But is accepting Christ as your lord and savior really accepting the tradition of Christianity? What tradition did the apostles follow? Tradition, as we talk about it, strikes me as being divorced from being a disciple of Christ.
Certainly we may choose a _church_ tradition, but at its root, being a Christian isn’t rooted in a tradition–it is rooted in the Person of Christ.

but at its root, being a Christian isn’t rooted in a tradition–it is rooted in the Person of Christ.
But how do you find out about the person of Christ, apart from tradition (which includes the Bible)?

While no one expects people to sit at home chanting by candlelight, there is an irony in all these “serious Christians” partaking in drink and food, texting and wide-screen television, watching the yearly orgy of capitalism known as the Super Bowl. Watching millionaires bash in to each other to profit other millionaires, interrupted by millions spent on 30 second ads couldn’t be further removed from the culture of simplicity and anti-modernity.

Um, Peter, that was the point of this post, a recognition that there was something funny about this. Anyway, we were watching a “yearly orgy of capitalism known as the Super Bowl,” but we were also watching a football game. Is ordinary pleasure forbidden in your world? Good luck with an ethic that tells people it’s wicked to watch the Super Bowl.

Good luck with an ethic that tells people it’s wicked to watch the Super Bowl.
I understand your point, but how is that different from an ethic about a whole range of modern spectacles. That’s what makes “real Christianity” such a hard sell, at least when it comes to critiquing the culture.
I agree with your commenter that it is a pause for reflection about one lives a life that questions modernity when one is constantly rolling-around in it.

But this is our common condition. Unless you are a hermit or Amish, you are embedded in modernity, and will have made some compromise with it. Nobody except the Amish, or cloistered monastics, can judge the modern world from a position of purity. But we all have to establish a foothold of some sort in this world, to live a meaningful life. Christians have the obligation to try to be “in this world, but not of it.” My theologian friend used last night’s gathering as a launching point for a discussion of this topic, and what it means for us living where we do, as we do.
Inasmuch as you are probably neither Amish nor a cloistered monastic, care to share how you negotiate the contradictions of which we speak?

Still, he has a good point: there is something phony about promoting tradition in the postmodern world.
I submit that there are a lot of us in the uneasy middle, who have to do the best we can trying to negotiate modernity with our guilty consciences, balancing ourselves between not letting an awareness of the difficulty of our position prevent us from saying No when No needs saying, but also allowing that difficulty to keep us humble about making sweeping judgments of the compromises others make.
This is a great post, Rod.
My (unsurprising?) take is that “tradition” has become a proxy for maturity. We see the wisdom of the ages being tossed out with the bathwater, and so we want to yell “Stop!” even as we take advantage of all the benefits of moving along.
Indeed, the same technology that encourages us to immaturity makes available to us whole worlds of ancient and current learning. We need to become literate in how these technologies alter our perceptions if we’re to hope to grasp how to hold on to the wisdom of the past while living in the environments of the future.
CAPTCHA +2

Larry,
how do you find out about the person of Christ, apart from tradition (which includes the Bible)?
This is spot-on. But the truth is even more radical than that, because it is not about “finding out about” the person of Christ, as if having information about Christ were enough. It’s about being united to the person of Christ, by grace. And you cannot be united to Christ simply by knowing about him. You must be united to him by being joined to the community which he founded, the fullness of him who fills all, in all.
The Apostolic Tradition is not a body of information handed down from those who know the information to those who do not yet know it; it is the divine life, handed on from those who are alive to those who are still dead.

care to share how you negotiate the contradictions of which we speak?
I acknowledge the contradictions and don’t suggest that rejecting modernity and embracing “tradition” is the answer to spiritual awareness or fulfillment. I try to get out of my head and focus on my heart.

There’s been over 50 posts so far on these Superbowl threads, and so far nary a mention of Tim Tebow.

