I'm working on writing a myth right now that takes some of the characters from tradition Christian mythology (Father, Son, Spirit, the Devil, etc.) and tells a completely different story. When I told one of my friends about this recently, she accused me of toeing the line that divides what is permissible and what is impermissible, sacred and profane, respectful and blasphemous.

I would like to take a little time now to defend my position, that I am not indeed being blasphemous when I tell a myth in which the Son charges the Devil with the task of killing the Father (which, by the way, does not represent the "death of God" in any Nietzschean sense, but rather the fact that we must slay our own image/conception of God in order to approach God).

First, according to apophatic theology (a.k.a. negative theology), God is so far beyond human conception that any attempt to describe God is necessarily only a metaphor. And, as postmodern novelist and one of my personal heroes, Thomas Pynchon, says in The Crying of Lot 49, a metaphor is "a thrust at truth... and a lie." Thus, any language used to describe God is a lie. There is scriptural and orthodox theological basis for this. See Exodus 33:20, John 1:18, and 1 Timothy 6:16 in the Bible, for some of the clearest examples. For theologians, check out Gregory of Nyssa, St. John Chrysostom, Gregory Palamas, Meister Ekhart, Nicholas Cusanus, and St. John of the Cross, to name a few. Even the great English poet of the 17th century John Milton, who was by no means inclined toward mysticism, wrote in Paradise Lost VII.112-114:
All of this is simply to drive home the point that when you use human language to discuss the Ineffable God, you must keep in mind that it's only metaphor.

Second, the goal of the artist is to "make it new," in the words of Ezra Pound. To re-hash old phrasings with nothing innovative is, for the poet, to die. I believe this is especially urgent for modern Christianity. In the circles of American evangelicalism, "worship" songs are nothing more than combining a select few images from the Bible (mostly from the Gospels, the Epistles, and parts of the Psalms) and singing them to a simple melody, usually sung over the chord progression G-C-D-C. These biblical images, I hasten to say, are quite beautiful and were probably daringly innovative when they were first written. But hearing them over and over again, they become sterile, lifeless. We turn the metaphors into idols. Alas, we may even be guilty of attempting to create God in our own image.

Thus, for the sake of the Church, it is exigent that we make it new. Armed with the knowledge that any language describing God is necessarily only an arrow and not the target itself, we must write poetry that follows Carl Sandburg's definition as "a search for syllables to shoot at the barriers of the unknown and the unknowable." Like a Zen kōan, a good work of art ought to shock you out of your normal way of thinking and make you see the world anew.

Therefore, my myth is not blasphemy, but in fact a call to worship, a purgative that hopes to cleanse your mind of all its stale images by forcing you to wrestle the angel or demon I put before you.

I hope to refine this arguments sometime in the future. Tell me what you think.

At work today (Wednesday), I had to transcribe the script for an infomercial for a televangelist from Long Beach, California, named something like Bishop Wellington (though I can't seem to find him or his church through Google at the moment). First of all, it was my first time transcribing a script. Up 'til now, I'd just been editing and timing them. So, of course, it took me a little while to get used to it.

[EDIT: I did find this guy's website after all: http://www.livingfaith.org/]

Secondly, the pastor spoke with a heavy accent and bad grammar. This meant it was hard for me to transcribe everything accurately. I was also faced with the moral dilemma of whether or not I should correct the guy's grammar for him. I chose, for the most part, not to.

Thirdly, the guy preached a health and wealth gospel, taking passages like 1 Corinthians 1:18 ("For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God," as rendered in the NIV), and proceeded to explain how his church's "day of power" on Good Friday would enable you to overcome your financial, emotional, and physical troubles. During the "breaks," the guy who does the voice-overs for action movie trailers told you all sorts of cliches about how bishops and pastors will put their holy prayers to work for you if you just sign up for their prayer book.

Oh, and get this: if you signed up, you'd get a bottle of Holy Oil from Jerusalem absolutely FREE of CHARGE! That's right! It came all the way from Israel! He quoted Mark 6:13 ("They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them," NIV again) in defense of his position, saying that "if Jesus and his disciples used this oil, they knew what they were talking about -- how can you argue that?"

So, in light of all this hypocrisy, I decided to read John Milton's poem "Lycidas" during my brief breaks. It's an elegy for his friend who has died, but the most famous part of it is a lashing out at hypocritical preachers of 17th century England. I'll end by quoting this section, making note that "the pilot of the Galilean lake" = Christ. Also, I've copy-pasted this from a version with modernized spelling, so forgive me if you're pretentious about that sort of thing.

