Sarcasm is a bitter/cutting expression or remark. (Confession: it’s a type of humor I find hard to resist) I was reminded recently that the etymology of sarcasm is late Greek meaning ‘tearing of the flesh’. Ouch.
There is a tearing of the flesh happening, but it isn’t new. It’s the church in America. The church is the body of Christ, right? (Confession: I’ve contributed to the tearing)
I don’t have too much to say on the issue right now, however, I would like to put forth a…theory?…I guess.
I was reading the first chapter of a book called Word Pictures by Brian Godawa, and he separates people into two camps. One being Word People (maybe best summed up as intellectuals) and Image People (maybe best summed up as artists). Anyway, he has an interesting table that puts forth a topic or ‘bias’ and then shows the polarity of the word and image people to that topic. When I saw this I started to think about when different people gravitate to each polarity it could cause a tearing somewhere in the middle. (Confession: I have a fear of division or separation, which may be why I seem obsessed with the issue)
Here is the table…(sorry if the columns are a little wonky)
Table 1
BIASES WORD IMAGE
Locale Traditional Church Contemporary Ch.
Era Modernity Postmodernity
Emphasis Doctrine Relationship
Basis Reason Experience
Mandate Preach the Gospel Live the Gospel
Priority Content of Message Style and Form
Communication Proposition Story
Pursuit Truth Spirit
Values Rules Freedom
Temperament Rationality Creativity
Reference Books, speech Film, TV, Pop Culture
Vulnerability Dead Orthodoxy Anti-Intellectualism
Risks Legalism License
(One last confession: I feel at home in the word catagory, but want to live in the image category)
