Ha! That is so funny. I was just thinking as I read that I wished readers could comment on this excellent article. Then I reflected that it must be a chore to read and monitor the commenting and I don't blame you for not doing it.
I'll be back after an appointment and after pondering this extension of the topics Jack and PK have begun. Did you listen to the podcast Paul K linked in his most recent post? They talk about church and religion, very interesting and related to this.
If disruption is internal as well as external, the practice of nothingness is as disruptive an exercise as there is. What kind of world would be have if this was a seriously sought after practice? Our connection would be that much stronger for one. Cheers!
The most awful power of the machine is that it can take away the ability to relate to real in-person people. Disruption means to keep having real and intimate conversations, laughing , singing , dancing , with real people you care about. Use it or lose it!
And there is so much complexity in this ordinary human intimacy, though we often take it for granted. Even when people are not actually dancing, our interpersonal lives are a kind of dance: one moves and the other responds, and it all happens through the multiple layers of what makes us human: emotions, thoughts, words, physical action. This intricacy is a very beautiful and un-machine thing.
Use it or lose it – yes. And we have all met people (or see it in ourselves at times) when over-engagement with virtual worlds numbs us to the nuances of the real world. Our dance steps falter then.
Forty years ago, my first teaching job was at a small Catholic school in LA. The students crashed out of their classes when the bell rang, full of energy and eager to talk to their friends. Very recently, my last job at a large Catholic saw the hallways quiet when class let out. Everyone was on their phone.
I taught struggling students during the summer at the large Catholic high school. The students came from different middle schools and had to pass my class to enter high school. They often knew no one at their new school. During the break, the students lined up, shoulder to shoulder on the low wall outside my class, opened their phone and rarely spoke to one another.
last week I finally bought an ancient flip phone to curb my addiction and distraction with my smart phone. I had no idea how difficult this would prove.
it took 5-6 call to my provider and half of my texts still go to my iPhone instead of the flip phone.
but the takeaway is how much punishment is dealt out for leaving the Matrix of the Machine.
I remember the first time I prayed over my lunch in a shopping mall after converting to Orthodoxy. As a Protestant I'd been in the habit of praying silently before meals and I didn't see any reason to do otherwise now. But it was when I got to the part where you make the sign of the cross that I suddenly became aware of the world and thought "I have to do this! If I don't perform the physical actions then I'm not doing it right - I'm doing something else. I can't just make it a mental exercise."
I felt like EVERYONE in the shopping mall was watching me and judging me.
I don't think they were.
But, for me at least, it was disruptive. It was confronting. It made me dig surprisingly deep into my identity. All that, from three chicken wings.
Your lunch story reminds me of another spiritually disruptive moment in a food court, in this case a flash mob singing the hallelujah chorus from Handel’s Messiah. It’s a few years old now, but still worth a look if you haven’t seen it.
Sometimes I think my most profound spiritual practice is simply staying alive. There is very little in this world of people that I want to engage with (*). I still marvel at the sunrise, an emerging crocus, and the waves on the sea, but the volume of ignorance of those gifts, and the machinery that distracts from them - even tries to obfuscate their very existence - can be overwhelming. It would be easy and very satisfactory to reject it fully and check out, but I stay here, holding on to my stubborn belief that my (our) miracle might be just around the next corner, and in that rebellious act if thought (prayer) is a genuine force, I believe I am doing, at least, something.
(*) by 'people' I mean the mass collective, rather than the limited number of awesome individuals who keep me fairly close to sanity. Essays like this, for example, and I got here via Paul Kingsnorth, another light.
Mind can be regarded as literally a thinking machine. Escaping this “machine” is the purpose of life. Slowing or stopping the flow of automatic machine like thinking is what leads to enlightenment. How to do so? That’s to be searched for by each individual till he finds his way. But the ways exist.
Peco- I think this is the best articulation of your position so far. Really excellent. I am interested in hearing more of how spiritual practices can be disruptive. Disruptive to our own enthrallment to technology? Disruptive to the machine itself? How much would the machine even "notice" such disruptions? If it wanted to crush it, could it? If the machine keeps going in the direction it is going, will such disruptions matter?
Anyway, those are probably more indicative of my own particular concerns/obsessions.
