The Tower of Babel by Pieter Bruegel (1563)

In the Bible there are perhaps few images of “empire” more poignant that that of the Tower of Babel.

This narrative tells the story of an attempt to build a city and a tower with its top in the sky. This is of course no mean feat – the building of such a magnificent tower, historical or otherwise, is an accomplishment of considerable time, effort and determination.

It also exacts a severe cost from the humans involved and the natural environment.

The Tower of Babel, a thinly veiled allusion to the Babylonian Empire and a parody of human pride and self-reliance, implies the abuse of humans in its building process (as with the Israelites in Egypt). The use of handmade bricks and bitumen rather than naturally occurring stones and mortar made of mud (Gen. 11:3) is, in the narrative context of Genesis, a move away from the providence of God through creation.

This building is not being constructed to meet a need. No – it is a symbol! It represents the seeds of empire.

This intention is not missed by God, whose action in the story highlights the mediocrity of empire – he must “come down” from where he sits in order to see the tower, built by the “children of men”, because he apparently cannot see it from that position.

God then scatters the people, diversifying their languages so that they would not understand one another’s speech. French philosopher Jacques Ellul has this to say about this story:

By the confusion of tongues, by non communication, God keeps man from forming a truth valid for all men. Henceforth, man’s truth will only be partial and contested.*

To summarise, in this short episode the author makes at least two potent points about Babylon, to whom this story alludes, and more generally about human empire – 1) they are human-made and not divinely sanctioned (as was claimed about Babylon) and they seek to control, both humans and also the flow of truth.

Yesterday the Christian Church celebrated Pentecost Sunday, a remembrance of the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit filled the first disciples. On this day, inspired by the Spirit, they began to speak in other tongues, proclaiming the “mighty works of God” (Acts 2:11).

What has been pointed out by many biblical scholars is that Pentecost, among the many things it represents, symbolises a reversal of Babel. Whereas in Babel the language of the people was confused, it is now united.

The community created out of Pentecost is the reversal of empire. It does not exploit or oppress. It is not human-made. It does not dictate truth.

On the contrary, this community holds things in common, provides for one another and is inclusive of all. It is animated by the Spirit of God. It seeks to tell the truth of a new Way, out of empire.

And it certainly does not build towers for its own pride and glory.

I’m not sure that overall we still embody this beauty, but I know that we can.

MCA

—
*From The Meaning of the City (1970), p.18-19. I owe this reference to Wes Howard-Brook from his book “Come Out, My People!”

We live in a world that esteems certainty, of knowledge beyond doubt. But the arrogance of Enlightenment reason has been shown to be, in so many ways, naive.

None of this makes knowledge bad; quite the opposite, knowledge is beautiful. But like beauty, knowledge is not easy to pin down.

Faith is, in part, an acknowledgement of our inability to really know many things with certainty.

Now when I say faith I don’t mean mere belief, much less blind belief. After all, belief is only part of faith, like flour in a pancake.

Faith is more than belief. It is faithfulness - loyalty, obedience, action. It is a hope borne of a redirected allegiance, of a new way of living.

True faith acknowledges that I don’t know everything. She has an inbuilt humility. She does not ignore knowledge, in fact the two are friends, and faith always lends its ear to knowledge to learn something new about herself. But faith also realises that knowledge is imperfect, and that he should not be one’s only friend.

Faith is a startling critique of human arrogance, of our naive sense of independence. We are never independent, but always interdependent. Faith asserts the need for community, both with the divine and each other. She makes a way for a reconnected world where we are no longer lonely ships in the night.

True faith is revolutionary. But she is also humble. She critiques knowledge, but she also listens to him. She knows that they work best together. Knowledge often doesn’t see the need for faith, but what he doesn’t realise is that she is always part of his life, even when he doesn’t realise.

MCA

From a life.remixed reader:

Hi Matt,

I have a question. I have been advised on more than one occasion recently to apply Ephesians 6:10-18 in my life, as in daily putting on the Armour of God. I have been told to physically put it on, going through each piece aloud whilst going through the motions of actually putting on said armour.

