January 2, 2008

The Year of Living . . . Faithfully

A plethora of books based on "a year of . . ." experiments have appeared recently. I read one such book, Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life (HarperCollins), this fall. She and her family moved to Virginia from the ecologically unsustainable suburban environment of Arizona to live a more sustainable lifestyle, specifically to eat locally, for a year. I "read" it on my iPod; it's 12 CDs and 100-plus miles of running. Given the long winters and short growing seasons in Minnesota, I'm not going to be eating exclusively locally in Minnesota any time soon. But trust me: you can't "read" 12 CDs on sustainable eating habits without thinking about and changing at least a few things about your food choices.

Then I saw reviews of A. J. Jacobs's The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible (Simon & Schuster). I was admittedly intrigued but didn't grant it much credibility. Yet when one of Ken's former parishioners from Ohio sent us a copy for Christmas, I grabbed it away from Ken as quickly as I could, curled up by the fire, and read away!

I thoroughly enjoyed Jacobs's wit and attempt to understand the role that religion plays in one's life. His quest was to "live the ultimate biblical life. Or more precisely, to follow the Bible as literally as possible." He wanted to explore "the huge and fascinating topic of biblical literalism." And that he does with a flourish! Wearing a beard and white robes, carrying small pebbles for stoning, and observing a host of other biblical laws while walking the streets of New York City. Yet don't be fooled: he discovers some things about religion that some folks learned only at the cost of seminary loans.

He began by calling himself an agnostic and ended up calling himself a reverent agnostic. I would classify him as a genuine seeker. And lest we scoff, we longtime Christians still must admit that Jacobs wasn't just studying religion but living it and, most important, wrestling with its meaning.

Aside from the book's message on biblical literalism (which will intrigue conservatives and liberals alike as well as cause them to gnash their teeth at points and then burst into laughter at others), one of the things that drew me in immediately was Jacobs's awareness that a year of living biblically couldn't help but change him. "The problem is, a lot of religion is about surrendering control and being open to radical change," he says (p. 36). Like Jacobs, most of us are not always willing to risk our sense of control! He honestly didn't know where this experiment would lead him.

In a quick survey of books on living a year differently (which I didn't read and therefore don't necessarily recommend), I began to see some patterns. In Julie and Julia: The Servantless American Cook (later re-subtitled My Year of Cooking Dangerously; published by Back Bay Books), Julie Powell embarks on a year of cooking every one of Julia Childs's recipes from Mastering the Art of French Cooking. (You may know that these recipes are the very definition of "labor-intensive.")

Powell identifies herself as a "low-level drone at a government agency in New York." As she approaches 30 she wants to pull herself out of "secretarial ennui." She embraces a passion: Julia Childs's cooking. And while she still slaves away at her secretarial job, her life is defined by what she does outside of it. Through her blog she becomes something of a folk hero. What intrigues me is how living out her passion defines all the other choices she makes within that year, especially with her time.

Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping, by Judith Levine (Free Press), arose out of a reaction to a bad Christmas shopping year. Levine went a whole year without purchasing anything other than the food, medicine, and absolutely necessities (and two renegade clothes shopping trips. Ken and I are considering buying only essentials during the season of Lent. Now that's a challenge!

Some "experiments in living" are not our choice—such as illness or other causes of suffering. Joan Didion's Year of Magical Thinking (Vintage) began one night at dinner when her husband, writer John Gregory Dunne, suffered a sudden massive coronary attack that caused his death. This chronicles and reflects on death and grief. Years like these are ones we would never choose but cause us to focus on one aspect of our lives that forever changes us.

Each of these "year of living differently" books is based on a passion (given or chosen) that opens one up to being forever changed, without knowing where that change will lead. The year involves an intense focus on one aspect of living. Each involves a heavy dose of sacrifice, through limitation of choices of time, food, money, and other options.

Finally, all of these experiments in focused, intense, impassioned, sacrificial experiments are countercultural. They fly in the face of "doing your own thing when you feel like it," of following no particular habits or rituals in life, and of avoiding embarrassment by "being different." As Paul cautions us, "Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking" (Rom. 12:2, The Message). This sounds a lot like what discipleship is meant to be in our Christian living.

The year 2008 is upon us. What would it mean to take an aspect of our Christian discipleship and intensely focus upon it at the exclusion or sacrifice of other activities and foci in our lives? This might entail