Useless Glory: Special Needs, Chinese Wisdom, and God’s Love

This week in Japan a man broke into a care center for disabled adults, tied up employees, and began killing disabled men and women with a knife. The man was a former employee who quit after revealing his deep disdain for the special needs men and women for whom he was helping to care. What began as dislike became hatred and resulted in mass murder.

A discomfort around those with “special needs” is not unique to one man in Japan, but is embedded in every culture across the globe. In fast-paced, capitalist cultures like those of the U.S., Japan, and Western Europe, people are measured by occupations and productivity. Try to remember the last time you were introduced or introduced yourself without answering the question “What do you do?”

And so, it is a matter of course that those who cannot be measured or categorized in this way often do not make for easy company. What can you talk about apart from your job, your last big vacation, or your active hobbies and team sports?

Let’s start by finding a solution in ancient wisdom. The Chinese sage Chuang Tzu or Zhuangzi (c. 4th century BCE) stands as perhaps my favorite Chinese thinker among those such as Confucius (Kongzi), Mencius, Han Feizi, and others. Chuang Tzu was all about what he called “wu wei,” acting by “non-action.” What he meant by this paradox was that life lived according to the nameless and eternal Dao (Way) was a way of letting things be as they really are, and of working in such perfect conformity to nature that it became unclear whether you were acting yourself or if things were simply unfolding by themselves.

I bring up Chuang Tzu because of a short poem he wrote about the glory of being “useless.” It ties in directly to the issue of understanding the glory in every person regardless of whether they are deemed “useful” by everyday societal assumptions. I quote it here in full because it is that worth reading. The translation comes from Thomas Merton, who was a Christian monastic also impressed by Chuang, in a book called The Way of Chuang Tzu (2004, p. 31-2):

Hui Tzu said to Chuang: I have a big tree, the kind they call a “stinktree.” The trunk is so distorted, so full of knots, no one can get a straight plank out of it. The branches are so crooked, you cannot cut them up in any way that makes sense.

There it stands beside the road. No carpenter will even look at it.

Such is your teaching—big and useless.

Chuang Tzu replied: Have you ever watched the wildcat crouching, watching his prey—This way it leaps, and that way, high and low, and at last lands the trap.

But have you seen the yak? Great as a thundercloud he stands in his might.

Big? Sure. He can’t catch mice!

So for your big tree. No use? Then plant it in the wasteland in emptiness. Walk idly around, rest under its shadow;

No axe or bill prepares its end. No one will ever cut it down.

Useless? You should worry!

And so this bizarre little episode ends. Hui Tzu was a friend of Chuang’s, a logician who sought to bring order to everything. Needless to say, the two of them argued a lot. Hui Tzu thinks much like modern culture: everything is evaluated based upon its usefulness; but this is a usefulness according to preconceived (often practical, yet shallow) notions.

What Chuang Tzu points out in talking about the wildcat and the yak is that everything animal, like every person or tree, has its own way of being that is good apart from what we make of it, and that such difference is a good thing. Hui couldn’t see the goodness of the tree because it didn’t conform to the patterns of “good” and “bad” he was used to.

But Chuang Tzu says, “Stand back. Just walk around the tree for a while. Maybe you’ll discover its inherent goodness when you stop projecting onto it your desires—desires which don’t take it for what it is, but for what it is not. Really, it’s very ‘uselessness’ frees it from the certain abuses society heaps upon everything labeled ‘useful’. In fact, Hui Tzu, it’s you who should be worried: because you’re so intent on being labeled that way, people will use you up as thoughtlessly as you wanted to chop down this tree!”

Our discomfort with those with special needs doesn’t really come from the people themselves, but from the realization that our categories and our way of thinking are completely insufficient to deal with this straightforward reality. The way forward isn’t to know immediately all the “intellectual” answers, but rather starts with an openness to understand and in giving up time simply to be around those with special needs. It takes a willingness to see differently.

The reward lies in a new ability to see the glory in simply living, the power of accepting people for exactly who they are. In Christianity, all dignity for people comes from two aspects: being created by God and being loved by God. Neither has to do with what we do. God does not love us because we are so great; rather, the goodness in us is only a result of God’s inescapable love. The difficulty—and the need for radical, in-breaking grace—lies in accepting the very love of God that pursues us all.