This doesn’t quite sit right with me and seems somewhat ritualistic. Has the passage been taken out of context? What are your thoughts on how you apply God’s Armour?

Thanks

Great questions. It seems there are at least two considerations here, one is the pastoral aspect of your question, and the other is the more “theological” element (i.e. what is the context and meaning of the armour of God? How do we apply it?).

From a purely pastoral point of view I would encourage you to stop “going through the motions” as you have been instructed if it is not helping you. The person who gave you this instruction obviously meant well, and intended the exercise to be an exhortation for your faith. However it seems that this is not the result, and as such you should not feel pressured to keep going.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that physically enacting metaphors is a bad thing – indeed that kind of symbolism can hold much power! However if the symbolism is not an encouragement for you then in this case it would seem to hold no meaning, and without meaning it really is simply a “going through the motions”. If the ritual is meaningless then feel liberated to stop doing it.

It may be that hearing a different perspective on the meaning of the armour of God may actually help bring meaning, and may give you a new desire to continue with the symbolic action. On the other hand it may not. In any case you asked for my view on Ephesians 6:10-18 and I’m more than happy to oblige the request.

When Paul lists the armour of God in Ephesians 6 we should ask ourselves – what is the purpose of putting on the armour? For what reason should we “wear” it?

The answer is really quite obvious since Paul tells us in 6:10-13:

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.

So the purpose of the armour is allow us to stand firm in our struggle (“wrestle”) with the rulers, the authorities, the cosmic powers and the spiritual forces of evil. This is a wide ranging group of opponents, but what is crucial to note is that they are not flesh and blood enemies.

That we do not struggle against flesh and blood is an important point, and it would appear that the Ephesians thought that their struggle was against flesh and blood – if it were obvious that is was not Paul would not need to say anything about it.

I would suggest that the powers that Paul is talking about are not human (flesh and blood), though they express themselves through humans and human systems and so they seem to be human, hence the confusion. This makes sense when you consider that the letter to the Ephesians deals with problems that the recipients face in the day-to-day struggles of life in their society and culture; it would not make sense for Paul to suddenly shift to talk about spiritual warfare that has nothing to do with these problems.

In short, Paul is talking about forces that look human but are in fact more than that. The “spiritual forces of evil” are not disembodied spirits going around haunting or possessing people, they are forces of evil that embody themselves in human activities.

For every human system there is a spirituality at its core that we cannot separate from it. Paul is saying that we cannot change these human systems – social, cultural, political, economic, personal – without dealing with such hidden spirituality. This spirituality, this inner spirit, is the real opponent, not the humans involved.

What Paul then does is genius – he subverts the very symbols of human violence. He describes armour and a sword as used by Roman soldiers. These are the regular tools used to deal with enemies in the Roman world, and still today. Paul uses these as illustrations for a completely subversive way of dealing with enemies – rather than putting on armour and using violence we are to embody the virtues of faith in Christ.

Indeed the only “armour” we should wear are truth, righteousness, peace, faith(fulness), salvation and the word of God*!

In the struggle against oppressive human systems that have at their core spiritual evil, Paul calls Christians not to use violence but instead to embody the way of Christ. This is the only thing that will bring genuine transformation to such systems and the people within them.

Indeed, the only “weapon” that Paul lists is a sword. For the Christian the use of the sword is to be rejected in favour of wielding the word of God. That is to say the way of transforming corrupt systems is to speak truth that unmasks the powers, identifies their evil, demythologises their credibility and offers a liberating alternative for both victim and perpetrator.

This continues to be the call for us today as we seek to follow Paul’s teaching. We must embody a subversive love that has the ability to transform all evil powers. This is always a risk – putting on defensive armour and taking up a sword does not guarantee that one will survive the battle, why should it be any different when we walk in the nonviolent way of Christ.

I encourage you to continue putting on the armour of God. This means embodying the values of the kingdom of God over-against all other powers. If physically “putting on the armour” as a symbol helps you, then great.

