Category: Culture

Memories Are Made of Ads

A current ad for a resort on Lake Simcoe, “Friday Harbour,” has as background the song “Sunny Days” by the late somewhat-lamented Canadian rock band, Lighthouse. They were immensely popular in the early 70s when they blasted past the weed-masking flags in university residence windows from Dual turntables and Kenwood speakers into campus pathways. Hearing the music evokes all kinds of memories. Which is why, I guess, music is such an important tool used by therapists in the whole not-much-heralded field of music therapy. 

A number of my classmates from Western (then University of Western Ontario) music class of ‘75 went on to graduate training in music therapy. I observed in pastoral visiting, in my many, many visits with seniors over the years, that the mere mention of some bit of music can change a person’s demeanour and make an opening for delving into important, maybe even healing avenues. So maybe when we hear the next nostalgia-driven musical background to some otherwise-unworthy product or service, we can consider what connection we might make, that we may have been overdue in making, with those who might share the experience, in spite of grievances or silly ideological niceties.

Movie Theatre as Prism

Apparently Cineplex is looking to reopen as early as July of this year, if, when, and where it may be allowed to do so. Seems they plan to march on after an apparently failed takeover deal, and have measures planned to make visiting their venues safe, including reserved seating.

I don’t suppose there is anything they will do to prevent there being some person a couple of rows ahead who insists on looking at their phone throughout the movie.

Anyway, there is the simple escapism of it, and if you care for films at all there are some you just need to see on the big screen along with the big sound. Sometimes there is even artistic merit, with something to be gained for the mind and heart.

There is always the chance this mode of expression — even seeing the same content as we would experience on a home theatre system — will awaken us to some human connection, insight or beauty we would not otherwise have apprehended. One might look forward to a return of live theater for the same reasons.

If and when it can be done safely, I just might visit a movie theatre again. Truth is always seeking ways to be revealed. 

A Gift to One Another

There is a movement afoot to rename a well-known Toronto street, Dundas, because this particular Mr. Dundas is known to have worked, back in England, to obstruct the abolishment of slavery. It is one of a multitude of instances we are all seeing of the re-assessing of the appropriateness of names attached to streets, monuments, various buildings and places. Good.

We might also take an evaluating look at the practice of naming things after people in the first place. There is, of course, the potential that the person being honoured in this way might turn out not to be quite as honourable as thought, even as another time might judge one to be honourable.  It may even suggest to some that this is how you live on. You become successful and you live on as a street or a shiny building.

Silly? Maybe to you and me, but I wouldn’t discount it. Especially when a long-standing pandemic in this world is a lack of self-worth over against a world of material obsession. Consider the first thing we think of when it is asked what a person’s worth is.

There are thoughtful people who sense that our being is tied to something much bigger than anything our memory could be tied to, that our consciousness is tied to a reality beyond ourselves. More specifically and personally, there are those who live in confidence of a promise that is  more reliable than anything we experience as reality: “I am with you always, to the very end of the age” (Matthew 28:20b).

Each of us has the power that is to be found in its relinquishing–relinquishing power, that is. We live instead by grace, accepting–in contrast to much of the spirit of the world being protested against–that we are a gift to one another, and we live in anticipation, by that grace, of a greater, more enduring community to come.

Maybe Unleash the Hornets

Over the weekend in the Toronto area police converged on a parking lot where upwards of 200 vehicles were doing donuts and other stunts. As police appeared they took off to speed along the relatively empty roadways. Thankfully, there at least hasn’t been news of them adding to the burden of overstressed hospital staff.

In another display of brilliance, police clocked a young man in his parents’ Mercedes doing 308 km/h–three times the speed limit. A police spokesman said he had no words.

There are those who say that in the first nanosecond of space-time, everything that could ever exist or occur was present in possibility. Out of all of that, these guys chose these things to bring to reality.

How’s this for a reality to bring to fruition: If they like speed so much, put them on a track in go-carts with the scent of honey bees, and let loose a swarm of those giant “murder” hornets.

In Honour of One

There are staggering numbers in circulation these days. They all represent very human COVID-19 realities: At the time of posting this, just under 3.5 million cases worldwide, and almost ¼ million deaths.

How about this. A second generation of locusts is consuming east Africa. A first generation struck a few months ago. A third is expected in June. Each generation produces 20 times the previous one. Efforts to deal with this are stifled by restrictions on activity and travel. It is said the swarms could spread to west Africa and even south Asia. In east Africa alone, 30 million people could face starvation. People. Not just numbers. 

Yes, the numbers are staggering. But, in the face of all these numbers, there is one number we need to be honoured for caring about: one. We are being as Christ when we are moved by the needs of one among many. It is not just natural to be worried for your loved one in long term care, it is honourable. And we each honour ourselves, and others, with our self-care in this time, and always. 

Ready for Alien Visitors?

Apparently when Edward Snowden was snooping into top secret government computer files he decided to check out some things we wonder about and argue about over morning coffee or evening other-stuff. Like, Is the U.S. government hiding evidence of alien  life visiting earth? The answer, you may be disappointed to know, is no. The moon landing, by the way, did happen. Meanwhile, Google is touting the successful test run of a quantum computer that can solve in a couple of minutes what a conventional computer would take, they say, years to get through.

