Francis Berger's Blog, page 37

The Saint Nicholas Window

A few days ago, I noted how my family is participating in my village's Advent window decoration tradition for the first time, and I promised I would post a photo of our Saint Nicholas Day endeavor.

Well, here it is. This was taken in the daytime. We illuminate the scene after the sunset. As I mentioned in the first post on this topic, nothing fancy, but we're pleased with the result. 

My Innocent Yet Naughty Krampusnacht/Saint Nicholas Day Faux Pas

Saint Nicholas Day is a big deal in Hungary, at least for kids. On the evening before Saint Nicholas Day, children place their cleaned and polished shoes on a windowsill for the same reason children in other Western countries hang stockings on fireplaces on Christmas Eve – to have them filled with goodies.

According to Central European lore, Saint Nicholas visits every household on the evening of the fifth to fill good children’s shoes with small gifts and treats. However, Saint Nicholas does not arrive alone that night.

​Accompanying him is the Krampus – a frightening, half-goat, half-demon monster whose sole mission boils down to punishing the bad children Saint Nicholas refuses to reward with treats. While good kids can expect goodies from Saint Nick, bad kids can only look forward to a sound beating courtesy of the Krampus, who enthusiastically whips all the naughty children with a switch made of branches.

Although December 6 is Saint Nicholas Day, the evening of the fifth is Krampusnacht – and heaven help any bad kid on Krampusnacht. Hence, on the morning of the sixth, good kids enjoy treats; the not-so-good nurse their injuries. The Krampus has since considerably toned down its violence. Instead of beating badly behaved children or eating them or taking them straight to hell, it merely leaves a small switch of twigs in the shoes, symbolizing that the kid should shape up before Christmas.

When I lived in Hungary briefly about twenty years ago, my wife and I agreed to put our shoes out on separate windowsills with the understanding that we would “secretly” fill each other’s shoes with goodies. I have to say, it was fun waking up to shoes full of treats on the sixth. My wife had filled one of my shoes with chocolate and sweets and had placed a Krampus switch of twigs in the other.

Later that day, a corporate student playfully asked me if I had put my shoes out the night before and was quite surprised when I informed him that I had. I then took a moment to explain how my wife and I had “secretly” filled each other’s shoes.

He smiled and asked me if I had been good or naughty.

I responded by saying that I had been both.

“Good and naughty?” he asked. “How is that possible?”

I described how my wife had filled one shoe with sweets and wanted to explain how she had placed a switch in the other, but instead of saying virgács , which is the Magyar word for a small switch of branches,  I used the word ​korbács, the Hungarian word for - well - something that looks like this: My student looked at me with a sly, amused expression and said,

“Good and naughty, eh? Okay, I think I get it now.”

We Are Saint Nicholas Day

My village has this advent tradition in which 24 households divvy up the 24 days leading up to Christmas. Each participating household takes one of the days and decorates a street-facing window for that day.

A newly-decorated window with the number marking the day appears each evening during the weeks leading up to Christmas. As part of the tradition, villagers go out for a stroll each evening to find and appreciate the window decoration marking that day. Once villagers find the house, the household featuring the decorated window offers its visiting neighbors pastries and tea or mulled wine and, perhaps, some good, stiff pálinka (fruit schnapps) for the men. 

My family is taking part in the tradition for the first time this year (as window decorators), and we have been assigned December 6, Saint Nicholas Day. We spent some time brainstorming ideas yesterday before finally deciding upon a traditional-looking Saint Nicholas with staff in hand, a basket laden with gifts on his back, walking through the snow toward a small village.

We drew what we needed and spent the evening cutting out the white-paper silhouette components and affixing them to the inside of my son’s bedroom window, which happens to be the middle window facing the street, and then illuminated the scene from the interior windowsill. It’s nothing fancy, but I think it turned out quite well. I promise to post a photo of it after the big “reveal” on December 6.

However, what I really want to share in this post is the immense fun I had creating the window decoration. The second I began working on it, I was transported back to my childhood when I considered little projects like this a very big deal. I revisited the joy and elation at creating something for a special occasion, and as I fashioned out the figures for the window, I experienced the same childlike zeal and enthusiasm I used to when I engaged in similar activities as a boy.

Though the task itself was delightful, how the simple activity moved my spirit extended beyond that into something almost magical. I’m not sure how to describe the sensation. All I can say is that it transcended nostalgia and touched a deep-rooted but sadly neglected aspect of my innate creativity and joie de vivre.

