Posts tagged "T.S. Eliot"
T.S. Eliot’s Parables of Self-Righteousness and Resurrection (A Conference Breakout Preview)
Bible / Literature / Theology / Theology/Religion

T.S. Eliot’s Parables of Self-Righteousness and Resurrection (A Conference Breakout Preview)

by Todd Brewer on Mar 22, 2013 • 2 Comments

Here’s the next installment of our breakout session previews for the upcoming 2013 Mockingbird Conference, exactly 4 weeks away!

Perhaps this is not your issue, but I often find that the language we speak as Christians when talking about Christianity simply fails to really connect. Whether it be in a sermon, prayers, or music, full of talk of ‘justification’, ‘grace’, ‘redemption’, etc., when we hear the words, nod our heads in assent, but fail to really understand. We may know the words, but since we don’t to have any emotional or existential connection to them, they fail to have any real…

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We Are Bold to Say… The Lord’s Prayer, Pt. 3: “Thy Kingdom Come”
Bible / Prayer / Theology

We Are Bold to Say… The Lord’s Prayer, Pt. 3: “Thy Kingdom Come”

by Todd Brewer on Aug 9, 2012 • 2 Comments

Continuing in the next portion of the Lord’s Prayer, we come to the section which is probably the most debated and discussed, but least understood. For many, the coming of the Kingdom means the future destruction of the world (a prediction of Jesus’ which – for some interpreters – never happened!). Perhaps in reaction to this interpretation, today Kingdom language is predominantly thought of as a present, ethical reality, often associated with various causes of social justice or politics. It is advanced when we advocate for the poor, help the environment, or promote family values in anticipation of the…

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Sin and Redemption in an Age of Bustle: T.S. Eliot on Baudelaire
Books / Literature / Poetry

Sin and Redemption in an Age of Bustle: T.S. Eliot on Baudelaire

by David Zahl on Sep 21, 2011 • 1 Comment

Taken from the master poet’s essay on Baudelaire (1930):

Baudelaire’s morbidity of temperament cannot, of course, be ignored… To the eye of the world, and quite properly for all questions of private life, Baudelaire was thoroughly perverse and insufferable: a man with a talent for ingratitude and unsociability, intolerably irritable, and with a mulish determination to make the worst of everything; if he had money, to squander it; if he had friends, to alienate them; if he had any good fortune, to disdain it. He had the pride of the man who feels in himself great weakness and great strength. Having…

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Another Week Ends: Christian Neurotics, Shrieking Children, Grunge-Love, Steve Jobs, and Idiot Brothers
America / Children / Film / Music / News / Psychology / Reviews / Suffering / Week In Review

Another Week Ends: Christian Neurotics, Shrieking Children, Grunge-Love, Steve Jobs, and Idiot Brothers

by Ethan Richardson on Aug 26, 2011 • No Comments

At week’s end, despite the continued reverberations, ironic photo blogs, and miraculous happenings, all is still in post-quake Central Virginia! The Mockingbird offices remain in functional tact…

1) Over at First Things, and similarly confronting the stigmas of mental health as discussed in an earlier post this week, “The Christian Neurotic” ponders “neurosis” and its impact (good and bad) upon one’s grasp on the dual nature of reality, that is, one fraught with despair and yet, in the framework of Christian belief, tinged with hope:

The psychological conflict of living in two cultures at once can be overbearing. However, it should also…

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Mama Liked the Roses (And So Did T.S. Eliot): Deciphering “Burnt Norton” – Part 2
Poetry / Theology

Mama Liked the Roses (And So Did T.S. Eliot): Deciphering “Burnt Norton” – Part 2

by WB on Jul 12, 2011 • 1 Comment

Have you ever wanted to reclaim the past? In images, especially those of poetry, we possess a moment frozen in time. It seems so accessible the more detailed and the more sensuous a description we give it—such as Eliot’s ghostly trip into the rose-garden last week—and yet the permanence which it suggests is devastatingly illusory.