I take hope in what I take to be your underlying assumption (correct me if I am wrong) that we can and perhaps will survive the machine with something like a normal human civilization. From the premise of your novel that might mean, for some of us, doing so at a more basic level of technology than what are existing with now.
Lastly, I saw a clip of Peter Zeihan on Joe Rogan. Best I could tell he thinks that deglobalization is inevitable and that we are headed towards a way of life similar to that of 1900. Maybe that's the best we could hope for. Still, I think that will make for a rough transition.
Thanks for your many and always interesting thoughts, Jack.
I would say the most powerful point of the disruption begins with either our conviction or our suffering. When we are compelled by a spiritual or transcendent story that is strong enough, or if we suffer deeply enough because of the machine, and as a result turn away toward a different and lifegiving path, we will have made progress in the most important battle (the spiritual one).
In terms of particular spiritual practices, I think people have to find their own way, whether through their faith or some other means. I do believe, though, that whatever our practice, it must be linked to our conviction and suffering, and to our whole being.
If enough people were living according to common beliefs and practices, if their collective disruption was large enough, then yes, the machine would obviously notice. Its initial response (if I had to guess) would likely begin with political or social policies that are designed to steer us in another direction or to demoralize us. So, if a large group of people established a thriving “town” in a remote area, with businesses, services, families, healthcare—outside the system—the machine would probably find ways to make their lives complicated and difficult.
Could it crush us if it wanted? I have no doubt. But as a person of faith, I do not believe there is any defeat in the end. The machine has already been defeated, even if it “wins”, because its metaphor and story is hollow.
That being said, I do think it is possible that machine policies and technologies will falter, or meet a lot of resistance from unexpected quarters (not just “religious” people), which could open the pathway for parallel societies to form. You mentioned deglobalization, but we might also see nations de-federalizing to some degree.
One could call this the Great Simplification. A term used in A Canticle for Leibowitz. It is also used by Nate Hagens, who takes a system theory numbers approach that the megasystem cannot last. I don't know if he got the phrase from the novel or it is just an obvious descriptor. Regardless, discerning how this change happens and how best to respond is something worth thinking deeply about.
Clara- Thank you for this link. An excellent interview. I have wanted to read Ophuls for a while now. But..so much to read already! I will have to make him a priority. -Jack
He seems like a wise elder. I love the term "electrifying the titanic" as a way to sum up the renewable energy madness. Also very interesting to hear someone who understands the energetic reality, the political, the human nature side of things, human history, and even the spiritual and ecological also weave them all together into something coherent.... which amazingly includes silence and meditation. That was why I particularly thought of you, Jack.
I agree entirely. He is someone that we should have been listening to decades ago, but won't heed even now. He knows this, but keeps at it anyway and seemingly staying sane while doing it. The book of his I want to read most of all is Plato's Revenge. I think it can broaden the discussion here on substack regarding what would constitute the basis of a sane society--if it is even possible. Of course, we very much need the people thinking of how to grow food, make clothing, etc. We need both. -Jack
It might seem strange to call motherhood a "practice," but I would argue that the postures and crafts of motherhood can be incredibly disruptive spiritual acts. Think of the ways motherhood makes us less at home inside the machine: our relationship to time, the shapes of our bodies, the vector of our attention-- all these change in ways that are at odds with the prevailing structures of the Machine. (E.g.: the Machine wants a lean, small body that exists either as a commodity for pleasure or as a mere vehicle for the intellect. My children want a warm, soft body that serves a thousand bewildering roles, from milk-giver to snuggler to dragon-who-tickles us). Whether a pregnancy ends in miscarriage or joyful birth (and I have known both), whether "planned" or not, the arrival of a child always disrupts, always calls us to prayer and hospitality and kenosis. The Machine does not know how to "let the little children come," and in the pain it takes for us to learn, we realize how powerfully disruptive our motherhood can be.
These are wonderful reflections, Bethany, and I totally agree. Family is a natural unit of (nonviolent) rebellion against the machine, and motherhood, in the sense you described, is a miraculous disruption on so many levels.
Thank you, Peco. And you're so right that the existence of the family is itself a nonviolent rebellion. I've been thinking a lot lately about how Joseph Campbell's "heroic journey" paradigm has never worked very well for women, and that feminine heroism needs other forms that are nevertheless fierce and holy and exciting. Motherhood-as-subversion fits that need better than anything else I've experienced.
