As a zoomer still in Church I definitely agree with the new wave of fascination with high church (hymns, liturgical worship, sacraments). I think young people can detect inauthenticity from institutions a mile away, and there's something about 'embracing the cringe' that screams authenticity.
Unfortunately many are drawn to the monastic life because they lost in their own life or careers. Reasons behind some of this is better than nothing at all tho
Brother, I can not thank you enough for this. I have never resonated with or felt more understood by a pice of media. You voiced my thoughts and developed them further. Genuinely, Thank you
I am very interested in Metamodernism (hence forth, MM). I am hopeful is a path forward for society. I have been rather anti-religious, but I now am more hopeful that MM effective at bridging the gaps between people, religious and secular. There are many reasons to think that this is the way to go. For example, recent history shows, that just becoming secular doesn't make you a more humanist or better person. Data shows, that your local social paradigms are more likely to influence you once you become less religious. Meaning, in the 1960's and 70's northeastern American liberals who became secular, became more liberal. While people from more fundamentalist attitudes, will become even more extreme when they are no longer reigned in by their religious institution. Then, there is the slew of data regarding humans inability to comprehend reality. That we are telling stories, just to cope and navigate existence. So, it seems to me we need better stories, and better tools to interpret stories. Hence, MM. I am still learning, though. As much of the theory around MM has the Jordan Peterson, melee mouthed, gymnastic double speak, going on. Some of this is just my ignorance grinding at comprehension. But, I am deeply wary of selling the status quo as something new and fresh. And, I don't think the status quo is sustainable. So, if MM doesn't have the utility that can prepare people for a new and changing world, then I am not sure it is the philosophical movement I was hoping for. Lets, hope as I learn, it can effectively provide effective world view philosophy that actually helps society not just cope, but improve. For example, if you narrative can not incorporate the scientific story of climate change, or how sex and gender are not strictly binary, or how homosexuality in biologically and socially common and natural, or how there are circumstances where an abortion is necessary, though society should still be responsible, with sex. Then, we are not getting anywhere. If MM doesn't teach people to see past the propaganda of the strong man, and the ultraliberal capitalist, then, we are going to decay, and collapse. I think this is the failure of Star Trek. It posits a utopia where humanity out grows its baser side, and solves its problems. But it is weak is showing the solutions that are used to accomplish this. It uses the terrible rock bottom conceit of WW3 to reset the stage. It is easier to imagine society building back if all the existing opposing paradigms are wiped out. It uses the conceit of patriarchal space angels, ie. Vulcans, to guide humanity out of our barbarity. Both of these are not necessary. We know more that enough about our problems, and solutions to them. What we lack is the narrative and psychological tools to implement them. Sort, of what the function of religion once served for people. I think the evolved human of Star Treks, Federation, are Metamodernists. Beneficiaries of generation of Metamodernists, that have build a society that is a positive feedback loop. Making each successive generation more resilient both biologically, but also psychologically, and spiritually (just, more psychology from my perspective). The most powerful thing MM could be, would be, to bring society together, in its infinite diversity, to build a society that is harmonious, in its totality, without having to necessarily be homogenous. That is why so much new Star Trek is not as appealing. The PostModernism is taking over, and the MetaModernism hasn't quite taken ahold yet. The next great ST will be a very MM journey. I too hope, the human journey can be great, and maybe MM can get us there.
Hi Paul! As a Hindu I appreciated this presentation, and I certainly agree that it is sheer ignorance to posit all religions are the same, or that they all lead to the same experience of the Divine. Most of us Hindus prioritize a certain story or group of stories within the vastness and diversity of Hinduism. There are stories about Shiva, stories about Ma, stories about Vishnu. Virtually all religious Hindus believe that God is One, but we typically interact with particular expressed personalities of God as well as inhabit particular stories of God. Together with our individual God-to-human relationships, there are also distinct schools of philosophy/theology/metaphysics. Not everyone is interested in these organized belief systems, which can be quite complex and sophisticated. But for those who do choose to engage the Divine in that manner, there are choices to be made. And somehow we Hindus manage to live with the fact that different people are attracted by different presentations of God and also convinced of different theologies.
Hey @PavaniGanga ! I so appreciate this comment and for your good faith exchange of ideas with me. I love it. I hope you feel your perspective is always welcome around here. Personally, do you find yourself referring to Ultimate Reality as Vishnu or Brahman?
