Mark Vernon - Talks and Thoughts

The makers of Seaspiracy and Cowspiracy are back. Christspiracy is another profoundly disturbing film detailing the industrial abuse of our animal kin. Expect more horrific carelessness and exploitation on a mass scale. 

Only this time, Kip Andersen and Kameron Waters not only go global but look back in time. “This is plausibly the most significant new discovery about Jesus Christ, in the last 2,000 years,” says the blurb.

But can that be right? Has justified outrage at the treatment of our fellow creatures got the better of them? Initially, I wasn't convinced. But then Kameron Waters reached out to me and we had this long conversation.

See what you think. 

[Spoiler alert - we thoroughly discuss the Christian details in the film.]

For more on Christspiracy see https://www.christspiracy.com

For more on Mark, and his work on early Christianity and Jesus via the ideas of Owen Barfield, friend of CS Lewis, see http://www.markvernon.com/consciousness

00:00 Introduction
02:20 Where to see the documentary and how
04:33 The treatment of animals as a religious concern
12:26 The prehistory of hunting, sacrifice and temples
21:15 What did Jesus do when cleansing of the temple?
34:10 What was the cause of Jesus’s death?
44:38 Jesus of Nazareth or Jesus the vegetarian Nazarene?
58:37 Kameron’s own Christian journey
01:05:42 But did Jesus really not eat fish?
01:13:40 Ichthus, Pythagoreans and the 153 fish
01:24:00 What did Paul mean by vegetarians are weak?
01:31:05 Engaging with the film, engaging with the tradition

Energy is a key organising principle in modern science, the conversation of energy being a grounding and universal law. But what is energy? 
In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon examine the history of the idea and the word. In science, energy is a relatively recently notion, emerging in its current form in the 19th century, drawing much on mechanics. 
The word itself was coined by Aristotle, in the 4th century BCE, carrying a sense of vital actuality and living presence. That meaning is still remembered in Orthodox theology, which describes the energeia of God. 
The conversation ranges over the promiscuity of energy in the natural world to the spiritual notion of energy, including the subtle energies of the body. The implications of shaping the idea of energy through mechanical metaphors also has important ramifications, from the descriptions of economics and the efficacy of psychology to the experience of God. 
Further, the most recent physics argues that energy is not conserved after all as the universe expands.
For more conversations between Rupert and Mark see:
https://www.sheldrake.org/audios/sheldrake-vernon-dialogues
http://www.markvernon.com/talks

I talk again with Landon Loftin and Max Leyf about the genius insight of Owen Barfield.

The Riddle of the Sphinx (Barfield Press) is a new collection of talks and essays about the great friend of CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien.

We discuss Barfield's take on analysis and analogy, Darwinian and other kinds of evolution, the significance of Rudolf Stein, and Barfield's notion of final participation.

Landon and Max are the authors of What Barfield Thought.

For more on my books, including A Secret History of Christianity, see www.markvernon.com

0:00 The new book of talks and essays
02:08 Plato, Aristotle and the evolution of analogy and analysis 
13:31 Participation and the limits of modern science
23:30 Barfield's critique of Darwinian evolution
33:47 When the mind changes, the world changes
38:03 Evolution as a moving image of eternity
42:51 How can we participate in evolution?
52:18 Barfield and the significance of Rudolf Steiner
01:03:45 Grappling with the esoteric
01:10:14 On the way to final participation
01:17:16 Barfield on the meaning and revelation

How can Christianity address the climate crisis? Isn’t the objectifying of nature and the drive to improve our lot a secular legacy of Christendom? And isn’t individual conversion more or less irrelevant in a time of systemic crisis?

I was delighted to be sent an essay by Gunnar Gjermundsen that asks these questions and more. His insights are wide-ranging, integrating, inspiring and challenging, focusing on a Christianity that is not so much moral as transformative, inviting us to consider again the sayings of Jesus, via theologians such as Maximus the Confessor and psychotherapists like Donald Winnicott.

In this discussion we unpack his argument in broadly three moves.

First, an analysis of current anxieties that, at heart, are to do with time. A linear view of history has fostered a hope of panicky escape, sacrificing the present for the future as a false substitute for eternity, with devastating consequences for ourselves and the world around us. 

The problem needs to be addressed at root, which comes in a second section exploring the misunderstanding of eschatology as an event to come and be feared, rather than an unfolding now, to be welcomed. We explore Jesus’s teaching as well as how it came to be so profoundly misunderstood.

The third section draws in psychological insights, particularly in terms of considering the schizoid, addictive and dread-filled nature of the modern psyche, and turns again to the Christian tradition and the remarkable notion of the kingdom of God that is near, and being born again.