Sound making on a century old trombone (a warm sounding horn with much gold in the brass), or strumming a small classical guitar, the reverbations of which are very near the heart and so a comfort. As a pagan herbalist, I very much appreciate your invitation to all denominations of people.
Thanks. Although I am well-rooted in my own faith, it is clear to me (and others) that new technologies and the implicit machine values around them is impacting everybody in a way that is more basic than our specific beliefs or practices.
just saw....yes...indeed, 'any port in a storm' keeps floating through my thoughts....and all the ramifications of that tactic....best from Oregon Peco
I have so much to say on this topic that I am a little embarrassed. I just read this post aloud at breakfast to my husband and we both picked up on this line:
"Prayer is divine technology: an alignment of the signals of a human creature with the signals of the Creator. " Yes, yes, and yes. For me lately one that has jumped out is, "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us." Stirring my compassion for all of us in this burning machine.
I agree that it is a divine technology and likely the very best one for our disruptive purposes. However, having been immersed in various religious groups most of my life I can't say that people who pray are doing better as a rule than people who don't. I suppose there is the fact that no one knows the quality of our prayer -- whether it is mechanical or heartfelt -- and no one knows how well others are doing in God's eyes. But I have to say that for some reason much of 'christian' practice as far as I can see is not functioning as disruptive, transformative, or life-giving. In the recent podcast with Paul Kingsnorth (The Regeneration Podcast?) his hosts were talking about "clericalism" in the church and PK seemed to be saying that he doesn't see this as a problem in Orthodoxy. I had to look up the definition of clericalism myself, and I found it describes exactly the sort of thing that has made church experience so weird for me throughout my life, in spite of having personally been alive to God, and recognizing that life in other church members and church leaders at times. I would be willing to visit an Orthodox church in spite of my skeptical inclinations (in case it is actually a whole different animal as some claim) but there isn't one anywhere near me currently. So, as you say here, we absolutely do need some embodied practices in addition to prayer, we don't want to just make it up as we go along, but here we find ourselves trapped inside the Machine without a church to guide us. At least some of us do.
So since this is the situation I find myself in, I have been inventing or seeking some things to do. One is going barefoot every morning when I let my ducks out and feed/water them. This came from our discussion on Jack Leahy's substack about how unfit we are for Wild Cave Christianity. I know I won't hurt myself, there is no real danger in doing this for a short time. It is enlivening to feel the cold earth and my nerve's response. It is something real, quite literally grounding and connecting with the planet on which I walk. It is strengthening, toughening, done in faith that I am capable of far more than the Machine would have me believe. It also causes me to briefly ponder where shoes and socks come from, how they are made and by whom, and how much nicer even my 45 degree F kitchen floor feels when compared to ice or snow -- I find that it is actually warm! If some day my conscience propels me to run away into the wild in order to respond to some awful machine circumstance I want to have the faith and strength to draw on. These are, quite literally, baby steps.
As someone else mentioned, many people are just trying to stay alive and don't have a patch of earth outside their door, don't have ducks to feed or a clothesline to hang the wash on. I hope others have things to share that are suited to those situations.
Another topic from the podcast was the idea that those who have family and children are not free to pursue monastic devotion. While this is obviously true in a way, I always feel a little perplexed and want to point out that family life need not prevent our following any true call from God, and that if we have family already then we are most likely not being asked by God to abandon them. But we do have some very difficult and weighty work before us, which will require all the devotion that a monastic call would require in my opinion. As many have mentioned, merely raising kids who have no phones is tricky. Where I live we do not know other families who do the same. If you teach your family about where food comes from and why we say no to certain treats, conveniences etc. you will feel the challenge. Making space to be real and to experience the real as a lifestyle choice in the midst of suburbia is a sort of battle, requiring the strength both inner and outer of warriors.
I hope that I have not participated in 'the pride of the internet' here; it goes without saying that we have many failures and repent often. But I do feel so encouraged by Peco's words written here and hope that we can encourage each other in these practical ways. And besides all that, it is fun. It is really fun to live a real life. It is not all gloom and renunciation.
Lots of interesting thoughts here, Clara, and I will only touch on a couple of them. In terms of the Christian faith—setting aside denomination and theological distinctives—it is easy to forget the primary commandment of our faith (and the actual example given in the death of Jesus) is to love God and to love each other. One of the better definitions of love I have heard was from my friend and pastor/speaker Ellis Potter: Love is a series of responsible choices that helps to establish a person in who God wants them to be.