Thank you for your kind interest. Please excuse the lengthy reply. It’s quite impossible to present my religion in a brief manner. At best I can convey some impressions. Philosophically, I follow the school known as Pratyabhijna, which developed in Kashmir around the 10th century CE, and according to which God is the Cause of all causes, the Ultimate Self of all selves, and the ultimate substance of everything, i.e., Divine Consciousness alone. In God’s immanent aspect, he/she is the (1) creator, (2) sustainer, (3) terminator, (4) concealer, and (5) revealer. His/her eternal aspect can be known in formless transcendental states, but he/she is more commonly known as a personal deity or set of deities. Because I am not much of a yogi or mystic, I mainly interact with God as a person introduced to me through stories, art, songs, and theology. In my everyday life, I cultivate my relationship with Shiva and his divine family. I feel I belong to them. Come what may, there is stable love and security in that-as well as periodic guidance and revelatory intuitions. Additionally (which is common for Hindus), there are occasions, for example major festival days, when I express reverence and appreciation for others among the most popular Hindu deities, whom ordinarily I would not bring to mind. Even if they do not belong to my main deity-group, they have well known relationships with my main deities; they are associated with endearing or inspiring stories; and they are part of my culture. Not often, but from time to time, I will also remember Buddhist figures, as well as Christ Yeshu, whose “red letters” influence remains with me and whom I occasionally visualize as a shepherd sitting on a grassy hill next to me. Although those great beings do not belong to my culture, they are not only great spiritual teachers, but also they provide uplifting refuge to countless people both here and hereafter. Therefore, they certainly deserve bowed heads and folded hands.
Just a few thoughts as how l understand some things to likely enough be. Jesus is as close as the Father, or as may be thought Brahman, which is a faith you can come to understand by scriptures and by verifiable and undoubtable experiences ie small wonder or even great miracles and any answer to prayers which come about no other way but by God. I paraphrase, Krishna is stated to have said that he is what is Kamdhenu, and of the Lord in hebrew texts is written that the cattle on a thousand hills, even universes, and ages, are His. So, I consider, maybe we awake to be aware this is about a relationship with everyone, God and neighbor and all grand creation, in love, made for him, by him, through him, of him, from him, to him, and in him unto most high almighty God the Father who is love, eternal for the world, and in whose image we are made with the gifts of these everlasting wills, to love, to faith, to hope, to process, to freedom, to live, and though not of our own wills subjected to futility by him whose unfailing hope is himself for us, so that the eyes of the heart be enlightened and from there every mouth along with the Spirit freely profess a confession of loving praise that he is Lord God with us whose name is above every name given to mankind, that is adored, Yesu Isa Jesus, Yeshua, the way and truth and life, from whom comes light, the flower of life, the cosmos, all being, all sentients, all spirits, gods and ghosts, every angel, seen and unseen, and to whom everything and everyone is drawn and returns, he being the beginning and end, the first and last, alpha and omega, least and greatest, working all things together to serve the unchanging plan so that we believe, his faith authoring and finishing and filling the universe, on earth as in heaven, so that God be all in all and all be one in love. What is there to know but God's love and faith and hope which is of himself to be within us for the sake of all. This is just my thinking. Blessings and namaskar 🙏🏼
Would love you to cover Tolkien. I think his lasting impact on people and his relevance even today is telling. I find his concept of myth and fairytale being latent with hope and imagination as a distinctly Christian thing--specifically his idea of eucatastrophe. Lord of the Rings is a defiantly anti nihilistic saga, one where you can feel theodicy, grace, goodness, and love humming through it all despite some of the hopeless moments it often displays. Very much a calvary tale.
Thanks for this encouragement! I’ve never felt like I can do Tolkien justice. There are entire fields of study dedicated to Tolkien… with experts fluent in elvish 😂 Maybe I’ll bring on an expert at some point, cause I don’t feel qualified!
"Embrace the cringe!!" is as a good slogan as we're likely to get for metamodernism! Paul you have an excellent radar for tracking what's going on in culture or at least it seems that way to an old timer like me (see I'm being self-aware!). John Hick was an important theologian and was a bit paradoxical about religious pluralism which he fully embraced and yet he also embraced that kind of perrenialism that asserte all religions were saying roughly the same thing. But that kind of paradoxicality makes him appropriate for metamodernism doesn't it? But you're right we must acknowledge the ways in which traditions differ particularly if one wants to be a devoted practioner I guess.
