Physics of Religion

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As an observer on life’s sidelines, I rarely participate in the action. The subject matter is more important than the critic, so I tend to respond in this blog rather than create. Once in a great while, however, someone I know shows up in the media. A number of years back Neal Stephenson introduced me to George Dyson. I instantly felt an affinity for him, and found his book Darwin Among the Machines a great triumph of intelligible science writing. It was no great surprise, then, when George was mentioned in an article in December’s Atlantic magazine, comparing his outlook to that of his father, physicist Freeman Dyson. I was intrigued by physics in high school, but my overwhelming supposition that religion explained life overruled this predilection and so I’ve ended up an unemployed religion professor than a scientist. In the article, however, author Kenneth Brower brings these things together.

Brower asks a pointed question: how can a physicist as brilliant as Freeman Dyson hold factually inaccurate and apparently misguided ideas about global warming? The story contrasts Freeman with his son George as exemplars of two different religions. George represents the environmentalist religion while Freeman represents the belief in humanity’s ability to solve any problem. The use of religion as a means of distinguishing these views again raises a question of definition. I don’t dispute the use of the word – it is entirely apt in this context – but the functional definition here is that religion equates to something deeply believed. I am a little troubled by this. Not because no gods or deities or supernatural forces enter into it, but because for years many evangelicals have boldly declared that science itself is a religion. That idea has been used as leverage to get Creationist ideas equal time with those of science because it comes down to purely a matter of one religion against another.

Belief is a phenomenon that is not well understood. Most people have no difficulty accepting the truthfulness of factual data. Seldom do even religious zealots doubt two plus two equals four. At a more theoretical level, however, facts become formulas incomprehensible to most of us and critics are quick to call this “religion.” Faith in human ability to solve the riddles of the universe. Where is the line with religion crossed? In the year 2000 Freeman Dyson received the Templeton Prize, an honor reserved for those who make significant contribution to the spiritual dimension of life, often with a scientific component. It is the dream of every religionist to be considered for this great honor. Once again, however, the further out we peer into our universe, the more the lines become blurred. That does not worry me. What concerns me is how such ambiguity will no doubt be used by Creationists and their Neo-Con supporters who are only too glad to have a scientist of Freeman Dyson on their side. When religion trumps science not even 2 + 2 = 4 is secure.

Hubble's ultra deep field has yet to detect any deities

Hallelujah of a Long Night

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I discovered Leonard Cohen is an unusual way. Having grown up with very limited funds for purchasing music, most of what I listened to growing up was what I heard on the radio out of a small-town station or what I heard emanating from my older brother’s room. My musical tastes, however, always included a “religious” element, whether that be a blatant religious message or provocative lyrics combined with compelling tunes. It was only when I first watched Shrek that I learned about Leonard Cohen. The moving scene where Shrek and Donkey have gone their own ways, both disappointed in love, is framed by John Cale’s rendition of Cohen’s “Hallelujah.” It is particularly poignant even in an animated movie, and I wanted to learn more about the haunted composer. The official movie soundtrack included the song covered by a different artist, but I found Cohen’s name listed as the writer. That’s when I began to explore.

I can’t pretend to be a groupie of any performer, but I find much of Cohen’s music to be moving and provocative. His lyrics, self-effacing and tentatively assertive, seem to capture the ideals of many religions. Reach out but don’t touch. Seek your own fulfillment, but put others first. I was reminded of this the other day while listening to some of his songs. A commentator once described Cohen as an artist with a Psalter in one hand and a picture of a naked woman in the other. An artist who struggles to overcome his humanity, yet who thoroughly enjoys it. “Hallelujah,” Cohen once explained in an interview, began as a religious song and ended up an erotic one.

As the nights grow longer and the days grow colder, my thoughts return more often to his provocative lyrics. After viewing Shrek I began to purchase Cohen CDs (this was back in the day when I was fully employed). I was amazed at what I’d been missing. There is an honesty about Cohen’s work from which many who overtly claim religion could learn. Cohen is the sinner who does not pretend to be a saint. His work openly expresses the struggle. If those who want others to join their religion could learn this simple trick of being honest, they might be surprised by the results. Self-assured bravado cannot convince as readily as the confessions of a lost but sincere seeker.

