Occluded Religion

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In my youngest days the word “occult” conjured the most perilous kind of fear in my inexperienced, Christian heart. It sounded malevolent and sinister, suggesting Hell, Satan, and the coercion of the divine. Therefore it took considerable time to pump up the courage to read Occult America by Mitch Horowitz. Well, maybe it wasn’t that dramatic—I learned in the course of my many years studying religion that “occult” is very difficult to tease out from “religion.” What I really feared is what others would think of me as I sat on the bus reading Occult America while heading to the Lincoln Tunnel. The word “occult” refers to the “hidden” or “secret” nature of certain religious practices. In ancient times it might refer to the Gnostics or Mandaeans, while in more recent days it might be used to describe Rosicrucians or Theosophists. Unconventional, yes. Evil, hardly.

Horowitz takes his readers through a whirlwind tour of some very colorful characters and, perhaps more importantly, shows just how deeply rooted occult practices are in the most Christian nation on earth. Few people realize just how influenced high office holders in this country have occasionally been by the occult. It seems a hard-and-fast rule that to be elected president you must be a professing Christian, strongly preferable if of the evangelical, Protestant flavor. Ronald Reagan made a great show of that while being personally convicted of the efficacy of astrology and some popular mediums. And Reagan has not been the only one. Still, politicians have to keep their more unconventional religious beliefs secret. The populace likes a straight shooter, devotionally speaking. The fact is that even what many people think of as regular Christianity has been seasoned somewhat with occult.

I can recommend this little book for getting a sense of just how deeply the occult has tunneled into the American psyche. The chapter on the ouija board took me straight back to a very straight-laced Grove City College, bastion of conservative evangelicalism. When I matriculated (which sounds vaguely occultish in its own right) the yearbook was called The Ouija. It was explained away as the combination of the French and German words for “yes,” but everyone knew, given what yearbooks are, that it had that spooky, occult vibe. By my senior year a more fluffy, evangelical-safe title of The Bridge replaced it. And many heaved a great sigh of relief. Christians thanked their lucky stars that they’d been delivered from the evils of the occult just as they were lining up to elect Ronald Reagan to a second term in office.

Religious Studies Project

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Edinburgh University is often the overlooked gem in the academic crown of the British Isles. I have to confess that that declaration is in part based on the natural pride of an alum, but it also arises from seeing the various projects the university has in some way sponsored or spawned. The study of religion is still taken quite seriously at my alma mater, and among the more recent incarnations is a website called The Religious Studies Project. (It at first reminded me of the Edinburgh Ras Shamra Project, with nearly the same initials, initiated by a couple of talented chaps just after I left town.) Founded by a couple of post-graduate students in religious studies, the RSP offers weekly podcasts and various articles on topics of interest in the realm of my erstwhile and eternal profession.

The Internet has forever changed the way that people learn about religion. This democratization of knowledge is generally a good thing, especially for those who test what they read (or hear) against other sources. This is the heart of the academic enterprise. Many people think that higher education is all about getting the answers. This may be true in some fields, but the disciplines known as the humanities—the things that make us human—find education in the perennial raising of questions. Religions should be the source of questions, not the monolithic bastions of all-answers. You can always tell when you meet someone truly educated in religion—s/he will be the one admitting that s/he doesn’t know.

In our cost-effective society we live under a prevailing myth that when you pay for something you should get a certain commodity in return. In fact, education often works just the opposite way, robbing the learner of easy certitudes, leaving him or her wondering more deeply. So I’m pleased to give my colleagues a shout-out.

If you’ve found this blog you likely have some passing interest in religion. Having been trained in Edinburgh I laud the method I learned: ask questions. Seek answers. Ask more questions. This is the tradition of religious studies. Even if it doesn’t lead to jobs, we hopefully emerge from it a little bit wiser.

The Illustrative Man

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To a young boy growing up in an economically depressed small town without money to buy fancy things, escapist reading is a natural hobby. As with many boys, science fiction held my undying attention. My favorite writer was Ray Bradbury. His stories were short enough to consume in a single sitting, and they were full of wonder, and imagination, and possibility. I had nearly all of his books. So today, when I learned that Ray Bradbury had died, it felt as if another author’s works had been burned and the great man himself simply disappeared. Along with Edgar Allan Poe—whom I discovered early—and H. P. Lovecraft—whom I discovered late—Ray Bradbury represented what I believed a short story should be. I began writing short stories when I was in grade school. I still have a few of them, and the influence of Bradbury is most profound. At times it feels like the world is running out of dreamers.

