Creativity: Imago Dei

WhiteCrucifixion on the streets
Originally uploaded by bobmendo

Why do we draw? Why do we listen to good music? What other animal draws for no (other) purpose? A spider spins her web, although beautiful and fantastic in design, to acquire food; a salamander weaves its way along a beach, leaving a pattern of beauty, but not for an arts degree. The beaver builds an impressive dam, but mostly for survival.

Mankind alone uses creativity for beauty's sake.

CS Lewis wrote much about creativity. For instance, "Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it." Wonderful understanding of application and style.

More to the point of being unoriginal, Lewis wrote "Creation as applied to human authorship seems to me to be an entirely misleading term. We rearrange elements God has provided.... we are recombining elements made by God and already containing his meanings." There, in a few short phrases is imago dei. It's God who is the Creator. It's God who pours his life into us, including his image, and including this entirely human characteristic of creativity.

Some people say I'm a creative person. And I think the closer I get to Jesus, the more creative I feel. I feel closer to the Creator and thus his image and his creativity is awash in me. Right now, I'm thinking about my time this morning, about my reading of the Bible, the singing I was able to do with some sacred songs from Hillsong, and pondering the Creator. As a result I feel uninhibited and free. I feel like dreaming new thoughts and writing this blog and calling others to join me in creativity.

Priscilla drew this crucifix on the streets of Melbourne during one of our outreaches there. She used her artistic talent a la Chagall to communicate "This Jew died for you." Some write songs; some draw chalk art. My first cousin Barbara Mendelsohn married a man named Fred who for decades has gone to the streets with sketch art, to help people around to understand the message of the Gospel of Jesus.

Listen, perhaps you don't believe in God. Fair enough. You have to ask yourself why you enjoy music. From where does that pleasure come? Do you like art or posters or television shows or movies or theatre? What's the point of that? Friend, you have discovered imago dei. And if there's an image of God, it doesn't prove, but it certainly points to a God who has such an image. I wish that for you soon.

Time on the clock

Time management is crucial in sports and at universities these days. Crowds clamber for coaches to call time out or to stall and use up all the clock if their side is ahead by a goal or two. As I blog today I'm watching the US gridiron contest, the grand final, The Superbowl between the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts. It's taking place at Sun Life Stadium in Miami, Florida next to Ft Lauderdale.

As the first half ended the crowd was not happy with the decision of the coach for New Orleans, but he was vindicated as their kicker helped trim the Colts' lead to 10-6 at the interval.

Many students will be back in the classroom tomorrow, and I have some advise on time management.

1) Blocks of study time and breaks
Try to use blocks of study time every week. Blocks ideally are around an hour, but maybe you become restless after only 15 minutes? Some difficult material may require more frequent breaks. Shorten your study blocks if necessary—but don’t forget to return to the task at hand! What you do during your break should give you an opportunity to have a snack, relax, or otherwise refresh or re-energize yourself. For example, place blocks of time when you are most productive: are you a morning person or a night owl?


2)Dedicated study space
Determine a place free from distraction (no mobiles or SMS) where you can maximize your concentration and be free of the distractions that friends or hobbies can bring! You should also have a back-up space that you can escape to, like the library, a study center, your folks' house, even a Gloria Jeans where you can be anonymous.

3) Weekly reviews
Each week, like on Sunday afternoon, review your assignments, your notes, your calendar. Be sure that as deadlines and exams approach, your weekly routine must adapt to them!

4) Prioritize your assignments and work
When studying, get in the habit of beginning with the most difficult subject or task. Always do the hard thing first! You’ll be fresh, and have more energy to take them on when you are at your best. For more difficult courses of study, try to be flexible: for example, build in “reaction time” when you can get feedback on assignments before they are due.
Blessed are the flexible; they do not break.

5) Get something done.
The Chinese adage of the longest journey starting with a single step has a couple of meanings: First, you launch the project! Second, by starting, you may realize that there are some things you have not planned for in your process. Details of an assignment are not always evident until you begin the assignment. Another adage is that “perfection is the enemy of good”, especially when it prevents you from starting! Given that you build in review, roughly draft your idea and get started! You will have time to edit and develop later.

