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The End of God-Talk, An African American Humanist Theology – Anthony B. Pinn Paraphrasing from one of the storybooks (19) Pinn referred to, and correcting for gender bias: “God is love and they who abide in love abides in God and God in them”. (1 John 4:8,16 ) We human beings are at our magnificent best when we are in love. That state is shared, and from within it, we are connected to other beings through time and space.
As I read Pinn a question began to creep in from the margins: “Where is love in this man's universe?” The word appears five times in the text: twice in relation to King’s “Beloved Community”(46), once quoting Thurman (78) and two times quoting others in the notes and bibliography. Pinn does not write about love from his perspective! No wonder why I needed to take a 7 hour break doing music after reading the first two chapters of “The End”. I was sucked dry by African American nontheistic humanist theology and its “embodied self and the nature and meaning of its occupation of space and time.” (62) The anthropological emphasis on the uncertain ups and downs of life having significance had me screaming for (63) William Jones’ heartfelt warmth, who’s rejection of the little god still held a place for something bigger.[A] His struggle with god is much more satisfying than Pinn’s more poisonous indifference. By Chapter 6, Pinn goes some way to redeem his bleakness with the notion of celebration and ritualization to achieve “complex subjectivity”. I resonated with his approval of the UUA as a good p(l)ace for humanist leaning people of color like me. I do not feel that I need to “surrender” my embodied self in the UUA. (141) In fact, I wish to assist other people of color to jump into the UUA pool. The water can be warmed. I offer another perspective rather than Pinn’s discussion of humanist writers. Instead of asking questions about what constitutes sacred space and the structuring of “religious thought and engagement” (with “... and”), I believe the more important question is “What do we humans love?” Yo-Yo Ma played the Bach Unaccompanied Suites for thousands of people at the Mexico/United States border the day before fire broke the back of the Notre Dam cathedral in Paris. Ma managed to unite millions of people over a very human issue with music written by a composer who died 269 years ago and who wrote “Soli Deo Gloria” at the bottom of all of his manuscripts. Ma was in love while he was playing the cello for people at the border (he always is). We cellists like to say that God plays the cello through Ma. As a professional cellist and composer I am “embodied” in the forms and shapes of music. Like a physicist seeking elementary particles only to find traces of God smiling back, composers dance in the same stream that is propelled by love. The composer in me can tell with certainty what Debussy had for breakfast the morning he composed a piece of music because I am connected in time to him through the choices he made using the same rules that govern the twelve notes he had to work with. Community created through orchestras, and the composers who write music for them, is one of the most powerful expressions of the “magnificence” I write about. The community of musicians is vast over space and time. It is driven by the love of encapsulating moments that can be communicated through human bodies in motion. I compose music for the people who will voyage to the stars. I like to think they will be listening to my music 300 years from now. They will know that I am in love with them, and that some version of God is encoded into our shared experience... Pinn notwithstanding. [A] Is God a White Racist: A Preamble to Black Theology - William Jones
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What part of “Climate change is a rapidly worsening existential threat to humanity. Global temperature could reach an irreversible tipping point in just 12 years that will ensure our planet is uninhabitable.” causes people to NOT immediately sacrifice EVERYTHING for their children (borders, economies, inefficient houses, carbon-based economies, eating cows, etc.)? Is it the word “rapidly”, “worsening”, “existential” (look it up), “threat”, “irreversible”, “tipping”, “ensure”, “uninhabitable”... just what is the problem? What is more important than ensuring our planet can sustain us?
My latest work for Chamber Orchestra will be premiered by the Ukiah Symphony Orchestra on March 24, 2019 from 2:00-4:00 pm at the First Presbyterian Church of Ukiah, 514 W. Church Street, Ukiah CA 95482. This 20-minute piece, entitled "Rose's Paintings", is a four movement work inspired by the paintings of Rose Xylona Ayala. You can go to my youtube channel at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAc4H-TDlUq2u7o606T6KnQ?view_as=subscriber to listen to the pieces. Just look for videos titled "Comets" "Stairway to Heaven", "Room With a Door", and "Rose". Please make plans to attend this fundraiser for the symphony. Other local composers to be featured are Jeff Ives, Joseph Nemeth, and Bill Taylor. DONATION - $30 SENIORS - $25 Click the poster below for details  This represents a critical point in the story of humanity... a morality play writ large. When faced with the mother of existential crises, human nature reveals itself. Some instinctively avert their eyes and drive full speed backwards off a cliff. Others see the threat clearly, take its measure, and true to the nobility inherent in humanity, rise to the challenge with bold, creative resolve. The Green New Deal is not a new initiative. It has needed new faces and new energy to propel it beyond the old, corrupt guard that would stand in its way. Welcome to the State of the Union. Welcome to the new world. I know it is shocking to witness a Congress that intends to both lead and legislate. I know those shiny new, not all white faces, that now populate the House are a fundamental threat to the powerful elite represented by the Senate. I understand that their ideas about fairness, equality, compassion, eliminating poverty, caring for people with medical needs, engaging the rest of the world in an effort to avert our extinction, and education for all is more important to them than purchasing a few more new aircraft carriers or squadrons of half billion dollar airplanes. If you have a problem with this approach to government, then get over it or get used to it. Here's the greatest shock of all, if you can bear to read it: this world belongs to the youth, who will inhabit it among the filth and chaos we older people have left it in. They will do what they can to fix our world, and they will die trying. They will call for radical change in every sector of our human activity because radical change is what is necessary for their survival. That means a world government will be formed, the needs of our planet will supersede all other considerations, what we now think of as individualistic rights to consume and plunder will be eliminated, spirituality will be expressed differently, religion will be radically altered, the immorality of the super rich owning more than they need will be corrected, wealth will be redistributed, and the quality of life will not be measured in GDP. It you have a problem with this view of the world to come, then you will suffer in the future. Your SUV will be crushed, along with your ego. If you are okay with this future, vote it into existence. Encourage the rebirth of true democracy in America. Call it whatever you like... socialism, globalism, elimination of racism, elimination of capitalism... even the destruction of "isms". However you feel, it's on the way. There is not a damned thing you can do to stop it. Embrace the change or step off the planet.  Click on the picture to link to the Huffington Post article or click here.
• GOP Congressman Spent His Week Harassing Muslim Colleague on Twitter
• Police Sergeant to Precinct: If a Homeless Person is Black, Just Shoot Them • 2 Years Later, Trump’s Muslim Ban is Still Keeping Families Apart • Ocasio-Cortez Flooded With Bigoted Calls • Virginia House Democrats Call for Gov. Ralph Northam’s Resignation (for black face photo) • The Covington Teens’ Racist “Tomahawk Chop” Is The Product Of Native Mascotry • Don Lemon Shreds Ralph Northam’s Disgusting Racism: ‘It Deeply Hurt’ Me • RNC Gets Roasted Over “Tone Deaf” Black History Month Tweet These headlines say a lot about our nation. We need to pay attention to the issues of race and bigotry that are becoming more - not less - prevalent as we struggle with white supremacy, white fragility, and white rage. We fought a civil war over these issues once before but we have never overcome them. Our government has never apologized for its role in the practices of genocide and slavery upon which our nation was built. Racist language is still present in the DNA of our Constitution, and has not been expunged or repudiated. I believe the United States needs to institute a national “Truth and Reconciliation” commission based on the South African model that addressed their apartheid era. God knows we could use such a process to help our nation transition from our myth of a white european ethos of the past to a superior one based on vibrant ethnic and racial diversity for the future. |
