Philosophical Story Challenge of the Week

Well, in a comment on Tuesday’s post Wayne made an excellent point, and while my series this week hasn’t been focused on his point, it is one that I believe is extremely important and that I want to address. In Christian theology, and I am utterly convinced in all truth, the Holy Spirit is active and works in the life of every believer, even before that individual becomes a believer. Every biblical theologian with a lick of sense (including Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Arminius, etc–my point here is major figures from each of the significant camps of Christian soteriology) accepts the doctrine that the holy spirit works in the life of the believer both after they are saved, to guide them in (as Paul puts it) working out their own salvation in fear and trembling, and before they are saved in initiating within them the ability to respond to God. In John 15 Jesus tells his followers that if they abide in him he will abide in them, and many theologians take this to refer to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the human soul. H. Richard Niebuhr, in his book The Responsible Self, makes the excellent point that a Christian should imagine the world around him as under the control of a sovereign God, and thus respond to every action as though it were an action in God’s design. This is not an argument that the believer should respond to sinners as though their sins were God’s perfect will for their lives, but that the believer should respond to sinners as though God allowed them to remain in their sins, and allowed those sins to affect the life of the believer, and thus should respond to those sins primarily as though he were responding to God’s hand in his life, and only secondarily respond to them as though they were sinful actions performed by sinful men.

The Holy Spirit is what Christians believe guides us towards and in this response. That if I am abiding in Christ then I can respond to all things as God would have me respond to them (i.e. as though responding to God’s hand in my life), and thus live out his calling to be holy, or wholly set apart for his worship through the of bearing his image to the world. Now, there are many mysteries here, not the least of which is that which has occupied Calvinists and Arminians through several centuries of sometimes vicious debate–the question of how the salvation of any individual may be both God’s choice from before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1 and 2, etc) through which the individual was crucified with Christ, buried with him, raised with him, and ascended with him into glory, and be the individuals own efficacious choice (1 Peter 3, 2 Timothy 2, Matthew 23, etc) to repent of his/her sin, confess Christ as Lord, and submit to Him before which he/she cannot be saved. There are actually two mysteries here–1) how salvation can be both man’s own efficacious choice and God’s preknown, predestined will before creation, and 2) how man may both have been crucified, buried, raised, and glorified with Christ either after the individual’s own death (for those who lived before Christ), while the individual yet lived (for those who were contemporaries of Christ), or before the individual was born (for those who were born after Christ’s death), and not be saved until the individual repents of his/her sin and confesses Christ as Lord. These are things that don’t seem to work together, and yet we are told that they are true. Some have tried to reconcile them in various ways (which often leads to heresy of some kind as you must deny one truth to justify the other); attempted to use them to dismiss Christianity as illogical, unreasonable, or ludicrous (which only works if you have already dismissed on other grounds the concept of an omniscient, omnipotent, personal deity that is not bound by time); and some have accepted them as mysteries that are fundamentally true, but beyond our current understanding and thus knowable only to God.

So, here is your question: given these ideas 1) the indwelling of the holy spirit, 2) the unity and mystery of the faith, 3) the individual’s response to God in every action, and 4) the aid of the holy spirit in doing so, what does it mean to write fiction as a Christian?

Normally I would ask you to write a story of 1000 words. However, I have a feeling that 1000 words may not be enough for this topic. So, I’m going to ask you to either write a creative, non-fiction essay on the topic or write a short story of up to 20,000 words on the topic. Please don’t post these in the comment, but feel free to make shorter comments or to post links to your longer responses.

Fiction as Theology Part 1: Is Fiction Theology and If So, What does this Mean?

