Fragment -- #245

[February 2004 journal entry]

Why have I invested the time/energy necessary to track my thought and experience through years of journal entries since going past the point of no return re the ‘religious’ sphere? Why have I kept detailed notes on virtually all extended conversations over these years? Why have I engaged in more probing examination of my experiences and ideas than anyone around me expects?

to reduce mistaking movement for progress;

to avoid unintentionally and unwittingly circling near the outer boundary of the ‘religious’ sphere;

to make sure my move from ‘religious’ to ‘non-religious’ is thoroughly radical (i.e., to the root);

to remain aggressive as a historian and as a theologian;

to take seriously the consequences for my wife and children;

to put pressure on my ideas that meets/exceeds the accountability medical students and residents face on rounds;

to strengthen the core/center of my thought as I seek to maintain consistency in the widening and increasingly diverse conversations in which I participate (i.e., in musical terms -- the theme from which variations are developed);

to leave a path/record (which I found from others only to a limited degree through access to the inner thoughts of a few who had done similarly – e.g., singularly Bonhoeffer as well as to a lesser degree Pascal, Kierkegaard, Berdyaev, Wiesel, Merton, Lewis, . . .);

to leave a record for family and friends who might, at my life’s end, wonder what gave my statements and actions meaning/consistency;

to attempt simultaneously to act and reflect (e.g., Quaker-like integration of spirituality and ethics, ‘Liberation Theologies’ methodology, Bonhoeffer’s Letters and Papers process, C. S. Lewis’ A Grief Observed, . . .);

to track my re-formation;

to create an inductive explanation of moving from a ‘religious’ to a ‘non-religious’ life;

to eliminate the risk of not being physically or cognitively able later in life to recall clearly or to interpret insightfully this spiritual/ethical/theological journey.

Fragment -- #244

[February 2004 journal entry]

Re ‘community’ ( in Birds & Blooms, December/January 2004) –

“One New Year’s Day, a large Canada goose landed in our snow-covered garden. It appeared to have been shot. One leg was limp from the knee down, and it looked exhausted. I left the goose some food and water so it wouldn’t have to move. After several days, the large bird let me rub an antibiotic on its leg. The bird sat in my flowerbed the whole time, and the rest of the gaggle waited at the edge of the creek, encouraging it to continue the journey. They’d chirp and grunt, each of them taking turns repeating the same sounds – like they were crooning a familiar song for comfort. One morning, I saw the injured goose standing on both feet. It preened and stretched, called to the group near the creek and took off. Once airborne, the rest of the flock joined it until they formed a perfect ‘V’, with the injured bird flying in the rear position. I was amazed that this entire ‘community’ postponed its southward flight to wait for one bird’s recovery – and impressed that they placed it in the least strenuous position when they left.”

Fragment -- #243

[February 2004 journal entry]

Being on a ‘cautiously/modestly modern’, ‘non-religious’, and ‘from below’ path – no idea in Jewish scripture or Christian scripture is for me categorically true or authoritative. By not ‘categorical’ I mean that verifying an idea’s place in such documents and critiquing an idea’s meaning are methodologically necessary for assessing an idea’s trustworthiness.

Fragment -- #242

[January 2004 journal entry]

I suspect that ideas dependent on a pre-modern worldview are smuggled across the hermeneutic bridge into discussions in modern settings when a presenter classifies a text such as Genesis 1-3 as ‘story’. Story is one among many ways to convey ideas. But the ‘story’ designation is not enough to cross the hermeneutic bridge. The ideas conveyed in a story that depend on a pre-modern worldview to be credible must be identified/critiqued. Not only may a metaphor be left behind (e.g., ‘king’, ‘sheep’), but also the idea/s carried by the metaphor (e.g., low/passive/dependent view of being human).

Fragment -- #241

[December 2003 journal entry]

Spiritual maturity has to do with realigning one’s self interests with a larger vision.