Jesus Gets a Head

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Sunday newspapers often contain stories calculated to appeal to the purveyor of the unusual in addition to the usual current events. When my wife pointed out an article in yesterday’s paper about the new (unverified) tallest statue of Jesus in the world, I was instantly intrigued. A Polish priest by the name of Sylwester Zawadzki created the statue which tips the yardstick at somewhere between 108 and 167 feet (a little triangulation might be helpful here). Noting that Rio de Janeiro’s Jesus is 125 feet tall, some are claiming this as the largest Jesus in the world. According to the article, some Poles feel the statue is tacky and in bad taste. Others rejoice that a very large likeness of what Jesus may have looked like now overlooks Swiebodzin.

Religions frequently display their colors. Knocking down crosses for crescent moons or stars of David for crosses is a religious activity as old as monotheism itself. Zawadzki claims that he was called by Jesus to do this task. According to the Gospels, Jesus seemed to focus more on his message than on himself, but the two have become so intricately knotted that the Jesus icon has come to stand for everything from preserving fetuses to longhair free-lovefests. What Jesus is depends on the eye of the beholder. As the gold-crowned head was lifted by crane onto the awaiting shoulders, a cross was lifted from the shoulders of Zawadzki who expressed thanks at having been able to fulfill God’s will.

Construction workers gathered at the base of the statue for photos, wearing safety helmets. Working on Jesus, like any construction zone, can be hazardous. If it is the will of Jesus to have enormous statues erected in this faithless world, are safety helmets really necessary? It is all a matter of perspective. Many people in the world are in need. Many do not have the resources they need to survive. Where is the triumph here? I understand the artistic urge, I sympathize with the need to stand out. But is the will of Jesus to be represented in larger and larger formats, or is it to help those who feel physical need day by day?

10 Questions

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This week’s Time magazine’s 10 Questions feature is directed to Stephen Hawking. Predictably, the first one concerns God. “If God doesn’t exist, why did the concept of his existence become almost universal?” a reader asks. I was less concerned with the answer than with the implications of the question itself. The very question represents a paradigm shift. Time was, such questions were directed to local clergy. The minister had the answers. To be sure, many millions, if not billions, of people regularly rely on their clergy for divine guidance. I used to teach clergy, so I am wary. Today, however, we need to know if all the answers fit. To find out if God exists, ask a scientist.

Theologians have earned their reputation as inscrutable doyens of the unspeakable. I have been involved in higher education in the field of religion for nearly twenty years and when I read theologians I am left scratching my head and asking “what?” Erudite to the point of being obtuse, the issues and methods of theologians address the unknowable. Much of it is idle speculation. The specialists, however, must earn their keep. Deans are impressed by what they can’t understand. God himself, I’m sure, wonders what some of it means. Is it any wonder that the average citizen would rather ask Dr. Hawking than ask some obscure theologian?

Religion and science are bound to bump at the borders like the parallel universes of string theory. Both are concerned with explaining things. Science has a proven track record of presenting verifiable results while theology has produced a poke full of intangibles. I am the first to admit to being a working-class Joe who has no special knowledge. What I’ve learned has come from the many classes I’ve endured and the books I’ve read. As far as I can tell, none of it comes directly from God. In my mind’s eye I reverse the situation. I see a popular theologian, take your pick (I have trouble conjuring the moniker of a household-name theologian), being featured in 10 Questions and the first query being, “What is M-Theory?” I can imagine the convoluted answer.

Golden Eagles

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I used to be a Boy Scout. Not a very good one, but I did try. Eventually, before even reaching the rank of “Tenderfoot” I dropped out. I often wonder what life would be like if I’d gone on to be an Eagle Scout, like Gerald Ford. Would I have made president? Or at least Assistant Professor? Last night I attended a workshop for Girl Scouts. My daughter is about to embark on the program that leads to the Gold Award, the highest honor a girl can attain in the organization. I want her to succeed where Dad failed. Maybe earn herself a better life.

