Beyond Use
Jake Meador’s newest book looks at the origins of our culture of use and offers an overview of what a different perspective might be.
Review by Pierce Gillen
I used her, she used me, but neither one cared,” Bob Seger once sang. Many things in life seem to be about use: what we can get out of them. Education can be just a way to get a job. A job can be just a way to pay the bills. At their worst, even relationships can be just a way to stave off loneliness. Jake Meador’s new book, What Are Christians For?, is deeply concerned with modern relationships of use, and it offers a thought-provoking account of where true Christianity diverges from—and may provide the antidote for—a modern ethos of exploitation and the power of the will. Meador weaves together personal anecdotes and experiences, historical research, and insight from numerous theologians in order to elucidate how we arrived at today’s cultural milieu and how we can chart a better path forward.
Meador believes that we have come to view nature as alien, devoid of meaning, and even hostile. In contrast, he argues that we should see the world as fundamentally good, albeit flawed, and full of meaning; it is a “a coherent thing, an order, a plan of love and truth” (the last description coming from Pope Benedict XVI). This theological point is crucial, because if we see the world as indifferent or opposed to our flourishing, we will try to control and exploit it, instead of learning from it and using it to inform our identities. And this erroneous attitude toward nature, Meador argues, has spilled over into how we view other people, our jobs, and more.
Historically and “materially,” Meador roots our modern ethos of exploitation in colonialism. Drawing heavily on the work of Willie James Jennings, Meador posits that white colonialists severed the relationship between native peoples and their lands, viewing both as just so many resources to be harvested from a barbaric wilderness. Through colonialism, we learned to objectify nature and other people, to treat them as things to be used for our gain. Meador refers to this shift as “the revolution.” Colonialists “self-designated” (Jennings’s term), that is, they defined themselves without reference to “history, culture, and land.” Meador then details how this spirit of objectification and exploitation manifested in the industrial revolution, which had a profound impact on economics and culture, and then subsequently in the sexual revolution. He argues that in the desire for self-definition, this product of colonialism, we can see the cause of our culture’s focus on sexuality as a key aspect of identity. In fact, sexuality becomes another sort of relationship of use when we try to express ourselves through others—a “sexual partner” becomes merely “an accessory for our own sexual expression.”
We tend to view the world around us as a toolkit of resources to satisfy our (constantly evolving) desires.
Meador’s historical narrative is interesting, especially when coupled with his theological arguments, but is quite high-level and selective (no doubt in the interest of brevity). One aspect that confused me, for instance, was his focus on colonialism as the genesis of the “revolutionary” worldview he describes. Nearly every page of history is stained with examples of divorcing other people from the land and using them ruthlessly, from the ancient Assyrians to the Mongols to the Vikings. Meador does not fully explain why colonialism in particular was distinctive enough in this behavior to be the identifiable initial cause of our current social ills. What philosophies of nature preceded this epoch? How did the Christian view of nature differ from that of the indigenous peoples of the New World? (Meador does not equate the two, but they are treated as substantially similar.) Overall, I found this section a useful illustration of the mentality he critiques, but I would need to look elsewhere for a comprehensive analysis of the causal relationships.
While other readers might have quibbles like this here and there, I think Meador correctly identifies our general attitude toward nature and identity. We tend to view the world around us as a toolkit of resources to satisfy our (constantly evolving) desires. Even conversations about “sustainability” tend to hinge on harvesting resources more efficiently or not exhausting them prematurely; they are rarely a critique of the exploitation mentality itself. In regard to identity, while some may have strong ties to a region or hometown, most people move around a great deal and live places temporarily (e.g., for college) and therefore have weaker ties to their geographic environs. Similarly, with respect to technological and medical innovation, natural limits are seen as easily transgressed in the name of disembodied moral considerations. Nature, in short, is less normative than ever before.
Having identified our un-Christian approach to nature and its harmful effects, Meador turns to the task of forging a better and more orthodox future. His focus is not on specific policies, but rather on a general spirit of renewal. However, this does lead to some of his recommendations being a bit open to questions about how we ought to implement them. For example, in regard to environmentalism, Meador posits that we should be more “willing to be obstructed”; that is, we should sacrifice some of our ostensible “freedom” in order to exercise more responsibility. He uses the example of paying more for “ethically sourced meat.” He acknowledges that some might not have the wealth to do so, but in general his treatment of the topic suggests a principle without telling us exactly how he thinks we should accomplish it. How far should we be willing to be obstructed? Should we set aside our willingness to be obstructed if it means we can more cheaply produce enough food for those who need it? Meador leaves these questions for his readers to parse out.
Christians ought to model a better path forward within their families and communities.
One of the strongest parts of the book is Meador’s discussion of the Christian family, which I think encapsulates a great deal of the counter-revolutionary mindset that he is promoting. Meador talks about how family is both selfless—including in the sense that marriage involves giving oneself to another—and natural—in the sense that it “arises naturally out of creation” and is pre-political. The Christian family thus represents the antithesis of the “revolutionary mentality” that Meador criticizes, which is based on exploitation and the rejection of natural order. He draws a great deal on personal experience, particularly of his father’s stroke and how his family came together to deal with that challenge. Meador’s prose and feeling glow, and this narrative relates to one of his broader points. Meador believes that instead of thinking as the Christian family as a “bunker” in a hostile world, we should instead view such families as “images of light that can, in time, give light to everyone.” Through their goodness, they can have a transformative effect on their surroundings.
This image is a microcosm for Meador’s solution to the revolutionary ethos that ails us. His prescriptions are a call not for laws and policies but rather for a lifestyle. Christians ought to model a better path forward within their families and communities. Some of his suggestions, for example, include choosing to live close to loved ones in a geographic area that is meaningful to us, and engaging in mutual generosity. Like his parents’ marriage in the wake of his father’s stroke, the kind of life that Meador envisions will require work. But what is good is rarely easy. And Meador’s call to action, contained in the very last words of his book, is that when it comes to this good work, “It is time for us to begin.”
Pierce Gillen is an intern at Fare Forward. He is a recent graduate of Baylor University, where he studied political science, Great Texts of the Western Tradition, and linguistics. He will be attending law school in the fall.
What Are Christians For?: Life Together at the End of the World was published on February 22, 2022 by Intervarsity Press. Fare Forward thanks them for their provision of a review copy. You can purchase your own copy on their website here.