Fragment -- #240

[December 2003 journal entry]

Which of two paradigms – one that finds divine will/intent immediately and directly expressed in any/every event or one that explains events in terms of nature’s (ir)regularities – makes the best sense of the data re human experience? For me, it is the latter. Two keys – (1) what is considered to be data and (2) the weight given to various kinds of data. ‘Make sense’ describes how most individuals make their way through the day. If a paradigm does not make the best sense of the data re human experience, then why would it continue to be held/used?

Fragment -- #239

[November 2003 journal entry]

Reading Getting a Grip on Evolution reminded me that – until social/medical advances a couple of centuries ago in western societies – (1) infant and maternal mortality was very high (with infant mortality estimated to have been as high as 40% by five years of age several centuries ago), (2) a typical lifespan did not commonly exceed forty years or so (estimated to be several years fewer in pre-recorded history), and (3) a view of life beyond reproductive years was largely an idea/experience neither conceived or developed.

Fragment -- #238

[November 2003 journal entry]

As I walked the streets of the French Quarter, I once again looked closely at the individuals – all strangers – around me. As often before, I was struck with their appearing to be settled and confident about their ways of seeing/being in the world.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #201

[March 2004 journal entry]

‘Seeing from below’ is not equivalent to ‘being from below’ or ‘living from below’.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #200

[March 2004 journal entry]

A Sermon on the Mount vision could be considered a ‘non-religious’ confessional statement/profession in the time of ‘Jesus’. What ‘religious’ T/O paradigm confessional statement/profession in the history of Christian thought centers on a Sermon on the Mount vision?

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #199

[February 2004 journal entry]

I heard recently a speaker mention that William James referred to a ‘more’ about human beings from which religious experience springs. I was not aware of James’ use of ‘more’ when, several years ago, I began using ‘more’ in the proposal that the ‘more’ to being human than can be empirically demonstrated is a starting point re spirituality and ethics in conversations outside ‘religious’ circles.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #198

[February 2004 journal entry]

‘Religion’ fails to establish a foundation/rootedness for the curiosity, the wonder, the questioning, the risk-taking, the imagination, . . . upon which a modern/scientific society is based.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #197

[February 2004 journal entry]

‘Religion’ creates stumbling blocks rather than signposts.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #196

[January 2004 journal entry] [1/04]

I am cautiously/modestly modern in that I stand apart from a fundamentalist disposition toward ‘modern’ as a tradition. But I cannot with integrity and candid (unrestricted) self-knowledge do other than identify myself as modern. I think cautious and modest indicate appropriate/necessary (1) recognition of the adolescent dispositions/actions early in the modern era (as Kant noted in his What Is ‘Enlightenment’? essay) and (2) recognition of the criticisms of the minority of post-modernists whom I take seriously because they take life seriously (rather than spin a literary and/or academic career by parasitically feeding off ‘modern’). I remain deeply concerned that ‘post’ inappropriately and inaccurately diminishes/dismisses ‘modern’. Moving from/past Newton to/past Einstein (1) does not eclipse or nullify all aspects/use of a Newtonian view of the world, (2) does not justify reaching back to or reasserting a pre-Newton view of the world, (3) does not discredit Newton-era critical assessments of pre-modern views of the world.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #195

[December 2003 journal entry]

Kant answered the question “What is ‘enlightenment’?” (see his essay by that title) by appealing to the ‘come of age’ metaphor. At some point across the continuum from infancy to childhood to adolescence to adulthood, an individual is expected to ‘come of age’ and is considered responsible (and accountable) for his/her actions. The relationship between parent and child evolves across this continuum. The child becomes increasingly independent. The parent’s control (‘sovereignty’) and accountability diminish. The parent’s beneficent instincts should be restrained as the self-determining child matures toward the point of making decisions about his/her life. Kant extended such observations about individuals to ‘enlightened’ societies and cultures as well.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #194

[December 2003 journal entry]

