Eternal LIFE: Attentiveness

So much of our work as artists is bound up in conscious attentiveness. We must pay attention. We pay attention to choices and how they interact in our media, to colors, to light, to tone. Attentiveness leads us to a weary contentment when at last, in the moment of inspiration, our work transcends form and material. The burden of attentiveness becomes the artist's most auspicious exercise, perhaps because it points to the reality that the present moment is imbued with it's reflective worth in eternity. As Maria Fee wrote this week about our next InterArts which will feature an exhibition of her artwork, "We will seek to explore how Eternal LIFE is part of our present life as artists". But how can we cultivate our attentiveness in order to work with eternity in mind?


At lunch with International Arts Movement Executive Director Bryan Horvath this week, we lamented about the human tendency to be blissfully unaware of all the ways that God is working in and through the arts. It's all too easy to imagine that an artist who may have little regard for God's kingdom or the work of the Spirit is consequently disqualified as a conduit of divine presence and power. But God often chooses to work through such unsuspecting people and circumstances. Curious, isn't it? Could it be that one reason for this phenomenon is simply that everything which we call good work is empowered by the Spirit who blows like the wind and falls like the rain on the just and the unjust? And if this is the case then could it also be said that anyone who cultivates a careful observation of this magnum opus of the Spirit through conscious attentiveness to his good work in essence becomes a careful observer of the Spirit? From this viewpoint it's more than a little embarrassing that we who would, by the Spirit, seek to worship, honor and cherish him through an ancient & divine blood covenant are so often the last to notice his precious presence and activity. So, what's that about? How can we connect our conscious lives in the present to the Eternal LIFE of the Spirit such that our work in the present becomes a reflection to us of it's eschatalogical destiny?


Perhaps we can learn from actors in this matter. Let us look to the theater! Actors endeavor to be present in the moment of each scene while also being fully aware of and aspiring toward the play's culmination. The skill of the actor then is to employ their bodies and imaginations in the service of their character's highest ends with an acute attentiveness to every detail of staging, lighting, music, direction and their fellow actors. All of this must happen concurrent with a collaborative effort to move the story forward for the audience with a tremendous amount of focused intention until the dropping of the curtain. This proves even more difficult in film when the scenes are disparate, often shot out of order and over the course of several months. But is it possible in our real lives to be fully present, attentive and yet future-minded? Tall order huh?


It seems impossible to me, until I remember the words of Jesus to his disciples upon his departure from the earth, I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high." (Luke 24:49). Jesus speaks here of the coming of the Holy Spirit and his instruction for his disciples is to wait in eager expectation even as the creation now waits for the Spirit of God to be revealed in human beings (Romans 8:19). Our conscious attentiveness, then, is no empty meditation but pregnant with anticipation of power from on high. It is the promise of Christ and the proof of his faithfulness (death on a cross) that becomes the subject of our attentiveness and the source of our power as we anticipate the culminating work of the Spirit in our world. We, like the disciples, must wait in the city for power from on high. And we do not wait in vain for God has shown us that he has held nothing back from us, pouring out his very essence even on those who reject him. Let's pray for eyes to see more of his magnum opus in the artists and industries to which we have been called. 


Kenyon

Being Displays Itself

Being Displays Itself

We are people of the Word but our beloved text points to gathered sounds that ultimately utter God’s actions. From burning bush to a son nailed onto a tree—we hear activity. The whole biblical narrative from creation, fall, alienation to reconciliation exhibits, as von Balthasar relates, God’s “genuine unfolding of himself in the worldly stuff of nature, man and history.” (von Balthasar, Glory of the Lord). The bible is a divine-human drama that begs for a theology that is just as robust and dynamic.

Following God-patterns employs imagination and theologian von Balthasar explores the Christian drama like a theatre critic trying to make meaning of a play. For Christ has radically changed the stage of history. The pagan dramas between human and divine entities so central to the ancient world has shifted. Through Christ “the dialectic of immanence and transcendence, nature and super-nature” can now find hope for reconciliation. (Von Balthasar, Theo-Drama, p. 129) Christ has invited all actors to take the stage and enflesh the Word through their lives.

Just as the torn temple curtain reconciles us to the Holy, the incarnated Jesus also removed the actor’s mask for God to draw near. This also means the Christian actor has the choice to follow Jesus into the tragedies of life. The passage into the dark abyss of the human psyche can only happen because of Christ’s own journey in and out of hell. As von Balthasar relates, “Christianity, with its inner dramatic tension… can take all theatrical aspects into itself in even the darkest moments” only because Jesus travailed through death.  (Von Balthasar, Theo-Drama, p. 82)

Observable transformation and authentic hope erodes the meaninglessness we find in much contemporary drama. With Jesus our stories become interwoven with the Christian story and some of these narratives need the stage to fully express its theological import. Theater allows us to publically incarnate these stories with the potential of ushering in his presence. 

Imagine a God who would write us into his drama. Be an actor on his stage.

--Maria

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.