Girl Scouts are as organized as Methodists and as legalistic as Jesuits. As we sat listening to the requirements, I was stunned by the degree of technicality. You can do this, but not that, that, or that. I remember now that I didn’t make Eagle Scout. What struck me as most intriguing, however, is the fact that certain projects are disallowed for theological reasons. In order to earn a Gold Award, the Scout must conceive, lead, and implement a social service project. It is a noble goal. In society many people are hurting and in need, and governors, representatives, and senators do not seem to notice. Yet, the leader of the meeting noted – if the project involves “controversial” issues, it will be declined. Controversial issues are things like abortion (i.e., women’s rights), or gay rights.

While I agree, it is not safe to put girls in the line of fire, I thought about these issues. The reasons that they are controversial is that Evangelical Christianity has made them so. Evangelicalism is a strain of Christianity that has a trajectory that went on the offensive in the 1960s. Charging the emotions of regular Americans with the terrors of gay love and dead fetuses, it raised these issues to national consciousness and made them a part of every political campaign in the latter part of the last millennium and into this one. These are points of great human suffering. The answers are not easy, but the fact remains – neither is a biblical issue. Yet girls are prevented from taking on issues that may have the most solid and tangible impact on their future. I was saddened.

I have no complaints with the Girl Scouts. It is a shining example of an organization that gives girls the confidence and tools they need in a hostile environment. I am disappointed, however, that a small but vocal cross-section of Christianity has made certain topics – topics that need to be addressed – off-limits for concerned young women.

Lions, and Politicians, and Bears

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A man was eaten by a lion in Zimbabwe yesterday. A boy on his way to school in Alaska was attacked but relatively unharmed by a brown bear. Predation. Much of the way humans act is based on our long history as both predators and prey. Evolution (may not apply in Kansas or Texas) has designed us to cope with these constant stresses of finding enough food and avoiding becoming food. A great deal of religious behavior can be traced back to avoidance of predation and success in the hunt. We like to think that we are somehow not animals, but animals are smart enough to disagree. Just ask that cheeky squirrel that finds ingenious ways to circumvent all the deterrents you put in place to assure that those seeds go to needy birds, not fat rodents. We are part of the mix. Our opposable thumbs help immensely; we build our own ecosystems to keep lions and bears out.

Yesterday was a day of predation. Even within the human sphere we find that killing others is permissible, as long as it is done slowly by those in fine clothes and fancy automobiles. Depriving the less deserving is a time-honored human behavior, after all, survival of the fittest only applies to animals, not us. Right? By backing policies that protect the wealthy in their lofty sanctuaries while others shiver in November’s Tuesday chill we show human nature. Humans are predators as well as prey.

Intriguingly, many politicians who support laissez faire economics deny evolution exists. Instituting policies that ensure survival of the wealthiest, they deny up and down that evolution has anything to do with the way that we are. It’s all in the nature of the evidence. And nature itself is evidence. We may be the smartest, most well adapted of the mammal class, and yet we can be eaten. What does the evidence suggest? From the point-of-view of a lifelong observer of religion, it suggests we are still the prey. When religion stealthily crawls into bed with politics, it is evident that even religion itself may be a deadly predator.

Theory of Everything

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Over the weekend my wife pointed out an interesting story on MSNBC pointing out that superstitious beliefs are becoming more common. While reason may dictate that as it becomes more obvious that reason explains everything the supernatural will fade from the human explanatory repertoire. Instead, scientists are using reason to explain why this does not appear to be happening. Many neuroscientists suggest that something in the brain predisposes us to believe, while other scientists suggest it may be in the DNA. For whatever reason, we are inclined to believe in outside agency.

The article is an introduction to the book Paranormal America by Christopher Bader and Carson Mencken. I’ve read some of Bader’s work before and it is admirable for its balance. He tends not to judge the phenomena but raises the question why people believe what is, frankly, often unbelievable. What stands out in such discussions is that religion is often classed separately from the “paranormal.” Paranormal is generally anything outside the accepted bounds of science. Supernatural, apparently, is anything that makes blatant claims to be outside the reach of science. With recriminations frequently flying both directions, I suggest maybe a reworking of definitions might be in order. Science, by definition, can explain all phenomena that exist. Supernatural, by definition, cannot be quantified. Too many mutually exclusive truths.