Yesterday I started reading John Frame’s A Theology of Lordship Volume 3: Doctrine of the Christian Life. I bring this up because Frame makes the claim in his introduction that life is theology and theology is ethics, thus life is ethics. Now, he explains that by this he does not mean that there God is desperately interested in whether I have pancakes or waffles for breakfast in the morning, and thus my decision between pancakes and waffles is both a theologically significant and morally important decision. However, if I am to understand the purpose of my existence as being to glorify God (consider that Colossians 1:16 tells us that everything exists 1) because God made it, and 2) for God’s purposes) then the way I approach my decision about having pancakes or waffles (or perhaps sausage and eggs or a bowl of fruit) fundamentally changes. No longer am I considering this decision simply as a matter of preference, but I am considering how to best glorify God–which inevitably involves my own enjoyment of his creation, my health as a human being, the example that I am setting for others, the habits that I am forming as an individual, etc. Suddenly my decision about what to have for breakfast is no longer merely a choice of which tastes I prefer this morning, but it is a matter of 1) who I am as an individual and who I want to become as an individual, 2) what the likely results of my actions are, 3) what the intrinsic nature of my actions is, and 4) how my actions express the image of God that I bear. Now, all of this may sound unbearably and unnecessarily complex for those non-Christians reading this post. However, I might point out that this is not wholly dissimilar to Aristotle’s perspective, though with an eye towards the Christian God. More importantly, I might point that that any belief system requires a focus. For me this focus is God, for a Muslim it may be Allah, for an Atheist it may be their own good or some abstracted concept of the common good. Now, as a Christian I will argue that some of these foci are more intrinsically valuable than others, but that doesn’t change the fact that there is a focus to each of them. Every action is performed for an end–even when that end isn’t consciously considered.

Some of you may also be wondering what in the world any of this has to do with writing fiction, and I’m getting to that, though this is only the first of three posts. Reading Frame’s argument got me thinking: is writing a theological practice? If life is theology and theology is ethics, then it must necessarily include that fiction writing is a practice of theology which is in turn an application of ethics. Thus, all fiction writing would be the practice of theology. How might this be so? Does this mean that Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers is a work of practical theology? Well, when practical theology is considered as a discipline, not so much. However, when practical theology is defined as the application of one’s beliefs about god, gods, or the lack thereof to some particular aspect of life in this world, then yes, in a sense it is. I must stress this in a sense because Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, while certainly a work of political philosophy, says little, if anything, about God. However, consider that everything we write is set on the basis of our fundamental notions*. A friend recently described Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn series to me as ‘very clearly a Mormon fantasy,’ and he was exactly correct. Sanderson is a Mormon and this particular series is very clearly a fantasy (well-written and well-plotted) that is heavily influenced by a Mormon conception of god, life, and the universe. What we believe often has a much greater influence on what we write than we realize. Often, even when we go out of our way to write something that is fundamentally not what we believe, it still clearly communicates to others what we believe.

So, what do we do with this knowledge? What does this mean for Christian, Atheist, Mormon, Hindu, Agnostic, Wiccan, or generally confused writers? First, I will point out that it is fundamentally impossible to not have beliefs. As soon as we are exposed to something we begin to form beliefs and opinions about it. These may be more or less informed, more or less accurate, more or less consistent with other beliefs, etc. However, the only way to have no beliefs at all is to not exist, and the only way to have no beliefs about some particular idea or thing is to never be exposed to it. So, in my next two posts I’m going to focus on two questions: 1) how can my writing help me to explore my own beliefs and discover inconsistencies in them? 2) how can my writing help me to communicate my beliefs effectively to others?

I hope that you’re looking forward to them. I’m looking forward to writing them, that’s for sure.

* This is true whether one holds to a historicist, empirical, constructivist, etc theory of knowledge. Regardless of what knowledge inherently is or how beliefs are initially acquired, once we have established a set of consistent beliefs or biases the rest of our interaction with the world (both input and output) tends to be defined around these beliefs and to reference them regularly.

Allegories: The Ups and Downs

Cover of The Crucible by Arthur Miller. Image taken from Wikipedia. Fair use.

Lately I’ve been reading Arthur Miller‘s classic play The Crucible with my 11^th grade Honors students, and I’m loving the experience. Reading it aloud in class with them has reminded me of when I first discovered the play as an 11^th grade student myself, and its powerful characters with strong moral themes still resonate with me today. In fact, I tend to get so caught up in the action of the play, in the brilliant character dynamics and the almost otherworldly setting of early Puritan America, that I almost forget a few things. I forget that the play was written much later than it takes place—within the last century rather than in the 1600s—and that the author wrote it as an allegory for the social and political climate of his own time.

