Dogmatics or Dynamics (Essay by Bob Racine)

A close friend of mine not too long ago accused all Christian liberals (of which I am one unashamedly) of destroying Christianity.  We are murderers of the pure thing, spreading a slow poison across our nation.  He is one of thousands who insist that only the so-called “born again” believers are the rightful offspring of the religion’s founder.  Let me put it in more earthy language: One only comes to God by way of Jesus Christ; there is no other access route.  So it was no surprise to me that in an editorial in the Sunday New York Times on Christmas Day a questioning writer for that paper with a Christian background interviewed an Evangelical pastor and asked him outright, “Pastor, am I a Christian?”  It seems this editorialist is an admirer and to some extent follower of Christ but had some trouble with a few orthodox doctrines – the Virgin Birth, a literal bodily Resurrection, some of the recorded miracles, etc.  When a sizeable segment of professed Christian advocates lays down hard and fast tenets to which all must be accountable, it is not surprising that many on the margin of the Church are going to question how genuine their own Christianity really is.

Sometimes I wish that the word Christian as a noun had never been invented.  If you search the New Testament, you will note that that noun never shows up in the writings of the Gospels or in the epistles of Paul.  The only reference made to that use of the word can be found in the book of Acts, where we are told in passing that followers of Christ “were first called Christians in the city of Antioch”.  They were called that by citizens of the surrounding society as well as by each other.  It was a label that was attached to an early, radical and revolutionary form of Jesus discipleship.

Yes, it is true that at the Ascension Jesus urges the people gathered about him to “go into all the world and make disciples of all nations”.  But what is a disciple?  A blind follower?  A sign-on-the-dotted-line convert?  An enlisted person radicalized for a prescribed set of rituals and hands-on functions?   Look at the twelve men Jesus gathered around him, his inner circle and others who strolled the land with him.  Did he organize them into a clique or club?

Jesus never built an edifice; he did not write out an epistle or draw up a charter.  He did not conduct a meeting of elders to lay out specifications for behavior.  All his words were spoken from heart to heart, his heart to the hearts of the world, directed at human need, some of them meant to challenge the existing order.  Many of them sound a bit mysterious, and they remained mysterious to people in the early Church long after Jesus was gone.  Many of them are multi-layered.  And these two thousand years later we are still groping to understand how they must apply to the way people treat each other and themselves.

I am sad and distressed that after so many centuries we still have those dogmatic leaders and followers who believe they have the license to hold others to account for the purity of their beliefs.  Look at me; look at us; we have it all wrapped up.  We have a pipeline directly to the Almighty, and you are either with us in our army or you are lost and drifting.  And with this attitude goes a kind of unwritten Litmus Test.  The Inquisition is past history, but the notion of checking each other’s beliefs for “accuracy” or authenticity is still rampant in many quarters.

I no longer use the term “my Jesus” as I once did.  The Christ of the New Testament is a figure of powerful charisma but great mystery at the same time, so how can I profess any ownership of his person?  That so-called Jesus of mine would at best be merely a mirror of my own assumptions.  It is tantamount to confusing him with what he represents, confusing form with essence.  Jesus pointed the way for a lot of people, myself included, but instead of directing our gaze at that to which he is pointing, many get distracted by the pointing finger.  They have learned to suck on his finger and nuzzle it instead of lifting up their eyes to see where he is directing them.  We confuse the message with the messenger.

In my prayers I never even address Jesus anymore.  I direct those prayers  toward the Creative Power behind the universe, toward the Spirit that I believe resides in every human heart and surely resided in his, whether that Spirit has ever been called forth by many persons or not.   To say that Jesus Christ is the only way to God is absurd.  Would those who so believe repeat those words to a Muslim or a Buddhist or a Jew?  What would such a contention mean to any of them?  It would be alienating; it can only be heard by them as a claim to exclusive privilege.  It would render their entire religious and spiritual histories bogus.

For me a Christian (if you want to use the word) is a pilgrim, a seeker of truth, one who moves in the direction in which Jesus pointed, not someone who has the gospel truth carefully packaged.  And the search, the pilgrimage goes on and on.  The essence of what Jesus declared and encouraged is what I now embrace.  Following the light of that essence takes many structural forms, all the way from the simplest community meeting in an attic or basement to the towering cathedrals and their formality and every shape and size and style in-between.  There is no one way to appropriate the teachings of the Galilean, no one way to institutionalize them or systematize them.  The essence of what Christ represented can often be found incarnate in the lives of people who do not name his name, those of non-Christian persuasion.   My wife and I live next door to a Muslim family who practice neighborliness and kindness in ways that sometimes exceed our own.                                          

The Christian I strive to be is a person who endeavors to live according to the spirit and the essence of the Christian faith as it derives from the records of the historical Christ.  I strive (do not always live up to, but I strive) to live by the things that in my mind Jesus valued – peace, love, compassion, joy, honesty, kindness, fair dealing, justice, sharing, humility of spirit, love of beauty, depth of devotion, commitment to the welfare of my neighbor as much as myself and a supportive community to foster any and all of these values.

