tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post6336471413449648516..comments2023-01-05T05:04:21.027+00:00Comments on Ramping & Roaring: "Let the little children come unto me"Roaringhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13242201448202716563noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post-51096718466237759242010-06-19T15:44:21.342+01:002010-06-19T15:44:21.342+01:00Dear Anonymous,
I agree. No one is completely pow...Dear Anonymous, <br />I agree. No one is completely powerless - part of our human condition is that we always, no matter how disempowered we might be, we are all enmeshed in these relationships and have access to power over someone/something. I'm reading Rowan William's Resurrection at the moment and he's interesting on this - with Jesus as the only real victim and thus only real possible saviour and judge.<br />From a feminist point of view, for me this is exactly the point. Jesus REDEFINES power/patriarchy etc. So as you say it's not about disempowering people to make them virtuous, it's about a different sort of power. The challenge is to always be aware of the privileged ways in which each of us, in our own power (whether gender, race, forms of embodiment, sexuality etc) puts the Other in an unhelpful position of their vulnerablity being reified.Roaringhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13242201448202716563noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post-85033173421127650692010-06-16T10:42:28.818+01:002010-06-16T10:42:28.818+01:00Anonymous Comment:
I agree that there are lots of ...Anonymous Comment:<br />I agree that there are lots of bad forms of kenosis which can be about oppression, destructive self-loathing, etc, but does this mean we should get rid of all talk of kenosis and sacrifice and just embrace self-affirmation/expression? The second half of your piece (after the bit about Milton) suggests not, but I think perhaps I would want to be more specific about saying how the virtuous qualities of the Skins characters themselves might be kenotic and sacrificial, in a good way, perhaps because they build up others in love. The implicit contrast with Constantine could suggest that the difference between good and bad kenosis is just whether you’re powerful or not, as if powerful people can’t be kenotic they just force others to be, while the powerless are the ones capable of true love and goodness. This obviously has strong Christian resonances (the Beatitudes and St Francis) but I think it has problems, not least that power becomes irredeemably corrupting and it would seem that it’s good to disempower people because that’s their only hope of being virtuous! I think I would want to say that power (even at the macro-Imperial level) can be exercised virtuously, even kenotically, against the Yoder-Mennonite-early Hauerwas-Ekklesia brigade. This is the sense in which I think being ‘anti-Constantinian’ is too easy an option. I think I would also want to say, in a Foucauldian sense, that even the Skins characters are not completely powerless, but have forms of power, including their virtues like friendship, loyalty, and self-sacrifice. To sum up, for me, sacrificial love is a sort of power: when God empties himself in Christ and is betrayed into the hands of sinners, he is not actually abandoning his power; this is the power of the cross. It is the Franciscan (Scotist-Kantian!) theology of powerlessness which I think actually encourages the abusive forms of kenosis which you’re concerned about at the beginning. <br /><br /> Sorry, I’m not really disagreeing with you, only questioning a possible subtext of power=necessarily bad, powerlessness= always good, and I know you can’t say everything in a blog after all!Rampinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17647636685982913359noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post-28698355829849662362010-04-21T10:21:57.568+01:002010-04-21T10:21:57.568+01:00That's why you have to remember that John of t...That's why you have to remember that John of the Cross (and others) were writing for monks and nuns. I mean what else are they going to do?Rampinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17647636685982913359noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post-69216620726689689912010-04-21T10:11:14.545+01:002010-04-21T10:11:14.545+01:00But that's exactly what I mean. For some, '...But that's exactly what I mean. For some, 'really discovering and strengthening themselves' isn't a straightforward matter when, say, survival is a priority, or so much time is spend doing necessary caring for others that there is no time left to build up oneself before one starts a kenotic project. <br />It's like Janet Soskice's story about the mother who gets really bad advice from the priests about when to pray in 'The Kindness of God'. <br /><br />So it's easily said - by certain sorts of mystics and priests who have the luxury of doing it.Roaringhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13242201448202716563noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post-10138641694194667222010-04-20T22:16:42.549+01:002010-04-20T22:16:42.549+01:00Denys Turner's The Darkness of God is interest...Denys Turner's The Darkness of God is interesting on the self. He talks about how the medieval mystics were all about annihilation of the self - but importantly this was in the context of a spiritual life which by rigorous discipline had created a quite formidable self. <br /><br />I think when it comes to kenosis we tend to rush in a bit quick. Most people don't have time, or haven't taken the time, to really discover and strengthen their selves before they start hearing the rhetoric of kenosis and self-abandonment. <br /><br />I think the first (and perhaps only stage for us seculars) is really to build up a fully operational relational self. This is what I think Skins is about - discovering and owning who we are while recognising that this somebody is connected to a lot of other people who matter.Rampinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17647636685982913359noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-262486400322098749.post-23211925328366855622010-04-11T19:07:08.497+01:002010-04-11T19:07:08.497+01:00Great post! I'm particularly interested in how...Great post! I'm particularly interested in how conservative the "saintly self-giving of the holy empowered" is, i.e. the vulnerability of those for whom vulnerability is easy. Obviously this is a massive feminist issue... how do you give yourself when you've got very little self to give? Maybe it goes back to the question of who can exploit themselves I was talking about in the Lady GaGa post. <br />And the mental health issues are relevant - it's only when Effie realises that her past - painful and impossible to deal with as it is - is a crucial part of who she is that she can get on with healing. By repressing her vulnerability, she forecloses true self knowledge. But it's her vulnerability as a young woman in the first place that sets her up for abuse by the doctor...Roaringhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13242201448202716563noreply@blogger.com