The Gospel According to America
Making use of my currently unemployed status (and lacking a vehicle to go to Hearts and Minds) I have been reading. I just finished re-reading "The Gospel According to America". David Dark's writing has a tendency to leave me breathless. And despite the fact that I don't consider this book on par with his Everyday Apocalypse it is certainly a worthwhile read.

Early on Dark describes his text as "an effort in moral orientation". I would prefer to call it an alternate narration, a subversive story telling of American identity. Dark is trying to pull us away from a triumphalistic description of American identity (we are not perfect people, democracy is not perfect in America, and we are not the bearers of God's salvation), Rather, Dark wants to insist that democracy demans of us a humility. For a democratic society to function its members must come with the assumption that the other, the outsider, the deviant very well might have the answer. "Like discipleship, the practice of democracy is a widening of our capacitites for moral awareness and an expansion of our sphere of respect".

One of the greatest strengths of Dark's book is the care he takes in distinguishing between the we that is our neighborly beloning as citizens and the we that is the Church universal (the we that takes primacy). This allows him to value democracy because it can increase moral awareness and to consider it a good thing but to not confuse it with the Church. Democracy is not the hope of the world but it can be a very good thing.

Dark does a wonderful job of drawing togethor disparate voices from American pop-art-- Melville and Michael Stipe, Philip Dick and Charlie Patton--in order to celebrate honesty and truthtelling. This is trademark Dark offering humble readings to find egyptian gold. Even if it wasn't the artists intention to provide an assertion of democratic dignity Dark finds it.

One humorous part is his description of an episode of the Simpsons where Mr. Burns attempts to control Springfield's media outlets accurate picture of him. In reponse Lisa produces an undergound newspaper The Red Dress Press. Pretty soon it catches on and everyone has their own.

"Echoing Martin Luther, Homer remarks, 'Insted of one big-shot controlling all the media, now there's a hundred freaks Xeroxing their worthless opinions.' So be it. This is the way the work gets done in the land of a thousand freaks. Let freedom ring. And blessed be the name of the Lord. Remembrance, after all, belongs to the people".

When I read it I couldn't help but scribble a note on the margin. I wrote "blogging?"