Martin, Hilary, & the Limitations of Knowledge

So, I’m kind of a big fan of Martin of Tours. I’m writing him into my Master of Theological Studies thesis at Duke Divinity School, which I am doing under Stanley Hauerwas (theological ethics) and Warren Smith (historical theology). I think Martin is one of the most under-sung heroes of the early Church, and we’d all do well to look more into his life and witness. Not just because it is from him that we derive the word Chapel and Chaplain, and not just because he was homies with a couple of Caesars, but because his life says more than his writings. Like another guy we like in the Church, maybe you’ve heard of him, we call him Christ…

So jokes aside, I’ve been doing some light research (read: Wikipedia) in getting ready to write this sucker. I want to know who influenced Martin and why, where he was involved and what events he found himself embroiled in. One of the biggies was the Priscillian Affair of 385, when the Church leaned on the state to do its dirty work of silencing heretics. In this case by killing them. Priscillian was the first person the Church appealed to Rome to have killed because we couldn’t have a decent conversation between Bishops. But that’s beside the point I hope to make in this particular blog post.

What is keeping me up at night for the time being is thinking about who mentored Martin and where he got some of his views (at least those he didn’t get while serving his 25 year Roman military obligation). Martin sought out Hilary of Poitiers as a mentor, who was considered the greatest theologian of the era. Hilary, like Martin, was raised by two pagan parents and went thru a conversion, eventually becoming a theological force to be reckoned with. He had some really concrete views on Constantine, the emperor who baptized the state and made Christianity a legal religion. Hilary thought Constantine was the anti-Christ…

Martin, on the other hand, didn’t feel the same way. He couldn’t have, otherwise he probably wouldn’t have remained in the Roman military for 20+ years after his baptism. But he seemed to think Hilary was pretty cool, since he continued to be mentored by him. Another early Church figure who wasn’t totally agro about Constantine was Ambrose, who mentored another church father we all know and love, Augustine.

Here is where it really gets interesting (and I will leave it here for tonight, maybe writing more about my thesis work in later blogs). Augustine is where the modern church turns for what we now call Just War theology/doctrine/tradition. I think this is a huge mistake. For one, Augustine never systematized a theory of when war was just. Instead, most of what we have of his writings directly on war were pastoral replies to high-ranking soldiers and government officials. Hardly a deliberate attempt at providing a framework through which to understand how war can be just. More importantly, the question of Priscillian should cause us pause. Augustine didn’t start his ministry until after the Church learned that it could have Caesar execute those it wanted silenced, and neither Ambrose nor Augustine seem to critically engage whether this is just (or theologically credible at all) to begin with.

In contrast, Hilary’s student Martin spoke out vehemently against the planned execution (as well as the heresy), even excommunicating the two bishops most active in appealing to Rome. It took Caesar himself to convince Martin to return to communion with these persecutors, a move that Martin went to his grave regretting, since Priscillian was executed nonetheless. Ambrose seemed to have remained silent about the affair, allowing the state to assert an authority over a Christian that had absolutely no historical precedent. Ambrose, who was a cradle Catholic, mentored Augustine (whose mother, Monica, was famously Christian), who similarly failed to critically challenge Caesar’s authority in the realm of violence (or at least did not do so strongly enough).

My thesis will be to look at Martin and how we have come to privilege a kind of ‘intellectual’ knowledge over that kind of knowledge we acquire through a lived experience. To understand war, we look to a thinker (Augustine), instead of a soldier (Martin), and that is a problem. To think that we can ‘know’ something primarily through abstracting it is horse manure. Certainly there is a kind of knowledge that comes by submitting a subject to intellectual scrutiny, but that knowledge is inherently limited to that which we can imagine apart from experience. For example, I might read about changing a diaper, but I won’t really know shit until I get my hands dirty. In relying too heavily on Augustine (Aquinas is another good example), we think we have ‘understood’ war and justice, but we have really only learned that which is possible exclusively through contemplation. But to really get down to brass tax, we have to get our hands dirty. We have to trust those who are practitioners at least as much as we do those who are theorists (if not more so). If we want to understand war, we should be looking toward Martin and the soldier saints long before we turn to Augustine, Aquinas, Grotius, Ramsey, or …Hauerwas.