People in my home church who nurtured me and encouraged my preparation to be a minister would be disturbed to read this essay.  They would see that I have moved some distance away from the thought forms that were handed to me in the beginning.  But I am more grateful to those early instructors than I can ever say.  They might not have given me all the answers, but they gave me something more important than the answers – the questions.  Those in this world who are lost are not the people without answers; they are the people without the questions – questions not yielding to a simple, one dimensional answer that compel us forward. Those first nurturers of mine gave me a foundation on which to build.  And I am still building, still examining, still exploring.

A few days ago we read that Jimmy Carter has broken his ties with his native Christian denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention.  He too has moved away from the nest, but I doubt if he speaks or thinks harshly of the nest itself.  He too was built upon a foundation of inquiry that was inculcated into him by his instructors in his native church congregation.  And now his pursuit of truth has compelled him to move in another channel.

In the movie version of “Inherit the Wind”, there is a poignant scene in which the two opposing attorneys, one prosecuting a young teacher for teaching Evolution and the other the attorney for the defense, have a conversation way off the record in private.  They have known each other for decades and have worked together many times, and now they find themselves political foes.  The prosecutor wants to know how the defender can have moved so far away from the “True Word”.  The defender answers, “Motion is relative.  Perhaps it is you who have moved away by standing still”.  The understanding of divine revelation is dynamic, on the move, and to grow in understanding of it one must be dynamic as well.



To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com.  To know about me, consult the autobiographical entry on the website for Dec. 5, 2016.

Children of Nazareth (Poetry by Bob Racine)

The Scriptures tell us of Jesus’ birth but give us no account whatsoever of his childhood, except his visit to Jerusalem at the age of twelve in the company of his parents.  The time between the events we observe at Christmas – the manger, the shepherds, the Wise Men, Herod, etc. – and his baptism by John that preceded the start of his ministry has otherwise been called the Silent Years.  We can only speculate about what this Hebrew child did on a daily basis around the Nazareth streets and countryside.  I offer the following simple poem as a meditation on that time, but seen through the eyes of other young ones, unsuspecting kids with whom he played or worked.      

Oh, children of Nazareth!  You have not looked of late

into each other’s eyes, as you rough about, kicking up the dust of centuries.              
And why should you know?  Why should you know?

Cease not then your animal noise.  Go make your little stampedes

among lazy herds of village sheep, who know you too well to fear you.
Go have your fights, skin your knees, take your bruises,
keep your dithery pace with the blood that races in your veins.

Why should you know now of that blood’s power to speak

to nations and peoples yet unborn?

Crouched in a corner, you wait to catch the desert wind by the tail.

But it spurns your habitations and sends you back to your
lackluster streets to ply your meager trades, live out your meager days,
and sow your proud mortal seed, dream however you must.

Soon enough the last seed will be sown; age will slow you down –

foot companions to your beasts of burden.
Not until then will you ever look, look deep, deep into each other’s eyes.
Then at last you may realize:  You’re not all the same,

for time, in accord with its sacred offices, has sought you out,  

yet to vindicate you, in the well-wrought life of Another amongst you  
more free, more knowing and more restless than even you.

To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com.  To know about me, consult the autobiographical entry on the website for Dec. 5, 2016.

Bob's Autobiographical Summary

This time around I am repeating the publication of my Autobiographical Summary first posted in October of 2013, with a few more pertinent details.  Many subscriptions have been added to my blog mailing list since that time and perhaps many who were on it in the beginning have forgotten about it.  This now will be the entry that henceforth I will make reference to at the close of each of the writings.  It will be easier to locate, being more recent. 

It was on February 25, 1933 in Norfolk, Virginia, that I, Robert Wayne Racine, arrived in the world, the only child-to-be of Raymond and Virginia Racine.  Growing up in Norfolk I was nurtured in Central Baptist Church of that city, where I felt the call to the ministry very early in my life.  I graduated from Maury High School there in January, 1952 and received my Bachelor of Arts degree from Wake Forest College in 1955 as a pre-ministerial student.  My divinity degree came from Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania in 1963, after a few years of experience in the field as a welfare caseworker, and I served as pastor of the First Baptist Church of Scranton, Pennsylvania from 1963 until 1967.  I then accepted a job with Mass Media Ministries in Baltimore, Md., an independent interfaith agency designed to serve churches of all faiths seeking to develop media programs.  I worked for them, under the editorship of Clifford York, a fellow minister, as chief writer and assistant editor on their bi-weekly Newsletter publication, reviewing short films, TV and current cinema.  I also conducted seminars on media usage, wrote promotional fliers and gave personal consultation to people in church-related professions on the planning of media programs. 