I'm currently working on an essay for uni about why postmodernism is bad, and offering postpostmodernism/metamodernism as a solution - this was an incredibly based lecture to listen to and I thank you because it'll help direct me on this essay. 😊
32:50 re: unitive pluralism. Yeah. Good point. The kind of perennialism or "unitive pluralism" that seeks to diminish distinctions and difference is silly-pants.
@@DeepTalksTheology I'd love that had some pretty intense experiences this spring that might be a conversion event though the process is still unfolding and has been backgrounded by other life events.
i’ve called myself a Postmodern Fundamentalist for like..since 1992. i hold to all the Fundamentalist theological claims -see the Fundmentals of the Faith publications from early 20th Century as few know the origin of the term or what it literally means and why you can’t be a Muslim fundamentalist - but not based on moderist as some provable logical argument. i faith in those claims with skepticism of ny sin infected epistemic organ trying to mislead me. i hold those claims by feeling then first and then thinking my life through them - the true basis of all knowlege which is faith initiated. i’d even say that the key difference between late modernism and postmodernism is M thinks to feel and P feels to think. In Jung, feeling and thinking are the two judging functions. i call feeling arational and thinking rational. the falsity of M is that some how you can think a premise into being and then think it’s conclusion - with feeling being a sort of deceptive side distraction. that’s how we get Scientism. every premise is first felt into being. it’s the arational beginning of thought that originates from spirit/conscioisness. P as criticle theory lacking in the positing of truth because such folks have a weak epistemic organ is a denatured or deficient form of P. Postmodern Fundamentalism lives by faith embracing all the miracles as literal without being subject to the literalism of criticality- the fundamentalism of the atheists. i’m really pretty sick of the Integral Christianity folks who want to transcend and exclude all those claims they can’t accept because they are actually anti-literal literalists. NOT INTEGRAL. the defecient Postmodernists are so becuse they are not filled with the Spirit and live out a satanic and luciferian mind as adversarial to their own lineage and practicing a false gnosticism.
But what do you do with being a Christian in consumer culture? Where Christianity has become a commodity or experience to be bought and sold. Something superficial. Does this solve this problem as well
Here is a Christian that I like what he says. We could even be friends. We just won't have deep philosophical discussions on 'what is truth?' Why? Because I care about what is true regardless of where it takes me. And he cares more about the feel good message of christianity.
Paul this is so good. How would you weave the element of lived testimony or the concept of experiencing the Holy Spirit alongside the notion of informed story choosing? I hope that makes sense, thanks
We have to move away from the term "oscillation" there is no oscillation, you are using tools of postmodernism to discover the inherent meaning in the modern and premodern worldviews. Its not an oscillation it is Intergration.
metamodernism is another cultural phony movement like postmodernism. Both are run by smug hipsters. We need a real postmodern movement lead by people with wisdom & who understand what real postmodernism is.
It’s a good analysis, but it misses to elaborate on the actual tenet of meta modernism - which is irony. The reason metamodern art is naive and wholesome is because it’s because it projects something that wants to criticize. Look at meme culture, many memes are realistically, naively and cutely sad and dystopian. Metamodersism invites us to reject us. The failure of woke culture is evidence of it. So your video is a metamodern projection of what we won’t be aiming at.
As a zoomer still in Church I definitely agree with the new wave of fascination with high church (hymns, liturgical worship, sacraments). I think young people can detect inauthenticity from institutions a mile away, and there's something about 'embracing the cringe' that screams authenticity.
Glad to hear your connected to a church, Jared!
Unfortunately many are drawn to the monastic life because they lost in their own life or careers.
