A THEOLOGY OF HOME Carrie Gress...from Helena Daily September 22, 2018
Home. It is a magical word that resonates with all of us. Even those from broken homes, or homes that no longer exist, there is still something in the idea that is sought after. Home is that place where we are meant to be safe, nurtured, known for who we are, to freely live and love. Home’s universal appeal populates culture. Take Me Home, Country Road, Sweet Home Alabama, and I’ll Be Home for Christmas are a few songs that invoke the theme. Movies and literature end happily with protagonists, like Odysseus, finally going home. The entire goal of the American pass-time of baseball is to be safe at home. YouTube videos of joyful homecomings fill up our social media feeds and we spend billions of dollars constructing and decorating our own houses, turning them into Home Sweet Home. Our homes are the great theatre where the drama of our lives unfolds, as G.K. Chesterton eloquently said:
The place where babies are born, where men die, where the drama of mortal life is acted, is not an office or a shop or a bureau. It is something much smaller in size and much larger in scope. And while nobody would be such a fool as to pretend that it is the only place where people should work, or even the only place where women should work, it has a character of unity and universality that is not found in any of the fragmentary experiences of the division of labour.
Home, by its nature, foreshadows heaven. Pope Saint John Paul II’s final words in this life were “Let me go to the house of the Father.” He wanted to go home – to the home that all of us are willed by God to go to, even if he allows our own will to lead us somewhere else.
Ironically, despite the innate human desire that there is for home, the notion that someone would actually want to make a home, providing a place of safety, love, cleanliness, order, education, and care, has fallen out of favor. Could there be, in the minds of millions of women today, anything worse than being a “homemaker”? In the 1960s, women left home. In The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan articulated an idea that resonated with millions of Western women: “the ache that has no name.” When Friedan and her feminist friends asked, “Is this all there is?” they assumed the answer was “yes.” In their female frenzy to escape home, the elite narrative became that women should offer a collective non serviam, a resounding “no” to serving their families, their children, or any future but their own. Wendell Berry captured some of the illogic of liberated women when he asked: “Why would any woman who would refuse, properly, to take the marital vow of obedience (on the ground, presumably, that subservience to a mere human being is beneath human dignity) then regard as ‘liberating’ a job that puts her under the authority of a boss (man or woman) whose authority specifically requires and expects obedience?”
*Women following the downward stream of the culture haven’t yet realized that the general malaise or malcontent felt by 1960s housewives is the same emptiness they feel now. Feminism hasn’t led women to happiness, just to more searching, grasping, transitioning, with the next best thing around the corner. What they don’t know is that no career, string of lovers, exotic trips to Bali, or Louis Vuitton handbags will fill this gap. In the meantime, children became the enemy, preventing women from fulfilling their dreams. Abortion became a necessity. The number of children lost through abortion is staggering. As the Vietnam War came to an end, casualties of that war – 58,220 U.S. servicemen total – were dwarfed by this new kind of killing, mothers killing their own children (60 million and counting, 3000 daily). Abortion is by far the number one cause of death in the United States annually, outpacing heart disease and cancer. What happens, then, when you have generations of people that have willfully killed their own children through abortion? The Medievals were against abortion because it takes an innocent life, but also because they knew it was mortally damaging to the human soul. It isn’t just a child that dies in an abortion, but something in the mother and the father dies as well. As St. Thomas Aquinas said, bonum est diffusivum sui, the good spreads itself out. The opposite is also true: evil spreads itself out. This grave evil has reached into every area of familial life. It is any wonder, then, that our spiritual home, the Church, seems to be crumbling from the core? When the fundamental piece of society — the family — has been shredded, it shouldn’t surprise us to see similar fallout in the Church. We expect bishops to know better, and to be holy and good, but they too are a product of our torn-asunder culture. This doesn’t absolve them of their crimes, but at least helps us to understand how those entrusted with the care of so many souls could respond with gross malfeasance. When some women can view the destruction of their children as a social rite of passage to join the “sisterhood,” it isn’t too far of a leap to see that bishops could abandon their spiritual children to join the “brotherhood.” “There are two ways of getting home,” Chesterton explained, “One of them is to stay there. The other is to walk round the whole world till we come back to the same place.” We are a culture that needs to reclaim the home, having looked the world over for happiness. Radical feminists, although they have looked high and low, still have “that ache that cannot be defined.” Their restless hearts are a God ache, which will remain until they make their way back Home again.
