Inaugural Post

It is perhaps cliche to start this blog off with a hypothetical question–but one has to ask, why one more blog? In some sense, I’ve missed the ‘blog fad’ of the early 2,000’s, and the only people that still have blogs these days are gathering ethno-nationalist and religious fundamentalist minions to wreak havoc on the real world. Blogs are not often beautiful–instead of trying to read culture charitably and interestingly, with perhaps the finesse of the poetic, many blogs exist to inspire fear and anger at a world that hardly looks the way it is ‘supposed to’ or perhaps is ‘meant to’ (or ‘used to’–the disease which Jaroslav Pelikan calls “traditionalism.”

But why dwell on things that are morose and disturbing. My intention in starting this blog is so that it can be a place of beauty. A place where a different, symphonic approach to culture and reality can take place, one that is not characterized by closed-off-ness, or smallness, or fear or anger but by the Christian virtues, Faith, Hope, and Love.

The hypothesis of this blog is thus that reading culture can actually be edifying for discipleship of Jesus Christ. More strongly, that engaging with culture, when done well, is vital to the spiritual life, that it is a spiritual exercise, something that helps us become more united with Christ and with one another. And finally, that engagement with culture can be “light” “airy”–“Fröhlich” even. I will try my best to be my usual mixture of irenic/polemic, religious/irreligious, playful/serious–but I cannot guarantee that each and every blogpost will hit the interval just right.

I often think about the way that Slavoj Žižek reads dialectical materialism out of the culture around him. And it gave me the idea that, perhaps, we could do something interesting by doing the same with the Christian metaphysical tradition. In this Žižekian spirit, I want to proceed to think about interesting things interestingly–whatever might come of it. The Christian life is one long journey, an adventure. And so, it stands to reason that whenever a Christian writes a blog, it will take on that characteristic as well.

One last thing to note. I recently did a google search of my blog’s title, “Untimely Meditations.” And for some reason, it came as a surprise to me that there are many sites with this name, and a lot of them share this blog’s experimental nature. This is most definitely due to the influence of Friedrich Nietzsche on both them and me. However, I should remark, as it is already apparent in what has gone before: this is a post-Heideggerian, post-Nietzschean, Christian blog, perhaps more in the school of Hart’s Beauty of the Infinite than anything else (though not, by any means, limited to that author’s views, prejudices, or actions). It is important to state at the outset that though experimental approaches to theology are good and right and salutary, I am writing from a particular standpoint: within the liturgical, worshipping community that has borne witness to the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Now with all that out of the way: Whether you have stumbled into this digital space, or intentionally made a point to read what I have to say, thank you for taking the time to read some meanderings. And I’m optimistic about some of the material that may follow.