New Year: New Artistic Initiatives?

In the parable of the talents, Jesus is clear that he does not want us to be wasteful with what little we have. Instead, the servant with the least amount of resources learns that he who is faithful with small things will be given more.

As we confront issues of funding for artists in the twentieth century church, we have to ask whether our funding systems are simply handouts, or if they innovatively encourage creativity that is both redemptive and generative.

By redemptive, we mean that, at the intersection of a theology of beauty and the church’s broader theological narrative, we find the opportunity to support art that is “on earth, as it is in heaven”—projects that are re-humanizing, full of resurrection, etc.

By generative, we mean art that is not a dead-end. Art that moves towards becoming self-sustaining, "pays it forward" by being life-giving to another person or work of art, or paves the way for future creativity, broadening the horizons of what arts practitioners consider possible. Most often, generative initiatives may come through projects (or even business plans) that confront systematic challenges within the creative realm, which require the “big bucks.”

Take the example of micro-grant programs like SOUP, the Detroit-based version of the national movement towards artists funding other artists. Area artists gather monthly to eat together, each participant contributes a small amount for admission, and attendees propose creative projects. At the end of the meal, the crowd votes on which proposal to fund with that evening's income.

Suppose that we re-worked the church’s current grant-like model of funding from Angel investment groups towards a combination of micro- and macro- initiatives. Democratic, grassroots dinners like SOUP only maintain their integrity if they remain small. (A 1,000+ SOUP night would be a conference, not a dinner.) So, let artists go on funding other artists until the end of a term when the completed projects funded by that year's microgrants are entered into a larger competition for funding. The projects which proved to be most successful, generative, redemptive, would receive a much larger grant so as to expand their scope. (Those who have been given little will be given more.)

Such a model would be revolutionary on a number of levels. 1) It engages artists in the decision about what to value instead of leaving our artists at the mercy of the art market. 2) It starts with a small responsibility, a small amount and entrusts those who are faithful with that amount with more. 3) It would be a systemic approach to funding (and growing) arts projects.

Rather than haphazardly giving grants to individual artists for single projects, the model develops groups of artists and pipelines of projects, paying innovation forward, and being truly generative.

Maureen Lovett, Director of the New City Arts Initiative

Natalie Race, Editor of The Curator

The authors thank Maggie Guggenheimer, Kate Daughdrill, and the International Arts Movement whose insights have influenced the thoughts behind this post.

Epiphany Is Manifestation

Epiphany can be seen as manifestation of the divine. As Christians we believe God can break into our lives in real and tangible ways. Not as a distant fire or cloud, not like a scorching burning bush. Christmas means Epiphany came as a small vulnerable child needing to be held.

Epiphany also occurrs through the mundane rhythms of life: a maiden at her task, men in the Far East studying the sky, and shepherds tending fields nearby. To these folks Epiphany appeared in the ordinariness of being, a gift wrapped in occupational details.

Simeon’s Epiphany took place in the temple. Here the old man gains the peace to die. And so, with this strange appearance of a new kind of life, one that is fully divine and fully human, there comes a death. Epiphany bestows the peace necessary for self to die. This peace comes by way of the cradle and the cross—the natal incarnation of the Christ and his ignoble death.

In chapter 1 of Colossians we read about creation. We learn who made it, upholds it, and redeems it. We read how God reconciles all of it to himself: heaven and earth, spirit and matter, the invisible and visible. Jesus’ work in and through creation and his death are the Christmas gifts of Epiphany, the manifestation of the divine in our lives. With his death our new birth and the birth of many of our creations become possible.

Those who have seen him re-orient their lives. Shepherds continue to shepherd, but because of Epiphany Christ deepens the meaning of shepherd. The wise men, in order to protect their Epiphany, re-route their journey home. And if Jesus “is the image of the invisible God,” as a small and hungry baby he hallows every mother’s embrace. Christmas asks us to make room for both a birth and a death in the ordinariness of life.

Welcome the gift of Epiphany.

Maria

Joseph and the Spirit

Christmas sermons, stories and songs don’t generally focus on Joseph. But then there is the nativity narrative found in Matthew. Because Joseph’s story demonstrates reliance on the provision of God, I must confess my own inability to worship God out of his abundance.

Here is a man who must take home a wife who is with child, a child not his own. But God’s command to Joseph goes further than the adoption that includes his Davidic heritage, he says to Joseph: when you fulfill your fatherly duty of naming this alien, give him the name I choose for him. Furthermore, this child will lead you to stables and through deserts. He will drink from your limited water supply and eat from your small table so that you and the world may know my abundance and grace.

Presently, we have two young adults living at home. There is my grown son and another who is not my own. To the son, all that is mine is his, I don’t expect him to restock the cereal, but I ask him to on occasion. To the other, I’m annoyed if she doesn’t replace a bar of soap. With the stranger I live in scarcity holding on to what belongs to kin. So, I ask myself, how did Joseph do it? The text gives us the key: “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.”

The Holy Spirit takes what is un-familiar, and seemingly un-related, in order to lead us to an abundant life with God, a life with Christ. Therefore, do not set to divorce, but rather take in what is not yours. With the Holy Spirit this axiom becomes fundamental to both art making and the Christian faith. Live life and make art out of God’s abundance.

Merry Christmas,
Maria

The Annunciation's Drama

A sort of advent ensues prior to a dramatic play. We make our way to the theater, purchase tickets, take our seats and wait for the curtain to rise. Yet something else transpires pre-show. We willingly put ourselves at risk for we know art has the ability to alter our belief systems— including the ways we view the world and ourselves. And thus it is so with Christianity, the world being altered by a true story. George Steiner goes as far to define the narrative of the annunciation as the scene of “gravity breaking into the small house of our cautionary being.” Indeed, beware of the angel’s announcement that the Holy Spirit is birthing something new in you, for as Simeon uttered to Mary, “A sword will pierce your own soul too.”

The Christian narrative asks us to give up our wants, or rather, re-align them with God’s. This push and pull is the formula for good drama. And what drama, as Lionel Trilling observes, “does not consist of the opposition of ideas?” Art unsettles. This is how it aids the arrival of Jesus. Art interrogates our ways of being, and hopefully, acknowledges our need for Him.

In literary terms, Edward Said would describe the “opposition of ideas” as “antithetical positions.” Here logic and reason dally with pure contingency. According to Said, this volatile combination generates meaning. And so in the logic of art making we become faithful through the contingencies. Faithful art provides meaning, produces new life, and breaks up the walls of our cautionary being.

Let advent and the annunciation enlarge you.

--Maria

Creativity and Incarnation; The message of Advent

In The Theater Essays of Arthur Miller the playwright describes a singular moment of artistic creation – the very first time in rehearsal that actor Lee J. Cobb actually became the character of Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman.

