What the Hell Happened to Education?

 

Tell me what the problem with education is? 

I've seen a few newspaper articles, commentaries and reports that suggest things are going backwards. Year after year the results for our students' result are falling. Some blame the teachers, some blame the lack of parent involvement, some blame social media, some blame the lack of a comprehensive approach to literacy, some blame NAPLAN. I totally blame NAPLAN, however if we're to examine how NAPLAN became such a big problem we need to think about NeoLiberalism.  

Before I go on I can't recommend Ezra Klein's interview with Wendy Brown and Noah Smith enough. It was a giant piece of the puzzle for me in understanding the daily struggles I was having with the madness of the world today. It's a long podcast, but it will lift a veil from your eyes. 

By definition, Neo Liberalism is market-oriented reform policies such as "eliminating price controls, deregulating capital markets, lowering trade barriers" and reducing, especially through privatization and austerity, state influence in the economy.

In a nutshell - the restraints from corporate interests are removed. The Government is powerless to stop the exploitation of the people. Further, the Government is infiltrated by Big Business to do the bidding of big business. The Common Good is no more. 

By the way I always talk about the Common Good all the time. When I use the term I'm saying that the common good is that which benefits society as a whole, in contrast to the private good of individuals and sections of society.

I think there's a couple of prongs to how NeoLiberalism manifests itself within education. 

One is the attitudes and beliefs of the people engaging in education at every level. 

The second is the permission given for Large Corporations to make decisions that impact teaching and learning - namely Silicon Valley operations like Google, Microsoft and Apple. 

As a belief system Neo Liberalism is pervasive and it is, by and large, THE belief that it's all about making money. Ideologically speaking, the goal of life within Western society or at the very least here in Australia is to make money. I use to ask students, why are you here at school? They would tell me it's to get a job. Anyone reading this may very well say to themselves - of course school is to get a job. Of course you would say that, look back at prong one of NeoLiberalism - that's you. You're in the system Neo. You ARE the system. 

From my understanding, it was never the purpose of education to train someone to just get a job. It's a pretty complicated topic worthy of some exploration. The modern version of Western Education takes form during the Industrial Revolution during the 19th Century in order to stop small children getting butchered by steam powered machinery. Laws were passed to prohibit children from being sent to work. Rich men wanted EVERYONE to work for them for next to no pay. God, once you look at some history you'll better understand why I SOUND like a socialist and grind my teeth each time a wild-eyed youngster starts crapping on about Ayn Rand and unfettered Capitalism. But what was to happen to all these children when they had to stay home qhwn mum and dad had to work gruelling hours. This is when the Church put it's hand up to say - we'll teach reading and writing and Jesus stuff. There's another lengthy blog right there!

I would get my students to think about this in the following way:  I would get them to do a little bit of maths. We would calculate how many years they would spend doing schooling from preprimary to tertiary. Then we would calculate on any given day how many hours they might spend at work. We would then consider how long we might spend in retirement. Ultimately we calculated that they might spend (and it's been quite some time since I did this activity- so the results are a little foggy) a third to a quarter of their life working. Given this, what about what we actually do at work - are we spending all that time at work working? Are we not primarily in relationship with other people. And further, what do we discover about being successful at work? Success in the workplace is about being able to successfully engage with other human beings. You might be very good at science, maths,  english and whatever else they've thrown at you in the curriculum but if you haven't been trained to be an effective listener (one of the key practices of a good communicator) then you're going to not be terribly successful. So, to clarify, we spend maybe eighteen years of our life preparing for a job. Then we get that job and discover that it sucks. Meanwhile some of us go through an existential crisis about the possibility that perhaps life is more than just working. What if, from early in life, we were trained to think for ourselves. What if were weren't hammered into believing that our fate is a little jigsaw piece to slot into the Western Industrial Complex?

Putin, Modi, Ana & Simeon

 

I 

I was listening to the podcast Today, Explained ‘Biden Vs. Putin (feat. Navalny)’ (28th April 2021) and I was overwhelmed by the injustice that has happened to Alexei Navalny, who is the opposition to Putin – Putin had his agents attempt to murder him with neural toxins and was almost successful, except Navalny was shipped off to Germany where he was saved. Returning to Russia he was immediately arrested and incarcerated. 