It means confessing that when it comes to letting-be and accepting our being-loved-by-God, those of us “useful” people are often the truly disabled, defining ourselves by things not central to who we are and thus abusing ourselves and abusing others.

Loving others for who they are as they have been created begins with accepting the love of God made concrete in the life, sacrifice, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, who came for us before we looked for him with love that pursues us even know—when we are ready to let ourselves be loved, and let that be enough.

Conclusion or Beginning?

What happened in Japan was a tragedy. But the same seed of discomfort which grew to murder in this man’s heart sits inside most of us. We can’t ignore it, or it’ll fester and grow. Please, don’t give it that chance. More than ever this world of violence and hateful speech needs those who are ready to begin with the knowledge of the brokenness and the goodness of every person: a goodness not based on our action, but God’s constant love.

So let’s stop. Breathe. Let’s do that admittedly hard work of appreciating those around us before we label them, before we use them, and before we let them be used—or murdered—carelessly by others.

What’s With All the Work?

In the 1980’s, a German theologian named Jürgen Moltmann wrote an essay entitled “the Right to Meaningful Work,” in which he examined the meaning and ethics of work from a Christian point of view.

He looks at work from three basic points of view: the person who works, the working community and society, and the big picture meaning of life, God, and everything.

In the ancient world, “labor” was seen as unvirtuous and meaningless, in large part because those who did that work were people defeated in battle. They were subjugated. The idea of work was tied to the idea of slavery.

In the Hebrew Bible, however, the first one who works is actually God! Yahweh, far from being a slave, worked creatively in total freedom. Work was an expression, not of slavery, but of freedom. And so when we get to Genesis 2:15, mankind’s first responsibility was to cultivate the earth—to participate with God in doing work. Moltmann makes the comment about the narrative:

“Not work itself, but work after the fall is regarded as work cursed by toil, pain, and uselessness. Therefore the deliverance of human beings from sin actually cannot lead also to deliverance from work, but only to a transformation of their work from curse to blessing.”

That’s a tall order. But another key in Genesis is Sabbath, or weekly rest. (It’s possible this conception invented the work week as we have come to know it.) Work isn’t just about producing, but it’s also about presenting, says Moltmann, meaning that we are not just working, but we can (and should) take time to be happy and pleased with what we’ve done. Work and enjoyment are in some sense tied together. It’s not just about “working for the weekend” when we can escape work, but about resting in the knowledge of what’s been done.

Moltmann next sees that Jesus himself is pictured in Isaiah 43 and 53 as a servant, one who carries sins like a porter. It was Jesus’ servanthood which led to the redemption of many. This flips the world upside down; now we are free because God has done the work of a slave. This is, for Moltmann, the hermeneutic for how we come to a Biblical understanding of work.

“The transference of the human concept of work to God and especially to his redeeming activity, then the redirection of the concept to human beings who are supposed to correspond to God” changes everything. Now we are taking part, in our limited way, in God’s continual creative and redemptive activity in the world.

But in a world which is work-crazy or which defines itself by its work—either by identifying work and life or by defining oneself by the work one avoids—there are some important things to keep in mind:

1. Work doesn’t define who you are or your value. Work, first of all, is for most all of us a means to make a living. But, as Moltman writes, “No one has to justify himself through work. No one has to demonstrate her right to existence through work! No one has to realize himself through work.” To argue those things, to follow up every introduction of our name with our work and make that the definition of a person, necessarily excludes the jobless, the disabled, and all of those who do work we don’t recognize officially as such but nevertheless is crucial for society (like raising children). It’s not really about ­self-realization, but Moltmann argues that work should provide a place for formation—helping you meet certain personal goals—and allow for some possibilities of self-expression—so that some of your work is identifiably yours.

2. Work in community can’t just be defined as “production,” or have to be what is called “creative” work. Production, reproduction, services, housecare, raising children, all of this is work which participates in cultivating our world, physical and social. Moltmann would rather define work in the communal sense as “active participation in the social process.” Everyone takes part in creating and shaping what we call our world. Unfortunately, by means of payment we can legitimize certain work and de-legitimize other work. Moltmann argues that all work which meets the definition should receive proper payment, but I am unsure how far this would correct our problematic assumptions. But it is something to consider.

