Final

My Final Project Can be seen using this link. 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1igYr_wBo0nTnNabWdneVRlVmc/view?usp=sharing

    My project as 3 parts. Aristotle and the mountain, Plato and the cave, and Boethius. 

    Aristotle and the mountain is showing the line of thought where he is trying to get to the supreme good in the world. Other people we talked about this semester were also Aristotelian in thought, including Moses, Paul, Augustine, and Benedict. Benedict was a monk who wanted to live a very strict lifestyle to become the best person he could, striving for the greater good, or God. Augustine in his confessions is saying that he needs to do better, and string for the same thing Boethius is, just in a different way. 

     Plato is talking about how we need to step outside of our "cave" and find the greater truth. People who are more Platonic in thought include Holmes, Dewey, and Basil. Basil discusses how we should be reading everything we can, including secular sources, to find the truth about God. He wants us to have a whole understanding of things. Holmes is similar in his argument for a liberal arts education. He wants people to have a wide range of understanding to be able to find the greater truth. 

     Boethius synthesizes the two. He would say that the supreme good is God, and we should strive to learn about him and get to know him in a multitude of ways. In his conversation with Philosophy the point is made that God is the supreme good, and that only through learning about him can we reach it, however we choose to learn about him. So he is in the middle of the two, as a bridge Christianize both of them and pointing everything to God.

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tps://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1igYr_wBo0nTnNabWdneVRlVmc/view?usp=sharing

Boethius

Boethius in his books brings up a ton of interesting points. From thought about supreme good, to being moral, happiness, and how to get there, there is a lot of different things. Now the thing that is remarkably missing is Christ. As Philosophy is talking to Boethius about how to gain happiness, and what to do, and to in some ways suck it up and what supreme good is, Christ is never mentioned. I think this is because philosophy, in this conversation, was completely focused on Boethius’s perspective, and how things affected him. She guides him from the things he does to be happy, from wealth to fame to plenty of other things. In this Philosophy is revealing things wrong with Boethius and his perspective. Obviously here there is no need for Christ, because he doesn’t have a bad perspective. Boethius needs to know the ways he is approaching happiness wrong, so that’s the focus. She goes through one thing after another proving that Boethius is working towards the wrong things in life, that he must change. She then goes on to take this a step further. Not only are these the wrong things to be going for, but they are harmful to go after. I agree. From fame, to money, to power it’s bad to chase after that in your life. The only way that can bring true happiness is God, as Philosophy describes as supreme good. God being something that is completely and satisfactorily good. Philosophy makes a good point here, but I feel as though Jesus added in here would enhance her argument. By pointing to someone who chased the right things Philosophy could help boethius do the same. The things he has been chasing must be replaced, and Philosophy’s argument is weak there. Every time in my life, when I change a bad habit, I must fill it with something-hopefully Jesus. By not even mentioning him, Philosophy misses that step. Taking this a step further, by chasing Jesus, or God, you can be truly happy, because he is the supreme good, and that is what makes you happy.

There is another point that I really liked about Philosophy. She didn't describe it in much detail, but suggested that we are all striving to be the supreme good, to be like God. This fits in perfectly with the Bible where we are striving to be like Christ lived. I love the picture of us all chasing Jesus, trying to emulate him, falling short, but following nonetheless. It's a beautiful picture of how our relationship with Christ ought to be, and I really love it. I think also that adding Christ here would allow Philosophy to take her whole argument to the next level, not just changing Boethius’s thinking, but changing him as well.

So I think Christ should have been added. I understand why it wasn't because Philosophy was so focused on Boethius, but I believe adding Christ into it would have enhanced the piece as a whole. I really enjoyed the piece, and saw connections to the bible throughout. I think applying this in my life would be really helpful, making sure I chase the right things, not just temporary happiness.