In 1974 I moved to Columbia, Maryland, where I have resided ever since.  Following the discontinuance of the Mass Media Newsletter in 1980, I became involved in community theater, organizing my own in conjunction with Kittamaqundi Community, an ecumenical church body in that city.  The theater remained in operation for twenty-two years.  In that endeavor I got training in acting, directing, and producing, and in 1988 began writing scripts, several of which have been performed in public, one for the annual Baltimore New Playwrights Festival.  In recent years, since the retirement of the theater, I have segued from script writing into fiction writing.  A novella, “It Won’t Fit Through the Door,” remains available on compact disc.  “All Saints Eve” is my first full length novel still seeking publication.  A novella entitled “The Safety Zone” was posted in serial form on this blog in the winter of 2015.  I have also written over the space of the last fifty years a considerable body of poetry, and at varied times and on varied occasions have given public recitations of them.  Several have appeared in this blog. 

I seem to have always worn two hats throughout my adult life – religion and the arts.  Almost all I have done over the past half century has involved participation in both worlds.  And now the early profession of film critic that I practiced in association with Mass Media Ministries, cut short by the onset of a severe hearing loss, has found a soul-gratifying rebirth in the reviewing of motion pictures on DVD in this blog, along with other writings.  The word processor now has become my stage as well as my printed page, thanks to the brilliant assistance and supervision of my stepson JC Nolan, to whom I will be eternally grateful.

I have been married to my third wife, Ruby, since 1981. An elementary school teacher for close to thirty years (retired in 1996), she is the supreme love of my life and has been a magnificent support to me in all my endeavors since we met.  We reside in Columbia.  We have seven offspring between us from previous marriages and eight grandchildren.  Though now in our latter years, we remain very active in the Kittamaqundi congregation and share in its leadership and work. 

I am largely in good health for my age, or so my doctors tell me.  I do have a severe hearing loss already mentioned which has plagued me since the early 1970s.  I have one good eye, and I am now a partial cripple as the result of a Lumbar Stenosis condition that keeps me somewhat bent over, relieved in no little measure by the use of a walker and aided by regular physical therapy.  But my internal organs seem to be functioning in top form.  I plan to be around for some time yet.

   

The following is a list of what I regard as my personal beliefs and values, to which I hold myself personally accountable:

Biblical writings as a repository of moral, ethical and spiritual instruction

The existence of God both as unfathomable mystery and redeeming presence

The perseverance of faith, both as outlook and practice

A spiritual community that is supportive and nurturing

Diversity of expression within a unity of faith sharing

Integrity and wholeness of character

Personal discipline in all domains as opposed to off-the-wall lifestyles

The dignity of work

Scrupulous care of one’s own body as indeed the Temple of God

Equally scrupulous care of the planet Earth as the bosom mother of us all

The sanctity of all living creatures

The unique giftedness of each and every human individual

The loving family as the foundation of civilized society          

A creative fusion between religion and the arts

Music and poetry as the language of God and food for the soul

The preservation and study of sacred and classic writings

Friendship that sets no boundaries and imposes no obligations

Patience and kindness

Humility of spirit

Unbounded and unqualified forgiveness, both of self and others

And basic to all:

Love as a verb, not a noun, which is to say aggressive good will in action,

compassionate service to others, selfless labors to lighten each other’s burdens, and active commitment to the ongoing liberation of the human spirit

To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com.

The Innocents (Movie Review by Bob Racine)

1 hr. & 55 min., color, 2016

                                               

Will footnotes from World War II and its immediate aftermath ever cease to turn up – not only to be deposited in the teeming trove of stories that nations keep on file but also to uncover further evidence of that war’s inhumanity as it crossed the boundaries of the countries that were directly involved?  Will we ever run out?  Not likely!  While this French/Polish co-production is a fictional work, it is based upon a postwar situation that I doubt if many of us have ever heard about.  I know I never have until now. 

                                               

We have seen visualizations of Nazi and Japanese cruelty, of the plight of children and families, of the extensive sufferings and oppressions of refugees, far more widespread than even those of our own day – so far!  But who knows what another year or two or three will bring about!   Stories of horror brought about by the insanity of any and all wars are as numerous as the sand grains on the seashore.  I have no doubt that ongoing historical research will continue to yield new material and inspire writers and film makers for generations yet to come.  We have not heard the last about the World Wars.  