Reasons behind some of this is better than nothing at all tho
Brother, I can not thank you enough for this. I have never resonated with or felt more understood by a pice of media. You voiced my thoughts and developed them further. Genuinely, Thank you
I am very interested in Metamodernism (hence forth, MM). I am hopeful is a path forward for society. I have been rather anti-religious, but I now am more hopeful that MM effective at bridging the gaps between people, religious and secular. There are many reasons to think that this is the way to go. For example, recent history shows, that just becoming secular doesn't make you a more humanist or better person. Data shows, that your local social paradigms are more likely to influence you once you become less religious. Meaning, in the 1960's and 70's northeastern American liberals who became secular, became more liberal. While people from more fundamentalist attitudes, will become even more extreme when they are no longer reigned in by their religious institution. Then, there is the slew of data regarding humans inability to comprehend reality. That we are telling stories, just to cope and navigate existence. So, it seems to me we need better stories, and better tools to interpret stories. Hence, MM. I am still learning, though. As much of the theory around MM has the Jordan Peterson, melee mouthed, gymnastic double speak, going on. Some of this is just my ignorance grinding at comprehension. But, I am deeply wary of selling the status quo as something new and fresh. And, I don't think the status quo is sustainable. So, if MM doesn't have the utility that can prepare people for a new and changing world, then I am not sure it is the philosophical movement I was hoping for. Lets, hope as I learn, it can effectively provide effective world view philosophy that actually helps society not just cope, but improve. For example, if you narrative can not incorporate the scientific story of climate change, or how sex and gender are not strictly binary, or how homosexuality in biologically and socially common and natural, or how there are circumstances where an abortion is necessary, though society should still be responsible, with sex. Then, we are not getting anywhere. If MM doesn't teach people to see past the propaganda of the strong man, and the ultraliberal capitalist, then, we are going to decay, and collapse.
I think this is the failure of Star Trek. It posits a utopia where humanity out grows its baser side, and solves its problems. But it is weak is showing the solutions that are used to accomplish this. It uses the terrible rock bottom conceit of WW3 to reset the stage. It is easier to imagine society building back if all the existing opposing paradigms are wiped out. It uses the conceit of patriarchal space angels, ie. Vulcans, to guide humanity out of our barbarity. Both of these are not necessary. We know more that enough about our problems, and solutions to them. What we lack is the narrative and psychological tools to implement them. Sort, of what the function of religion once served for people. I think the evolved human of Star Treks, Federation, are Metamodernists. Beneficiaries of generation of Metamodernists, that have build a society that is a positive feedback loop. Making each successive generation more resilient both biologically, but also psychologically, and spiritually (just, more psychology from my perspective). The most powerful thing MM could be, would be, to bring society together, in its infinite diversity, to build a society that is harmonious, in its totality, without having to necessarily be homogenous. That is why so much new Star Trek is not as appealing. The PostModernism is taking over, and the MetaModernism hasn't quite taken ahold yet. The next great ST will be a very MM journey. I too hope, the human journey can be great, and maybe MM can get us there.
Hi Paul! As a Hindu I appreciated this presentation, and I certainly agree that it is sheer ignorance to posit all religions are the same, or that they all lead to the same experience of the Divine. Most of us Hindus prioritize a certain story or group of stories within the vastness and diversity of Hinduism. There are stories about Shiva, stories about Ma, stories about Vishnu. Virtually all religious Hindus believe that God is One, but we typically interact with particular expressed personalities of God as well as inhabit particular stories of God.
Together with our individual God-to-human relationships, there are also distinct schools of philosophy/theology/metaphysics. Not everyone is interested in these organized belief systems, which can be quite complex and sophisticated. But for those who do choose to engage the Divine in that manner, there are choices to be made. And somehow we Hindus manage to live with the fact that different people are attracted by different presentations of God and also convinced of different theologies.
Hey @PavaniGanga ! I so appreciate this comment and for your good faith exchange of ideas with me. I love it. I hope you feel your perspective is always welcome around here.
Personally, do you find yourself referring to Ultimate Reality as Vishnu or Brahman?
Thank you for your kind interest. Please excuse the lengthy reply. It’s quite impossible to present my religion in a brief manner. At best I can convey some impressions. Philosophically, I follow the school known as Pratyabhijna, which developed in Kashmir around the 10th century CE, and according to which God is the Cause of all causes, the Ultimate Self of all selves, and the ultimate substance of everything, i.e., Divine Consciousness alone.
