I-YOUniverse

In the mid-20th century two British writers produced huge amounts of work. One is J.R.R. Tolkien, whose Silmarillion and Lord of the Rings created a genre and influenced generations. The other is C.F. Andrews, a British clergyman identified with Gandhi and the Indian poet of the age Rabindranath Tagore.

Today books, films, video games, websites influenced by Tolkien are legion. Andrews, however, is mostly out of print and unknown. Tagore is not hugely popular, as he was at the time.

Andrews wrote prolifically for magazines, journals and newspapers, recording and interpreting the struggle of India for independence from Britain. He introduced the English-speaking world to the thought of Gandhi. He wrote a number of books on Indian questions, and on his experience with Christ.

Tolkien has populated the modern imagination with balrogs, orcs, dwarves, elves, wizards and hobbits. His deeply held Christian faith provides the bedrock on which LOTR stands, but nobody I know sees it as an apologetic work.

So what?

I’m casting about for what to do with this wonderful tool called a blog. Shall I adopt a cause? Politics? God help us! Global warming? Justice in matters racial or economic? How about a devotional column about prayer? Or reading and understanding the Bible?

I really enjoy making the Bible come alive. Years ago I wrote a workbook called Touching Life through the Psalms, which pointed out the role of emotions in worship. Since then, a lot of my biblical teaching and preaching could be called Touching Life through the Bible.

In our culture we’re genuises at how? but, in George Buttrick’s words, we’re a “cut flower civilization.” We’ve lost our roots. That’s why I’m so interested in old literature and classics. We need answers to who? what? why? We need truth, not technology.

If I write about that, especially guided by the Word made flesh now Spirit, I won’t miss the mark by much.

BTW, if you are reading this, I’d love to hear from you either by comment or by email (see side bar).

Working in a nursing home I met people who no longer read. Maybe they couldn’t, due to deteriorating eyesight or because of mental condition simply lost the capacity or interest to do so.

I resolved, then, to read all the books I could, especially the great books, so that if the day came when I also didn’t read any more, I would have read as many as possible.

Reading the great books

I have in mind some of the classics. Homer, whom I’ve never read. The existentialists Kierkegaard, Dostoyevski. The great Russians. Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina and War and Peace. Of course, Shakespeare. I have him on audio CDs, and listen to one or two plays a week. Don Quixote has never held my attention for more than 100 pages, but one of these days…

I get distracted. I like biography. Bonhoeffer’s biography by Bethge is terrific. That led me to others of his works. The Cost of Discipleship. Life Together. Required reading for those of us who dream of a family-based monasticism. Mother Teresa’s Come Be My Light. Compelling, heart-breaking.

Distractions

At the moment I’m into C.F. Andrews. I noticed his character in the film Gandhi, and want to understand how this Englishman realized who Gandhi was and what was happening in India. So I read The Ordeal of Love by Hugh Tinker (Oxford, 1979), and I have Charles Freer Andrews (Harper & Brothers, 1950). The latter is more personal, lyrical, and more positive. I’m looking forward to two of Charlie’s books What I Owe to Christ, Christ in the Silence. These will shine light upon his religious quest, from High Church Anglican to some degree of Hindu and finally back to the person of the Christ.

I’m also reading Tagore. Gitanjali, for which he won the Nobel Prize. Sadhana: the Realization of Life. Selected Poems.

I also love liberation theology. We Drink Water from Our Own Wells I carry around with me. And I found Liberation Theology Resources Online.

Deciding what not to read

You realize that I don’t have all that much to do but read.

I’ve gotten to the time in my life when I realize doing one thing means not ever doing ten others.  Younger people think they’ll get around to everything. But decide comes from the same root as suicide, a root that means to cut off.

I feel conflicted. On the surface are the waves, the winds; in the depth is the Gulf Stream. You get to do both. Read the acknowledged classics and also read the blogs, some of which are emerging classics.

