“I find the best way to understand something or someone is to explore it. I suppose, in this age, we think there’s a set of directions on the browser we call ‘like.’ ‘Just check the manual. Ask Google. Or call the help desk.’ This won’t do. We must listen to the voice buried deep inside of us and take the first step into exploration.”- Timothy D. Willard
As Timothy Willard moves on in Chapter 5 of The Beauty Chasers, he posits that we all have a little bit of plastic in us. Some people choose to remain in that plastic world. Others, though, happen on a way out. But once we manage to squeeze through the portal, we discover the whole world staring us in the face.
Therefore, once out, we must learn to live in this gigantic world, now void of plastic. However, our complete understanding is not required in learning to live. Rather, learning to live on requires our participation with the divine.
But, Timothy astutely observes, we find it hard to pull ourselves up and see beyond the walls of the reality we’ve created. And that reality? That we live alienated from each other and the natural world. And in turn, that severs us from a concrete understanding of meaning and value. As a result, we reduce things, events, and humans to their simplest form in order to understand them. A concept known as reductive materialism.
Furthermore, philosopher Roger Scruton once called the loss of beauty in our culture the ‘postmodern desecration.’ Because this religious term implies the spoiling of what is sacred. Thus, Timothy describes our culture as sick yet seeking, fraught with despair yet straining for something else. Something more.
In conclusion, the author notes, most of our modern culture turns beauty inward. Consequently, we define beauty because we believe it originates in us. Thus, this focus turns to how something looks and makes us feel. Instead of dealing with a person’s nature or essence.
Today’s question: What type of people think there’s a set of directions on the browser called life? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Through the lens of heaven”