For many decades many scientists have been seeking a grand unified theory, something that explains everything. This they hope to do without recourse to the supernatural. When they arrive at this theory or formula, predictably, those who believe God is bigger than all this will claim that God is simply outside the system. Perhaps the net needs to be widened. We know that we humans do not possess the keenness of senses that our animal friends have. Various creatures see, heard, smell, taste and touch with such exquisite sensitivity that we can only be jealous. Some can sense magnetic fields, while some flowers follow the sun without the benefit of any eyes. We, in our presumption, think we see and measure all that is to be seen and measured. Hamlet would disagree. I can’t wait to read Bader and Mencken’s book, but I’m inclined to think that even when a grand unified theory arises there will still be room for philosophers, and maybe even theologians.

All You Zombies

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Not being a cable subscriber bears a burden all its own. Not only would paying the extra monthly fees for television prove a hardship, but the constant temptation to watch it would rate as a deadly sin. So on this “All Saints Day” I find myself wondering if the world is still out there after last night’s much-touted “The Walking Dead” premiere. The new AMC series has been written up in local papers and this week’s Time magazine. The latter calls it “a zombie apocalypse.” The fascination with zombie goes beyond holiday-fueled monsters. As James Poniewozik states in his Time article, zombies symbolize society’s insecurities: pandemics, terrorism, economic instability. The unrelenting undead remind us that death is perhaps not the worst thing to fear.

The religious side of this trend is fascinating. Revenants have no place in traditional Christian, Jewish, or Muslim theologies. Perhaps the closest semi-sanctioned version is the golem, a soulless protector of persecuted medieval Jewish communities. Traditional zombies are inextricably connected with magic, a means of manipulating the physical world through supernatural means. Like modern vampires, modern zombies have shifted from supernatural to biological, or at least scientific-sounding, explanations. Even Night of the Living Dead had an errant satellite to blame. The zombie has been reborn in a secular context, making it safe for religious believers to add it to their repertoire of fictional ghouls. And yet, the religious aspect has not completely vanished. The “apocalypse” that accompanies “The Walking Dead,” whether it is Armageddon, 2012, or Ragnarok, is a religious concept. Humans simply can’t face the end of the world without religious implications.

Audiences feeling a little let down after October’s terminal scare-fest, however, might find some cheer that Halloween is an end, but also a beginning. It is the start of the darkest time of year. Very soon not only do we drive home in the dark, but light will not have dawned by the time we start the car for work. In northern reaches of the globe, people can’t help but feel a little stress at finding our accustomed visual assessment of our world a little bit impaired for months at a time. And when we see that shoddy-clothed stranger straggling along in the half-dark, it may be time to remind ourselves that despite the naturalized zombie, there are still those who prey on their fellow humans. They may not be the undead. They may dress well and drive expensive cars and live off what they can legally draw from that stranger on the street. They may be the true harbingers of the apocalypse. They are the ones we should really fear.
Whose apocalypse?

Origin of Halloween

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Perhaps the most misunderstood of holidays, Halloween has grown into a major commercial holiday. Outsold only by Christmas in the United States, Halloween now supports its own seasonal stores that cash in on the massive public interest. A few years ago a wrote a book explaining the holidays for teens/tweens. The book was never published, and I’ve been putting excerpts on this blog on appropriate occasions. For the full story of Halloween, please check out the Full Essays page (link above).

Accusations of a demonic origin may fit in with the popular creatures of the holiday, but they are far from the truth of the matter. A cross-quarter day, Halloween comes in the opposite side of the year from May Day (remember Walpurgis Night) when spirits make their way back into the mortal world. It represents the passing of fall into winter and the shades of death that accompany it. How much more religious can you get?

From ancient times people have been aware of how weak our control over our lives really is. We depend on the sun and the weather to cooperate for our crops. We fear the darkness when our eyes can’t compete with those of our predators. As the year descends into longer and longer nights, we secretly fear that eventually night will not end. The dark time of the year belonged to the spirits.

Just as all ancient people celebrated the vernal equinox (if you missed it, check out the Passover-Easter Complex for more), they marked the autumnal equinox with festivals. Although Halloween is six weeks after the equinox, it seems to have inherited some of the ancient associations of that season. One of the ancient feasts of the equinox was for Pomona, the Roman goddess associated with fruits and seeds. There is more of Thanksgiving than Halloween in this festival, however.