In saying this I would suggest that to pretend to put on armour could actually miss the subversive point that Paul is trying to make – we are not putting on armour at all, in fact we are rejecting such tools of violence! Instead we are putting on the values of the kingdom, a far more dangerous garment.

MCA

—
* That is, not only the Bible, but everything that God speaks.

…This leads me to the second reason why we should question that aid is about the wealthy sacrificing their wealth to the poor: the assumption that aid is about charity and generosity. When such intentions, however virtuous and commendable, become the sole moral lens through which foreign aid is viewed, the criticism that aid is really a form of the “White Saviour Complex” can become all too accurate. The truth is that aid is not primarily about generosity – it is about reparation.

In this construal, the “White Saviour Complex” is in fact a “White Sinner Complex,” and it is not inappropriate that we should suffer from it. In truth, the way each of us lives is in some way connected to a global economy that exploits someone on the other end of the production chain. As Thomas Pogge has written:

“affluent countries, partly through the global institutional order they impose, bear a great causal and moral responsibility for the massive global persistence of severe poverty. Citizens of these countries thus have not merely a positive duty to assist innocent persons mired in life-threatening poverty, but also a more stringent negative duty to work politically and personally toward ceasing, or compensating for, their contribution to this ongoing catastrophe.”

That every major world religion ascribes in some way to the ethic of “love your neighbour as yourself” should lead us to deep moral reflection: Who is my neighbour in such a globalised world?

You can read the rest here.

MCA

Here is the blurb I wrote about the song:

This song is a longing for a better, more beautiful world.

We live in a world of powerful myths that capture our imaginations and drown them under the chaotic waters of violence and domination. We are invited into something different, a flourishing for all in the kingdom of God. Yet our minds restrict us from fully entering into the beauty of this invitation – we cannot conceive of an alternative, for our imaginations lie dormant.

Musically, themes of imperial myth and violence are accompanied by a rigid, unrelenting, barbarous drum beat (listen to it on decent speakers to get the full effect) that is menacing yet hypnotic. Yet this power eventually surrenders to something gentle, something simple. Is it any different “out there”?

We need desperately to recover what Walter Brueggemann calls the prophetic imagination; the ability to evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the dominant myths around us. There is a reason why totalitarian regimes are so afraid of artists – imagining is the most revolutionary thing we can do.

Hopefully this song is helpful or encouraging for a few people (in truth I just write and record music because I enjoy it, which probably explains why I am so slow with it).

Lastly, here are the lyrics in case my diction is bad and my lines can’t all be deciphered:

Take a look at the world we made here
See the affluent reach the next tier
Hear the cries of the poor,
they’re needing something more
Than a world alike

Fumbling through the way of the powers
Hear the sounds that they make get louder
With the past in our heads,
future in our hands
What fills our mind?

 It’s a beautiful world we’re imagining now
And the thing that we need is imagining now
What we get is what we see, when will we say
“It’s a beautiful world,” we’re imagining now?

Clear out from the path of the empire
See peace rule the world through gunfire
See our boys go to war,
they’re needing something more
For which to die

See the spoils of a war they fought for
Our god-given right to use more
Our trade isn’t free
when imperial sprees
Take one more life

It’s a beautiful world we’re imagining now
And the thing that we need is imagining
The most revolutionary thing is when we say
“It’s a beautiful world,” we’re imagining now

MCA

Disclaimer: The views expressed on this blog are my own and do not reflect the opinions or policies of any group or organisation, including my employers, unless otherwise stated.

The 2012-13 Australian Federal budget, just announced, has incited an outcry from those in and around the aid and development sector who had hoped that the Labor Government would keep its promise to raise the overseas aid budget to 0.5% of GNI by 2015.

In the last fortnight the #DontCutAid hashtag has managed to trend consistently on Twitter as those passionate about alleviating poverty spoke out about Australia’s need to do its fair share. It seems that even in the face of a constant barrage of public messaging (and even public-funded major newspaper spreads) the Government decided to significantly reduce the proposed growth in the aid budget (by $2.9 billion) in order to bring the Federal budget back to surplus.