3. Finally, he offers a few points for thinking through the place of work in the big picture. He writes:

• “In his or her work a person corresponds to the creating God.” This goes back to that Genesis account of people being made in God’s image and told to participate in creation. God isn’t a cosmic watchmaker, but someone actively engaged in making the world what it is, and he wants the people he has created to participate in their own ways.

• “In his or her work a person participates in God’s self-emptying for the purpose of liberating humanity.” We give up a lot of our time and energy just to work. But we need to see that in a bigger context. Work isn’t just about us. It isn’t just about our families. It’s about doing a small part to help make the world a better place. Work isn’t just about the present—it’s also about making a future for the generations to come.

• “In his or her work, even if not in it alone, a person realizes his or her call to freedom.” In work, we realize we have a self, and that we are able to make a difference, whether that’s making a box or negotiating between nations. There’s a world, and we all can do something with it. He cautions us though that we should not make what we usually legitimize as “work” the sole means of achieving our freedom or worth. But it can play a part.

There’s a lot more in the essay, but these are the basics. It’s not just about how I work, or how we work, but also about how we run jobs and corporations, about what kind of jobs we make and how we improve them. Is there room for self-expression in this job? Can we help those who are in charge appreciate how helpful—healthful—this would be? Is there a sense of community at work, or is it all competitive? Am I helping this situation?

Comment below with other thoughts you have on Moltmann’s ideas and any ways you’d improve them! Or with wholly new ideas inspired by this post!

Sparrows, Swallows and Finding Home

Home is an elusive place. For some, home is right where they are. Family, friends, joy, and peace are all around them. For others, home is merely a memory. Some of those memories are good, other memories are so bad that they have nearly been forced out altogether.

For some, it is people that make home what it is. For others, its tied to a physical place, that room where the light filters through just so, where the chair lets you sink in so far that the world is left somewhere out there, away. For still more, home is tied to a certain culture, a tradition, a way of life shared by people around us.

And then there are some of us who never really feel quite at home. Sometimes it feels so close, but we never quite reach it. That’s the position of the poet at the beginning of Psalm 84. He considers home to be where he can worship God in peace, but he is sad because he can’t be there.

Read through the beginning and try to connect with that sense of longing, that sense of homelessness.

Psalm 84:1-6 (ESV)

How lovely is your dwelling place,

O Lord of hosts!

My soul longs, yes, faints

for the courts of the Lord;

my heart and flesh sing for joy

to the living God.

 

Even the sparrow finds a home,

and the swallow a nest for herself

where she may lay her young,

at your altars, O Lord of hosts,

my King and my God.

Blessed are those who dwell in your house,

ever singing your praise!

 

Blessed are those whose strength is in you,

in whose heart are the highways to Zion.

As they go through the Valley of Baca

they make it a place of springs;

the early rain also covers it with pools…

All life is, in a sense, a quest for home. “Home” carries with it connotations of peace, of rest, of happiness even in the midst of struggles. “Job” isn’t home. “College” isn’t really home, either. “Abroad” reshapes our perceptions of what we call home, but in the end we want to get back home, even if it isn’t in the same place as we left. We define ourselves by our proximity to home.

Why does Psalm 84 mention birds? Sparrows are tiny birds. The Psalmist is talking about those who are the least significant in society. Those who feel like they can’t make a difference. Home can be hard to find when you feel like you don’t matter.

Next, the swallow desires to have a place for her children, where they can be safe and grow up well. She wants to be a home for others who are dependent on her. So many around seem like they can’t find a place to belong. What can we do?

But both find that home in the Temple. The poet wishes he, too, could fly off from where he is, far from home, and make his abode near to God.

But even if he can’t make it, there’s still strength to be had; the situation isn’t hopeless. There’s a home which begins in the heart. His deep longing for God and his devotion to God’s ways help him to realize that God is near to him. He is aware of God’s presence, so that even the driest of places (the Valley of Baca) becomes an oasis, a home. 

Blessed are those… While home can begin in one heart, it’s never meant to stay a solitary place. Now, often I don’t feel very at home anywhere. But I know that wherever I end up, I can worship God through the mediation of Jesus Christ, whose Spirit is present everywhere and who makes a home in the lives of those who love him. And God’s home is open to anyone, significant or insignificant. It’s a place we can all come, no matter our differences or backgrounds. And it’s a better place the more who come. Come exactly as you are, and together, perhaps, we’ll begin to find…home.

