Ministry Project Write-up

Hello Classmates. Although we didn't have to post our write-ups on the blog, I wanted to read what everyone else thought about our project, so here's what I thought. You all should post yours too. - Josh

One discourse surrounding our simultaneous group action project boils down to the age old question, “can we imbue objects with supernatural powers by saying magical spells?” (i.e. water, nilla wafers and koolaid, relationships). I think all of us find this idea quite absurd and the primary element of our performance was the lampoon of such a notion. The fact of the matter is, many people believe this and this belief provides lots of ammo for ridicule by those of us with superior disbeliefs. What is interesting to me is the parallel of satirizing what some believe are supernaturally sacred ceremonies, or sacraments, and our status as internet-ordained ministers. When I was ordained to marry my brother, my mom and her family were appalled and mostly boycotted the wedding. My uncle said, “authority from God pales in comparison with authority from the state.” For my mom’s Catholic family, only ordained priests who have been through years of seminary have the magical power to invoke God to transubstantiate wine to blood or ordinary water to water that repels the dark forces. That being said, I think it is an equal lampoon of religion to be able to type your name into a field on a web page and legally perform marriages, or even go to a court house, or Vegas for that matter. When you think about it, this is just a much of a joke as consecrating water against vampire attack. The humor lies in the fact that the political and legal system still have this policy called marriage, which is necessary and practical when it comes to things like property, etc., but that still has this residue of religious belief attached to it (i.e. only heterosexual people can do it because that’s what God says, or, you have to be a judge or a church minister to perform them.) In fact, the whole issue is so complicated, I can only deal with it through comedy, and I find myself having a hard time even beginning to explain how ridiculous society is.
I think our three team ministry did a good job in covering a wide spectrum of satirizing religious belief. The same sex wedding evokes all those issues aforementioned regarding current policy, church/state; the satirical communion satirizes a current sacred belief in transubstantiation; and the holy water vs. vampire satires an archaic religious superstition. By lumping these three elements into the same project, we expose their similarities within a diverse spectrum of socio-religious absurdity. If an audience member that didn’t believe in vampire attack but did believe in communion were to witness both ministries, he/she might have a hard time justifying his/her belief in one and not the other. In other words, you can’t logically laugh off vampire attack and also take offense to a same sex wedding. After all, they’re both in the bible, somewhere. Since I already stole the obviously shallow interpretation of our project as “a satire,” some one else should write about this important and age old question, “if water is blessed in a forest and there is no one there to see it, can it still burn vampires?”

Readings List Week 14

Here's what you need to do before class on Monday:

•Post four links to your del.icio.us site
•Have your final project proposal ready to turn in (at least one page but no more than two; written in academic style).
•Write your response/recap regarding our Simultaneous Group Action project. This should be between two and three pages and should be written in an academic style. Consider the efficacy (and various levels of possibility) of the rituals/exercises you performed; discuss the purposes, motivations, and processes involved in the conception of this project; comment on the group dynamic and the issue of simultaneous performance.

Email me if you have any questions.