A Bleak Theology Guide to Resistance

Everything is terrible everywhere all at once. What to do? How to respond? Here is a Guide of ten things to help weather this storm. I hope that you will find this Guide helpful. It is a longer read, but I believe it is worth it. Take your time. Ruminate on it. Share it. Peace be with you.

First, for those who don’t know, bleak theology is an existential theology in that it focuses on not only questions and concerns about meanings of life in relation to a possibly and seemingly silent or absent God, but also how to discern living authentically and deliberately in relation to such irresolvable questions and concerns. Bleak theology is not nihilistic, but is not optimistic. It is also a theology about bleak circumstances. Let’s accept this truth: life will suck at some point. This is a theology about that. It is about living authentically, existentially in bleak times. It is, as I like to say, a post-punk counterweight to joy. Unfortunately, bleak theology seems to be having its moment. Here are utensils that I can offer.

Find your eras of resistance. It’s bleak, kids. But remember, it’s been bleaker. Find the historical moments that matter to you. We’ve been here, in some way, before. My two personal go-to historical eras for understanding religious persecution are the early church until 313 CE’s Edict of Milan, when the Roman Emperor Constantine made Christianity an approved religion, and the underground church during Nazi Germany. These eras resonate with me because I have a degree in classical civilization and because of my German heritage, though my family line left Germany decades earlier. Forget the romanticism of martyrdom. Things were bad. Countless people were killed for their beliefs and their resistance. Dietrich Bonhoeffer is just of one of thousands who perished, like the members of the White Rose and countless others in the anti-fascist resistance. They did not see the end of their cause. At the end of ELCA Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton’s Youtube response to the lies spread by Elon Musk and former General Michael Flynn, she recalls the 258 CE story of Lawrence, who when pressured by the Roman Empire to turn over the church’s coffers, liquidated every asset and distributed the money among the poor and needy. When the Emperor Valerian asked where the treasure was, he gestured to the sick, widows, poor, and needy behind him and said, “These are the treasures of the church.” And for that he was martyred and eventually made a saint. “Be of good courage, church,” concludes Bishop Eaton. “And let us persevere.” She knows the worst is yet to come. Let us prepare.

Name your saints of resistance. Saints serve as models for living. They inspire us, reassure us, challenge us, and for some people, protect us. Christianity has saints for pretty much every person and occasion. In these bleak times, we can also look beyond the church for those resistors who can provide us with the individual and collective inspiration we need. These days, we find saints where we can. Saint comes from the word “sanctus,” Latin for “holy.” Who is holy for you? Who are your holy resistors, set apart in distinction against the powers that be? Who speaks truth to power for you? Read about them. Keep a picture of them near. Is it someone spiritual, political, cultural? All three? Or more? Are they an artist? What is their creativity? Make it yours. Saints, by their nature, are subversive. Mere pietism doesn’t make a person a saint. Who’s your transgressor? Your resistor? Your agitator? Hold them dear. Know their story. Make it part of yours. Warning: your saints may have been killed for their efforts. Know what you’re getting into, because you already do, really.

Create rituals and practices. In a time of chaos, we need personal order and regularity. Our bodies, minds, and spirits need it. Control time and event as you can. Rituals and practices disrupt chaos. Establishing rituals creates a miniature universe, a superstructure within which one can dwell and move and create a practice. A practice is not something done toward perfection, but mastery. A practice is a sustained action by which one becomes intimately familiar with a regular routine and its sublime meanings. Imagine your repeated effort through time as a kind of corkscrew by which we can understand ourselves better and find rest. Set a time to take a walk outdoors, to meditate, to stretch your body. Move your body in space and time. Schedule time to create art, to make something. Look at what you have created. Go to a church service that offers Vespers or Evensong. Have a set game night with loved ones. But do it regularly. This is not your new normal. This is intentional. Intentionality is not normality. Intention requires desire and effort. These are not normal times.

Tell your story. All theology is autobiographical. For Paul? His first letter to the Corinthians. For Augustine? Confessions (Confessions is actually a prayer, in which he tells his story.) We have been telling such stories for two thousand years. We connect to and see each other through acts of storytelling. Are you deconstructing your faith, critically analyzing it after a childhood of fear and dread? Tell it. Have you experienced radical hospitality and kindness when you most needed it? Tell it. Did you have the opportunity to be Jesus to someone? Tell it. Did you see the humanity in someone marginalized by society and share solidarity with them? Did someone feel seen? Tell it. Have the teachings and love of Jesus helped you love others as you desire to be loved? Tell it. Have you witnessed injustice firsthand? Tell it. Is having faith in God and humanity difficult right now? Tell it. Does God seem silent if not absent or even dead? Tell it. Have you received grace from someone? Tell it. All theology is autobiographical. Autobiographical theology is constructive theology. It builds, undergirds, and creates its own foundation and scaffolding through personal story. And in doing so, it challenges systematic theology, those constructed, yet academically helpful categories that work to make sense of God. Our stories present ourselves as human, especially in a dehumanizing age.

Read meaningful things and reflect. Each of us have favorite readings that reassure and edify us. A poem, the Book of Psalms, a favorite essay. Something small and manageable, something that you can pause in the middle of and think about what it means for you. Read such meaningful things. Keep them in your heart and cherish them. These words can be sad, very sad. Sad words pierce our hearts and cause the flow of tears. These are very sad times. We can be sad, together. Mourning is the vulnerability of humanity. Lamentation is the outward cry of inward sorrow. And share these meaningful things with others. Words are gifts to be shared. A gifted word is a remembered word. Create connections with each other through words. This is communication and the reaffirmation of truthful things. Read meaningful things for education. Theologians like Delores S. Williams, Rosemary Radford Reuther, Dorothee Sölle, James Cone, Gustavo Gutierrez, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer can teach us from their own vantage points how to understand and to find hope while combating fascism and oppression. Dwell on these things. Share them.