I’m going to insist we participate in the Advent window decoration tradition every year from now on. I'm also going to focus on ways of accessing that neglected creativity and joie de vivre more often!

The Tragedy of the External in Ferenc Molnár's The Paul Street Boys

The Paul Street Boys sculpture in Budapest This brief post on Ferenc Molnár's classic youth novel The Paul Street Boys contains every spoiler imaginable.

I have been reading books in Hungarian over the past three years to keep my Magyar language skills up. Though I am fluent in the language, have lived in the country for nearly a decade, and easily pass as a native, I don’t use the language much because I essentially live in a bubble world here in Hungary.

Off the bat, I have to say that my experience with Hungarian literature thus far has been a little disappointing. Hungarians take pride in their literary culture and often name streets and squares after their authors and poets. However, the little Hungarian literature I have read has been rather dull and mediocre. Or overladen with politics or artifice. Even the supposed masterpieces I have read to date have been mostly meh. Great works of Hungarian literature undoubtedly exist – I guess I just haven’t been lucky enough to pick one up yet.

On that note, I am pleased to report that Ferenc Molnár’s classic youth novel The Paul Street Boys – which I finished yesterday – has bucked the disappointing Magyar literature trend. Though not a masterpiece, the novel is a solid example of excellence in its genre. First published in 1906, The Paul Street Boys remains a staple in grade school curriculums here in Hungary and ranks among the most-read Hungarian novels beyond Hungary’s borders.

I tend to write meandering and overlong book summaries, so I’ll let Wikipedia provide a brief overview of The Paul Street Boys:

The novel is about schoolboys in the Józsefváros neighborhood of Budapest and is set in 1889. The Paul Street Boys spend their free time at the grund, an empty lot that they regard as their “Fatherland.” The story has two main protagonists, János Boka (the honorable leader of the Paul Street Boys) and Ernő Nemecsek (the smallest member of the group).

When the “Redshirts” — another gang of boys, led by Feri Áts, who gather at the nearby botanical gardens—attempt to take over the grund, the Paul Street Boys are forced to defend themselves in military fashion.

Although the Paul Street Boys win the war, and little Nemecsek repeatedly demonstrates that his bravery and loyalty surpass his size, the book ends in tragedy: Nemecsek dies of the pneumonia he caught in the conflict. 

At the very end of the book, Boka also learns that a tenement building will soon be erected on the grund lot, meaning that the boys' heroic struggle to defend it and Nemecsek's sacrifice was in vain.

The novel’s ending addresses the inherent insufficiency of mortal life in this-world of continual change and entropy -- which is quite a way to end a youth novel!

Eventually, the external world will abandon us. We will inevitably lose everything we work and struggle for. All that we defend will one day be taken from us. The people we love will all die just as we will die. Our little pieces of heaven on earth will disappear and become something else.

The final sentence of the novel captures this quite subtly yet brilliantly (my translation from the original):

Boka János komolyan nézett maga elé a padra, és most először kezdett derengeni egyszerű gyereklelkében a sejtés arról, hogy tulajdonképpen mi is az élet, amelynek mindnyájan küzdő, hol bánatos, hol vidám szolgái vagyunk.

János Boka looked earnestly at the bench in front of him, and for the first time, his simple child soul experienced a sense of what life is and what we, as its servants, struggle against, sometimes sadly, sometimes happily.

Ferenc Molnár ends The Paul Street Boys there. He makes no mention of the choices available to Boka after the boy experiences that sense of what life is, but I hope one of the choices would lead Boka to the eventual realization that he is not merely "life's servant" and that what life is is not all life is.

Yet, hoping Boka will find Christ is not enough.

Boka must find the internal Christ because if his faith finds Christ only in the external world, he will eventually lose Christ, too — one day.

No, You Are Not the Eggman, John . . . I am

My henhouse is home to 24 hens that lay 18-22 eggs daily, or about 140 a week. My family consumes about 30 a week, and I sell the remainder to colleagues.

My colleagues are happy because they get to buy fresh eggs for less than the store price, and I am happy because the money I receive covers the feed and the eggs my family eats.

About a quarter of the households in my village keep chickens, which helps explain why the little shop on Main Street never stocks eggs. Yes, eggs are an abundant commodity around here, or at least they were.

It started with one of my chicken-keeping neighbors revealing that her hens had stopped laying and then asking if I had any eggs to spare. Two days later, another neighbor with hens informed me that he was the victim of a sudden and unexpected egg shortage. I cut back on the amount I take to colleagues and now supply both neighbors with eggs every week, too.