                                               

The action in this motion picture takes place in the vicinity of Warsaw in December of 1945, just seven months after formal hostilities with Germany have ceased. The victims portrayed and their sufferings are a most unlikely group, not apt to be printed on page one of any newspaper, but the consequences of their abuse are made painfully immediate in this powerful drama.  They are not peasants or members of a hated race or political prisoners; they are Catholic nuns in a local convent.  In keeping with their policy of privacy and seclusion from society at large they suffer in silence from a nightmare visited upon them by Russian soldiers those many months previous.  But that allegedly sacred seclusion is cracked wide open in the movie’s first scene.  They find that they cannot endure out of sight of the world any longer without terrible risk to the lives of many of the women inhabitants.

                                               

The Rev. Mother Superior (Agata Kulesza) tells it most plainly: They have suffered plenty under the Germans, deprivations of one sort or another, but they were not prepared for what the supposedly liberating Russians would bring upon them, something far worse.  Every last nun in the place was raped by Russian soldiers, not just once but many times while the soldiers billeted themselves on the convent grounds.  The rapes all took place during the same month or so of the occupation. Many of them have become pregnant and now as expectant mothers they are coming to term at approximately the same time. 

                                               

The first sound we hear is a choir of nuns singing their daily prayers.  The second sound we hear is a scream that pierces the serene and solemn air, one that curiously no one in the chapel appears to be surprised by; they keep on singing.  We soon determine that the scream is a young postulant in labor, having been the entire nine months without medical assistance.  At last one of the singers, Maria (Agata Bazak), leaves the place and rushes desperately to a Red Cross hospital not far away to get help. 

                                               

A French doctor Mathilde Beaulieu, in Poland to serve in that Red Cross unit that has been dispatched from France, played by a French actress named Lou de Laage, is persuaded to take time out to rush to the convent.  She does this at some risk to herself, because the doctors are under tight military restrictions that require them to give priority attention to the sick in the hospital where their country has commissioned them to serve.  The patients in that hospital have been under their care for many weeks.  What Matilde sees in the convent horrifies her, especially when she discovers that the baby the woman in labor is about to deliver is in the breach position.  She has to perform the surgery in the presence of other nuns including the Rev. Mother Superior.  Probably nothing like this had ever happened at a convent before in recorded history.  There is therefore no precedent for how to treat these circumstances without the violation of vows taken.   Maria lets the outside world into what is supposed to be an inviolable dwelling, and earns the censure of the Mother.   

                                               

What follows is a titanic struggle, physical and emotional and spiritual. The previously air tight cloister in which these nuns have been training and learning turns into an environment of scared women, whose faith is severely tested, even that of the Mother to whom they have pledged obedience.  They have been trained to regard any exposed flesh from beneath their habits as a betrayal of their commitment to their vows. Naturally Mathilde, who is not a person of faith, only of healing, finds this premise to be inscrutable.  One older nun recoils against being asked for her swollen stomach to be examined.  She pulls her garments tight around herself and runs off, saying she does not want to be consigned to hell.  The nuns have been convinced that God will punish them if they do not endure what needs to be endured, even apparently if it risks the life of an unborn child.  What we observe is actually a collision between Medieval religious superstition and 20^th century science.  Mathilde, young and sensitive and relatively new to her profession, has to suppress her revulsion over the conditions she observes and try in her own inexperienced fashion to prevent a human disaster. 

                                               

Breaking water and the agony of labor gradually consume everybody’s attention.  More births are portrayed in this motion picture than I ever remember seeing in any motion picture before.  The disciplines of the nuns and their usual rigors are disrupted – the crying of newborns gasping for life.  The Mother finally claims that she has found homes in which the children will be raised.  She begins wrapping each infant in a blanket and walking it to its alleged new residence herself.   

                                               

Maria, who has not been impregnated, turns out to be the strongest of the nuns and finally stands up to her Mother Superior, who maintains that the place will now be in disgrace and subject to scandal.  She tells the Mother that the convent was already beset by disgrace and scandal before Mathilde arrived and tries to convince her that the doctor is a gift from heaven.    

                                               

Though it is controversial, the writing never takes on the cast of a political drama. Maria and Mathilde establish a wholesome rapport, the former becoming a much needed help to the latter, even learning how herself to deliver a baby in the doctor’s absence.  This alliance does much to soften the resistance of the nuns to Mathilde, especially after she saves them from further molestation and maybe arrest by letting the phony word out to the Russians that an epidemic has broken out in the building. This places the Rev. Mother in a kind of subordinate position, which is reinforced when some shocking news about her comes to light.    

                                               

Mathilde is not treated as a supporting character.  She is a leading player, not some symbol of enlightenment amid the unenlightened.  The writers give her dimension and spend time delving into her heart and mind.  She does some meaningful introspection, disclosing dark emotions to her momentary lover (Vincent Macaigne), also a doctor, fighting his own demons of doubt and near despair.  They are both professionally skilled but demonstrate a personal vulnerability they would never reveal to their superiors.  He himself eventually becomes involved with Mathilde in the healing of the nuns.  