The apocalyptical has become a master metaphor for the contemporary imagination, inducing fatalism and denial. Christianity has a vision to undo this terror via the transformation of our consciousness and experience of time. The apocalyptic is not to come but is an unveiling in every moment, a theosis, of the eternal present.

And we can live by that alternative.

The essay we are discussing is Living on This Earth as in Heaven: Time and the Ecological Conversion of Eschatology, published in Modern Theology, online - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/moth.12930

Gunnar Gjermundsen works in the Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo - https://www.tf.uio.no/english/people/aca/gunnargj/

For more on Mark Vernon’s work, see http://www.markvernon.com

Western liturgies are obsessed with sin. "There is no health in us", or words to that effect, begin and end most services, particularly in Lent.
Jesus's wilderness experience was actually about something else - practicing paradise, to use to the phrase of Douglas Christie.
It's a time to reorientate attention, not wallow in guilt and re-embed shame. The kingdom is near. Eyes that see, ears that hear, can awaken.

Isaac Newton is best known for his theory of gravity. And yet, the great scientist also insisted: "ye cause of gravity is what I do not pretend to know.” In other words, notions like gravity, and force in general, are deeply mysterious phenomena. 

In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon ask just what gravity might be. The conversation begins with a feature of gravity that is typically overlooked by physicists, namely that gravity has a speed which is far faster than the speed of light. 

They consider how gravity might be linked to the notion of levity, a link that can be renewed again. Newton himself was inclined to regard gravity as the divine will in the cosmos and was also influenced by the belief in daemons, particularly the entity called Eros or love. These are go-betweens in the universe, in the case of Eros, attracting all things and securing the many as a whole. Panpsychism and final causes are other themes that arise. 

Contemplating the mysteries of modern science, often hidden in plain sight, leads naturally to deeply meaningful considerations about the nature of the world in which we live.

The paper Rupert mentioned, The Speed of Gravity, can be found here - https://www.intalek.com/Index/Projects/Research/TheSpeedofGravity-WhattheExperimentsSay.htm

For more conversations between us see
https://www.sheldrake.org/audios/sheldrake-vernon-dialogues
http://www.markvernon.com/talks

The rituals around death and dying are changing in the UK and across the developed world. Medical care advances, which is for the good, though can mean to a loss of other kinds of wisdom about this facet of life. People’s beliefs and convictions about death are also in a state of flux.
The think tank, Theos, has extensively researched this changing landscape, so I was very glad to speak with Madeleine Pennington from Theos about their discoveries, particularly from the perspective of design. This conversation is one of several I am having looking at how designers can foster love in human affairs, personal and social.
We discussed the turning away from the ritualisation of death and its effects, the power of rituals to raise aspects of human experience to awareness, and how the grieving process and holding periods of silence can be aided by design.
For more on the work of Theos see - https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk 
Madeleine Pennington has written here too - https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk/research/2023/11/27/love-grief-and-hope-emotional-responses-to-death-and-dying-in-the-uk

A conversation with actor, Jamie Robson, whom I met through the work of Rupert Spira.

00:00 Meeting through Rupert Spira
03:26 Nondualism and Christian mysticism
06:02 Nondualism and acting
15:00 Being and doing
19:40 Detachment and Meister Eckhart
26:48 Two modes of perception in Iain McGilchrist and others
32:43 Double vision and a re-enchanted world
37:30 UFOs and levitation as cases
49:45 Everyday re-enchantment
52:07 British Weird Wave film
59:33 Cultural shifts?

Born in Nigeria and raised in the UK since the age of 4, Chine McDonald is well placed to explore love in different cultural contexts, and what happens when differences meet.

We talked about how differences show up particularly in relation to the practicalities of loving, from house design to how people talk at funerals, as well as wider questions such as images of God and the critiquing and idealising of different traditions.

Our conversation is one of many I'm conducting as part of a project looking at how love can be fostered by design, funded by the Fetzer Institute.

Chine is Director of the think tank Theos, having previously worked at Christian Aid and as a journalist. She is the author of God is Not a White Man: and other revelations, and regularly contributes to programmes on the radio. She studied Theology and Religious Studies at Cambridge University. 

For more on Chine - https://www.chinemcdonald.com/
For more on Mark - https://www.markvernon.com/

Environmental degradation caused by technological progress is in the news almost everyday. So can any sense be made of an ancient intuition that human beings are not just part of nature but have a distinctive and positive role to play in nature? 

In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon discuss issues from the significance of consciousness to cosmic emergence in order to explore a vision of humanity in nature that goes well beyond our life being the meaningless byproduct of random processes. 

Humanity contributes to the diversification and beautification of the natural world, even as monocrops undermine that enrichment, too. Alternatively, religious traditions add a layer of meaning to natural processes that science alone can’t provide, from expressing divine creativity to returning that blessing in the praising of God. Panpsychism, strong emergence and Charles Darwin’s appreciation of the excessiveness of nature are other themes in the conversation, making a case for humanity’s place as participant in the remarkable abundance that surrounds us.

