"mightier than the waves of the sea" In the ancient Near East, the sea was a primeval, chaotic power. In the Babylonian creation story the Enuma Elish, Tiamat, the Mother of the Gods, is a primordial sea goddess who embodied chaos. In Ugaritic texts, the weather god Baal battles Yam, the chaotic sea deity. In Egypt the sea god was Nu, who was called the "Father of the Gods." Living in the waters of Nu was the great snake Apep, called "the Lord of Chaos" as the embodiment of disorder and darkness. Given this cultural background, it's not surprising that the Hebrew Scriptures describe Yahweh ..read more

In the conclusion of The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries Evans-Wentz connects the Celtic experience of fairies with psychological and psychical research that was prevalent at the time. According to Evans-Wentz this research helps prove the existence of fairies. Recall, The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries was published in 1911. Freud had published The Interpretation of Dreams in 1900, putting the unconscious on the map. Hypnosis was being widely used at the time in the treatment of mental disorders. The Society for Psychical Research, devoted to the scientific investigation of psych ..read more

So, let's say you want to believe in fairies. More, you take Hart's argument from the last post to heart and have concluded that you have a moral duty to believe in fairies. Or, you at least think that being open to believing in fairies is saner, more rational, and more wholesome than an arid, boring, and soul-sucking disenchantment. How, then, is such a leap into the purportedly fantastical to be accomplished?  How do you make yourself believe in fairies?  Well, to go back to the first post and Evans-Wentz's anthropological study in The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries, what you'll ..read more

In my researches about the Celtic fairy-faith, preparing for my class this summer in Ireland, I came across David Bentley Hart's 2009 essay "The Secret Commonwealth," which Hart has reposted on his Substack newsletter.  In "The Secret Commonwealth" Hart sets out a defense of the fairy-faith. If you know Hart's work, this will not be surprising. For example, Hart's most recent book is entitled All Things Are Full of Gods, which takes its title from a quote from the pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus. You can draw a straight line from the ancient belief that "all things are f ..read more

This May I'm teaching and leading a class on Celtic Christianity, taking a group of students to Ireland.  I did a deep dive into Celtic Christianity to write my chapter on "Celtic Enchantments" in Hunting Magic Eels. I'm proud of that chapter for its scholarly integrity and academic rigor which avoids a lot of the commercialized nonsense one finds among those who sell visions of "Celtic Christianity" to spiritual-but-not-religious audiences. Leading a three week class on Celtic Christianity has caused me to return to the pre-Christian Celts and the Irish monastic tradition. I'm wanting t ..read more

"It is good to give thanks to the Lord" Gratitude is having a cultural moment. It has for a while now, due to the research of positive psychology making its way into wellness culture. I tell much of this story in The Shape of Joy. But it's important to make a distinction between interpersonal gratitude and what is called existential or cosmic gratitude.  Gratitude, we know, is the emotional response we have to being given a favor or gift. When we receive these gifts from another person our gratitude is directed toward the giver. This is interpersonal gratitude. Relational thanks. But w ..read more

Out at the prison we were discussing the "do not worry" passage from the Sermon on the Mount: “Therefore I tell you: Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing? Consider the birds of the sky: They don’t sow or reap or gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you worth more than they? Can any of you add one moment to his life span by worrying? And why do you worry about clothes? Observe how the wildflowers of the field grow: They don’t labor or spi ..read more

For years in this space I've made the point that faith involves both orthodoxy and orthopraxy. There is both "right belief" and "right practice." The notion that one can "practice Christianity" is new to many people and is generally neglected. Christianity tends to become mental, theological, doctrinal, creedal, propositional, and metaphysical. Christianity is something we "believe in," "espouse," or "assent to." We hold to Christian "values," "beliefs," and "worldviews." But Christianity is also something we do. Christianity is acting, behaving, and living.   Beyond orthodoxy and o ..read more

You often hear very earnest Christians proclaim that they love God "more" than anything else in their life. That we have to love God "more" than our spouses, our friends, and our children. And while I understand what I think these people are trying to say, I've always had a worry and concern here. For example, as newlyweds and young parents, Jana and I once had a conversation with a very devout and earnest couple from church. We were sharing about our spiritual lives and how we wanted God to strengthen our marriages. And at one point in this conversation the couple said, "We don't want our ma ..read more

At the end of the last post I mentioned that I was borrowing from Maximus the Confessor concerning the nature of sin at the first instant.  The basic idea is linking sensation to desire. When sensation dawns in consciousness desire follows. That desire pulls our loves toward created things and away from God. This, I am arguing, is the primordial fall, recapitulated in every person. Our desires "immediately" tug our loves toward the sensible world, causing us to lose contact with the invisible. This isn't an exact example, since it has to do with fear rather than desire, but think of Pete ..read more