                                               

Perhaps what I have said thus far gives the impression that this is a stark tragedy, but let me correct that impression.  There are a few tragic incidents portrayed, and some very disturbing sights disclosed, even an attempted rape of Mathilde by Russian soldiers, but it is ultimately a story of personal triumph, with a decidedly bright and upbeat conclusion.  It weighs many conflicting values but comes out solid in the corner of decency and humanity.  We could say that the convent undergoes a positive rebirth of spirit and purpose. 

                                               

Credit for this amazing and vivid work of cinema goes essentially to a French woman named Anne Fontaine, who did the directing and co-wrote the screenplay with three other persons – Sabrina B. Karine, Pascal Bonitzer, and Alice Vial.  Someone has called “The Innocents” a war movie about women, by women and for women.  But speaking as a male viewer, I recommend it most highly to all who respect life and those brave enough to be dedicated to maintain it under hostile and forbidding circumstances.  You can rent it from Netflix.

To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com. To learn about me consult on the website the blog entry for August 9, 2013.

Recovering from Election Shock (Essay by Bob Racine)

Recovering from Election Shock (Essay by Bob Racine)

At least half the nation woke up on Wednesday morning November 9 and encountered a severe shock.  As supporters of Hillary Clinton my wife Ruby and I were among them.  These several days later we are still a bit unsteady and out of focus from her defeat at the hands of Donald Trump.  We feel bruised, affronted, and even slightly traumatized.  At the very least the news was disillusioning, and we find ourselves asking each other and no one else in particular the dreadful question: What happens next?  But whatever Mr. Trump takes it upon himself to do after the Inauguration on January 20, we know that before we can expect ourselves to regain our sense of balance and brace for the contrary wind that may soon be blowing, we have to apply the first aid required for newly depressed and crushed spirits.  

It is my habit to begin each and every day by engaging in my own personal devotions, before I even eat breakfast or hop on the day’s agenda.  That morning was a slight exception.  After rising from bed I was so eager to get the final word about the election that I skipped to the front door and picked up the Washington Post off our front walkway where each morning it is faithfully delivered.  When I read the headline I experienced a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach before the emotions I have already described kicked in.  To be perfectly honest I was suddenly in no mood for prayer or meditation.  But I pushed through that resistance and got right to it, as downcast in spirit as I was.

Now what could I say to the God of the universe at a moment such as that?  After complaining to the Great One and baring my feeling of dismay, what else? – I did what I have been instructed by the New Testament to do.  I prayed for my enemy – well, not my enemy exactly; I knew without giving it much thought that Trump had not done me any particular harm.  It was and is his mindset that I and millions of others are up against.  Before I further report upon what I did in that quiet moment, I would like to summon the shade of an Old Testament character.  

“Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” has arrested the attention of millions of youngsters and young-at-heart adults over the four decades since it broke loose upon the stage and the video circuits.  Joseph is the youngest of thirteen sons of Jacob, descendent of the venerated Abraham.  He is portrayed in the play as a handsome, innocent and pleasant young person that any child or teen could smilingly identify with – in other words, very brotherly loving.  But he is in actuality a well-scrubbed version of the conceited, precocious Daddy’s boy, brash and narcissistic, that shows up in the original Biblical narrative.  The father Jacob is clueless about his favorite son’s irritating traits.  Jacob even has the effrontery to dress the boy in a sparkling coat, while apparently leaving the twelve others in ragged garments.  Not until Joseph begins spouting off about his dreams of royal authority does Daddy take some issue with him. 

Then comes the dream, flung into the face of his brothers.  It goes something like this: “I dreamed that we were all stars in heaven, but that I was the brightest star of all and you my brothers bowed down and worshipped me.”  This is too much for the brothers; they gang up on him and sell him to slave marketers headed for Egypt.  Frankly I would have felt like shipping him off myself, after hearing this outburst of pomposity.  But of course most of you know the story.  The brothers tell the father that his favorite son is dead, gored by an animal.  Years pass, as Joseph manages to win the Pharaoh’s favor enough to be freed from his bondage and get himself appointed to a high government post.  As it so happens, his family back home, suffering from a widespread famine along with thousands of others, comes begging to the Pharaoh’s food distributor, whom they finally recognize as the presumably dead brother, and they are all reconciled.       

I will not give further details except to say that Joseph, older and more mature, goes through much soul searching and inward struggle when he finds himself in the very position of power over his relatives, about whom he had so brashly prophesied as a youth.  Reconciliation does not come easily.

