The big wet

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Except for a small part of Western Australia Australia this year experienced a rain deluge to eclipse all previous records. Everywhere you see a velvet green carpet instead of the usual brown paddocks.

The hopes of farmers were raised early on the expectation for the best harvest ever as a respite from a decade’s long drought. Early optimism is now threatened by simply too much rain preventing harvesting due to widespread flooding. Others unable to spray to repel the expected locusts plague attacks (once the weather finally clears ) may also have their hopes dashed. But despite these setbacks many will rejoice over the rich pastures with abundant fodder for stock or in the dry farming regions which this year promise record yields.

The really good environmental news is the floodwaters have entered and flushed out the mouth of the mighty Murray River ( Australia's largest river system )to restore the ecology of the Coorang. Previously the Coorong dependant for its biological existence on periodic washing from the sea mouth was facing slow strangulation as the mouth remained permanently blocked due to insufficient water flow as too much was taken out for irrigation during the long drought.

But if you would like to view natures ability to renew itself and to work miracles this inspirational story of Lake Eyre with amazing scenery is worth seeing by clicking on the link above. I think you will be suitably impressed with both the scenery and the story.

Finally a joyous season to everyone.

A revelation

Eschatology comes from the Greek ‘logos’ describing the final or last event, but it also can mean the end of an age or time. In monotheistic religions (religions believing in one God such as Christianity Judaism and Islam) eschatological writings, amongst other things, supported a hope and desire for a kingdom free from suffering and evil. In that context the prophesies were intended as a solace to those suffering, under siege or subject to tribulation to revive drooping hearts with prophetic majesty.

At the time of Jesus a new Messiah was eagerly awaited in Israel, since the Jews, whose ‘Promised Land’ was being confiscated by the Romans, were unable to pay the punitive crippling Roman taxes being imposed, and were being imprisoned or forced to become fisherman, or executed. The Jewish people longed for a Messiah (an anointed one) to come in glory to end the Roman yoke and usher in a new just kingdom. Despite the Roman rule with their multiple Gods worship the Jews were allowed to practice their own religion. The Jewish authorities imposed additional taxes for the upkeep of the temple and priests, creating an uneasy alliance with their Roman occupiers in exchange for continued religious freedom.

It was within this seething cauldron of politics and unrest that Jesus was born and to whom their hope for a new kingdom was attributed. But very little is known about Jesus as any study will quickly conclude historically he barely exists – since there are only two fleeting references outside of the Bible in the whole of cumulative history. References by Tacitus and Pliny in the first century A.D. don’t prove that Jesus Christ existed but rather confirm the existence of Christians at that time.
Within the biblical texts we know a lot about his death and subsequent events but virtually nothing ( except for a brief reference to his excursion into the temple whilst with his parents ) of his earlier life, since what is recorded is almost exclusively confined to his short public ministry, which scholars think lasted only one to three years. All we have in any detail are the accounts recorded in the gospels which consist of parables loosely interwoven into the story of his ministry and death. It seems very likely to me the communities, while initially devastated by his death, thought he would shortly reappear to establish a new messianic kingdom. The fact the gospels were not written until maybe 60- 70 years after his death adds weight to the idea the early church saw no need to record in history what was believed would become irrelevant to be soon supplanted by the establishment of a new messianic kingdom. Further evidence is in Paul’s letters to the fledgling Christian communities in Asia Minor written only about 20-30 years after Jesus’ death which are all strongly rooted in eschatology.

As time progressed the immediacy of this eschatology softened so that by the time Revelations was recorded maybe 80-90 years after his death the language becomes descriptive and less definitive; symbolic seals, plagues, beasts, trumpets and the number 7 describe a new age clothed in mystery. Our modern day understanding can best be understood by reference to allegory, metaphor and myth. Revelations is a personal and cosmological perspective of how Christ’s death and those who suffered martyrdom solidified an everlasting gift of atonement; the metaphorical reference to the slaughtered lamb is the atoning victory of Christ. Revelations is not so much a prophesy about the future but more of an existential revelation, rich in imagery and symbolism of the continuum of the atoning sacrifice of Christ. Revelations rallies against the transitory nature of the emperor’s power whose earthly reign is both temporary and illusory compared with the primacy of Christ’s death and resurrection.

The real revelation is the mystery that the kingdom of God is already established as an existential reality, but that it lies tantalizingly outside of the realms of our earthly restraints.

Dinner dance to the tune of the “Degenerates”

 

The Malawi Support Group held another Fundraiser last Saturday when we were entertained and danced to the wonderful music of the "The Degenerates" who donated their services for our dinner dance.
The performance of this marvelous band seems to become more polished each year. One of our past members of the Malawi Support group who died several years ago told the story to another good friend about his experience whilst serving in the merchant marine in WW2. Whilst under severe bombardment everyone was feeling frightened and miserable but during a lull the ships loudspeakers broadcast the song ‘White Christmas’. He recalled vividly the immediate calming effect on the entire company. One of the band members who was his good friend had asked me to sing that song at a previous function he attended. We repeated the song again at this function in memory of our good friend as a reminder of the universality of music as a source of warmth and hope for the darkest of times.
For more photos visit the Malawi Blog under blogs of interest.