For more conversations between Rupert and Mark see https://www.sheldrake.org/audios/sheldrake-vernon-dialogues
and http://www.markvernon.com/talks

Christmas risks losing its meaning not only because of the commercial frenzy but because of the way it is talked about in churches.

In this conversation, Russell Jefford talks about his discovery of the understanding of the incarnation conveyed in the writings of the early church fathers. They were unknown to him as an evangelical Christian and have refreshed his love of Christianity now.

Together with Mark Vernon, they consider the iconography of the nativity. Why is Jesus born in a cave? Is that a coffin rather than a manger? They consider phrases of three key figues in particular:

St Nazianzus "He who Is, comes into being, and the uncreated is created" (Oration 38.13)

St Irenaeus "He sanctified every age by the resemblance we have with him" (Against Heresies 2.22.4)

St Athanasius "He became man that we might become God" (On the Incarnation 54)

The humanification of God enables the deification of humanity. Salvation is thought of as recapitulation, the divine sanctifying humanity through the various stages of life. The work of atonement is the work of incarnation, as both are manifestations of God, grabbing our attention as to our true nature through the life of the body. 

For more on Russell’s work and teaching days see https://ordinarytheology.com/

For more on Mark’s work see https://www.markvernon.com/

“A worldview that understands indigeneity is a paradigm of regeneration, a worldview rooted in enduring values in what we call our original instructions, common themes of reciprocity, of gratitude, of responsibility, of generosity, of forgiveness, of humility, of courage, of sacrifice, and of course love. But these values are not just words, we need to live them.” Melissa Nelson

In this conversation with Melissa, we explore various facets of what she summarises in the quote above. The original instructions of indigenous knowledge are rooted in a reciprocal and relational way of being in the world, an integration of knowing and loving. The creatures of the world, with the landscape and sky, are living records preserved in oral traditions, spoken by participating in rituals and stories. 

We discuss the consciousness prompted by creatures and places and how that varies between different peoples, across place and time. We look at the notion of the erotic and the role of human beings within the wider ecology, and also how a synthesis between modern scientific and indigenous ways of knowing might weave together to enrich our love and, therefore, being in the world.

We talked everything from eagles and turtles to love and participation.

Melissa K. Nelson is a Native ecologist, writer, media-maker and Indigenous scholar-activist. She is the President/CEO of The Cultural Conservancy, which she had directed since 1993. In 2020 she joined Arizona State University as a Professor of Indigenous Sustainability, after working since 2002 as Professor of American Indian Studies at San Francisco State University.

0:00 Introductions
01:13 What is indigeneity?
02:33 The names of tribes and nations
04:27 Stories in the landscape
06:06 The teaching of the eagle
07:17 Relational and reciprocal worldviews
10:25 Bridging worlds and the notion of love
12:47 Oral cultures and universals
15:01 The sun and turtles: beyond metaphor to participation
25:20 The link between love and knowledge
29:21 Expanding the erotic
32:42 The role of human beings
38:01 Science and indigenous ways of knowing

Clare Martin is co-director of the St Ethelburga’s Centre for Reconciliation and Peace, located in the heart of the City of London. In this conversation, we spoke about what love can look like in the public square, particularly in contexts of crisis and conflict, and how encounters between peoples can be designed so as to foster love as a resource and active dynamic. 
The conversation ranged over the importance of stories, histories and the design of places, so as to aid people being more vulnerable and truthful to one another. Intention is also crucial, from reverence to respect, so that difficulty can become generative. And such tension is not just an incidental matter but, in an age of crisis and fear, stresses the spirit of any engagement.
St Ethelburga’s is a religious foundation, working in an interfaith context, so questions such as prayer and invocation also come to mind. Love, then, is not only a moral matter but an elemental openness to more.

VALA can be downloaded as a pdf here - https://blakesociety.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/VALA-04.pdf
My essay is at p60
For more on Mark - www.markvernon.com

What is the role of love in public life? Can it have a place given the scrutiny faced by leaders and the processes of bureaucracies? Or is love what we need to face the huge challenges of today, from distrust of public institutions to the environmental crisis?

Claire Gilbert is the author of several books, a fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, has served on several public and advisory bodies, and is the Director of the Westminster Abbey Institute. In this conversation, we talk about soulfulness as well as morality in public life, for which Claire is convinced there is a deep yearning. We cover questions from how to design safe and inspiring places that allow people to ask about love of their work, to the role character, contemplation and vision.

We ask about how fear, despair and forgiveness might be part of a more loving approach to public life, as well as reconsidering the nature of power, which can be compassionate and stimulating as well as coercive.