Halloween, as we have come to know it, is usually traced to the same people who gave us St. Patrick’s Day – the Celts. The Irish calendar was divided into four quarters, marked between the solstices and equinoxes by the cross-quarter days. The fall cross-quarter day was Samhain (in case you don’t speak Gaelic, this is pronounced “sow-win”). Samhain can be understood as “summer’s end” and it was the traditional marking of the onset of winter; it actually comes just a month before meteorological winter.

The Celts, as well as other ancient peoples, believed that spirits of the dead were active as the trees lost their leaves, the grass began to dry and, and the world itself seemed to be dying. Huge bonfires were lit to ward off evil spirits, and perhaps bloody sacrifices were made to ensure the safety of the living.

No matter what modern Halloween critics may say, the Celts did not worship Satan and the origins of the holiday are not satanic. Pagan, maybe, but who isn’t somebody else’s pagan? The idea was to fend off evil, not worship it. The shamans, or “medicine men” of the Celts were a class of priests called Druids. Samhain would have been one of the festivals overseen by the Druids. These guys were priests of a religion that focused on nature, not the Devil. They did play a little rough though. They seem to have practiced human sacrifice once in a while, but Samhain was more often about killing off livestock before the winter. Either you can keep your animals alive and they will eat the little food you have, or you can butcher them and add to the little food you have. After all, not much grows in winter.

[See Full Essays for the rest]

Om, Are You Through with That?

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High school curricula constantly change, and one of the tasks I have set myself is to read what my daughter is assigned in English class so that we can discuss it. Sometimes by happy coincidence I’ve already read the book, and teaching four classes of my own this semester, I appreciate the break. This practice has led me to several books I would otherwise have never found on my own. Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse is one such novel. Based, as it is, in the imaginary world of the Buddha’s India as seen by a Swiss writer, Siddhartha is an odd blend of Eastern and Western religious ideas. Having spent four years studying German in high school, I am embarrassed to admit that this is the first Hesse I’ve read.

Naturally, given the strong Buddhist orientation of the work, Siddhartha deals with religion. More than just religion, however, it is the story of self-realization, of becoming. At times it is difficult to sympathize with the protagonist since his religious arrogance and self-assurance make him unapproachable. Nevertheless, as the brief story unfolds he discovers that he is merely human, and a needy human at that. As he reveals his final thoughts to his lifelong friend Govinda, Siddhartha states, “in every truth the opposite is equally true.” Here is a gem worth keeping. When statements of faith are uttered, are not those speaking their creeds also affirming the antitheses? The world is just so, and therefore it is also entirely opposite.

Many students approaching the Hebrew Bible fail to realize just how Eastern the outlook often is. Since the Bible is foundational for Western culture, we easily assume it shares the viewpoint of our culture. Those who read it seriously find out that the ideas and concepts often fit much better into an “Eastern” outlook. The Bible is comfortable with opposites and contradictions. The Bible values the journey as much as the goal. There are parts of the Bible that read very much like Siddhartha. While I doubt that Siddhartha will ever be my favorite novel, it has become for me a commentary on the religious life. The protagonist can, after having rejected the teachings of the Buddha, only seek. And the search is the point of the entire journey.

La Puerta

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A musician who has always deserved more acclaim than he has received in his solo career is John Cale. A founding member of the Velvet Underground, a band whose lyrics and insistent – if at times atonal – music capture their era far more effectively than most, Cale has gone on to produce some songs provocative enough to rival those of Lou Reed himself. On his Paris 1919 album, the song “Hanky Panky Nohow” contains these thoughtful lyrics: “nothing frightens me more than religion at my door.” These words are, ironically, prophetic. Religion at the door, in public office, behind major media corporations, has become an insidious threat to the founding principles of this nation. Right, Ms. O’Donnell?

Yesterday morning I went out to get the newspaper. Although I live in a relatively safe town, we are classified as the “Greater New York City” area, and I’m always suspicious of anything unexpectedly left on the doorstep. There was an unaddressed, blank, sealed white envelope there that jingled when I nudged it with my foot. At first I thought it might be a set of keys left at the wrong house, but when I did finally open it I discovered a bilingual set of aluminum faith coins. An accompanying letter assured me that God wants to save me and shared with me a dream of somebody in a white dress carrying a Bible. The letter, amazingly, misquotes John 3.16.