Now, why would I gloss over such an important historical detail, and one that is well established as the greatest influence for the writing of the play? Maybe it’s because allegories get a bad rap sometimes—and, sometimes, they deserve it. Oftentimes, when we think of allegories, what comes to mind is childish fairy tales with thinly veiled symbolism and much too didactic moral messages. I am reminded of stories like the Chronicles of Narnia—a series which, though I enjoy and respect it to a great degree, is understandably considered by some readers obvious and simplistic in its symbolism. Of course, I’m also reminded of some of my own science fiction and fantasy writings from five or more years ago that I kind of cringe to remember, because the Christian symbolism was similarly thinly veiled and rather unoriginal. (Heck, I know someone in a Christian writers’ community who even used the word “allegories” in the title of an independently published graphic novel. It’s like some authors aren’t even trying to hide it.)

The point is that allegories are sometimes looked down upon these days, because when they’re too obvious, they can come across as preachy and pretentious—a moral message disguised as a work of fiction rather than a genuine creative work itself. I saw an internet article once that, when poking fun at heavy-handed symbolism in a popular contemporary novel, jokingly called the author “C.S. Lewis.” And that got me thinking. First, my English major nature thought things like, “Well, if you think C.S. Lewis’ symbolism was so heavy-handed, then maybe you should go read ‘Young Goodman Brown‘ by Nathaniel Hawthorne and be glad for C.S. Lewis. And if you think that’s too much, then you should go read The Faerie Queene by Edmund Spenser, in which pretty much every character’s name equates to some moral concept like ‘Charity’ or ‘Despair’ or ‘Faithless.’ But once I let my snarky English major side calm down a bit, I got to thinking, “well, aren’t there right and wrong ways to do symbolism and allegories in ways that today’s audiences will accept?”

And the answer is that, of course, there are. After all (though I personally haven’t seen it yet), wasn’t there recently a very popular movie in which the characters were just living embodiments of emotion? And aren’t some of the superheroes I like, the Green Lanterns and their multi-colored associates, based largely on the same thing, harnessing their powers from will or fear or hope and rage?

It’s not that symbolism—or direct thematic conveyances of emotion—are entirely shunned in today’s culture. It’s just that those elements have to be coupled with others, too—like good characters and a good story, which every compelling work of fiction should have anyway.

I remember writing a paper on the allegorical nature of The Faerie Queene, and how it (or at least the part we read in class, because the whole thing is super long) is pretty much just a Christian knight battling monsters who represent different sins, and using supernatural help to overcome them. My professor recommended a book called The Allegorical Temper, which I ended up citing in my paper. I don’t have exact quotes handy anymore, but the author’s consensus was that allegories only work if they’re stories as well. They shouldn’t be only moral messages, but they should be able to function on two levels, as messages conveyed through a good story. If a character represents an idea, then the character shouldn’t completely disappear into that idea; they should still be a well-developed, fleshed out character who is enjoyable and compelling to read about, like any other character should be. Then whatever underlying messages are present may still come through, but without overpowering the story for what it’s supposed to be.

Copy of Animal Farm by George Orwell. Image taken from Flickr Creative Commons.

In hindsight, I’m not sure I can say that The Faerie Queene meets that goal particularly well. Obviously, more than a few direct allegories have been good enough to make their way into the classic canon of literature, and yet they vary in how much they actually tell a story beyond just the allegory. I recently started rereading George Orwell‘s Animal Farm because I’ll be teaching it too later in the year. Of course, my memory may be flawed because I haven’t read it in a decade, but I seem to remember the symbolism in that book being fairly thinly-veiled as well. Different animals correspond directly to different people or social classes involved in the Russian revolution, and the plot is narration-heavy without a lot of room for extra character development. The anti-totalitarian theme—a political message if not necessarily a moral one—comes through very directly, and the entire story seems to be there to serve that theme.