Jesus, Psalm 88, and Killswitch Engage

Did you ever play that board game where you were given three things and had to come up with something that tied them all together? At first glance, Jesus and Psalm 88 may seem to go together, because, you know, the Bible. But what about the metal/hardcore band, Killswitch Engage?

I’m not quite the music connoisseur that I used to be, but I still love some metal. It’s all about a free reign for creativity, and, contrary to what non-metalheads often think, the genre is probably the most diverse. Killswitch Engage is one of those bands that I have really enjoyed. They blend interesting rhythms, shredding guitar riffs, and a scream/clean vocal combination that I find is just the right proportion for my musical taste.

Oh, and the lyrics are often written juxtaposing the usual metal despair with a sense of hope. A lot of that comes from the fact that the two vocalists who have been a part of KSE have been Christians. It’s not and never will be a “Christian” band. Their lyrics are “modern” in the way American poet Christian Wiman defined it in My Bright Abyss, modern meaning something doesn’t explicitly mention “God,” leaving the implications to the reader/listener.

What these three really have in common is lament. A lament is a genre of psalm in which the psalmist or his community laments a past or impending tragedy, but then experiences a movement toward hope because of a turn to confidence in God.

What makes Psalm 88 different is the fact that it is the only lament within the collection of 150 psalms which never has this turn. It literally ends “…and darkness is my only companion.” (Now I’m thinking Simon and Garfunkel…) The whole thing would make some of the best metal lyrics ever produced. Another of the lines reads “[I am] lost among the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave.” Heavy.

From the cross, Jesus quoted another lament, Psalm 22, which begins, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Unlike Psalm 88, however, Psalm 22, just like Jesus’ story, has a turn, though in Jesus’ case the turn came three days later rather than a few stanzas later.

Killswitch Engage has a great song called “In Due Time” off of their 2013 record Disarm the Descent. A part of one of their verses reads,

What victory

When my soul is weak?

Where does my help come from?

 

If you know your psalms, the last line should sound familiar, a quotation of a line from Psalm 121, which begins,

I lift my eyes up to the hills; where does my help come from?

My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.

 

Since this song is “modern,” the answer is implied for those who know a thing or two about Psalms. See if you can call to mind any other passages when reading the bridge:

 

All that we suffer through

Leads to determination

The trials we all go through

Gives us the strength to carry on.

Something within us burns

Desire feeds the will to live

A reason to believe

I will see redemption.

 

Killswitch Engage here holds together the tension of the Christian life, the tension of Jesus’ life. There really are times of suffering, moments in life like Psalm 88 when hope doesn’t feel close, when we experience the death of someone close, when we are left in despair and depression. The Bible doesn’t say, “Get over it!” or “Cheer up!” Rather, it validates the use of lament.

However, Psalm 88 is followed by Psalm 89, which begins “Your love, O Lord, forever will I sing!” We’ve moved from darkness as a companion back to the light of God’s love. It doesn’t happen in a moment. For Jesus it was a life of suffering that seemed to end in defeat and despair. Hope only came after three days of death. For some of us, we go through years of difficulty. Some of us live with mental illness which always threatens to encroach on our lives and steal our joy, and sometimes it succeeds.

But resurrection is promised in Christ. We can trust God that our times of Psalm 88 will turn to times of Psalm 89. I’ll end with the chorus of “In Due Time”:

All in due time

See the world through different eyes.

All in due time

Shadows will give way, give way to light!

Yeah! Comment below with some of your favorite lament songs!

God Descends in Blue

Morning traffic like the red sea broke

Around us as we split through

The barest rain which softly spoke

Your grace to this world and to us, too.

•

The silence full as sky poured forth.

Serenity and heavy eyelids; sleepiness we shook

Off like thick, down coats in new spring warmth

And all other burdens the sunlight took.

•

Stopped on red at the turn. Wipers clean the dew

Fallen on the glass and we eyed wide the world anew:

in mourning clouds God had snuck down in a shade of blue

To kiss the day with faintest hue.

•

God descends in filtered blue

Which covers all and lifts as soon.

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“When I was driving Michelle to work this morning, it was just barely raining. We stopped at a light just after dawn, and somehow, because of the way the light was moving through the very thin clouds which were breaking up, everything took on a light shade of blue. It was very pretty. And by the time the light changed and we started driving again, it was gone.”