Though it is normal for chickens to slow down or stop laying during the winter, mine stay productive year-round. Last winter, my original nine hens were consistent, with only a minor reduction in overall weekly totals.

The same trend seems to be at play so far this year. While my neighbors' hens have decided to take time off, mine are still going strong.

I think the secret lies in light. Most hens naturally slow down or stop laying as the days shorten, but if they get at least twelve hours of light a day, they will generally stay productive throughout the winter months. Unlike my eggless neighbors, I provide my chickens with two or three hours of light in the mornings and have found that it helps keep them productive.

I have encountered conflicting opinions regarding chickens and light. Some say it is detrimental; others claim the opposite. My experience informs me that a little extra light does not harm. On the contrary, my chickens generally look healthier and, I dare say, happier than other chickens in my neighborhood.

No light, no eggs.

If I were eggless, I could not be the eggman. And where would my neighbors, colleagues, and family be without the eggman? 

Value Inversions Also Serve to Reflect Metaphysical Assumptions; Or, Why Virtually No Western Church Believes in God Anymore

Though they appeared around a century ago, I have found Max Scheler’s hierarchy of values, metaphysical confusion, and value inversion concepts extremely helpful in clarifying why value inversions like altruism have superseded authentic Christian values.

A four-tier hierarchy ranking values from highest to lowest provides the core of Scheler’s work on the subject. The hierarchy, edited slightly, is as follows:

Values of the Holy (the Divine; Creation; Reality)Spiritual, Psychic, and Mental Values (Truth, Beauty, Goodness; Morality, Ethics)Sensual Values (Health; Vitality, Pleasure; the Agreeable and Disagreeable)Values of Utility (Economics; Government; Politics)
Scheler believed the values above to be a priori. I agree to an extent, but I would add that a certain set of metaphysical assumptions formed the values above, and such assumptions must be individually discovered and accepted as true before the values can be formed. Otherwise, one is simply adopting a set of values and the metaphysical assumptions upon which they are based.

For example, Scheler was a devout Roman Catholic when he came up with the hierarchy of values, but later in his life, he abandoned Catholic metaphysical assumptions altogether, including belief in an omnipotent Creator God in favor of pantheism. Needless to say, this shift in assumptions had a profound effect on his previously held values! 

I resist delving into Scheler’s finer points concerning the hierarchy because I am using it here as an illustrative framework rather than an authoritative model, but I will go over the basics.
​
None of the values in Scheler’s hierarchy exist in isolation. Instead, they work together and influence each other according to their ranking. Thus, the Values of the Holy represent the peak that should guide and inform all other values, in descending order. Likewise, the Values of Utility at the bottom must accommodate the Sensual Values and the Spiritual Values, but like all other values, must be inspired by the Values of the Holy.

The positive values above, ordered in the way they are, ultimately reflect a distinct set of metaphysical assumptions. Since the Divine takes precedence over and guides all other values, the Values of the Holy provide the basis for all Spiritual, Psychic, and Mental Values, including things like philosophy, education, and art. These Spiritual Values then cascade down and govern the Sensual Values, which include defining the significance of pleasure, health, security, and safety. Finally, all Spiritual and Sensual values – inspired above all by the Values of the Holy – would culminate in the Values of Utility in things like the ordering and governing of society.

According to Scheler, the hierarchy of values remains positive if it retains the ranking noted above and stays on the positive side of the value range, i.e., the worship of the Divine rather than idols, art that aimed for beauty rather than ugliness, philosophy that was motivated to seek truth rather than prove falsehoods, and so forth.

However, any shift in the range from positive to negative would eventually trigger tier displacement or rearrangement, thereby shifting some or all the values into the realm of negative values, leading to what Scheler refers to as metaphysical confusion.

Metaphysical confusion causes value inversion – first as a shift from positive to negative, and then from lower to higher. For example, if the negative value of fearing disease usurps the positive value of maintaining healthfulness within the Sensual Values, the usurpation immediately impacts ethical and moral considerations at the level of Spiritual Values. If other Sensual Values follow suit – shift from positive to negative – then the tier of Sensual Values could move upward on the hierarchy and knock Spiritual Values down a level.

Scheler argues that such movements indicate metaphysical confusion. Instead of the Spiritual informing the Sensual, the Sensual now informs the Spiritual. And since Spiritual values have fallen in ranking, the first order of business for the Values of the Holy would be to attend to the Values of the Senses and vice versa.

