My Sickness Unto Death

I'm realizing more and more what a good choice Kierkegaard was for this essay, for it seems more and more that I learn something of myself the more I study Kierkegaard. His inner struggle seems to loosely match my own, as I'm sure he had intentioned for all of his readers. I'm also realizing, in judging whether Kierkegaard was successful in rising above the idioms and systems of his day to communicate something significant, that he might not have 'risen above' in his communication. But such was not his intent; therefore, in wallowing in the endless categories, the dialectic and the struggle, he was showing that the paradigm of his time was not worthy of him - or us, for that matter.

How would Kierkegaard Respond to Camus?

Our generation has often spoken with reverence of Sisyphus, and I felt moved to respond just now, after recalling it. Many of us have talked as if Camus has put forth something we’ve known our whole lives, but without realizing it. I have to say that I, too, have stood with them, admiring the mastery with which the human condition is considered within these few pages. If this seems like the truest account of humanity, perhaps it is because it may be.

I know I would be the typical one to be speaking like this, but then again, you probably know already that I must have more to say than that. And I do. But inasmuch as Camus focuses on the human condition, Ned, I believe he is right, and yet, if my life indicates anything I hope it shows that there is more to life than just absurdity.

But going back to Camus, he believed what he wrote. And I think his work is so believable because he wrote about himself, and then he also wrote about all of us. He knew himself better than the best of us do, perhaps, even on our most insightful days. He looked at the same world, the same life, that we do, but I think his bravery – his ability to not let himself be diverted from considering the chaos around him – is admirable. He saw the fatal flaw of our life – the meaninglessness, and the eternity. And yet with his fist raised, he turned back to himself, to his life, never reasoning that perhaps the intention of life is for us to see its meaninglessness and look beyond it for answers.

I did say ‘eternity’, even though Camus said he did not believe in such a thing. But it is my opinion that he did, and this was the thing that he believed without articulating, just as you and I read his writing and felt we had believed it all along without articulating it. For in ‘shaking his fist’, he was looking out at the eternity of lives lived over all of time, boiling them all down to one generality – that they are all meaningless, going off into eternity with no end, and no purpose. And so, where he saw that reason is unable to surmount the chaos of Life, and chose his life anyway, that is where I leave him. I found faith instead, and in finding it, realized that it found me.

I write this to share my experience, and faith is my experience. It is how I understand the purpose of this life. Ah, purpose – something from which Camus was so far, and yet so near at the same time. In your own journey through life, I pray that you too will continue to ask these hard questions of life.

The Sum of Human Wisdom

Alas, the truth of human wisdom is laid forth by Kierkegaard in The Sickness Unto Death.

"The summa summarum [sum total] of all human wisdom is this "golden" (perhaps it is more correct to say "plated") mean: ne quid nimis [nothing too much]. Too little and too much spoil everything. This is bandied about among men as wisdom, is honored with admiration; its exchange rate never fluctuates, and all mankind guarantees its worth. Now and then there is a genius who goes a little way beyond this, and he is called crazy - by sensible people. But Christianity makes an enormous giant stride beyond this ne qui nimis into the absurd; that is where Christianity begins - and offense."

The Greater Hypocrisy

I was writing in my journal Sunday about this topic, and it dawned on me that perhaps there is a greater hypocrisy among those faithful to the church than there is among those cultural Christians that identify themselves with the church but show only marginal conviction. It has become increasingly apparent to me that those truly in the grips of the gospel will want to share their faith - not as something that they do, but as the foremost thing that they do. This means that in raising their children, they are training them to share their faith; in loving their spouse, they are encouraging them to share their faith; in choosing a career, they are choosing the place in which Christ can best use them to expand His kingdom; in attending church, they are learning how to share their faith better; an so on.

But sadly, most people in church on a Sunday morning don't want to share their faith - not as the foremost thing. And so they are faithful to the church, hoping that the church will meet another need of theirs, be it community or importance or truth. They use the church to meet a need that it was not meant to meet. And so they misuse the church. See, when people say that the church is full of hypocrites, they are saying that the church is full of people who, on Sunday, say, "yes - I believe this," but then the rest of the weak say, "I'm not going to believe this stuff enough to change the way I live. It's important, but I just don't care enough." But then the hypocrites I'm talking about say, "I don't really believe this stuff, but I'm going to pretend that I do as long as I can so that I can use this church to get something that I want." I may be misguided, but all the sudden I am thinking that this is the greater hypocrisy, because it is on a much deeper level.

Of course, I'm convicting myself here as the greatest offender. And then there are those who don't do the things they want to do, but do the things they don't want to do, and so on and so forth. I am not sure that this state of agony exhonerates one from the above offense, but even so, it is probably the state of half of the Church today.

Truth we can't deny

Lyrics from the forthcoming album...

We are bound for better truth than this,
which we have come to find,
which bids us hold inside
the truth we can't deny.
We know we can't arrive,
for it is ours to strive,
pushing all else aside
for a truth we can't deny.

Who would give the sun to watch the sky,
and make believe the reasons why,
and give their life unto the call
that so often eludes us all?

Who would give away their right to know
embracing all their strife to show
that certainty is not the goal
of those who stive to truly know?

We are bound for better truth than this,
which we have come to find,
which bids us hold inside
the truth we can't deny.
We know we can't arrive,
for it is ours to strive,
pushing all else aside
for a truth we can't deny.

To push aside the things we know today
and embrace the one true way
goes against uncertainty we claim
holds any truth behind a veil.

For who am I to say what's true for you,
and what are you to hold me to?
I know there must be more than this
to show the reaasons we exist.

We are bound for better truth than this,
which we have come to find,
which bids us hold inside
the truth we can't deny.
We know we can't arrive,
for it is ours to strive,
pushing all else aside
for a truth we can't deny.