Brock's Road Trip: Day 1

Today, I embarked on the ten hour road trip that took me to Philadelphia to hear Jack Caputo and Richard Kearney talk about metaphysics, deconstruction, and postmodernism. I won't say much about the conference, because we only met for two hours tonight and I haven't had time to digest what was said.

But the trip is worthy of mentioning.

I began at 7AM with what seemed to be a noneventful road trip, driving my (now deceased) grandpa's old (and behemoth-like) Grand Marquis. As a way of saving gas, I bundled up in coat, hat, and gloves and refused to turn on the heat. Two hours later (and still cold), after a brief interruption with construction and traffic on the east side of Indianapolis and horrifically tight driving conditions near Dayton, I found myself racing into Bob Evans to relieve myself of the coffee I had made in the morning. There, I had breakfast with my brother, Bryce, while listening to “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” in the background.

From there, I was off to traverse the entire states of Ohio and Pennsylvania. As I drove, the sun pleasantly warmed my car so much so that I had to take off my coat and even roll down the window for a moment. From Columbus to the state line, I listened to Over the Rhine (“Hello Ohio/The back roads/I know Ohio/Like the back of my hand/Alone Ohio/Where the river bends/And it's strange to see your story end…”). Then came West Virginia – for about ten miles. But it was a gorgeous fifteen minutes (seriously!).

As I moved into Pennsylvania, I merged onto the Pennsylvania turnpike. Up into the mountains I climbed – and noticed the temperature in the car steadily decreasing. By the time my bladder needed emptying and my gas tank needed filling, I found myself at the height of the Blue Ridge Mountains – and in the middle of a snowstorm. On the ground had formed two-three inches of sludge, and when I stepped out of my car I was instantly blasted with a powerfully biting wind. I put the gas pump nozzle into the tank and jumped back into the car.

Then, I was back on the road (with the heater now turned on). The weather cleared bit by bit as I trekked down the mountain, swerving through turns and channeling through tunnels. Finally, several hours later, I was in Philadelphia.

As I got off the turnpike onto a local highway, I was relieved to find that my exit was directly before miles of backed up traffic (whew!). From there, I made my way to Eastern University only to find a gigantic tree across the road and numerous power lines on the very road that was to take me to the front entrance of the school. After driving around aimlessly for fifteen minutes, I finally humbled myself, stopped the car, and pulled out my map of Philadelphia (courtesy of my AAA membership – thanks grandma!). A few minutes later, I was on the campus.

And now, it’s late, I’m tired, and I need to go to bed.

Adieu.

Jacques Would Be Proud

As I prepare to go to a conference entitled "What Would Jesus Deconstruct?," I've been reading up on Jacques Derrida and trying to understand the nature of deconstruction. Though much could be said about this philosophical notion, one of Derrida's chief concern was justice - particularly for the outsider, those on the margins, the Other.

Although deconstruction has been labeled many things - many of which it is not - one thing it calls for is hospitality. The call of deconstruction is the call of hospitality, of justice, of making room for the Other, of creating space for those who are not like ourselves without forcing them to conform to us.

Philosopher James K.A. Smith writes, "Justice, for Derrida, is hospitality: welcoming the other. Thus, he is most interested in those institutions which are called to be paradigmatic sites of welcome but which, in their current configurations... have become systems of closure, shutting down hospitality by shutting out the other. Thus [Derrida] has shown a particular interest in questions of immigration and international law, heightened no doubt by disturbing tendencies in France... which have given rise to new justifications of xenophobia and shutting down borders in order to protect against the threat of... 'French identity.' (Jacques Derrida Live Theory, 68).

How timely this is for us in America as Congress currently wrestles with immigration policy, the Bush adminsitration fluctuates its stance, and the destiny of millions of resident aliens is in flux. If Derrida were here today, he would have called for what he did in 1996. Then, he spoke for the International Parliament of Writers - an organization that provides aid to authors being silenced by their home nations - as they focused on developing "Cities of Asylum," places writers could find freedom from the oppression of their home nations. Here, the IPW and Derrida were drawing from the Old Testament notion of "cities of refuge" (Numb 35:9-32) [Cf. Life Theory, 68-69).