Why Read Literature?

What does the Church have to do with the Library? A Christian exploration on the question of reading literature.

Up now on Dallas Theological Seminary’s EIKON artist’s page here: DTS EIKON

Check it out, and leave a comment with your thoughts or with YOUR reason for reading (or not reading) literature!

The Mystery of Beauty

The Mystery of Beauty

“A Mystery in short is an invitation to the mind. For it means that there is an inexhaustible well of Truth from which the mind may drink and drink again in the certainty that the well will never run dry, that there will always be water for the mind’s thirst.” Frank Sheed, Theology and Sanity

Beauty is a mystery. A mystery is not a problem to be solved, but the reality that there is something greater than us that we cannot ever fully grasp, but into which we may enter. As Aquinas recognized, there are levels of imperfection and perfection in both our knowledge and its corresponding object; we either strive for perfect knowledge of imperfect, or lesser, things, or for imperfect knowledge of perfect things. Thus, scientific enquiry (perfect knowledge) is directed toward that which is less than human (imperfect things, such as plant cell structures), and therefore that which is fully comprehensible to our minds; psychology takes one step away from “mere matter” into the uniquely human, that which is body and mind together, and thus psychology is part science, part philosophy, part perfect knowledge (about neurology/physiology) and part imperfect knowledge (motives and desires); finally, philosophy is the discipline of the more than human, of such things as the reality and nature of beauty.

Just as we ourselves are mysterious, much more so is beauty. Beauty transcends even the human mystery into a greater, perhaps infinite, mystery. We cannot define beauty in totality by offering propositional statements, “Beauty is A, B and C, and nothing else!” No, we can only describe it and intuit it, but we can never deduce it as if it were a mathematical proof waiting to be discovered (there is nothing which is its equal). Frank Sheed, quoted above, also offers this metaphor: a mystery is not a series of rungs on a ladder to be climbed, but a gallery to become lost in, falling deeper and deeper, including the mystery of beauty. This means that in entering into a mystery we will begin to lose ourselves, but in doing so will somehow come to understand all mystery more clearly. This includes the mystery of the human self, where we are both producers of and participants in beauty.

There is nothing here to conquer, only to know and love. As Dostoevsky wrote in The Idiot, “Beauty will save the world,” which, like a teenager, is so terribly concerned with only itself; beauty will teach us how to leave self-concern behind us, and therefore save us. Any reader of Dostoevsky’s will know that we are all saved from ourselves by this principle, which he calls love, or the total identification with another who is more perfect than we are. Beauty leads us to love beyond the self, and through self-denying love we will be able to see ourselves and each other clearly for the first time. And then, perhaps, if we are not yet completely happy, we will at least see joy’s peak upon the dawn horizon, a beckoning silhouette whose true form and power is greater than we ever before imagined. As you read, step into beauty with your whole mind, heart and soul; anything you keep for yourself might just be lost forever.

In Unity, We Find Beauty

Some of the more practical things I have ever done involve spending evenings listening to very good music, music that could send me through the entire range of human experiential response, both intellectual and emotional. This included symphonies by Beethoven (5^th and 9^th, of course) and Tchaikovsky (6^th) to modern masters such as Sufjan Stevens or Sigur Ros, or even the liturgical music of the Eastern Orthodox Church. And, yes, I said practical. This was music which affected me, which has stayed with me day after day, moving my thoughts constantly back to its beauty, producing a paradox: I gained both emotional satisfaction from the music and an anxious desire to return to it. This paradox is resolvable because I know that when I return to the music, my desires will be continually fulfilled in a healthy and life-giving way, and this knowledge only serves to heighten that satisfaction. This is the objective effect of the beautiful, that it draws one out of oneself and towards, or into, itself. This is a perfectly natural and fundamental aspect of reality: human, animal, molecular, physical, spiritual­—all obey to a greater or lesser extent the principle of unity, of desiring union with the desirable.

