daily life as life goes on . . .

My next-in-line brother passed away 15 years ago.

I’m looking through his photographs which are stored at my house.  He had an eye for beauty and a knack with timing.  Even the family photos jump out at you.

We literally grew up in the same bed together – he vigourously complained when I went over the middle line of the mattress (yes, there were days where siblings shared beds!).  Then as he was into his 20’s he roomed with my wife and I.  Then our physical worlds were separated by jobs and ambitions.  We seldom spoke or wrote.  Family reunions were our way to update.

Now I’m reviewing his life – the part where we were apart. 

He was a world traveller.  He captured the beauty of mothers and their children exquisitely.  His friends were friends for life.  He was unassuming and yet totally captivating.  He was athletic and competitive.  He was compassionate and loved by others.

I have a feeling I would benefit from the writing of a book called – “The brother I did not know.”

My neighbour and I were shovelling snow yesterday.

She turned to me and explained a revelation she had.

Our countryside is covered with white snow.  Not dirtied snow from dust or mud.  Not rutted snow from others passing along.

Just white snow. 

So what does it mean to be white as snow?

I couldn’t see definitions of ups and downs.  Or holes and rises.  There was no diversity, need for equality or inclusion.  That was all taken over by the white snow.

Everything was just covered and completely clean.

From the abstract of a thesis by Andrew P. Porter (2006 – Graduate Theological Union):

Radical faith meets exposure with confession, repentance, remorse, and joy. Faith meets limitation with innovation, initiative, grief and gratitude. Need is met by opening eyes, hands, and heart to one’s neighbor, ending in celebration and fellowship. In each case, what was initially seen as “bad,” unwelcome, is turned into something welcome, the source of new life.

Over the years I have been exposed to various theories regarding our current age of transition.

I’d like to think that we are earth shaking at this moment.  I’d also like to think that us “’60’s” kids were the last great generation.

Perhaps none of the above.  But perhaps we are in a time of change that can carry shards of reflection from the Reformation.

The printing press was changing the way the public were able to access information.  No longer was it just the elite.  A culture that had developed around visual and narrative “truth-telling” now had the more permanent archive of paper that could document what was said.  An oral culture became a print culture.

Fast forward 500 years.  A print culture is now confronted with a digital culture.  Digital combines archival repositories of both video and print.  This is not just a return to a visual culture some had expected with the digital age.  This is a combination of full sensations able to be documented. 

When the public are confronted with full exposure to that which happens around us, they are left to figure out whether the elite have created a plausible scenario for the citizenry.  Conspiracy theories will abound.  For the sake of change, outcries and protests will dot the horizon and cloud the sun.  Chaos becomes the ground of being.

Back 500 years.  The Bubonic plague hits.  The printing press pours out paper.  Unified states become divided.  Religion is rethought.  Suspicion abounds.

The Reformation and Renaissance arise.  Activists and scaremongers confront authority figures and religious hierarchy.  Somehow the system is overtaken by individuals who eventually return to a new system that may or may not be much better.

What prompted this rant? 

I read an article by Martin Gurri ( https://www.thepullrequest.com/p/the-prophet-of-the-revolt ) suggested my Mark Galli (former editor of Christianity Today).  I returned to discussions with Robert Webber from the 1990’s.  My seminary studies took me into Reformation studies with the three main Christian streams in Western Culture all vying for legitimacy. 

When all of these thoughts converged, I felt like I was living 500 years ago, seeing the future through 20/20 (2020) vision, and excited for what is coming.

Someone should write a Ph. D. dissertation on this!!