If there is love and what you do, and in your relationships, then you have gone a very long, long way, and perhaps the whole way.
When I first returned to the faith, some years ago now, I had one hesitation: I did not want to become “churchy”. I wanted to be real. I think God wants us to be real. I could get into a long and rather abstract rambling about “real”, but perhaps I will save that for another time, or a book.
Below is a direct quote from Potter’s book How Do You Know That? His background is protestant, but he is not unsympathetic to the more ancient Christian traditions, and was (years ago) a Zen Buddhist.
With all that in mind, his take is clearly Christian and might not resonate with people operating in other religious/spiritual traditions.
Here’s the quote. Hope it helps.
“The revelation of the Bible (e.g., 1 John 4:19-21) tells us that we can only know God and His love by loving each other. We can only love each other in institutions [i.e., relationships]. We cannot know this love by doing a religious ceremony. We cannot know it by just feeling it either. Love is not a feeling. Love is a series of responsible choices that promote and encourage the other so that they can become who God intends them to be. The purpose of love is to make us more fully real. As you can see, love is not self-centered. The center of love, the focus of love, is the other person. So the purpose of love is not to express my satisfaction or my desire or my enjoyment. The purpose of love is not to gratify myself, or even to gratify the other. The purpose of love is to establish people in truth. For this reason, love can sometimes be experienced as difficult or painful. Many people feel that they know the love of God when they experience people loving them. This is half of the truth. This is love that we receive, or get. The other half of the truth is that we know the love of God by loving other people sacrificially. This is the love that we do. The relationship between getting and doing should be complementary rather than competitive. We cannot know love only by reading the Bible. We cannot know love by reason. We have to live out this love in relationships, in institutions. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word for ‘know’ means sexual intercourse. That’s not something you do rationally at a distance. It’s a committed, engaged, involved way of knowing.”
Thanks for this article, it seems to have found it's way to me at just the right time. I find myself resisting practically and spiritually. Practically, I turn off the wifi whenever we're not using it, at the plug socket. My phone is turned off when I finish for the evening and all devices are turned off completely when their not being used. And I don't connect at weekends! Spiritually, I find it helpful to remember that just because I have a thought doesn't make it real and I don't have to believe it. And I spend a lot of time in gratitude, not necessarily for what I have but simply for what 'is'.
I have never been attracted to Islam, but I have a great respect for their practice of stopping whatever they are doing five times a day and praying. Truly a great practice to interrupt the grim droning in our heads of everyday concerns. Of course, Catholics do have a similar practice, the tolling of the Angelus Bell three times a day to remember the Incarnation. I come from a fairly Catholic family with deep roots in the West of Ireland, and somehow I did not know about the Angelus until I was an adult. It is my impression that as a practice it has faded away, probably because a lot of people don't know about it. Mores the pity. I think it would be a good thing for people to stop 3 times a day to reflect on the central mystery of the Christian faith.
Just a note to let you know that I tried to subscribe but my card kept being denied. I went Amazon Prime and bought another copy of a Fr. Seraphrim Rose's Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future"- so I know it's working. Hope this helps!
My debit card gets shut down every time I make a payment on substack. They call it fraud protection... because the charge comes from some distant location. Convenience at our fingertips. But this never happens with Amazon.
Ha! That is so funny. I was just thinking as I read that I wished readers could comment on this excellent article. Then I reflected that it must be a chore to read and monitor the commenting and I don't blame you for not doing it.
I'll be back after an appointment and after pondering this extension of the topics Jack and PK have begun. Did you listen to the podcast Paul K linked in his most recent post? They talk about church and religion, very interesting and related to this.
Clara
Yes, there is a “chore” element to that, and it brings its own sort of disruption, but I do enjoy hearing people’s perspectives.
I haven’t got around that podcast, laggard that I am, but I’m sure it’s a good one.
If disruption is internal as well as external, the practice of nothingness is as disruptive an exercise as there is. What kind of world would be have if this was a seriously sought after practice? Our connection would be that much stronger for one. Cheers!
Or we could practice “everythingness”, giving ourselves over completely to whatever or whoever is before us.
Basically the same thing.
