A Praying People

The annual National Prayer Breakfast will take place in Washington, DC, this coming Thursday, February 2. It is not an event that is usually on most people's radar. The only occasion it was on mine, the only time I can ever recall commenting on it, was three years ago, coinciding with the first impeachment and acquittal of President Trump, who spoke at the event (as presidents do). At that time, I wrote:

And what a desert American religion is in right now! That desert was fully on display the very next morning at the so-called National Prayer Breakfast. That event dates back to the middle of the last century, and every US President since Eisenhower has participated in this once honorable event. Speakng just before the President, this year’s keynote speaker, Arthur Brooks, author of Love Your Enemies, addressed the audience of more than 3,000 on that foundationally Christian theme. Then the recently impeached President spoke and expressed his essential disagreement with the keynote!

On such occasions, I am again reminded of my favorite quite from Southern Baptist Russell Moore back in October 2016, regarding ostensibly religious figures who ally themselves with this President:  "The religious right turns out to be the people the religious right warned us about."

Mitt Romney's father, George, who also aspired unsuccessfully for the presidency back in the 1960s, was born in Mexico where his devout Mormon grandparents had had to flee to avoid persecution by the US. government. A practicing member of the LDS Church, Mitt Romney, knows something about real religious persecution and real religious freedom - in contrast to the fevered "Flight 93" apocalypticism so often invoked by some ostensibly religious people to justify their alliance with this impeached President. This week Romney reminded anyone who was listening that faith is about God and God's Kingdom and not about political power and idolatrous prayer.

The annual tradition of the National Prayer Breakfast (originally called the Presidential Prayer Breakfast) goes back to 1953, the first year of the Eisenhower Administration. It is held every year on the first Thursday in February and often features speeches by special guests as well as the President. Out of an apparent desire on the part of Congress to return the event somewhat back to its original spirit, a new organization, the "National Prayer Breakfast Foundation," will oversee the event this year, and the number of the attendees is being limited to members of Congress, the  Administration, their families, and their guests. (It  will still be live-streamed online and on C-SPAN.)

In the United Kingdom and the Scandinavian countries, for example, the presence of an Established Church facilitates religion's decorative role in civil life - part of what Walter Bagehot called the "dignified" dimension of a country's constitution. Even without the benefit of formal religious establishment, displays of religious ritual and, in particular, invocations of religious language and exercises of public prayer have been a ubiquitous part of American civic life from the very beginning. The National Prayer Breakfast is an honorable part of that long tradition. As its misuse in recent years by Republicans' religious allies has made evident, however, the line between dignified prayer and idolatrous prayer can be an easy one to cross.

Beyond the Baby Boom

 

We of the "Baby Boom" generation have more or less always taken it for granted that we would be at the center of society's attention - and in recent decades at least the holders of most of the power in American society. That is largely still true, but changing. Hence, this latest book on Boomers and their power, The Aftermath: The Last Days of the Baby Boom and the Future of Power in America (Viking, 2023), by Philip Bump, a national columnist for The Washington Post. As the author observes about us boomers: "They opened their eyes and everyone around them was working to meet their exceptional needs."

In case anyone doesn't already know, the "baby boom" refers to the generation born in the aftermath of World War II, the great period of post-war prosperity from 1946 through 1964, when the annual average of births int he U.S. was around 4 million (compared with the 1930s average of 2.4 million). "In 1945, the year before the boom began, the population of the United States was about 140 million. Over the next 19 years, 76 million babies were born."

Born in the most prosperous era in American history, we boomers have accumulated material wealth and all that goes with that. Obviously, individual boomers are rich, poor, and everywhere in between, but as a group we Have been wealthy and powerful. We are 23% of the population, but are 43% of the country's homeowners, for example. "Since 1989, those aged 55 and older have always controlled at least 54 percent of the wealth in the country. By 2019, that figure was over 70 percent."

We are also whiter than subsequent cohorts, which is due to the very specific circumstance of having been born in the period of U.S. history with little immigration, thanks to the restrictive legislation of 1924. My grandmother was an immigrant, as were several aunts and uncles, but no one I knew of my own generation.

What that means for the future, Bump shows, may be less straightforward than some have assumed. 

