This is an interesting read. At age 79, my days of youth are long past. I’m on the other side of the mountain heading down. I think fondly of my youth, but I have no sense of wishing I could regain it. I love where I am, and feel closer to God, spiritually. I’m certainly closer in a mortal sense. Old age has its challenges, but I find them easier to accept because I know more. There are many younger than I who are much smarter than I am, but I’ll always know more than they know because I’ve been a terrestrial longer. However, I hate the euphemisms younger people invent to soften the reality of being elderly. I’m perfectly happy with “old.”
"Youthful beauty essentially consists of “immediacy” (Umiddelbarhed), that is to say, a spontaneous relation to other entities. .... Rather than seek God through, say, ascetical practices or philosophical demonstrations, “youth understands immediately that God is Creator.”
Do you think, Chris, that Umiddelbarhed and Alvor can come together in the life of faith, somehow? That Umiddelbarhed, immediacy, and Alvor, earnestnest, could bring the "light and the heavy" into faith's paradox, in a miracle....
The thing about the sadness that people feel when provoked by the Tiktok filter to behold what could have been their teenage self, that is moving. What the technology mediates, the effect, the feeling and its thoughftful response, that's real even if the mediation itself seems trivial or even somehow cruel. I kind of think that perhaps what could be a Kierkegaardian way of going with this, and this is what I think you're saying in your conclusion, "unless there's more," is that in giving the sorrow of the loss of youth to God who knows you and loves "in all your changes" (cf. Works of Love) that there is a way to live instead of to only wither in the feeling of the losses and the suffering.
Here's the quotation from "Works of Love" because it seems so fitting to quote it in support of your piece, from the chapter "Our Duty To Love Those We See" from the Hong translation:
"Christian love is not supposed to vault into heaven, for comes from heaven and with heaven, It steps down and thereby accomplishes loving the same person throughout all his changes, because it sees the same person in all his changes. Purely human love is always about to fly after or fly away with the beloved's perfections ... whereas Christian love grants the beloved all his imperfections and weaknesses and in all his changes remains with him, loving the person it sees."
Yes, truly! It's very fitting for the cusp of Holy Week too, because SK on "the work love in loving the one you see" is about in biblical narrative context, the look of Christ to Peter when he says "I will never betray you!" And so then, with all of those echoes and Christological meanings, like, return to both the question of "remember your Creator in your youth" and like, the abyss that the TikTok filter opens up for people to confront of "all their changes" - and sin, despair, betrayal that creeps into the temptations that abyss opens.
It is powerful how you bring the thinking of Kierkegaard to todays youth and to all of us. It make his thinking relevant today. I want to think about my youth and the wonderful innocents of my spirituality back them. It is important to revisit what makes us - us. Thank you for helping me to think about it and to understand how “old philosophers” can be modern in todays world. You are a gift to your profession.
This is an interesting read. At age 79, my days of youth are long past. I’m on the other side of the mountain heading down. I think fondly of my youth, but I have no sense of wishing I could regain it. I love where I am, and feel closer to God, spiritually. I’m certainly closer in a mortal sense. Old age has its challenges, but I find them easier to accept because I know more. There are many younger than I who are much smarter than I am, but I’ll always know more than they know because I’ve been a terrestrial longer. However, I hate the euphemisms younger people invent to soften the reality of being elderly. I’m perfectly happy with “old.”
It’s interesting. I do think Kierkegaard is saying: at any age, a “childlike” relationship with God is a good thing, though often forgotten.
"Youthful beauty essentially consists of “immediacy” (Umiddelbarhed), that is to say, a spontaneous relation to other entities. .... Rather than seek God through, say, ascetical practices or philosophical demonstrations, “youth understands immediately that God is Creator.”
Do you think, Chris, that Umiddelbarhed and Alvor can come together in the life of faith, somehow? That Umiddelbarhed, immediacy, and Alvor, earnestnest, could bring the "light and the heavy" into faith's paradox, in a miracle....
The thing about the sadness that people feel when provoked by the Tiktok filter to behold what could have been their teenage self, that is moving. What the technology mediates, the effect, the feeling and its thoughftful response, that's real even if the mediation itself seems trivial or even somehow cruel. I kind of think that perhaps what could be a Kierkegaardian way of going with this, and this is what I think you're saying in your conclusion, "unless there's more," is that in giving the sorrow of the loss of youth to God who knows you and loves "in all your changes" (cf. Works of Love) that there is a way to live instead of to only wither in the feeling of the losses and the suffering.
Here's the quotation from "Works of Love" because it seems so fitting to quote it in support of your piece, from the chapter "Our Duty To Love Those We See" from the Hong translation:
"Christian love is not supposed to vault into heaven, for comes from heaven and with heaven, It steps down and thereby accomplishes loving the same person throughout all his changes, because it sees the same person in all his changes. Purely human love is always about to fly after or fly away with the beloved's perfections ... whereas Christian love grants the beloved all his imperfections and weaknesses and in all his changes remains with him, loving the person it sees."
(Harper Perennial Modern Thought, 2009, pg 169)
That is indeed an excellent quote!
Yes, truly! It's very fitting for the cusp of Holy Week too, because SK on "the work love in loving the one you see" is about in biblical narrative context, the look of Christ to Peter when he says "I will never betray you!" And so then, with all of those echoes and Christological meanings, like, return to both the question of "remember your Creator in your youth" and like, the abyss that the TikTok filter opens up for people to confront of "all their changes" - and sin, despair, betrayal that creeps into the temptations that abyss opens.
It is powerful how you bring the thinking of Kierkegaard to todays youth and to all of us. It make his thinking relevant today. I want to think about my youth and the wonderful innocents of my spirituality back them. It is important to revisit what makes us - us. Thank you for helping me to think about it and to understand how “old philosophers” can be modern in todays world. You are a gift to your profession.