until very recently in human history music was an activity
that took place largely in the home
it was considered an essential aspect of
what it meant to be cultivated
and it also transcended social class
even while I think it safe to say that wealthy people had more leisure time
to pursue the sonic beauty which is man made musical sound
poorer people when given the chance took the time to entertain themselves
with song and dance and simply listening to musical artistry
that existed in many homes
I'm thinking of the Bach Cello Suites but also most guitar music before the 20th century
and the countless trios and sonatas which weren't necessarily meant for the stage
they were written on and for the aficiandos of music which existed
plentifully in European towns from the middle ages onward n the homes
and in celtic society the existence of fiddle music and song and dance
has long been considered an essential part of daily living
the stage-- the concert hall--- recorded performance
these are all rather modern social arrangements
and I wish only to address the dark negative aspects
of such activity....they exist as means of distortion
while one could argue that the modern orchestra is the brainchild of stage performance
and practically inseparable from the notion of social music making for the last 300 years
it is safe to say that only in very wealth driven circumstances has the orchestra been able to sustain
any sort of prominence
while the solo guitar or the solo fiddle can exist quite well in utter poverty
what we know as folk music is the fundamental music of home life
now we know there's train songs and rambling songs and mining songs
tragedy songs all of which point to the realities of humans living in the world as we know it
yet the performance and the sustaining of the performances of these songs
is something that happens primarily in the home
and home is the proper place for these songs
I would even go so far as to argue that the stage is a means of taking the folksong
out of its typical place and stretching it beyond its aesthetic limits
that's why you had all those opera trained singers doing folk music in the 50s and 60s
trying to make them sound like stage songs...which they were not
this overemphasis on commercial music making has driven someone like pascal quignard to proclaim his utter hatred of music
now you could argue that the nightclub is a place for the music of the people
and for certain the nightclub has its place
but most of those songs and that music defies the principle of folk music anyway
it is music designed to have some commercial appeal and one could even say some monetary value
but folk music is not meant to make money
it is true that very few homes are conducive to music making as an essential part of every day life
and this is a tragedy of great proportion
for somehow the emphasis of music has been yanked out of domestic life and into the market place
and has left most homes rather sterile and places unadorned with beautiful sound
and one could argue that the phonograph and the sound system in general have taken over the role
of providing for musical life in the home but this is a terrible illusion for recorded music is not music at all and the fact that the contraptions of electrical musical propulsion have completely overrun our daily lives it has resulted in the most abhorrent depletion of aesthetic values and thus an undermining of cultivated values which are necessary for human survival...well at least we have strong pharmaceuticals as antidotes to the horrid state of affairs
there is no reason whatsoever to think that music has only a personal formation or merely educational aspect to it...that a person must aspire to the symphony or a perfect recital or a recording date...when it is even more true that real music can and should happen on almost any given day in any given home...for it is in the home where the primitive intuition for music making can be protected and cultivated...and it is in the home where the songs we need to hear should be easily sung and in the home where dance might have a rather natural expression
of course this should then translate to a wider social importance
music being the stuff of which happy people really pull together and weave
the demands of civilization with one another...these days it seems more likely to be sports
or exaggerated expressions of popular art rather than the humble sounds cultivated in homes that is given social priority
and that is rather pathetic
music is the medium of refinement for the finest sensibilities known to mankind
and these sensibilities find their clearest and dearest expression In the strong values
that tie families together and hold the walls of home inevitably up
now I've been meaning to write on this very topic for some time it's amazing how lazy I can get I play the role of the deep thinker but then have to acknowledge that all my meditation and rumination is but near idle time-wasting
which i do declare I think has a place in the world
and this leads directly to my next topic
where is a man free to do nothing?