Given the complex but hardly insignificant continued role of religion in our politics, it is noteworthy that while somewhat less religious than our predecessors, boomers are still significantly more so than those waiting to replace us. "The boomers were less inclined to embrace religious identifiers than their elders, yes, but they still embraced them. And they did and do so to a more robust degree than their own kids, over whom religious institutions have been wringing hands and for whom those institutions have been crafting appeals." Indeed, it is still the case that "More boomers go to church one or more times a week than never go."

Politically, boomers vote more and are overrepresented in Congress. We are also more likely to identify with one of the two political parties. "Boomers were more likely to be members of one of the parties, with 67 percent identifying as Democrats or Republicans. Among millennials, only 54 percent did so."  And it is significant that the only age group Trump won in 2016 "were those aged 50 and up—that is, the baby boomers and those older."

Bump's account is journalistically engaging. He interviews the person officially identified as the "first baby boomer" (born January 1, 1946), and he entertainingly  rents a golf cart to explore around The Villages, the infamously enormous senior living community in Florida, some of whose residents call themselves "frogs," since they are there until they "croak." 

On the other hand, he seems never to have met a number he didn't appreciate, and the book is filled with an overwhelming number of charts and graphs (128 by one reader's count). That's probably information overload, but one can not look at the charts and just read the text and still get the message. There is, perhaps, too much of that (text) as well, as he seems determined to examine as much as he can about America's changing landscape. At times, it feels that the book will never end, much as it must feel to many that the baby boomers' presence and dominance will never end. But, of course, we will eventually end. And so does the book. In the process, he succeeds in providing the best on-offer analysis of the implications on the coming generational change in American politics.

Tár (The Movie)

 

I have to admit I have struggled to figure out what to say about Tár, Todd Field's 2022 hit, "Best Film of the year" according to the New York film Critics Circle and others, and of course one of the nominees for the upcoming oscars. It stars Cate Blanchett, who performs brillliantly as star conductor Lydia Tár, whose imperious (and, by some accounts, abusive) behavior dominates the movie and precipitates her eventual dramatic downfall. The film is susceptible of multiple interpretations. It can be seen as a reasoned attack on "cancel culture." It can also be seen as a justified defense thereof. It can be seen as a critique of how contemporary identity politics and "cancel culture" can corrupt the arts, education, and human relationships. It can also be seen as illustrating how widespread abuses of power (to which contemporary identity politics and "cancel culture" are in part a reaction) can corrupt the arts, education, and human relationships. The fact that the film is simultaneously susceptible of such contradictory interpretations highlights both the film's complexity and the real-world complexity of those issues and perhaps provides a vehicle for reflecting upon them further. Meanwhile, while some see Lydia Tár's triumphant career careening to a deserved (or, at least, predictable) collapse, others see a confusing mix of real and imaginary sequences, which leave her final fate uncertain.

Without wading into the "cancel culture" quagmire, I think it fair to say that the film portrays the Berlin Philharmonic's star conductor Lydia Tár (born plain Linda Tarr from Staten Island) as a human disaster - not, perhaps, unlike many others who hold positions of comparable power. She is married to Sharon, who is also the orchestra's First Violin, and she depends upon and tyrannizes her personal assistant, Francesca. It is implied that she has groomed other young aspiring musicians in the past, a pattern apparently being repeated in real time with a new, young cellist, Olga. Unsurprisingly, her behavior seems to be recognized as such by those around her - and apparently tolerated by them all, at least as long as they have to. Meanwhile, one of her previous targets, Krista, has been blacklisted by her after their relationship went wrong, and Krista's suicide seems to become the event that triggers a professional reckoning, accompanied by all sorts of strange sensitivities to sound, nightmares, and bouts of pain. 

A lot is left implied that in reality would need to be cleared up. What exactly happened between Tár and Krista is hardly established beyond doubt. As is often the case, we are in the realm of suspicion and allegation, although there is certainly evidence of Tár's susceptibility to particularly poor judgment in such matters (poor judgment presumably exacerbated by her apparent power to get away with it). On the other hand, Tár's ultimate response to all this seems somewhat out of character (at least as her character has been portrayed thus far in the film). Indeed, her behavior becomes bizarre beyond belief - assuming, of course, that we are still in the realm of real behavior and not fantasy. What exactly are we supposed to think about this remains itself mysterious.