This insistence on bringing the budget back to surplus has been a recent hallmark not only of Australian economic matters but politics in general. Both sides of politics have communicated the need for a surplus as quickly as possible, and both have expressed a willingness to cut what is necessary to get there despite the widespread criticism of mainstream economists.

Some have called the trading of Australia’s aid commitment for a surplus “immoral” and have already shown signs of continuing to fight for increased aid in line with Australia’s commitment to the MDGs. This is a just and important struggle to be had, however to best engage this issue it is crucial to consider what led us to this place of national compromise. It is equally important not to jump to ill-considered reactions, especially those that express one’s vote is reliant on this one issue (as important as it may be; I don’t recall progressives complaining when Labor passed the carbon tax).

First, it is important to be clear on what has not happened – the Government has not cut aid. Instead it has deferred raising the aid budget by one year; the percentage of foreign aid in the 2012-13 budget will continue to be 0.35% of GNI as in 2011-2012 (a gross increase of about $300 million according to inflation). This is of course a tragedy – Australian aid saves hundreds of thousands of lives annually and a lack of increase equals a wasted opportunity to save more lives than the previous year. Still, it is important that we do not tell less than full truths about what has transpired.

While many social progressives have scourged Labor for breaking a promise to raise the aid budget, turning their attention to ensuring the Coalition Opposition does not break its stated commitment, the reality is Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey has already alluded to bipartisanship regarding the delay.

More than this, it is the Coalition who has driven the conversation about a budget surplus all along. The weakness of the Government is not so much its moral bankruptcy (this is apparently universal, see my post on political nihilism), but its inability to define the national agenda and political conversation.

In truth this Coalition-driven agenda is, as is often suggested, populist in nature. That is to say the drive to surplus, and thus the deferral of increased foreign aid spending, finds its provenance in the public mood and discourse; it begins with us. A visionless Government largely follows public opinion.

The irony of #DontCutAid was that it was directed at a Government who was looking to the electorate for moral direction in the first place; in the face of looming electoral demolition they intended their latest budget to appease potential voters.

This is certainly not to say that #DontCutAid was misguided, or pointless – it was a more-than-worthy cause and according to some accounts may have averted an even worse result – but just that it was always in competition with the perceived needs of the majority of the Australian population. Such is democracy in an age of entitlement, and the message did not address the public on that level.

Should we continue to push the Government to keep its commitment to 0.5% GNI, and more than that to reach the UN goal of 0.7%? Yes, yes, yes!

But in a political scenario where neither a Government nor an Opposition will demonstrate vision and leadership to its electorate the hearts of the people must be captivated with an alternative vision of society, both domestic and global.

There is of course much to be said about this theologically. In my last post I addressed an aspect of this topic, asking ‘What is a uniquely Christian vocation and hope?’. Biblically-speaking there is a consistent approach to political engagement in which embodiment precedes confrontation (even in Romans 13 – read Romans 12!).

In short, advocacy must be preceded by embodiment. In regards to the budget issue, the Government will only take an unswerving stance on foreign aid if it can see that a crucial portion of the voting public do first. The beauty of #DontCutAid was that it provided an opportunity for many voices to join in chorus about compassion for the global poor; the problem was that this did not capture the hearts of most of the population.

This, my friends, is the foremost task.

It is beyond the scope of this post to suggest ways to do this. In saying this, perhaps aid organisations can encourage Australians to donate the portion of money that would have been represented by them in the budget ($2.9 billion/22 million people = about $133/person). Perhaps they could call Australians to give 0.5% of their income ($250 for someone on $50,000 p.a.). Not only would this mean more money going into projects to alleviate poverty, it would also mean a wonderful witness to our nihilistic politicians.

Imagine it – citizens self-sacrificially making up for the moral deficit of its own government’s budget.

Perhaps we can all start by embodying our passion for this issue by giving our share to an organisation working in poor communities abroad. I can personally recommend one organisation ;-). It is no use criticising the Government for not doing something (give aid, cut carbon, care for refugees, enact reconciliation) that we are not willing to do ourselves.