The upshot of the story for me, as I am sure it is for many others, is the old saw about being careful for what you most want and hope for, you just might get it.  Joseph discovers that governing is not as simple a matter as he has assumed.  It is not some fancy dressed affair or some ongoing circus.  And that is what my prayer for Trump was all about and still is.  I pray that once in office, or at least within the first year of his administration, and confronted by the complex business of governing and the knottiness of the issues he has treated so sophomorically during his campaign, he will be sobered and – far-fetched as it may sound – perhaps humbled by what he finds on his plate.  He has already softened some of his daggered rhetoric.  The people he wanted to bar from the country are no longer Muslims per se.  Now he claims he just wants to keep out people from countries that support terrorism.  One thing that may do much to bring about some change in his mindset about immigrants is for the government agencies, in charge of vetting those who apply for entrance, to invite him to peruse and study just how strict the process is.  Take him through the rigor of it and the thoroughness of it!  Recently on 60 Minutes we heard people who have been admitted after a years-long wait speak of just how hard it really is to even gain a foothold in the U.S., much less obtain citizenship.  He needs to meet immigrants and become familiar with immigrant families.  He should be given a thorough education about the country he has decided to lead.  He should be vetted!

I confess that there is a spiteful part of me that wants him to be a total failure as the Chief Executive, so that I can become smug about the balloted choice of him to lead, a choice in which I did not participate.  But that would involve lying in wait to maybe sabotage his best efforts.  I am not interested in sabotage or in thorough demonization.  I agree with what Obama said to him when they met for the first time in the Oval Office.  He said he wanted Trump to succeed, because if he fails, the country fails, the people are shortchanged.  I hope he can do something about reducing unemployment.  How can I ask him to keep an open mind, if I’m not willing to do the same?  I hope he can do some needed repair work on our unbalanced economy.  I hope he can improve the condition of our cities.  I hope he can contribute toward the plans already being put in place for the updating of our nation’s infrastructure.   And I really am hoping and praying that he will surprise us all and build healthy personal relations with minorities.  Nobody would be more pleased than I in any of these cases.

Presidents have surprised us before.  Who would have ever suspected that a practically unknown individual like Harry Truman, a temperamental, dogmatic, rude, undiplomatic, opinionated snapper, chosen for Veep in 1944 as a result of some inner party compromising, who knew nothing about the atomic bomb or nuclear power when Roosevelt’s death forced him into office, would in his eight years in the White House racially integrate the armed services, preside over the forging of the GI Bill, give impetus to the Marshall Plan that did so much to heal postwar Europe and recognize the then new State of Israel!  Who would have suspected that a deep south politician like Lyndon Johnson would upon John F. Kennedy’s death be responsible for the passage of more Civil Rights legislation than any President before or since has ever been able to claim?  And Abraham Lincoln had more enemies than a sick dog has fleas when he took office; who would have thought this backwoods rail splitter could bring about at least the legal emancipation of slavery that would stand the test of time over what is now one hundred and fifty years and counting?

So I hope I have made it clear that in this posting I have not come to praise our new Caesar OR to bury him.  I am asserting my allegiance to my country and am expressing my appreciation for our democratic form of government that allows for such a peaceful exchange of leadership, even in the midst of such sharp social and political division as has become so evident during this past Presidential campaign.  I am saying that since we now have a new President, let us give him a fair chance.  My prayers have led me to once again embrace that opportunity.  It is the only alternative we as a civilized nation have at our disposal other than the chaos of military coup or bloody revolution.    

To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com. To learn about me consult on the website the blog entry for August 9, 2013.

Ex Machina (Movie Review by Bob Racine

                                    1 hr & 48 min, color, 2015

Those who care deeply about the emergence of Artificial Intelligence and its potential for becoming dominant over Human Intelligence (and ingenuity) should make it a point to see this sharp futuristic piece of science fiction.  While it does not work through the controversy or come to any specified conclusion about that mysterious question of possibility, it does pose a plot predicament that places the thinking and exploring viewer into yet another conceivable set of bizarre circumstances in which the two, the Artificial and the Human, come eyeball to eyeball with each other. 

We share the bedazzlement of a twenty-six-year-old Caleb Smith (Domhnall Gleeson), programmer for a high profile digital research company.   He is asked to examine a robot and determine by observation whether or not she has developed consciousness.  Yes, this robot has gender; she (Alicia Vikander) is called Ava by her creator, and she has been shaped into the slim body of an attractive young woman who speaks flawless English.  Offhand she reminds me of the movie “Her”, except in that gripper the artificial being is only a voice, not a tangible corporeal manifestation.  And she is also reminiscent of the computer brain HAL in “2001: A Space Odyssey”, who speaks most clearly and eloquently, manifests emotion and makes independent decisions that complicate human programming. 

Caleb interviews and interacts with Ava, whose seductiveness is not at first apparent to him.  It is the kind of one-on-one that requires us to pay close attention to each and every word and phrase and syllable.  There is no room for the attentive mind to wander, not even for a fleeting moment.  We know that there is more to Ava’s part of the encounter than there appears to be, more than a mere exchange of names.  It does not take Caleb long to verify that she is indeed a creature of consciousness, not simply an amalgamation of wires and cylinders and programmed apparatuses, though she does look wired up and quite conspicuously. 