 I read an article by Arundhati Roy, about India’s disaster in the face of Covid, and the terrible antics of the Indian Prime Minister. 

 And I complained to the Lord, these people just reign, unchecked, reigning disaster down and oppressing people. These rich, selfish, boorish men are having the time of their life and people just have to live in the misery these bad leaders bring about. 

II 

Yesterday as I prayed I recalled the account of Simeon and Ana in Luke’s Gospel. 

 25 And there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon; and this man was righteous and devout, looking forward to the consolation of Israel; and the Holy Spirit was upon him. 26 And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s [o]Christ. 27 And he came [p]by the Spirit into the temple; and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, [q]to carry out for Him the custom of the Law, 28 then he took Him in his arms, and blessed God, and said, 29 “Now, Lord, You are letting Your bond-servant depart in peace, According to Your word; 30 For my eyes have seen Your salvation, 31 Which You have prepared in the presence of all the peoples: 32 A light for revelation [r]for the Gentiles, And the glory of Your people Israel.” 33 And His father and mother were amazed at the things which were being said about Him. 34 And Simeon blessed them and said to His mother Mary, “Behold, this Child is appointed for the fall and [s]rise of many in Israel, and as a sign to be [t]opposed— 35 and a sword will pierce your own soul—to the end that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed.” 36 And there was a prophetess, [u]Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in [v]years and had lived with her husband for seven years after her [w]marriage, 37 and then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She did not leave the temple grounds, serving night and day with fasts and prayers. 38 And at that very [x]moment she came up and began giving thanks to God, and continued to speak about Him to all those who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem. 

 So, Simeon and Anna? 

They spent their lives campaigning against the corrupt religious leaders of their day, and led many political marches against the Roman Empire during their lifetime. 

 No. 

 They spent the better part of their lives in the Temple. Doing what? Praying and fasting. I have no idea what their lives were like, Luke’s account certainly has Ana spending the bulk of her life in the Temple praying and fasting. Simeon, not sure, maybe he did do what I mentioned earlier? 

What struck me was that, as far as we would be concerned, they were doing nothing.

 Part of this comes from my own angst – I want to serve God by getting out there and making the world a better place. 

This is what came to mind yesterday. 

III 

I was chatting to Tan this morning and that’s when I began to join the dots. I keep wondering why everything seems to be getting worse. Then I realised my old mistake of expecting God to fix everything up so that we can have an easy life right now. If I read Revelations right, the Devil and his angels have been unleashed on the Earth. Satan has dominion over the Earth. Jesus in the wilderness doesn’t challenge the Devil’s authority when he says to Jesus that he’ll hand the kingdoms to Him, if Jesus will just bow down and worship him. We are witnessing this. That makes sense of the satanic nonsense I see unleashed upon the Earth. We’re not here to ‘fix’ things up. I don’t think we’re here to make the world a better place. But all through history, you can see the campfires in the darkness. The moments when the Church of Jesus Christ ignites and God is made know to the people all around. And people can enter that Kingdom and live in that Kingdom and experience that Kingdom in their lives right then and there. It’s a kingdom of peace, and of joy. Where the burden is light. Where we bear much fruit. But that Kingdom is not coming through the flesh. That kingdom won’t appear in the flesh. There are righteous men and women that transform their systems. Lawyers, politicians, nurses, cleaners, doctors, social workers, school teachers – the ones who listen to Jesus and bring light and life. And for a moment around the people that know them, there is a reprieve. They’re not going to bring the perfect legal system, or a perfect hospital system, or a perfect school system. But for the people who know them, they bring Christ. These people I just mentioned. I think they’re the Anas and Simeons in the temple. Of course, the temple is long gone. The veil was torn in two. We now, are the temple. We are the body that grows up into the Head Who is Jesus Christ, Christ Who looks and sees what the Father is doing, and follows that lead. We must pursue the prayer and fasting, the worshiping of God and the participation in His life before we do anything else. Not to look around us and go and fix problems that we think are problems, because I suspect there is someone else out there stirring up trouble in order to lure us into our flesh. 

 One caveat: it looks like I’m being nihilistic. 