Last came, and last did go,
The pilot of the Galilean Lake;
Two massy keys he bore of metals twain	110
(The golden opes, the iron shuts amain).
He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake:—
“How well could I have spared for thee, young swain,
Anow of such as, for their bellies’ sake,
Creep, and intrude, and climb into the fold!	115
Of other care they little reckoning make
Than how to scramble at the shearers’ feast,
And shove away the worthy bidden guest.
Blind mouths! that scarce themselves know how to hold
A sheep-hook, or have learnt aught else the least	120
That to the faithful Herdman’s art belongs!
What recks it them? What need they? They are sped;
And, when they list, their lean and fleshy songs
Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw;
The hungry sheep look up, and are not fed,	125
But, swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,
Rot inwardly, and foul contagion spread;
Besides what the grim Wolf with privy paw
Daily devours apace, and nothing said.
But that two-handed engine at the door	130
Stands ready to smite once, and smite no more.”

Tonight, I had to caption an episode of "Secret Lives of Women" about a woman who works with the FBI, pretending to be a 13 to 15-year-old girl, in order to catch sexual predators. I have never felt more disgusted in my life.

There are a number of reasons for this disgust. The most obvious is the sexual predation itself. I had to repeatedly listen to a tape (the actual tape from the FBI archives) of a guy masturbating while talking to what he thought was a 13-year-old, going into all the explicit details about it.

Next, it's kind of disgusting morally that these FBI agents and employees spend 40 to 60 hours every week engaged in this kind of activity - making not provocative (that would be entrapment) but ambiguous comments to perverts online and on phone. I know they're working for the greater good, but there's still something sleazy about it all.

Then, there's the fact that people watch shows about trapping sexual predators (e.g. "To Catch a Predator") for entertainment. There are a few sub-points I'd like to go into here:
How could something like this be a person's idea of entertainment? It's reprehensible. People show up at malls with oxycodone and hotel room keys (that's directly from the show), waiting for a little girl.

Finally, there's the show series, "Secret Lives of Women." The company I work for has captioned a number of these shows, and the very first ones in the series start out just fine - surgeons (there are very few female surgeons in the U.S.), scientists, etc. But by midway through the first season, you have episodes about fetishes, (literal) cradle robbers, etc. And let it be known that the episode I captioned was #3-20. That's right. The twentieth episode of the third season.

Needless to say, I feel terrible inside. However, I work from 4 pm to midnight, so I have no one on whom to unload this after work, as everyone's already in bed. And so, here it is, on the internet.

Not much going on here. I've been sending some older poems to contests, and I think I'm starting to write a new one (I have like two lines so far). I've also been working on a story as a bit of an exercise. You can find what I've written so far here.

Work has been fine. I captioned a couple of episodes of Alien Abductions: True Confessions. It was amusing. Almost all the vivid stories of encounters came after the person went under hypnotism to "rediscover" her memories. We got off early last night, so I went out to the Pickwick with the whole crew: Cody, Kayla, Kyle, Lisa, Gabe, Paula, Brooks, Miriam, Graham. Fun had by all.

The lunar eclipse was also nice to look at for a few minutes.

I've also started playing guitar more again. I wonder if that'll go anywhere.

Well, that's all for now; it's off to work I go.

This past week has had its extremes of ups and downs. On the upside, I got to see some of my old friends, such as Ian and James, as well as my younger brother Steve. When Steve was home for the weekend, my whole family ended up playing the Wii, including my Mom on bowling and my Dad on golf (of course). It was strange to see my mom up past her bed time playing video, exactly what she used to chide us for when we were preteens.

On the downside, I found out a few nights ago that my friend from Vancouver, Janine, died. I taught English with her in Shenzhen in July 2005, and she was one of the most pious people I knew and helped me get back on my feet spiritually. We emailed a few times after teaching, but our correspondence petered out over time. Sadly, I had not talked to her in about a year and a half, although she had been on my mind, especially since I've recently been reading Thomas Merton, whose favorite saint, St. Theres, was also Janine's favorite. She was 22, going to a Catholic university in Ontario, when a few nights ago, she and a few friends were driving and took a shortcut over frozen ice. The ice broke, and while two other passengers escaped, she and another guy drowned in the icy water. But if anyone had the peace which passeth understanding and was ready to die, it was her.

In more personal news, I'm heading back up to Grand Rapids tomorrow morning, so I'm trying to get all my stuff together and take of a few things before I go. Unfortunately (or fortunately from an aesthetic point of view), it's been snowing hard recently, so the ride up may be tough.

Back to work!