Expressing the Body

"In the beginning was the Word (logos), and the Word (Logos) was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning."

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."

"God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."

"the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."

I once asked the world, "What is language?" I asked far and wide. I asked philosophers, scientists, missionaries, sociologists, psychologists and linguists; men from old ages, men from the current age and asked them to define what they found. For if God created the heavens and the earth, and left his fingerprints upon them, shouldn't those who've studied creation, and the marvelous capacity to speak and form words, shouldn't they know something of the divine? Shouldn't they know something of God? My journey as a scholar took about two years, yet I abandoned it when I searched for the Word in the ordinary, plainly spoken world of today. My journey as a scholar was not in vain. Only now, years later do I have the courage to return to my notes and speak of what I saw. My hope is not to quote exactly what I read, but to cast a vision of what I understood while perusing the minds of the intelligentsia.

My journey started with a German by the name of Martin Heidegger. Raised Catholic, Heidegger abandoned the road for the priesthood when he began his journey as a philosopher. Heidegger is not known for his faith, for when he left seminary he did not produce any works related to faith; it would be accurate to describe him as one who burned out, and then went on to accomplish many great things in another field. Heidegger is best known for his work Being and Time, in which he explores the question of existence. His exploration of this topic is thorough and sharp. He goes back to Ancient Greece and forward to his day, the age of the World Wars. He notes that the ancient philosophers wondered what it meant to be, how existence described what was, but could not be described itself. He notes how men abandoned the topic of existence, as many gave up the pursuit of something so common, but he pushes into existence and approaches a divine notion. Being simply is. It is what we are, but for all the things that are, there is something that is not. The Nothing. This Nothing is wholly other, entirely apart from what is. This Nothing is outside of, yet somehow visible, as we are aware that if there is, there must also be not. But this Nothing is not a negation of existence, rather it is it's own sphere of something. It is set apart. Knowable, but mysterious. It was here I found Heidegger's description of God. That we must thrust ourselves out into the existence of the Nothing [God] and embrace our anxiety of uncertainty about this something that is not at all like us. A midst all of his writings, I found a step of faith, the belief in something that is not like us, that is not like us yet we still know a grain of sand of what it is; it is enough to know and not fully describe. The search for description of Being and Nothing is a worthwhile effort, and points us in the direction of the divine.

As I considered Heidegger's words, I considered words themselves. What is language? And how is it that we speak? I asked a man by the name of Noam Chomsky, whose life long goal is to discover Universal Grammar: the set of rules that govern all parts and pieces of speech, the roots of all languages and discover the origin of man's ability to communicate with one another. He too began his journey near something biblical, for his first work was on ancient Semitic language. He also did not pursue this journey, and we would be wrong to describe him as a Christian, Catholic or even a follower of God. but in his quest for truth, he must reconcile the origin of language with man's ability to speak. It is here that he falters, and does not provide a conclusive standpoint. His science and mastery of grammatics does not provide him with a story of origin, it simply tells him that language is extremely diverse, matching an extremely diverse people that are somehow beholden to the same laws of language and particulars of expression, even though the how and why a group of speakers speak the way they do is a trail that leads into the fog of time. We simply have not produced a united story explaining language in all cultures, for some have never studied grammar; they speak because they can. It is simply enough to speak and be united with a few others in the way we speak, even though we long for the answer of origin. It is a question that those surrounded by many languages ask, "How is it that we speak so differently, but are still so similar?" We desire to know what holds us together, even though we're not entirely sure what that something is.

It was here that I asked the post-modern philosophers, the men of our age, what they thought. I asked Jacques Derrida what he thought of existence, for he had the work of Heidegger to build his theories from. Derrida did not tell me what was, only how to break down what is. To deconstruct what has been built. In his work I discovered that our highly structured existence, and the mechanical pursuit of what drives it, leads us to a place of deadening. A place of aporetics. Here Derrida describes how to live, by asking what is so important about life? How should we spend our time? He provides few answers, but does say this; many people want to know how to live, not what to live. The massive structures that govern our modernly designed lives leave something to be desired. The designed tracts from birth to grave do not give us answers. The questions of who we should be and the answers our societies give us are not enough, for they only tell us tasks, they do not give us meaning. Our hearts cry out for something more, a meaning behind all of the structured madness we find invading our thoughts, even though we do not notice that the constructs are telling us how to live. How is it that something dead should tell something alive what it means to find life?