‘Just sit back and do nothing because the world is meant to go to Hell in a handbasket.’ I think of the Martin Luther Kings, the Dietrich Bonhoeffers, the William Wilberforces, the Florence Nightingales etc etc… they did not sit back. They had deep, deep convictions that cost them mightily. Nothing could have stopped them, I suspect. But they started from a place of prayer. And they were raised up for that moment. All I’m saying is that, perhaps we’re called to the place of Ana and Simeon. They’re only mentioned because they enter the same space as the Christ. There are oceans of Anas and Simeons that will only ever have the attention of the One True God.

Martyn Iles 'The Truth of It' is anything but.

I'm curious. If you are a Christian, and you have strong opinions about Kamala Harris and Joe Biden, do you know where those opinions come from? What is it you're reading? Do you hear this from the pulpit? Online? Other Christians. Perhaps you have no idea what I'm talking about. 

I've come across this a lot recently. People have expressed the sentiment that the Democratic leadership will lead to the downfall of America. I suspect one of the key issues for people is the issue of abortion. 

This is not the place where I'm going to discuss abortion. 

The point of this post is addressing the claims, made by a person of influence, that are false. In September 2020 Martyn Iles released an episode of The Truth of It entitled: 'The Truth about Kamala Harris'.

 The first half of the episode Ilse outlines Harris' political position and some of the things she's voted on. In summary he describes her as very, very, very LEFT. Oddly enough the 'LEFT' regard Harris as way too RIGHT. But the dog whistling here is the description of Harris as LEFT, which, of course, sets people off. That's pretty much the end of any rational discussion because, well, cUlTuRaL mArXiSm!!!!!!!! Thanks Peterson.  Anyhow: I'm not addressing the first half of the video. My concern is Iles' misrepresentation of the facts in the second half of the video. 

THE CLAIM

The claim by Martyn Iles, the managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby - (you’d know him as the legal defence of Israel Folau ), that Kamala Harris was a rabid Pro Choice persecutor of Pro Life campaigners and it’s really dangerous she’s in power, is not correct. 

I feel really strongly about the misrepresentation of Kamala Harris, (newly elected Vice President), particularly by Christians. 

Some time ago Martyn Iles posted a Vlog on his Youtube channel: The Truth of It. It was called The Truth about Kamala Harris. (I've embedded a link a little further on, so keep reading) I think it's one of the reasons why Australian Christians are under the impression that the Harris and Biden are double teaming for satan. 

If you can’t be bothered reading everything here my main point is:

1. Iles is claiming that Kamala Harris is a rabid Pro Choice persecutor of Pro Life campaigners and insinuates that it’s really dangerous she’s in power.

2. Martyn Iles is repeating claims that have been THOROUGHLY DEBUNKED through criminal investigations, and court cases.

I’ve heard Martyn Iles speak, he’s a gentleman and an exceptional speaker however as the Managing Director of the Australian Christian Lobby he has an obligation to faithfully represent all sides of an argument without trotting out claims that have been debunked. 

And I mean REALLY debunked by people of the highest integrity. 

You can Martyn Iles video here. watch the video before proceeding (I'm only dealing with his claims from 6.42min so fast forward to that.

I’m starting from 6:42min Regarding the David Daleiden matter….. 

David Daleiden 

Now, you may recall that the reason Daleiden got into so much trouble was because back in 2015 he posed as a Bio pharmaceutical company looking to buy ‘baby parts’ from Planned Parenthood. He edited the videos of the interviews he conducted so it looked like the Planned Parenthood representatives were ACTUALLY selling him baby parts. (go check the Wikipedia entry on him - I'm not posting a link cos all you gotta do is write the guy's name and + wikipedia).

He and his partner was raided and the full videos were presented to the court. One of the claims made by Martin Iles was that Harris presided over the raids. 

FACT CHECK• "While Harris was California attorney general, her agency investigated the anti-abortion activists. They were charged with violating state privacy laws (and raided) AFTER Harris left for the U.S. Senate. (See for an amazing fact check website on the entire matter: here

The full un-doctored videos did not in any way demonstrate that Planned Parenthood had actually accepted his offers. He got into a tonne of trouble because he released these doctored videos, putting the lives of Planned Parenthood staff at risk. Everything is on the public record. 