Friends of God and One Another

Some 30 years ago, a majority of American men had a half-dozen or so close friends. Today, half as many do, and many say they have no close friends at all. That’s a problem if, as is widely believed, having friends enriches one’s life and is probably good for one’s health. Aristotle famously said that no one would choose to live without friends, even if he had all sorts of life’s other goods.

 

One cannot read the opening words of Paul’s 2^nd letter to Timothy without appreciating the intense bond of friendship between the two. I am grateful to God, Paul writes, as I remember you constantly in my prayers, night and day. I yearn to see you again, recalling your tears, so that I may be filled with joy.

 

As friends, Paul and Timothy (and Titus, another friend of Paul whom we commemorate today) shared a common mission - the mission which Paul had received directly from the Risen Lord and which Timothy had received from Paul, the gift of God that you have through the imposition of my hands.

 

Jesus, as we just heard in the Gospel, famously sent his disciples out on mission in pairs, not just because a group effort would be more efficient but because of the greater witness value of non-competitive, collaborative life and work in partnership. In the Middle Ages, Saint Dominic, one of the patrons of the Paulist Fathers, whom we will commemorate later this week, discerned the special witness value of such an apostolic manner of life for his time and place. And, in the 20th century, the Second Vatican Council likewise highlighted how such an evangelical life witnesses to God’s kingdom at work in the world through the Church.

 

In today’s climate of predatory individualism, a dead-end into which our consumerist culture seems increasingly capable of absorbing even religion itself as well as so much of the Church’s life, the renewed witness of shared life and mission cannot be underestimated.

Homily for the Feast of Saints Timothy and Titus, Disciples and Companions of Saint Paul, Church of Saint Paul the Apostle, New York, January 26, 2023.

Triangle of Sadness (the Movie)

 

Chances are that I might not have seen Swedish filmmaker Ruben Östlund's Oscar-nominated film Triangle of Sadness had it not been for its nomination. Such is the still real (although one would be hard-pressed to explain why) standing of the Oscars that an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture almost automatically makes a film a must-see. The film received an 8-minute standing ovation at Cannes (where Östlund won his second Palme d’Or), which may say as much about elite culture's masochistic appreciation of art which highlights the soul-destroying inequality of contemporary capitalism and the almost comic vulgarity and contemptible shallowness of the rich.

There are many such films. The Menu most recently comes to mind. What Triangle of Sadness reminds me of most, however, is Lina Wertmüller's 1974 movie Swept Away - updated, of course, to portray the far greater vulgar excess and moral shallowness of contemporary consumer capitalism. It offers much the same moral parable of unexpected calamity overturning the corrupt social order and empowering the competent, hardworking servant class at the expense of the thoroughly dependent and useless idle rich class. Since many more characters are involved than in that memorable 1974 shipwreck, there is also a lot more room for complexity even within the oppressive class structure. 

The film follows Carl, a male model, in what is portrayed as a corrupt and oppressive profession, and his girlfriend Yaya, also a successful model. In that particular profession, female models make more money than male models, an inequality which introduces tension into their romance, and sets the stage for one of the varied reversals the shipwrecked survivers will eventually experience. To amplify their vacuousness, Carl and Yaya supplement their income as "social influencers," which gets them a place on a luxury cruise on a large yacht. The cruise highlights the dysfunctionality of almost everyone involved (not just the wealthy guests but also the captain) and proves no match for a storm which makes many of the passengers sick and a subsequent pirate attack, which is what leaves the survivers marooned on an apparently deserted island. 

There, of course, necessity inverts the reigning social pyramid, and Abigail, a lowly member of the yacht's cleaning staff who has survival skills beyond the capacity of the helpless rich, asserts herself in predictable ways. It is more like Lina Wertmüller than Lord of the Flies, but  that possibility too is never too distant. Here too civilization turns out to be not too far away, after all.

Triangle of Sadness - the title comes from Carl's career's "professional" vocabulary - could have cut down some on the amount of vomit and excrement and thus become a shorter, tighter film, with its principal focus highlighted that much more. That said, it is well worth both the extra time and some unsightly (somewhat humorous) scenes.