…Lee rose from his chair and looked at Milly Dunnock and there was a silence. And then he said, “I was driving along, you understand, and then all of a sudden I’m going off the road…”

And the theater vanished. The stage vanished. The chill of an age-old recognition shuddered my spine; a voice was sounding in the dimly lit air up front, a created spirit, an incarnation, a Godlike creation was taking place; a new human being was being formed before all our eyes, born for the first time on this earth, made real by an act of will, by an artist’s summoning up of all his memories and his intelligence; a birth was taking place above the meaningless traffic below… I knew then that something astounding was being made here. It would have been almost enough for me without even opening the play.

Miller’s fascination and wonder at witnessing a live artistic birth reveals a wonderful truth – that creativity and incarnation are intertwined. Many artists have experienced similar moments when time stands still and something new suddenly springs to life. It is what makes art so thrilling. The only fitting descriptive language that seems to suffice is the supernatural.

The beauty of Christ’s incarnation, which we celebrate at Advent, is that God chose to become like us, to identify with us, in order to save us. He did not come as a raging storm, smiting everything in His path. He came as Emmanuel, God with us. He felt what we feel and experienced what we experience. This is not the action of a remote and uncaring deity but of a lover doing whatever is necessary to rescue the beloved. Take away the incarnation and you drain the power of Augustine’s conclusion: “God is more intimate to me than I am to myself.”

--Steve Shaffer

Steve is a fellowship group director at Redeemer. This entry is excerpted from his presentation from the Living Room study series.

Galaxy Quest For the Artful Theologian

In my mind, I always envisioned a theologian as a real book-wormy pious person with no connection to anyone of the artistic bend. I am now of the opinion that all artists are secret theological agents.

I have a strange fascination with certain movies. Galaxy Quest (1999) starring Tim Allen and Sigourney Weaver is one of them. From a superficial standpoint, the movie is pretty silly. It starts out as a mocumentary of the Star Trek phenomenon. It sports stereotypical characters that were once a part of a popular TV series who now make a living signing autographs at space conventions. Through a crazy turn of events, these now washed up and embittered TV characters end up meeting real aliens who have been following their show for years reverently terming the wisdom from the program series "The Historical Documents". These perky extraterrestrials reveal that they have based their entire existence on whatever truths they had gleaned from the series' contents. In order to rescue the aliens from impending doom these faux-futuristic astronauts, with the help of some dedicated fans, end up using the wisdom from their experiences as actors on what they thought was a trite scripted series to save the day.

On some level, artists are the crazy TV characters embodying truths that are being observed by the outside world. Another generation will look at the products of the artists' efforts--for we are guardians of the ancient record. It is a record of galactic proportions. The artwork tells a story which is our theology in motion.

--Molly Franzone

Molly is a Filmmaker Vocation Group leader and has worked in children's television programing.

Holy Grounds: The Role of Place In Your Spiritual Life

What is holy ground for creative and spiritual people living in New York City? In Redeemer’s most recent writing workshop, we discussed having a special place carved out for God and for our writing.

Our apartments are cramped. Our lives are full of distractions. If we don’t carve out time and space for the things that really matter to us, it’s likely we’ll continually push them aside and never get around to them.

In the story of Moses and the burning bush (Exodus 3:1-12), God commands Moses: "Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground." God invites us to take off our shoes and encounter the Holy. In New York City, we can encounter God on the subway, in Central Park, and on our rooftops—but we have to pay attention; we have to open our eyes. Intentionally seeking out and creating sacred spaces, where we can read the Word of God and cry out to the Lord, helps us focus and tune in to God’s presence.

Setting up a room of one’s own, as Virginia Woolf might say, may also give us the impetus to write. New York City doesn’t always lend itself to quiet, private spaces but we can seek out a corner of our bed, a quiet nook in the library, or a cozy spot by the window of a coffee shop—our own sacred spaces for writing. Always writing in the same place and only writing in that place is a bit Pavlovian: over time, it triggers an automatic reflex to go into writing mode.

Where do you encounter the Holy? Do you have a sacred space carved out for quiet time with God? For your writing?

Writing prompt:
Write about your favorite sacred space in New York City.

—Stephanie Nikolopoulos

Stephanie is a leader for the Writers Vocation group and helped edit our literary magazine, RedeemerWrites.

A Pound of Nard

It’s funny how often I hear an artist say something like, “I wish I could stop being an artist, but it’s not possible…” Less funny is how often I feel this way myself. No matter how difficult it gets to simply keep making art in the midst of my busy, city life, there’s always a sense that I must continue to tell stories in song, film or on stage. I can’t throw aside the activity of developing characters or interpreting the dance of lyrics and melody anymore than I can stop eating, sleeping or breathing. Giving in to the fact of my particularity as an artist is both freeing and costly. Freeing, because I can immediately begin to joyfully explore and share my gifts; but costly because a life spent as an artist will ultimately require self-sacrifice in one way or another. Joy and sacrifice, freedom and great cost: these experiences are common to artists, but also to those who would follow Jesus with all their heart.

I love the story in John 12 of the radical and artful gift given to Jesus by Lazarus' sister, Mary. About a week before Jesus would be crucified He attends a dinner party with His friends (one of whom, Lazarus, Jesus had raised from the dead). At some point during the evening, Mary honors Jesus with a radically sacrificial and intimate gift by pouring out a year’s earnings worth of spiked nard (a costly perfume oil) on the feet of Jesus and completing her presentation by wiping His feet with her hair. No doubt, a hush fell over the room as the smell of the fragrance filled the house and Mary stood silent, her hair still wet with perfume. Mary’s gift was radical, sensual and even scandalous in her cultural setting.

In all accounts of this story, the first to speak were the disciples, scolding Mary for wasting the nard which could have been put to some practical use like feeding the poor. But Jesus receives the gift with heartfelt and solemn gratitude. For Him, Mary's gift came just in time. It was just the encouragement and solidarity He needed as He faced the reality of His own impending act of sacrifice. Mary's gift resonated both emotionally, spiritually and prophetically for Jesus, a comfort He would not receive from His sleeping disciples in Gethsemane. Despite the cost to herself or her reputation, despite her fear, Mary offered the gift she'd prepared, in all it's particularity, and it did not disappoint.

The gifts of the artist and their expression, worked out through obedience and faithfulness, are meant to bring healing and wisdom to the community of faith, to the neighborhood and to culture at large. The process of making art requires something of us. We must give ourselves over to the process in which we allow the art to be expressed. As Madeline L’Engle reminds us, art is incarnational, it impregnates us. Therefore, creation can become like a kind of sacrament, a sign of present grace and future glory. It is an act of worship on the part of the individual artist. Yet, in community, this sacramental act can be prophetic, making Divine truth newly apparent. This is the mysterious and essential work of the Holy Spirit, filling the house with the fragrance of our offerings. May it also fill our lives, our communities, and our cities.