Instead of churning out young people eager to explore the possibilities—and even the impossibilities—of the world, our educational system has become much more prosaic. We teach our young how to find jobs. Walking across Manhattan in a weary mood one morning it occurred to me: we go to college and we receive specialized training to make us fit for more cerebral jobs. We work those jobs in order to make corporate executives wealthier. Work benefits the one-percenters most. All the way to the office I dream of a life where I might have pursued creativity and exploration. I still awake before 4 a.m. every day to scrape together a few fragments of a moment to write before heading off to work in the big city. The characters I invent live in my head and die a subtle death as email and book proposals force their bossy way into my consciousness.

The worlds Ray Bradbury imagined were places where the familiar and the strange easily mixed. Many of his tales would be categorized as fantasy rather than science fiction today, but they manage to instill an almost religious reverence among those who believe paradise might be just over on that next unexplored planet. Or perhaps it will never stop raining there and the universe will drive us mad. When I “grew up” and needed to liquidate my juvenile assets, I sold most of my Ray Bradbury books to a used book dealer. Rarely a day passes when I don’t regret that impetuous move. And some days, such as today, I feel it especially deeply. One commodity that our fumbling world simply can’t afford to lose is its dreamers. On an unexplored planet somewhere out there, I know Ray Bradbury agrees with me.

From Wiki Commons

Lunchtime in Midtown

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It was a brilliantly sunny day and there seemed to be rain nowhere in sight. It wasn’t even hot. Days like this have been rare this spring, so I went out for a lunchtime walk in my neighborhood. I’d been by the United Nations with some visiting family the day before, so I went down again and pondered the words attributed to Isaiah carved in the wall across from one of the largest intentional organs of peace in the world. I was reminded that a copy of the Edict of Cyrus resides in the UN; as a historical text it is often considered to be the first document promoting religious tolerance among lesser powers allowed by a greater power. The world could use a few more like old Cyrus the Great these days. I think Deutero-Isaiah would agree. So with biblical thoughts in my head, I strolled back toward Grand Central.

Along the way I saw a phrase from the Eucharistic Prayer on a building and it was like meeting someone from college that moved halfway around the world to disappear from your life. I saw that I was standing outside 815 Second Avenue. To the majority of the world—even the majority of Christians—this will mean nothing. At Nashotah House, however, “815” was regarded as the source of all evil. It is the headquarters of the Episcopal Church in America. It is hard, as a disowned son, to describe the feelings that assailed me there. Those good Christians who intended me such harm did not seem to realize all I had sacrificed to join them. Some of the clergy whose daggers remain in my back are well-paid priests right here in New York. Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look, I thought.

With that cloud in my sky, I turned the corner back to work. Parked in the street was a truck labeled “Divine Moving & Storage.” That sounded an awful lot like a trope for my life. The reproduction of Michelangelo’s God reaching to Adam contrasting with a phone number ending in 666, this bundle of contradictions might just have been a small sample of the human experience. Caught constantly between Heaven and Hell with doleful prophets and profit-loving dolers of sacramental grace living one next to the other. New York is a religious city in every sense of the word. Somewhere off in the shadows I think I hear Isaiah whispering, “I make weal and I create woe…” I love a sunny day in Manhattan.

Brown Out

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Brown University’s commencement ceremonies include a deluge of academic mythology. The curse of my chosen field of academic study is the tendency to see mythology everywhere. Some individuals see dead people, others see myths. I always feel an inordinate sense of pride in the graduates, especially those who are related to me, but the whole arrangement takes part in the mythology of higher education. Who wouldn’t feel awe in the presence of the illustrious recipients of honorary degrees? There on the Jumbotron, Viola Davis, Marilynne Robinson, Diane Sawyer, and John Lewis. In the program book the seemingly arcane symbols of academia are explained. These are the scriptures backing the mythology. I always wondered why some old professor always carried a mace in academic processions.

But the mythology of higher education runs deeper than the symbols and ceremonial. Education itself is under intense fire for participating in the realm of finance that it helped to create. Despite constant affidavits to the opposite effect, there is more to life than money. The cost in educating our young requires a greater input than becomes obvious in the immediate return on the investment. Often I hear concerns expressed over the cost of higher education, and there are certainly excesses that must be addressed. The real profit in this transaction, however, is our future. Who can look at the ocean of mortarboarded potential and not feel, deep down, a sense of optimism, no matter how guarded?