Saint Augustine

St. Augustine in these confessions talks about the sins he committed over his life. In book 2 he describes how his heart was, and how he was seeking fleeting pleasures. He describes how he was when he was 16, and consumed by lust. As he was venturing into the world, going through puberty and exploring his body, his Dad just encouraged him to do whatever “ he was as pleased as if I had already made him a grandfather” pg 34. Although Augustine cites this, he does not use it as an excuse as to his sins. He takes full responsibility for his actions, when we could have just blamed his Dad. I find this remarkable, and is a true glimpse of his character. The fact that he knows where he is at and takes full responsibility is astounding. That isn’t something you find often. I love the fact that Augustine is humbly confessing here, giving us a seemingly accurate representation of what’s going on in his life, especially around puberty.

But then he takes an interesting turn. Showing remarkable hindsight and discernment, Augustine goes on to explain that he didn’t sin for a purpose, except that it was sin. He committed crimes for the sake of committing crimes. I believe this is the most accurate description of the main reason we sin. Why do we speed? For the adrenaline rush. Now, I don’t mean when you’re running late and you go 15-20 over to get to your destination, but that 5-7 mph over we always go. We do it simply because we shouldn’t be allowed to but are. Pg 36 of his confessions, when Augustine is talking about stealing fruit “we did so only for the pleasure we had in tasting forbidden fruit”. Augustine shows great wisdom is saying this. He did those things simply because he wasn’t allowed to, for no other reason.

Augustine then goes on to talk about how he is searching for fulfillment, and how it can only be found in Jesus. He shows great insight into sin, and our drives towards sin. I love the way he talks about it. Sin for us is just looking to fill a hole in our hearts. We don’t always sin for a purpose, just for the pleasure to see if it becomes filled. It becomes this inner battle.

Augustine also talks about what happens in his heart after he starts following Jesus. It reminds me of Paul, doing what you do not want to do. This concept is great. I find in my life, oftentimes I look back at decisions i’ve made in confusion, unsure of why I did. Augustine touches on this and i’m glad he does. He presents a clear understanding of our hearts, and shows remarkable self-reflection in his own to do this.

So, I liked Saint Augustine. He presents wisdom, understanding, and insight into what  he is saying. He humbly admits his mistakes, and discusses what went on in him.

Saint Benedict

The Rule of Saint Benedict was a fascinating read. I loved hearing about the way he wanted the monastery to run, and seeing the why behind it. One of the biggest things I loved was the focus on humility. All throughout the rule Benedict emphasized being humble, and getting rid of yourself to completely live for Christ. He wrote about a reverence for God that showed in the way he did things. From keeping your prayers quick, to the 12 degrees of humility, it was written everywhere. Personally, I feel as though the modern church has lost it’s reverence for God, and because of that we have a skewed picture of our faith. We see God as more our best friend, then as the creator of the universe, the King of kings, Lord of lords. Yes, God wants a personal relationship with him, but when people such as isaiah had visions about heaven they were trembling, scared because of the glory of God. Modern Christians would walk in as though they owned the place. This is saddening to me, because in a way it is limiting God. Yes, I want God to be personal to me, but I also want a God I serve to be so powerful I am trembling in his presence. Where I am afraid to look on his face because he is so pure and I am so sinful. By losing this picture of God, we have lost a humility that is seen throughout the Bible. If, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forevermore” -Hebrews 31:8, then we should be just as humbled when God speaks to us as the heroes of the faith were. We shouldn’t take it lightly that God comes down to be with us when we worship, that he goes with us everywhere.  In my CHED class we talked about how diving deep into Jesus starts with a fear of him. Obedience, Love, everything comes from that. As you read proverbs you can attest to how many times it starts with the fear of the Lord. It is important we remember who our Savior is, and I love how Saint Benedict knew, and made it vital.

The other big thing that stuck out to me was his thoughts and rules on dealing with sin. His big point? Take someone aside and deal with it personally. Remove them from everyone else, and separate them from the rest of the monks. I love this idea. Benedict is saying that there isn’t a need to call someone out publicly, when you could respect them and deal with it privately. “Do not embarrass each other, let things be dealt with in secret if they can “If, however, the cause of the offense is secret, let him disclose it to the Abbot alone, or to his spiritual Superiors, who know how to heal their own wounds, and not expose and make public those of others.” pg. 53”. Paul also says this. Work things out one on one. Oftentimes we can be so quick to judge, when we really could make it personal and try and work things out. Pages 30-33 outline how to deal with someone when they are sinning, or not following the rules. I like that Benedict went into such detail, he knew there had to be a plan. It starts with Grace, but ultimately removes a monk not obeying so the rest of them can continue. The way Saint Benedict approaches this is filled with love.