But again, consider The Crucible. It’s well known that Arthur Miller wrote it as a caution against the militant McCarthyism sweeping through 1950s America. Thus, the judges conducting the Salem witch trials within the text of the play are analogous to the anti-Communist courts of Miller’s era, and the town of Salem can be seen as a warning against America following a similar path. But that’s about it. That’s where the allegories end. John Proctor, the main hero of the story, doesn’t directly represent goodness or sin or anything like that. He’s a well-developed, realistic character with both good and bad traits, who just acts in accordance with his personality based on the events of the story. Abigail Williams, the main antagonist, isn’t directly representative of any one person or philosophy in Miller’s time. She’s just the villain, acting on evil motives but not on the author’s determination to drive home a moral point. The characters have lives and stories of their own that stretch beyond the text of the page and can exist independently of the author’s anti-McCarthyist sentiment.

To summarize: if you’re ever trying to write an allegory, or any story with an above-average amount of symbolism, know how to do it well. Include your symbolism and the themes and meanings you want it to represent, but don’t lose sight of writing a good story beyond that. Develop your plot and characters first and foremost so that the deeper messages can really come through in an engaging, compelling, and powerful way.

Philosophical Story Challenge of the Week

Hey, this is Alayna. Tobias is fighting some pretty nasty respiratory infection, so this morning’s post is on me. I’ve been enjoying (in a somewhat sarcastic sense) a blog written by a ‘Christian’ (using that term somewhat loosely) man detailing what a Biblical marriage looks like and what it means to be a husband/wife…with a little parenting advice thrown in for good measure. This man is in his second marriage, the first of which ended when his ex-wife had numerous affairs. However, his blog mainly details the issues he is facing in his second marriage. He and I often have the same critiques on American culture, but we have very different ideas on how to solve them. One of the issues he looks at is preserving virtue and how to best accomplish that. So your question today reflects that: is it possible to preserve virtue in another person? Should we even try? And if so, what should that look like? As always, your answer should be written in a 1000-word story.

Philosophical Story Challenge of the Week

So, something that I run into with fair regularity are people who will claim multiple beliefs or philosophies. Some are obviously compatible (such as Christian Republicans) while others are much more questionable (such as Christian Hindus). So, today I want you to think about this issue: how can two different systems of religious belief, philosophical understanding, and/or political thought be combined? What limitations are there? How do you determine when two systems are simply incompatible? For instance, could a person be a Christian Democrat? An Islamic Buddhist? A Christian Confucianist? A Utilitarian Hindu? An Epicurean Muslim? Etc…

The possibilities for combination are virtually endless. However, rather than simply examining two or three particular combinations and determining whether those specific thought systems are compatible, I want you to go deeper and focus on why two systems would or wouldn’t be compatible.

As always, present your answer in the form of a story of 1000 words, and have fun!

Philosophical Story Challenge of the Week

Happy Halloween! I hope that you’re all ready for a fun night of costumes, candy, and apples in various amounts. By the way, have you heard about the off-broadway production called The Christians? I just read an article about it and it sounds like something that I’d quite enjoy. From the article I read, the play also raises an important and interesting question: when an individuals profession relies on their theological and/or religious beliefs (whether this be a pastor, missionary, parachurch minister, seminary professor, etc) when does it become unethical for that individual to assume the privacy of their beliefs? There have been many people who faced this question in different situations. Some, like Dan Barker, keep their change of belief secret for a time, or even deny to themselves that their beliefs and convictions are changing. Others, like Bart Ehrman declare it publicly, or even make it a point of argument in their professional work.

This question may be more complicated than it seems as well. Not only is financial and physical well-being tied into religious/theological belief in these situations, but in many cases the weight of two changing beliefs may not be the same. For instance, could a pastor who has publicly preached against drinking, and who leads a congregation that generally considers drinking of any kind to be sinful, rightfully keep secret a change of heart about whether the consumption of alcohol is sin? For instance, could he tone down his sermons, perhaps stop preaching that drinking is sin, but still warn against drinking in excess and refrain from any further public disclosure about his change in belief?