In God’s immanent aspect, he/she is the (1) creator, (2) sustainer, (3) terminator, (4) concealer, and (5) revealer. His/her eternal aspect can be known in formless transcendental states, but he/she is more commonly known as a personal deity or set of deities. Because I am not much of a yogi or mystic, I mainly interact with God as a person introduced to me through stories, art, songs, and theology. In my everyday life, I cultivate my relationship with Shiva and his divine family. I feel I belong to them. Come what may, there is stable love and security in that-as well as periodic guidance and revelatory intuitions.
Additionally (which is common for Hindus), there are occasions, for example major festival days, when I express reverence and appreciation for others among the most popular Hindu deities, whom ordinarily I would not bring to mind. Even if they do not belong to my main deity-group, they have well known relationships with my main deities; they are associated with endearing or inspiring stories; and they are part of my culture.
Not often, but from time to time, I will also remember Buddhist figures, as well as Christ Yeshu, whose “red letters” influence remains with me and whom I occasionally visualize as a shepherd sitting on a grassy hill next to me. Although those great beings do not belong to my culture, they are not only great spiritual teachers, but also they provide uplifting refuge to countless people both here and hereafter. Therefore, they certainly deserve bowed heads and folded hands.
Just a few thoughts as how l understand some things to likely enough be.
Jesus is as close as the Father, or as may be thought Brahman, which is a faith you can come to understand by scriptures and by verifiable and undoubtable experiences ie small wonder or even great miracles and any answer to prayers which come about no other way but by God.
I paraphrase, Krishna is stated to have said that he is what is Kamdhenu, and of the Lord in hebrew texts is written that the cattle on a thousand hills, even universes, and ages, are His.
So, I consider, maybe we awake to be aware this is about a relationship with everyone, God and neighbor and all grand creation, in love, made for him, by him, through him, of him, from him, to him, and in him unto most high almighty God the Father who is love, eternal for the world, and in whose image we are made with the gifts of these everlasting wills, to love, to faith, to hope, to process, to freedom, to live, and though not of our own wills subjected to futility by him whose unfailing hope is himself for us, so that the eyes of the heart be enlightened and from there every mouth along with the Spirit freely profess a confession of loving praise that he is Lord God with us whose name is above every name given to mankind, that is adored, Yesu Isa Jesus, Yeshua, the way and truth and life, from whom comes light, the flower of life, the cosmos, all being, all sentients, all spirits, gods and ghosts, every angel, seen and unseen, and to whom everything and everyone is drawn and returns, he being the beginning and end, the first and last, alpha and omega, least and greatest, working all things together to serve the unchanging plan so that we believe, his faith authoring and finishing and filling the universe, on earth as in heaven, so that God be all in all and all be one in love.
What is there to know but God's love and faith and hope which is of himself to be within us for the sake of all.
This is just my thinking.
Blessings and namaskar 🙏🏼
great stuff, Paul. really enjoyed this and really helpful in my own thinking.
This is a great summary of what my freinds at seminary and I have been discussing for a while. Thanks for the video.
Would love you to cover Tolkien. I think his lasting impact on people and his relevance even today is telling. I find his concept of myth and fairytale being latent with hope and imagination as a distinctly Christian thing--specifically his idea of eucatastrophe. Lord of the Rings is a defiantly anti nihilistic saga, one where you can feel theodicy, grace, goodness, and love humming through it all despite some of the hopeless moments it often displays. Very much a calvary tale.
Thanks for this encouragement! I’ve never felt like I can do Tolkien justice. There are entire fields of study dedicated to Tolkien… with experts fluent in elvish 😂 Maybe I’ll bring on an expert at some point, cause I don’t feel qualified!
@@DeepTalksTheology If you could get Peter Kreeft on, he'd have some lovely things to say!
Thanks for this Paul! As a 1985 kid I relate to this a lot. Love what you’re doing.
Thank you, Ben!
"Embrace the cringe!!" is as a good slogan as we're likely to get for metamodernism! Paul you have an excellent radar for tracking what's going on in culture or at least it seems that way to an old timer like me (see I'm being self-aware!). John Hick was an important theologian and was a bit paradoxical about religious pluralism which he fully embraced and yet he also embraced that kind of perrenialism that asserte all religions were saying roughly the same thing. But that kind of paradoxicality makes him appropriate for metamodernism doesn't it? But you're right we must acknowledge the ways in which traditions differ particularly if one wants to be a devoted practioner I guess.
thank you, Mike!
