{"id":1142,"date":"2020-09-30T17:05:35","date_gmt":"2020-09-30T17:05:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/farefwd.com\/?p=1142"},"modified":"2020-12-30T18:36:36","modified_gmt":"2020-12-30T18:36:36","slug":"the-good-life-is-slow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/2020\/09\/30\/the-good-life-is-slow\/","title":{"rendered":"The Good Life is Slow"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t

The Good Life Is Slow<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

The slow pace and deep delight in the beauty of the world that characterize Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead novels can counter-catechize us to the demands of our liberal, capitalist society. The Church should take advantage of that.\u00a0 <\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

By Alex Engebretson<\/em><\/p>

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

My undergraduates don\u2019t much care for Gilead<\/em>. I\u2019ve taught it for a number of years now, both to Christian and secular students, and I know what they\u2019ll say. They\u2019ll say there\u2019s no plot.\u00a0 It\u2019s slow. Nothing happens. It\u2019s beautiful but boring. I nod my head. Keep reading, I\u2019ll say. And I\u2019ll clarify and define some things: misericordia<\/em>, Sennacherib, the West Nishnabotna.\u00a0<\/p>

Who\u2019s Feuerbach? they\u2019ll ask. Look him up, I\u2019ll say. Then we\u2019ll talk about Ames\u2019s gracious reading of The Essence of Christianity<\/em>. The incident with the horse and tunnel will always get a laugh. There will be silence around the burning of the Black church. Students are mildly scandalized by the marriage of old Ames and young Lila. The ending, when Ames blesses Jack on the bus station bench, will not satisfy them.\u00a0<\/p>

Yet I continue to teach Robinson\u2019s masterpiece in part because it makes students uncomfortable. Their complaints I take as signs that something important is taking place.\u00a0 Something potentially formative. I\u2019ll read long passages as slowly as they can stand:<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

\u201cOur dream of life will end as dreams do end, abruptly and completely, when the sun rises, when the light comes. And we will think, All that fear and all that grief were about nothing. But that cannot be true. I can\u2019t believe we will forget our sorrows altogether.\u00a0 That would mean forgetting that we had lived, humanly speaking. Sorrow seems to me to be a great part of the substance of human life. [Here I\u2019ll pause, nearly in tears.]. For example, at this very moment I feel a kind of loving grief for you as you read this, because I do not know you, and because you have grown up fatherless, you poor child, lying on your belly now in the sun with Soapy asleep on the small of your back.\u00a0 You are drawing those terrible little pictures that you will bring me to admire, and which I will admire because I have not the heart to say one word that you might remember against me.\u201d<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

I give space in class to approach Gilead <\/em>as a means of formation. Rather than starting with a typical lit. class question, I\u2019ll foreground the students\u2019 experience of the text. What was beautiful? I\u2019ll ask. What was wise? I then venture a claim: Gilead<\/em> is attempting to form you. It\u2019s attempting to slow you down. Its \u201cprocessional pace\u201d (James Wood\u2019s phrase) implies an argument: The good life is slow. It\u2019s conditioning us to an experience of time where beautiful practices like prayer might flourish. Such practices may be possible in an impatient culture shaped by social media, but they may also be harder to sustain. The good life of reading, friendship, and holiness takes much patience and much time.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

Despite my students\u2019 complaints, Gilead <\/em>is worth teaching, and the quartet is worth reading, because they grate against the world that is forming us. If the liberal, capitalist order is our great catechizer, these novels serve as counter-catechesis.\u00a0<\/p>

My students need this. And the church, broadly conceived, needs this too.\u00a0<\/p>

We need to have our Christian principles affirmed and reinforced, not only by traditional creeds and catechesis, which appeal to the intellect, but also by new aesthetic forms, where the Christian vision of our neighbors and our God can be freshly experienced and internalized.<\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Instead of judging Robinson for dubious theology, or questioning the system that permitted her rise, we should reflect on how these novels might benefit the church.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