Maximilian of Tebessa & Lenten Abstinence

For many years now, I have been captivated by the Roman Catholic church. In fact, I spent much of last fall and winter staying late after weekly Mass to participate in the  Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (RCIA). Roman Catholicism intrigues me with its structure and hierarchy, much like the military I spent over six years within as a forward observer for the artillery. Like the military, there are things I cannot quite give my “Amen” to, so for now I have taken a break from RCIA, though I am still deeply contemplating Catholicism.

In Catholicism, abstinence takes on a deeper meaning than my mainline, slightly evangelical Protestant background. Abstinence in the Roman church means abstaining from meat, not necessarily sex. Every Friday during the season of Lent, Catholics are expected to refrain from eating the meat of fellow mammals and also fowl. Ancient practices based this restraint on the fact that meat at one point bled, and abstinence is observed on Fridays in Lent as foreshadowing Good Friday. On Fridays, Catholics abstain from their moral proximity to shedding blood in anticipation for the One who bled once and for all, for us all.

Courtesy www.fatherbill.org

Another thing that compels me to consider the Roman Catholic church is the emphasis (some would say dependency) on tradition and liturgy. In particular, I am grateful for the formality with which the Catholic church honors saints throughout her history, especially those who served in the military (as I once did), and even more particularly, those who abstained from shedding blood. In fact, the majority of soldier saints from the first three centuries were martyred for refusing to shed blood (or worship the head of state). March 12^th marks the feast day of one such soldier saint, Maximilian of Tebessa. Saint Max would actually not like the title “soldier saint.” In fact, he was killed for refusing the title (well, not “saint,” but certainly “soldier”).

The year was 295, and young Max was compelled by law to enlist. Max’s father Victor had served, and Roman law dictated that the sons of veterans be conscripted. His father reluctantly took him to the local recruiting station, where they gave him the equivalent of a set of dog tags, which he refused to place around his neck, stating

It is not permitted to me to bear the lead upon my neck after [having received] the saving seal of my Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God.

Maximilian found military service to be in violation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that violence and shedding blood was wrong. At just 21 years old, he was beheaded for refusing to enlist.

This year, in remembrance of Maximilian, I have decided to abstain from meat as a symbolic gesture to the pacifism he and I share – of abstaining from shedding the blood of our fellows (animal and enemy alike). Of course, Lent is supposed to be a time in which you give up something you actually find pleasurable, and I certainly did not find war pleasurable. I did love my time in the military though; the camaraderie, the sense of purpose, ‘roughing it’ in the field for training exercises, jumping out of airplanes in North Carolina, hiking through the tropical jungle in Hawaii…

But like Max, I found Christ calling me out of the world’s way of doing things, out of the cycle of supposedly redemptive violence. It was a difficult path, the one least traveled that leads to a narrow gate few will find. Those who that embark on that martial journey, like Max before us, face an uphill climb as part of a community that faces social distress (such as substance abuse, homelessness, and suicide) of epidemic proportions.

Christian soldiers wrestle constantly between their faith in God and their service to our country, often thrown about in the tumultuous waters of political sloganeering (what can “support” really mean when purchased for just $1.50 and slapped haphazardly on a million bumpers?). In churches and communities, loved ones remain reluctantly silent for fear of asking the wrong question or wandering into restricted moral territory. I still get asked if I have killed people, and the awkward silence the inquisitor is met with dwarfs the emotional toll already exacted internally by well-intentioned ignorance. But I refuse to let the silence win, no matter how painful reconciliation might be.

With a decade of war behind us, it is time to speak up and listen in to our war-torn warriors. We will make mistakes, but we shouldn’t let the challenge deter us – our love for those who’ve served must conquer our fear of slipping up. For pointers on where to start with the ones we care for who’ve been touched by combat, here are a few credible resources;

• http://sites.duke.edu/aftertheyellowribbon/media
• www.helpersunite.com/projects/76-centurion-s-guild
• http://conscienceinwar.org/about
• www.thesimpleway.org/index.php/store/product/jesus-bombs-ice-cream-dvd-resource-guide

Of course, Lent is a time to give up things we love, and nobody in their right mind loves war. But we so often choose silence when it comes time to speak; to our friends and family, to our government, to our enemies. Let’s abstain from silence the rest of this Lenten season, the rest of this year, the rest of our lives. Words can hurt, but they can also heal, and this generation of veterans deserves every bit of attentive care we can possibly afford.