The mace is a symbol of violence. Education, if done right, is violence against ignorance and ossified old ways of prejudice, discrimination, and selfishness. For those of us who have tried—and some of us have not been successful—to shed some light on future generations, commencement is a humbling experience. While at Nashotah House I sat through many of them, and sometimes the mythology mingled with hypocrisy as I saw raw hunger for power and the lust to control the lives of others. It was refreshing to experience the mythology anew in a setting where genuine hope seemed to linger among faces full of optimism and pride of achievement. Perhaps it was the obvious inclusiveness instilled by outgoing president Ruth J. Simmons, but prayers by women clergy, and honorary degrees conferred across the spectrum of humanity are signs of hope. The mythology of academia is one myth worth believing in, if it is truly a commencement.

Dark Light

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It took a few weeks and five states, but I finally got to see Dark Shadows. Although I’d seen the trailers, there was quite a bit over which I remained in the dark. After all, the television series ran daily for several years and the story of Barnabas Collins was never really resolved, to the best of my knowledge. Trying to fit all of that into a couple hours of cost-intensive Hollywood showmanship would be a tall order. I have come to trust the Burton-Depp collaboration, however, and I had read some time ago that Johnny Depp had wanted to be Barnabas Collins when he was growing up. It is difficult nevertheless to resurrect a vampire after some three-and-a-half decades of slumber. Speaking with some friends after the movie I discovered that I was not the only child discouraged from watching Dark Shadows after school as a child. But watch I did.

Barnabas Collins became a monster as the result of a curse. The series—which I remember principally as a series of impressions and images—and the movie make that clear. The man who has lost control of his own fate is a reluctant monster. An aristocrat who lives by draining the blood of the common folk. Despite the humor and carnality of the movie, social commentary is there. Sometimes buried in an iron coffin, and sometimes in a vintage VW bus from the early ‘70’s. It may not appear full blown on the big screen but it pulses through the veins nevertheless. Barnabas Collins is a reluctant and conflicted vampire, but he does kill others to survive.

Why would a kid raised in a religious setting be so drawn to a creature of evil? Perhaps it was because Barnabas was the ultimate penitent. He had to victimize others, but he always regretted doing so. Like any living (or undead) creature, his nature compels him to survive. He is sad about his lot in the world, but is helpless to change it. Like many children of the monster generation I was nourished by a long series of movies featuring impossible creatures, including vampires. The earliest vampire I knew, however, was Barnabas Collins. Although Bram Stoker had set the type nearly a century earlier, my measure of the vampire was the reluctant denizen of Collinwood. Although I read my Bible dutifully, and never missed church, I still found the plight of this lonely monster compelling. The movie may not live up to the standard of all Dark Shadows aficionados, but if it brings a subtlety of moral ambiguity to a generation of absurdly self-assured modern-day fundamentalist children, the curse of Barnabas Collins may really be a blessing in disguise.

Blazing Forest

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Back in 1996 an angel was on the big screen. In a manner of speaking. Michael, starring John Travolta as the archangel Michael, may not have been an instant classic but it did have a memorable line or two. The image of a smoking angel had been contrived by Van Halen over a decade earlier, but the idea of the prince of the army of Yahweh being a guy just like the rest of us was strangely refreshing. No Park Avenue deity this. When the reporters first meet Michael and wonder if he’s the real thing, one suggests tugging on his wings to see if they’re real. Michael responds by asking if he should pull the reporter’s privates to see if they’re really attached. His companion comments, “An angel that says ‘pecker.’” While the very idea of “bad words” is an unusual one, it is well-nigh a universal. In just about every culture there are words or phrases that just aren’t uttered in polite company. Those who can’t control their mouths, suggests the book of James, can’t control their lives. So it is with a kind of perverse wonder that I read about the bullying bravado that issues from the lips of New Jersey’s governor.

Don’t get me wrong. I never fault anyone for speaking like they were taught. I was raised in a blue collar family and at times the talk could get pretty blue as well. I would, however, point out that you’ll not find a student I taught over my two decades in the classroom that every heard me cuss in class. It is a matter of standards. Emotions, those great clawing monsters inside us, rage to escape. The building blocks of society—restraint and control, and dare we even wish? subtlety and refinement—are signs of civilization. Some of us were taught to leave name-calling on the playground. I am profoundly saddened when politicians believe they are the best America has to offer when in reality they reveal themselves coarse, vulgar bullies. Enter Chris Christie.