Martyn Iles goes on to make three key claims: 

7:13min Iles: 

"They included meetings with very senior executives from America’s largest abortion service Planned Parenthood. They confessed they had been doing for some time, they’d been doing the following…" 

CLAIM ONE 

"...selling baby body parts or the body parts of aborted babies as an industry standard practice thereby trading in human organs and tissues." 

NOT CORRECT. The House Committee on Oversight and Reform website CLEARLY scuttles that argument. Planned Parenthood does not, and has never, participated in the selling of  body parts of aborted babies. You got any doubts fact check it yourself over at the House Committee website. It's got tonnes of video and documented evidence. 

CLAIM TWO 

"...adjusting their abortion procedures to birth late-term babies alive and harvest their organs whilst they are still alive to obtain the best quality specimens." 

This one is tricky. It's a mix. I think it's presented by Iles in a way that is misleading. There's a Scientific America article that interviews a bioethicist who 'raised an eyebrow' at a Doctor:

"In one video, physician Deborah Nucatola, the group’s senior director of medical services, describes how she crushes fetuses above and below key organs to preserve them intact for research. She also described turning a fetus into a breech presentation to deliver the head last, when the cervix is more dilated, thus preserving the brain.

This raised the question of whether physicians are altering abortion techniques to accommodate research requests, violating a widely held precept of research ethics. Arthur Caplan, a bioethicist at the New York University School of Medicine, dismisses the videos as “pure politics”, but some of the footage “did get my eyebrow to arch”, he says. “You can’t use a different approach to the abortion to try to preserve something. Those are just no-no’s.”

Planned Parenthood spokeswoman Amanda Harrington says that the organization is not aware of any instances in which the method of an abortion has been changed to preserve organs. But, she adds, “if minor adjustments that have no bearing on the woman’s health and safety are done when the woman has expressed a desire to donate tissue, that is entirely appropriate and ethical and legal”. Women’s health and safety, she says, “is always the number one priority”."

Further, I Googled: 'do Planned Parenthood harvest babies organs whilst they are still alive?', and I found a Snopes article 'Did Planned Parenthood Harvest the Brain from a Living, Late-Term Fetus.?

That article said:

What's True According to unedited Center for Medical Progress video reviewed by the Los Angeles Times, the heart of an aborted fetus was briefly restarted before its brain was harvested. 

What's False A portion edited out of the video stated that the fetus was dead at the time the organ was removed. ' 

So, I think Mr Iles is oversimplifying things there to the point of, well, I don't know if his Youtube Channel should be called 'The Truth of It.'

CLAIM THREE

 Iles: "Providing price lists to biotech companies for such things as whole babies heads, whole foetus’s and hearts that are still beating.You can buy those things as a biotech company off an abortionist." 

NOT. TRUE

I'm sorry but it's Snopes again. But that's their job, fact checking, and they're a lot better at it than Iles. Click here for the link.

Here's the gist of it

"The anti-abortion website LifeSite published a story containing a headline that said the CEO of the biotech company StemExpress admitted in court to “selling beating baby hearts, intact baby heads.” That headline was not only false, but it presented a security risk to a witness in a criminal trial, according to a report from an investigator with the California state Department of Justice."

I won't go on. However this is all part of a bit of a project of mine to try and understand why people, in particular Christians, are so susceptible to buying into conspiracy theories so readily. 

Seeing some of the stuff that Iles puts up, as someone that Christians are supposed to trust, sheds some light on that mystery. 

The Time I Lawrenced of Arabiaed a student

Fire is a purifier. 

I used fire as a metaphor today. 

It came just after my Lawrence of Arabia analogy. Allow me to explain, and yes, it is well over a year since I last blogged but two things happened over the last two days that has compelled me to kick this off again. 

Where I work, they have laid prostrate before the god of technology and thrown wide their arms to receive the iBlessing. 'Bring your own device' policy has meant you can bring any device. ANY. DEVICE. Except that one, and that one, wait....yep not that one either. Hell, just....let's just use Mac okay? So when you have a class the student with throw open the wee satan clams and clatter away on their scrabble sets. And what are they doing? Playing games. What sort of games do you play on a $1500 machine? 16-bit stuff that looks like what we were playing in the 80s. 

