Majoring in Christianity: The College of Arts and Sciences
Rev. Mark Schaefer
Kay Spiritual Life Center
October 7, 2007
Ecclesiastes 1:12-18; Psalm 19; Revelation 5:6-10

Ecclesiastes 1:12-18   "I, the Teacher, when king over Israel in Jerusalem, applied my mind to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven; it is an unhappy business that God has given to human beings to be busy with. I saw all the deeds that are done under the sun; and see, all is vanity and a chasing after wind. What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.
I said to myself, "I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me; and my mind has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge." And I applied my mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is but a chasing after wind. For in much wisdom is much vexation, and those who increase knowledge increase sorrow.

Psalm 19 To the leader. A Psalm of David. The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard; yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.
In the heavens he has set a tent for the sun, which comes out like a bridegroom from his wedding canopy, and like a strong man runs its course with joy. Its rising is from the end of the heavens, and its circuit to the end of them; and nothing is hid from its heat.  
The law of the LORD is perfect, reviving the soul; the decrees of the LORD are sure, making wise the simple; the precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is clear, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the LORD is pure, enduring forever; the ordinances of the LORD are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, even much fine gold; sweeter also than honey, and drippings of the honeycomb.  
Moreover by them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward. But who can detect their errors? Clear me from hidden faults. Keep back your servant also from the insolent; do not let them have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression.  
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.  

Revelation 5:6-10   Then I saw between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders a Lamb standing as if it had been slaughtered, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. He went and took the scroll from the right hand of the one who was seated on the throne. When he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell before the Lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. They sing a new song: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slaughtered and by your blood you ransomed for God saints from every tribe and language and people and nation; you have made them to be a kingdom and priests serving our God, and they will reign on earth.""

A call to Christian vocation is not limited to the clergy alone.   Every Christian is called to Christian service.   It is our calling to find ways to make whatever work we do work that serves the Kingdom of God.   In this sermon series, we explore ways in which the careers for which you are preparing can be Christian vocations.   Tonight we conclude our exploration with the College of Arts and Sciences.

I. THE STORY SO FAR...

In the Western tradition, we have gone through a number of changes in our attitudes toward what can be known and how it can be known.

Up until the medieval era, it was believed that the source of truth and authority was by revelation: that is by holy scriptures and traditional teachings of the church.   Well, after centuries of bloody wars in which one revelation sought to wipe out another, Europe decided it was done with relying on revelation in finding out what was true and authoritative.  

And so the Age of Reason began--the Modern Age--with its reliance on the scientific method, rationalism and empiricism.   And Europe (and eventually America) would prosper and the future would be one of limitless progress--the triumph of reason.   Well, then came the First World War and for Europe, the idea of the limitless progress of humanity came to an end.   (That idea didn't come to an end in America until 1963 with the assassination of President Kennedy).

And so the Post-Modern Era began.   An era in which it is no longer believed that there even is an absolute truth, let alone a way to discover it.   It is a time marked by cynicism, relativism, and deconstruction.  

It is a time that might very well agree with the sentiment of the passage from Ecclesiastes that we read earlier:

"I, the Teacher, when king over Israel in Jerusalem, applied my mind to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven; it is an unhappy business that God has given to human beings to be busy with. I saw all the deeds that are done under the sun; and see, all is vanity and a chasing after wind. What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.

It's not exactly the passage of scripture that you'd read at an opening convocation for the academic year.   It's not exactly brimming with optimism about seeking and searching out "all that is done under heaven."   Such a process is described as an "unhappy business that God has given to human beings to be busy with." Interestingly, it sounds exactly like the task that students studying in the College of Arts and Sciences are tasked with.   Furthermore, all the activity that will be investigated is, as Ecclesiastes says, "vanity".   A better translation would be "pointless" or "absurd".    Ecclesiastes will say later in the book: "Of making many books there is no end, and much study is a weariness of the flesh."

So then what are we to make of pursuits in the social and natural sciences, the humanities and the arts?   We have seen the connections made between Christian vocation and those in public service, those in business, those in international service, those in communications and journalism... is there any hope for our friends in the Arts and Sciences?

II. THE TASK AT HAND

I suppose when considering the nature of Christian vocations, we are well served by going back to the source: to Jesus.   Jesus was once asked what the greatest commandment of the law was.   This is not a small question: there are 613 commandments in the Torah, discerning the relative importance of them required a lot of study.   Jesus answers, quoting Deuteronomy and Leviticus:

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40 NRSV)

The Christian task is straightforward: love God and neighbor.   In very many ways, the Christian vocations we have talked about have been about exactly that, especially love of neighbor.  

But it is a hard thing to love someone you do not know.   And this is where the arts and sciences come in.   For these pursuits offer us knowledge and understanding.   Not of vain or pointless things, but of the very heart of the matter.

III. THE HANDIWORK OF GOD

The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard; yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.

These are the words of Psalm 19 could not make the point any clearer: The heavens are telling the glory of God.   It is a point that has been made throughout our history.  

St. Thomas Aquinas, the greatest of the medieval theologians, the founder of the school of thought known as Scholasticism, which is the basis for most Catholic theology, believed that God had provided a means for revelation through the creation.   Aquinas believed that by observing the creation, it was possible to learn something of God.   He would say, you couldn't come to completely understand the God of the Bible--that required revelation--but that one might be able to come to an initial understanding of God through the creation.

This idea finds an echo in the work of Albert Einstein.   Einstein was not a particularly religious person.   Though Jewish, his understanding of God was not particularly personal.   But nevertheless, Einstein spoke of physics as 'understanding the mind of God'.  