6) Postpone unnecessary activities until the work is done!

Don't be distracted. Postpone tasks or routines that can be put off until your school work is finished! This can be the most difficult challenge of time management. As learners we always meet unexpected opportunities that look appealing, then result in poor performance on a test, on a paper, or in preparation for a task. Distracting activities will be more enjoyable later without the pressure of the test, assignment, etc. hanging over your head. Think in terms of pride of accomplishment. Instead of saying “no” learn to say “not now”.


7) Identify resources to help you
Maybe you need to find people or books or websites. Are there tutors? An “expert friend”? Have you tried google to get better explanations? Are there specialists in the library that can point you to resources? What about professionals and professional organizations. Using outside resources can save you time and energy, and solve problems.


8) Use your free time wisely
Take blocks of time for study and do the same with exercise. Take 3 hours for the gym and don't feel guilty. Play an extra set of tennis. But you will still have extra time. And it won't be a block. So what do you do? Think of times when you can study "bits" as when walking, riding the bus, etc. Perhaps you’ve got music to listen to for your course in music appreciation, or drills in language learning? If you are walking or biking to school, when best to listen? Perhaps you are in a line waiting? Perfect for routine tasks like flash cards, or if you can concentrate, to read or review a chapter. The bottom line is to put your time to good use.


9) Review notes and readings just before class
This may prompt a question or two about something you don’t quite understand, to ask about in class, or after. It also demonstrates to your teacher that you are interested and have prepared. I'm not talking about cramming, that is putting things into your head that never were there during the term.


10) Review lecture notes just after class
Then review lecture material immediately after class. The first 24 hours are critical. Forgetting is greatest within 24 hours without review! Use another method of review, like re-writing your notes, or studying with another person. Using another sense, like hearing will also help.

Hope this all helps. It certainly is helping the Saints.

Big Brother

George Orwell was such a prophet. Wikipedia reminds us, "Big Brother is a fictional character in George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, the enigmatic dictator of Oceania, a totalitarian state taken to its utmost logical consequence - where the ruling elite ('the Party') wield total power for its own sake over the inhabitants.

In the society that Orwell describes, everyone is under complete surveillance by the authorities, mainly by telescreens. The people are constantly reminded of this by the phrase "Big Brother is watching you", which is the core "truth" of the propaganda system in this state."

So today I found this regime in my television. It was so weird. I had a technical question for the Foxtel people. So I rang the 1.300 number. All good. Told the mechanical voice on the other end that my problem was not related to ordering Vancouver Olympics. Sorry Buble. Sorry JZ. I had other issues. Then the "your call is important to us" voice, mechanical Tom, said, "please state in a few words what your issue is." OK, so that done, now we can deal with recording remote via the computer. Um, that's not the department I went to. Instead I was sent to 'technical' problems. I guess that will work.

First 'technical' tells me that there are troubles in several suburbs, none of which is mine. OK, I think, I'm getting closer to a real help person.

"If you are in one of those suburbs, you may hang up now." Wow, that's a little unhelpful, Foxy.

So now ...and here's Big Brother at work... once I got to 'technical' and I was in a suitable suburb, the computer told me that my Foxtel box would be rebooted, and that should fix the technical problem. If it didn't, then I could ring back and get to a customer service person. Before I could say, "B-B" (see ** below), my television went dark; my Foxtel was in fact off.

Whoa!

From wherever this 'conversation' took place, maybe Philippines, maybe India, maybe in Sydney... someone or more likely, some computer knocked my television to 'off.'