Anyway, it's a damn pain. ESPECIALLY if you have to use the damn laptops because the kids are addicted. The minute they have to think their neurons go - I NEED FLASHY CATS WITH RAINBOWS - and off they go.  Now to actual do anything of a disciplinary nature, you need to catch the kid dead-to-rights. It's no good explaining to parents that you THOUGHT Annie or Andre looked like they were enjoying themselves in class, so you drew the obvious conclusion that they were playing games.Thanks to the innovation of that dead god Steve and his anxious slaves, kids can just wave their hand and boom. Problem gone. There is NO WAY YOU CAN CROSS THE ROOM FAST ENOUGH TO CATCH THEM so your best bet is to hurl a chair. 

But today I got lucky. Today I got to give my Lawrence of Arabia speech. Unfortunately the girl I was addressing stormed angrily out of the room before I could get half way through, so as far as she's concerned Lawrence risked his life to save some Arab guy. Actually if people started applying just that principle things might be a little more peachy, globally speaking. 

So what happened? I bloody won is what happened. Ironically it was the magic touch-pad three finger  swipe that saved the day, for me, that is. Not the girl. She got Lawrenced of Arabiaed. 

Me: (sitting at front of room in chair) What are you doing?
Girl: My work?!
Me: (looking at girl next to her) Is (insert girl's name here) playing a game?
Girl slowly shakes her head but the fear in her eyes is saying, 'Yes Limb...yes she most certainly is'.
Me: (moving towards the girl who shall soon feature in my Lawrence of Arabia analogy)
Me: Show me.
Girl: (grinning triumphantly - turns the laptop around - and it's what she should be working on)
Me: (not saying a word I reach into the heavens and I snatch Steve Jobs Heavenly Three Finger Swipe and I ruin that girl's day in a manner she won't understand for 4 minutes yet).

A game. A flashy game that actually looks mildly interesting. 

Girl: some comment about something about the game something. 

I return to my desk. 

Silence

The jury wants a verdict. I sigh. 

Me: Well, you guys know the rules (I have at this point no damn clue about what the rules are)
Group of boys in the gallery: Sir, it's a send out. 
Me: Well, I'd better write this up.
I write a message to the Deputy Principal and hit send.

Girl: (who had been smiling, suddenly loses her composure and is outraged) THAT'S NOT FAIR!!!! WHAT ABOUT ALL THE OTHER PEOPLE THAT WERE PLAYING GAMES?!?!?!?! 

Me: You know (put the girl's name here) ? It's not fair. Not fair at all because you're right. I bet heaps of students in here were playing games. But I caught you. Don't take this personally, but you have to leave now... in fact have you ever seen LAWRENCE OF ARABIA?

Girl: (in a pitched fury is packing up her stuff)

Me: Has any one here seen Lawrence of Arabia?

One kid puts up his hand but I actually couldn't care less because I'm now going to deliver my Lawrence of Arabia analogy. 

Me: See there's this scene where Lawrence of Arabia has to cross the desert in order to attack and take a fort from the rear because it's impossible to take, as it's heavily fortified by the Turkish because it faces the sea. 

While Lawrence of Arabia and his faithful followers are crossing the desert they lose a man in a dust storm. They only realise this when they get to the other side of the desert. They all decide the man is a lost cause because, well, they'll all cook to death and they bloody miraculously made it in the first instance. But not Lawrence of Arabia, because he's Lawrence of Arabia. And do you know what he does? 

(at this point the door to the classroom slams and we're all distracted because the girl is now erratically walking backward and forward and I'm hoping to God she does not walk back into the classroom because it will completely ruin my Lawrence of Arabia analogy. Thankfully she just left.)

Resuming... Lawrence of Arabia goes back and he gets that guy and he rescues that guy and everyone is so happy and he is friends with the guy.

Later in the film Lawrence of Arabian is trying to bring all the warring factions of the Arab tribes together because he's Lawrence of Arabia. But in an awkward and somewhat predictable moment,  there's a murder. So Lawrence is called upon to adjudicate. Now everything has been going so swimmingly well, (in spite of it all being a desert) that everyone thinks that maybe, just maybe they can pull together. But there's a murder between two warring tribes and everything's about to go to pot. So Lawrence of Arabia announces that they must bring the murderer to him. 


