This may surprise you, but I’m not one of those 30-somethings that can go deep and wide on Simpsons quotes or trivia past the second season. The same is probably true for Seinfeld. That said, I’ve never forgotten some of the nuances of the episode where Johnny Cash plays a coyote in Homer’s vision quest. You likely have an idea, even if it’s just from other popular media, about what a vision quest is.
I didn’t know until yesterday that it’s also the name of the language (or something…I’m a liberal arts/MFA grad, let us ne’er forget) that Facebook uses to run their insight tools for Pages:
Isn’t that sort of like naming a program “Baptism” or “Bar Mitzvah?” It strikes me as rather insensitive, inappropriate, and rude. Considering that vision quests are meant to impart, well, a vision, the use of the program or protocol or whatever it is within the Insights application (or whatever it is) feels kind of crass, don’t you think?
If you’ve been reading The Daily Cocca for a while you probably know that I’ve become increasingly interested in spiritual formation over the last year or so. I’m not going to pretend to be an expert on First Nations rites of passage or spirituality, but I will say that the general idea of listening for or hoping for or even preparing for the building or outright giving of spiritual insight is something the Christian tradition and other traditions affirm. With that in mind, the juxtaposition of insight and vision within the Facebook Pages platform got me wondering about the degree to which we all either:
a) think of insight as an ability to know the good in a given situation (political, economic, whatever) and then how to enact it (basically, this is Aristotelian prudence) rather than the building up or taking in of some other kind of knowing (spiritual/existential).
b) think that insight, even apart from its meaning in metrics, is something quantifiable.
c) think something must be quantifiable to have value.
In some ways, of course, most faith traditions suggest a kind of metric for spiritual growth: Christians, for example, speak of the non-quantifiable process whereby Christ is built in us, or in which grace upon grace is imparted to us. Even though we can’t measure in objective ways the degree to which we are becoming like Christ (or, perhaps, healthier, happier), there are subjective measures: the fruits of the spirit, the sense of God’s will in community, etc. All ripe for manipulation and abuse, mind you, but useful and helpful in healthy, humble spiritual communities.
I was talking with a friend the other day about whether or not I believe that there’s anything soteriological (saving, in a spiritual sense) about the Eucharist, which Christians also call the Lord’s Supper or Communion. I’ve believed all kinds of things about the Lord’s Supper over the years, but right now I’m at the point of saying “I don’t believe the Eucharist saves us, but when I take it week to week, and when I go up in front of church of anointing, I….”
“Meet Jesus,” my friend said.
“Yes.”
Nothing in my practice or study of various Christian spiritualities convinces me that God requires us to be saved by the Eucharist, but I do think God uses whatever God can from our traditions, and from our need for tradition, to meet us where we are. I’ve referred to this elsewhere as God deigning to be part of our rituals and practices, but really, it’s more than that. I think maybe God delights in the opportunity. “Hey, man, thanks for being here. Oh, you need to eat? Eating is like the most communal thing you do, not just with each other but with all of nature, too? Well then, friend, when you do it, think of me.”
Did God meet Homer Simpson in what began as a hot-pepper trip? In the person of a God-voiced coyote? Do I meet God in the act of Communion? Yes, I know I can only speak for myself, and I know The Simpsons is a cartoon. But I also know there’s a lot of mystery in the universe, that our brains do amazing things when given the chance to rest, to solve problems, to sleep, to mediate, to dissolve in the great freeing spaces of spiritual practice or prayer or circadian rhythms. I heard Tony Campolo saying the other day that when Mother Theresa prayed, she really just listened and believed that God listened, too. Nurturing our own vision quests requires a certain kind of listening, I think, and that’s different for each of us. For me, it’s lately been poetry, prayer, meditation and honoring my fearfully, wonderf’ly made self by taking better care to eat right and sleep better.
What is it for you? Let’s not fail to start.
Chris Cocca 
I think I agree with the whole idea of the Eucharist not being the saving factor, but rather a jumping off point to be closer to Jesus/God/Joe Sakic (the three in one).
The rest of it? TD/DR (too deep/didn’t read).
One could argue that the traditional idea found in ascetical and mystical theology that progress in prayer and union with God follows the path of purgation, illumination and union is also a kind of “metric” for measuring spiritual growth.
That’s a good point. It’s just a very subjective one…though not so subjective to the person experiencing the growth, I think. Thanks for reading and commenting!