Showing items filed under “The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin”

Style

It was the day after Thanksgiving; I was driving back to Dallas from the state on the other side of the Red River, waiting for my double (no cheese, grilled onions) at In-N-Out. The place was hopping with lots of people waiting for their orders. I was sitting at a ledge, wearing a button down shirt, a cable knit vest, old green chinos, ankle socks, and Brooks Cascadias. I was also wearing my pack because the floor was wet.

Some girls of indeterminate age (though much less than mine), sitting just down from me, said, “Like your style.” I mumbled thanks as I wondered about their capacity for irony.

— 

They left and a couple of young adults took their place, all while I’m reading the Wall Street Journal, waiting for my burger. I had finished the front section and asked if they would like it. “Do you get the paper every day?” The question was posed as if by an archeologist. I used to, but no, this paper was given to me at my hotel that morning. I got my burger and continued with the other sections. I heard them talking with interest as they noticed one article, then another, but I tuned out their content. When I was ready to leave, and as I was offering them the rest of the paper, I noticed they had it opened to the crossword puzzle. They had been talking about it without filling it in. I told them that Friday was the hardest puzzle, that they start easy on Monday and get progressively more wicked through the week. They had never heard of this, but were intrigued.

— 

Reading that day’s newspaper I noticed, first, that I already knew what many of the stories were reporting. That is, thanks to headlines or daily blogs that I get, I already knew the news. The second thing I noticed was how delightful it was to have the story in front of me in print. It was longer and had more detail, and it wasn’t subject to updating: it was just there and would stay there until the next day’s paper. 

It was, in a sense, old news. But it was a fixed report, not to be updated until the next day’s paper. I felt encouraged to sit with the report as given, to pay more attention to what was there, and to think less about whether there were new things that I needed to find.

In all this I noticed the absence of anxiety. To be more precise, I did not feel the anxiety that comes from constantly checking to see if there is new news. The paper was a physical object, fixed, and that fixity was encouraging my mind to have its own fixity, a focus that blocked out our peculiar anxiety.

What is that anxiety? I think it is particularly well-depicted in the closing scene of “The Social Network,” when the Zuckerberg character sits in front of his computer, continually updating his screen, hoping for a response: sad, anxious, and lonely.

— 

    Out & About. Sunday preaching: Dec. 8 at St. John’s in Savannah (at 8 and 11 a.m.) and Dec. 15 at Good Shepherd Cedar Hill, just south of Dallas (at 8:15 and 10:30 a.m.).

    At St. John’s in Savannah, I will also participate in their “Sunday Evening Sessions” with a talk on what’s good about marriage. This will be at 5 p.m. on Dec. 8, with refreshments and Q&A.

    At St. Matthew’s in Dallas, I am offering Advent meditations, “Looking Forward, Looking Back,” on Christ’s future return and his first coming. This is in the context of simple Evening Prayer services in the cathedral. Wednesday, Dec. 11, at 7 p.m, meeting in the back of the nave.

    And for your 2025 calendars: The next three “Good Books & Good Talk” seminars will be (each a Sunday at 5 p.m. at St. Matthew’s):

    Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” on January 26, 

    Bessie Head’s Where Rain Clouds Gather on February 23, and

    Parts of a World by A. G. Motjabai on March 23.

 

 

Posted by The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin with

Everyone's Lonely: Thoughts on a Greg Brown Song

On a cassette tape from the turn of the century, which is to say 24 years ago, Greg Brown performed his then-new song. On its face, “’cept You and Me, Babe” is a love song. But today what stands out is its critique of technology, its taking notice, early on, of what cell phones and the internet were doing to people.

    This is how it begins: “Half the people you see today are talking on cell phones, Driving off the road and bumping into doors.” We might change “talking” to something else—texting, perhaps—but many drivers, with phone in hand, go crashing. And pedestrians in crowded places bump into things because their eyes are not on the world but on their screen. Brown turns ironic: “People used to spend quite a bit of time alone. I guess no one’s lonely anymore.” 

    The second stanza puts us in a rainstorm. No one is outside: “They’re all at home living it up on the internet.” The same ironic comment follows: “So I guess no one’s lonely anymore.”

    These lines, from the year 2000, border on prophecy. Today there is an epidemic of loneliness, well-documented, tied closely to the strange ways that social media (contrary to its name) has diminished sociality. Social media has made us less social. People don’t know how to be alone with themselves anymore, and they don’t know how to present their “selves, [their] souls and bodies,” to one another or to God. The cell phone and the internet—the technology for being connected with anyone and anything at any time—have, ironically, made us lonely.

    All of us can see how this is true of others, yet many of us tend to think of ourselves as exempt. This loneliness is happening to “people” out there, but, “you and me, babe,” we’re the exception. But that’s not true. I wrote this on my computer, connected to wi-fi, and frequently checking out other things on the Net. You’re reading it on your phone or tablet or something else with a screen. Who says we aren’t, in this ironical Greg Brown sense, lonely?

— 

    The only true cure for loneliness is to connect with the One who is always with us. The first, baby step is to turn this off, breathe deeply, and open your Prayer Book to, say, Morning or Evening Prayer.

— 

    Out & About. I announced last week that the next “Good Books & Good Talk” seminar will be on “Hamlet” on January 26, followed by Bessie Head’s Where Rain Clouds Gather on February 23. Regarding our March 23 reading, Parts of a World by A. G. Motjabai, you can check out John Wilson’s essay on how he came to champion the author: https://www.christianitytoday.com/2011/06/partsworld/

    On the Web: Wipf & Stock has all its books at halfprice through November, free media mail shipping: wipfandstock.com. The code you need is CONFSHIP. They publish literally thousands of theological books, including yours truly’s Post-Covid Catechesis and several volumes in the Pro Ecclesia series, not to mention Being Salt by somebody named George Sumner.

Posted by The Rev. Canon Dr. Victor Lee Austin with

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The Rev. Canon Victor Lee Austin. Ph.D., is the Theologian-in-Residence for the diocese and is the author of several books including, "Friendship: The Heart of Being Human" and "A Post-Covid Catechesis.: 

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