Newton (late 17^th century) identified a pivotal (and, in my estimate, irreversible) shift occurring re interpreting events/experiences. In place of beginning with the premise or assuming that events/experiences reflect divine or supernatural will/intervention, Newton proposed that natural explanations of events/experiences be sought and, when satisfactory, preclude the need to look for divine or supernatural will/intervention to explain events/experiences. Natural or ‘from below’ explanations of events/experiences were few in Newton’s time. Since then the natural or ‘from below’ penetration of events/experiences has been so deep and broad that Newton’s observation has been widely amended – i.e., wait in confidence for a satisfying natural or ‘from below’ explanation of events/experiences when such explanation does not yet exist.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #193

[December 2003 journal entry]

The ‘two kingdoms’ – one good, one evil – theological framework foundational from the later Augustine (e.g., City of God) through Luther/Calvin had framed questions re human will in terms of which kingdom’s sovereign (i.e., ‘God’ or ‘Satan’) controlled/determined the character/behavior of human beings. This framework had/has no place for the premise that formed from the Renaissance through the Enlightenment re human will – i.e., that humans are capable of truly free/autonomous choices (self-determination) and should be permitted/encouraged to exercise this facet of being human. The disagreement between Erasmus (On the Freedom of the Will) and Luther (On the Bondage of the Will) had essentially to do with this clash.

A ‘non-religious’ view of Dietrich Bonhoeffer -- #192

[December 2003 journal entry]
The exercise of human freedom/will/choice had transitioned by the 17th century from generating seminal ideas to transforming social structures and worldviews (e.g., Galileo, Bacon, Descartes, Pascal, the introduction of statistics, Locke, the beheading of the British monarch, Newton, . . .). We are irreversibly past that 17th century transition. We have immediate/direct control (i.e., ‘sovereignty’?) over more and more that happens to/around us. Note the frequent references to ‘playing God’. The origins from which all Christian theological traditions have emerged predate that 17th century transition (most by many centuries), thereby creating a complicated hermeneutic task if one’s intent is to radically (i.e., into the root) participate in the modern setting. Some Christian theological traditions in/since the 17th century (have) responded with suspicion; others (have) embraced the spirit of critical inquiry that was building momentum on numerous fronts (including challenges to traditional sources of religious authority). No Christian theological traditions (have) responded with more suspicion/resistance to this spirit of critical inquiry than the traditions that evolved from Luther and Calvin into the Synod of Dort (1619) and the Westminster Confession (1648) statements of orthodoxy. Both the more suspicious and the more embracing responses faced (and continue to face) substantial theological challenges re participating in a scientifically-based society/profession (most pointedly in my judgment – the pressure from such ideas as ‘innocent suffering’ and ‘theodicy’).

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #97

[April 2004 journal entry]

What ideas do I trust unconditionally? A carefully considered few – e.g.,

1. the regularities of nature,
   
2. the scientific method (and the antecedent ‘scholastic method’ that fueled the turn from the ‘dark’ centuries to ‘enlightenment’ in the unfolding of European/Western thought) re careful and rigorous inquiry,
   
3. that there is ‘more’ about being human than can be empirically detected,
   
4. that the clearest insight into a person comes when s/he encounters strangers and adversaries,
   
5. the way of being that is implicit in the resolve to give expecting nothing in return,
   
6. that respect heals/unites,
   
7. a ‘beatitudes’ way of being,
   
8. courtesy,
9. the ideas expressed in the ‘I Have Time’ poem and the ‘To Live Life Well’ poem I wrote for our daughters,
   
10. that all ‘God’ language is morphic (i.e., anthropo-, socio-, cosmo-),
11. . . . .

