Avdat

Like a religious Comic-Con, without the costumes and fun

Aside from the gender issue, what saves this from being my autobiography is that the Ren Fest was within easy driving distance of my previous pastorate:

HT: Facebook friends.

Theological fantasy football

As I sit here watching the game and think about the Paul Tillich curb-stomping I seem to have convened at Facebook (quite inadvertently, BTW), it occurs to me that football and theology have much more in common than one might think.

Just as there are great players and coaches, there are great theologians. Some teams have established themselves as dynasties, so have theological movements and schools. Finally, and most importantly, when theological students debate the merits and demerits of a theologian or idea, they often sound like "Mike on a car phone on I-95" calling in to trash the play-calling in last weekend's loss, or to taunt the fans of their arch-rival.

All this raises the question: Who deserves to play in the NFL of theology, and who would win the Super Bowl?

John Calvin gets to play, and not just because I'm a Presbyterian. Phenomenally successful, enormously influential, loathed by those outside his fan base, and not particularly loved by those within, Calvin is the Bill Belichick of theology. But Calvinists as a team remind me less of the Patriots and more of the Oakland Raiders in their heyday. Especially John Piper's shock troops who are conquering college campuses one IV group at a time.

John Wesley doesn't get to play. Wesley is (Jonathan, I hope you'll appreciate this) the Steve Spurrier of theology: very, very good at a certain level. No Calvinist animus here; I won't let Jonathan Edwards play either. Nobody from the 18th century gets to play, unless we take this league in some weird XFL-like direction and let middle linebackers play with baseball bats. In that case, David Hume gets to play.

Since Thomas Aquinas built his entire theological system by creating and destroying his system's mirror image ("It seems... but on the contrary..!"), Aquinas represents the meanest, nastiest defense that ever took the field. Purple People Eaters, or '85 Bears? I'd say the latter because Thomas was extremely fat, and we remember that Bears team for the Fridge as much as we do for that Buddy Ryan/Mike Singletary 46 D.

My warm comments about Pentecostalism notwithstanding, I think they're the San Diego Chargers of theology. Pentecostals can put up some gaudy, gaudy numbers. Dan Fouts numbers. Philip Rivers numbers. But I doubt they have what it takes to win a championship.

Big question: Who's the Dallas Cowboys of theology? This would be a school or movement that once strode Christendom like a colossus, but whose latter day glory resembles a dumpster fire. Plus, their devotees would have to be wankers.

Another big question: Could we ever get an Augustine/Aquinas matchup in the Super Bowl? A lot depends on whether those two belong in the same conference, if you know what I mean.

Karl Barth versus Thomas Aquinas would be one for the ages, like the Steelers and the Cowboys in Superbowl XIII.

Glum

For a while there I was relieved that Democrats had lost the House, relieved in that way you were relieved when your father finally got home after being threatened all day with, "Just wait 'til your father gets home." After a while there's no more dread, just an eagerness to get it over with.

But today I am glum because, as Kevin Drum points out here, it wasn't just the economy, stupid. The wretched economy probably cost Democrats 40-some seats, but they lost 60-some. So to some extent this election was a repudiation of Democratic policies. And this makes me sad because the policies were basically sound.

Nobody liked TARP; it wasn't even Obama's creation; it was President Bush's idea, but if Bush hadn't done it, global capitalism would have ground to a halt. Maybe in a few centuries people will have no more stake in keeping capitalism alive than we do keeping in feudalism alive, but we aren't there yet. Meanwhile, we're blaming the wrong guy for prescribing the right medicine for a serious, acute illness.

And then there's health care reform. The GOP didn't have the votes to stop it, but it looks like they had the moxie to demonize it. It's been said before, but it bears repeating: the bill the President signed was basically Mitt Romney's version of health care reform, the GOP alternative to HillaryCare in 1994, and yet the Republicans threw their own policy under the bus just to have something to run against. The cynicism is breathtaking, and you know what? It worked!

I know; I know; I sound like I'm shocked that there's gambling in Casablanca. Politics is a sordid business full of venal people. Being a student of history, I should not be surprised. LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act, and southerners have been punishing Democrats ever since.

I am sure that one day the outcry over being forced to buy health insurance will sound as petty as the outcry over being forced to serve all comers in one's business establishment. I just wish that good politics and good public policy aligned better, that public servants didn't have to wait for history to vindicate them. Maybe then we'd have better public servants.

P.S. Drum's chart does show that the Democrats were bound to lose the House anyway, simply on the weakness of the economy. So given the choice between doing nothing and losing, and doing something and losing, they chose the latter, and that was certainly the right choice. Evan Bayh is full of it.