The most awful power of the machine is that it can take away the ability to relate to real in-person people. Disruption means to keep having real and intimate conversations, laughing , singing , dancing , with real people you care about. Use it or lose it!
And there is so much complexity in this ordinary human intimacy, though we often take it for granted. Even when people are not actually dancing, our interpersonal lives are a kind of dance: one moves and the other responds, and it all happens through the multiple layers of what makes us human: emotions, thoughts, words, physical action. This intricacy is a very beautiful and un-machine thing.
Use it or lose it – yes. And we have all met people (or see it in ourselves at times) when over-engagement with virtual worlds numbs us to the nuances of the real world. Our dance steps falter then.
Two snapshots about the power of the machine.
Forty years ago, my first teaching job was at a small Catholic school in LA. The students crashed out of their classes when the bell rang, full of energy and eager to talk to their friends. Very recently, my last job at a large Catholic saw the hallways quiet when class let out. Everyone was on their phone.
I taught struggling students during the summer at the large Catholic high school. The students came from different middle schools and had to pass my class to enter high school. They often knew no one at their new school. During the break, the students lined up, shoulder to shoulder on the low wall outside my class, opened their phone and rarely spoke to one another.
😕
Docility is becoming the new tyrant.
great stuff.
last week I finally bought an ancient flip phone to curb my addiction and distraction with my smart phone. I had no idea how difficult this would prove.
it took 5-6 call to my provider and half of my texts still go to my iPhone instead of the flip phone.
but the takeaway is how much punishment is dealt out for leaving the Matrix of the Machine.
but I keep going forward here on my laptop...
I remember the first time I prayed over my lunch in a shopping mall after converting to Orthodoxy. As a Protestant I'd been in the habit of praying silently before meals and I didn't see any reason to do otherwise now. But it was when I got to the part where you make the sign of the cross that I suddenly became aware of the world and thought "I have to do this! If I don't perform the physical actions then I'm not doing it right - I'm doing something else. I can't just make it a mental exercise."
I felt like EVERYONE in the shopping mall was watching me and judging me.
I don't think they were.
But, for me at least, it was disruptive. It was confronting. It made me dig surprisingly deep into my identity. All that, from three chicken wings.
Your lunch story reminds me of another spiritually disruptive moment in a food court, in this case a flash mob singing the hallelujah chorus from Handel’s Messiah. It’s a few years old now, but still worth a look if you haven’t seen it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXh7JR9oKVE
Sometimes I think my most profound spiritual practice is simply staying alive. There is very little in this world of people that I want to engage with (*). I still marvel at the sunrise, an emerging crocus, and the waves on the sea, but the volume of ignorance of those gifts, and the machinery that distracts from them - even tries to obfuscate their very existence - can be overwhelming. It would be easy and very satisfactory to reject it fully and check out, but I stay here, holding on to my stubborn belief that my (our) miracle might be just around the next corner, and in that rebellious act if thought (prayer) is a genuine force, I believe I am doing, at least, something.
(*) by 'people' I mean the mass collective, rather than the limited number of awesome individuals who keep me fairly close to sanity. Essays like this, for example, and I got here via Paul Kingsnorth, another light.
Thank you.
Mind can be regarded as literally a thinking machine. Escaping this “machine” is the purpose of life. Slowing or stopping the flow of automatic machine like thinking is what leads to enlightenment. How to do so? That’s to be searched for by each individual till he finds his way. But the ways exist.
Clicked over from Kingsnorth's 'stack. Glad to find you. Guess I'll lose a few hours today reading thru yours! Best to you, Peco.
Yes! The incredible irony of this fact that we get the most encouragement and companionship as resisters of the Machine... via the internet.
Clara
I know, it’s a weird irony.
Sorry, brother, but it isn't weird at all. "Even the devil is the God's devil "(Luther)
Wisely put!
Peco- I think this is the best articulation of your position so far. Really excellent. I am interested in hearing more of how spiritual practices can be disruptive. Disruptive to our own enthrallment to technology? Disruptive to the machine itself? How much would the machine even "notice" such disruptions? If it wanted to crush it, could it? If the machine keeps going in the direction it is going, will such disruptions matter?
Anyway, those are probably more indicative of my own particular concerns/obsessions.
I take hope in what I take to be your underlying assumption (correct me if I am wrong) that we can and perhaps will survive the machine with something like a normal human civilization. From the premise of your novel that might mean, for some of us, doing so at a more basic level of technology than what are existing with now.
