Today, the British government announced their intention to apologize for taking an estimated 150,000 poor British children from their fathers and mothers to ship them abroad.  The program, which ended just 40 years ago, was intended to reduce the burden of poor children on British society, and provide “sturdy white genetic stock” for the colonies.  In the first century or so, the program was administered by religious organizations! 

Imagine the churches today wresting children away from impoverished mothers and fathers, and sending them away to hard labor (and abuse) across the world – in the name of helping the children!

I’m reminded of William Blake’s poem about The Chimney Sweeper.  Excerpt from Songs of Innocence:

When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue
Could scarcely cry ‘weep! ‘weep! ‘weep! ‘weep!
So your chimneys I sweep, and in soot I sleep.

And from Songs of Experience:

A little black thing among the snow:
Crying weep, weep, in notes of woe!
Where are thy father & mother? say?
They are both gone up to the church to pray.

Because I was happy upon the heath,
And smil’d among the winters snow:
They clothed me in the clothes of death,
And taught me to sing the notes of woe.

And because I am happy & dance & sing,
They think they have done me no injury:
And are gone to praise God & his Priest & King,
Who make up a heaven of our misery.

~

Some will see this story as further evidence that Christianity preys on children.  Whether pederast Catholic priest or Calvinist British Puritan, these critics will say, a strong secular government is necessary to protect children from Christianity.  I mean, isn’t that what Blake’s final stanzas in Chimney Sweeper from Songs of Experience alluding to – hypocritical Christian parents sitting in the church while their child dies outside?

However, I don’t think that’s right.  This story, and Blake’s poem, reinforces the fact that life has always been pretty terrible for poor children.  And while some Christians societies have been hypocritical about their moral responsibility to “let not your children pass through the fires of Molok”, at least Christianity bore within it the seeds of recognizing this sin.

Anyone who thinks these days are behind us – that we are beyond this treatment of children –  is indulging in wishful thinking.  And anyone who thinks that eradication of Christian values will prevent these old practices from returning is even further deluded.  As our postmodern Western culture cuts the chain from the Christian values that have anchored us for centuries, we already see a slide back toward euthanasia, eugenics, and all the worst of the past.  Speaking up for the rights of widows and orphans, and more generally for the least among us, must always be a moral prerogative.

From “Khutabat” by Sayyid Abul A’la Maududi:

The Quran says:

“Lo!  Allah hath bought from the believers their lives and their wealth in return for Paradise which will be theirs.” (9:3)

This is the attitude of the Master towards you.  And now look at your behavior.  You sell away a thing to others which was given to you by your Master and which He had also bought back from you against payment.  And this selling is done for a paltry compensation.  The buyers take work from your against the wishes of the Master and you serve them thinking that they are your sustainers.  You sell them your brains, your hands and your feet, the energy of your body and all that which these rebels of God want to buy.  Can there be a greater moral turpitude than this?  To sell a thing already sold out is a legal and moral crime.  Those guilty of such crimes are tried in the world’s courts for cheating and fraud.  Do you think that no suit will be filed against them in the court of God?

This passage reminds me of the book of Hosea.  But there is something missing from Maududi’s analysis.

~

I still owe a review (or two, or three) of Scruton’s “Beauty”.  I ordered Scruton’s “Culture” on account of the genius of “Beauty”, and will review that as well.  “Khutabat” has some fascinating parallels to the fundamentalist/evangelical discussion, which I hope to review some time here.

Quentin Tarantino and Jon Stewart fulfill a common role for today’s cultural “elites”.  Both pander to people’s desire to feel erudite, ironic, and “above” the childish sincerity of the past.  They (and their followers) want to be seen as smarter than everyone else, but when you push aside the curtain, they protest, “I only make fart noises for a living, what’s your excuse?”  Are they really that different from more “intellectual” critics like Jurgen Habermas?  I don’t think so.

Nevertheless, Lee Siegel’s takedown of Quentin Tarantino is quite surprising.  It is satisfying to see a secular critic finally speak the truth.  But one wonders if he realizes that he is shining light on a disease that is a lot bigger than Tarantino.  By insisting that criticism must involve more than Tarantino offers, he risks hamstringing the entire modern art criticism industry.  Does he not realize that Tarantino, Stewart, and Habermas are the absolute pinnacles of their respective fields of criticism, and that all other critics are pale emulators?

We get it, Mr. Siegel: Tarantino and Stewart are no different from Ham, heaping scorn on Noah’s naked flesh in hopes of gaining approval of his brothers.  But you’ve left us hanging.  Without encyclopedic regurgitation of meaningless, self-referential facts, and a desperate veneer of false superiority, HOW WILL WE CRITICIZE ART?

In reading Roger Scruton’s “Beauty”, I am struck by how little has changed since the first-century Christians settled in Rome house churches.  On the one hand, the devout easily fall prey to smarmy kitsch, and tend to lack depth.  This sheltered simple-mindedness can be embarrassing when not coupled with humility.  On the other hand, the secular elites start with pride and take some decidedly twisted turns that lurch toward degradation.

Milton’s “Paradise Lost” begins the scene of the fall with an image of Satan standing at the sidelines and looking jealously at God’s new creations, Adam and Eve.  Satan is incensed at the love that God shows these creatures, and moreso, the love they have for each other, as they are “emparadised in one another’s arms”.

Milton uses the word “emparadised” to imply that the embrace of the two lovers is paradise; the culmination of the creation story.  Unfortunately, this wording plays into the romantic notion of human love being heavenly.  Anyone who misinterprets Milton and the creation story to say that “Romantic love is next to Godliness”, is making a terrible mistake.

In fact, the fall was precipitated, in part, by Adam and Eve focusing too much on one another and not enough on God.  It’s a telling slip that romantic people talk about “falling” in love.  When we see nothing but romantic love, we are fallen indeed.

I don’t have proof, but I am convinced that Edgar Allen Poe was thinking of Milton, and our fallen tendency to glorify romantic love, when he penned "Annabel Lee’.  Poe’s poem parallels Milton’s, with an angel becoming jealous of the humans’ love, and seeking to punish them.  Instead of separating the lovers from God, however, Poe’s angel separates the lovers from one another by killing Annabel Lee.  Defiantly, Poe’s narrator asserts a love that transcends the grave, and places himself directly in the grave with the dead Annabel:

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Yes, they sure “fell” in love.  They fell so deep, they are both in the grave.  Poe’s poem is often cited as a glorification of the power of romantic love to reach beyond the grave, but it’s pretty obvious that it’s anything but.  It is a stark picture of what happens when we go too far with the idea of “emparadised in one another’s arms”.