The Meaning of the End

That's all folks.

by Ben Howard

Yesterday I was reading through a blog post where the author had collected a bunch of articles about Game of Thrones and theology. A few dealt with the issue of morality in the universe created by George R.R. Martin. They made arguments about what the story meant. 

The author of the post responded to one of these articles by saying that, "We can't yet say what the story means because we do not yet know how the story ends."

This phrase struck me in the moment and has stayed with me since. It fascinates me because while it's true, I'm not convinced that it should be.

At their very root, stories are constructs. They are snippets lifted from an ever-evolving, ever-unwinding narrative. We give them a beginning to provide context and an end to provide meaning, but the reality is that the meaning we impose is defined by where we begin and end the story.

Take for example the story of Johnny Cash told in Walk the Line. The story told in the movie ends with Johnny marrying June as the climactic moment in a story of love and redemption. The end of the story re-defines the meaning of Johnny's experiences as an unloved child, his rise to fame, his drug problem, and his unsuccessful first marriage. The story is cast in the light of its conclusion.

Happily ever after?

But in reality that's not where the story ends. It continues through the next 35 years of their marriage. What does that story mean? In fact, the real narrative arc continues on in their children and grandchildren, in their musical legacy, and in the iconography that survives death and continually ripples throughout history. The real story can be found in every aspiring country singer who idolizes Johnny Cash.

So what does a story mean if a story never ends?

To judge something by its end means that you have to choose. Either you can cut off the story and choose to say, "This is what this story means now, in this particular moment," or you can let it play out delaying ultimate judgment eternally because even in death, the ripples never cease. The consequences and effects of a life lived and a story told intermingle with the ripples of other stories and other lives and continue forward, gently fading into one.

The question of whether meaning is tied to an ending is an interesting one to consider now when the world of pop culture, especially TV, stands on the brink of so many of these "important" endings.  Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy ended last year. Mad Men is in it's next to last season. Breaking Bad is approaching it's final year. Even the prolonged (and occasionally frustrating) narrative of How I Met Your Mother is beginning it's final season in the fall.

Is the entire meaning and essence of these stories tied into their end? If Don dies, or Walter goes to prison, or if Ted meets "the mother" and she's terrible, does it ruin what came before it? What about the story that comes after it, the fictional narrative that we'll never see play out?

Worst movie, or worstest movie?

These may seem like insignificant questions once you step back and remind yourself that I'm merely talking about vehicles for entertainment, but the underlying conversation is far larger than that.

Most Christian theology defines itself in terms of its end. That's not just true for people who believe in the rapture, or an eternity spent in a heaven/hell removed from this world, but for those of us who believe in the second coming and the restoration of creation. So many of us define ourselves by the hoped for outcome at the end of the story, but what if this myopic focus blinds us to the beauty of everything else?

What if the end, and the beginning too for that matter, aren't actually real? What if they're constructs we use to delineate and divide life into consumable chunks? And if that's true, what does it mean when we use them to explain the parts in between?

What if stories don't end? What if life keeps going on? What does it mean then?

Peace,
Ben 

Ben Howard is an accidental iconoclast and generally curious individual living in Nashville, Tennessee. He is also the editor-in-chief of On Pop Theology and an avid fan of waving at strangers for no reason. You can follow him on Twitter @BenHoward87. 

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology.

You might also like:

• On Being Enlightened
• Death and Don Draper
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Ben Affleck Teaches the Church A Lesson

by Ben Howard

During the summer between my junior and senior years in college I worked as an intern at a small church in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It was difficult at times, but ultimately a great developmental experience. One of the more bizarre experiences involved one of the leaders at the church. He took me out to lunch one day and decided to lecture me about how I needed to be a better salesman. He used that classic line, "You're a salesmen and you've got the greatest product in the world!" I stared ahead and nodded politely while inwardly I shook my head.

It bothers me when churches try to market or sell themselves. I understand it, but it still bothers me. They've decided the gospel is something you consume, but that's not true. It's something you live. Something you inhabit that changes you into who you are meant to be. It's living art and art isn't something you consume, it's something you engage with.

