Diary of a Theologian

 On a recent visit to some old friends in another state, I saw hundreds of campaign signs at the various intersections of their city. One of them had a remarkable slogan, along the lines of “It’s Time to Start Fighting Back.”

One wonders about the future if this candidate is successful and gets elected. Does he keep fighting back, year after year? Will there ever come a time when he says: mission accomplished, we fought back and we were successful? Can it ever be time to stop fighting back?

To put it more sharply, the political problem is that if he is successful, he has undermined his own position. If he successfully fights back then he becomes the establishment, and his own logic requires that someone else rise up against him and say, Time to start fighting back!

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This problem arises out of scepticism about authority. The truth is we live in a country that’s both good and bad while being, in many ways, the envy of the world. What is good about our society is connected with its social institutionsand the way we live with one another. This includes many things, including freedom to engage in the world of exchange, community responsibility for one another, having a rule of law, valuing religion and respecting its free exercise. Everything we do together is possible only because we acknowledge a measure of authority, from the conductor of the orchestra to the principal of the school to the manager of the store. Without authority and institutions, the range of human goods available to us is terribly diminished.

There is much that needs to be reformed. At the same time there is much that needs to be treasured and preserved. 

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God is interested in our human institutions. He provides us with governments for our human good, because we are sinners and certain judgments need to be provided for the good of us all in society. He provides us with educationalinstitutions because he is himself the Teacher and the Truth behind all teaching and seeking truth. He underwrites the various networks of human communications and creativity so that people may flourish with productive work. 

In the face of imperfect institutions, the normal Christian posture is to give thanks for their existence as being part of the providence of God, while working to improve them. With regard to persons of authority within those institutions, our posture is similar: to give thanks that God has provided such for us, while working for such improvement as may be possible. 

Which is to say, whatever “fighting against” we may be called to do, such “fighting” remains within the context of gratitude for the good that existing institutions have provided and, even if in a curtailed sense, continue to provide.

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    Fall Dates for Brothers Karamazov seminars (Good Books & Good Talk). The dates have been set for a four-session series on Dostoyevsky’sBrothers Karamazov. In Dallas, at St. Matthew’s Cathedral, Sundays from 5 to 6:30 p.m.:

    August 30, Part One

    October 11, Part Two

    November 1, Part Three

    November 29, Part Four

Time to get your copy and start reading the first “Part”: a great book awaits you. (Part One is “Books” 1-3, about 150 pages in many translations.)

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    Out & About. Sunday, July 26, I am to preach at St. Matthew’s Cathedral in Dallas.

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    For fun. Ninety-six years ago this past Tuesday, construction began on the Hoover Dam. The following is thanks to the calendar of the National Association of Scholars: “The beaver said to the rabbit as they stared at the Hoover Dam, No, I didn’t build it myself, but it’s based on an idea of mine.” Can any of my readers identify the source of that charming line?