But there is a third character in the scenario whom I found to be even more of a fascination, and that is Nathan (Oscar Isaac), the middle-aged genius who has invented her.  If the film had followed the expected protocol of science fiction and made Nathan in the image of the conventional Frankenstein-ian mad scientist in strident quest for power, he would have been tiresome from the get-go.  But the first we see of Nathan he is recovering from one of his many alcohol-induced hangovers, a quite self-involved hedonist, somewhat depressed and depressive to listen to.  He acts as if he is more an observer in the scenario than an instructor or controller.  He appears to be relaxed and matter of fact about what he has created.  He works alone in his subterranean lab located at a remote mountain spot many hours away from urban civilization.  Caleb is ordered flown there by helicopter, where the object of his inquiry as well as Nathan awaits him; there he is scheduled to stay for a week.  Nathan has also created another female robot named Kyoko, who is purportedly incapable of much reasoning and not conversant in any language.  Her only function is to wait upon Nathan mechanistically.

The place is surrounded by lush mountain scenery at a quite high altitude, with cliffs and snow-covered rock and waterfalls.  An apparently peaceful environment!   And we encounter only this foursome.  A very small cast in very restrictive surroundings!  I am not sure how the average viewer will experience the setting as the movie begins, but I found it to be strangely foreboding, in spite of the unspoiled sanctuary of nature in which the lab is cradled.  Even Nathan refers to the place as claustrophobic.  Ava does not speak in some abrasive monotone; her voice is soft and appropriately inflective.  And yet we know that more is in the offing than we can imagine.

We are exposed to the bewildering corridors of Nathan’s mind and his somewhat amoral assessment of life on the planet, its tumultuous past and what he sees as its grim future.   But Ava, from whose wiles Nathan makes no effort to protect Caleb, turns out to be the intended manipulator of both men.  Just how susceptible each of them will be to her devices is the question that keeps the drama of the film in high suspenseful traction.  

Caleb sees things in the lab that disturb him and make him somewhat vulnerable before Ava.  One would expect that Nathan is closely observing the young man’s reactions.  But does he have any real agenda in mind or is he just a lonely, hermitic man using Caleb to satisfy his hunger for human and professional contact?          

Sexuality comes to play a very vital part in the functioning of both women robots.  Caleb is amazed and a bit confused over the fact that Nathan has given them sexuality at all.  Nathan’s reason for this, which he readily and matter-of-factly shares with the younger man, leads to some strong medical and philosophical argument between the two of them.  Is not a robot’s only purpose for existence that of improved calculation and reasoning and motor functioning?  Is it not constructed to serve Science?  Or does this creator have something more in mind?  Caleb soon discovers the answer, to his shock and horror.  He also begins to have a sense of unreality about the environment into which he has stepped.  Is it all a professional experiment or is there a game being played?  Is he being tested, or is he the butt of some joke?  One thing that feeds these fears is Ava’s attempt to turn him against Nathan, or so it appears. 

Where are things headed in this spooky business (one of last year’s Oscar nominations for Best Original Screenplay)?  This may not be a film for all tastes; its outcome is quite horrific.  But it is not an exploitative exercise in chills for chills’ sake.  It directs our thinking and sense of inquiry – carefully and ingeniously – toward a most crucial subject, one that the scientific genius Stephen Hawking, who believes that the AI threat is real, has written about.  

The honored screenplay and the film’s direction are both the labor of a man named Alex Garland.   He has well named it.  The title, “Ex Machina”, is a Latin phrase derived from a Greek term meaning “out of a machine”.  Sometimes it is joined to the Latin word for god, Deus.  “Deus ex machina” is the concept of deity as something technical, created by human ingenuity and intellect as opposed to a transcendent living force that defies definition.  Can a robot generate feelings and independent self-consciousness; can it develop spiritual quality?  Or is she, he, or it doomed to be nothing more than a mechanism, however far advanced?   Or – here is the really scary question: Does she, he, or it have to have these capacities in order to exercise independent control over human beings?  Mr. Garland attacks these frightening questions excitingly and intelligently and with superb, state-of-the-art use of cinematic engineering.  I hope he has other great things in store for us.

To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com. To learn about me consult on the website the blog entry for August 9, 2013.

Lord Jim (Movie Review by Bob Racine)

                                    2 hrs & 34 min, color, 1965

Is it a degree of fear that distinguishes a hero from a coward?  If not, what else does?  This is a fitting and most pertinent question when studying the narrative of this exciting late 19^th century adventure movie, released in 1965 and recently rereleased into home viewing and based upon a novel by the celebrated author Joseph Conrad.  The man whose story gets told is one who must swim in the dangerous waters that cover the boundary separating courage and cowardice.  I call it an adventure story, though it is also one of deep reflection.  The journey its main character takes is not just one through time and space but of the seeking heart and mind.  The novel is strange in that this main character is not given a last name.  From the opening narration he is called simply Jim, a kind of Everyman on a quest for redemption.  He is British, but he is not a Lord in his country’s Parliament nor is the designation in any respect official.  That title is bestowed upon him by grateful people he rescues.  More about that shortly!

