweep society.
There will also be celebrations to mark Alaska’s half century as a US state. We will see more of Governor Sarah Palin, who was not seen as the solution to America’s problems last year.
Democracy and science and hope are alive. Genius can escape the duvet.
Has there ever been a year which has started with so many people wanting to stay under the duvet? Why don’t humans come with a hibernation switch so we can sleep through economic earthquakes?
Barack Obama will enter the White House in a cloud of goodwill but even his most ardent fans must acknowledge that he can’t revive the fortunes of the red squirrel.
In a sense, 2009 is the year of low expectations. Any manager who stays a millimetre out of the red will be guaranteed a hearty backslap (if not a bonus).
But the next 12 months will be punctuated with the anniversaries of people and achievements that transformed our very understanding of reality. Could it be that the grey gloop of 2009 Britain is not a sea of mediocrity but the perfect breeding environment for an evolutionary leap of inspired genius?
There will be the twin celebrations of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin and the passing of 150 years since the publication of On the Origin of Species.
There is no need for this to be a High Noon shoot-out between atheists and creationists. For a moment we might be able to gaze out beyond the tangled chaos of the credit crunch and see the beauty and mystery woven through the cosmos.
It is also the 500th anniversary of the birth of theologian John Calvin whose work has had a comparable impact on Christianity as Darwin’s has had on biology.
Thirtysomethings will feel suddenly old when the 20th anniversary of the shattering of the Berlin Wall is marked. A conflict which periodically threatened to escalate into a nuclear holocaust ended not with a war but German families hugging – it should inspire hope that the cultural fractures defining contemporary geopolitics can heal.
Abraham Lincoln, born 200 years ago in February, possessed the genius and wisdom to bind up wounds that could have killed America. His nation has grown into an imperfect and battered superpower but it still possesses promise and potential no other country has matched.
Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon 40 years ago in July. His footprints are still on the lunar surface and remind us that AIDS need not remain incurable or fossil fuels essential.
The 800th anniversary of Cambridge University is proof that great institutions can guard and grow art and science, regardless of the ravages of folly, fanaticism, pestilence and war which routinely sweep society.
There will also be celebrations to mark Alaska’s half century as a US state. We will see more of Governor Sarah Palin, who was not seen as the solution to America’s problems last year.
Democracy and science and hope are alive. Genius can escape the duvet.
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