Kenyon

An Intern's Musings

Within my first week in New York City as an Arts Ministry intern, I found myself sandwiched in the corner table of a Thai restaurant, deeply engaged in theological conversation with Kenyon and Maria while practically bursting with excitement about what the next four months of my life would entail. Little did I know that this conversation would contain one of the most influential pieces of wisdom I would take away from my entire season at Redeemer. After a brief ‘get to know you’ session, Maria went on to elaborate upon the amazing particularity of God’s delight in us as artists. She described a friend’s passion for needlework as an integral piece of her existence, explaining that God places these meticulous details into our image to rejuvenate and renew our hearts. I tried to mask my inner excitement with serious nods of agreement, but the newly introduced truth behind this statement rang in my ears for the coming months.

In David Taylor’s For the Beauty of the Church, Barbara Nicolosi also focuses on the specificity of artistic giftedness, saying “every one of us has to become an artist because the practice of art makes us focus on the details. Whether it’s gardening, or cooking, or needlepoint, or whatever it is that you do, everyone has to master the details of a craft in order to keep their life vibrant and their perception of God in the ‘tiny whispering sound’ keen.” The encouragement we receive from this reality is that even our smallest forms of self-expression shed light on the glory of our Father. In the Arts Ministry’s most recent gathering of The Living Room, we discussed the artist as theologian, reveling in the fact that God is even more committed to our artistic flourishing than we are. This means that every seemingly inconsequential piano recital, bouquet arrangement, incomplete song, dance class, embroidered handkerchief, or passion for painting ultimately brings joy to our Creator. We can now relax in our enjoyment of these gifts, no longer regarding them as superfluous or selfish, but as important and full of purpose.

Rachel Rogers

Knowing the Creative Christ

Time and time again, when discouraged by the estranged relationship our society has with the material world, that also translates as an indifference towards the arts, I revisit a piece of art: the hymn found in Colossians 1:15-20.

This doxology is a cosmic big band explosion of praise conveying how all of creation culminates in Christ. This praise flows from a revelatory grace that attributes the wisdom of the ages to that of Christ. Failure for artists to understand this theological song can discount Jesus’ own creative work. It is through Christ, God accomplishes his creative and redemptive purposes in and for the world. It is only through the broken and resurrected body of Jesus where we find hope. Hope, not only for our bodies and the material world, but also for our bodies of work made up of, and existing in, the material world. Christ is at work redeeming all things through the cross.

The wisdom of the cross bridges the visible and invisible, heaven and earth, the concrete and concepts. Seen through the cross, our art pronounces our humanness with a heavenly accent that hints of a life beyond our limitations.

Knowing that Jesus holds all things together—past, present, future, seen, and unseen—where, then, are all of our doxologies? If we read and meditate on Colossians 1 we have no excuse for artistic inactivity. Please take the dancing shoes out of the bag, reboot your computer and complete your short story, open the piano bench and take out the unfinished song, and praise him who reconciles all things to God.

--Maria

Solitary Query

Do you ever find yourself wondering, What am I doing here in the city? I love what the Apostle Paul says to an astute group of urbanites in the book of Acts,

He determined the times set for us and the exact places where we should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have our being.(Acts 17:26-28)

God, in His wisdom and love, created each of us with a deep interconnectedness to Himself, relationally and missionally. In fact, the place in which we find ourselves and the gifts we possess are ordained by God to draw us to Himself, and into His great work of renewal.

Because of the gospel, my work becomes a setting for my personal renewal. If I belong to Christ, then I am wholly His and I must bring my whole self into my work as an artist. God is at work to make us whole, and to make us His! Therefore I do not solely serve the industry or my own personal gain. My work, like my heart and myself, is being swept up in the great work of renewal that God is accomplishing in the whole of creation.

Kenyon

Beauty and the Temple

“Where there is no temple there shall be no homes”—T.S. Elliot, (The Rock, II.40)

In the Hebrew Scriptures the Temple represents God’s abode, the place where heaven and earth collide. With the birth, death and resurrection of Jesus, the Spirit becomes “the way God himself is now present on planet earth, by indwelling his people.” (Gordon Fee, Crux, Summer 2008, p. 5) We become the new living Temple of God, the home of heaven on earth. As artists it becomes our job to sing, dance, and paint believing that artistic activity can be a service towards God and one another. T.S. Eliot writes:

The Lord who created must wish us to create

And employ our creation again in His service

Which is already His service in creating.

For Man is joined spirit and body,

And therefore must serve as spirit and body.

(T.S. Eliot, "Choruses from The Rock")

With the Spirit, our living bodies now possess entrée to the seemingly inaccessible. It is through the Spirit, YHWY becomes Father (Gal 4:6; 8.14-17). It is through the Spirit enemy becomes brother. And it is through the Spirit we become empowered to make this world home, practicing for our true home yet to come. We need the Spirit to enable true relationships with the triune God, with each other, as well as with the material world. Much of our Christian teaching has emphasized the first two, but the biblical emphasis on the beauty of the Temple tells us God cares about the things of this world. So much so that N.T. Wright asserts, “The virtue of the royal priesthood, the new living Temple, ought to be the cultivation and celebration of beauty at every level.” (After You Believe, p. 232)

Furthermore, the Spirit joins in our creative activities; it helps give life to our materials. But ultimately life with the Spirit signals a life dependent on God. Christian cultural renewal is at the mercy of Spiritual renewal. There shall be no true beauty in our earthly home, without the beauty of the Temple.

--Maria

Strange Fruit

One of the artists in our community at Redeemer, a classical actress, recently encouraged me to think more about the idea of God’s sanctifying work in our life v/s our own ideas of success: His fruit v/s our fruit. In the process, I’m attempting to draw a tangible connection between our lives in the city, and the purposes of God to reconcile ourselves individually, even artistically, to Himself. How can we see a connection between our personal sanctification and the Grand Work of Renewal that God is bringing about in the world, of which our own salvation, sanctification (and potentially our creative expression) are an evidence?

Perhaps married life is a good starting place. When I got married I had some good intentions, like wanting to love and serve my beautiful-sweet Emily, and see her reach her potential in Christ. But also, in my own sinful condition, I married her to make myself happy forever and found new hope in this “perfectly wonderful person” whose love could make my life, somehow, more pleasing to God. On the surface, those don’t seem like bad things, but they aren’t exactly what God had in mind. He does intend to make me happy forever and He knows that union with Himself is the only hope of that. But happiness is not the point of marriage, though it is a pleasant bi-product. Rather, in laying down my life for my wife each day, as Christ did for me, my heart is transformed to be like His heart, bringing me into fellowship with God who is the source of all true Joy and the only reward worth longing for. It wasn’t even a bad thing that I wanted a perfect person to justify me and make me right with God. That person just isn’t my wife. It’s Jesus. So, those two, seemingly small, distinctions become major shifts in my reality and lived experience.