MCA

[UPDATE: Join with Micah Challenge in responding to the budget by calling on the Opposition to fulfil its promise to increase aid to 0.5% GNI by 2015.]

Over the weekend I went on retreat to heaven (i.e. Cudgee) with friends from Melbourne. One of the things that we discussed at a number of points was the story of Jesus’ wilderness temptation in Matthew 4.

In this story we see Jesus, the one who was sent to change everything, being offered the apparent means to enact such change and solve many of the world’s problems – material possessions, religious power and political power. Rather than accepting such earthly power, Jesus rejects it – it is simply not the way of the kingdom of God.

Jesus instead chose a different way, a way in which people were invited into the life of God in the world, not coerced by power. This Way was not grasped by those in power, and this incomprehension continues today.

Christians are called to continue this mission, one of embodying rather than enforcing, of inviting rather than inciting, of compassion rather than control. It is the way of love.

What does this Way embodied by Christ mean for Christian engagement with modern politics, with the centre of power?

Big question, no doubt. At the very least it should call into question the Christian allegiance to a particular form of political power and ideology, lest Christian hope be collapsed into the policy platform of some party. Jonathan Cornford, in an essay that deserves as much attention as possible, makes an important point:

Essentially, where we have identified problems in the world, we have generally failed to own them as our own problems. There is a great truth in the popular wisdom which notes that whenever you point the finger, there are three fingers pointing back at you. Hence the strength of Jesus’ language concerning logs and specks.

Conversely, because we have lost sight of what the problem is, it is not surprising that Christians working for change often lack a clear vision of what the Christian hope is for this world. It has been my observation that the political outlook of most ‘progressive Christian activists’ is basically the policy platform of the Australian Greens, or perhaps the Democrats. Is this because a secular political party has somehow arrived at the same view of society as Jesus of Nazareth? I don’t think so. The real reason is that for the last three hundred years most of the church has studiously avoided having an opinion on most matters of social and economic life. What is a Christian perspective on the stock market? Or the real estate industry, or superannuation, or health insurance, or land use, or genetic modification, or … whatever? In the absence of any solid teaching from the church on these matters, politically minded Christians have understandably turned to the nearest and most amenable secular ideology.

Of course the same point applies to those of a more conservative bent, and their preference for parties of the Right, since they are less in view in Cornford’s essay, being directed as it is at socially progressive Christians.

It seems to me that Christian hope and vocation has too often been subsumed in other ideologies, other -isms. As Cornford says, we have “become trapped in the same tired old debates between socialist and capitalist, between conservative and progressive, and between environmentalist and rural producer.” As a result we end up with nothing uniquely Christian to say, as if the mission and teaching of Jesus was made unnecessary by later ideologies. Worse, we have so often relied on those in positions of power to bring about our preferred social vision that we have not actually embodied it.

To return to my original question – Is it problematic that it is so often impossible to distinguish the social visions of most Christians from their political party of choice?

If so, what is a uniquely Christian hope? And in light of our view of hope, what is the Christian vocation in the world?

MCA

Last year I reflected on the myth of violence inherent in ANZAC Day, and I don’t think it necessary to tread that ground again this year. What I am thinking about in 2012 is the function that the ANZAC myth plays in Australia (not by any means a unique thought).

There has been a reasonable amount of commentary floating around that suggests ANZAC Day was and is a reinforcement of common identity in Australia. In Eureka Street on Sunday, Benedict Coleridge wrote:

By paying tribute to the Anzacs, Australians reinforce their sense of common identity: in doing so the Australian nation is imagined as a sovereign and limited community defined by certain ideals.

Arguably this focus on ideals is what makes Anzac Day so popular. Day to day political affairs and cultural and social debate is often antagonistic — democracy as a process of public argument rather than public reasoning. And in the realm of morality, modern life is defined by a plurality of moral perspectives so that it is difficult to form a moral consensus on a wide variety of issues. Anzac Day, by contrast, is an occasion for public concord and consensus — it is marked by displays of solidarity.