Buckle your seat belt, watch over your shoulder, the prophet Orwell was right. I am being forced to type this....no, it's not right, there is no Big....no Big B....STOP, you cannot type this... We are watching...[off]


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
** "a deep, slow, rhythmic chant of 'B-B! .... B-B! .... B-B!'—over and over again, very slowly, with a long pause between the first 'B' and the second—a heavy murmurous sound, somehow curiously savage, in the background of which one seemed to hear the stamps of naked feet and the throbbing of tom-toms. For perhaps as much as thirty seconds they kept it up. It was a refrain that was often heard in moments of overwhelming emotion. Partly it was a sort of hymn to the wisdom and majesty of Big Brother, but still more it was an act of self-hypnosis, a deliberate drowning of consciousness by means of rhythmic noise" (Orwell, 1984)

Another Australian Victory: Most Sinful Nation on Earth

rubbernecking mennonites
Originally uploaded by -sina-

The Sydney Morning Herald reported today another Australian victory. Seems our country is #1 in the world in .... the Seven Deadly Sins.

Australians have come out on top as the world's most envious people in a tally of nations viz the seven deadly sins.

BBC magazine Focus found Australians also scored highly for the other six sins, making Australia the 'most sinful' country on Earth.

"Sin-prone" Australia was followed by the US, Canada, Finland and Spain.

Researchers used a points system to determine which countries committed the seven deadly sins (lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride), the most.

A bit of history, if I might. According to Sacred Origins of Profound Things, by Charles Panati, Greek monastic theologian Evagrius of Pontus first drew up a list of eight offenses and wicked human passions:. They were, in order of increasing seriousness: gluttony, lust, avarice, sadness, anger, acedia, vainglory, and pride. Evagrius saw the escalating severity as representing increasing fixation with the self, with pride as the most egregious of the sins. Acedia (from the Greek "akedia," or "not to care") denoted "spiritual sloth."

In the late 6th century, Pope Gregory the Great reduced the list to seven items, folding vainglory into pride, acedia into sadness, and adding envy. His ranking of the Sins' seriousness was based on the degree from which they offended against love. It was, from most serious to least: pride, envy, anger, sadness, avarice, gluttony, and lust. Later theologians, including St. Thomas Aquinas, would contradict the notion that the seriousness of the sins could be ranked in this way. The term "covetousness" has historically been used interchangeably with "avarice" in accounts of the Deadly Sins. In the seventeenth century, the Church replaced the vague sin of "sadness" with sloth.

You might think I'm being a bit worrisome about whether there is an order or even a batch of sins which warrant noting. After all on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, we spend literally hours listing and shamefully renouncing a litany of dozens of sins. The "Al Chet" confession of sins is said ten times in the course of the Yom Kippur services: Following the Amidah of the afternoon prayers of the day before Yom Kippur; just before sunset on Yom Kippur Eve; and twice during each of the following services--the evening service of yom Kippur eve, and the morning service, the Musaf service and the afternoon service of Yom Kippur day--once at the end of the Silent Amidah, and once during the cantor's repitition of the Amidah.

So if a short listing of 7 is tiring for you, imagine that Yom Kippur listing, whilst fasting at that!
I'm not necessarily agreeing with the Focus people of the UK, but if I had enough time, I should want to ponder the alternative.

Are there seven virtues? Where else do we go but user-defined, content-driven space Wikipedia. There we read: "In Catholic catechism, the seven virtues refers to one of two lists of virtues, most commonly referring to the 4 Cardinal virtues of Prudence, Justice, Restraint or Temperance, and Courage or Fortitude, and the 3 Theological virtues of Faith, Hope, and Love or Charity; these were adopted by the Church Fathers from virtue as defined by the Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle." Thanks Wiki!

Yes, those sound like things a nations should strive to attain. I'm not a Catholic, but I like all seven of those. Justice, (ever give it, never demand it), Restraint (self-control, that's a worthy goal), Courage (I so admire guys like the Apostle Paul, a no-matter-what kind of guy), Prudence (the beginning of wisdom is.... get wisdom!), and faith, hope and love.

I'm wishing we could be known as a country full of those. Where even the idea of a virtuous country would be held in honor and esteem. Where at a party of friends, the topics of prudence would be met with story after story rather than dismissal. Or after 18 holes of golf, the fellas would talk about courage and restraint rather than #19 in Tiger's list.