our unspoken and cultivated quiet understanding of home is colored by the principle that we all need a place that is warm a place where we're welcome and a place where we can kick back and do absolutely nothing if we so choose without having to endure the harsh consequences of a social perception of idleness...a slacker a slackard
I will even go so far as to say that unless a person experiences the quality of time which has no constraints or presuppositions...in a place called home... he will spend the rest of his life quietly but frantically searching out such possibilities
so this is a fundamental and vital inclination amongst human beings one which does not get talked about much perhaps it is too universal to merit anything by way of critique
somehow the portion of freedom we are all offered is connected to the extent to which we might sacrifice or extend our very selves in procuring and assuring ourselves of an actual place whereby we can be certain of security and self-contentment self-definition and exercise the efforts we must in assuring that others with whom we live might be assured of the same freedom
perhaps a person is more free in a place called home than anywhere else in the world
and even while a person must expend energy time and resources to maintain home it is understood as a mere obligatory requirement in the life process of knowing where one lives...where do I live?.... then takes on a heightened sense of meaning
where do I thrive where is my hive how am I alive
of course the world has a certain hominess about it it is possible to travel in the world and find sustenance and shelter and distraction of any sort...with enough financial backing a person could literally live in and out of hotels eat at restaurants use public transportation and be as perfectly content as anyone else...I am struck immediately with wondering whether this is a true statement or not
one might even argue that it is somewhat more difficult to engage deeply with ones need for home for it lacks the excitement of the world ...but this is the very issue is it not
one maintains home as a place where one is free to partake in life's warmth in such a way as to be outside the general scrutiny of mankind a place to sleep a place to share food a place to enjoy conversation a place to plan a place to sit quietly and do nothing or read a place to care for natures' ubiquitous demands
we are free to be bored of course
somehow we're inclined to do something unless sleep is the preferred conscious disposition
at some point home obliges us to exert energy in holding forth with the possibility of hospitality and the freedom to be a source of charitable receptivity not simply a secure refuge against danger or a fence against the less attractive qualities of society at large but a place that carries about it a warm openness to preparing the possibility for optimal enjoyment of life be that with food be that with reflective quiet be that with festive humor be that with physical intimacy be that with learned wit be that an understood moments' retreat a time of freedom in order that life's meaning might grab hold
we hunger for freedom and everyone seems to know without saying that whatever freedom we will be granted in this life will be contingent upon the place we dare to call home
we are free to either cultivate or neglect our places we call home
...I want to explore more keenly the case for hospitality and the sustaining of home life
though it's rather easy to recognize the fundamental elements which go into making a home a home it is also necessary to recognize that there are different types of living a variety of ways people appropriate their connection to home
let's start with the homeless a homeless person is disciplined by his own unfetteredness he is tied to various exigencies that provide what minimal comfort he can derive from the world he may not have the luxury of a roof over his head he may resign himself to living in a state of relative stench and filth home takes on a merely geographical component he is where he is
some folks make lives work from shacks with a water source and a stove perhaps a cot a few pans they make life work with minimal tools
then there is institutional living the sharing of space with many others in prisons in military compounds in religious houses educational facilities dorms for instance
somehow the ideal is a private home a place where space the demands and the joys of life weave themselves out into the tapestry of lives shared under one roof fed and noted at one table
there are millions of people who essentially live by moving about by flying great distances and streaming in and out of hotels and restaurants and business haunts
what's it going to be
the planet the map the pinpoint the general neighborhood the piece of ground the mailbox the network of acquaintances
when did the 'stay at home' mother become a social class a social class with strong suggestion that it is an undesirable role a misfortune of sorts????
it seems the crisis to which I indirectly point is the crisis of perception perception regarding the very understanding of the idea of home
someone informed women in north America in the mid20th century that there was no real redeeming value in being held prisoner of a house in focusing ones complete attention on the well-being of the very youngest members of the human race within the trap then understood as the home so the purpose of the women's movement had in it an explicit social criticism which sought to liberate women from the perceived trap when in fact women had been in the most powerful position in the world for centuries the place of power in the home the predominance over the kitchen over the whole domain if you will
they were liberated into a demented social involvement to the debilitating misfortune of everyone
there has been a horrible and pathetic social misunderstanding
this however does help to explain how the fundamental value previously almost universally held which places the home in a place of nearly invaluable recognition slowly but surely was transformed into a mere pragmatic function and the notion of family was then regarded as a disruptive social institution the home then a sort of prison one pays for one way or another
it is in this very sense that I have heard it said by mothers who devoted their lives to their children that perhaps they have missed out on something they didn't aspire to some place in the world of business or culture and therefore were relegated to an existence of domestic banality