Some people will disagree with a lot of what Saint Benedict says, and that’s okay, but don’t be quick to judge someone who is a Saint of the Catholic Church. I only touched on a couple things, but I could write about issue after issue he brings up, and I would love to dive deeper into him. There is just one thought I have. In all of this Saint Benedict is trying to disassociate himself and live completely for Jesus, but it seems that by doing this he is becoming completely self-focused and losing his potential impact. Now this cannot be the case, and I would have loved to be able to find out the difference, and dive a little more into it. It was just something I noticed.

The Quran

I really appreciated reading the Quran this week. All of my life I have been curious as to the differences, knowing it came out of the same place as Judaism, so it was nice to see some of that, and be able to learn some of it myself.

But as I was reading something huge stuck out to me. The Quran, and how God and following him is described, reminds me of a rewards system. It sounds like a “Do this and you will get that” type of deal. Surah 57 finished with the argument of saying, is this was done for you why wouldn’t you believe? Now with Christianity I know that is my thought, but it is a place of going “Jesus did all this, how can I walk away?”, whereas the Quran sounds more like a payment owed. It reminds me of what I am learning in my CHED class, about the different moral levels. There are 6 stages of moral development, and the one described in the Quran is a level 2. It’s the reward system. Now the ages for this stage is childhood, and although having a childlike faith is good, I would propose it’s best to move beyond this. I believe this is an important difference for us following Jesus. The rewards system is very self-centered, and Jesus calls us to live for him, not us. This would be a major disagreement between the two religions, and it’s a fundamental shift in the way we do things. I want to live my life for Jesus, pouring it out, not because I have to or should, but because I want to live that way.

Another big shift is how we approach our enemies. Jesus preaches to love them, pray for them, be with them. The Quran takes a radically different approach, and says you can’t even associate with them at all. That although you can pray for them, that they are not believers and thus lost forever. This is another way the Quran is different, and it speaks to the deeper levels of the belief of it. The Quran sounds more like a return for your efforts, in any way. It also speaks to the idea that God will do to you what you do to others. This may be a bad return, but it is still a return. It is all about me, and what I get out of it.

I disagree with the way this is presented. Now I am not bashing the religion or the book, I just disagree with basing everything off of your actions. By doing it like this you leave no room for your heart, and who you truly are. Anybody can fake it. Anyone can be good, avoid unbelievers, and pray. But for something like this to advance you must look beyond their actions, at the heart. For heaven, and our kingdom under Jesus, it advances because of people radically transformed by his love. It is a kingdom with grace, reaching the lost, doing whatever it takes to help people know Jesus personally. Although I respect the Quran, and the religion is Islam, I just don’t believe it is the right way to go. The God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob doesn’t sound like the god of the Quran, and that is what sticks out to me. If everything is based off of a return for your efforts, a reward system, then it is completely self-focused. You aren’t living for something more, just for yourself and what you will gain, or how you won’t get punished. This is why reading the Quran sat uneasy with me, as much as I appreciated the perspective. There are lots  of good insights, and some good things to take away, but for the way their salvation is presented, I just disagree, respectively.

Saint Basil

Saint Basil in this reading raises some very intriguing points. The first one I would like to discuss is the fact that we should not be ignoring secular readings: “Perhaps it is sufficiently demonstrated that such heathen learning is not unprofitable for the soul” (Basil 3). Unpacking this, it makes sense. Basil goes on to emphasize when authors or poets or songwriters approach virtue, and how that’s a good thing for us to take from them. But that’s not all. In my CHED class we are learning how to best educate people form a Christian viewpoint. A major part of this is knowing how people learn. This involves knowing Psychology and how people develop. Now this may be considered a secular thing, but ultimately it helps us advance the spiritual lives of people. This is why I agree with Basil. Sometimes by adding in things that aren't from a Christian perspective we can gain a more whole understand of what it is, and that can helps us complete our understanding with a Christian perspective. Basil said that when writers extol virtue that we should listen. This is just one example of where adding in that other perspective can be very helpful. I believe that we can gain a more full understanding of who we are by looking at things from all perspectives. God will show up in every part of creation, we can just explore and find it.