**This is the fourth stop on the IVP Lenten blog tour, sharing posts every Monday this season. Leading the way was Margot Starbuck, Brent Bill, and Rachel Stone. Following me will be Andrew Byers, Valerie Hess, Beth Booram, and Chad Young. Stay in touch by following @IVPbooks or @IVpress on Twitter.

Opportunity to Support the Troops!

Right now, there are more soldiers falling on their own swords than there are falling to the sword.

Since at least 2005, 17 (yes, seventeen) veterans kill themselves each and every day. They are broken and in need of compassion, and what’s worse, they are standing behind you in line at Whole Foods, sitting next to you in Church on Sunday, and sharing notes with you in class. The data was collected by CBS in a report they aired in 2007, and Congress.org found that in 2009 & 2010, there were more suicides of active duty troops than there were combat fatalities in Iraq and Afghanistan COMBINED!

Head over to http://help.st/3zy and consider contributing to the work of Centurion’s Guild.

At Home in Combat

I’ve heard a number of times that combat veterans sometimes feel more at home in combat than back at home in safety. Maybe you’ve heard it too, in movies like The Hurt Locker and In The Valley of Elah (Private Diaz mentions, toward the end, that despite the horrors he witnessed, all he wants “to do is go back.”). This is a problem; nobody in their right mind should want to return to the hell of war. Families and communities wonder how it could be possible for someone to actually desire to deploy again and again. Maybe an illustration could help to at least put some color to it all.

Imagine you are a beautiful piece of fine China. You sit on the shelf with the other pieces; cups and plates, salad forks and butter knives. People admire you as they walk by. Life on the shelf is interrupted only briefly by special dinners for important guests. You are a part of a set, and all the pieces of China are all relied on for particular qualities you all share, you know what your place is, what specific quality you possess and therefor offer.

But then one day you are accidentally dropped, breaking into a thousand dangerously sharp shards. In the bustle, you are swept under the rug so the guests don’t have to see you. After dinner is over, you’re brought out from under the rug. Some of your smaller pieces can’t be found, but you get glued back together as carefully as possible. You bear visible scars, but you are also fundamentally weakened. Questions plague your mind; will the glue hold? can I still be stacked with the rest of the China? will I ever be admired again?

No matter how skilled the craftsman who put you back together, regardless of how much money was put into your repair, you know that you will never be the same as you once were. Do you want to be put back on the shelf at all, or do you just want to be put back on the floor? You care so much for the other pieces of China that you don’t particularly want to be put back on the shelf, you don’t want to sully the aesthetic uniformity. The trash can looks more appealing than the shelf; after all, you just wouldn’t fit in on the shelf you once called home…

Church is that place where we don’t hide our scars, where some are China but others handcrafted pottery. All have scars, so none are out of place. We are admired not for our perfection but because we are products of the Owner’s hand.

When people are deployed repeatedly and come home to awkward glances and uncomfortable silences, can we blame them for only wanting to return to combat instead of coming (all the way) home? It is not merely an addiction, it is a fundamental shift in identity – soldiers can feel the difference in their very souls. In these circumstances, we at home need not only to remind them that they are still valuable and “normal,” we also need to be honest about ways in which we are all scarred and shattered.

Confession must take on a whole new meaning, not just for those who have killed in combat, but those of us who instinctively think that they are not even indirectly a part of that violence. Heschel said that in a representative democracy, some are guilty but all are responsible. We all need to confess, we all need to acknowledge the collective nature of the responsibility for war we all share. We are all damaged goods, all touched by the horrors of war. If we can convey that reality, maybe then the rest of the broken plates and cups would feel more at home with us than they do in the shattering chaos of war.