And so I asked, "What is life? What is the natural life that give us the ability to speak?" I asked Broca and Wernicke, men who spent their lives studying the brain, for whom portions of the brain are named after; surely they know something of biological life and expression, something about the meaning behind our ability to question and the structures of our minds! Yet even here we came up short, for while we can describe regions of the brain and how language can broken up into the written, the visual and the spoken, all brains are different. Each brain processes language slightly differently yet somehow the same. The size of the brain, or shape of the head, does not even display the ability of that specific mind to process language. In other words the visuals do not tell us how vibrant or monotone the mind. For intelligence is more than any one region of the brain to process language; it is greater than these regions, even though it is limited through the regions ability to express. Brain electro-activity can be mapped within specified regions, but the mind of an individual is unlike that of any other. Each mind is unique, even though so very similar to those around it. Who can say what language will come forth from its lips? What thoughts are carried along the currents of dendrites, neurons and neurotransmitters? Who can say what truths a mind has grasped or what darkness still surrounds it? Where do we find the answers to these questions? The answer to how we can communicate with each other?

And then I discovered a Frenchmen commissioned by a Quebec university to explain how to build bridges between those who speak different languages, but inhabit similar space. A real conundrum for French speaking Canadians who live in a predominantly English speaking society. Here I found the language games, and simple rules of human interaction: that we must have something shared in order to build a foundation; that we must 'play' with our foundations in order to build likeness; and that as we develop likeness we begin to establish culture, and culture is an establishment of those who choose to play with each other. In short, we must be near and around each other in order to establish similarities, allowing us to get along and understand one another. But this is not all Jean Lyotard wrote. He lashes out against meta-narratives, stories that offer the grand picture and exclude all other stories. But he was not writing against religion, rather he was writing against technology and the exact sciences that believe they can explain all. Never-the-less his work has had a profound impact on many who believe their grand narratives have caused separation and abandonment.

 I remember listening to a student in one of my classes begin a story with Lyotard's famous words "incredulity against meta-narratives," knowing that when he would finish he would declare his atheism. Even though Lyotard railed against the grand stories that brought war and political upheaval, he was not cursing God, for God was not his concern, but rather humanity and our constructed philosophies of existence.

And so I turned to my last friend, who, like many of those listed above, gave up belief in God as he could not reconcile God to his own personal worldview. Carl Rogers, the psychologist/sociologist who coined client-centered therapy, the art of listening to others, allowing them to heal as they processed their stories. He allowed them to play, to discover and to work at their own pace. All in an era that was building the constructions that Derrida and Lyotard would rebel against. His simple belief? Everyone was in need of healing. He never described the source of health, but knew that the road to healing involved patience, allowing people to unwind. That life was not all about having the correct answers, but the ability to safely express what we think and feel, want and desire. This is the dominant model of psychology today; everyone practices some form of Rogers described, not because Roger's described it, but because Roger's was describing a part of what it means to be human: to express and to be loved despite expression. It was here I found his description of God.

These were the atheists, the burned out, the far from religious that I asked my questions to. If I were to take their divine descriptions and place them together, they would describe a God who: was knowable, even though entirely other; who had put structures together for plurality of expression, yet these languages should be familiar enough that he could still communicate with them; who put into us a desire for more than the constructions of this world; and designed our minds to be so very vast and different from each other, yet also so close and alike that no physical difference could ever separate us from each other; who understood that building communicable language requires time spent in each others presence, and that a falsely constructed world should make those who seek who seek truth angry; and finally, this being should love us, listens to us, and be patient with us, no matter what we say. I recognize these qualities in the person of Jesus. For it is not enough to have a book, which is in and of itself a construction and a dead language, but God must spend time with us. Even though he is unlike us and set apart. He must overcome the Being/Nothing barrier, even though we don't know how to overcome it. Any God that does not spend time with his people, listen to them, care for them, is no god at all, but is a construction and meta-narrative designed by men. Such a god does not deserve to be worshipped; he deserves to be thrown out onto the trash pile of dead and useless ideas. This is what so many of my atheist friends have seen; this is what so many of my atheist friends have done. They have removed the construction of god from their lives, and they have been right to do so. Even though they rejected the idea of god, they still knew something about him. And what is it that a Christian knows about God in the midst of the chaos of living?