I think churches and movie makers have a lot in common. There are mega-churches and blockbuster directors utilizing cliches and big budgets to make their message consumable for the masses. There are indie-chic auteurs and hipster churches that dazzle with artistry, but lose the thread under a thick layer of pretension. There are hack filmmakers who make the Left Behind books into movies and there are hack churches who tell people to go see it.

But this can be a good comparison too because sometimes churches, like filmmakers, can do amazing things. So today, I want to take a lesson from the making of a great film and see what churches can learn from Ben Affleck's latest movie Argo.

1) Tell Your Story

The first lesson of good movies and good churches is to simply tell the story. That's the reason you are there. You are being invited to be a part of this story.

Argo tells the story of a CIA mission to rescue six Americans from Iran in 1979 during the Iran hostage crisis. It's a good story and Affleck, the director, trusts the story to keep the audiences attention. He doesn't need gimmicks or explosions or any other ancillary pieces of movie magic. He just needs a good story.

Christianity has that. It is an amazing story. It is a story of creation, brokenness, liberation, power, exile, redemption, death, resurrection and reconciliation. It is the story of everybody and anybody filled with peril and grace and honor and loss and tension and love. It carries itself, you don't need to convince people to pay attention. You just have to tell the story.

2) Know Your Context

Argo does something really interesting in its opening sequence. It tells the story of the Iranian people leading up to the storming of the embassy in 1979, not the story of the United States. It explains the context of the country and why it might seem like a good idea to someone to use violent force against innocent US citizens. Essentially, it tells you why the story's ostensible villain isn't necessarily evil.

This is a vital lesson for the church. First, the church must deal with its own historical context and it's important that the church own this history. It must understand that it has occasionally been the villain, but that's not the same as being evil. It must also understand that those outside the church are neither evil nor the enemy of those inside the church. They are people too with their own specific motivations.

3) Pay Attention to Detail

During the end credits of Argo they show side-by-side comparisons of the actors and their real-life counterparts. The resemblance is remarkable. There are also photographs from the era shown beside shots from the movie which make it clear the level of research and prep that went into this movie. The movie is set in the 1970s in Iran and it feels like it. It is entirely possible to be immersed in the story because you know that everything has been crafted with such care.

This one in particular speaks to me. I'm bad at preparation and detail. I like to do things from the seat of my pants and usually it works out well, but not all the time. When I fail, I fail spectacularly. I also realize more and more that it's easy to tell when something isn't important to someone because of the lack of focus on details. Details show dedication. It shows importance. Churches are by and large volunteer groups and so details often go overlooked, but they are vital in the success or failure of a church. Pay attention to details, it shows that you care.

4) Show, Don't Tell

I'm going to get a little nerdy here. When I watched Argo I realized that there is a pretty major sub-plot that was entirely cut out of the movie. This subplot involves the drinking problem of Ben Affleck's character Tony. I would bet that there are two or three scenes on the cutting room floor that directly address this issue, but they aren't in the movie. In fact, there isn't any dialogue in the movie about Tony's drinking problem, but there are pictures. You see him waking up with empty beer cans in the background, you his reaction to the lack of alcohol in Iran, you see him swipe a bottle of whiskey, these are all things you witness.

One of the great lessons of writing is that, when you can, show and don't tell. It's one churches have always struggled to learn in their context. We talk and talk and talk and talk and talk about love and grace and hope. But loving is hard and being gracious is hard and hoping for things unseen is hard. We say all the things we wish we believed and then we go out the door and show off what we actually believe. We need to learn to show, and if we can't show, then it isn't even worth telling.

5) Have Fun

Argo is a fun movie to watch. It's adventurous, it's tense and it can even make you laugh when it wants to. It was serious, but it was enjoyable.

Dear fellow Christians, please remember that at the end of the day you should be happy. At the end of the day, no matter how difficult life may be it is a ultimately a gracious gift. It is good. It is fun. Let loose and have some fun. Enjoy yourself and live the story.