In a public venue on Wednesday New Jersey’s governor called the chief budget officer for the Office of Legislative Services, “idiot,” “jerk,” and “numbnuts.” Here’s where we see Tea Party values incarnate. Belittling others, especially in a public forum, reveals a nature that should make all civilized civilians hang their heads in a surfeit of collective shame. America has come to this? Admiring bullies and slashing and burning services for those who need a little communal support? And he has been posturing for a vice presidential nomination. And angels will be smoking cigarettes in the wings. A President/Vice-President who says “numbnuts?” America deserves far better than this. Where is Michael when we need him?

Take that, you #!@&$!

Scary Monstrances

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I can’t help myself. I’ve always found monsters fascinating. Now that I’m mostly grown up and am expected to have a modicum of respectability, I try to read academic books on monsters so that I can legitimate what would otherwise be puerile juvenility. David D. Gilmore’s Monsters: Evil Beings, Mythical Beasts, and All Manner of Imaginary Terrors was my latest foray into the forest. As I have come to expect, just pages into the book the first reference to religion emerged. This connection between monsters and religion is not Gilmore’s central theme, but it does recur at several points in the book. I especially enjoyed his discussion of Spain’s Pentecostal dragon. The Tarasque, named after its host town, is a medieval dragon that is still feted to this day in some locations. Considered to be symbolic of the sins of humankind, it accompanies either the holy day of Pentecost or of Corpus Christi. This connection between the church and monsters took me back to my first experience of Corpus Christi.

Raised as solid a protester as a Protestant can be, I had a difficult transition to some aspects of Anglicanism. The ceremonial was great, but some of the popish blandishments I could never quite accept. When a member of Boston’s famed Church of the Advent, the rector asked me to be a torch bearer on Corpus Christi. This involved processing outdoors onto Beacon Hill in full drag (or cassock and surplice, as I’m sure the parsimonious will correct me) to accompany the holy sacrament, carried as it turns out, in a monstrance. The idea that looking at a piece of wafer-thin bread on public display could somehow mediate a divine blessing, I never understood. It felt as much a fairy tale as the dragons of Spain. Monster or monstrance?

Gilmore concludes that monsters are people’s projections of their deepest unresolved issues. He may be right. One of his observations, however, struck me. He suggests monsters predate even gods in the human imagination. I tend to think they entered that gray space at the same time. Our minds have always told us that there were creatures out there to fear. Some of them, we hope, are good. Others are clearly evil. Monsters are difficult to explain in a world created by a benevolent deity. It is perhaps no mistake that Zoroastrians conceived of Angra Mainyu as monstrous. Divinity and diabolism could be fused into one being. There is a profound lesson here, for those able to read. Monsters are among the earliest projections of human imagination. And they remain forever with us.

Angra Mainyu; god or monster?

Children Shall Lead Them

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One of the perks of moving to New Jersey was landing in a town with strong support for the arts. Every time I attend a middle or high school concert, I consider how the old image of painful evenings of parents patiently pretending to enjoy the music has ended. The kids in this town could be professionals. If I close my eyes, I forget they’re all under nineteen. Last night at a school concert one of the pieces was “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life,” Eric Idle’s chestnut from the Life of Brian (now featured, I hear tell, in Spamalot). I first saw the Life of Brian with some trepidation while in seminary—I had been sounded warned that it was a profane movie, making fun of Jesus. Considering that all the actual references to Jesus in the movie are quite positive, I eventually realized what all the fuss was about. The movie doesn’t make fun of Jesus, it does, however, show the laughable nature of those who follow a religion blindly. This, I gather, was the real root of the problem.

Next to this fun piece, the concert also included several pieces taken from originally sacred contexts such as Mozart’s Dies Irae and settings of Veni, Sancte Spiritus and Ave Maria. Spirituals, likewise, are a perennial favorite. Performed along next to these pieces of religious origin were also decidely secular pieces such as “Scarborough Fair” and the Beatles’ “Hello, Goodbye.” In concert the sacred and profane blend beautifully. Perhaps there is a paradigm hidden in plain sight here. Religions need not be defensive and unbelievers need not attack them. The world is surely big enough for differences of opinion.