A Christian knows that false-notions of God should be cast aside, but this doesn't mean casting aside people or entire cultures, it means finding the truth and bringing it to life. For if God created, shouldn't we all be able to see something of the creator? Even if it is a broken and shattered image? I believe this is true, as would my friends St. Patrick and Vincent Donovan. Patrick, who rejected the fifth century world of Roman constructions and Catholic culture, went to an insignificant island west of Britain called Ireland and worked with a savage and pagan people. Instead of calling them sinners and telling them how far they were from God, he explained who God was through their culture. He embracing their natural surroundings, even while leading them away from their pagan beliefs. They didn't need to be Romanized or Catholicized/Christianized to know God. And their reaction to his efforts? Four hundred years of growing faith: conversions of entire tribes, abandonment of destructive ways, and a people who reached into Europe as the fires of God were growing dim. His movement defined Christianity for many. It was based on the person of Jesus as described by the Scriptures; it did not have to be changed to impact a people, it did not have to transformed into a story of only love and acceptance without judgment, it could exist simply as it was; recognized as the living Word of God inherent in every being in His image. Donovan believed this as well. He went to the Maasai in Africa, a people so bond to each other that Western Christianity could not penetrate their unity for over a hundred years. His plan to reach them? Spending time with the tribes on their lands, preaching the Word in their language, learning how to present the gospel through their culture. For his efforts he discovered why so many had failed; no one had approached the tribes as a singular entity. When he did so he converted entire tribes, who continued to be Maasai, not Westernized Christians! He came to understand that it was not about changing the Maasai so they could meet God, but rather changing his mindset about God and how He desires us to preach his message.

And for all of my scholarly study, all of the books I read, papers I wrote and things I left undone, I could not define how I should live. I knew there was more I could study, for I had not yet begun to unravel how geography shapes language, or how language physically manifests itself in our muscles, not just our minds. For while I was and still am deeply interested in the foundations of how we speak and how our bodies communicate who we are, I knew I was lacing something. People. For in my studies I began to spend more time with thoughts and ideas than connecting with people. I had learned what I would need to do to learn another culture, but I didn't know how to take that knowledge and make it real. So I walked away from the pressure of finding an answer; I pressure I had created, and simply sought to live, even though it caused me great pain to walk away from my ideas; I was not ready to express them, nor did I know how to say what I was searching for, even though I knew it was related to Jesus.

Over the few years since I left my thesis, this search has manifested itself in my stories and my writings. I abandoned technical language because I knew it wasn't simple enough; it only spoke to a small group of people. My desire is to speak plainly, even though what I think is plain language is often indecipherable to some of the people to whom I speak. I once loved my world of books, thoughts and ideas; it was comfortable. Working with people was much more difficult. At the time I struggled to understand those different from me or their motivations, for somehow my motivations were distinct, yet strangely similar to theirs. And so I lived as an alien in an American culture not my own, and even now I do not know how to explain my culture, for I am a product of many states. Even the pursuit of this self-definition is somewhat meaningless, as it is enough to say that I exist; I am human, that should be a sufficient definition to my thoughts and desires. Although it is nice to give reason for my difference by referencing a far off place and people. The living out of my desires will change over time and come forth in various expressions, but they are all a part of the larger expression of myself and the simple truth that we are all human, even though we may not look the same, act the same, or speak the same language. Some may say that I have abandoned my culture, and perhaps the Christian God. To this I would say, "I have abandoned your expression of God, for our God is bigger than our individual expressions; he is set-apart. He is Holy. And the LORD our God is One. He is not many. He is the One upon which our creatively driven existence spins and it is okay for us to see different parts of Him, to live that life which was given to us to be a part of His expression. God loves us and desires us to come to Him through the path He created; his manifestation as Jesus. Only Jesus fits the pattern we find when searching the world for answers. Everything else is a half answer, a partial truth that bears some likeness to God, but is incomplete. And even though we seek to fully describe God, we cannot. Because God, even though he has presented himself to us in a way we can understand, and know his desire for our healing, is not like us. You do not understand Him if you fully understand Him. There is always something more to learn, something new to find. And this is one of the ways He shows He loves us, and communicates with us." There is truth to His holiness. Familiarity within the good pieces of creation, upon which we catch glimpses of Him. I have found peace with those who ask questions and say, "why" rather than "do this and then you will find contentment". For I can tell you why the world, yet I cannot describe why it is the way it is; it is a complex mathematical calculation involving numerous constants, variables and forces, while at the same time being able to be stripped down to the bare variables of earthly principles, the human body and human nature. I cannot sufficiently describe all languages and thoughts processes, even though I may be able to recognize patterns and outcomes before final conclusions are ever spoken. Humanity is too wonderfully diverse. Such is what it means to be made in the image of the creator. There is a unity in our diversity that is as perplexing as it is amazing. We are not stagnant because the creator is not stagnant. The creator is life, and so we have life. The creator is the living breathing Word, and as such we have living and breathing words. The creator expresses himself, and we should be able to express ourselves, even if all of our expressions are not easily understood.