Lastly, I saw a clip of Peter Zeihan on Joe Rogan. Best I could tell he thinks that deglobalization is inevitable and that we are headed towards a way of life similar to that of 1900. Maybe that's the best we could hope for. Still, I think that will make for a rough transition.
-Jack
Thanks for your many and always interesting thoughts, Jack.
I would say the most powerful point of the disruption begins with either our conviction or our suffering. When we are compelled by a spiritual or transcendent story that is strong enough, or if we suffer deeply enough because of the machine, and as a result turn away toward a different and lifegiving path, we will have made progress in the most important battle (the spiritual one).
In terms of particular spiritual practices, I think people have to find their own way, whether through their faith or some other means. I do believe, though, that whatever our practice, it must be linked to our conviction and suffering, and to our whole being.
If enough people were living according to common beliefs and practices, if their collective disruption was large enough, then yes, the machine would obviously notice. Its initial response (if I had to guess) would likely begin with political or social policies that are designed to steer us in another direction or to demoralize us. So, if a large group of people established a thriving “town” in a remote area, with businesses, services, families, healthcare—outside the system—the machine would probably find ways to make their lives complicated and difficult.
Could it crush us if it wanted? I have no doubt. But as a person of faith, I do not believe there is any defeat in the end. The machine has already been defeated, even if it “wins”, because its metaphor and story is hollow.
That being said, I do think it is possible that machine policies and technologies will falter, or meet a lot of resistance from unexpected quarters (not just “religious” people), which could open the pathway for parallel societies to form. You mentioned deglobalization, but we might also see nations de-federalizing to some degree.
My novel is indeed premised on the latter.
Thank you. Not surprisingly I agree with this.
I sent you an email, by the way.
One could call this the Great Simplification. A term used in A Canticle for Leibowitz. It is also used by Nate Hagens, who takes a system theory numbers approach that the megasystem cannot last. I don't know if he got the phrase from the novel or it is just an obvious descriptor. Regardless, discerning how this change happens and how best to respond is something worth thinking deeply about.
here is one of Nate Hagens' interviews that is directly related to this post....
https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/47-patrick-ophuls
Clara- Thank you for this link. An excellent interview. I have wanted to read Ophuls for a while now. But..so much to read already! I will have to make him a priority. -Jack
He seems like a wise elder. I love the term "electrifying the titanic" as a way to sum up the renewable energy madness. Also very interesting to hear someone who understands the energetic reality, the political, the human nature side of things, human history, and even the spiritual and ecological also weave them all together into something coherent.... which amazingly includes silence and meditation. That was why I particularly thought of you, Jack.
Clara
I agree entirely. He is someone that we should have been listening to decades ago, but won't heed even now. He knows this, but keeps at it anyway and seemingly staying sane while doing it. The book of his I want to read most of all is Plato's Revenge. I think it can broaden the discussion here on substack regarding what would constitute the basis of a sane society--if it is even possible. Of course, we very much need the people thinking of how to grow food, make clothing, etc. We need both. -Jack
It might seem strange to call motherhood a "practice," but I would argue that the postures and crafts of motherhood can be incredibly disruptive spiritual acts. Think of the ways motherhood makes us less at home inside the machine: our relationship to time, the shapes of our bodies, the vector of our attention-- all these change in ways that are at odds with the prevailing structures of the Machine. (E.g.: the Machine wants a lean, small body that exists either as a commodity for pleasure or as a mere vehicle for the intellect. My children want a warm, soft body that serves a thousand bewildering roles, from milk-giver to snuggler to dragon-who-tickles us). Whether a pregnancy ends in miscarriage or joyful birth (and I have known both), whether "planned" or not, the arrival of a child always disrupts, always calls us to prayer and hospitality and kenosis. The Machine does not know how to "let the little children come," and in the pain it takes for us to learn, we realize how powerfully disruptive our motherhood can be.
Right on. Even birth itself, written about so well by Mark from Metanoia of VT.
https://www.metanoiavt.com/reflections/2022/8/19/doorways-to-the-sacred-upheaval-rites-of-passage-and-birth
For my husband and myself, having homebirths was a foundational experience of losing trust in the machine system and its claims.