Music has a power that sometimes frightens me. I don’t often address it in my blog because of how much it affects me. Theorists often note that music is part of nearly every religion ever invented—we know that something special is going on when we hear it. And music has the ability to move large groups of people simultaneously. I’ve not attended many professional concerts (the last one was Alice Cooper in Atlantic City back in 2008), but no matter how secular the artist the experience is profoundly spiritual. I’m not sure I can adequately define what that means, but when it is felt there is no mistaking it. So maybe that’s why school concerts have such power. It seems that schools that support the arts also tend to have excellent academic records as well. The truth is hidden in plain sight.

Convergent Evolution

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Back when my opinion mattered—in higher education, you must realize, a scholar’s outlook only matters when s/he has a teaching post, no matter how abysmal the school. Once that post is gone you just become another guy with an opinion—I was invited to a conference. This is quite an honor for someone consigned to the bargain basement of academia, and for my paper I read from a burgeoning book that died a sudden death along with my academic career. In that stillborn tome I argued that many aspects of ancient mythology—including some in the Bible—made better sense in the light of science. I suggested that some of the infelicities in ancient texts might be the signs of continuing evolution of the human brain. Ancient people were able to believe what we find troubling. By the end of the conference many respectable scholars were looking askance at me when I stepped into the room. Honestly. I heard the word “Wiggins” uttered as if it were an archaic curse. Shortly after that I found myself working out of some guy’s basement for a salary fit for a knave.

Imagine my delight, then, at finding a reputable scholar who argued that the human brain indeed continues to evolve. In fact, it has speeded up the pace as new challenges have emerged. Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors by Nicholas Wade was recommended to me by my brother-in-law. As I was updating myself this week on how we became human, I was surprised to see Wade suggesting what I had suggested in my paper—the patterns of human behavior (we both have an interest in religion, it seems) are tied to the evolutionary state of our brains. Sitting on a bus next to many other drones commuting like ants to New York City, I felt strangely vindicated. I had an idea scorned by my colleagues that is being suggested by science. Not that everyone will accept Wade’s conclusions. Many scholars of ancient religions will never even read them. When I explained my thesis to a colleague after losing my academic status, he said, “I don’t give much credibility to science.”

Convergence is the phenomenon of two species evolving an adaptation independently. Often it is difficult for people to believe that a trait shared by two populations is simply nature’s way of trial and error that happened to work twice, in different situations. Nicholas Wade and I experienced convergence on this point. He, of course, is a famous writer and I am nobody. Nevertheless, my unpublished idea was presented at a conference the year his book must have been in production. We had both been reading about evolution and wondering what its effect on religion might have been. I will comment more on Wade’s specific ideas about religion in the book in another post. He, of course, went on to write The Faith Instinct, which was widely acclaimed. At that time I was struggling to find work and it seemed that natural selection hadn’t selected me at all. I am glad, however, that my idea made it into print, even if it was evolved by someone else who is far more fit for survival.

Living with Art

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A day spent among art can be more spiritual than a month of Sundays. Few become rich by being artists—in fact the opposite is society’s expectation. The masterpieces artists leave behind then become among the most valuable of all human creations when their often tragic lives end and it is recognized that no more genius is forthcoming. As a lifelong dabbler in the arts, I know that nothing like a perturbed state of mind serves to bring about the pieces I like best. Seeing the art of others, however, is a deeply satisfying experience. In a pre-Mother’s Day celebration, we met friends yesterday to revisit Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, New Jersey. We’ve grown accustomed to gray skies this spring, so the fact that it was sunny and warm came almost as a divine sign that this was a day to spend outdoors among the artwork of both humans and nature.

As rational as we strive to be, emotion remains our main motive force. Psychologists and neuroscientists, approaching the human mind rationally, inevitably conclude that emotion and reason are hopelessly entangled in the psyche. Not only does this explain the persistent draw of art, but also of religion as well. If possible, pull back and try to listen to someone, anyone, describe their religion in rational terms. How quickly it breaks down! And yet, reactions against a purely scientific—and doubtlessly empirically correct—explanation of the origin and development of life on earth lead to very hostile reactions. For many such explanations are not emotionally satisfying. We need a little more magic in our imaginative diet. Art allows us to indulge without embarrassment in our need for emotional expression. In the art galleries I’ve seen, whether Edinburgh, London, Paris, New York, Milwaukee, Corning, or Hamilton, there have always been hundreds of others seeking something there as well.