Some Enchanted Evening

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Who could fail to appreciate the deep rich baritone voice of Brian Stokes Mitchell singing the part of Emile and the immortal words of ‘ Some Enchanted Evening ‘ from that great Broadway show ‘ South Pacific ‘ from the genius of Rodgers & Hammerstein. Occasionally a singer ‘owns’ a song as it seems no one else can bring that unique powerful vocal interpretation into play; but he is even better singing ‘This nearly was mine’ from the same show but there is a block on the encoding.

Standing next to Brian is Reba McIntyre (who was for 4 years in a row Country Music Association's Female Vocalist of the Year and is also a fabulous actress) in Concert from Carnegie Hall. Reba aptly sings the part of Nellie elswhere in the performance. All I can say if you don’t like this version you don’t like ice-cream.

I have sung the song many times but never heard a version as rich as this one. Surprisingly he does not take the top note at the end; possibly to maintain the depth and tessitura (musically the most comfortable range for a given singer) that encapsulates this song so magically within his vocals range.

Biennial Conference in Philosophy

 

 

I recently attended the ‘Biennial Conference in Philosophy Religion and Culture’ held in Sydney and entitled “Creation, Nature and the Built Environment”.

Above are photos taken whilst there depicting a harbour scene around Balmain where we stayed and from the Kurnell cliff tops within the national park. The lone rock fisherman was nearly washed off soon after I took the picture.

These conferences started in the early seventies to inform the Catholic Church about the latest contemporary theology and philosophy from a variety of Catholics and non Catholic scholars. I am attempting to provide some snippets from a few of the many papers presented.

The keynote address was by three New Zealand academics namely Elizabeth Aitken-Rose, Douglas Pratt and Jennifer Dixon on “Community and Incarceration: The Architecture of Alienation and the Politics of Redemption”.
‘According to the International Centre for Prison Studies (Kings College, London) New Zealand has the fifth highest rate of incarceration per head of population in the OECD – after the USA, Chile, Poland and Czechoslovakia – and well ahead of Australia. New Zealanders pride themselves on breaking records and perhaps the most impressive is the rate at which they lock people up and throw away ongoing responsibility. A new prison in the city of Auckland looms large over the surrounding urban landscape: it is a larger, gloomier, shadier and more embarrassingly obvious human cage than anyone had anticipated. From a Correctional perspective, the locality addresses essential needs. It is close to the courts and a perfect situation for the requisite remand centre.‘

The presenters argued for a radical improvement in the design and administration of prisons to combat the world wide high degrees of recidivism. Their multi faceted approach highlighted the physiological and religious fundamentalism perpetuated in the design roots from a medieval societal view of incarceration. Those involved are working with the NZ government to instigate design improvements and were of particular interest to the press in Australia. In NZ it currently costs the state $90,000 pa per prisoner.

This year the environment was a popular theme with a large number of papers talking about eco-spirituality and drewing attention to environmental concerns.

(Fr) Gregory Jacobs’s sj paper argued ‘that there needs to be a change away from the dualistic model of a mechanical worldview when we look at creation, and returning to an organic, or holistic model. Here he believed that the Temple theology (the idea of reverence for the temple to encpulate the earth as the sacred tabernacle) of the Old Testament, and a deeper understanding of the ‘creation covenant‘are helpful starting points for analyzing the creation stories, and thereby gaining a new understanding of both our place in the environment, and our use of the resources of the earth. Karl Rahner‘s Christology adds a New Testament development of this theology into the modern, western framework.

Cullan Joyce’s religious thinking about the environment has focused on moral issues and on spirituality. His paper approached the question as something that should be of concern to the systematic theologian. As such it asked what saving the environment might have to do with the doctrine of salvation. This entailed a consideration of the connection between the doctrines of creation and salvation. In the end, it may all be a question of how we understand and communicate an adequate understanding of the eschaton. ‘

Personally I think the wisdom of Albert Schweitzer is to be recommended though inevitably there are flaws in his philosophy as there are in any philosophy. His insight contained within his ‘Reverence for life’ involved the ethic of love evidenced in the New Testament to be realized in ones natural occurring gifts.

Schweitzer’s ideas were to think positively about life (life affirmation as he calls it) to share with all living things in the world in which we live. His idea came from his concern about civilization which he thought had lost its spiritual roots because of our lack of reverence for life as in the post enlightenment world view which had become totally reliant on reason. His philosophy was not a utopian ideal or quantifiable to given values, outcomes, behaviors or morality. Rather he encouraged a way of thinking which would return to our spiritual roots whose outcome although diverse shared in the communal ancestry of all living things which he referred to as ethical mystericism. The aim was to think about the reality of our co – inhabitance with the world by accepting our life mystery which was to show reverence for it. His thinking is much more deep seated than a casual observation might first conclude.