I can’t agree more. My recent post on political disillusionment in Australia made similar points – nihilism has so pervaded our collective life that there is no foundation on which to build a common future.

In comes ANZAC Day, a commemoration that has the potential to bind us together under a common history of struggle and sacrifice for freedom. The only problem is that this is a historically problematic conclusion.

The Gallipoli history has come under fire in recent times. Just this week a number of articles popped up raising the legitimacy of the “official” history. Historian David Day wrote in The Age yesterday:

Initially, Gallipoli was embraced as a way of closing the curtain on the shame of Australia’s convict origins. The stories of the war correspondents allowed the international image of Australian manhood to be transformed from a cowering convict to a courageous soldier. From being the rejected detritus of British jails, Australians could project themselves to the world as being the bravest defenders of the British Empire.

Few publicly questioned the terrible cost – 8709 Australian dead – for no gain. And the architect of our war effort, Billy Hughes, ensured as prime minister that the official version of the Gallipoli story would be used to bind Australia even closer to Britain rather than advance Australia on the road to independence.

And, characteristically colourful, Guy Rundle in Crikey:

We were pitched into the First World War, not merely out of unquestioning imperial duty, nor out of racial fealty, but also as a confected nation-building exercise. Billy Hughes, the little grave-digger, was quite clear on this — a nation, federated from six states, and existing as a dominion (at the time Australia had no independent diplomatic missions, and most national activity still occurred under the Union Jack) would never find an identity until blood had been spilt, in its own name, and in copious amounts.

That the ANZAC myth could be so wielded by political leaders should alarm us, particularly in light of the recent revival of the event at the hands of John Howard. It should, at the very least, cause us to ask important questions about the disparity between what we continually assert and what might have actually happened. In 1915 it was perhaps easy to gloss over the horrors of war, its folly and the true costs, and our subservience to more powerful allies; today it is not so easy, and it could be that this is reflected in our generally negative attitudes to more contemporary wars in contrast to those of the past.

That the identity of modern Australia has been partly built on the lost lives of beautiful young men and women is clear; what is not so clear is how we understand this phenomenon. Is our understanding even historically accurate? For example, an important symbol of the ANZAC myth is that of Simpson and his donkey rescuing wounded soldiers, a story that has recently had its historical foundations questioned.

What if this story is untrue? It is likely that we will never know for sure, but perhaps more important is the question – does it matter?

Some in the popular media who responded to challenges to the historicity of the Simpson story asserted their belief that it doesn’t actually matter. But of course that leads us to a place in which history has little to no bearing on our collective identity, where we (or at least our leaders) are free to construct our own identity based on an idealistic view of our past, and on the hopeful insistence that our ancestors did not have their lives taken in vain.

The same can be said of our supposed struggle for freedom. Again, David Day says it well in regards to the Second World War:

Yet [our] abiding fear of invasion was misguided. The only invading force that ever headed for Australia was led by Captain Arthur Phillip in 1788. Even when Japan had the chance to do so, it chose to send its forces elsewhere.

There was never really a point in modern Australia where our soldiers could be unquestionably said to have fought for our freedom. Still, the myth goes on and it shapes our self-designated underdog battler identity.

It seems the ANZAC myth has taken on a life of its own, liberated from the bounds of pesky historical accuracy and the scepticism that now plagues every other aspect of public life.

In this light ANZAC can embody all the things Australians value but do not actually practice. Take mateship, perhaps the most common value to be derived from the ANZAC myth nowadays. This value is too often absent from our collective social life, as are others like service, loyalty and courage (one only has to look at our politicians for paradigmatic examples). It is unclear how the “ANZAC spirit” which supposedly embodies these virtues is actually alive in contemporary Australia in any consistent and characteristic sense.

In an age of nihilism it seems that not even history is immune. In the case of ANZAC Day it is the beautiful lives that have been sacrificed by the powers that be which are caught under the wheels of our desperate attempt for a meaningful identity. While the increasingly small number of soldiers remember their friends who lost their lives, the rest of us are confronted with questionable-but-largely-unquestioned narratives about our collective identity.