What we are seeking can’t be purchased with money, and it can’t be grasped by greedy hands. It can only be held in receptive and hungry internal places—the space pre-scientific individuals called the soul. And there it will remain. The first time I saw the Mona Lisa and the statue of winged Nike will never leave me. Yesterday, wandering the acres of art called Grounds for Sculpture, once again artistic expression claimed another willing victim. In our money-fevered world where “real life” is squandered chasing material goods to outstrip everyone else, art, the spiritual quest, lies quietly awaiting the weekend. The time people value most. And those who spend that time among art will be the most blessed of all.

Beyond Measure

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Thinking back to my first course in World Religions, I recollect learning about Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, and Confucianism for the first time. It is likely that Taoism was also mentioned, but I had to do a ton of research before I taught the course for the first time at Oshkosh. I remembered learning nothing about Sikhism or Shinto, not to mention Jainism or any host of religions boasting smaller numbers, by gosh. Now that I’m in the business of commissioning books on world religions, I have come into a quandary. As I know from experience, those who teach world religions are faced with a classic case of TMI: too much information. These religions I’ve mentioned only begin to scratch the vast surface of human religious expression, while your typical semester is only 14 weeks in duration. How do we cover all the smaller religions, some of which may have even a million or more adherents, and may be, at times, geared toward violent behavior? There’s simply no way.

This is where the quagmire grows thickest—are “major religions” quantified by numbers alone? From comments of readers of this blog it is quite clear that Christianity is no uniform religion. The differences go deeper than Protestant or Catholic or Orthodox. Most of us follow rather idiosyncratic blends of various religions we’ve experienced. It is not unusual for a Christian to practice yoga or to engage in meditation. And there are thousands of smaller religions as well, and the beliefs are deeply embedded in the lives of those who hold them. A good example would be Native American religions. There isn’t just one. Various tribes held their own beliefs and yet try to find a textbook that covers the differences between them. (Ah, but publishers are bound by the need to sell many copies to make such books profitable, and what professor is going to have the time to parse out different belief systems of these small, sometimes powerless groups?)

It is the curse of categorization. In our free market economy bigger is always better. Religions, on the other hand, do not always concern themselves with winning the most tricks. The Zoroastrians, who gave us the concepts of Heaven and Hell and much else that became standard theology in the monotheistic religions, continue to exist. In small numbers. So small that, as a religion major, I didn’t really learn about them until I began teaching classes exploring the origins of our modern religious concepts. When the modern eye assesses the importance of something, it does so by crunching the numbers. Religions have been our human means of seeking the truth since civilization began, perhaps even before. Often numbers and truth just don’t align.

Come Sail Away

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A profound sadness accompanied my reading of Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses, by Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa. I mentioned this study when it was highlighted in the Chronicle of Higher Education a couple months back, and have just finished reading it. My sadness stems from having been told from my earliest years that I was a natural teacher, but having fallen victim to statistics. Higher education, Arum and Roksa assert, no longer considers undergraduate education to be its highest priority. This is statistically borne out. Often it is because colleges and universities no longer have the will or incentive to retain committed educators. Concerned parents sometimes ask me what’s wrong with the system. Truth is, I worked hard on my teaching only to be forced out—I simply don’t know. A large part of it, I believe, is that in the 1970’s the US government instituted changes in higher education policy to advantage freer market forces (i.e., capitalism). Our educational institutions have been on the decline ever since.

Not being a sociologist, I can’t assess all the data presented in Academically Adrift, but the portrait painted is a disheartening one. Middle class and working class people pay enormous amounts to send their kids to college. The majority of students do not learn much in the way of critical thinking when they are there. It became clear, however, that one thing higher education does not erase is class distinctions. The findings seem to indicate that, if anything, college deepens the rift. Those colonists who long ago fled the tyranny of the crown replicated their own version of a caste system in their new nation. I have not been the only one to notice that those of us who grew up in very humble circumstances just don’t stand a chance of earning credibility in academia’s elitist eyes. Our only hope is education—precisely what many college students are not getting for their parents’ money.

