Response to Alan Jacobs on the Benedict Option
Matthew Loftus writes a good article, mostly stuff we've already said here. Excerpts:
[T]he potential for good-hearted Christians to go to war with one another about anything seems to be elided in most BenOp discussions. Every Christian community I have ever participated in has seen heated debates about theological or practical issues drive friendships apart; the more intense communities seemed to be the ones with the greatest potential for enmity. There is no amount of liturgy or localism that will address this fundamental defect in the human heart that is one of Satan’s greatest strategies against ministries all over the world. I cannot say for certain that it is any worse in modernity, but the discipline of Christian love for one another deserves more serious consideration as we talk about how to form more intense Christian communities. How would parachurch organizations, nonprofits, and churches work together in a BenOp vision, and how would the BenOp schema alter the tendency towards petty infighting that often besets attempts at such cooperation?
That bit reminded me of this. Here's another:
After all, another theme that dominates Dreher’s writing is the cultural morass which various communities in the West seem to have found themselves; presumably many BenOp communities would find themselves in proximity to the people drowning in the waste products of promiscuity, drug abuse, and self-centeredness that cultural elites have flushed downstream. It seems obvious to me that for every BenOp community nestled into an isolated riverbend, there should be two in a trailer park or neglected inner-city neighborhood. Yet I still get the sense that the BenOp is trying to protect us from lost people as much as it is trying to be a light to them. The Bible clearly teaches both, but it always speaks as if the lost– powerful cultural elites and powerless victims of sins– are a present fixture in our lives to bring the Holy Spirit to bear upon. I suspect that the healthy fear that animates much of the BenO might lead us to hide our light under a bushel unless we clearly plan ahead to do otherwise.
The Benedict Option is nothing if not an orgy of Alinskyite omelet making with homegrown eggs.
ReplyDeleteYet I still get the sense that the BenOp is trying to protect us from lost people as much as it is trying to be a light to them.
ReplyDeleteThat's exactly it in a nutshell, isn't it? (If not understated.)
The motivation behind Dreher's BenOp is entirely reactionary -- it is a reaction to the erosion of culture and encroachments on religious freedom. You can see this from Dreher's blog, which is largely a "parade of horribles" (as someone here noted), many with the laments of "how can we raise our children amid this" or that Christianity is incompatible with "Enlightenment liberalism". So of course the BO is a running away from
the "lost people" -- that's its reason for existence.
The novelty of the BO is that it claims to be a "strategic" withdrawal, not to run away from the world (oh no, wouldn't ever do that) but instead to save the world. Of course, the saving part is a long way off in the future, thus absolving its founder from making that part happen (or even suggesting how it would be done).
Further to this passage:
ReplyDeleteAfter all, another theme that dominates Dreher’s writing is the cultural morass which various communities in the West seem to have found themselves...
We have this logical extension from Dreher today:
Islam and the Benedict Option.
Yeah...in trying to broaden the pool of potential purchasers of his book by expanding and diluting the resonance of the BO to any people cross with that dang Enlightenment and its bastard spawn like the U. S. Constitution, which does nothing if not promote atomizing individualism, Rod may not realize just how many Christians initially on board with a Christianity-affirming BO aren't yet subscribing to his newly found pan-Abrahamic ecumenism. But Russell Moore! Eh...
DeleteThere is also another way of understanding Dreher's welcome of Muslims into a common BOptionesque embrace: for those choosing it, it will function much like Sharia. The only differences BOCs and BOMs will be dietary and abstractly theological.
DeleteDon't worry -- there will be Certified Benedict Option Ghettos for Muslims and Jews (emphasis added):
DeleteI mean, devout Muslims and Orthodox Jews would always be resident aliens here, in a sense, but increasingly, faithful small-o orthodox Christians will come to share their sense of being in this culture, but very much not of it. And in that we have an opportunity for fellowship, even mutual support.
In other words, they'll be useful to Dreher until they aren't.
Evidence that not only the Dreher BO, but much of Dreher's political "thought" is also entirely reactionary is provided today in his Brexit post (emphasis added):
ReplyDeleteTo be honest, I have not had a strong feeling about Brexit, though I had generally hoped that the Leave side would win. This, simply because a Leave victory would be a strong repudiation of the elites, and in particular the unaccountable internationalists in Brussels. As I type this, I’m watching a British political analyst on CNN describe this as a stunning discrediting of the experts, all of whom thought Remain would win. Christiane Amanpour has been kind of losing it....
I’ve just watched Christiane Amanpour very nearly spontaneously combust, going into a gran mal Anderson Cooper rage while interviewing UKIP politician Ray Finch. Finch kept his cool. Had he been on for a minute more, she would have blamed Orlando on Nigel Farage.
O Fortuna, truly you have spun the wheel justly this time…
There are many good substantive reasons for the UK to have left the EU, those reasons having been laid out by Nigel Farage and Daniel Hannan over the past decade and then some. And there are substantive reasons for the UK to have stayed. Reasonable minds may differ on the question.
But Dreher doesn't bother with all that -- for him, it's all about sticking it to the Man, whoever it is. Just like his trashing of the Republican party over the past years and his barely-veiled cheering on of the Trump faction over the past year, only now to feign horror at Trump himself.
It is a waste of time to read his output. And it is a waste of what talent he has for his writings to be so substantively empty.
The Man is Daddy. Always has been, always will be. After all, he liked Ruthie best, only subscribed to a milquetoast faith, never embraced his indoor kittyhood, etc., etc.
DeleteDante, thankfully, liberated Rod from the particularity of Dreher père so that he could finally hold the Man Universal accountable.
He's Brexiting in his heart, you know, or at least, like an anglerfish, holding out that image for the impressionable Christian who might want to march for him down that yellow brick tunnel.
DeleteAfter reading that post, it seems more obvious than ever that the Benedict Option is really the "Brexit Option" -- checking out of the culture is at the very top of Dreher's mind. His loud protests when someone accuses the BO of being a "Brexit", so to speak, is further proof of it too.
DeleteOkay, let me see if I've got this straight....
ReplyDeleteRod is Brexiting in his heart because the elites in the west are promoting "alien" values. However he believe that (from Hauerwas) Christian are by nature resident aliens in western culture. He's going to have to get that book published soon so I can figure out who the aliens are; I can't tell the players without a program.
I've never come across anyone who has spent their life writing about religious/philosophical/cultural topics that has reached meddle age with less of a identifiable established belief system then Drerod. Watching him try to write about current culture and events is like watching a pinball bounce around in a pinball machine; there is no way to tell where the ball will carom off the bumper du jour.
-Anonymous Maximus
Yes, I think you've got this straight.
DeleteDid you see where Rod said a few days ago, about some Mennonites who got onto his radar, "Honestly, aren’t people getting sick and tired of these hysterics?"
Rod. Said that. And he said:
"It is a mark of our times that protesters and activists press their case by making highly emotional assertions of their own sanctity, and then asserting, with equal hysteria, their opponents’ evil. Sooner or later, I hope, reasonable adults in all kinds of institutions and communities will marginalize these drama-queen bullies, and refuse to be intimidated by this nonsense."
Pot, meet Kettle.
Maximus: Life must be good when you can go to a Conference in Maui without the wife and kids? http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/maui-said-hey/#post-comments
ReplyDelete