Could a pastor who is having a similar change in belief about the sinfulness of homosexual activity do the same?

What about a pastor who has come to believe that the bible is not the authoritative word of God? Or a pastor who has rejected the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ? Should these pastors publicly proclaim their change in belief? Continue to teach and preach doctrines that they are now convinced are not true? Offer to step down from their positions in light of their change in belief?

As always, write a 1000 word story presenting and defending your answer to the question. How should a religious professional handle his/her change in religious/theological belief?

Tom’s Not Here

Well, Tom would normally be posting today, but he’s traveling right now, and unfortunately the person who was supposed to be covering his spot had to bow out as well. Have you ever had one of those days when you just wanted to beat the living shit out of someone? I have. Actually, I used to have a lot of them (like… every day… I used to be a very angry person). Or one of those days when you just wanted to hide under the covers until the whole world went away? I’ve had a lot of those as well (amazingly enough, very angry people are often very frightened people as well). Let me tell you how to deal with them. It’s simple… …not easy, but simple (I’ve often found that those two don’t go together as often as you’d think).

1. Acknowledge how you feel. Give it a name. The more you try to deny your anger, fear, envy, hate, etc the more control you give it. As long as it is something that you hide, cover up, or try to ignore the less you actually do to control it and the more it does to control you. At this point it can help to think of the feeling as a blackmailer trying to hold you hostage. You can pay up, repeatedly, or you can just come clean and take away the blackmailer’s power.
2. Accept that this is who you are. Again, the more you deny it, the less you can actually do that will help it. You are an angry person, a cowardly person, a jealous person, a hateful person, etc. It’s a part of your character, and until you acknowledge that as well, your just going to keep being that angry, cowardly, jealous, hateful person because you can’t admit to yourself that something is wrong.
3. Recognize that who you are is not who you should be. There’s a difference between being authentic and being good. I can be a very authentic douchebag and still be a douchebag. My authenticity doesn’t change that at all, though some people might think it will for a short time. So, while authenticity is important, you also need to recognize the need for change. I am not who I should be, nor am I who I want to be, and until I’m willing to recognize both who I am, and who I should/want to be, and see the difference between the two, I’m still stuck.
4. Face your emotions and think about how you should feel in those situations. If you’re dealing with fear, think about a time that you’ve felt confident in a difficult situation, and then imagine that confidence bleeding over into the situation that you are afraid of. Something that also helps here is taking steps to alleviate actual reasons to feel a certain way. If you’re afraid of being mugged, start taking self-defense clashes. This isn’t going to simply solve the problem, but it will help you deal with the legitimate fear, and to recognize the difference between legitimate fear and illegitimate fear.
5. Meditate on the way that you should feel. Take the time to not only reflect and identify how you should feel, but to repeatedly build in yourself a mental habit of feeling that way in the situations that would normally trigger your anger, fear, envy, etc. This is not a one time step. This is something to do on a regular basis, perhaps even a daily basis, and to spend time on (i.e. give this 20 or 30 minutes a day, not 2 or 3).
6. Expose yourself to small, controlled aspects of the events that would normally trigger the emotions that you want to deal with. For instance, have someone you trust start a personal debate with you, or put you in a situation that would normally cause you to panic. Go slowly, separate your mind from the situation, try to look at yourself in the third person, and identify when the feeling begins. In that moment, practice the extension that you’ve been training at. Stop yourself, focus on a time when you did feel the way you should be feeling, and let that feeling bleed over into the current situation. Again, this is something that takes time and effort. It is not a one time or one day event.

This isn’t easy, but it can help overtime. Of course, other things can help as well. Consistent spiritual practices, a relationship with God, and close friends who are willing to point out areas in which you need to work are all huge benefits when dealing with these kinds of overwhelming emotions. That being said, don’t give up! There is hope.