The Church\u2019s Reception of Robinson <\/strong><\/p>

Perhaps the church is already receiving the Gilead quartet in this experiential, formative way. Anecdotally, I have heard of many churches reading Gilead <\/em>together, and spoken to others who read the novels as a devotional exercise. Robinson clearly has her acolytes within and without the church. But it\u2019s also true that her reception within Christian circles has been met with skepticism, and sometimes denunciation.\u00a0<\/p>

To be violently reductive, Robinson\u2019s reception within the church breaks down into, as I see it, two main critiques. Many have found good grounds for judgment, but the problem is that these criticisms tend to deemphasize or ignore the way in which the books may help and minster to people. I would like to see greater reception of Robinson\u2019s work as a gift to the body of Christ. Many already do, but the voices of those who don\u2019t often seem much louder.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

The first critique is cultural: Robinson\u2019s acceptance by the literary establishment is due to her liberal Protestant faith being palatable to our largely secular, liberal elite. She gives the elite exactly the kind of religious sensibility that is most acceptable to them: individualistic, non-dogmatic, this-worldly. If she were a different kind of Christian, more doctrinally orthodox perhaps, or who openly espoused traditional social teachings, then she would never have become the Pulitzer Prize\u2013winning, Presidential Medal of Freedom\u2013recipient she is today.\u00a0<\/p>

There\u2019s some truth to this. Robinson belongs to a liberal mainline congregation, the United Church of Christ, and her politics are leftist in an older New Deal sort of way. Thus, the establishment gatekeepers\u2019 admission of Robinson is in part due to shared political ideology.\u00a0 But the Gilead quartet is built on traditional Christian assumptions that, if understood, would indeed challenge a great many secular liberals. Just because the literary elite approve of her doesn\u2019t mean they\u2019re reading her well.\u00a0<\/p>

The other critique is theological. These are Christians who read Robinson for the theological content and implications of her novels, and who form judgements based on the degree to which Robinson deviates from their own definitions of orthodoxy. The worst of these readers approach the novels as an Inquisitorial opportunity. When a student asks, \u201cWhat\u2019s Robinson\u2019s view of salvation?\u201d I know there\u2019s a heresy-hunt afoot. One of my students, upon learning of Robinson\u2019s inclination toward universalism, pushed her copy of Gilead <\/em>away, as if the book itself threatened moral pollution.\u00a0<\/p>

Others of this school simply see Robinson\u2019s theology as erroneous in one way or another.\u00a0 I always assign Jessica Hooten Wilson\u2019s \u201cPushing Back Against Marilynne Robinson\u2019s Theology,\u201d<\/a> since it\u2019s not overly technical for undergraduates and makes for lively debate.\u00a0 Wilson judges Robinson deficient (and Flannery O\u2019Connor sufficient) against her understanding of scriptural revelation. Wilson implores us to \u201cread Robinson\u2019s novel. Delight in its beauty and the places where Ames speaks truth in accordance with the Word. But, then, be ready to live out a more uncomfortable and challenging gospel.\u201d It\u2019s a terrific piece. And while Wilson is far more sophisticated than my disgusted student, they share the tendency to receive the novels as a kind of dramatized theology, which can then be judged, even condemned, based on a priori dogmatic commitments.\u00a0<\/p>

But instead of judging Robinson for dubious theology, or questioning the system that permitted her rise, we should reflect on how these novels might benefit the church. How might these novels be read so as to offer cultural support to the church\u2019s own crucial work of formation?\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Even if churches were flourishing, baptizing and confirming in droves, our current cultural conditions would make catechesis a challenge.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Catechesis in the Age of Metaphysical Capitalism<\/strong><\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

The church is not producing deeply formed individuals capable of living an orthodox version of the faith in a dominant culture that\u2019s largely indifferent to it. That is, the church is failing at catechesis. This is difficult to prove, and I hope I\u2019m wrong; perhaps the next generation will be full of great saints. But my sense is that the formative power of the church is weaker today than the power of other institutions. The corporations of Silicon Valley have a stronger educative role than the institutional church. Our smartphone apps catechize us with a relentlessness and intimacy the church can only dream of.<\/p>