How do you decide what to read?

I upload this Russian icon, the first image of the wp2.5.1 upgrade. There’s a new upgrade tool that literally reduces the process to a few clicks. Thanks be to God! I feel like a time of desolation is passed.

The documentation suggests I treat myself by writing a post after upgrading from wp 2.3.3 to 2.5. Who writes this stuff!

According to Martin Buber, the more It, the less You-the more preoccupied you are with technology, the less open to spirit. In the past couple weeks I’ve been working on the computing side of my bog-uh, blog. But I’m spiritual, not a computer person.

 I feel like The Shipping News’s Quoyle, who kept saying “I’m not a water person.” The end credits roll over footage of him expertly manning his sleek craft built by master builder Alvin Yark.

I migrated from blogger (simple, beautiful, working) because people tell horror stories of how bots spammed their site with so much stuff their free host shut them down. I imagined a thousand bots out there looking for my site, to shut it down.

I chose wp 2.3.3. That’s what most of the expert, informed, professional bloggers at CCblogs use. I clicked “give permission,” then “migrate blog,” and watched in astonishment as the counter ran from 1 post migrated to 50 in less than 60 seconds.

Then, wp released 2.5. Matt Mullenweg recorded the demo having just had five teeth pulled. At the top of each antiquated 2.3.3 screen was the plea “please upgrade now.”

Using outdated software poses security risks. Hackers could be lining up to break into my obsolete software. With trepidation I read the upgrade instructions. No way could this be actual English.

But nobody’s gonna tell this boy he can’t do it! Right?

After a couple weeks of fear and trembling that make Kierkegaard look like a Valium zombie, I decide to take the plunge. I upgrade. Ba boom!

Everything goes flawlessly. Breathless with anticipation I open my blog: blank header and first post “Hello, world!”

Seriously fucked up.

I shoulda noticed when the techs at bluehost.com said they haven’t gotten full instructions on 2.5 yet. (They’re great, they answer the phone quickly, and never laugh out loud at my questions which are -1000 on a scale of 1 being most computer-challenged to 10 being most geeky.)

So I spend the next 24 hours using an advanced program to transfer all my posts to the new blog. It’s called “cut and paste.”

I don’t have copies of some. Others exist in various states of undress. But I can’t sleep. I gotta get my blog up and running.

My loyal readers are clamoring. Where’s the guy with the golden tablets!

(Advil.)

Reminds me of presenting at my first case conference. One item in the complete write-up of a client is a diagnosis from the DSM-IV. As far as I knew, DSM stands for Damn Sophisticated Material. It’s actually the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual and contains all the diagnoses mental health professionals use in their work.

I felt inadequate because I hadn’t mastered the thing prior to my first presentation. I did the same thing in grad school. Only the subject matter was the Hebrew language. I’m a fast learner.

 Now I devote several weeks adding a plugin so I can add photos and images to my blog. In blogger this was a two click operation. I had three courses at the post-doctoral level in two click operations. I am prepared.

I add zenphoto. It takes a call to bluehost.com. But when I activate the plugin through wp, I get a message accusing me (I think) of hacking in without a password; it sounds ominously like it’s about to crash my computer. The wp documentation may say, if the plugin shuts down your program, delete it from your server.

I can’t tell exactly what it says. So I delete the uploaded items from the server and my computer.

The thing about computing is, the simplest instruction can become a monster, as in the Lord of the Rings I episode, the bridge at Khazzad duhm (I make no assertions of correct spelling). The script read, “they cross the bridge.”

But the CGI animators kept throwing in complications, resulting in a 20-minute sequence that’s one of the most dramatic in the film.

I do all this stuff (I tell myself) to create the most beautiful, witty, spiritually insightful, hugely successful, yet elegantly unself-conscious holy blog in the history of the planet.

As far as It vs. You goes, some days it’s all 1s and 0s. Take a deep breath and try to keep up with the divine Blogos.