Martin Soldier of Christ Icon Commentary

   Leading up to the 2011 After the Yellow Ribbon event put on by Duke Milites Christi, Fr. Bill McNichols worked with me and a small group of students in commissioning the amazing icon to the left of Saint Martin, who would go on to become Bishop of Tours in modern day France. Martin was known to have told Caesar Julian, the most powerful man in the known world (and his own commander-in-chief); “I am a soldier of Christ. I will not fight” when he first found himself on the field of battle in Worms. His declaration came after nearly 25 years in the Roman army, a reminder for all soldiers of Christ that faith and service sometimes correlate, but often collide. When they do, Martin reminds us that we serve God and country, in that order.

In this icon, Martin is depicted in his military attire with a sword that has been broken by the power of the Cross. Fr. Bill commented that he had never before used so much gold leaf in writing an icon, a testimony to the richness of character we find in the life of Martin. As a part of the commissioning process, I was asked to write a short reflection on Martin’s life and significance, which you can find below. The complete prayer card can be found on Fr. Bill’s website; www.fatherbill.org.

Martin the Shepherd Icon Commentary

   I wrote the following commentary for an icon that Fr. Bill McNichols did some time ago of the patron saint of soldiers and chaplains; Martin, Bishop of Tours. Martin was reluctantly acclaimed bishop of Tours (in France) on July 4th, 370 CE. The townsfolk had led him into the city under the auspices of needing to have a sick man healed. When he reached the town center, the peasants proclaimed loudly and in one accord that he would be their bishop. Some other religious were present and muttered their doubts, but were scolded so harshly by the people that they raised no further objections.

Fr. Bill, accomplished iconographer in the Roman Catholic Church, asked me to write a short reflection on Martin so that he could transform the beautiful icon to the left into a prayer card for Christians hoping to learn more about this inspiring man of God. Below you can read what he and I came up with. You can order cards on his website; www.fatherbill.org.

Q&R; Praying for enlistees

I have been asked to lead a time of prayer in a couple of weeks during Sunday worship in which we will pray over a young man who has joined the Air Force and shipping off to basic and eventually his assignment. I have agreed to lead the time of prayer, but I’m wondering how I go about praying for him with me being a Christian pacifist. Any suggestions? I have spent significant time thinking about, practicing, and experiencing ways this has happened.  So I very much value your opinion on this.  I’m open to hearing anything, even, “what’s the big deal, of course you pray for him.”

I think that it would be a mistake to focus on the bad aspects of the military, though there are many. But there are some things that do build up and strengthen those who join the military, especially boot camp. It can give people confidence, teaches them camaraderie, and fulfills their desire to be a part of something bigger than self. It takes courage, especially in a time of war, to enlist. These things are all things we can be thankful for and acknowledge (if you like) in praying for him in church.

I also know that we sometimes want to qualify our support and make it known in some way that we have some reservations about military service, but I don’t know if a prayer is the place for this. Instead, maybe pray that he be led to always do the right thing, no matter how hard it might be. Ask that God continue to strengthen him in his moral discernment, to always follow his conscience and (if yours is a “high church” tradition) the teachings and doctrines of faith.

Finally, i think it is important to ‘mark’ the person that he is before he is trained to do violence. You and I might agree that what he is about to do might compromise his moral or spiritual integrity. Having a moment naming him as wholly (and holy) one person now might give him something to return to if and when he encounters things that challenge the moral framework I hope your church has constructed for him to rely on. Problem is, i don’t know how this might be accomplished. This is not something that he needs to be aware of himself, but something referencing the person he is within his family (father, brother, son, etc.?) could serve this purpose. Did he always take his kids to baseball games? Was he always doing his chores for his parents? Did he and his siblings have anything particularly unique they did together? I think he might need that sensory memory in case he does something later that makes him feel less whole (and holy); something to return to, however mundane. i.e., even if he has to kill in war, he can return to wholeness by sharing baseball games with friends, or that thing he does with siblings, etc.

Most importantly, keep it brief, don’t make it a big deal. He is doing something important, but not incredibly more important than, say harvesting our food or educating our children. All vocations deserve respect, but none more than necessary. We venerate our service members too much sometimes, and that can have disastrous consequences. The longer he is the center of attention, the more this can become ingrained in our conscience. Keep our prayers short and our confessions long, if you ask me (or mewithoutYou, the band that I stole that line from).