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #96

[April 2004 journal entry]

Whom do I trust unconditionally? Whom do I know that well? Whom have I tested that carefully? With whom have I faced together the necessary existential challenges over many years? In whom has unconditional trust not proven to have been misplaced? With whom have I shared the deepest wounds as well as the deepest joys? Very few. I try to express clearly and often my gratitude to each one for this rare gift. Individuals I know only indirectly through historical sources – e.g., (of deepest significance for me) the 1939-45 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the ‘non-religious’ ‘Jesus’, the author of the ‘scrapheap’ Job middle section of the story/play Job, the author of Ecclesiastes – form a second crucial circle re ‘trust’, distinguishable from the first/inner circle of ‘trust’. I imagine trusting these individuals unconditionally. However, they are more difficult to trust unconditionally than individuals with whom I live and work due to uncertainties re historical reconstruction of their lives and thoughts, absence of shared experiences, inability to converse, differences in the concrete realities faced, lack of intimate familiarity, inability to share corrective and/or restorative feedback, . . . . Beyond the few individuals I trust unconditionally and the few individuals I know only through historical sources I imagine trusting unconditionally, there are many persons I trust with varying levels of caution or self-protection.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #95

[April 2004 journal entry]

I realize now more than I did 20+ years ago that my ‘non-religious’ and ‘with the world face to face’ path is very far from the shore or the marked paths desired/preferred by most individuals and characteristic of most ideas. I regret putting more stress (than I or they anticipated in our mutual understanding) on persons I trusted unconditionally who finally broke under that stress. I did not foresee the painful consequences. I do not regret putting stress on any idea that has resulted in the collapse of the idea. I eventually came to the conclusion that it is necessary to relieve relatives and friends of feeling trapped in a relationship with me as I continue on a ‘non-religious’/‘from the scrapheap’/‘from below’/‘with the world face to face’ path once they realize how many standard deviations from the mean this path makes/takes one. They may choose to remain near. I want them to be able to step back without guilt. The unrealistic expectations the ‘scrapheap’ Job had re his three close friends illustrates the undesirable and damaging consequences of not taking this approach.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #94

[April 2004 journal entry]

The utility pole climbers knew to examine repeatedly and regularly their security belts (and other equipment). They knew to protect their security belts from unnecessary damage or deterioration. I try to avoid trusting unconditionally any person or any idea I have not carefully/thoroughly tested (i.e., when the testing is the focus). In other words, I try only to trust a person or idea as far as I have tested that person or idea. I knowingly trust unconditionally a very few persons or ideas. I trust with varying levels of caution many persons. However, since ideas are linked, I trust fewer and fewer ideas as the level of caution increases or as the number of questionable links to other ideas increases. I test persons and ideas existentially as well as intellectually before putting any significant trust in them. I look for honesty, for consistency, for steadiness when ‘eye to eye’ with life’s severities. I have made mistakes, miscalculations.

The ‘scrapheap’ Job -- #93

[April 2004 journal entry]

For many years, the utility pole climbers I recall from my youth -- who, trusting their security belts, had to turn loose of and lean back from the pole in order to work -- have been my image of ‘trust’. The trust they placed in their security belts -- unconditional, everything at risk -- illustrates one end of a spectrum. To trust unconditionally is to be completely at ease, completely free of distraction, completely exposed, completely vulnerable. Complete distrust stands at the opposite end of the spectrum. At some point across the spectrum, the paradigm switches from ‘trust’ to ‘distrust’, with numerous gradations on either side of the threshold. We begin life very (completely?) trusting. We soon experience betrayals and disappointments (some playful, some malicious) that teach us to test, whenever possible, before trusting. Once betrayal/disappointment occurs or trust fails, forgiveness is possible. However, lost trust may never be recovered and perhaps only in obligatory relationships (e.g., marriage, parent-child, co-worker).