Clara
These are wonderful reflections, Bethany, and I totally agree. Family is a natural unit of (nonviolent) rebellion against the machine, and motherhood, in the sense you described, is a miraculous disruption on so many levels.
Thank you, Peco. And you're so right that the existence of the family is itself a nonviolent rebellion. I've been thinking a lot lately about how Joseph Campbell's "heroic journey" paradigm has never worked very well for women, and that feminine heroism needs other forms that are nevertheless fierce and holy and exciting. Motherhood-as-subversion fits that need better than anything else I've experienced.
Sound making on a century old trombone (a warm sounding horn with much gold in the brass), or strumming a small classical guitar, the reverbations of which are very near the heart and so a comfort. As a pagan herbalist, I very much appreciate your invitation to all denominations of people.
Thanks. Although I am well-rooted in my own faith, it is clear to me (and others) that new technologies and the implicit machine values around them is impacting everybody in a way that is more basic than our specific beliefs or practices.
just saw....yes...indeed, 'any port in a storm' keeps floating through my thoughts....and all the ramifications of that tactic....best from Oregon Peco
I have so much to say on this topic that I am a little embarrassed. I just read this post aloud at breakfast to my husband and we both picked up on this line:
"Prayer is divine technology: an alignment of the signals of a human creature with the signals of the Creator. " Yes, yes, and yes. For me lately one that has jumped out is, "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us." Stirring my compassion for all of us in this burning machine.
I agree that it is a divine technology and likely the very best one for our disruptive purposes. However, having been immersed in various religious groups most of my life I can't say that people who pray are doing better as a rule than people who don't. I suppose there is the fact that no one knows the quality of our prayer -- whether it is mechanical or heartfelt -- and no one knows how well others are doing in God's eyes. But I have to say that for some reason much of 'christian' practice as far as I can see is not functioning as disruptive, transformative, or life-giving. In the recent podcast with Paul Kingsnorth (The Regeneration Podcast?) his hosts were talking about "clericalism" in the church and PK seemed to be saying that he doesn't see this as a problem in Orthodoxy. I had to look up the definition of clericalism myself, and I found it describes exactly the sort of thing that has made church experience so weird for me throughout my life, in spite of having personally been alive to God, and recognizing that life in other church members and church leaders at times. I would be willing to visit an Orthodox church in spite of my skeptical inclinations (in case it is actually a whole different animal as some claim) but there isn't one anywhere near me currently. So, as you say here, we absolutely do need some embodied practices in addition to prayer, we don't want to just make it up as we go along, but here we find ourselves trapped inside the Machine without a church to guide us. At least some of us do.
So since this is the situation I find myself in, I have been inventing or seeking some things to do. One is going barefoot every morning when I let my ducks out and feed/water them. This came from our discussion on Jack Leahy's substack about how unfit we are for Wild Cave Christianity. I know I won't hurt myself, there is no real danger in doing this for a short time. It is enlivening to feel the cold earth and my nerve's response. It is something real, quite literally grounding and connecting with the planet on which I walk. It is strengthening, toughening, done in faith that I am capable of far more than the Machine would have me believe. It also causes me to briefly ponder where shoes and socks come from, how they are made and by whom, and how much nicer even my 45 degree F kitchen floor feels when compared to ice or snow -- I find that it is actually warm! If some day my conscience propels me to run away into the wild in order to respond to some awful machine circumstance I want to have the faith and strength to draw on. These are, quite literally, baby steps.
As someone else mentioned, many people are just trying to stay alive and don't have a patch of earth outside their door, don't have ducks to feed or a clothesline to hang the wash on. I hope others have things to share that are suited to those situations.
Another topic from the podcast was the idea that those who have family and children are not free to pursue monastic devotion. While this is obviously true in a way, I always feel a little perplexed and want to point out that family life need not prevent our following any true call from God, and that if we have family already then we are most likely not being asked by God to abandon them. But we do have some very difficult and weighty work before us, which will require all the devotion that a monastic call would require in my opinion. As many have mentioned, merely raising kids who have no phones is tricky. Where I live we do not know other families who do the same. If you teach your family about where food comes from and why we say no to certain treats, conveniences etc. you will feel the challenge. Making space to be real and to experience the real as a lifestyle choice in the midst of suburbia is a sort of battle, requiring the strength both inner and outer of warriors.