Just as my marriage is not about making me happy, I had to realize that my being in New York may not be for the reasons that I initially had in mind. But that doesn’t mean that the Sovereign God of my life and this world doesn’t have a reason for me being in NYC. In fact, I can take a pretty good guess that it has a lot to do with the life of Christ being formed in me (which involves a very unpopular word beginning with an “s”), and the hope that I, yes even I, can join Him in His work of renewing all things, through creative endeavors which flow from a heart and life which are being renewed through suffering (I waited until the end to drop the “s-bomb”). And He is so lovingly faithful in bringing about this end, that He will allow many trials and Graces to come until Christ is fully formed in me. “Christ in me, the Hope of Glory”!

I can’t help but think of Paul, the apostle, chained to the wall of a prison cell, probably unable to write on his own after being cruelly beaten, but joyously testifying in a letter to the church in Philippi. He writes in Philippians 1:29,

“...for it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake…and, “do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit…”.

Perhaps the most exultant part of his letter to the Philippians is in chapter 3 when he says,

“( vv. 7-11) Whatever gain I had, I count as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as [dung] in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him…that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

God bless you as you seek His purposes for your life and creative work in the city. Grace is at work here, in us and around us. Thank God for that Reality check.

Kenyon

Working Out Of The Resurrection

Just as Jesus becomes the face of the Father, his broken and resurrected body gives access to the Spirit, who helps us live a renewed life. According to N.T. Wright, from the moment of the resurrection, “the forces of decay and death have suffered their major defeat, and from now on new creation is under way, with its first signs being the new life of those who believe the Gospel.” (The Redemption, p.84) Wright understands how the resurrection not only impacts our future, but is a reality that transforms Christians in the here and now. Therefore, Beth Felker Jones is correct in stating “Resurrection doctrine is indicative not only of final hopes, but also of present attitudes toward the bodies of the living.” (Marks Of His Wounds, p. 4) Jones believes God revealed himself through our senses by the Spirit which “has granted us the body of the Son.” It is through a broken body, that new life emerges. What this means for artists is amid the brokenness, “we can invoke nature with proper care…we can appeal to the nature of our own bodies, as we know it through the risen body of Jesus who is the paradigm of our own redemption.” (Marks Of His Wounds, p.100)

Life with the Spirit transforms our thinking about bodies and bestows a new attitude towards the things of this world. In her book Marks of His Wounds Jones directs us to the Augustinian understanding of embodiment and our inordinate desires. Our bodies and the material world are not necessarily the source of our sins; it is our disproportionate desires for these things. Through the Spirit, it becomes possible to possess a right relationship with God, that reorders our desires appropriately. Our art, then, becomes the means through which we can understand God and the world in a deeper way, not an end unto itself. By the Spirit, the material realm no longer enslaves, instead, we become free to value and nuture the things of this world, including art and the things it points to. Miroslav Wolf understands having dominion over the natural world means being responsible for God’s created order not “simply the satisfaction of human needs and wants.” (Work in the Spirit,p. 147) Thus, through the Spirit, we fulfill the Cultural Mandate, not because we must, but because we long to. Christ’s resurrected body prompts our desire to see all things become new again. Therefore the resurrection, according to Paul, allows us to give ourselves “fully to the work of the Lord,” this includes our art making endeavors, because we know that our “labor in the Lord is not in vain.” (1 Corinthians 15:58)

--Maria

A Dialogical Journey

Recently, we’ve had the pleasure of meeting with lots of pastors who are seeking ways to better serve the artists in their cities and congregations. It’s been exciting to see that God’s Spirit is moving in cities around the world to build bridges between artists and communities of faith. These meetings have also given us the opportunity to step back and really clarify the concepts that we have found to be most vital in this dialogue concerning artists and the gospel.

This year, Redeemer Arts Ministries will be embarking on a ministry-wide dialogical journey, exploring what it means for us as artists to allow the Gospel to change our hearts, our communities and our world.

How can we learn to articulate our spiritual callings as artists? What descriptors, what roles and words can we assign to one who is called to the work of renewing culture through art-making? We came up with six descriptive roles or themes in which we'll root our discussions:

The Artist as Disciple

The Artists as Theologian

The Artist as Creator

The Artist as Servant

The Artist as Cultivator

The Artist and Beauty: The Glory of the Lord

Over the course of the ministry year, we will be using these roles as a framework for our discussions at IAF and in the various vocation groups. We invite you to join the dialogue through attending arts ministry events and by posting your responses to our weekly blogs as we unpack these concepts in the coming months.

See you soon at InterArts Fellowship!




Kenyon

Embodied Soul Work

Through Christ, love took form as a body. Jesus, the ultimate love offering, is the foundation for a theology of embodiment. How does this theology relate to artists? Since we will soon relaunch a dance industry vocation group let’s refer to a dancer’s work. Hours of discipline result in wounds and pains to the body; artistic activity can be physically challenging. Yet through the bleeding and bruising we are able to witness the wonder and awe of patterned movement and physical elegance. Beth Felker Jones speaking of Christ, but a fitting remark for a dancer, proclaims, “If we want to know the shape of a holy life, we look at the wounded body.” (Mark of His Wounds, p.111)

Stanley Hauerwas commenting on the disciplined life of the artist writes, “Artists, who must learn to submit to the medium in which they work, demonstrate the kind of training necessary for any of us to see the world rightly.” (Hauerwas, “Fully Human; Art And The Religious Sense.” Image Number 60 (2009): 103) But the regiment of an artist is not just an analogy or a paradigm for the well-ordered life of a Christian, it is reflective of true Christian embodiment. Just as the ascetic directs the body to God, the dancer can likewise make room in the body for God to nourish self and others. What makes anyone want to exert such effort? Love—therefore, Jones is correct, “Love must have a body.” (Mark of His Wounds, p.108)

A theology of embodiment is crucial for our technical age, with our rational ethos. The Church needs dancers, painters, and actors to teach us how to inhabit our bodies. Christians are called to be present in space and know how to move in space with real presence in order for love to take shape physically. Let us, then, offer up to God our bodies and our bodies of work and begin to praise him. Let’s dance.

--Maria

Gold Rush!

Before I moved to New York I was a commuter, coming in on the train from New Haven to audition for Broadway and television. I always made a point to connect with old friends who had found their way to the city. Scouring the theater district near Times Square, I’d knock on stage doors and wait for their tired, cheerful faces to appear. It was like panning for gold, something you can do on the fly if you happen to be walking along a river with a rich mineral deposit. Cities are like that, urban frontiers with gold rush magnetism, rich in culture and opportunity. New York’s gold rush attracts artists from far and wide who come with pockets empty and pans jangling, hoping to find those luminescent moments of glory, crowning their young lives with the shining gold of recognition. But did God really call us to New York City merely to pan for gold, to strive for recognition? Well, no. In His rich love and mercy, God has given us this time and place to graciously shape us (you and I) into His treasured possession. While we do good work and make art happen, we become like rich deposits of gold that shine amid the current of this city.