and herein lies the problem it is the contention of this project the raison d'etre of sorts to foster with unabashed enthusiasm the essential nobility of the role of mother specifically and parent in general for fatherhood is in fact every bit as important but another topic altogether
you can find youtubes by' Stefan molyneux which are good and interesting resources of instantaneous philosophy and this is one of his most intriguing topics the mommy wars the breakdowns of mommydom which for some odd reason now needs to be justified as a credible social possibility for godz sake
it is because I care about homes that I care enough to be harsh and critical about the notion of home and what it takes to make to keep to cultivate home and why once a person sets out to make a place a home there should be serious thought and energy put into making the project as warm and happy as possible and this takes a lot of work it is the work of a lifetime it is the complete giving of grace and possibility in the cultivation of love in a home where it can't be cultivated very well anywhere else
somehow someone got drunk on the notion of dream home and people started imagining these monstrosities of architecture and design which were nice to look at but had nothing of strength and durability what a pathetic mess it's all been
we each maintain a secret commitment to offset the pull of chaos we each are driven toward the trust and security of being in a place of peace
I wish to restore the idea that stay at home moms are the norm and they live out a societal role ennobled with its own treasury of wisdom anything else is a wretched and unfortunate aberration to presume that a professional career is of a higher order than this is the greatest of modern travesties
maternity is of the highest human order and contends for that status with nothing else except perhaps the religious vocation which will always have its merits
it can be asked fairly what about homes where a man and woman have no children where the cultivation of love is held at the distance of two fatherhood and motherhood are not lived out in any immediate and tangible way this is not to say there is no care no fundamental necessity for life for there is truly something miraculous in the effort of two people to stay together for no other reason than to love one another
and the role of the hermit as well a dedicated a loving person could commit to live alone and be a witness to god's grace and love in a solitary state...or in sheer existential stoicism
this is not to say that women should not read or draw or compose music or weave baskets or find places of generous creativity...the home in its ideal form should be a place of the cultivation of all the great human attributes god's grace often being detected in the creative impulses of siblings or the nurturing of unique talents
the home should be a place where the creative grace of god is both sensed and engaged
it is somewhat interesting to note that our western civilization has tended toward the individual concern with pursuing what it might take to establish a physical context which then might well lead to the establishment of a family
however let us be honest the preoccupation with individuality has translated itself into the creation of vast networks of apartments where single persons can assure themselves of at least the physical utilitarian aspects of home if only for a short time places that are not that much more complicated than a hotel room...save perhaps for the existence of a kitchen
sexual intimacy is the one human activity which demands privacy other activities like eating reading conversation... playing games ,,,making art...etc. ...these things all seem to possess both public and private aspects and can function within a complete open context
sex however...even while we've tried to make it as open and conversational as possible in our times...does require and even, one could say, lends itself most naturally to a private expression...and again if we want to speak of consequences...only seems to take on a public character when the natural development reveals itself in the manner of signs of success...pregnancy has about it a rather overt public quality...I stop to ponder the obvious freedom of expression that lovers might exhibit...yet when it comes down to actually being open to the ultimate human physical expression of sexual union a man and a woman quite naturally give themselves over to the security of a place where they can be intimate beyond the perceptions of other humans
in a perfect world or a world perfected by values and virtues which would hold sexual intimacy between a man and woman in exalted terms of sanctity there would be no pornography no debasement of the seriousness of sexuality to mere indecent distraction would somehow relegate this aspect of human interaction to the accepted status of privacy and sanctity this of course is the ideal of Christian morality concerning this most intense human proclivity
it is the objective of this blog to pursue to some sort of reasonable conclusion the notion of home as a place where family happens and family being a sacrament ( with a small s ) both a visible sign and a means by which grace is bestowed and experienced
it occurs to me that the elements which go into establishing the physical reality of a church are correlative to the basic elements of home... ...the table... ...the bath... ...the need for hope... ...a place of security... ...a place of sustenance... ...a place of honesty... ...a place of rest... ...a place of easy recognition... ...a place of union...
a young couple can sustain their love for one another for awhile without thinking about natural demands but eventually there comes a time when they both realize that in order to sustain their love they need shelter they need privacy they need a place for their fleshy union to enjoy both freedom and responsibility and this has resulted in a consistency amongst all the peoples of the world albeit the contingencies have been worked out in different ways and this has resulted in the character of home being the basis for what we might call cultural distinctions
another thematic piece might draw the line between those cultures which tend toward utilitarian preoccupations and those which maintain awarenesses which reflect a closer connection to the demands of the natural world of vegetation and meat and water the understanding of home being quite different for people who must acquire fresh water each day in contrast to those who simply assume that the faucet will come forth with water at the turn of a key
for home to be understood as a sacrament it will be essential to develop ways of understanding the natural and healthy acquisition of life-sustaining and life-enhancing modes of human interaction