This is part of series of conversations Mark is conducting as part of a project investigating how design might help nurture more loving relationships at a personal and social level.

For more on Claire see - https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-biographies/dr-claire-foster-gilbert

Constellations, also called family systems, is a way of visualising the dynamics of love that operate in any group that has to do with creativity or life. 

A constellation workshop brings people together to look at predicaments with which people are wrestling, be they personal or organisational. The goal is to find a design that releases and acknowledges the love that yearns to find a way forward, though can be thwarted or become stuck.

In this conversation, Robert Rowland Smith and Mark Vernon, explore what in the constellations world is called the orders of love. They ask how love, because it manifests as a dynamic or spirit, is seen and fostered by rituals and gestures. The right distance between people may be as important as the right connection. The manner in which events and times are remembered or honoured can be crucial. 

The dialogue suggests that love won’t be pinned down and that becoming more conscious and aligned with the field of love, within which we all live, is crucial. Seeing how this is so is not only expansive for the individual but vitalising for the whole. 

Such collaboration is aided by principles akin to principles of design and which are discovered by testing and exploration, and proven by the beauty and truth released.

For more about Robert, including Simple Truths, https://www.robertrowlandsmith.com

For more about Mark http://www.markvernon.com

Do our minds reside solely inside our heads, or perhaps bodies? Or do they extend into the wider world, perhaps even reaching to the stars? 
In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert Sheldrake and Mark Vernon discuss the extended mind theory, taking a lead from recent work of Rupert’s on the sense of being stared at, and also the problems that contemporary science has with understanding vision. 
The discussion considers new research carried out by Rupert and others, as well as the theories of A.N. Whitehead. The way in which science since Maxwell has considered light as moving backwards as well as forwards in time is explored, alongside the way that William Blake described how we see, which itself fits the ancient understanding, that seeing is an active process of engagement, not a passive mode of reception.
Rupert references two published papers. 
One is on the nature of visual perception, co-written with Alex Gomez-Marin, online here - https://www.sheldrake.org/files/pdfs/papers/The-Nature-of-Visual-Perception.pdf. 
The other is on directional scopaesthesia, co-written with Pamela Smart, online here - https://www.sheldrake.org/files/pdfs/papers/Scopaestheia-and-Its-Implications-for-Theories-of-Vision.pdf.
For more dialogues between Rupert and Mark see https://www.sheldrake.org/audios/sheldrake-vernon-dialogues and https://www.markvernon.com/talks

Robin Dunbar is an Oxford evolutionary psychologist who has written extensively about friendship, amongst other things, not least in relation to “Dunbar’s Number”.

We talked about what friendship is, and how it differs from other loves. We explored the varieties of friendship that people experience, and why metaphors such as “circles of friends” are so significant.

Numbers are illuminating when it comes to understanding the dynamics of friendship, not only Dunbar’s Number, but also other threshold numbers – 5, 15, 50, 150, 500. Get those group sizes right, and much will be gained.

We also asked about why social media seems to corrosive to friendship, how notions of friendship do and don’t vary across cultures, why gender differences in attitudes to friendship seem so robust, and whether we need rituals of friendship to guide this most important of relationships.

Robin referenced the seven pillars of friendship. These are language or dialect, geography, educational experiences, hobbies and interests, moral or spiritual viewpoints, political views, sense of humour and taste in music.

Bishop Barron is another figure I think worth listening to, who spoke at ARC in London, alongside Jordan Peterson. Like Peterson, he simultaneously leaves me as wary as enthused. 

I’ve explained where that took me with Peterson in another short talk. Here’s where I’ve ended up in response to Barron, which interesting is also, in my view, with a richer, fuller sense of Christianity untamed, unleashed.

In short, you might say that Barron has his diagnosis right but his antidote wrong. And like Peterson, the misstep turns matters such as freedom and responsibility, and the side-lining of forgiveness and love.

My thoughts in response to Jordan Peterson are in this podcast. A written version of this talk can be found at my website, www.markvernon.com

All in all, there is much to consider in Jordan Peterson’s latest passionate suggestions. I think he is right to present a vision of the human good coming from the future, thereby calling us and shaping a meaningful life now. The human self needs a sense of itself that exceeds an otherwise atomised, lonely individualism.

However, in may view, Peterson celebrates faith and responsibility at the risk of losing love and response.
 
In this talk, and in the spirit of dialogue, I try to show why the full Christian vision matters, and the inclination to secularise is risky. Distortions inevitably appear. Love and response is reduced to faith and responsibility. Judgment is replaced by an exertion of will. Forgiveness is sidelined. And grace becomes the assertion of moral order.

A written version of the talk is online here - http://www.markvernon.com/faith-responsibility-or-love-response-thoughts-on-jordan-peterson-at-arc-in-london