Hamlet saw this flat unweeded garden - why can't we ?
Our Jennifer Byrne ( ABCbookclub )has enough knowledge of the old civilization sustaining faith to know that we can and have over millennia now gone where angels fear to tread, She has not enough knowledge of the substance of sin to avoid falling through the cracks that angels and devils still know about .
Lots of light footed observers like her have their eye on " New ideas and so called science " and their feet firmly in publicly funded studios.
Science doesn't always help us decide when mind over matter matters . Infact, the greatest advocates this century of PhD were tyrants . Angels , evil and devils still exist - kids know it ( games dress and in house talk) even if their parents are in denial about it -esp in own household where it matters
Presumably her regular colleagues couldn't cope with her fearless foray into real fear territory , but then, she never got there anyway . Playing around the edges on the The Book Club ABCLots of light footed observers like her have their eye on " New ideas and so called science " and their feet firmly in publicly funded studios.
Science doesn't always help us decide when mind over matter matters . Infact, the greatest advocates this century of PhD were tyrants . Angels , evil and devils still exist - kids know it ( games dress and in house talk) even if their parents are in denial about it -esp in own household where it matters
Her Seven deadly sins were like her picture of reality - an outside glance that's positive ....whatever is in the woods behind the trees, doesn't matter ; we have sunshine and grass on this landscape with comfortable chairs ,books and unreality. Dull and Flat up close but maybe curved on the horizon ?
On the book club ,to its all smiles, its late ,we only have 1/2 an hour and its fiction/fantasy after all . Not hard to see why determinists enjoy escape even more than we do -- the world according to them has been fixed in concrete formulae for eons --it will do what evolution means it to do and that 's that .
Mind over matter is useless chatter , so lets play with words and some more constructs, Reality is ..just steps and blocks , even if we talk the blocks (components of reality ) on the show ----- we know its only Lego and we are only doing child's play. Suits us.... its that time of night and maybe we in that mood ?
As Chesterton said , rather a philosophy that deals with the evil inside and finds something good there than one that is bright and positive on the outside --but never deals with the rottenness beyond skin deep. Trouble with breaking the surface is you maybe breaking bad; you don't know how deep you are going to go;-maybe one step too far ( now there is real fear territory) Maybe there are cliffs and no comeback ?
ABC Book club photos show them all smiling as they talk about and dismiss guilt and ineffectively try to explain it away - as children do. Guests too come unread and unaware of the soft floor and soft centred sweets when talking of sin.( The apple after all was sweet ) Lets dismiss what we don't like ; No such thing as temptation or restraint let alone good intent mixed with evil action. appetite rules so gluttony must be at least half positive Lets dismiss what can't be pushed into a simple equation 1+1=1. No tension when we are being pulled and drawn through history.
The phenomenon of superficial featured in all the episodes I saw = not getting to the gist of why a good God would make life better and easier by naming bad choices . Even kids today now talk more than her crew about it - call them" the breakout generation" and lets hope they get beyond the superficial.
Take Gluttony which is not about how much but about taking seriously our role as members of community ( the ecological view ). We are designed in the image of God to make things and to share them . Its not bad to have excess (Who wants the stupid stoicism and simplemath of marx when you are offeredand given the abundant life) Its just not good to keep the excess for yourself . Equations even tell us that . God is concerned if he's made you wealthy, how you use it . Equally God created the world not like some endless chocolate factory but with limits . We are are here to share and enjoy sharing like microbes and other " lower life ;' do . Scarcity and Abundance are normal parts of the cycle . Enough is not a threat- its our God given opportunity,
God made the world good- his rule for the stewards who have dominion is to share . He gives us ENOUGH - not all we want , but enough . Wise occupants of the planet know this and poor people know it best ( why is that ?) Why don't rich people get it and why do they seem not to have enough . Has someone deceived them , or have they deceived themselves about what they really need .
If Jennifer and her colleagues ever dig deep enough they will find that to really identify and hate sin is a positive thing cause its the real waste factor of life .
Practical example - we are in denial about what we and others really need ..
IF ABCTV had dug deep over the last decades, it might realise that its science programs on "need" ( Landline Quantum, Innovation news in Ag) are quite ill focused / distracted. The problem with food is NOT a science one ( higher production as the myth ) but a sharing one . All this concentration on getting more kg/ hectare has pushed the earth too far in the wrong direction - those hectares and that sin ( over the edge , what,s good turns bad; what threatens resilience limits ) .
Wrong prognosis of poverty traps has lead to even less wisdom in action - real waste. My generation have failed to progress the science of poverty. REAL progress is about the RIGHT direction . Real productivity is good; real waste is evil =sin . But we are not to know that via ABCTV . Hear about it here
Are we to to believe them when they assume that the best problem solving occurs when everyone goes off in their own chosen direction ? Whitehead saw this nonsense coming
"The church frightened us with talk of SIN " true .PhD's focus on the fear and miss the point of warning .
Maybe too its just easier to just keep on ignoring the effects of sin, guilt ,anger hurt ,waste and robbery ( how did Seven deadly sins come up anyway?)
Maybe if we just keep acting on what we feel and spend the rest of our lives justifying why we let our hormones rule our heads. If that's progress and moving on ( Tony Jones favourite phrase 2 date ) I'm outta here.
PS On moving on. When something appears in the rear view mirror that we don't like , like the flashing red and blue ,it doesn't always help to speed up. It pays to slow down reflect and maybe even take a different route Good on it when government ministers stick to the real guns and are not tempted by fantasy, fatalism. and fast fixers