AND THEN THE BIG REVEAL.... DUM DUM DAAAAA 

A man is roughly brought before Lawrence of Arabia and the hood comes off and IT'S THE GUY!!!! IT'S THE GUY LAWRENCE OF ARABIA SAVED FROM THE DESERT!!!!

and you know what he did kids?

He let him off. 

(weirdly the class kind of slumps like it's a bit lame but then I yell, laughing suddenly and to be honest I was a bit alarmed that I burst out laughing) 

NO HE DIDN'T!! HE SHOT HIM IN THE FACE.

A girl interrupted me.

Interrupting girl: But sir, it's NOT FAIR. You didn't tell the other....

I obviously cut her off. 

(And then I really yelled. It wasn't an angry yell. It was now time to Samuel L. Jackson it up.)

DON'T SIT THERE LIKE I JUST MURDERED STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE OR WINNIE THE POOH. YOU PEOPLE ARE PLAYING WITH FIRE. THE TINY MAN IS NOT TO BE CROSSED BECAUSE YOU WILL GET BURNT. TODAY (insert girl's name here) GOT A LITTLE SINGED. BUT IF I LET HER OFF, WHAT IS THE MESSAGE YOU WILL BRING TO CLASS TOMORROW???

Twelve Months Later

It is, of course, difficult to write these sorts of things knowing that anybody could read it. I'm wondering if this is a journey I need to begin down the path of. I keep my cards very close to my chest. If know one really knows quite what you think, there's not much they can raise against you. Short of your actions. Your actions speak louder than words. Not really. Your words speak pretty bloody loudly. People know if you're an idiot essentially through your words. You say something daft, you'll have to work quite hard to recover.

Once again my head is brimming. I can't find the question at the bottom of everything else. The silence of God doesn't worry so much. It doesn't change very much. I have drawn the conclusion that He is there. It would appear He is not much fussed with providing conclusive evidence to that for people. As Jesus demonstrated and articulated, you could have God right in front of you and still not see Him for Who He is. Humanity's enormous problem is that they see what their emotions compel them to see. We see through the veil of our emotions.

The problem of God might seem quite simply one of His existence. Where is the evidence? There's plenty of evidence. History is littered with it. Science is full. Pity we impose our English language upon scripture and to boot assume that we are going to 'get' ancient Middle Eastern world views. This aside, I think it's this. I think people know who God is, in part. They know there's going to be shit that they have to put down. It's preferable that He doesn't exist, because  then I will not have to let go of the things I cling to. Part of the contention against God is that He is a party pooper, a difficult Individual to deal with. These are largely our projections of what we would be like were we God; unlimited power would turn us into unapologetic jerks, which is what I suspect what people think God is like. Further, it's better that a jerk like that doesn't exist thanks very much. AND (they shuffle through their websites, their bits of paper, their assumptions) HERE'S THE EVIDENCE! But they haven't really read the counter arguments. God needs to vanish in a puff of convenient smoke and hackneyed arguments do the job.

There's a disquiet in these people though. A guardedness. Because, what if, against everything they know, all their evidence, He's just there. At the back of everything. Sure, He's an Iron Age creation that required blood sacrifices to be satisfied...not everyone's back catalogue is that great. But it's important that the back catalogue has an historical/cultural context. How would you explain yourself to a pre-scientific age? That's the thing that annoys me. The offhanded way it's all disregarded with half arsed arguments.

Right. Well. Here's hoping no
one reads this.

The world got crazy

The world is crazy.  

Crazy: Meaning "full of cracks or flaws" is from 1580s 

Crazy because we've got rules for our story.  

The good guys win, justice prevails, the Earth doesn’t swallow up the innocent.

 The further you squint your eyes, the crazier it gets.

Near you there some sort of nonsense with your partner, friends, work. You’ve haven't done this life before (no - you actually haven't), so you have zero experience, just the stuff you’ve picked up along the way, but you just get a sense that it’s not supposed to be like this.

Look further. It gets way worse. Towns get swallowed up. Rabid gunmen destroy people’s lives. Men swirl around innocent women and crush them. Children are pulled from rubble.

You think that it’s not supposed to be like this.

Pick up the history books. Not history at a distance. Look at the intimate history. The diaries people kept. They’ll shock you. Sometimes these people don’t grow old. Worse, the choice is completely out of their hands.