Writing for Children (and how to do an at least halfway-decent job at it)

Today I’m talking about the writing project I’ve been working on most recently. I’ve been busy—traveling to visit family and attending to some projects with tight deadlines—so, sadly, I still haven’t made any headway on either of the stories I mentioned in my last post. What I’ve been doing lately is of a fairly different nature. Last week I wrote a series of short skits (that I will also direct and act in) for my church’s upcoming Vacation Bible School.

I know. It’s hardly lofty or literary writing. It’s not a deeply involved sci-fi story, and it’s not even written in the same medium as a novel. (I’d like to talk more about the differences between drama and prose, but that may be a post for another day.) I’ll be honest: as you might have guessed from my descriptions, these skits are geared toward children, and they’re designed specifically for teaching moral and spiritual lessons, in a way that some might understandably consider didactic. I wanted to write a post on this project, because it’s my most current creative writing experience. But I admit I had some trouble with the question of “how can simple skits like these relate to the writing of more ‘serious’ fiction?”

Of course, C.S. Lewis is also well-known for his own series of children’s books that are still well-loved by many adults.

But, according to a long-standing principle of writing fiction, a book written only for children is a bad book. A good children’s book (or skit, etc.) will be enjoyable to children but also appeal to adults, because the author hasn’t watered down the quality just because it’s for kids. If I recall correctly, C.S. Lewis espoused this belief on children’s writing (or one like it) in An Experiment in Criticism, and our own Mr. Mastgrave reminded me of it when I asked him if he had any ideas for my post. So now I’m trying to see whether or not my skits can be counted as “good” children’s fiction by appealing to people of all ages.

As I’ve already admitted, these skits I’ve written are not literary or extremely profound. Yes, they are mostly episodic in nature, and yes, they do each feature a “Brady Bunch” sort of ending in which characters verbally recognize a moral, apologize to each other, and resolve their conflicts nicely and neatly by the end. That’s kind of dictated by the nature of doing only a ten-or-fifteen-minute skit for instructional purposes. In fact, I might say that the quick, clean-cut moral resolutions are more due to the time constraints than to the age of the audience. In any case, due to the nature of the beast, these skits inherently have some qualities that definitely seem non-literary and would be seen as bad writing if they appeared in serious fiction.

Nonetheless, that’s not all they have. When I write skits like these, I do make an effort to write for adults as well, because 1) I know that the leaders helping with VBS will also be watching them, and 2) I’m an adult and I like to feel clever to myself with my writing. So, in accordance with the above principle about good and bad children’s writing, here are some qualities in my skits that I hope will appeal to both children and adults:

• Humor. When you’re writing for children, you’ve got to make it fun. But shouldn’t writing for adults be enjoyable too? I try to fill each skit with jokes that, while still not incredibly clever or original, can be appreciated by both children and adults (as long as the adults like corny puns, which I happen to personally). In fact, sometimes the humor is more for adults than for kids, because the youngest class of children (four-year-olds) doesn’t understand the wordplay. Nonetheless, I still include one goofy, comic relief character who often tells puns. But the humor doesn’t exist in isolation; more serious characters react to the puns but still show off their own eccentricities as well. For example:

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Megan: As camp guides, you and I will be responsible for watching over the activities and making sure all of our campers have the most awesome time they can!

Jared: Wow! That sounds pretty intense! [Smiles and points as if he’s just made a hilarious joke.]

Megan: [Confused.] Yes, um…very intense…

Jared: Get it? Intense? Like, “in tents”? [Slaps knee and laughs loudly and obnoxiously.]

Megan and Sam: [Groan and facepalm.]

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Megan: A movie, huh? That does sound kind of interesting. What’s it about?
Jared: It’s about a park, not so different from this one, except it’s full of huge, tall giraffes. And then the giraffes escape and go wild and try to eat everyone in the park!

Megan: Oh, that’s silly. Giraffes don’t eat people. They just eat plants!

Jared: Well, in this movie, the giraffes are ferocious hunters with huge fangs, and it’s awesome!

Megan: That still sounds silly. What’s the name of this movie, anyway?