Listen, it starts with one person. You. And it grows one person at a time. Share what matters, what is value-able, to the person near you. Don't mock; don't listen to mockery. Faith is admirable in Haiti just now. Love from all corners of the world to the half-island nation is glorious and ought to be heralded.

Let's do this. Let's make Australia a glorious nation, known for justice and hope, for us and for all mankind. Then I'd still call Australia 'home.'

Freedom of speech

RabbiLecture.jpg.JPG
Originally uploaded by bobmendo

Let 'em speak! That's the idea of the concept of 'freedom of speech.' It's a work in progress here in Australia. Although there is no legal statement of such in any Bill of Rights, it's been a right that is assumed. But that right is being challenged as reported today in the news.

A row has exploded between retailing groups about politicians making public appearances in shopping malls.

Shopping Centre Council of Australia executive director Milton Cockburn told News Limited newspapers that shopping centre managers had to ensure patrons could visit centres without interference or harassment.

But the national executive director of The Retailer's Association, Scott Driscoll, said local politicians were only in the shopping centres for a short amount of time to connect with the real people.

Can a politician speak about his issues on such private property as shopping centres?

On another topic, George Brandis is taking on Julia Gillard, Deputy Prime Minister of Australia. It has to do with yesterday's comments by the opposition leader, Tony Abbott and his opinion that pre-marital sex is wrong for young ladies. Asked if Ms Gillard had children she would see the issue differently, Senator Brandis replied: “I think so. I think that any parent I can imagine would agree with Tony Abbott.”

“I think people are entitled to know what their politicians think and beyond the narrow range of issues about public policy but it's, it is just bizarre - bizarre - to say that because a person, a politician says, 'well, this is my particular view about this particular moral issue,' they are somehow forcing their morality down other people's throats. Nonsense.”

Mr Abbott has also hit back at Ms Gillard's criticism of the remarks, noting the deputy prime minister was speaking as a politician, while he was speaking as a parent.

The Liberal leader's interview with The Australian Women's Weekly on pre-marital sex, abortion and maternity leave has sparked a national debate about his socially conservative views on pre-marital sex.

End of the day we all have the right to speak. I value that freedom. Pictured in this blog is Rabbi Harold Vallins, a friend from the UK, who graduated and got smicha (rabbinic ordination) from Leo Baeck and moved to Melbourne and then led the liberal Jewish congregation in Moorabbin. He started a family and then, in 1996 or 1997( I forget), came to faith in Jesus. His freedom to believe what he wanted and his freedom to speak about his convictions got him in trouble. He lost his wife and kids, the courts saw to that. Harold lost his congregation and thankfully found fellowship in the Body of Messiah in Melbourne and then many places in Australia and beyond.

Harold died in 2009 and I miss him. I was grateful he came to Sydney and helped me one night at an "Ask the Rabbi" night we sponsored. We worked at various meetings and had good fellowship.

God gives us the right to speak about what we believe. Of course, the octogenarian in Horsham who told police he was late to an appointment and as a result had to drive at 150 kph, then changed his story in court this week to 'falling asleep'...well that's another story. Ron Bell, 80, said his life has been destroyed by his act of hooning last July and he can no longer go to bowls or church.

It's important for us to have the freedom to speak and to speak the truth. The judge down in Horsham,Magistrate Richard Pithouse said this was the most "nonsensical'' excuse he had ever heard.

Mr Pithouse said Bell's legacy would be "the fool who speeded''.

Friends, let's use the freedom to speak. Let's speak the truth like Harold Vallins did. And Tony Abbott. And Jesus. He even claimed to BE the Truth. In John 14. 6 we read the words of Jesus, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life, no one comes to the Father but by Me."

Wow, what a claim. What chutzpah. What Truth!