God meant this to be a richly rewarding journey for us, one that leads to our maturity and wholeness. When we envision our art as the context in which God can do deeply sanctifying work in our lives, then the work of art making, whatever discipline it may be, moves us towards God,not just recognition, approval or a false sense of identity. Such pursuits are poor substitutes for our true callings as servant-leaders. As we strive merely to be faithful with our gifts, we become gifts to others, to the city, and most of all to God. Our true calling is to become like Him in His death and resurrection for the glory of God. Sometimes the “death" can look like a missed opportunity or a seeming failure in which we see what we've been truly trusting for our identity, comfort or hope. I surprised myself last month while having a drink with a friend and chatting about a recent missed opportunity. "That was my only life-line in the city!" I exclaimed with a truly pitiful sigh. He smiled and gently repeated my words back to me with his hand on my shoulder. Thank God for His Holy Spirit who is with us along the way to instruct our hearts and minds as we continue reading scripture daily and prayerfully sharing our lives with others.

In the Screwtape Letters Off-Broadway, Max McLean portrays a voracious demon surviving on human souls for food. During one of his disdainful lectures on “tempting”, he quips that the best way to destroy a human’s spiritual potential is to keep them always focused on the future or past, never enjoying present pleasures or provisions. It's the kind of joke that gets a knowing chuckle from the audience, as we all recognize in ourselves a constant striving for more. In a similar way, a ravenous pursuit of recognition detracts us from our true callings as artists in the city: to enjoy and to become the gift of God. God became a Gift for us in Christ, and we are meant to become like Christ who was a servant to all. So what has become our gold, our treasure? For what reward do we walk by the riverbed with pans jangling? What drives us as we write, rehearse, network, audition, study, design, paint, perform and collaborate?

Recently I came across a video of Bill T. Jones accepting a commission to create a new work. His stark humility and brazen generosity remind me of what a gift it is to be an artist: To have this food for our souls, and to be able to extract meaning from living in a way that is transferrable to others. I’m reminded that I must continue my journey as an artist for some other reason beyond recognition. Even in New York City, those moments are too fleeting to sustain a faithful pursuit of the work. God created us as artists not to pursue the glittering lights of the city but to become the glittering lights of the city. As we work, faithfully pursuing our craft with joy, our art becomes rich deposits in the river, flowing steadily on toward the city of God.

Take care in the city, friends. I hear there's gold in that river!

Kenyon

Video of Bill T. Jones, Receiving a commission

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt3fdKj-P6Y&feature=related

Word and Deed

Genesis Chapter 1 portrays the transcendent God creating the world through speech. At the pinnacle of God’s creation is humanity. “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” is the decree God imparts to the male and female in Genesis 1:28. Genesis chapter 2 depicts a more intimate God, physically handling materials and transforming them into his creations. The dust of the newly created earth becomes an aspect of mankind. “By means of the mysterious ed [moisture], the dry, dead earth became admamah, living Earth.” (Kessler and Deurloo, A Commentary on Genesis, p. 42)

In Genesis 1, God creates through speech; in Genesis 2, God fashions life through his hands. All that exist comes into being through word and deed. In the same way, the New Testament portrays Jesus bringing life through both command and action. In Luke 5 he instructs the paralytic to get up and go home. While a few verses before, Jesus touches an unclean leper and orders him to be clean. But, my favorite story is that of the Centurion, found in Luke 7 and Matthew 8, who astonished Jesus with his faith. In this narrative work and command are tied together through the job details of a pagan official. When the Centurion commands, action is demanded. This is a fact from his daily life. Faith, then, for the Centurion is not a personal preference, it is a fact. If he can command action, the creator of the universe can work beyond earthly expectations. One may surmise how the Centurion holds an integrated faith and work theology, being able to see through his work, the shape of kingdom life.

For Christians, stories, poems, commands, warnings, and songs shape our lives. Words work their way into our being and doing. Through them God speaks truth, but he also gracefully eases his wisdom through our daily activities of work, play, and worship. The Centurion understood how all of life comes under God’s sphere of influence. Perhaps he perceived, like the psalmist, how the skies proclaim the work of God’s hands; how day after day they pour forth speech. Psalm 19 tells us the “commands of the Lord are radiant, giving light to the eyes.” God’s commands, his words to us, illuminate the works of Jesus, Word and Flesh. Artists rely on both God’s words and his deeds in order to abundantly create through both.

--Maria

Little Treasures

Do you ever get the feeling that you were meant for another time or place?

My wife, Emily, and I were walking to a restaurant on the East Side this week when I noticed a small gathering of people, furtively surrounding a row of cardboard boxes on the sidewalk. I immediately recognized this scenario. The all-too-familiar posture of contained, pedestrian greed was all the evidence I needed that time was short. I had to act. Emily suppressed her hunger momentarily and followed me across the street. Books! There were books! Freshly left on the sidewalk from some nearby office or studio, some of them looked new! I waited for Emily’s voice to patiently remind me that I’m not allowed to collect any more books, but it didn’t come. Too late now, I’m digging through boxes like a looter in a national disaster, only with a faint sophistication and poise as if to say, “I certainly don’t need these books”.

In a box that seemed to have belonged to a graphic designer, a lover of beauty, I came across my little treasure. The striking cover was all purple hues, natural textures, lavender in a field…it was a book dedicated to lavender, and to how its fragrance and bloom so richly adorn the region of Provence in France. Well! I wasn’t going to miss this! I scooped the book up nonchalantly, giving eyes to Emily that it was time to make our exit. She was relieved that I’d only accumulated a single book. At dinner, we talked and dreamed of France…again. What would our lives look like in France? “What would we do?” she said. We both agreed that it would be reason enough just to BE there.


Ok, so we certainly have a romantic view of the French countryside, but I wonder if some couple in Provence isn’t dreaming of New York City. We have these inexplicable desires to be elsewhere, don’t we? More than that...we believe in our hearts that we could, in fact, be meant for another existence altogether. The little treasure I found in the box on a city street made me long again for my true home, my true city. C.S. Lewis affirms this longing in his timelessly lucid Mere Christianity, suggesting that if we have desires which cannot be satisfied in this world then it must follow that we were meant for another world.

Perhaps our art-making, too, serves as a reminder of our other worldliness. Not merely that inspiration emits from a mysterious source, but that we as artists are consumed by work that addresses elements of our world which are not entirely of this world. As we discussed at Inter Arts Fellowship this month, art extracts information from text or experience which is not expressly present in time and space. In this way, art groans with the universe in eager expectation for the final and eternal proliferation of beauty and grace, the Redemption of all things! As I live my days in the city, I’m thankful for lavender reflections in cardboard boxes, and for the beautiful reminder of art. May we always be graced to discover it.