None of this is new. This has always been happening. It’s just that there’s vastly more effective and less discerning ways of communicating it.

Close your eyes. Who are the voices closest to you. Look after them. Lay your life down for them. That is an effective form of care. Those that cry from far away. Maybe you can help them. Maybe you can't. Perhaps you can help them as much as you could help the people that from cry from the pages of history.

Speech to 2013 Year Twelve Students

I gave this speech the other night.

There are a couple of moments that don't feature here:

During the build up to talking about Darwin's daughter's death, I made mention of his memoir. The whole mood being created was destroyed when one of the Year Twelve girls yelled out 'MEMOIR?!?!?'

I paused. Then said, "To those of you who do watch Big Brother, memoir means 'diary'. I moved on. 

Anyhow. My address.  

I appreciate being invited to speak to you all tonight. But having heard Mrs. Lacey’s and Mr. Marlow’s speeches this morning – this has become a rather daunting task. I want to leave you with something useful. If I’ve been given the opportunity to speak to you, I don’t want to blow it away on cheap laughs or telling you something you are already familiar with. Which is not the advice some of you gave to me. I was also advised to speak for 7 minutes. This comes in at around about 10 minutes.

I want to take you off road a little bit. Take you into territory that’s not that familiar, that’s a little bit scary and looks like it might end badly. Kind of like a Bali bus trip that suddenly veers off the mountain pass into the jungle, because an overly enthusiastic tour guide decides that today, today you need to see monkeys very close.

Recently, I was standing looking at a stunning view of the mountains. The cool evening air gently ruffling my clothing as I looked out at the distant city lights. I felt one with nature, I felt connected with… I don’t know… life. Then my 15 month old girl knocked my cup of tea over. I have this Ikea coffee table that’s called a Klubbo. It’s quite large and she’d crawled onto it and just knocked the tea over. Which is ridiculous because it was a coffee table, and I’m drinking tea on it. Then again, I don’t know what the word Klubbo actually means – you just don’t know what those Ikea names really mean. Or maybe my baby knew, maybe she knew that a scalding hot cup of tea had no business on a coffee table.  “This is a coffee table! Away with your tea!!!!  Anyway, her spilling the tea over me took me right out of the moment I was having in Grand Theft Auto V. 

And going off road in GTAV is the closest I get to getting away from it all. My life doesn’t allow for much down time and having 4 children and a blind and deaf dog that my wife won’t let me euthanize means that my life is kind of like a long narrow hallway that I have to run down while babies, crying toddlers, yelping dogs, poo, wee, mucous, vomit just… gets… thrown at me. And there are moments where I look at people I know on Instagram, on holidays, and I just go… (mime looking depressed)

So if this strikes you as a little depressing, that’s because it is. At first glance. Even a second glance. Actually if you stare at it, it’s still depressing. But bear with me.

I’ve been trying to understand my life for years. I have spent a lot of time looking at the lives of many different people. Political figures, Philosophers, Writers, Theologians, Actors, Directors, just a whole range of people who have, in one way or another, been significant figures in history. Because I want to know what life is about. What’s it actually for.

Here’s the worrying thing. I think it’s best summed up by the dying words of the Philosopher Arthur Shoepenhauer, who in one of his finer moments pushed an old woman down the stairs. He said at the end of his life about life, words to the effect, “I just don’t get it.” Here is this wise old man, actually not that wise, he shoved an old person down the stairs,  and he says (mime: shrug) Pfffft. I… dunno. And it’s not like he’s the only one that does that. Ok so maybe that’s people at the end of their life… you can imagine that they’ve got other things on their mind. Like death. But if you go trawling backwards through their life you just find movement after movement of ideas that ultimately go… “Life is about this… no wait, I was 17 when I said that… it’s THIS! No wait, that was when I was in my 20s… now that I’m 30 this is the… no wait, I can see now that I am 40 it is clearly, now this is the answer to what life is supposed to be all about… wait… no that was wrong and now that I’m 50 I believe… well… gosh I’m 60 and I’m starting to think maybe…  wow I’m 70… I was 70 and now I’m 80…” And then you go. “So?! What is the meaning of life old person?” And this wizened 80 year old goes “Pfft” throwing up a shrug.