We by necessity desire unity, and as Thomas Aquinas, the great medieval philosopher mentioned above, wrote: there is no fundamental desire in the world for which there is not a satisfying reality (CS Lewis said much the same). Hunger has the reality of food, sex has the reality of a mate. We desire unity because it is the most logical solution to the fundamental problem of existence, which goes something like this, in two parts:

Existing is an active thing, which means that I cannot choose whether to interact with the world. For example, I am sitting on a chair which is not myself, thinking about ideas of which either most, or more probably all, have begun outside my mind and have found their way into it. Existence is activity, never passivity. I must interact with other people: ideas, emotions, bodies and souls. I can avoid someone or avoid a choice, but as a smart sitcom mother probably said, “To avoid choosing is still a choice.”

On the other side, I cannot help being me. I can imitate someone or through love find my identity in other things and people, but I am all the while an individual, me. Existence means being active and seeking our identity in others; being a person means being unique and indivisible.

Unity, our solution, is not two things. It is not sameness, which is the attempt to lose one’s self entirely, to give up one’s personhood, as this is impossible. Objectively you are always you, no matter whose you are subjectively or what you take part in.

Secondly, beauty and unity are not, and strive against, individualism, defined as any activity which does everything with the focus on the good of the self. If existence means activity, then it means always refusing to be nothing, consciously or unconsciously, and thus always moving oneself away from the darkness of nothingness towards other people and things. These are the only directions towards which we can move: outward.

To eschew others completely is to attempt to do the impossible: both to get what you want from the world and avoid what you do not want from it. But no one is ever really alone. Every time you see a billboard, an idea comes into your mind and you must fight it or accept it. Even reading this essay is, in one manner, an act of love, by which you seek out something which is not yourself. You found me here, or a piece of me. We have shared something, entered into communion. Whether this is comforting or terrifying depends on whether you are open to others or closed to them (and on what you might know about me), which is a vital thing to know about yourself. Unity creates peace through the acceptance of a person’s value, love to the point of wanting them to be better, and the employment of an individual’s unique expression of self-giving, but all towards a common end; therefore, the whole transcends the part without the loss of individuality. In fact, the individuals find themselves more fulfilled by giving up some of their individual desires to fulfill their greatest desire: unity through love.

Example

This is the greatest principle one can learn from a Beethoven symphony: that beauty means diversity in unity. Diversity in unity, at the most practical and human level, includes the meaningfulness of every part, no matter how small it is, no matter how random or sudden it appears to us, how slow or quiet­—in a symphony, nothing is random, it only seems so, and this is part of the greatness of the experience; we need not to know everything in order to enjoy something to the fullest extent. Beauty, therefore, needs weakness as much as strength, the low as much as the high, the male as much as the female. The symphony, as beauty incarnated in small, teaches us that it is foolish to always prefer the strong or always prefer the weak, but there is reason to insist absolutely on the both together.

In the same way, a society must not be or seek to be all men, nor all women (remembering gender is really not the most fundamental thing about a person), nor all some third thing in the version of “equality” which is really sameness, but must be both together working perfectly in unity of purpose, but by nature working differently. Again, to insist on sameness at any level (physical, intellectual, emotional, or personal) is to do away with an integral part of beauty. Man and woman are not nothing alike: our commonality of human nature and existence amidst our differences is the basis for unity, for comm-union. We are much more similar than we are different. But it is this diversity in nature in cooperation which is beautiful because it does not dissolve into chaos, but works itself out from the past to the future.

Diversity in Cooperation

This diversity in cooperation is a principle which ultimately cannot be violated if we are to experience the true love or happiness, which are found in that which is very much not us, in the other, but also in that which can align in union with us. Can an oboe ever be a clarinet? No, they are different in inherent and necessary ways, especially in reed type, despite similarities of function and purpose. Can an oboe player ever be a clarinet player? Surely! But this presupposes a community-focused, rather than simply individual-focused, aspect and choice: that the whole orchestra will make arrangements either to successfully fill the spot now vacant, or that they will by creative means overcome that which is missing and make space for something new. We cannot be different on our own. Finding our place in life means learning how to be different in a way that is the most beneficial to society and to us.

Creativity

Diversity in cooperation, then, also necessitates creativity, another obvious aspect of any symphony. Creativity gives purpose and beauty to change, to those who are different. It wraps its arms around the different and creates a whole new space for it; a unique space for a unique individual. It highlights both the inherent individual beauty, but also sets the individual in a place where she will flourish within the purpose of the whole, therefore gaining both objective and subjective meaning, meaning which the individual knows and feels. Creation is a divine act, and is seen by all people as good. Creativity engages our whole being—our intellect, our sensitivities and talents, our bodies and souls (who we really are)—and it gives us joy when we overcome change through new solutions. It is not a stability summited through sameness, but through commonality in purpose and in the humility (adaptability) of its members. It is neither same form nor function, but common ultimate purpose, goal, end.