Peace,
Ben

You can follow Ben on Twitter @BenHoward87 or email him at benjamin.howard87 [at] gmail.com.

Also, you can subscribe to On Pop Theology via RSS feed or email on the top right corner of the main page.

Nicolas Cage Should Be In Jail

by Ben Howard

Today I'm going to take a bit of a break from the Who We Are Instead series because it's my blog and I can do that. Impenetrable logic, I know.

I want to take a break to talk to you about Nicolas Cage. More specifically, I want to talk about why Nicolas Cage should be in jail.

No, not the actual Nicolas Cage. I have no illicit information about the beloved (?) actor. I'm talking about his character Benjamin Gates from the National Treasure movies.

Over the weekend I watched most of National Treasure 2: The Legend of Curly's Gold Book of Secrets. Why did I watch this movie you may ask? Well...it was on. I think that reason is good enough.

If you don't know the premise, Benjamin Gates is a historian/treasure hunter who finds a major fortune in the first movie while evading the machinations of the actor who would become Ned Stark. In the second movie, he is tasked with clearing the name of his ancestor Thomas Gates who is implicated in the plot to assassinate Abraham Lincoln. However, in the process of clearing his great-great grandfather's name he learns of an ancient treasure (name check!) and goes off in search with his sidekicks/family in tow.

Here's the thing, in his quest to clear his long dead ancestor's name and in effect change nothing about the present, Gates commits or attempts to commit the following crimes: Breaking and entering, grand theft, trespassing, hacking, attempted manslaughter, attempted vehicular manslaughter, leaving the scene of an accident, breaking out of jail, kidnapping the President, espionage against a friendly government and some light treason.

I'm just saying it really shouldn't matter what happens at the end of the movie because according to almost any measure of justice, Benjamin Gates should go to jail and possibly worse if we stick close to the treason argument.

But he doesn't. Because it's a movie. And he's the hero. And the hero doesn't go to jail at the end unless he's Danny Ocean (but only for a few months).

It's really convenient that everybody in an action movie knows it's an action movie. I mean even the extras know how to avoid the cars in the chase scene or the stray bullets that never seem to hit the heroes.

I always wonder about this kind of weird mundane stuff. The things that happen after the adventure. How did the Congressional hearings regarding the Transformers turn out? Did someone decide to start watching the Watchmen? How did the revolution in V for Vendetta go? Will the Avengers face a lawsuit for destroying a city?

I think this is an important perspective to have, especially as a Christian. Not that I think these are actual serious questions, but the ability to have concern about the day to day existence of life once the adrenaline wears off. Everybody wants to be the hero, not so many people want to be the community organizer ten years after the hero saves the world.

When I was 18, I went down to Mississippi for a week to do relief work after Hurricane Katrina. One of the things I remember hearing was that volunteers are always around at the beginning, maybe the first six months to a year, but the real rebuilding can take five to ten years to complete. Not as many come down to help out in years five and six. The heroes are gone and they think the story is over.

This is actually something that has always bothered me about short term mission trips, especially for teenagers and college kids. It allows us to have this kind of Christian Hero Fantasy Camp experience, but then we return back to home and comfort with all the memories of “those cute kids,” but their day to day is probably the same as it was before meeting us.

I'm not meaning to sound cynical, but it's something to consider and something to think about. Do we know what kind of story we are in? Do we know why we are doing the things we are doing? Do we realize that this is real life?

Benjamin Gates is allowed to do whatever he wants with no regard for the long-term consequences because he knows there won't be any. His story will be over in about two hours.

We are not allowed the same luxury. We live in the real world. In the real world, action heroes are overrated and real heroes fight through the day to day grind to try and do a little better to try and help a little more. They know that they won't win, they understand that winning was never the point, it was always about trying, it was about doing justice and mercy even when it was hard and when it hurt.

We can be heroes, but it takes more than one day.

Peace,

Ben

You can follow Ben on Twitter @BenHoward87 or email him at benjamin.howard87 [at] gmail.com.

Also, you can subscribe to On Pop Theology via RSS feed or email on the top right corner of the main page.