Even if churches were flourishing, baptizing and confirming in droves, our current cultural conditions would make catechesis a challenge. Take the Heidelberg Catechism, which proclaims: \u201cI am not my own but belong, with body and soul, in life and in death, to my faithful savior Jesus Christ.\u201d The Christian is, by definition, in relation, unified with Christ. Self-possession, self-sufficiency, self-reliance, or any definition of the self apart from the other, is alien to the Christian tradition.<\/p>

But Heidelberg\u2019s assertion is entirely antithetical to our dominant culture. Sovereignty of the self is our cultural script. Alan Jacobs calls this metaphysical capitalism<\/a>, which he defines thus: \u201cThe one central and indispensable axiom of metaphysical capitalism is\u00a0\u2018I am my own\u2019<\/a>\u2014I am a commodity wholly owned and operated by myself in service to my own interests, as defined by me. I am my own store of capital.\u201d The script of metaphysical capitalism is embedded into the very form of our media technologies. Whether it\u2019s Instagram or Tinder, our dominant platforms place You at the center, with others present as \u201cfeed\u201d for your desires. All social media platforms assume and enact the creed of \u201cI am my own.\u201d<\/p>

This of course has an effect on ethics. The simple command to \u201clove thy neighbor\u201d is met with the insistent cultural message of \u201cexchange thy neighbors for capital.\u201d We are encouraged (especially on social media) to exchange people into various forms of capital\u2014social, sexual, or actual capital. Our neighbors\u2014or our \u201cfriends\u201d and \u201cfollowers\u201d\u2014become a means to increase the power of our personal brands. The cultural exemplar of metaphysical capitalism is the YouTuber.<\/p>

Perhaps there is less historical novelty to these cultural conditions than I suggest. For when, historically, was robust, orthodox catechesis ever easy? The calls to turn our neighbors into means rather than ends, or to see ourselves as self-sufficient, are as old as sin. The only reasonable case for novelty would cite the Internet, with its power to disseminate heterodox messages widely, intimately, and insistently. If all cultures present challenges to catechesis, our Internet-shaped culture is no exception\u00a0 The Internet shapes us with every touch of our screens, not simply with its content, a wild mix of the beautiful and profane, but in its underlying principles and forms. The medium itself encodes the principle of self-sovereignty. It encourages us to adopt attitudes, orientations, and predispositions antithetical to Christian tradition.<\/p>

All of this is to say that the church needs assistance in her work of catechesis. The Gilead quartet might play an important role. This is not to say the church\u2019s tools of formation\u2014formal catechesis, Sunday School, Bible study, etc.\u2014are inadequate. But that, in order for formation to be internalized and habituated, we need a cultural atmosphere that strengthens and affirms the work of the church. The family is primarily where this atmosphere ought to be cultivated. Aesthetic forms, such as novels, can aid as well. I would certainly encourage the church to read more novels for their beauty and wisdom, and to expand her moral imagination. The anthropological assumptions of mainline realist fiction are quite compatible with the church\u2019s view of an embodied, rational soul. Jane Austen and Tolstoy can benefit us. Marilynne Robinson\u2019s Gilead quartet can as well.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

If the church wants to realize the formative potential of Robinson\u2019s novels, it would do well to think less about their theological content and more about their underlying Christian assumptions. It\u2019s perfectly valid to read the novels for debates about theological topics, like soteriology. But the formative power of the Gilead books lies in the experience of reading, where readers can unconsciously catch Christian attitudes and dispositions in an atmosphere built on traditional presuppositions.\u00a0<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Robinson will not allow race, gender, class, genetics, or any social or natural category to fully define human beings. Humans are too complex, too singular, too mysterious for any of these categories to serve as an exhaustive explanation.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

The Christian World of Jack <\/em><\/strong><\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

Robinson\u2019s latest and last addition to the quartet is Jack<\/em>, which is arguably her best novel since Gilead<\/em>. It\u2019s a beautiful interracial love story and a sustained character study of Jack Boughton\u2019s truly wretched life. It is also, much to my delight, thin on overt theological topics or discussions. Nevertheless, it is resolutely a Christian novel, built on metaphysical assumptions about human identity, equality, and language. To read Jack <\/em>is to experience a world where the Christian vision is true.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