In the laws of physics, Einstein saw order and wonder and a harmony that lay behind everything.   To him, this was the 'mind of God'--the order and constancy that lay behind everything.  

A. Sciences

For a Christian, the sciences are the exploration of the "handiwork of God"--the discernment of the rules of nature, the study of the universe itself and all that it has to tell us.   It is a long-held Christian belief that one can learn about the builder by examining the building.   And for us, the sciences are a way of coming to know God.

When Jesus speaks the words of the first "Great Commandment"--he makes it clear that we are to love God with our heart, soul, strength, and mind.   Now, "heart" means "mind" in the Jewish understanding, so that Matthew is probably providing a little Greek explanation of what Jesus meant.   But the implication is clear: you cannot love God fully without loving God with your mind.   And that means, using your intellect.   It means not being afraid of what you might learn.   The sciences are not antithetical to Christian faith--they are required by it!

The sciences are part of the understanding of the Creation, using the God-given gift of reason and wisdom.   Can one be a Christian and a scientist who maintains that human beings evolved from a lower primate species?   Absolutely.   To insist otherwise would be to create an artificial division between the laws of nature and of Nature's God (to use a Jeffersonian phrase).  

If there is anything that the sciences help us to understand it is that we and the entirely of the universe are more "fearfully and wonderfully made" than we might ever have considered before.

The scientist, then, explores the heavens that tell the Glory of God and the firmament which declares God's handiwork, in order that we may more fully love God with our mind.

IV. THE PEOPLE OF GOD

But Jesus did not command us to love God alone.   Jesus commanded us to love our neighbor as well.   And in the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus provides for us an expansive definition of the concept of 'neighbor'.   It is no longer limited to us by geographic, or cultural, or linguistic proximity.   It is meant to encompass the whole human family.   But how do we love one another fully the way we are meant to?   We come to know one another; by learning about one another.   And this is where the social sciences come in.

A.  Social Sciences

Anthropologists help to make sense of human culture, identifying the things that are universals and the things that are attached to culture.   By better understanding the dynamics of human cultures, we come to a better understanding of the peoples of the world and how best to serve and share with them.

Sociologists help to address the dynamics of society as affected by race, gender, class, and all the other divisions that we are often unaware so deeply affect the way we think and live.   They challenge us to peel off the lenses of our social situation and to see the world from alternative perspectives.   They challenge us, too, to examine our faith, to see which parts of faith are of God and which are of culture, and to remind us not to insist on the parts of faith that are cultural rather than based on the Gospel.

Economists help us to understand the dynamics of our economies, that we might better understand the causes of wealth and poverty and be best equipped to respond to the challenges of both.

The study of language is not usually considered a social science, but those who study foreign languages help to build the bridges between different cultures and communities, bridging the biggest gap that separates people: the inability to communicate.   For the Gospel is not limited to one language, to one culture or community, it is meant for all.   We celebrate this fact tonight on World Communion Sunday, with the reading of the opening prayer in the languages of the world.   The student of a foreign language helps to bring the human family closer together by bridging the divide.

Historians have the tools and the skills to help to chronicle the history of peoples.   To help to tell their stories and to help us to tell our own story.   They help us not only to know the stories of others, but to come to a better understanding of ourselves and our own story.   The student of history likewise helps us to understand the world as we know it--how it got this way, how it might have been otherwise.   By helping us to understand where we've been they help us too to understand where we're going.

Educators pass on the knowledge and wisdom that we have gained in these fields of study to others and to help us to build upon our understandings of our world and one another to the next generation.

Through the understandings of the social sciences, we come to understand one another better--and thus are better equipped to love one another, not as strangers, but as neighbors.

V. INTERPRETING OUR STORY

There is one other piece to this story.

As a people of faith, we not only love God and one another, we share our experience of the love of God with one another. That is, it is not enough that we as individuals or as a people should experience God's love active in our lives, but we have to interpret that experience, to share that story with others.

And this is where the arts and the humanities come into play.

Those who study literature, and philosophy, the arts, and music--they help to provide the poetry, the images, and the songs of our faith and life.   They are the ones who provide the images and artistry to faith.  

            There are times when life sends you challenges, unforseen and unexpected. And reinterpretation of the story of faith is necessary. For example, when the Babylonians destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem and carted off the people into exile, they faced a catastrophe like they had never faced before. The situation is recorded in the 137th Psalm with power and feeling:

By the rivers of Babylon— there we sat down and there we wept when we remembered Zion.
On the willows there we hung up our harps.
For there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!” [They were mocked by the Babylonians: "Sing us one o' them Jew songs..."]
How could we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?

When catastrophe strikes, when people feel that they are in the midst of exile, there is only one choice: to sing a new song. A new song, like that envisioned in the Book of Revelation, a new song that heralds the coming reign of God:

When he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell before the Lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. They sing a new song...

Who will write the new song? This is where the writers, the artists, the philosophers and theologians, the musicians come into play.   They are the ones who help us to reimagine, the recontextualize, to rework our old experiences in to new ones. To craft images, philosophies, words, and music to reinterpret our faith in every age. This is not a small matter: we certainly benefit from the influence of music on our understanding of God.

VI. END

The world may have gone through a number of different understandings of the source of truth and authority.   We may well be in a time that is cynical about claims on truth or on what can actually be known.   We may at times be tempted to say, like Ecclesiastes, that all human endeavor is in vain.

But if we take the commands of the Gospel to love God and one another seriously, then we must be engaged in the constant discovery to know our world, each other, and in ways to express our story of the love and grace of God.

In all these things, those of you who are studying now in the College of Arts and Sciences, who will take those talents and skills with you in to the wider world, engage in the very heart of Christian faith, and can make your lives--in whatever you do--lives of Christian vocation.