These bits of other-than’Trump news maybe appeal to us because they hint at the possibility of something other than our own problems and ways of dealing–or not–with them, especially if it’s as if the people you have to live and work with have materialized from some parallel reality. Or maybe people who show up in the context of whatever you are trying to accomplish in this world seem like some new species if hominid. You want a break.

So it’s somewhat understandable if we can entertain thoughts of other-worldly or wonder-computer ways of making everyday life different. But everyday life is exactly where we–in this current dimension and in our present hominid form–can make a difference. We could start, as prodded by the sign n the photo, with how we dispose of batteries 

And, if and when the aliens do come, maybe they’ll be impressed with what we’ve undone with the place.

Genesis 1:31

Image and Worth

Let’s face it. We are all image-conscious. That’s not a bad thing. You wouldn’t want go to a job interview looking like you just got up in the morning. It wouldn’t be good to have no concern about how you are perceived by others, or, more importantly, by yourself. Self-image is important. But there is something even more important, and it keeps self-image from being an unhealthy obsession. We can benefit in this from a Biblical-historical perspective.

John the Baptist appeared on the scene when his nation’s self-image would have been very low. Luke makes a point of providing the historical-political setting in which John appears (Luke 3:1-3). Israel was surrounded in its setting and experience by powerful, unfriendly forces, and this had been the case for a long time, centuries in fact. They were ripe for a hero to lift them to new heights, reliving the glories of old, restoring their image, you could say. But who announces this? One who appears in the desert, a wild figure, pointing to one, Jesus, who is the opposite in appearance of the conquering hero.

Nevertheless, there is something about this Baptizer who recalls Elijah and the hope of the ages. Such hope would not be disappointing, because it all points to the one who alone is worthy to rescue the people–all people–from what really ails us, more than any self-image issues: a sense of worth, which cannot come just from a good self-image. It runs much deeper, and withstands what can easily cause a good image of ourselves to evaporate, say, when we fail badly. Sure we say then that we just pick ourselves and get back at it, but the truth is that not everybody does. There are countless human tragedies stemming from failure of self-image.

What is the answer when, like John’s people in their collective experience, you feel oppressed and beaten down by others, but circumstances, by life itself?

Two handy and apparently popular options are: 1. Wall owin victimization and blame of others. 2. Find victims of your own to oppress, i.e., become a bully.

Or, 3, you can change your mind, how you think and deal with such circumstances. A word for this kind of change is repentance. You can say, I’m not even going to think in such categories as options 1 and 2. No matter what happens, no matter what I have to deal with, I refuse to waste my life on what can only bring (further) pain and pointless, soul-sapping misery. I am worth more than that, not from how I view myself, but from how God sees me, loves me, and accepts me, no matter how I might, at times, see myself.

 

Dress Shoes and Shorts

It was the (almost) last leg of a trip home from out of the city for the day. It was early evening, Sunday evening of Labour Day weekend, and I was in the midst of that “I just want to get home” sort of befuddled-fatigue state of body and mind. I was on the subway, where of course you look anywhere but where you risk making eye contact with anyone. Most people are looking at their phone screens. Or you intently read, perhaps memorize, the backlit ads that run along over the windows. I was staring at the floor, and people’s feet, specifically noticing footware. It occurred to me, this being an evening holiday weekend crowd, the style of footwear was a little different from what might be on the rush hour commute.

There were flourescent runners, glitter-covered sneakers, a multitude of sandals (with and without socks) and flip floppy things, along with regular old Nikes and Addidas and the like. And one pair of black dress shoes, with ankle socks, with the wearer sporting cargo shorts. My thought: That’s just wrong. But then, the Lord does seem to love variety, in humanity and in all of creation (Genesis 1).

So fella, go ahead and rock those black dress shoes with your cargo shorts. Not that you need my permission. Someone else made you.

Be the Story

The Lego Movie is continuing to draw big crowds. It is reported that, based on such success, Lego is planning a whole new multimedia strategy, and that they have a head start in this in that kids are drawn to the brand, eager to see what’s next.

Intriguing. Something kids (of all ages) can use to build stuff and create a story of their own in the process, are drawn to media that tells its own story, like in a movie. Maybe part of the appeal in all this is that we are the building blocks, particioants, and mind-full partners in telling a story: one that God has had in mind for all eternity, and is working out in us. It is so sas that some people demean themselves by not realizing the importance of the story, the adventure, that is their life.

The Main Character

The motives may not be evangelical, but many evangelicals understandably have encouraged and applauded the development of some upcoming Hollywood productions featuring Biblical characters. Indeed, this can only be good, even if the producers and directors are seeing in it only the same sort of results they have had from making effects-laden (as the Biblical flicks will be) productions based on Bible stories.

Russell Crowe as Noah, Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah, Christian Bale as Moses, Brad Pitt as Pontius Pilate–what believer would not celebrate this kind of publicity for Biblical stories and chracters?I would not say we should not. But I also am thinking of all the young lives that have been turned from the Bible because of wretched Sunday School curricula that moralized on the lives of Biblical characters–only to be disillusioned later on. \

The films will be an opportunity for pastors to point out to people–who may thankfully have a heightened or new interest in the bible because of the movies–that the same God who worked through these seriously flawed characters works through us in our place and time to bring about his purposes of ddrawingpeople to himself and making them part of his plan.

May we all be drawn to the one Main Character.