It\u2019s Della who most clearly states Robinson\u2019s own view of human identity as ensouled, commenting, \u201ca soul has no earthly qualities, no history among the things of this world, no guilt or injury or failure. No more than a flame would have. There is nothing to be said about it except that it is a holy human soul. And it is a miracle when you recognize it.\u201d Robinson spends the majority of Jack <\/em>staging an encounter with his holy human soul. Every human has value and dignity, even humans as beat down as Jack Boughton, because they were created in the image of God.<\/p>

Robinson\u2019s locus of the divine image, and the mark of humanity\u2019s mysterious exceptionalism, is self-consciousnesses. This is why Jack<\/em> largely consists of a dramatization of interiority\u2014\u201cthat endless, secret conversation that was himself.\u201d Yale professor Amy Hungerford says Robinson\u2019s novels assume that \u201cordinary people have rich and complicated interior lives, that they embody a silent discourse of thought that, if we knew its voice, would astonish us.\u201d That\u2019s the soul Jack<\/em> illuminates, the secret realities of \u201ceverything [a person] didn\u2019t mean or couldn\u2019t say or wished for or grieved over.\u201d Robinson dramatizes the principle of imago Dei<\/em> through the representation of these hidden depths, showing us their beauty. Della says, \u201cI just think there has to be a Jesus, to say \u2018beautiful\u2019 about things no one else would ever see.\u201d When we read Jack<\/em>, we are invited to see this inner beauty, contemplate it, cherish it, as Christ does. \u201cThe world is teeming with beautiful souls,\u201d says<\/a> Robinson, paraphrasing Calvin. \u201cIf we greet them as Christ, they may well show us the face of Christ.\u201d Her work forms us to assume that every person we ever encounter has creaturely dignity and contains mysterious depths.<\/p>

This is also a source of human equality. Robinson\u2019s essays seize on the democratic, egalitarian, anti-hierarchical implications of imago Dei<\/em>. In her fiction, equality is expressed in her attention to \u201cordinary people\u201d\u2014the Jacks and Dellas\u2014rather than the rich, powerful, or famous. It\u2019s also expressed in her attention to sin. Jack<\/em> quite emphatically assumes the traditional doctrine that though we are all equally image-bearers, we are also equally fallen.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

Robinson chooses to frame the reality of the fall with the language of \u201charm,\u201d giving sin an ethical, interpersonal character. Jack longs to do no more harm, believing himself to have a \u201cvocation of harmlessness.\u201d And yet harm persists: \u201che had done harm he did not intend, which was another proof that he did harm inevitably, intentions be damned.\u201d Jack<\/em> imagines a world where to be in relation is inevitably to do harm. To be radically harmless is to be alone: \u201cDear Jesus, keep me harmless. He knew what that meant. Keep me alone.\u201d<\/p>

This only adds to the already long and troubling record of unintentional harm throughout the Gilead quartet. In Gilead<\/em> John Ames chooses to preach on Hagar and Ishmael in an effort to console himself about leaving his wife and child behind. This sermon ends up magnifying Jack\u2019s guilt for the abandonment of his child and drives him to a suicide attempt. In Home<\/em> the Boughton family makes several attempts to help Annie Wheeler, the poor, young woman Jack abandons.\u00a0 But all of these attempts at charity are an offense to Annie: \u201cShe was a hard, proud, unsmiling girl, and she may well have hated them all for their benevolent intentions, which were indeed condescending, reflecting as they did their awareness that her circumstances could be improved.\u201d\u00a0 The novels testify to the ubiquity of unintentional harm.\u00a0<\/p>

It is this metaphysical vision of human identity, informed by imago Dei<\/em> and sin, that may help readers resist seeing identity as either overdetermined by culture\u2014the social constructivists\u2014or overdetermined by nature\u2014the biological determinists. Robinson does not dismiss these shaping forces, and she is particularly sensitive to how race, class, and gender shape our lives. Indeed, race will likely dominate the reception of Jack, as perhaps it should, given our political climate. Jack may well prove one of the wisest, subtlest meditations on the experiential realities of racism in American literature.\u00a0<\/p>