--Kenyon

Art and Care

Last spring I attended a retreat for Christian art leaders held at Laity Lodge, outside of San Antonio, TX. How gracious for an organization to provide space where leaders could share their stories of healing and spiritual deepening through the use of art. Listening to these various accounts I realized just how much artists are currently using their gifts as tools towards pastoral care and spiritual growth, regardless of whether they classify it as such.

Professor Howard Clinebell defines pastoral care as “ministry of mutual healing and growth within a congregation and its community.” (Basic Types Of Pastoral Care And Counseling, p.26) To witness God’s people utilizing the language of art for the well being of its community is exciting. Having to be always an advocate for the arts in this pragmatic society, I found these testimonies to be a healing balm for my own soul. I am in awe of God’s provision for the Church. This organic impulse to utilize art in the most humble ways also widens the scope of art within our postmodern context. In our society art is a thing onto itself — it exits for its own sake. To counter the bias of our scientific and technological society this belief is sometimes necessary, but art also lives to heal, unify, as well as to inspire.

One year after the Laity Lodge retreat, the Center for Faith and Work decided to incorporate a more creative hands-on approach in our yearly retreat. Our desire was to grasp great teaching by engaging it through a variety of activities that included embodied interaction. After all, as Margaret Kornfeld reminds us, “God is a God who wants to be remembered and has created our bodies — with complex neurochemical systems — so that memory is possible.” (Cultivating Wholeness, p.86)

The weekend began with individuals creating a personal collage representing the good/bad of their vocational field. This activity enabled retreaters to process their circumstances and articulate them to group members. Later on, we commenced our evening worship by passing out glow sticks that illuminated our parade to the meeting hall. Once we reached our softly lit destination, participants beheld a giant mosaic floor scroll made from their collages. Surrounding the mosaic were simple musical instruments, waiting to be picked up and played with. The glow sticks, now collected together in a glass urn, illuminated our evening filled with songs, prayers, and praises. All these concrete activities helped reinforce our teaching for the weekend: our stories, held together, can become aligned with God’s story.

Art is a receptacle for our stories. But, art also helps us to understand God’s story in deep and meaningful ways. Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon put it this way:

"How does God deal with the human fear, confusion, and paralysis? God tells a story: I am none other than the God who ‘brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the land of Bondage’…In telling that story, Israel comes to see itself as a people on a journey, an adventure. Its ethics become the virtues necessary to sustain Israel on the road." (Resident Aliens, p.54)

Art reminds us that beauty is possible even in the midst of our broken and confused lives. Art helps sustain the community of believers on the journey of being and becoming the children of God.
--Maria

Looking without seeing

[We’re sorry it’s been so long since we posted something new – it was a very busy spring! We hope you’ve been enjoying your summer so far…]

So, those of you who know me well have been wondering just how long it would take before I went on a rant. Here we go….

My husband and I have enjoyed visiting Washington, DC twice in the last two years. It’s cheap and easy to get to from NYC, you don’t need a car to get around, and the museums are free (relatively speaking – they are directly supported by our taxes). A year ago when we visited DC for the first time since childhood, we were disappointed that what we remembered as one of our favorite museums, the National Museum of American History, was closed for renovations. So, when we went this spring, we were eager to visit that museum and the Museum of Natural History, which we had also skipped a year ago because we were frustrated by massive numbers of school groups. (Okay, so neither of these are art museums…but bear with me for a few minutes, I’ll be making a point that applies to art.)

We were first shocked to find that American History Museum no longer actually displays artifacts – at least, not many. What we both loved about the museum as children was the sheer quantity of really cool stuff. Now, one or two objects might be displayed alongside large displays of “context” – signage with photographs and text, an interactive video, etc. – telling you about the importance of the artifact, suggesting how to think about it, and encouraging you to have a personal interaction with it. Although (according to their website), “The Museum has more than 3 million artifacts in its collection,” I’d be surprised if even 300 are actually on display today in the new, re-envisioned museum which is finding “new ways to present the objects of our nation's past.” Um…was there a problem with the old way?

Then we went to the Museum of Natural History. We failed in our effort to time our visit around the swarming schoolchildren and teenagers, so we stepped over and through them to get to the exhibitions we wanted to see. I remembered being gobsmacked, as our British friends would say, by the Hope Diamond as a child, and the rest of the gemstone collection, so we visited it.

The gems were incredible – but I was amazed to see that, instead of actually looking at the pieces, the schoolchildren (and their adult chaperones!) were instead compulsively photographing them, one after another, rushing as quickly as possible through the exhibition to be sure they got to see everything.

We had noticed this on our previous trip, too, at the amazing Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, which is made up of numerous statues and other creative interpretations of FDR’s presidency. A group of pre-teens – with T-shirts from a Christian school, no less – raced through the memorial, posing with the statues for photographs, and never actually took time to see the pieces and be affected by their meaning.

Imagine yourself here…sitting on FDR’s knee…or petting the nice doggie….

To have an experience of anything – whether it is a historical artifact, a beautiful piece of human craftsmanship, or a tribute to a great man – requires attention. Attention, in turn, requires an absence of distractions (like multiple layers of “context”), plenty of time (which might require being selective), and focused sensory engagement (looking, listening, touching, tasting, smelling, or moving).

Has life started to move so fast that we are afraid we’ll miss something if we pay attention? Does interacting with something, inserting ourselves into it, make it “ours”? Are we so fearful that another beautiful experience will never come again, that we feel the need to capture and hold onto it, even if only in a photograph?

1 Corinthians 13:12: “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.”

Perhaps, really attending to what we have here – even if it is only as a digital photo of the Hope Diamond is to the real thing – can lead us to a greater eagerness and hope and joy now about what we will experience then.
--Luann

The Drama of Believing

What greater drama is there than the Christian narrative? The Bible starts with toe-tapping rhythmic ordering and ends with the show stopping, coming down from heaven, glittery gemstone city. It’s as if our world held a concealed secret reality to be discovered only in the sweetest of dreams. In between these scenes we see humanity’s struggle to love God more than their desire to play God. God’s faithfulness, always present, brings the drama to a climax with the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The coming of Christ is epiphany. By knowing Jesus, humanity gains access to its own humanness, putting off its need to be God and growing in its need for God. Indeed, the Christian “actor” puts down the mask and picks up the rhythms of life in order to flesh out true character. Christian incarnation eliminates disguise. The actor no longer needs the mask as he leads those who willingly follow him into life’s tragedies and comedies.