In one of Kurt Vonnegut’s descriptions of aliens, the Tralfamadorians from Slaughterhouse-five compare the human experience of linear time to being strapped down on a moving train, without being able to turn one’s head right or left, and having to look through a small hole at…

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Mama Liked the Roses (And So Did T.S. Eliot): Deciphering “Burnt Norton” – Part 1
Philosophy / Poetry / Suffering

Mama Liked the Roses (And So Did T.S. Eliot): Deciphering “Burnt Norton” – Part 1

by WB on Jul 5, 2011 • 3 Comments

Eliot’s Four Quartets remain among his most critically acclaimed and notoriously inscrutable works. Although there’s no established consensus on the precise meaning of these poems, they’ve all been viewed as meditations on time, each focusing on a particular aspect of this central reality of human life. Constantly going back to the Quartets and always enjoying them, this summer I’ve taken it upon myself to try and tease out some of the questions and ideas Eliot develops. Feel free to comment with other takes on the poem.

In “Burnt Norton,” Eliot struggles with the contingency of the past: there was a genuinely…

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Possibly Insane Thoughts on Ash Wednesday (Written on the Occasion of a Sleepless Night)
Church / Philosophy / Religion / Testimony / Theology

Possibly Insane Thoughts on Ash Wednesday (Written on the Occasion of a Sleepless Night)

by Mockingbird on Mar 9, 2011 • 19 Comments

A close friend of Mockingbird contributes the following reflection on the meaning of the day, and I’m sure you’ll agree that it is a welcome and considerably more profound alternative to the (admittedly irresistible) irreverence with which we’ve treated (the “public displays of piety” which characterize) Lent in past years. A touching and personal defense of the season, and today in particular, from an exceptionally sympathetic a point of view:

For those of us who came of age in certain fundamentalist or evangelical Protestant churches, life was a strangely disembodied affair. It is true that various sins of the flesh…

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Christmas Cheer, According to T.S. Eliot
Christmas / Poetry / Theology

Christmas Cheer, According to T.S. Eliot

by Todd Brewer on Dec 24, 2010 • No Comments

The following is from Eliot’s “The Cultivation of Christmas Trees.” While less popular than Eliot’s other Christmas poems, it is his last- and probably his most insightful. There are several attitudes towards Christmas,Some of which we may disregard:The social, the torpid, the patently commercial,The rowdy (the pubs being open till midnight),And the childish—which is not that of the childFor whom the candle is a star, and the gilded angelSpreading its wings at the summit of the treeIs not only a decoration, but an angel.The child wonders at the Christmas Tree:Let him continue in the spirit of wonderAt the Feast…

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The Timeless God, an excerpt from T.S. Eliot
Literature / Poetry / Theology

The Timeless God, an excerpt from T.S. Eliot

by Todd Brewer on Dec 16, 2010 • 1 Comment

An excerpt taken from T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets“, “Dry Salvages”:

To communicate with Mars, converse with spirits, To report the behaviour of the sea monster,Describe the horoscope, haruspicate or scry,Observe disease in signatures, evokeBiography from the wrinkles of the palmAnd tragedy from fingers; release omensBy sortilege, or tea leaves, riddle the inevitableWith playing cards, fiddle with pentagramsOr barbituric acids, or dissectThe recurrent image into pre-conscious terrors—To explore the womb, or tomb, or dreams; all these are usualPastimes and drugs, and features of the press:And always will be, some of them especiallyWhen there is distress of nations and perplexityWhether on the…

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THE MOCKINGBIRD SINGS: Pensacola & Good News for People with Big Problems, Plus
Addiction / Conferences / Film / Humor / Literature / Music / Poetry / Sermons / Theology / TV

THE MOCKINGBIRD SINGS: Pensacola & Good News for People with Big Problems, Plus

by Mockingbird on Nov 8, 2010 • No Comments

1. The Pensacola Mini-Conference is a mere 11 days away! November 19th and 20th are your long-awaited chances to experience Mockingbird in all its physical, um, glory. The theme is “God’s Grace When We Need It Most: The Gospel For Hard Times,” and we promise it will be more fun than it sounds (you can read the previews of the content here), especially with the Mockingfather himself, Dr. Paul Zahl, speaking! Believe it or not, what we’re most looking forward to is PZ’s pre-conference seminar on preaching/ministry/life – not that any of us need help with our sermons, of course…!