I am the frequent victim of Jehovah’s Witness visits. I have students handing me booklets that will save my soul. I receive offers of golden miracle crosses in the mail – I still carry mine around, but prosperity has continued to elude me – with the assurance that God wants only the very best for me. I open the paper and see the suffering of the people of Indonesia. I see a column about teen suicides resulting from bullying with victims as young as twelve hanging themselves. I see overweight politicians feathering their already overstuffed nests. I turn back to the anonymous letter. “Please hold this coin or pass it on to someone who needs it,” it instructs. I think I’m going to need a truckload of coins. Nothing frightens me more.

Zombie Walks

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As October nears its creepy climax, signs of the macabre have become abundant. A trend that has reached new heights in recent years is the zombie walk. Various cities or regions host large groups of brainless, reanimated corpses in parade (rather like a Tea Party, I should imagine) to welcome in the darker half of the year. In a most unconventional display of cultural unity, groups of strangers meet for the purpose of sharing their fascination with the undead. Given the inherent potential for overly enthusiastic participation, these events are usually held during daylight hours and are becoming as accepted as trick-or-treating on Halloween.

Fear of death is sublimated in a conquest of the same with less definitiveness than traditional resurrection, but with a more gritty and graphic triumph of life. Organized religions have had difficulty maintaining numbers in much of the “developed world” while this new danse macabre has taken on a life of its own. Many find claims of divine authority in institutions that refuse to make clean breaks with sex scandals or threats of Quran burning somewhat disingenuous, while nobody questions the motives of zombies. They simply do what it takes to survive. An honest zombie stumbles toward eternal life.

Credibility is less easily commanded than it had been in former times. While many voices, such as Tea Partiers’, are claiming the need to erase the sixties and seventies and subsequent decades from the calendar so that the authoritarian Father can be returned to power, thinking people are asking what the plan might be. Is it time to break down that putative wall between church and state and declare America a plutocratic, evangelistic Republic? Never mind that inevitable conflicts will break out over who has the right to set doctrine and public policy – most citizens will be found out walking with their fellow zombies, welcoming in the darkening season.

Black Monks and Grim Reapers

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Last night I assisted my daughter with a stint of volunteering at the local community “haunted house” for charity. This is one of the high points of October, so I was glad to be asked. I reprised my role that I developed for Nashotah House: in that context the character was called “the Black Monk,” based on a local ghost story. While I was on the faculty of Nashotah there were plenty of students who swore the Black Monk story was true, the actual event involved an early student who drowned while trying to walk across water (something many students think they are capable of) – this was actually during the winter, however, and Upper Nashotah Lake is not always as thickly frozen as people assume. The poor student broke through and is buried in the cemetery on campus. Halloween was a major event at that Gothic location until a new, evangelical administration came along. During a haunted hayride, the kids of the community lumbered along on a hay-wagon while costumed students jumped out to scare them. I played along in a costume my wife made where my face was invisible and the flowing black robes eerily blended into the night.

In my current secular context, of course, I was simply The Grim Reaper. This character has a very ancient pedigree. Religions from the earliest times have personified Death as a character that all people inevitably meet. The Mesopotamians had Ereshkigal, the Queen of the Underworld, the Ugaritians had Mot, the god whose name is “Death,” and the Hebrew Bible has “the Angel of Death.” We are often not given a physical description of this baleful but sometimes beneficent supernatural entity. When Revelation was finally penned, Death is one of the four horsemen, and he rides a pale horse, but we do not find many physical details. In the fifteenth century Death was pictured as a skeleton, often with a scythe. His role is that of the classical psychopomp, or guide to the next world. He is not evil, but when the doorbell rings you’d rather hope it had been Avon calling rather than the G.R.

Carlos Schwabe, Death of the Undertaker

Appealing to the fear of the unknown, I lurked last night in the shadows, face completely obscured, not speaking, stepping out to reminded holiday revelers that what is really scary is that which we can not define. When playing the silent ghoul, sudden movements are not necessary to frighten, shouts and screams are unimportant. The simple reminder of mortality and the unspoken question “is he here for me?” are sufficiently frightening on their own. Whether the Black Monk or the Grim Reaper, this character has a natural place on the chilly nights of October. And sometimes it seems there is just not enough October to keep all of us in line.