I suppose I could be accused of saying these things because I am anti-war. I don’t see, however, any reason why one who stands in opposition to my anti-war ethic could not also stand in solidarity in the conviction that we need a more historically thorough appraisal of the ANZAC myth. None of this devalues those who lost their lives (they should be remembered) since being anti-war does not mean being anti-soldier; accuracy does not undermine respect.

The challenge for us is whether we will take seriously the problems of our history, and whether we will take seriously the morality of our future.

Judging by much of the current debate it seems that history must give way to ideology and emotion, and anyone asking questions is doomed to be marginalised, dismissively labelled “unAustralian”. ANZAC Day has taken on the status of an ahistorical religion, holy and unquestionable, free to be shaped as its adherents see fit. Are we happy with that?

MCA

As with my original post about #Kony2012, I write this post with a fair amount of trepidation since I learned from that episode just how emotional this topic can be. My aim here is merely to reflect on what we can learn from the ‘Cover the Night‘ event, not to criticise it, and I will attempt to be as sensitive as I can. For this reason I will not be commenting on the content of the Kony campaign; in any case I have done that previously.

—

The first thing to note is that the Cover the Night event was highly successful, at least in relation to Invisible Children’s initial expectations prior to the release of Kony 2012.

These expectations included that half a million people would watch Kony 2012. However given that the video became the most successful social media campaign to date, with over 100 million views, the results embodied in Cover the Night were quite disappointing. In my hometown of Sydney 19,000 people clicked on ‘attending’ for the Cover the Night Facebook event, though one report claims only 25 or so people were present at Martin Place, the event’s main centre.

That is not to say it’s all over. The campaign has not ended just because IC’s main event has passed by; there is still the opportunity for further advocacy. However judging by the take-up rate of Cover the Night this seems unlikely.

This is not a reflection of Invisible Children so much as the current state of popular activism; Invisible Children is merely the most publicised instance of the difficulty in translating social media popularity to on-the-ground work. Indeed, many I know who shared the Kony video and criticised those offering a critique stayed home on Saturday night… This is not a problem with IC, but the state of young generations (of which I am part).

So what have we learned from this episode?

One of the clearest lessons is that awareness does not guarantee action, much less change. Literally tens of millions of people watched Kony 2012. It is possible that over a billion people at least heard the name Kony during the height of the campaign. Yet cities across North America, Europe and Australia remain poignantly unplastered with Kony posters. A routine by comedian Aamer Rahman has illustrated well the point, though in a reasonably harsh way, that intentions are not enough.

We have also learned that social media is young, and that we do not yet understand it. In saying this most charities have learned by now that energy on social media does not necessarily translate to energy off social media – the leap from Internet to the streets is a long one. Again a fairly harsh YouTube clip serves as a good illustration. It should be clear that clicking a button does not make one an activist. Indeed, we should go further – clicking a button does not even demonstrate care for a cause; that conviction is reserved for sacrificial action in real life.

Causes come and go – what matters is that people live entire lives characterised by justice and goodness. Activism is just as much about the mundane moments of life as it is about campaigns and events. So-called “clicktivism” or “slacktivism” is simply another form of status-seeking and consumerism that reverses the course of real justice in the world. For us young people: the challenge is set.

An honest observer must acknowledge in this episode the implosion of the oft-uttered sentiment that it is good that young people are finally interesting in a cause beyond themselves. As it turns out many of those same young people weren’t that interested. The ascendancy of motivation as the primary locus of goodness or justice is either a fantasy or idolatry, or both. Let the fruits bear witness to the tree; we can say that young people are finally interested in something bigger than themselves when their real life actions, and not their Like-happy index fingers, suggest so.