I'm currently working on an essay for uni about why postmodernism is bad, and offering postpostmodernism/metamodernism as a solution - this was an incredibly based lecture to listen to and I thank you because it'll help direct me on this essay. 😊
32:50 re: unitive pluralism.
Yeah. Good point. The kind of perennialism or "unitive pluralism" that seeks to diminish distinctions and difference is silly-pants.
Great topic.
Very engaging presentation - useful - thank you
Glad it was helpful!
Loved this one Paul
Thank you, Rafe! We should talk again soon this fall!
@@DeepTalksTheology I'd love that had some pretty intense experiences this spring that might be a conversion event though the process is still unfolding and has been backgrounded by other life events.
i’ve called myself a Postmodern Fundamentalist for like..since 1992.
i hold to all the Fundamentalist theological claims -see the Fundmentals of the Faith publications from early 20th Century as few know the origin of the term or what it literally means and why you can’t be a Muslim fundamentalist - but not based on moderist as some provable logical argument. i faith in those claims with skepticism of ny sin infected epistemic organ trying to mislead me.
i hold those claims by feeling then first and then thinking my life through them - the true basis of all knowlege which is faith initiated.
i’d even say that the key difference between late modernism and postmodernism is M thinks to feel and P feels to think.
In Jung, feeling and thinking are the two judging functions.
i call feeling arational and thinking rational.
the falsity of M is that some how you can think a premise into being and then think it’s conclusion - with feeling being a sort of deceptive side distraction.
that’s how we get Scientism.
every premise is first felt into being. it’s the arational beginning of thought that originates from spirit/conscioisness.
P as criticle theory lacking in the positing of truth because such folks have a weak epistemic organ is a denatured or deficient form of P.
Postmodern Fundamentalism lives by faith embracing all the miracles as literal without being subject to the literalism of criticality- the fundamentalism of the atheists.
i’m really pretty sick of the Integral Christianity folks who want to transcend and exclude all those claims they can’t accept because they are actually anti-literal literalists.
NOT INTEGRAL.
the defecient Postmodernists are so becuse they are not filled with the Spirit and live out a satanic and luciferian mind as adversarial to their own lineage and practicing a false gnosticism.
Carry your cringe and bear it!
But what do you do with being a Christian in consumer culture? Where Christianity has become a commodity or experience to be bought and sold. Something superficial. Does this solve this problem as well
You don't think that there is transcendant or universal path beyond all traditions?
Here is a Christian that I like what he says. We could even be friends. We just won't have deep philosophical discussions on 'what is truth?' Why? Because I care about what is true regardless of where it takes me. And he cares more about the feel good message of christianity.
Knowing its just a story. Its not a source of meaning.
Paul this is so good. How would you weave the element of lived testimony or the concept of experiencing the Holy Spirit alongside the notion of informed story choosing? I hope that makes sense, thanks
Great question! Let me chew on that one a bit
Reject modernity, embrace tradition. Find the SSPX.
How about post-dialectical approach for a change?
Right? Not all revolutions are good. Not all change is progress.
Some good points, but what is wrong with empire building? That is the end goal of Islam? Wouldn’t disciplining nations mean the same thing?
Could be a return to fideism. But classical theism removes the cringe.
Look up Ubuntu philosophy and Prout?
Is the main character in the film "Elf" an example of someone who is "embracing the cringe"?
ha, I hadn't thought about that!
We have to move away from the term "oscillation" there is no oscillation, you are using tools of postmodernism to discover the inherent meaning in the modern and premodern worldviews. Its not an oscillation it is Intergration.
Umm. Have you heard of the dialectical? Try reading Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder?
Kern yer terk for the kingdom
metamodernism is another cultural phony movement like postmodernism. Both are run by smug hipsters. We need a real postmodern movement lead by people with wisdom & who understand what real postmodernism is.
If you are a Christian who doesn't understand this, wake up.
It’s a good analysis, but it misses to elaborate on the actual tenet of meta modernism - which is irony. The reason metamodern art is naive and wholesome is because it’s because it projects something that wants to criticize. Look at meme culture, many memes are realistically, naively and cutely sad and dystopian. Metamodersism invites us to reject us. The failure of woke culture is evidence of it. So your video is a metamodern projection of what we won’t be aiming at.