Derrida is not here, but thankfully, someone is picking up the baton. Mayor Robert Patten (a Republican, mind you) of Highstown, NJ has made Highstown a "sanctuary city" for illegal immigrants. The Washington Post article states, "Joining a growing list of cities enacting a no-questions-asked policy on immigration status, Hightstown now allows its undocumented residents to officially interact with local police and access city services without fear of being reported to federal authorities." Patten speaks for himself in the article stating:

"Most of us know this town would have a heck of a time trying to run itself these days without the immigrants. They're working at the grocery stores, the fast-food places, they're opening businesses and keeping this town alive and young. We're just being practical by telling them, 'Look, we want you in our community, and we want you to feel like you belong.' "

Patten makes a point that raises a thought-provoking question: if these illegal immigrants practically run the big businesses that lobby so hard in Washington, why hasn't anything been changed? Where are the CEOs that look into the cameras and say they care so much for their employees?

Some may argue, "But these immigrants have broken the law! They ought to be sent back to Mexico where they all belong!" To this, I respond: Could it be that it is not the people that need changing but the law? Could it be that we as a nation, at the risk of preserving our "American identity" [which is, uh... what??] have strayed mightily far from the words coined by Emma Lazarus that preach from the foundation of our Statue of Liberty:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

To those who want to send them home [and thus destroy our economy while they're at it], I suggest they answer to one other figure: the original master of deconstruction himself. The one who often suspended the law in the name of justice himself - picking grain on the Sabbath, preventing an adulterer from being punished, fellowshipping with outcasts, touching the unclean, and readily permiting a human sacrifice - might have a thing or two to say about the immigrants, the Other, the least of these, the last who will be first.

Which begs the question: why has it taken a philospher who would rightly pass for an atheist and a mayor of a little town of about 6,000 people to bring to pass what Christians should have been doing all along?

I fear we have sunk so deeply into the entrapments of our narcissistic culture that we have kept the cold cup of water for ourselves.

Thoughts on Good Friday

“Father, forgive them for they know not what they are doing.” [Luke 23:34]

Jesus’ first saying from the cross raises many questions:
Why did Jesus, who forgave the sins of a paralytic, appeal to the Father?
Was Jesus, as human and frail, too weak to forgive sins from the cross?
Or was this sin of such cosmic proportions that only One in heaven could grant pardon?
And how could God forgive someone who had yet to repent?

For these questions, we cannot answer. But this we know:
(1) On the cross, Jesus practiced what he preached. The One who commanded his disciples to love enemies and pray for persecutors, provided an example amidst great injustice.

(2) By this prayer, Jesus fulfilled Old Testament prophesy. Isaiah 53:12 states, “He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.”

(3) In this scene, Jesus provides the ultimate picture of peacemaking. To those unlovable in Jewish society – thieves and Roman soldiers – Christ offered his communion.

(4) And here, Jesus embodied the Law. The Scriptures distinguish two types of sin. For “sins done in ignorance” or unintentionally, a sacrifice provided forgiveness. But for sins done deliberately and defiantly, the sinner was to be cut off and “no sacrifice for sins was left.”

By this word, then, Jesus offered many prayers:
He prayed for his disciples, that they would learn to lay down their lives for one another.
For the Jews, that they would see he was the Messiah.
For the soldiers that they, though steeped in racial hostilities between Jew and Gentile, might experience true reconciliation.
For God, that he would keep his covenant and grant sinners a second chance.


"Abba, the priests are trying to correct blasphemy; the soldiers, just doing their jobs.
Daddy, they don’t realize they’re killing the Son of God.
Papa, take my sacrifice as the ultimate Day of Atoning!
Father, forgive them for they know not what they are doing.”