Jared: It’s called…Giraffe-ic Park!

Megan: [Sarcastic.] Oh, wow. What an original idea.

Jared: The first movie has a boy giraffe and a girl giraffe falling in love. And there’s a really cute baby giraffe.

Megan: A BABY GIRAFFE? OH MY GOODNESS! I’VE GOT TO SEE THIS! [Rushes over and sits down with them.] I can’t wait to see that baby giraffe! I bet it’s gonna be sooooooo cute!

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• Morals. Again, the moral messages here can’t be too complex or obscured as they might be in more serious fiction, and that’s just the nature of this type of writing. Nonetheless, the moral principles conveyed apply not just to children but to people of all ages. Furthermore, I tried to bring them away from just a quaint platitude in a Bible verse into the realm of real-life application. For example, one skit is about the dangers of hurtful words. In addition to just quoting Bible sayings about words, I also want to show, in a realistic way through the characters, that hurtful words don’t solve anything, and that encouraging and affirming others is important. Do kids need to learn that? Sure. But so do a lot of adults these days.

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Sam: So, you and Jared got into an argument, and you both said some mean things to each other. Is that right?

Megan: Yes…that’s right.

Sam: And his words were hurtful to you?

Megan: Yes! They hurt a lot!

Sam: And did saying mean things to him make you feel better?

Megan: Yes! Well, no. I mean, a little bit at first, maybe. But now I just feel awful about the whole thing!

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Sam: Even though you can do a lot of bad things with your tongue and with your words, you can do a lot of good with them too!

Jared: Oh yeah? Like what?

Sam: Well, how about this? Megan, I think you’re a great part of our team! I like that you’re always hard-working and focused on the important things!

Megan: Oh…well, thanks for saying so.

Sam: Jared, I think you’re a lot of fun to be around! You bring a lot of good energy and enthusiasm to our team. Plus, I like your jokes!

Jared: Yay! Thanks, Safari Sam!

Sam: See how much better it feels when you use your words to say nice things instead of mean ones? When you encourage and strengthen each other instead of trying to hurt?

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• Creativity. What I love about writing these skits is that they allow me to be creative and have fun onstage, and this sort of fun (costumes, visual spectacle, etc.) appeals to children and to young-at-heart adults. Here’s a quick run-down of the most creative element I included this year.
• When performing these skits, I work with high-school or middle-school-aged volunteers. Thus (if I write myself in at all), I usually make myself the older leader of some group, and have their characters be my underlings. For example, when we did a medieval theme a few years ago, I was the king, and the other actors were my knights and ladies. Last year, they were secret agents and I was the commander of their top-secret organization. This year’s theme is some blend of camping, mountain climbing, and an African safari, so I made myself the camp director and made them guides or counselors under me.

• 

  If including a talking lion worked for C.S. Lewis, then it’s got to work for me too. Right?

  But, in my opinion, camp guides aren’t quite as exciting as knights or secret agents. So I asked myself, “what can I do to make this more exciting and fun?” And the theme-appropriate answer was to make one of the other actors into not a camp guide, but a lion. Yes, a friendly, cartoonish, anthropomorphic pet lion, with a limited vocabulary about the size of Scooby-Doo’s, who the camp staff has taken under their wing. But a lion nonetheless. Because, adult or child, who wouldn’t rather see a lion onstage than another boring old human?

• Having a lion as a main character is another source of comic relief to the skits, but also a chance to do a lot of visually fun things, like tackle other characters or chase them around the stage. And I think it adds a nice touch to the skits overall. I anticipate that the kids will love seeing the lion (the youngest ones will likely be ecstatic), and the adults will have fun with it as well.

So that’s what I’ve done to try to make my children’s writing slightly less childish and make it fun for adults as well. Did I do a good job or do I still need some work? Have you ever written for children? What approaches do you use to make it appealing for everyone?