In the case of Kony 2012 it turns out that being too popular can be a bad thing. Having been bombarded by Kony 2012 it seems that people became fatigued. There is a case to be made for more organic campaigns that rely less on explosive attention and more on a committed minority:

Students of social change tell us that it is better to aim at consensus within a strategic minority rather than to waste time and breath at soliciting the conformity of the majority. Since a movement for change involves vision and sacrifice it is not possible to start with the many. Very few people can see ten steps ahead of them. Most are too enclosed in the realities of the present to be able to imagine an alternative future. It takes a lot of imagination to believe that with the coming of Christ, a new order has come into being. (Melba Padilla Maggay)

Related to this is that celebrity-driven campaigns are questionable because of the framework for social change that they promote, namely top-down. Certainly social change can come top-down, but what is unclear is whether such change leads to flourishing for all people, particularly those on the bottom. What is far more likely to bring meaningful and sustainable change is grassroots campaigns. That is not to say that social media cannot play a part; on the contrary the Arab Spring uprisings relied heavily on social media for communication. However the Arab Spring was also a movement of the people. The equivalent in the case of the LRA issue is Ugandan people, and not Westerners, taking action (which they have been doing for years).

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There are many lessons for us to learn from Kony 2012 and Cover the Night and I know I’ve only scratched the tiniest surface. All of us involved with social change, in whatever capacity, owe a debt of gratitude to Invisible Children for paving the way in the social media sphere, and making important mistakes from which we can all learn. This is not a veiled criticism since all organisations make mistakes. As noted, social media is in its infancy and there is still much that we do not understand about it.

We must also remain healthily critical about these issues of social justice, since we can do harm whilst massaging our guilt and Facebook ‘Like’ buttons. In the end I pray people will take up the challenge of holistic, all-of-life activism.

MCA

A friend then posted a link in response. It seems that someone has taken Coyote-related questions seriously.

Peter Rollins, in a fantastic post entitled What happens when you get what you want?, discusses the hypothetical: What would happen to the Coyote if he ever caught the Roadrunner? The below clip illustrates a possible outcome (warning: this clip includes profanity).

On its surface the question may seem trivial, even meaningless. However Rollins uncovers a significant question about human experience, particularly in our fast-paced contemporary world: when we are highly driven to achieve, what happens to us when we get what we have longed for?

What happens to us the day after? And the day after that?

I will refrain from quoting Rollins at length (I encourage you to read his post), but this selection is central to his piece:

In this way Wiley Coyote ends up in a similar place to where he would be if he had given up his pursuit of the Roadrunner. In this situation he would retain the dream of catching him and thus never really be happy with anything else. He would yearn for the chase and imagine, over and over, catching the elusive bird. Nothing else he ever pursued would match up to the goal he had renounced.

Does this mean that the only solution for Wiley Coyote is to keep up the pursuit, secretly sabotaging his own efforts (using defective equipment, old ropes etc.), so that he never catches the Roadrunner? This would seem to be a depressing answer and one that would be hard to keep up for long.

So are these our only options? Getting what we want and despairing, not getting what we want and despairing, constantly chasing what we want and despairing?

How easy to be driven solely by achievement in our social-Darwinian-lite meritocracy, both individually and in our organisations. It is no light task to stand against the tide of defining ourselves by what we do, or perhaps more accurately, what we have done; I personally battle with this daily.

Achievement is of course no evil thing. However when it is the primary, or indeed sole, driver in our lives we are on a road to either devastating failure or post-ecstatic depression.

A simplistic Christian answer is that we should make God our “driver”. This is right in my view, but not for the Deus ex machina concept that underpins it. Rollins puts it so well:

Perhaps there is another possibility, if we are lucky enough to find it. And that is in finding and being with the one we love. In being with the one we love we gain what we desire while remaining at a distance from it. When we love someone they are present to us as a mystery. They are the opening to, and encounter with, otherness itself. They are a vast and endless ocean.

Or as a friend of mine, a well-known Christian speaker, once said: “All this speaking stuff, it’s all bullshit unless your wife and your kids love you.”

In love we find an infinite and evolving depth of experience and acceptance that brings meaning to life. It goes beyond what I do; it is inclusive of who I am and who I am becoming. It goes even beyond this, since “who I am” is parochially individualistic – love includes who we are, who we are becoming, what our life looks like.

How much is this the case with family, or lovers? How much more with enemies?

How much more with the God of Jesus Christ?

MCA