Another enthusiastic scholar was Robert Tilley who presented a paper entitled Cosmic Liturgy and Biblical Criticism: a Question of Method: ‘For some decades now there has been what many have called a crisis in biblical criticism. A crisis concerning many of the basic assumptions informing the methods used, which we can see now were little more than the prejudices of modernity. With the rise of the 'Third Quest' the task has been not only to assimilate the early Jewish and Christian material previously neglected, but to rethink our method. A good deal of this project has involved a focus upon the concept of covenant, not merely as a social factor but as a cosmological, even metaphysical, one as well. The effects of this have been both profound and exciting, but the new approach is not without its own attendant pitfalls. By reference to the works of Margaret Barker this paper identifies what is one of the major pitfalls: this is the failure to give due attention to the way in which common concepts can be differently employed, not least by reference to the use of irony and reversal. It is a mistake that not only flattens out the depth and dimensions of history and the texts under discussion, but lends itself to what one might call 'a conspiracy theory method'. A method that effectively means the assumptions of the critic can only ever be confirmed. Thus, we run the risk of repeating the same errors of earlier biblical criticism. ‘

Tilley invites us to think about the prevailing literature at the time and the propensity for the Hebrew writers to engage in different styles as evidenced in the prevailing literature and culture apparent at that time. His invitation was to review the societal nuances from an ironical perspective in contrast to previous scholars who attribute different styles of writing to different authors. Tilley asserts changes in style are a deliberate ploy in keeping with the cultural approach of that age which leads to more liberal interpretation of scripture which is best viewed through the prism of irony. The writer(s) use of myth, poetry, allegory and above all irony add to the rich composition and often confirms an understanding of the sacred nature of life's mystery unable to be articulated in rational dialogue.


Aristotle’s Most Beautiful City
Scholar Andrew Murray is currently involved within the Australian government to bring peace and stability to this troubled Solomon Islands located close to Australia. By introducing the harmonious philosophy of Aristotle he aims in turn to bring peace and tranquility to these troubled Islands.
‘In Book VII of the Politics, Aristotle notes that ‗beauty is realized in number and magnitude, and the city which combines magnitude with good order must necessarily be the most beautiful. ‘{Politics VII, 4 (1326a33-35)} Not much else is said there about beauty itself, and so the sentence must refer to other discussions. What is Aristotle‘s understanding of beauty? How is it found in the physical features of a city as discussed in Book VII? How does it relate to the moral entity of the best possible city? The paper will in three sections discuss Aristotle‘s understanding of beauty, the beauty of the built city and the beauty of the constituted city’.

Andrew provides some very useful insights as to how the design and architect of a city create a welcoming friendly beautiful environment as opposed to the fortress mentality which only engenders mistrust as a bar to peaceful co existence with ones neighbors.

Terang

 

Terang

A hopping mouse, the house in which we were billeted and back garden. The last photo is the beautiful garden of one of the locals.

Terang

Yours truly with wife in the lovelly garden created by one of the locals.

Terang

Our Local church choir last weekend journeyed to the small country town of Terang which is about 3 hours drive south west of Melbourne to enjoy the tremendous hospitality of the local community. We were all billeted and treated to dinners and a sightseeing excursion of the region along the nearby Great Ocean Road which I have only partially captured in the above photos.

We provided the music for the weekend masses. As everyone enjoyed themselves it seems likely this will become an annual event.

The first photo at Timboon is the old railway station which has been converted to a store selling delicious ice-cream from local produce and whisky.

The second photo is of the Loch Ard Gorge which shows the narrow opening which fortuitously only two survivors were swept through from the Loch Ard wreck on Mutton Bird Island reefs near Port Campbell in 1878. The cabin boy Tom clung to a lifeboat which was washed into the deep gorge now called Loch Ard Gorge. Eva, like most people of that time could not swim but was able to stay afloat useing a chicken coop and spar. Tom dragged her to safety after an hour-long struggle fighting the elements. They rested in a cave at the end of the gorge where she collapsed from exhaustion having spent 5 hours in the water. Tom, after consuming half a bottle of brandy that had been washed ashore, went for help, running into a party from nearby Glenample Station. They returned in time to rescue Eva already turning blue from the cold. Eva and Tom never saw each other after they recovered at Glenample. Eva soon became homesick and returned to Ireland to later marry. Tom became a ship's captain.
The last photo is of an underpass for cattle. Dairy farms in the area have expanded and frequently a property will be both sides of the road.

Debra Byrne

Occasionally a singer ‘owns’ a song as it seems no one else can bring that unique powerful vocal interpretation into play; an emotional strength aptly befitting the words. I think this is true of Debra Byrne but you can judge that for yourself by listening to her version.

Debra in my view is streets ahead of her contemporaries whose qualities and vocalizations may be superior at times but are no match to her telent evident in this recording.