Our modern struggle is different, but no less real than the struggles of life throughout the ages. Perhaps now it’s a bit more existential — less about how to physically survive or finding purpose in the midst of unchangeable oppressive live circumstances, and more about how to balance what is available with what is good for us. A problem of affluence, rather than the scarcity which most of our fore-bearers had to contend with. I completely agree that throwing up our hands because a “pure” traditional lifestyle isn’t really possible would be foolish. Humans have always struggled with separating the baby from the bathwater. I think now there is just a lot more bathwater and you have to swim in some of it to get to the baby. (Sorry for that painfully stretched metaphor, but I think it illustrates my thoughts.)
Finally, I would submit that not even the Amish are immune from the modernist struggle. They accept rides to town in their neighbors’ pick-up trucks when the need arises, and they have discussions within their communities about what kinds of modern technologies to allow for the good of the community. Phones? One Amish community I read about solved the phone dilemma by having a community phone in a public gathering place, but not allowing them in private homes. It was still a question they had to contend with. As Amish farms begin to be too small to support the entire community, Amish men are taking jobs outside the community. The Meetinghouse our Quaker meeting is building (almost finished!) was framed by an Amish work crew. They got special dispensation — by providing their own insurance, I think — to wear their broad-brimmed hats instead of hard hats. I’m sure the decision whether to wear the hard hats or not was (and perhaps still is) a point of extended discussion within the community. How to balance tradition (and whatever other values are at play for them) with the safety benefits of commercially produced and purchased hard hats?

Just a note that the Amish are not “pure” as in rejecting technology.
I’ve been in an Amish home. They had a Swedish refrigerator, powered by kerosene. They had football team posters on the walls. Their workshop used power tools that were on an air-compressor, electrified by Honda car batteries. They can now have telephones on power poles a certain distance from their homes.
They just slow down the rate of change, they do not reject it completely.
What’s that got to do with “real” Christianity, anyway?

“What’s that got to do with “real” Christianity, anyway? ”
I don’t recall anything in the teachings of Christ about rejecting or embracing technology. Most of what I recall is about how to relate to others and God.
How did “tradition” become equated with Christianity?? If I recall correctly, Christ was actually advocating a break from the “tradition” as espoused by the Pharisees. I can’t see where he would have had a problem with the internet or cars or whatever in and of themselves.

I don’t think the issue is about using technology. Moving from clay tablets to papyrus was a radical technological innnovation at the time and certainly had an impact on that society. No one for several thousand years would consider writing on clay tablets. Pens are a lot more convenient than the styllus. I think the issue is more about how we allow technological innovations to shape our culture. The focus could be more productively placed on how we relate to each other and the rest of the created universe than wheither we use technology or not. If you use your cell phone to help maintain your connection to family than you are still honoring tradition and that which makes life meaningful. If you combine your cell phone use with a lifestyle that finds joy not in consumption but in your family, faith and work than I would say you are living a more traditional life. I know people who have returned to the land and eschewed many features of modern life yet they have no connection to family and avoid the locals. I sometimes find it odd that some who speak so lovingly of the American past as a better time forget that those folks who plowed the fields and established small towns were migrants themselves and they displaced the locals ( native peoples).
As to living locally – much of human history has been marked by migrations for exactly the reasons Deneen describes – the loss of arable land, invasions etc. Staying in place was often a luxury our ancestors could ill afford. Our mobility today is no longer a function of the need for arable land but it is the modern equivalent – jobs etc. The strip mining Deneen speaks of has been going on for a long time – since the invention of agriculture which produces surplus food and cities. The same dynamics which cause people to leave the hinterland and move to the city results in art, music and scholarship. It is a little late to get all riled up about it. I think the important decision is to recognize that where you are is local – and to commit to and support that community. One can stay put in the place you were born and yet not live locally. I do very much agree though that there is an element of hypocrisy than is more than a necessary compromise. If you truly believe that the organization you work for is part of that which you protest – than don’t work at that organization.
It seems to me that the Super Bowl exemplifies the dilemna – if things are so bad our only ability to connect with our roots is to watch the ultimate consumer/modern culture spectacle then it for sure is time to pack it in. Of course – one can connect with your roots in other kinds of ways.

Every new cultural development is a free rider on the previous one, the way every twig is a free rider on the branch it sprung from. What’s problematic is when you pretend that you’re moving *down* the tree. Crunchy conservativism is a new outgrowth, like all of the other new movements from tea partyism to the emering church. They are all equally rooted in modern culture, and should be compared on their merits.
This is inconvenient for people who wish to avoid competing in the marketplace of ideas by claiming that their new variant is actually more fundamental than all the rest, but as you point out, that argument is weak anyhow. There’s a reason culture moved on from the fundamentals.