Another thing Basil brings up is training.  I love what he says about this. He talks about how a musician wouldn’t train with the way wrestlers do, how that a musician would need to train in the ways they need to, by practicing their instrument. If we are to fight this world, we need to train against it. Against the enemy that is controlling this world right now. This involves us getting out into it, exploring it, learning about it. We must know what we face, and how the world acts. By exploring things outside a Christian viewpoint we are better prepared to not only fight the bad, but also learn how to best help this world see Jesus. It’s very important to do this. If we don’t know what influences our world, we can’t effectively proclaim the gospel. We can be in the world but not of it. We can use technology to reach people, without spreading the hate and judgement that gets spread through it a lot.

The last thing that stuck out to me was his focus on spiritual growth. He says we need to keep our bodies healthy, but only for our spiritual growth. We should be focused on growing our spiritual selves in every aspect. I agree with this. It is okay, and even good, to stay healthy physically, but we need to be focused spiritually. This is really important because, although we live in this world, we are not of this world. We cannot spend all of our time and energy focused on the physical part. Money, health, etc. We must be concerned with our spiritual selves. It is vital to growing as Christians.

Overall, I highly enjoyed the reading. I would love to dive more into Basil’s writings as a whole.

Faith Without Deeds is Dead

“Faith without deeds is dead” -James 2:26b. Oftentimes the church gets this mixed up. We push living a lifestyle modeled after Jesus, while missing the point of this verse. While yes, living out the faith you have is important, it is not the only thing. Paul in Romans discusses this from many different angles. Paul states that only through faith can you be saved, but that your faith is proved by your deeds-by what you do. It isn’t enough to just say it, you must live it out. I love this point, even though in the church this gets twisted so much. At my old church the leaders wanted everyone to serve-to the point where it seemed like you weren’t a Christian if you didn’t serve all the time. That was the church twisting something good into something bad. What you do does not determine your salvation-but it does serve as proof of it. At another point in Romans (10:14-15), Paul goes on to say that unless we tell people about Jesus, unless they hear about him, they cannot be saved. One of the biggest ways we ‘tell” people, is by how we live our lives. This makes our deeds infinitely more important, because, if you haven’t heard the line before- “Our lives may be the only Bible some people read”. How we live our lives is a direct glimpse into who we are. As it suggests in revelation- when we feed the hungry, clothe the homeless, and so on, we are doing the same for Jesus. In Romans Paul states that living like that is worshiping God.

Now that statement can be true in many ways. Take the fact that we are made in Gods image(Genesis 1:27). If every single human being you meet is made in the likeness of God, how you treat them is a likeness of how you treat God. Better yet, it’s how you treat his creation. Remember he pronounced creation good, so by defaming it, cursing it, attacking it, and killing it, you are dishonoring the thing God himself proclaimed was good. If God made creation to be good and perfect, then how we treat it is a picture of how we will treat God. Who are we to say something is bad when God himself said it is good? So, how we live our lives as an example to those around us is worshiping God, it is honoring his creation.

But this isn’t all. Paul also teaches the truth that we are no longer slaves to sin. Romans 6:14-“For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.” This truth is the only thing that allows us to live the life filled with faith. We must be free from sin, because, even Paul stated that “I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it”. He knows what he wants, but he can’t do it. Paul is trying to get across that only through Jesus can we truly live the life we are called to.

So what does it mean to be human to Paul? It means to live with God in you, striving for him daily. Contrary to Moses, who focused on the law, Paul focuses on the heart, and how you live that out. Where Aristotle and Plato believe there is “superior man”, Paul would say as long as you follow God anyone can be that person, but that it is only through God. He brings a new perspective on what it means to be human that I hope we all appreciate.