The Values of Utility might then tackle the negative values directly via governmental dictates aimed at fighting disease via bureaucratic control. Such a shift would then relegate Spiritual values to the bottom of the hierarchy, where they would be informed rather than serving to inform. And so on.

Scheler’s used the term value delusion to refer to these negative shifts in the hierarchy and noted that such delusions immediately entailed metaphysical confusion, leading to value inversion.

Why am I bringing all of this up?

To draw attention to values and demonstrate how these reflect metaphysical assumptions.

The point I want to argue here is that values do not create metaphysical assumptions; metaphysical assumptions create values. 


To illustrate, I offer the following tacked-together hierarchy of inverted values as representative of our current time and place, once again, ranked from higher to lower:Values of Utility (totalitarian control via the Science, experts, and media; dishonest politics, exploitative voodoo economics, climate change hysteria, anti-racism, mass migration, vilification of native populations in the West, self-destructive altruism, the birdemic and the peck, etc.)Sensual Values (the homo and trans agendas, hedonism, feminism, plague fear, no one is safe until everyone is safe, etc.)Spiritual Values (corrupt churches and institutions, right is wrong, vulgar non-art or anti-art, falsehoods as philosophy, corrupted education, media and social media, materialism, mindfulness, etc.)Values of the Holy (hypocrisy, a concept of the divine modelled upon the Values of Utility) Like it or not, the hierarchy of inverted values above is probably an accurate representation of how our contemporary world orders and ranks its values. Moreover, this hierarchy of value inversion reflects a distinct set of metaphysical assumptions ou r modern world holds concerning the ultimate nature of reality. 

To demonstrate how these metaphysical assumptions manifest in the world, I will turn to Dr. Charlton, who described the Church of England’s actions during the birdemic in the following way:

In April of 2020 during the birdemic lockdowns; The Church of England's churches were allowed (by the Bishops' instructions!) to open and be used for use as food banks and "peck" centres, while all sacramental activity in the same buildings was forbidden. Analogous actions were taken by all major "Christian" churches - revealing their true priorities were almost exclusively material, expedient, and totalitarian-compatible.

Let’s break that down according to the slapdash value-inversion hierarchy I put together above:

At the behest of the secular government and its globalist rulers, which occupy the peak the of the heirarchy, the Church of England, which now officially sits near the bottom of the hierarchy of inverted values, closed its doors and offered no religious services. This action demonstrates that the Values of Utility guide and inform all other values, including the Values of the Holy.The Church of England closed its doors because it bowed not only to Values of Utility but also to Sensual Values. Keeping everyone safe physically was infinitely more important than providing religious services or communing with the Divine.When the Church of England finally did open its doors, it used its buildings and churches as food banks and peck centers rather than for religious reasons proving that it was adhering to the modern Spiritual Values of placing the material over the spiritual, health over soul, physical nourishment over spiritual nourishment, etc.The above shows that the Church of England believes in a god that endorses the values of Utility above all else. Put another way, the Church of God believes in a god who does not believe in himself.
Re-read the value chain I have sketched above and ask yourself this: What metaphysical assumptions do the Church of England hold?

What do the people who lead the Church of England believe about the fundamental nature of reality? How do these assumptions motivate them? How do they create and inform their values? 

The Church of England is certainly not alone in this. Virtually every church, government, institution, organization, and association in the West loyally adheres to this hierarchy of value inversions and gross metaphysical confusion, as do most individuals comprising Western societies, implying that the West is currently under the sway of a particularly abhorrent set of metaphysical assumptions. 

Metaphysical assumptions matter. Values matter.

That is why sorting out assumptions and values is the most meaningful and vital task individual Christians can take on in this time and place.

Taking personal responsibility for those assumptions and their subsequent values must follow.

I would even dare to say that this falls into the category of "non-negotiable."

As Dr. Charlton notes in the linked post above:

The only way out and forward from burial beneath the vast complex of wrong motivations and false priorities and confused intentions that led to such appalling practices (in so many churches): is a clean break.

Only from a Ground Zero position of complete spiritual freedom from the currently suffocating network of worldly-entanglements and social-responsibilities; can properly Christian motivations be rediscovered and renewed. 

Only after we have solidly established the priority of the spiritual, may we then choose to rebuild a selective and effective concern with the material. 

As With Everything, When It Comes to Christian Blogs, Motivation is Key

​I used to spend a great deal of time contemplating the ideas and opinions Christian blogs offer. I still do, but only after I have satisfactorily discerned the overarching motivation driving the blog and the blogger.