My critique of higher education is accompanied by just a small morsel of hope. I cherish every school I’ve had the privilege to teach in, save one. In each classroom I found some students who were eager to learn, some of whom would become friends. Education is pointless if it doesn’t make life better for people. We could be starving dogs growling for the same bone (just like capitalists) living in a junk yard or a desert. Education alone holds the promise of lifting us out from our bestial predilections. With its Midas touch, however, the free market has transformed higher education into a money-making venture eviscerated of its very soul. Unless our society can learn once again to support education for its own sake—the sake of improving our lives instead of improving the bottom line for the top one percent—we will find ourselves back in our caves scratching the fleas from our unwashed bodies. Of course, at least the one-percenters will have plenty of cronies standing in line to scratch their noble backs even then.

Degradation

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Having felt like an automaton in the realm of higher education, I was occasionally overwhelmed by the number of students and lack of resources. One of my fervent beliefs is that multiple-choice tests do not really demonstrate what a student knows, but playing the numbers, I sometimes had to resort to them. Being an adjunct, I didn’t have access to Scantron, so I devised a method of stacking the sheets precisely and grading them with a power drill. It was my one bit of notoriety at Rutgers—I was the guy who graded with a drill. All the while, however, I knew that a truer method would be to allow students to write for themselves. Even that, however, is going the way of automation. A recent story in the Chronicle of Higher Education reveals that student papers are sometimes being graded by robots. Real robots. The truly scary part of the story is that the robots provide grading almost indistinguishable from the professor, a species quickly becoming obsolete. I tell myself not to panic.

“Don’t panic,” of course, was the catch-phrase popularized by Douglas Adams in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. In a world overwhelmed by forces we can’t hope to understand, panic is a natural enough reaction. Adams gave us Marvin the Paranoid Android. Higher education has given us the paranoid professor. Parents who pay extraordinary—mythologically high—tuition rates often ask me where all that money goes. It certainly doesn’t line the pockets of humanities professors; indeed, many of the classes are taught by adjuncts who are the penny dreadfuls of academia. I don’t know where the money goes. I do know that university presidents and football coaches are not wanting for material goods, but even their greed can’t account for the entire greenback drain.

If I were still a professor I’d be tempted to ignore the sage advice of Douglas Adams about now. Courses can be covered by an overwhelming army of competent adjuncts, and grading can be contracted out to robots. Students really don’t even need to come to class any more as distance education has taught us. College becomes little more than an excuse to drink while away from home with a hefty tab being picked up by the folks back home. Higher education may have had the seeds of its own destruction always planted within itself. We’ve confused technology with the desire for increasing comfort and ease of lifestyle. It was only a matter of time before universities caught up. Standing by the grave of Douglas Adams in Highgate Cemetery I’m thinking that his bizarre vision of the future was more sensible than what has actually evolved in our culture. That, and I’m glad I learned to use a power drill.

Dark Shadows Indeed

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Part of my childhood died today. Like millions of others, I have been eagerly anticipating Tim Burton’s new Dark Shadows movie to wash the treacle of Twilight from the vampire’s mouth. Barnabas Collins was the epitome of the conflicted gentleman vampire, fully aware of and repulsed by his curse. After school I would religiously sit in front of the black-and-white television and watch the waves crashing into the cliffs of Maine as the moody story began to unfold in daily episodes. So when I read this morning that Jonathan Frid had died, I knew the vampire had found peace at last. And I was sad.

Although I’ve read scholarly analyses of monster fascination, nothing sets me back to childhood so directly as my beloved monsters. I don’t know why I feel a thrill in my chest and my pulse quickens when monsters appear before me. Perhaps it is a child’s way of coming to grips with a world beyond his or her control, or perhaps it was my way of dealing with a broken family. Lacking a father figure in life, I was fascinated by the gentle care and predatory nature of Barnabas Collins. He really did care, but he still had to bite you in the neck to survive. To my pre-adolescent mind, Jonathan Frid was Barnabas Collins. When I grew old enough for gothic novellettes, I consumed the serialized Dark Shadows books by Marilyn Ross, no matter how predictable or trite. I was reading about my heritage.

I have no doubts that Johnny Depp will portray a believable Barnabas Collins next month. Jonathan Frid, it is said, was consulted and was often present on the set of the new movie as it was being filmed. His turn to portray the tortured ancestor of the Collins family had lapsed, but he was the original. What is the draw of the vampire if not life after death? And although Jonathan Frid is gone, next month I will stand in line to see the resurrection of the vampire on the large screen.