There is a bit of advice given to us by the ancient heathen Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest; and lending money at interest–what we call investment–is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong. Some people say that when Moses and Aristotle and the Christians agreed in forbidding interest (or ‘usury’ as they called it), they could not foresee the joint stock company, and were only thinking of the private moneylender, and that, therefore, we need not bother about what they said. That is a question I cannot decide on. I am not an economist and I simply do not know whether the investment system is responsible for the state we are in or not. This is where we want the Christian economist. But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilizations had agreed (or it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life.

~C.S. Lewis; Mere Christianity, Social Morality

• 
  Mere Christianity
  Author: C. S. Lewis

• Where do we live?
• What is modernity?
• What is post modernity?
• What is our life composed of?

Perhaps in the midst of a global economic meltdown we can begin an honest appraisal of the realities of our modern existence. To call ourselves “post modern” without ever reckoning with the substance of modernity seems like an exercise well beyond foolishness.

Post modernity in the simplest of definitive terms is that which comes after modernity. If we cannot begin to honestly name the attributes (for good and for bad) of modernity, who are we to ever judge that we have now escaped beyond modernity?

This I believe is the best question to emerge not from the post moderns, but from the critics of the post moderns who would assume to have jumped beyond the tired rationality of modern thought and into a blissful world of the amorphous future present.

And so, what should be our response? Should we blow our brains out along with Tyler Durden as we simultaneously watch the credit card companies implode upon the dynamite of our own cultural acquiescence?

Man, I see in fight club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War’s a spiritual war… our Great Depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.

~Tyler Durden, Fight Club

• 
  Fight Club
  Director: David Fincher

Maybe when we are tired of punching and scraping at our imaginary selves such exhaustion will prepare us for repentance and baptism?

1In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the Desert of Judea 2and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.” 3This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah:
“A voice of one calling in the desert,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord,
make straight paths for him.’ “[a]

4John’s clothes were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. 5People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. 6Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.

7But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. 9And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. 10The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.

11″I baptize you with[b] water for repentance. But after me will come one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. 12His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

~Matthew 3:1-11

Categories: Modernity, C.S. Lewis, Economy, Bible Study
No Comments »