The Current Controversy over the Duggars

I don’t plan on joining the giant hubbub over what is going on in the Duggar family or what Josh Duggar did when he was a teenager. If you’re not sure what I’m talking about and you want to know, then I suggest you google it. However, Alayna did make an excellent point to me today. Reading blog posts, articles, and what people have shared on facebook I have seen a lot of shock, outrage, judgment, and chastisement. I’ve seen a lot of people pointing out what the Duggars did wrong, raising concerns about responsibility, safety, wise judgment, influence, etc. I’ve seen a lot of hate and vitriol mixed with rampant gossip mongering and what is probably a little honest fear. What I haven’t seen is anyone who actually seems more concerned with the people who were hurt, both by Josh’s actions as a teen and by the current media hubbub, that about making a political or personal point. Honestly, I think the best thing that anyone can do is to let this story die in the media. Whatever happens, it needs to be the Duggar family, their community, and the local authorities who make the decisions. Those are the people involved, and those are the only people who actually have a place to raise or reraise any concerns.

I’m seen a lot of people who are ready to crucify someone. A lot of people who are acting like Josh Duggar is the exact same person now (and I do not mean the same metaphysical entity, but the same person psychologically, spiritually, and socially) that he was when he was 14, and a lot of people who are acting like the victims involved are the exact same people now that they were when all of this happened. This speaks to me of a singular mindset: the idea that people can’t change in any real way. I think that this is an extremely dangerous mindset. However, even in saying this I am not arguing that questions don’t need to be asked or that no action needs to be take. To be honest, I don’t know if questions need to be asked, or if they already have been. I also don’t know if actions need to be taken, or if they already have been. I am not well enough informed because what few facts the media has actually presented aren’t sufficient to actually inform me to the point of making a meaningful opinion possible. So, my encouragement to all of my readers is to let this go. Give your prayers to the family, and let the people who are actually involved, actually know the people involved, actually understand the situation, and can actually make meaningful decisions concerning it actually handle it. This is the most responsible action that can be taken.

Philosophical Story Challenge of the Week

So, I have a fun question for you this week! At least, it’s fun for me. This is something that I’ve been challenged to work through myself, so I’m just starting my thinking on the issue. The issue is this: what is the relationship between natural theology and natural law?

To define terms, at its core natural law is a moral philosophy first proposed by Aristotle that presents the argument that there is an objective ‘natural’ state, and that this natural state is the way things should be. For Aristotle the ‘natural’ is defined as ‘the way things should be.’ Thus, it is natural for lions to eat antelope. However, it is unnatural for lions to eat pizza and beer. Applied to modern debate a natural law theorist might argue that heterosexual relations are natural because they allow for the procreation of the species. However, homosexual relations are unnatural because they do not allow of the procreation of the species (i.e. they serve no objective purpose). Of course, there are other natural law theorists who will refute this argument and argue that homosexual relations are actually natural, but the key is that to be acceptable they must be shown to be natural in some way.

Natural theology, on the other hand is best presented in Romans 1:18-25 where Paul presents the argument that gentiles have cannot excuse their sin by arguing ‘I never knew about this God’, because the natural world itself reveals the existence and ultimate nature of God to anyone who bothers to look. This natural theology or natural revelation is generally presumed to be less direct and extensive than ‘special’ or ‘direct’ revelation (such as the Christian scriptures). For instance, as Aquinas might argue, by looking at the sun we need not presume that the sun itself is a god, nor that it is representative of a particular god, but that it must have been created by someone. This someone must have created everything else as well (i.e. all of creation must be created by someone), and thus we can deduce the existence of a monotheistic (i.e. supreme, set apart, or on a greater order of being) God. However, from this natural revelation we cannot deduce the trinitarian nature of God, the person and work of Christ, or God’s divine law.

Some will argue that Romans 2:14-16, in which Paul argues that gentiles show that ‘the law is written on their hearts’ when they do what the law requires (e.g. refraining from murder, robbery, etc) even though they do not know the law, connects natural theology with natural law. However, the question is 1) whether that relationship exists at all, and 2) what the nature of that relationship is.

As always, write me a story of 1000 words that presents your response and defends it.