I posted a few more personal reflections on last week’s The Idolatry of God retreat in Belfast (here and here), which turned out to be more professional (i.e. academic) than I thought because, on reflection, I failed in trying to move from the intellectual to the existential and from information to transformation. But, as Jen summarised in a great comment on one of those earlier posts, ‘We are all in a different place between intellectually protecting ourselves from what triggers the hurts of the past and letting go of past hurts enough to fully experience the present’.

I then posted two pieces about the academic paper that Pete Rollins asked me to present at the retreat, ‘Positioning Pyrotheology’, in which I looked at the wider theological and philosophical frame and political the significance of Pete’s work (here and here). My forthcoming book, Radical Theology and Emerging Christianity: Deconstruction, Materialism and Religious Practices (Ashgate, 2014), will go into much more detail about the relationship between Pete’s work and contemporary deconstructive and materialist theologies, and the research I hope to do next will focus more on the political potential of practices like ‘suspended space’.

But today I wanted to write another personal reflection – although it’s also somewhat professional, because it’s about my style of presentation, and whether or not I can speak to the churches.

Video of Ikon’s 2009 Greenbelt transformance art piece, ‘Pyrotheology’, taken by Steve Collins. For the text that Cary and Pádraig are performing, see here.

I was asked to take part in Pete Rollins’ Idolatry of God retreat as an academic that could ‘address the wider cultural, political and religious significance of Pyrotheology’ because of my ‘in-depth understanding’ of Pete’s work ‘and the new collectives that it calls for’ (see Pete’s introduction to me on his blog). Having made a few more personal reflections on the retreat (here, here and here), I thought I’d also briefly outline some of the points that I made in my presentation, ‘Positioning Pyrotheology’. I’ll write a bit about the first half of the presentation today, and about the second half tomorrow.

Pyrotheology is a term that was coined by Chris Fry for a transformance art event that Ikon, the Belfast-based collective founded by Pete in 2002, presented at Greenbelt in 2009.

Photo from Pete’s website here.

When Pete began exploring how this word ‘pyrotheology’ might come to describe Pete’s wider theological project, he wrote that ‘the central event of Christianity is nothing less than a type of white-hot fire that burns up all we believe about ourselves, our gods and our universe’.

The pyrotheology website states that,

By theoretically setting fire to the layers of belief we put over reality to protect ourselves form reality, pyrotheology seeks to ignite a sense of greater depth in life beyond the need for wholeness and certainty. Pyrotheology explores how the events testified to in the founding documents of Christianity invite us to fully embrace the reality of our brokenness and unknowing.

For Pete, this means that,

The question for those seeking to build collectives is how to fan the flame rather than trying to extinguish it. In short, how to draw those who attend into the event of absolute loss reflected in the Crucifixion so that they might experience Resurrection.

On the back of my Greenbelt presentation this year, “Giving Up God for Lent: A New Kind of Christian is A New Kind of Atheist”, I’ve been contacted by Third Way Magazine to write a short piece about Atheism for Lent for their Jan/Feb 2013 issue. I’m very excited about this, and more than a little nervous, since I’m more used to academic than journalistic writing styles and I’m not particularly familiar with the magazine’s audience. Still, I’ve had some useful suggestions from the Features editor at Third Way and hopefully the finished piece will inspire readers. 

Also, my husband (Simeon Wallis) and I are hoping to pitch an anthology for Atheism for Lent to some popular Christian publishers in the next little while. It’ll include excerpts from philosophers, theologians and researchers of religion from modern atheists (like Freud, Marx and Nietzsche), new atheists (Dawkins, Hitchens, etc), secular philosophical interpretations of Christianity (from figures like Alain Badiou and Slavoj Zizek) to what I call the a/theism of people like Jack Caputo. Fingers crossed that we can get the finished manuscript out in time for Lent 2014. 

You can now buy my Greenbelt 2012 talk, “Giving Up God for Lent: A New Kind of Christian is A New Kind of Atheist”, either as an MP3 download or on CD. I haven’t listened to it myself yet, partly because I don’t like what I sound like and partly because I’m too scared to find out if they also recorded the Q and A session, which I wasn’t very pleased with. I often have trouble with the questions at the end of a presentation, and I was so nervous giving my first “non-academic” talk that I don’t think I was in the right mindset to deal at all well with the questions I got! So, feel free to download this audio, but please stop it before it gets to the Q and A. Also, I swear in this audio, although I am just quoting Reverend Richard Coles.

Having recently returned from a very soggy Greenbelt 2012, I was both pleased and disappointment by my presentation, “Giving Up God for Lent: A New Kind of Christian is A New Kind of Atheist”. I was overwhelmed by the number of people who packed out the room to hear me talk, which certainly boosted my confidence! But I feel that I let myself down with how I answered the questions in the Q and A. Apparently my talk was recorded, and I’m really not looking forward to hearing it back. I quite often feel that I don’t do myself justice in Q and As. Partly its to do with being relieved the presentation is over and then not being able to concentrate on the question. Partly its being uncomfortable and just saying whatever comes into my head without pausing to really think things through. And I need to get much better at saying “I don’t know”. 

If you are going to Greenbelt this year check out the brilliant @KSMoody bit.ly/LPQyaC

— Peter Rollins (@PeterRollins) June 27, 2012

My bio for Greenbelt 2012, where I’ll be speaking on “Giving Up God for Lent: A New Kind of Christian is A New Kind of Atheist”.

Kester asked me a few weeks back to speak at Greenbelt this year (August 24 - 27), and I’ve decided to introduce and reflect on the Atheism for Lent course that I ran at Journey. I’ve just emailed in my presentation title and blurb:

Giving up God for Lent: A New Kind of Christian is A New Kind of Atheist

What did you give up for Lent? In Atheism for Lent, a six week course exploring great atheist critiques of religion, we tried to discover a richer faith in which our own atheisms, our own experiences of the absence of God, are recognised and remembered. Find out what we did, how it went, and why I think a new kind of Christian is also a new kind of atheist.

I’ve been invited by Kester Brewin to speak at this year’s Greenbelt festival, which is exciting. The theme is “Saving Paradise” so I’ve got to have a think over the next little while of suitable topics and titles.