{"id":28445,"date":"2022-03-31T13:16:42","date_gmt":"2022-03-31T20:16:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=28445"},"modified":"2022-03-31T13:16:42","modified_gmt":"2022-03-31T20:16:42","slug":"desires-of-the-consuming-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/desires-of-the-consuming-fire\/","title":{"rendered":"Desires of the Consuming Fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Consuming Religion<\/em>, written by Vincent Miller, discusses and explores how consumer culture impacts our religious life and perspectives. He presents the idea of \u201ccommodification of culture\u201d to argue \u201chow consumer culture changes our relationship with religious beliefs, narratives, and symbols.\u201d[1]<\/a> This book deals with psychology and economy to argue that religious items have been abstracted and fragmented as simply consumption in this modern day by the people with religious identities. He argues that commodification has two interrelated consequences for religion \u2013 abstraction of elements and fragmentation of practices. \u00a0The first argument is an abstraction of elements\u2013 \u201celements of religious traditions are fragmented into discrete, free-floating signifiers abstracted from their interconnections with other doctrines, symbols, and practices.\u201d[2]<\/a> And second is the fragmentation of practices \u2013 \u201cwhen abstracted from their conditions of production \u2013 practices are deprived of their links to the institutional and communal setting in which they shape the daily lives of religious practitioners.\u201d[3]<\/a> Then, Miller further takes his arguments into theological considerations of desire to give a new perspective in dealing with the problem and effects of consumerism to establish that root of the problem isn\u2019t about choosing things over God, it is at the foundation of desire – endless seeking and pursuit of joys of desiring itself. Finally, he ends the book with a practical conclusion to counteract the abstraction and fragmentation of religious traditions and practices by suggesting a variety of tactics to counter abstraction in order to link people back to living a more authentic Christian life in a world of consuming culture.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The contents in chapter 4 helped me to understand and gain a clearer picture of connections between human desires and three loci in the Christian traditions, which Miller categorized into three desires \u2013 \u201cthe desire for God, the desire for the kingdom of God, and the desires associated with discipleship and vocation.\u201d[4]<\/a> This chapter reminded me of a time back in seminary when I wrestled with questions of human desire. \u2018Is desire good or bad? Does God give us good desires or bad desires?\u2019 I was baffled by these questions for a while and I went on a searching journey to try to answer that question and I arrived at an understanding that desire is neutral and it is part of the image of God within humanity. The natural part of the sanctification journey involves internal witnessing of flesh and sinful desires fading away and holy and righteous desires growing as faith grows within a person. Miller writes, \u201cConsumer desire is neither about attachment nor about enjoyment.\u201d[5]<\/a> When I observe youths and young adults these days, they are growing up with too many things and there is an abundance of consumer culture all around them. One might swiftly think that abundant availability in quickness (amazon is getting faster and faster) and a wide variety of choices will bring greater desires and enjoyment of self. But in reality, I observe lots of people struggling with life\u2019s passion and purpose because of loss of desires. I would further argue that consuming culture is slowly putting out the fire within Christians \u2013 fire for God, fire for the kingdom of God, and fire for discipleship and vocation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

One of the legendary South Korean soccer players I look up to is a guy name Cha Bum-Kun, a devout Christian who played as a striker (nickname Cha Boom) in Germany\u2019s Bundesliga back in the 80s. After a very successful professional soccer career in Bundesliga, Cha retired in 1989 and came back to South Korea. He continued his soccer career as a coach and broadcaster, but his greatest significance and influence came out from his establishment of the first non-profit soccer youth development center. At that time, South Korea\u2019s youth development soccer programs were in a state of abuse. It was expensive, young players were abused verbally and physically, and lots of bribing was going on that stunned the growth of young players and development of future players. At that time, many people called him foolish for wasting his own personal money and talents on a dream that would never become a reality. But a small and humble seed beginning that started out of his fire for God, fire for the kingdom of God, and fire for discipleship and vocation have now proved to be a change of culture after 30 years. The majority of current south Korea\u2019s superstar players, Son Heung-Min, Hwang Hee-Chan, Hwang Hee Jo, Lee Kang In, Ki Sung Yong and many more, came out of his academy programs and scholarships. In order to counteract the effects of consuming religion to live in and with a consuming fire, the Christian person and the body of Christ have to desire together. As Dr. Clark invites the believers to understand the need for the \u201cfurther understanding that habitus is structured, communal, individual, directed, and acquired. The structuring of habitus is \u201cpersonal and political,\u201d coming from outside and conditioning agents\u2026 the mechanisms of habitus allow us to understand how the bodies of individuals are incorporated into other social bodies.\u201d[6]<\/a> The challenge to stand up against the consumer culture will start as a seed of a desire, but that seed will grow into a kingdom of God that will certainly stand sovereign over to serve as an agent of change. We must always remember God isn\u2019t a material waiting to be consumed by Christian consumers. We must be consumed in the love for God so that we can use the given materials to build God\u2019s kingdom on earth and bless God\u2019s people on earth.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Vincent J. Miller, Consuming Religion: Christian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture<\/em> (New York: Continuum, 2005), 3.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Ibid, 4.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Ibid, 126.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Ibid, 127.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Jason Paul Clark, \u201cEvangelicalism and Capitalism: A Reparative Account and Diagnosis of Pathogeneses in the Relationship\u201d<\/em> (diss., George Fox University, 2018), 105, https:\/\/digitalcommons.georgefox.edu\/gfes\/222-223.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Consuming Religion, written by Vincent Miller, discusses and explores how consumer culture impacts our religious life and perspectives. He presents the idea of \u201ccommodification of culture\u201d to argue \u201chow consumer culture changes our relationship with religious beliefs, narratives, and symbols.\u201d[1] This book deals with psychology and economy to argue that religious items have been abstracted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[255],"class_list":["post-28445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-miller","cohort-lgp11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28445"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28446,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28445\/revisions\/28446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}