I hope that I have not participated in 'the pride of the internet' here; it goes without saying that we have many failures and repent often. But I do feel so encouraged by Peco's words written here and hope that we can encourage each other in these practical ways. And besides all that, it is fun. It is really fun to live a real life. It is not all gloom and renunciation.
Clara
Lots of interesting thoughts here, Clara, and I will only touch on a couple of them. In terms of the Christian faith—setting aside denomination and theological distinctives—it is easy to forget the primary commandment of our faith (and the actual example given in the death of Jesus) is to love God and to love each other. One of the better definitions of love I have heard was from my friend and pastor/speaker Ellis Potter: Love is a series of responsible choices that helps to establish a person in who God wants them to be.
If there is love and what you do, and in your relationships, then you have gone a very long, long way, and perhaps the whole way.
When I first returned to the faith, some years ago now, I had one hesitation: I did not want to become “churchy”. I wanted to be real. I think God wants us to be real. I could get into a long and rather abstract rambling about “real”, but perhaps I will save that for another time, or a book.
I'd love to hear more on this, "Love is a series of responsible choices that helps to establish a person in who God wants them to be."
Perhaps an example of how it might happen to illustrate the meaning?
Below is a direct quote from Potter’s book How Do You Know That? His background is protestant, but he is not unsympathetic to the more ancient Christian traditions, and was (years ago) a Zen Buddhist.
With all that in mind, his take is clearly Christian and might not resonate with people operating in other religious/spiritual traditions.
Here’s the quote. Hope it helps.
“The revelation of the Bible (e.g., 1 John 4:19-21) tells us that we can only know God and His love by loving each other. We can only love each other in institutions [i.e., relationships]. We cannot know this love by doing a religious ceremony. We cannot know it by just feeling it either. Love is not a feeling. Love is a series of responsible choices that promote and encourage the other so that they can become who God intends them to be. The purpose of love is to make us more fully real. As you can see, love is not self-centered. The center of love, the focus of love, is the other person. So the purpose of love is not to express my satisfaction or my desire or my enjoyment. The purpose of love is not to gratify myself, or even to gratify the other. The purpose of love is to establish people in truth. For this reason, love can sometimes be experienced as difficult or painful. Many people feel that they know the love of God when they experience people loving them. This is half of the truth. This is love that we receive, or get. The other half of the truth is that we know the love of God by loving other people sacrificially. This is the love that we do. The relationship between getting and doing should be complementary rather than competitive. We cannot know love only by reading the Bible. We cannot know love by reason. We have to live out this love in relationships, in institutions. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word for ‘know’ means sexual intercourse. That’s not something you do rationally at a distance. It’s a committed, engaged, involved way of knowing.”
Thank you, I bought the book. :)
Thanks for this article, it seems to have found it's way to me at just the right time. I find myself resisting practically and spiritually. Practically, I turn off the wifi whenever we're not using it, at the plug socket. My phone is turned off when I finish for the evening and all devices are turned off completely when their not being used. And I don't connect at weekends! Spiritually, I find it helpful to remember that just because I have a thought doesn't make it real and I don't have to believe it. And I spend a lot of time in gratitude, not necessarily for what I have but simply for what 'is'.
I have never been attracted to Islam, but I have a great respect for their practice of stopping whatever they are doing five times a day and praying. Truly a great practice to interrupt the grim droning in our heads of everyday concerns. Of course, Catholics do have a similar practice, the tolling of the Angelus Bell three times a day to remember the Incarnation. I come from a fairly Catholic family with deep roots in the West of Ireland, and somehow I did not know about the Angelus until I was an adult. It is my impression that as a practice it has faded away, probably because a lot of people don't know about it. Mores the pity. I think it would be a good thing for people to stop 3 times a day to reflect on the central mystery of the Christian faith.
Just a note to let you know that I tried to subscribe but my card kept being denied. I went Amazon Prime and bought another copy of a Fr. Seraphrim Rose's Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future"- so I know it's working. Hope this helps!
I’m not sure what the difficulty was, Jamie; a machine glitch perhaps. Thanks for letting me know.
It was my credit card that blocked the subscription. Issue resolved!
Jamie
Oh, great to hear!
My debit card gets shut down every time I make a payment on substack. They call it fraud protection... because the charge comes from some distant location. Convenience at our fingertips. But this never happens with Amazon.