‘the ethical dimensions of patient care’ -- #53

[August 2006 journal entry, reflecting on the unfolding Terri Schiavo case]

A noticeable complexity re decisions about withholding/withdrawing artificial nutrition/hydration technologies, ventilators, antibiotics, and/or dialysis is the inescapable reality that affecting the time and manner of death is central to the decision-making process and the decision’s consequence. In other words, the reason for the withholding/withdrawing of these interventions does not have to do with the ineffectiveness or futility of the particular intervention. Each one may be effective when assessed in terms of the intervention’s specific/narrow function – e.g., nutrition/hydration may reach the body, air may reach the lungs, infection may be overcome, waste may be eliminated. The reason to withhold/withdraw, therefore, has to do more directly with the larger issues of the patient’s quality of life and of managing the patient’s dying process (i.e., ‘in league with death’). I think it takes great maturity re such considerations as ‘life’, ‘death’, ‘conflicts of interest’, ‘power’, . . . when faced with these decisions. If individuals oppose/shun this complexity and maturity, then I do not think they should employ modern/intensive medical care. I think the reactions from the religious ‘right’ in the Terri Schiavo case demonstrate the result of a one-sided use of modern/intensive medical care. ‘Playing God’ begins long before decisions about existence-sustaining technologies. I am not too confident in the maturity of those toward the ‘left’. However, there is the possibility of encouraging such maturity toward the ‘left’. I do see evidence of the needed maturity in the United States (or in Holland, for that matter) of those toward the ‘left’.

‘the ethical dimensions of patient care’ -- #52

[August 2006 journal entry, reflecting on the unfolding Terri Schiavo case]

I do not consider artificially delivered nutrition/hydration to be equivalent to or interchangeable with a plate of food and accompanying drink. I know firsthand there is a spectrum re the preparation/delivery of food and drink for individuals who cannot eat/drink easily – e.g., selecting food that does not require chewing to swallow/digest or holding an individual’s head up/forward when s/he tries to drink or selecting food drink that can be more easily digested or . . . – the far end of such a spectrum being giving the disabled person ice chips and other comfort measures. I do not place nutrition/hydration technologies on this spectrum but instead view such technologies as methods devised in the last few decades to override the physiological consequences of an individual’s inability to eat or drink. Justification is required for them to be used. Justification that is compelling on the ‘fighting illness and death’ side of the ‘care’ spectrum’s threshold is not compelling on the ‘in league with death’ side of the ‘care’ spectrum’s threshold. Before the development of these overriding and artificial interventions, caregivers were not thought to be cruelly abandoning or starving a patient who could no longer eat or drink.

‘the ethical dimensions of patient care’ -- #51

[August 2006 journal entry, reflecting on the unfolding Terri Schiavo case]

If a person accepts as fact the miracles reported in Jewish scripture and Christian scripture (e.g., stories of the sun standing still, or of raising Lazarus from being dead, or of correcting withered limbs, or of restoring sight to the blind, or . . .) and believes such can/do happen in the present, then all hope is not gone if a patient is in a ‘persistent vegetative state’ or is ‘dead by neurological criteria’. Such a person will regard a completely flat EEG or a completely atrophied brain or a completely absent brain or . . . to be no more insurmountable than Lazarus being brought back to life after being dead three days. Therefore, it should not be surprising when such a person insists on all existence-extending interventions for patients at life’s end. For such a person to do otherwise (i.e., to regard the situation as futile) would be to draw a faithless conclusion and make a faithless decision. The core issue has to do with such a person’s appeal simultaneously to two contradictory worldviews – i.e., the modern/scientific worldview underlying the development/use of the technological existence-extending interventions vs. a pre-modern/pre-scientific religious worldview.

Fragment -- #237

[November 2003 journal entry]

When does one get to the point of scrapping rather than continuing to revise a hypothesis/theory/paradigm – (1) when there exists an alternative minus extraneous/irrelevant ideas (i.e., the ‘Ockham’s Razor’ principle – pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitate or “do not multiply ideas without necessity”)? (2) when an alternative hypothesis/theory/paradigm accounts for more of the (relevant/weighted) data? (3) when the hypothesis/theory/paradigm is no longer recognizable?

Fragment -- #236

[November 2003 journal entry]

‘A good sense of humor’ is often included in a listing of ideal traits for a friend, a spouse, a partner/colleague, an employee, et al. Why? – (1) because of life’s unexpected, surprising, incongruous moments? (2) because one will otherwise take him/herself too seriously? (3) because of the health benefits?