Yet, unlike the social constructivists of the political left, or the biological determinists of the right (whom she takes to task in Absence of Mind<\/em><\/a>), Robinson will not allow race, gender, class, genetics, or any social or natural category to fully define human beings. Humans are too complex, too singular, too mysterious for any of these categories to serve as an exhaustive explanation. Robinson associates identity with narrative voice. Perhaps this is why the novels are not written in a uniform voice; instead, each novel possesses its own musical qualities to reflect the tone of the protagonist\u2019s self. In her choice to focus mainly on one soul in each novel, Robinson subtly argues for the singularity and irreducibility of identity.\u00a0<\/p>

But she will not follow the logic that, because we are irreducibly complex and our lives are made out of uniquely lived out experiences, we can never hope to communicate our lives to others. She never accepted the solipsistic implications of the postmodern conception of language.\u00a0 Language is not a prison-house of arbitrary signs. Robinson writes with implicit faith in the power of language to bear our lives to others.\u00a0<\/p>

This is imaged in Jack and Della\u2019s shared love of poetry. Their extended dialogue in the cemetery is the cement of their love. The novel often reflects on the nature of language: Della says, \u201cIf you make a sound it\u2019s just a sound, unless it belongs to a language, and then it\u2019s a word.\u00a0 It means something. It can\u2019t not mean something.\u201d Meaning between souls is possible. That this task of communicating our inwardness is granted to language, so prone to error, failure, and confusion, makes it even more lovely. There\u2019s a tenderness toward language in Robinson, a compassion for those paltry sounds tasked with such heavy burdens. Jack<\/em> is a world where readers can be confident in the reconciling potential of language, an affirmation of a faith that proclaims the Word made flesh. Language can bridge ethical gaps between souls, as well as political gaps between Black and white.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

Jack <\/em>takes place in a world that imagines humans as image-bearers in a fallen world capable of divine grace. For the church, this is the true world. And if we desire to form better disciples of Christ, the church must surround herself with true imaginative worlds.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>

David Bentley Hart once quipped<\/a>, \u201cContrary to conventional wisdom, Christianity has never really taken deep root in America or had any success in forming American consciousness; in its place, we have invented a kind of Orphic mystery religion of personal liberation, fecundated and sustained by a cult of Mammon.\u201d These cults are a challenge for the church. The formative value of Jack<\/em> (and the rest of the quartet) is found in the experience of reading, of being immersed in a world rooted in Christian assumptions that encourages recognizably Christian attitudes toward our neighbors (like charity).\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>

Perhaps many within the church are already doing this, thankful for Robinson\u2019s gift and avoiding overly scrupulous attention to heretical implications. (I think it\u2019s safe to assume most great Christian artists are at least mildly heretical; the role Dante assigns to Beatrice seems a bit heterodox, doesn\u2019t it?) As for myself, I found Jack<\/em> hard to read. Not because it was hard to understand, but because I could not summon the emotional attention it required. Perhaps this is because I\u2019m parenting a lot during Covidtide. Perhaps it\u2019s the Internet forming me in a way that makes novels nearly impossible to read. Jack<\/em> took me weeks to finish. I found myself feeling sorry for my students, whom I force to read Gilead<\/em>. But unlike many of my students, I persevered to the end. I did so because Marilynne Robinson\u2019s writings bless me. She\u2019s helped form my own Christian consciousness. She helps me slow down and be still. She\u2019s helped me see the wondrous beauty latent in every soul.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Alex Engebretson<\/strong> is a Senior Lecturer at Baylor University.\u00a0His book\u00a0<\/em>Understanding Marilynne Robinson was published by The University of South Carolina Press.<\/em><\/p>

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Alex Engebretson. The slow pace and deep delight in the beauty of the world that characterize Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead novels can counter-catechize us to the demands of our liberal, capitalist society. The Church should take advantage of that.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1143,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"elementor_header_footer","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"ocean_front_end_style_editor":"no","ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[48,10,59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives","category-essays","category-issue-9","entry","has-media"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/farefwd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/Palmyra_Methodist_Episcopal_Church_Warren_County_Iowa_2019-2150-Paul-R.-Burley--scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1707&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1142"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1142\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1268,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1142\/revisions\/1268"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/farefwd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}