Become “degenerate.” In 1937 Munich, the Nazis put on an exhibition of 650 art pieces from over 5,000 works they’d seized entitled Entartete Kunst (“Degenerate Art“). The fascists’ intention was to instruct the public as to what should be understood as perversion. The show included paintings by now-beloved artists like Max Beckmann, Pablo Picasso, Vincent van Gogh, and Henri Matisse. This exhibition absolutely backfired on the Nazis and introduced artistic innovation and creativity to countless people. It’s possibly one of the greatest modern art exhibitions ever held. During a fascist age, this degeneracy is a virtue, speaking subversive creativity to power. Fascism seeks to control and establish what is “normal.” But we have the Paraclete, the helper that is the Holy Spirit that works against hegemony, that queers conformity. I have written about this before. In a word, “queerness” is this degeneracy. How are you degenerate in the eyes, in the face of fascism? How do you not comply? How are you insufficient for fascism? How are you abnormal? How do you not conform? How is your art degenerate?

Remain artistic. Christianity believes in a creative God, mostly readily evident in Genesis 1-2 and John 1. Created in God’s image, we are imbued with creativity and it is good. Creativity is a good. We are artists by default. Let us act accordingly. Remain artistic in the face of conformity and tyranny. Incorporate your artistry, your creativity in the practices you create for yourself. Good art requires non-conformity. It resists kitsch and commodification. Earlier this year, at a January 6th gathering we called “Epiphanies of Resistance” that I led at my church with local Brooklyn artists, I shared a few books that inspire me in my creativity during these difficult times. They were eagerly received. Perhaps, you will find them useful as well.

• Making Art During Fascism, by Beth Pickens (pdf download)
• On Artists and Hopelessness, by Beth Pickens (pdf download)
• Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking, by David Bayles and Ted Orlando (I don’t like linking to Amazon, but the book is hard to find elsewhere)
• Create Dangerously: The Power and Responsibility of the Artist, by Albert Camus

Creativity, artistry resists stagnation, resists stasis. We cannot be creative without incorporating ourselves. Let us be artistic as only we can for each other and our community.

Be kind to be resistant. After I wrote about this last November, I was surprised how quickly my idea has been picked up by others. Kindness is resistance. Full stop. MAGA, Christian Nationalists, and now even our federal government are engaging in a kind of cruelty that we naively imagined was left behind in our country’s history. Evangelical Russell Moore was aghast to hear conservative Christians saying that Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount is “too liberal.” Matthew 5-7 is clear and non-negotiable. This is the foundation of Christian ethics. In the Trumpocene, even the most basic act of kindness is a form, a direct action of resistance. History is rife with unkind, shitty Christians. Let us resist their current cruelty and evil with that love in action that is kindness for the least of us, even if that kindness may put us at risk of suffering the cruelty of our neighbor and government.

Sustain meaningful community. As I watched the election returns, my stomach sank as I realized that I have absolutely no power at the federal level. Living in New York City with eight million people, where is my agency? I realized that my agency is with my immediate community in my immediate surroundings. In Brooklyn, I learn and understand very quickly who my neighbor is. The opportunities are actually overwhelming, so I must choose carefully for my self-preservation. I am active in our son’s school, my writing community, but most significantly at St. Lydia’s, my little dinner church on the banks of the fragrant Gowanus Canal. St. Lydia’s practices radical hospitality in the ritual praxis of preparing and sharing a sacred meal every Sunday night. We welcome the stranger. We share and listen to our stories. We sing. We pray. We mourn. We rejoice. We eat and drink. We practice right action over conforming “correct” belief. We remember the story of Jesus and put it into action in our lives. We create community with and for each other. We are a nerd church, full of creative individuals, including writers, musicians, composers, singers, visual artists, playwrights, dancers, architects, and many more. We are the creative arts and letters. This is my home for over a decade, on the banks of the fragrant Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn, New York. We are a Lutheran church, the kind that Elon Musk and General Michael Flynn despise. Find your meaningful community, whatever it may be. Make it your own. Sustain it and in sustaining it, you will be sustained. This is the direct action of kindness that is the church that the Paraclete helps. Because when the government strikes, and unkind Christians strike and MAGA strikes and seeks to tear your community apart, you will have already woven together a textile, a garment that cannot be ripped apart.

Assess your gifts and talents. Everything is terrible everywhere all at once. What to do? How to respond? Everyone has a particular aptitude and agency. Your role is what you do best. What are you best suited for? Are you a protester? An educator? A writer? An organizer? A boots-on-the-ground worker? A liaison? A networker? A pastor? A counselor? A caregiver? A strategist? An encourager? What haven’t I mentioned? Is that what you’re suited for? Of course, it is! You are made for action. You are a human being! You are *already* wondrously made for these times. You may just not be needed at this very *moment*. But you are and will be needed. You are essential. Each of us is essential. If you are panicking, if you are despairing, think of how you are wondrously made for this moment. You are needed. We need you. I need you. Each of you. Peace be with you.

Take this Guide and share it widely, if you so choose. Use what works. Modify as necessary. Make it your own. Tailor it to your self and your community. It is bleak because we live in a bleak age. But it is loving action in the midst of bleakness. This theology, this bleak theology acknowledges the unknowability and mystery and danger and inconsistency and raw humanness of existence and belief and action and is but one of countless theologies. It admits our circumstances and the fact that we may not survive intact, that we may not even get out alive. But it seems to be a useful theology for this moment, for this age. Love one another. Be kind to be resistant. Welcome the stranger. Help your neighbor. Live the Gospel. Be of good courage, church. And let us persevere.