At its most basic level, motivation provides the impetus for thinking, acting, and behaving in a certain way. Motivation also provides penetrating clues into a blogger’s overall goals and objectives. The motivation driving a blog – not the ideas or opinions the blogger presents – reveals what the blogger truly is, where his priorities lie, and what he is ultimately aiming for.  

Motivation is particularly crucial in Christian blogs. Christian bloggers whose ideas, opinions, beliefs, and assumptions differ from mine do not unsettle me to any great extent, but Christian bloggers whose motivations do not seem to emanate from a good place appal me.

Even more dismaying are Christian bloggers whose motivations inevitably point to the eclipising of or absence of a good heart.   

As with everything, motivation wavers. Even the best Christian bloggers are susceptible to publishing posts that qualify as motivationally suspect. Such inconsistency is understandable and forgivable as long as the overarching motivation flowing from an otherwise structurally good heart remains.

That said, when bloggers start losing their motivational grip, the motivational inconsistencies have a way of morphing into antithetical motivations.

The good heart begins to fade, something else stands in its place, and the ideas and opinions the blogger shares stop meaning all that much, regardless of how penetrating or insightful the ideas and opinions happen to be.  

Note: A good heart is not synonymous with nice! Most nice Christian bloggers are insufferable, seemingly unsalvageable fools.

Many nasty, cantankerous Christian bloggers have good hearts and clearly discernible motivations that are good, but that good heart and those good motivations must be discernible; otherwise, such bloggers are, at best, only nasty and cantankerous or, at worst, on the wrong side. 

Hope is the Antidote to Despair, But It Can Also Be a Double-Edged Sword

Let us contemplate Sartre’s dictum that life begins beyond despair.

​Note the word beyond. Assume it means on the far side of or the other side of. Assume beyond also means far away from and outwith.

With this in mind, two potential paths to living beyond despair become apparent. The first involves encountering despair and overcoming it with spiritual hope. The second entails avoiding or shunning despair altogether by utilizing temporal hope.

Considering the nature and reality of mortal life, the first path appears less common – at least when it comes to contending with despair spiritually. The second, though possible, seems idealistic -- perhaps even false. After all, how would one even know one is beyond despair if one claims to have never experienced it or leaves no space for it due to elevated optimism and hope for this world?

Hope is the universally prescribed antidote for despair, but what kind of hope can dispel despair and propel one beyond it to the beginning of life?

Vanquishing despair with hope can be a double-edged sword. We all know that the devil tempts toward despair, but many seem to have forgotten that the devil can also tempt with hope.

For example, relying on predominately temporal hopes may provide Christians with unfathomable optimism and many reasons to live, struggle, fight, organize, and build; however, hope based primarily on churches, societies, culture, and civilization may also distance them from the real hope Christ offers.

If the devil can provide Christians with enough worldly hope and get them invested in enough reasons to live in the world and for the world, then he knows he may succeed at getting Christians to regard the hope Christ offers as secondary.

On top of that, the more the devil succeeds in grounding Christian hopes firmly in this world, the more chance he has at dashing those hopes when the temporal inevitably succumbs to entropy and death.

From a Christian perspective, living beyond despair demands that we face despair sincerely – that is, spiritually – and work to overcome it via inner transformation guided by the hope Jesus offers. For Christians, the orientation of this transformation must be next-worldly. This kind of hope-inspired transformation can overcome this-worldly despair and help place one beyond its clutches.

Some might consider such next-worldly hope to be lopsided in its focus and may even complain that it makes Christians passive and complacent about worldly affairs.

Nothing could be further from the truth. When Christians vanquish temporal despair with spiritual hope, they do not turn their backs on the world. They turn and face the world from the transformed viewpoint of a new life beyond despair.

Disconnect

Step One:

Write a long-winded, sprawling post in which you decry the demonic influence of mammon and declare money to be the root of all evil. 

Step Two:

At the end of the post, ask readers to support you and your blog with .  . . money.  

Development

The supernatural and natural are the same.

The supernatural and natural are separate.

The supernatural is beyond; the natural is fallen.

The supernatural can be approached through the natural.

The natural proves the supernatural cannot exist.

The natural and the unnatural are separate.

The unnatural proves that the natural is fallen.

The unnatural proves that the natural cannot exist.

The natural does not exist.

Only the unnatural exists.

The unnatural exists to destroy.

The unnatural exists to be destroyed.

The supernatural still exists.

The supernatural can still be chosen. 

​The supernatural cannot be destroyed.