I was only going to go to a SuperBowl party yesterday because it was also my nameday (St. Richard of Wessex, 7 February), pretty much everybody I would have invited to a nameday party was going to be at said SuperBowl party, and the host said, “Hey, we can do both.” Otherwise, I don’t care about the SuperBowl (although it was pretty neat last year to see Troy Polamalu making the Sign of the Cross on national tv).
As it happened, I got sick, was stuck at home all day, and everybody forgot anyway. I’m in Indiana, so all the Colts fans had much bigger things to worry about.
With respect to Tradition, it’s pretty hard to get around 2 Thess 2:15 — “Stand firm and hold to the traditions (??????????) you were taught by us, either by our word or our epistle”. I suppose you can argue about just what is meant there, but since the plain meaning of ????????? is “tradition,” you can’t really assert that the New Testament represents a blanket condemnation of the concept.
Richard

My understanding of the Amish is that they are not anti-technology as such. Rather they take a cautious/intentional approach to adopting new technology by asking the entire time, “how will this innovation effect our community and spiritual health”. Here is a nice link laying out how the Amish decide which technologies to adopt (or not):
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.01/amish_pr.html

Rod, if one wanted to be like the Amish, that option is always there. But there’s got to be a defensible middle ground between complete refusal (the Amish option) and complete, uncritical acceptance.
I disagree with this. Some points:
1) The Amish live at a certain level of technology. What makes the Amish different is they have chosen this level as a community, picking and choosing what works for building community (hard work and thrift) and rejecting what divides and destroys them (isolating leisure, birth control, individualism, materialism, etc.). They reject those things that don’t work for their culture, but they certainly do not have “complete refusal” when it comes to technology or to interaction with others. They pick and choose, just like everyone does to some extent.
2) The real issue: what technologies and cultural lifestyles divide us as a Christian community, and which ones build us? What makes us more human and what makes us less? These are the big questions, and Deneen and 99% of CC certainly gets them wrong imo.
Examples of choices we have made:
a) we accept “pull media” (books, internet and telephone with ringer turned off)
b) we reject “push media” (tv, radio)
c) we grudging accept energy technologies that are useful, but seriously minimize their use (cars when nothing else will do, walking/biking otherwise, electricity but conservation, motors but by hand if practical)
d) we reject non-community technologies that replace the social and accept things that operate at a pace that allows one to build community (reject video games, accept board games and cards; reject video games and wi and recorded music, accept musical instruments, song and dance; reject Super Bowl parties, accept birthday parties and religious feast days)
e) reject unhealthy things, embrace healthy and whole foods (no fast foods, no processed foods except ones that have raw ingredients, little sugar, no coffee, etc.)
None of this is “rejection” as much as it is merely “not doing” in order to make room for what is good and health. Personally, I have no desire to watch the Super Bowl and imbibe the cultural crap (who needs it?) However, I often watch the commercials later as a window into just how bad it’s getting out there. I’m always amazed at how immune people have become to how bad tv really is for Christians; if you don’t watch tv, you can really see it unlike those who are dipped in the slime every so often.

A quick final comment: it’s really not complicated at all. The Amish and (real) Christians merely place GOD, FAMILY, and COMMUNITY first. It’s a no-brainer. Then they are quick to reject MATERIALISM (mammon over God), FEMINISM (personal agendas over family) and INDIVIDUALISM (personal agendas over friends and neighbors). Everything else flows from these values. And Ideas have Consequences – following natural law creates a dang good, healthy life. I’ve lived on the other side growing up, and it’s anything but.