See I’ve been looking for years to find someone that gets to the end of their life and goes –“IT’S THIS!!!!” Because I think we spend our lives straining to reach the peak that just stretches out eternally before us, and this peak we’re trying to get to could be called ‘the things that will make us happy’;  the ideal job, a partner who will satisfy us, a career in the arts, perhaps being famous until we stop and go – this is an illusion, I can’t ever get there! These things do not satisfy me like I thought they would.

This seems to be the pattern for every single one of these lives I’ve looked at.

But if you go back to the lives of the people I was talking about and you stop looking for the conclusion; the point at which you go – oh, so this is the meaning of life! You stop looking for that ‘aha’ moment and then you start examining what caught their breath about life and gave them pleasure, gave them joy, made them happy.

Charles Darwin. You’ll be familiar with him as he refined the theory of evolution and upset everyone forever after that. Pfft something about monkeys. Anyhow. I find Darwin amazing. He was quiet wealthy. Lived a life of tremendous suffering as a result of constant poor health, but the joy that comes out over and over again in his letters, was his family. His love of his family is what gave him joy. And it’s the opposite emotion – grief that demonstrates this. You see Darwin had a daughter called Anne. And a little after her tenth birthday she caught scarlet fever and died.

Darwin wrote in a personal memoir:

"We have lost the joy of the household, and the solace of our old age.... Oh that she could now know how deeply, how tenderly we do still & and shall ever love her dear joyous face."[4]

This heart breaking cry by Darwin hits me because it reveals a truth. The meaning you have, is the meaning you give to others. The meaning you have, is the meaning you give to others. My search through all these lives, and in my own life is ultimately a search for meaningfulness.

I think meaningfulness comes from investing in the lives of others. In this you  inevitably invest back in your life. That shouldn’t be your motivation, but it is an unavoidable reward. That as you care for others, love others, that love love will find it’s way back to you. 

I believe that things in life should be fair. I think for life to be equal the most important things in life must be available to every human being on the planet. I think for God to be true, if God is going to exist, this equality must exist, otherwise life, and in turn, God, is not fair. And an unfair God is no God at all.

I have drawn the conclusion that meaningfulness through relationships, out of everything, makes the most sense of what this life is all about. This is the thing available to everyone, and it is the one thing that will result in a fulfilling life.

Universally the joy and meaningfulness to be had in life is in our friends, partners, children, our families. Every person that I have examined that believes this to be important, this is where they found meaningfulness.

Everyone who thought that this was not important, and that work, celebrity, money or anything else was more important, gets to the end of their life and goes – what was the point of that? I don’t get it!

All of this makes sense of God to me. Achieving and doing only has it’s place in the context of relationships having their rightful place. Front and centre in our lives. I think this is true of God. I think that God celebrates and enjoys life. That the plan was always to create and then incorporate into that celebration of life… us. The hints, the answers are all around us. The hint is: where is it that people are struck and caught by joy. Joy that makes you feel good not just in the moment, but has a meaningful effect.  And yeah, there is a price to pay for that joy. Human beings are fickle, they’re difficult, they’ll hurt you, they’ll make you cry, break your heart… but don’t give up on them. Don’t swap them for something else. 

But hey, you have your whole life to test if what I’m saying is true. Is life about  focusing on satisfying yourself as you see fit in work, sex, celebrity?

Or is life about quietly investing in the lives of those around us.  If you invest in the lives around you, every moment of every day is important. Life doesn’t begin when you get to Uni, or get a job or get married or whatever. It means life is now.

And what has the world around us promoted as important? The imaginary end point that will make us satisfied ‘in the future’ and never allowing us to appreciate the moment.

 Jesus said don't worry about tomorrow. If you understand that God is for you, you won’t worry about tomorrow. IF you don’t think God is for you, you will worry about tomorrow. But know this, worrying about tomorrow will mean that when tomorrow actually comes you’ll discover you worried about all the wrong things and the things you should have been worried about – well, you could have barely imagined those anyway.

I think we spend too much of our lives chasing these goals that we imagine will make us happy – the ideal job, a partner who will satisfy us, a career in the arts, perhaps being famous we shrivel up into nothing living on the imagined horizon while we miss the real meaningfulness and joy of life that’s right in front of us. Until they come along and knock your tea over.