Practical Consequences of This Theory of Beauty: Meaningful Suffering

If giving meaning to every person, weak or strong, damaged or whole, is not practical enough for you, then I will finish by going a step further; feel free to agree or disagree. What can we learn about pain and suffering through beauty? What can we learn about the place in society of those with disability or disease, who are so often cast aside?

Perhaps most importantly, can such an abstract idea as beauty save those who need most to be saved?

When we experience great joy in listening to a symphony, we suppose the meaningfulness and worthwhileness of a great amount of suffering: the suffering of the listener in his part spending the requisite years studying music so that he might appreciate it to its fullest extent; the suffering of the musician, who has been practicing to perfection his or her part, in spite of the personal hardships or even tragedies which occur; the suffering of the musical author during the creative and refining processes. (Beethoven was almost completely deaf by the time he wrote the 9^th, and yet he did not stop creating and participating in the beautiful for its own sake, just to save himself the effort and stress).

If all of these come together, then the product is worth the pain. Ten poor concerts are eclipsed and forgotten after a very good one. If we never spend time practicing, we can never expect to experience the greatest joy. If we never spend the hard effort of practicing virtue, individually and with others, our lives will never become the symphony they were meant to be. An initiate glances the Mona Lisa and moves on, receiving little of worth. The woman who has spent her life contemplating and studying artistic beauty will look at it for days on end and not grasp the totality of its beauty. Just so, the moral initiate will see the quick gratification available and take it without another thought, supposing it to be happiness. The man who has spent his lifetime cultivating virtue will give his life joyfully to save one small child, or even one cruel and unappreciative man.

Can we really believe that a society is not better for having most of its people willing to give their lives for one another, that it is really better to have a society where people are only concerned with themselves? Most will say, “Yes, it is better,” but fail to see that the lofty ideals are only reached by starting at the lowest step and with the minutest task.

There is a small child whom my fiancé spends time with every other week who has Down syndrome, a genetic disorder which causes developmental and intellectual delays. He carries with him the label “special needs.” If you know anything about Down syndrome children, they are often incredibly sweet and happy. Some have a habit of running up and hugging strangers, sometimes to the fright of their parents. I heard of one boy recently who ran up to a homeless man and hugged him, and the homeless man began to cry. Why? Because the boy longed to share himself with that which was inherently beautiful, and created beauty itself in that moment.

The Questions We Ask

We as a society are asking these questions: Why is this child like this, when he did nothing wrong? Can this child ever really be happy, especially if most of his or her life is spent in constant pain? Should we abort children who we know are going to have special needs?

For the last question, we should see by now that even existence itself means self-giving, and thus to take life, no matter how we classify it, does not obey even our essential human nature (nature, in philosophy, is that which makes us real and human). If we think physical suffering is enough reason to cease living life, then we have again missed the point of the beautiful. Beauty teaches us that true joy is not in the absence of suffering, but comes when suffering is given meaning, when we believe subjectively and objectively that suffering serves a greater purpose, even if we cannot see all of it, for beauty is ultimately beyond us.

If we wish to give people joy by getting rid of suffering, that is simple: all we have to do is get rid of all people and all life. However, every child, as every adult, or even every microbe, is meaningful in life’s symphony. The weak by effortless existence teach the strong the beauty and value of life. The strong, in turn, create new spaces for people to find their purposes and express their individualities in ways which are meaningful and beautiful to the whole. Each finds joy, and freedom, through service. The idea is not to be free from one another, but to free ourselves of the addictions and attachments which keep us from being free for one another.

Beauty teaches us, no matter who we are, that our purpose is the same: to give ourselves to and for one another, to love. A very Dostoevsky-like principle is this: We are saved or damned by what we love, because we become most like what we most love, whether material possessions, people, or our idea of God. Beauty shows us a way out of ourselves, and is therefore teaching us how to truly love in a way which will perfect our human nature and experience, and which makes each small part, each breath we take above the waves of struggle, both meaningful and beautiful.