Heidi does Australia (Tennis in Melbourne Park)

What is the role of an exectuive anyway? Isn't it to execute, to choose, to make tough choices? So where were the television Channel 7 executives at 5:55 pm today Sydney time? I know, it's Australia Day, and I'm celebrating with my family. I enjoy the barbie and the lamb (thanks, Sam, good recommendation). We had a lovely day. The weathermen were dead wrong calling for rain, and I felt confident in their wrongness so we did the laundry and hung it out this morning.

Speaking of wrong calls, back to Channel 7. You see, Channel 7 rides the back of the Australian Open (tennis) each year this time. It's a good partnership, almost as good as the Woodies.

So what did the executives do or not do? In the fourth set of the match between Marin Cilic of Croatia and Andy Roddick, with everything on the line, Channel 7 said, 'we'll be back at 7:30, with the match between Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray.' That's it. No apologies, no "you can see the entire match in its entirety..." nothing. Wow, if it had been Lleyton Hewitt or Sam Stosur in the match, would the Aussies have pulled out for ...get this...local news! Following that in the next hour would be a feature news magazine program and a soap opera. But no more coverage of the crucial match.

Shame, shame executives. What were you (not) thinking?

Wikipedia reminds us about this similar event, four decades ago, from the US and the mistake the network executives made that day. "In American football, the Heidi Game (often referred to, facetiously, as the "Heidi Bowl") refers to a famous American Football League (AFL) game between the New York Jets and the Oakland Raiders, played on November 17, 1968 in Oakland, California. This game is memorable largely because the NBC television network terminated the broadcast in the Eastern and Central time zones with 65 seconds left to play in the game in favor of broadcasting a pre-scheduled two-hour airing of Heidi, a new made-for-TV version of the classic children's story. (The telecast included commercial breaks; the actual film ran 104 minutes.)

With the Jets leading 32-29 with only 65 seconds left in the game, NBC executives attempted to reach their broadcast operations unit to extend coverage of the game but were unable to reach them in time to delay the cutover or reinstate coverage before the game ended. In the meantime, the Raiders came back and scored 14 points, winning 43-32. As a result, no fan following the game on TV was able to see Oakland's comeback live. The complaints to the network indicated a new height of popularity for the game in the United States."

And today, Heidi does Australia. To be sure, Cilic ran the table in the fifth set and beat Roddick. OK, fair enough and they won't have to eat any crow with their lamb. But wait, maybe they should?

Think about the effect of carrying afternoon matches, Channel 7. They may well run long, and you have an obligation to carry them to the finish, don't you?

Country and Preferences

Tonight in Tamworth the party of the year let loose. Earlier presenters distributed the Golden Guitars, and country and western noteworthies enjoyed the night. The Country festival has been going for 8 days, and what a way to conclude.

Wait, you say, you aren't into country music. I understand. It doesn't seem right. Some say it's too much honky-tonk, it's too much sadness, it's too much the same.

Felicity Urquhart was awarded her first solo Golden Guitar as Female Artist of the Year. Troy Cassar-Daley walked away with a total of six Awards for his ARIA-Award-winning album, I Love this Place. The impressive win brings Troy’s cumulative total of Golden Guitar trophies to 20. Keith Urban won an award tonight and received it via video feed, maybe next year Keith will come along.

Blake Shelton and Trace Adkins sing Hillbilly Bone and get all kinds of uppity New Yorkers off their chairs. You really have to watch the video. It's a hoot. I think that's the way it is for me. Those boys weren't in Tamworth, but their influence is deep.

You see, I don't like opera and I don't like hip-hop (apologies to my son), but I can appreciate that there is good opera and good hip-hop and bad opera and bad hip-hop. What I like or don't like doesn't make something good or bad. There are mechanisms to evaluate music or art or drama, even country music, but your tastes are not the mechanisms. Nor are mine.

That said, maybe I can apply this lesson to religion. The mechanisms to evaluate religion and religious claims are not preferences. That I like a religion or don't doesn't really matter. Truth stands alone and must stand alone.

It would be good if your preferences line up with the religions which are right, and the truth claims which are right. So find out what's right, who is right, and then line up with Him. That's my recommendation. And hey, give country music another listen. You may just travel to Tamworth for January 2011.