Theater itself is a large collaborative effort. Here is an earthly paradigm for the rich interrelationships of which the Bible speaks. Theater, just as in Christianity, depends on a rapport between text and the writer of that text. The director, crew, and cast must all connect and relate to the same script. All parts work together to incarnate these words connected by speech and gestures. What actors say and what they do reflects what is written.

On Sunday mornings when we gather together to worship, we too enact a drama based on a text. We sing songs, make speeches, and perform gestures that embody the Scripture stories. We work Scripture into our own beings every week through the body of Christ, the gathered church. We practice now a bit of what we will be doing together forever. And, art and beauty—the songs, symbols, and settings of the scripture—is now and always will be a part of our corporate activity. What an exciting drama we behold and God unfolds.
--Maria

Affordable Art

Can you experience great art in NYC at prices you can afford? Yes! If you know where to look and can plan ahead and be flexible.

[Do you have tips for affordable arts experiences? Share them as a comment below!]

Visual art: Some major museums have "free nights." The Museum of Modern Art is free on Friday evenings from 4-8pm, and Brooklyn Museum has a great "First Saturdays" event (coming up on March 6!) that is free and includes live music, dancing and other programs. Both would be great to attend with a group of friends!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Cloisters (in Washington Heights) are always "pay what you wish" (check the fine print - it's a "suggested donation"). The Frick Collection - a great "unknown treasure" - is "pay what you wish" on Sundays from 11am-1pm, the Guggenheim on Saturdays from 5:45-7:45pm, and the Whitney on Fridays from 6-9pm (regular admission is only $8 at the Whitney through February 24!). Don't feel guilty - the museum would rather have you come for what you can afford than not visit at all! The staff won't hassle you. (If it would make you feel better, go to the museum three times in a year, and split your "suggested donation" into three installments.)

Check the Visitor Information page for other museums to see what they offer. Art galleries are always free and NYC has the best galleries in the world, featuring the most cutting-edge contemporary art.

Performances: A number of discount programs offer tickets to theater, dance and music performances for affordable prices. Theatre Development Fund, which also runs the TKTS booths, has a membership program that features tickets to all kinds of performances, between $9-$37, up to a month in advance of the performance. Annual membership is $30/year and is open to students, artists, teachers, those working in non-profits, retirees, and more. Click here for details.

Other ticket discount programs like Audience Extras and Play-by-Play have a higher annual fee, but only a small service charge for day-of-show tickets to a wide range of performances, including Broadway.

Many of the major venues also offer inexpensive tickets to their regular performances, including New York City Ballet ($15/ticket plus $20 annual membership), Metropolitan Opera ($20), New York Philharmonic ($31+) and more. Yes, you have to plan well ahead to get these tickets. And, no, you won't be on the front row. But let's face it, how big are the people on your TV set at home?

Some performances offer discounted day-of-performance "rush" tickets. Check the website of the organizations you're interested in for more details.

You also might consider ushering - it's a great way to serve the people and arts organizations of our city, and see some shows for free! Contact your favorite venue for more information.

Redeemer also offers group-priced tickets through our "Culture Club" program, which attends an arts event each month. Sign up for the email newsletter here to receive announcements about these events. Most Culture Club outings are not also announced in the worship service bulletin or elsewhere.

Enjoy some great art!
--Luann

The Good of Art

Jonathan Edwards poetically expressed how the creation of the world came into being as an overflow of the relational love dynamically expressed among the persons of the Trinity. The material world is the manifestation of the active love present within God’s own triune being. Is it any wonder, then, that God consecrates his creative outcome in Genesis 1 as good? In a similar manner Colin Gunton understands God as the ultimate artist creating for love’s sake. He believes, “creation is a project, something God wills for its own sake and not because he has need of it” (The Cambridge Companion to Christine Doctrine, p.142). Creation then is intrinsically good in and of itself as an outpouring of God’s own love and beauty. Therefore, Richard Viladesau is correct to exclaim, “To experience beauty is to experience a deep-seated ‘yes’ to being” (Theology and the Arts, p.42).

One beautiful aspect of art is its ability to operate on many levels. Art reveals, inspires, and heals. It facilitates in a sensory way mediation of the world and our experiences in it. Art also reserves the power to elevate, motivate, and touch us in deep and meaningful ways that mere communication of facts cannot produce. Most importantly, art reminds us what it means to be human while at the same time discloses the divine and the transcendent—what is beyond us, what we hope for. But to continue to list the human benefits of art becomes a bit of an apologetic appeal. In our rationalistic society, pragmatism tends to rule and there is little room for art. We must therefore take the paradigm of God creating the world in and through love, not because he needed to, but because the constitution of love is generative and giving. Love and beauty beg for regeneration. Art is a gift to be given away, to inspire more works of art and to provide hope and meaning.

If it is true that art is self-expression as well as a reflection of the community it comes from, is it not likely that our work, our artistic creations as those who have a relationship with God, also contains the aroma of Christ? Despite the troubles and tribulations of our lives (that may also be evident in our art) Christ leads us in “triumphal procession,” and according to 2 Corinthians 3:14 distributes through us a fragrance—a sensory knowledge of himself. The love of God is so active it pours over us and inundates us with a scent. A scent, though not seen, is physically present—sometimes even discerned by taste. This presence clings to us, latches onto our work. Christians, therefore, should continue to participate in artistic actions not because they are necessary, but because love bids them to do so.
--Maria

NYC Church architecture

In our Arts Month devotional series, debuting today at www.faithandwork.org/artsdevotional, we talk about "beauty" - that God cares about beauty, and experiencing beauty brings us closer to Him.

One of our suggested activities is to visit a church that is "beautiful" in its architecture and decoration. We suggested "the usual suspects" - St Bart's, St Patrick's, St John the Divine (sensing a theme here?) - but we'd like to know what other beautiful churches you've found in NYC. Let us know in a comment below and we'll add it to the list when we move these devotionals to their permanent location on the website.

Thanks!
--Luann

Don't Go It Alone

One of the most glaring realities facing artists in the city is a sense of sheer isolation: a feeling of not being known or truly knowing others. In an increasingly post-Christian, urban, social context, the need for Christian community in the lives of artists is greater than ever. This growing reality presents a prime opportunity for reconciliation between artists in the city and the urban church.

As artists who belong to Christ, we are also meant to belong to mutually nurturing, Christ-centered community sharing fellowship, accountability and discipleship. We cannot realize God’s calling on our lives living autonomously, outside of the community of faith. Because our expression is divinely inspired, artistic growth is intrinsically tied to our spiritual growth and maturity. In reality, there is no separation between vocational life and devotional life. Reality is, however, easiest to avoid while living outside of Gospel-centered community. The Holy Spirit works wherever He wants, but He works especially through community to grow and change us as we pursue faithfulness in our vocational callings. This process is enabled as we commit ourselves to group of Christians with whom we can share the journey, knowing and being known by them, understanding that our best and worst cannot make us right with God or each other, only dependence on Christ and a deep sense of God’s love for us because of Christ.