Rod said:
“I submit that there are a lot of us in the uneasy middle, who have to do the best we can trying to negotiate modernity with our guilty consciences, balancing ourselves between not letting an awareness of the difficulty of our position prevent us from saying No when No needs saying…”
That’s life. I say that in a positive sense, not a negative one. That’s the challenge of being in the world and not of it. The Amish are barely in the world at all. Adam and Eve were not in it at all. We are. We have eaten of the “fruit of the knowledge OF GOOD and of evil”. It’s worth remembering that the state of innocence was not the state of Glorification.
What I’m saying is, why should we expect things to be easy and perfect in our fallen (but still hopeful) world? I constantly wonder whether I’ve made too many compromises with the world, and I know plenty of Christians who are very non-worldly who would probably say that I have. But the fact that I wonder is a testament to the fact that I’m (somewhat more) fully living and grappling with the dilemmas of the world. And that’s not a bad thing.
I may be a traditionalist, but the tradition I want to preserve is the robust one of the Greek world or the High Middle Ages or whatever (always somewhat idealized) golden age you prefer. But it’s NOT the emaciated one of the Dark Ages, which hardly grappled with the world at all – and also missed out on those benefits. There was lots of piety during the Dark Ages – probably far more than our own day – but also no theology, philosophy, literature…..all of which expand the possibilities of knowing ourselves and God to a degree far beyond what anyone in the Dark Ages could have hoped for.
All good things have danger associated with them. To be fully human is to venture onto that path (as one is able), fully aware of the greater possibility for good and for evil. This means being ever more vigilant against the potential new evils of modernity, but also being grateful for the potential new goods.
To quote one philosopher who thought pretty deeply about modern technology, “the closer we come to the danger, the more brightly do the ways into the saving power begin to shine….”
I’m almost surprised to hear myself write these words, almost as though I’m rejecting MacIntyre’s conclusion or suggesting some kind of conclusive answer beyond what my meagre wisdom can and should offer. But I think the Amish solution forces us to reject civilization. Besides, I think we need to be skeptical about solutions. Hobbes was wrong. Worldly existence is a life to be lived, not a problem to be solved.
Thanks for your thoughts, Rod. It sounds like you’re truly living life.

Fine comments and important questions, Rod; thanks for sharing, as always. Here’s a response (or at least a responding question) from one sometimes Front Porcher; perhaps others will join in.

Anonymous @ 2 AM writes:
“I may be a traditionalist, but the tradition I want to preserve is the robust one of the Greek world or the High Middle Ages or whatever (always somewhat idealized) golden age you prefer. But it’s NOT the emaciated one of the Dark Ages, which hardly grappled with the world at all – and also missed out on those benefits. There was lots of piety during the Dark Ages – probably far more than our own day – but also no theology, philosophy, literature…..all of which expand the possibilities of knowing ourselves and God to a degree far beyond what anyone in the Dark Ages could have hoped for.”
The shade of a certain Charlemagne is now clearing his throat in your general direction, good sir/madam/whatever. And the Venerable Bede. And you may wish to brush up on the activities of certain monks at places like Lindisfarne. And let’s not forget Byzantium !
Charlemagne managed (for about 30 years or so) to make the area around Aachen a serious center of learning/copying/scholarship. Recall that he hired a certain Alcuin to run his teaching programs; one of the greatest intellects in Church history. And recall that this was in the early Ninth Century.
Granted, it didn’t last—those dam-ed Vikings !—but at the risk of sounding pedantic, just because it may not have lasted doesn’t mean it wasn’t important or didn’t count for anything. The fact that you’re using majuscule and miniscule letters to write your posts, btw, means that something they did survived (1,200 years, give or take a decade or so), and made a difference. Now THAT’S what I call a long-standing tradition !
Modernity did not arise out of nothing. There were, are, and always will be other “raw materials” for Human minds to work with.
Your servant,
Lord Karth

I agree with the thrust of this post. Years ago, when Vanna White (of Wheel of Fortune) was receiving lots of positive publicity for just being Vanna White, I thought, how inane- are we really that superficial? Don’t we have better things to do? That is the “law” speaking, telling us to be perfect. But then I realized that we have the gospel, and the holy “work” has been done for us- we have a certain amount of license to enjoy God’s gifts, even things as silly as Vanna White. Laugh and enjoy. But there is a very real danger of escaping into this kind of superficiality, and forgetting to “love” others by serving in our normal capacities. We are caught in this existential situation, never getting it exactly right, sinner and justified at the same time. Yes, for you theologically inclined, I think of it in terms of Lutheran law and gospel.
How do I work it out personally ? I’m pretty ascetic in my take on life, and with my kids (e.g. no video games), but enjoy the odd pleasure like sports (not watching entire games, though, even Super Bowls).

Karth,
I’ll defer to your knowledge of the 7th-10th century world and accept the correction.
Nonetheless, I think the general point still stands. If anything, your evidence only goes to show that even in the (relatively) dark(er) ages, it was worth engaging with the world rather than retreating.