It is a story of a man’s search for his destiny and his craving for redemption.  And who better equipped to bring such a one to life than Peter O’Toole, one of the best actors ever to be seen on the movie screen.  Watching him make his way in Jim’s shoes gives me the unmistakable feeling that he is still alive.  He was gifted with a face that could externalize complex emotion so vividly that I wonder how many takes it required to get each demanding scene just right and what vast resources of spirit and imagination he drew upon.  Those who directed him, in this instance Richard Brooks, who also wrote the screenplay, must have been awestruck by what he gave them to work with.  It must have been something like being entrusted with a precious metal to build a tower.  “Lord Jim” is not O’Toole’s best role, but it is nevertheless one that draws us almost musically into the mystery of the man he embodies. 

Jim is a man who starts out as an aspiring seaman, beginning at the lowest rank in His Majesty’s Navy but rising over time to the distinction of an officer.  He yearns to be a hero and for a spell he establishes himself as a loyal second in command earning the plaudits of an admiring captain (Jack Hawkins), saving his commander-in-chief from a mutiny and proving himself diligent and rugged in all departments.  But fate deals him a nasty blow, when an injury forces him into temporary hospitalization on land, and afterward, eager to get back over water, he takes up second in command on a vessel of a less reputable crew and less structural seaworthiness.  During a raging storm and in a moment of human weakness he makes a sudden, fateful, panicked decision that amounts to desertion.  His career as a seaman tanks, his reputation in ruins.  In disgrace he then becomes a lonely vagabond wandering the earth and looking for he knows not what, until a European merchant (Paul Lukas) not knowing who Jim is offers him an extremely dangerous task smuggling arms and ammunition to a tribe somewhere in the Southeast Asian islands who are captives of a savage warlord (Eli Wallach). 

Yes, he becomes their champion liberator, toppling the dictator and inciting the captive population to throw off their captors and reestablish civil and sacred order.  The half hour or so in which this uprising is depicted is an especially exciting and heart thumping affair, intricately portrayed and hard driving.  Through it all he gains a measure of self-respect as well as the admiration and gratitude of the people he has liberated.  He also wins the love of a beautiful young and brave native woman (Dallah Lavi).  But fate it seems is not through with him even yet.  Other greedy fortune hunting enemies (led by ruthless swindler James Mason) conspire to subvert the colony, and Jim’s infamous history catches up with him.  The justice finally meted out is both strange and somehow sad and beautiful, all at once. 

Fear does play a large part in the twists and turns of his odyssey.  We are told in the voiceover that imagination, something Jim has in acute quantity, can make a person see what that one fears to see.  A strong and daring individual may force her/himself to act bravely in an emergency situation, but however much that one accomplishes with brave behavior, fear is like a silent foe forever stalking and waiting.  Courage may momentarily resist fear, but it does not obliterate it.  Especially is this true of those whose means of livelihood is fraught with danger.   

At a climactic moment Jim himself gives us an even more challenging notion:  “Maybe cowards and heroes are both ordinary [persons] who for a split second do something out of the ordinary”.   I personally find this a bit of a puzzle.  It certainly warrants discussion.  In fact, there are many words coming from the mouths of both sympathetic and corrupt characters in this screenplay that one could spend an entire evening examining. 

Here is another puzzler: “Some men [or women] are not meant to be heroes and some heroes cannot become men [or women]”, apparently too busy making one sacrifice or another or thriving upon life-or-death risk.  This kind of dialogue is typical of Conrad’s fiction.  He is both mysterious and intellectual.  Accordingly the movie is both an action spectacle and a meditation upon the behavior of the human mind and heart.  It tackles not only the subjects of courage and cowardice but of humility and atonement.  And in Conrad’s world the evil persons portrayed know the weaknesses of their enemies and play upon them; there is as much psychological combat at moments of confrontation as there is armed conflict.  

Speaking in purely cinematic terms, the picture’s stereophonic soundtrack and photography are quite lovely.  The imagery and the editing are of the finest caliber, as is the score.  There is also some beautiful choreography engaged in by the natives that my wife and I found most fascinating and entertaining.  Many including myself are still puzzling over the film’s weak reception at the time of its first release a half century ago.  I think it would prove a worthy rediscovery.

To read other entries in my blog, please consult its website:  enspiritus.blogspot.com. To learn about me consult on the website the blog entry for August 9, 2013.