Reborn artists in the city often find a natural camaraderie in their professional and collaborative circles (or in some cases, at their night job) which becomes their primary source of community and, consequently, their identity. As a result of this, many of these artists find themselves adapting the pluralistic ideologies of secular humanism instead of integrating a biblical worldview into their lives through a gospel-conversant community of believers. This life construct offers them little or no concept of how, or even why, they might explore deeper inflections of the gospel in their vocational lives. Though it is true that few, if any, Christian communities can claim to be experts on how to biblically and thoughtfully inflect the Christian worldview in vocational artistic practice, a helpful dialogue may be sustained in community which will lead to shared insights, practices, and ways of thinking, doing and being in the arts. Without being linked to the gospel narrative through a community of believers, even the most gifted and thoughtful Christian artist may be tempted to imagine that the gospel is somehow automatically infused into their vocational lives without exposure to the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit through intentional Christian community. These may have a view of sin, that of the world and in themselves, which is unrealistically light and narrow.

The church is certainly not the only community in the city offering a brand of righteousness to its members. It’s very possible to find one’s identity and justification in other communities. This poses a serious threat to the spiritual health of Christian artists in the city in particular. In very few places in the world can one find the variety of scenarios in which to justify oneself and discover alternative brands of righteousness, than can be found in the city. To navigate this, a reborn artist must be living in mutually transparent, gospel-centered community, finding herself in the story of the narrative which begins and ends with Christ.

So we see that this problem of isolation and autonomy may perpetuate a general atrophy of spiritual growth and theological soundness, causing many artist’s lives to be increasingly dualistic and making an integrated approach to Christian life nearly impossible. As I once heard a theater agent say, “If you live a cut-off [dualistic] life, then you will be a cut-off actor!” The reborn artist cannot thrive or effectively pursue her calling in a vacuum. An artist’s life and expression are meant to be shared and upheld in community.
-Kenyon

The Dancing Life

We named our dance performance project Perichoresis. Even though no one could pronounce it, we thought it was a really great name. Maria – our resident theologian (she’ll correct me and say “seminarian”) – used the term one day, and I had no idea what it meant. But I like playing with where words come from and how that influences the nuances of their meaning. So, I started looking:

peri- means “around,” as in peri-meter, peri-scope, etc.
chor- means “dance,” as in chor-eography, from the Greek chorea, which also gives us “chorus,” reminding us that, in Greek theater, the chorus danced as well as chanted or sang.
-esis, is a suffix that makes a word about action or process.

The word perichoresis means, in Greek, “to dance around.”

But the really interesting use of “perichoresis” is theological – it’s used to describe the relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Wikipedia says it “refers to the mutual inter-penetration and indwelling within the threefold nature of the Trinity” – but I much prefer the image of God, Jesus, and the Spirit dancing around all day. Their enjoyment of one another is expressed through movement, and rhythm, and harmony; and their presence in our world and in our lives grows out of that creative act. [Note: some scholars state that the theological term "perichoresis" relates to a different Greek root word that emphasizes the "unity" of the Trinity, and doesn't relate to dancing. I think that's boring and choose to disregard it. :-) -lj]

I think we have an image of God the Creator as a sculptor (he created us from clay) or as a director (he sets situations in motion and shapes them as they unfold). But maybe he’s also a choreographer and, in making us in his image, wants us dancing too.

Isn’t life in community a dance? We have to rehearse a lot to get everyone in the right place and on the same steps. We bump into each other and step on toes. But, when we get it right…it’s gorgeous.

Shall we dance?
--Luann

The Greatest Commandment

Some time ago, in conversation with a friend, she claimed that in order to have the capacity to love others well one must know one’s self. I argued the opposite. One couldn’t possibly love the self fully without knowing others. Knowing the other makes clear the boundaries that exist, which force us to identify what we are not, thereby imparting what makes us tick. My intent here is not to prove my friend wrong: while our emphases are considerably different we both understand knowing and loving happen in relationships. In Mark 12:30 Jesus summed up God’s commandments as such. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” And “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Loving self, loving neighbor, comes by way of loving God. The ten commandments are therefore gracious. They seemingly restrict our being by setting boundaries, but these boundaries help us to know what we are (or what we are not) while simultaneously giving us insight into loving and knowing God, self, and others. The law does not rob us of particularity, it protects and honors what makes us particular and offers us a way to care for others.

Jonathan Magonet in A Rabbi Reads the Bible understands God’s commandments in terms of relationships. In Hebrew to have “no other gods before me” uses language similar to an intimate marriage contract. (p. 201) Magonet points out the biblical and Rabbinic terminology for the commandments is the Ten Words. Instead of a list of prohibitions it carries a more relational sense—“you could not possibly wish to do any of these things” because personal relationship promotes “internal, volunteering policing.” (p. 194) When do we break one of the ten commandments? When we are not in true community. We fall into sin when knowledge of God and others becomes an extension of ourselves.

I’ll be married 25 years this April. The roughest points in our marriage have been when my husband becomes an extension of my own desires, fears, and insecurities. Sometimes I can’t hear, believe, or accept his love for me. I also won’t ask him for help (after all I created him in my image therefore he already knows what needs to be done). I take away his personhood by not honoring the choice he made to enter a contract that entailed loving and caring for me. I violate the community of our marriage when I don’t allow myself to depend on or grow through him.

In the same way many artists understand their work as extensions of themselves. Christian artists forget they have entered into a relational contract with God. God in turn set us in community. Our work does not necessarily comes from us or belong to us—they are not solely extensions of who we are but also of the relationships and communities we come from. In his article, “Tradition and the Individual Talent,” T.S. Eliot goes so far as to state that poetry “is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not an expression of personality, but an escape from personality.” For Elliot the artist forgoes individuality, “surrendering himself wholly to the work to be done.”

Our work grows out of community. Not only does the community feed and strengthen our creative disciplines, but ultimately our work is a gift stemming from our relationship with God. Through God’s own being as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit we are given the ability to live and create in community. Our work is to be a regenerative force that continually bears fruit, not just in us, but also in those around us. This is why when I visit a friend’s studio I am eager to get back home and paint. My friend’s work becomes the best critique of my own, forcing me in new directions or helping incarnate my thoughts and ideas in a fuller sense.

While it is true that God and his commandments help “determine the stability of society,” (Magonet, p. 196) they point to something beyond the ethical. Within the commandments there is disclosure not only of God and his desires but also of clues towards humanity’s wholeness. Our God is a relational God and has made us to be relational beings. Like any creative endeavor relationship building is difficult. We must continually die to self for God to reinforce our particularity—our truer sense of being and our place in community. When we create we must remember how valuable our endeavors are, for they come through, in, and for community. Let us then love the Lord with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. Amen.
-Maria