Where Whoever Walked

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No adequate explanation has ever been proffered for the human desire to be where more prominent individuals have been. In its religious guise this is generally called pilgrimage, and the faithful seek out locations where a besainted member of their faith tradition once trod, ate, slept, or died. Going to the place of the famous is a major motivation for the travel industry. We are driven to see what s/he saw, taste what s/he tasted, experience what s/he lived. Just to be there, and contemplate. No one person, however, is universally known by every individual world-wide, so who it is we follow varies widely. This sense hit me once again last night as my family undertook the rare treat of a live show at the Paper Mill Theater in Millburn. Although Hairspray is not the most profound of shows, it was exceptionally well done, and the images on the walls of the foyer reminded us of who had been here before.

The Paper Mill Playhouse, a place of transformation

The shotgun blast of emotions this experience created verges on the religious. There was a time when I too donned the greasepaint (hard to believe for those who’ve only known me with this two-decades worth of old-growth forest on my face), and I know it to be a transcendental experience. The clean-shaven face is a boundless canvas. My own experience was local and small-scale, and certainly not done for fame, but the transformation was palpable. I am sure that actors everywhere share this experience – the apotheosis of becoming someone else. This week in mythology class we discussed Dionysus, the god of such transformations (and theater). A god who travels, a god associated with place, it is easy to understand how Dionysus became so popular, with or without the wine.

An epiphany of Dionysus

Dionysus was the recipient of a mystery cult in antiquity, one that rivaled Christian inroads in the Roman Empire. You see, many people recognized the similarities of Dionysus and Jesus. Both were begotten in unusual ways by their father (the high god), and both were gods of epiphany. Both were gods who understood the human condition – having mortal mothers, who came to people where they were, and who transformed the ordinary into extraordinary. Both were associated with wine – Jesus’ first miracle at Cana showed his theological pedigree – and both had reputations for associating with the less desirable members of society. And yes, both offered resurrection, a means of overcoming the limitations of life itself. Perhaps that is why the rare pilgrimage to the theater is so transcendental. It is pilgrimage and apotheosis all in one. And that is more than most of us might ever hope to achieve, short of encountering Jesus, or Dionysus, himself along the way of our pilgrimages.

The Colbert Confessions

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Gnu WikiCommons image by David Shankbone

The New Jersey Star-Ledger ran a human interest story on Montclair resident Stephen Colbert yesterday, “outing” his Catholicism. Well, given the fact that his religious affiliation is available on Wikipedia, maybe this isn’t so much news as filler. Nevertheless, the story repeatedly makes the point – cited by Colbert’s colleagues – that the mere fact that he is a practicing Catholic makes Colbert an evangelist every time he mentions the church. This is a bizarre concept, and one that would likely surface only in the United States. Many famous people in a variety of media are practicing Catholics (and I even hear, some public officials) and many of them would be shocked to learn of such an avocation being applied to them. Is the mere fact of belonging an affidavit? Does the government know about this? Does Christine O’Donnell even care?

What was noticeably absent from the piece was humor. Yes, the columnist mentioned that Colbert is a comedian and has a show on Comedy Central. She even noted that Colbert makes jokes about religion. What I mean by humor here is that little allowance is given for the fact that religious humor crosses some invisible line in our society, as if God is deeply offended when people use the sense of humor he gave them against him. Colbert is not shy about making fun of religion when it is appropriate, and for the last few decades, it has frequently been appropriate.

One of the surest signs of health in an institution is its ability not to take itself too seriously. Academic institutions are just as guilty, if not more so than churches, at presenting themselves as above reproof. Nevertheless, churches, colleges, synagogues, universities, and mosques are human institutions. Run by humans, they are bound to lead to comedic errors. When these happen it is standard procedure quickly to draw attention elsewhere while damage control is done. What Colbert does is evangelize for laughter. It is all right to take one on the chin now and again, but religious institutions, always in stiff competition with their rivals, do not give themselves much time to laugh. I say we need more Steve Colberts who aren’t afraid of the well placed snicker. And can you imagine having him as your Sunday School teacher? Montclair looks better all the time.