Register…

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Confessions of an Elder Statesman – T.S. Eliot, Part 4 of 4
Law / Literature / Poetry / Psychology / Theology

Confessions of an Elder Statesman – T.S. Eliot, Part 4 of 4

by Todd Brewer on Sep 16, 2010 • 4 Comments

The fourth and final installment of this series looking at T.S. Eliot’s “The Elder Statesman” culminates in what is the decisive dialogue in the entire play. For previous installments click here, here, and here. By way of review, Lord Claverton has been pressured out of high office “for his health’s sake” and finds that his youthful indiscretions have resurfaced now in his retirement.

For almost the entirety of the first two acts, Claverton is morosely resigned at the revelation of his past sins. He is given remarkable clarity at the folly of his life and the absurdity of the false self…

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Who I Am Hates Who I’ve Been: T.S. Eliot’s “The Elder Statesman” Part 3
Identity / Literature / Poetry

Who I Am Hates Who I’ve Been: T.S. Eliot’s “The Elder Statesman” Part 3

by Todd Brewer on Sep 7, 2010 • 2 Comments

We now come to the crucial issue of identity as understood and articulated by T.S. Eliot in his play “The Elder Statesman.” For previous posts in this short series click here and here.

Lord Claverton is a politician by profession. And like a politician, he has tried to play the role of the responsible, admirable father to earn the love of his daughter. Sadly and predictably, this has pushed his daughter away. In a moment of inspiration he reflects on his life and who he has become.

The worst kind of failure, in my opinion,
Is the man who has to keep on…

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T.S. Eliot’s “The Elder Statesman” Part 2 – Sins of the Past
Literature / Poetry / Psychology

T.S. Eliot’s “The Elder Statesman” Part 2 – Sins of the Past

by Todd Brewer on Sep 2, 2010 • 4 Comments

The following comes from T.S. Eliot’s play “The Elder Statesman.” It’s part 2 of 4. For the previous post go here.

Those who flee from their past will always lose the race,
I know this from experience. When you reach your goal,
Your imagined paradise of success and grandeur,
You will find your past failures waiting there to greet you.

The entire play can be seen as a demonstration of the truth these words spoken by Lord Claverton to his son Michael. Claverton has lived a mildly successful political life, yet the sins of youth have now greeted him in his old age.

Like Scrooge of…

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T. S. Eliot’s "The Elder Statesman" – Part 1 of 4
Law / Literature / Poetry / Psychology / Theology

T. S. Eliot’s "The Elder Statesman" – Part 1 of 4

by Todd Brewer on Aug 31, 2010 • 4 Comments

I’ve recently been floored by T.S. Eliot’s last play “The Elder Statesman.” Eliot’s plays at their best speak with universal brilliance while remaining true to a moving plot. This play tells the story of a retired politician, Lord Claverton, whose past sins have come to back to haunt him. This brief series will reflect on some of the high points of this play in four manageable topics.

“Perhaps I’ve never really enjoyed living
As much as most people. At least, as they seem to do.
Without knowing that they enjoy it. Whereas I’ve often known
That I didn’t enjoy it. Some dissatisfaction
With myself, I…

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T.S. Eliot’s "The Confidential Clerk"
Literature / Religion / Suffering

T.S. Eliot’s "The Confidential Clerk"

by Todd Brewer on Aug 24, 2010 • 1 Comment

A few highlights from Mockingbird favorite T.S. Eliot and his often overshadowed play “The Confidential Clerk.” This play in particular speaks to the tragedy of the divided self in conflict with oneself. For more from Eliot go here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

“I’m not at all sure that I like the other personThat I feel myself becoming – though he fascinates me.And yet from time to time, when I least expect it,When my mind is cleared and empty, walking in the streetOr waking in the night, then the former person,The person I used to be, returns…

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