Still Point: Communication as Communion
Communication is the heart of the learning community. This is a meditation on communication for communion with one another through humility, grace, and faith.
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"Of all things, communication is the most wonderful."
— John Dewey, 1939
John Dewey opens a chapter in his book, Experience and Nature, with this quote. And communications scholar James Carey says, "If we interpret the sentence literally, it must be either false or mundane." What could he have meant? Most of the news and entertainment we get in mass media is either depressing or trivial. And our encounters with one another hardly qualify as wonderful.
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1859 - 1952
John Dewey was a prolific author, philosopher, social critic, and educator.
James W. Carey
1934 - 2006
James W. Carey interprets John Dewey's remarks in a seminal essay entitled "A Cultural Approach to Communication," in his Communication as Culture: Essays on Media and Society (1989).
Transmission model
Control others from a distance
He finds that Dewey's first model of communication is the transmission of messages to control others from a distance. "In the 19th century . . . the movement of goods or people . . . and the movement of information . . . were both described by the common noun 'communication.' It's still the most common understanding of communication today.
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Transmission
Extension of messages in space
It's a way of extending our reach through space. Remember "Reach out and touch someone"?
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"Society exists not only by communication,
but in communication."
- John Dewey
In another place Dewey offers an even more enigmatic saying. Carey interprets the shift in the prepositions from by to in as an allusion to a second understanding of communication as ritual. What Dewey believed we have in common are aims, beliefs, aspirations, knowledge — similar ways of responding emotionally and intellectually to expectations and requirements.
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ritual Model
together in fellowship
This ritual model is ancient and has its roots in religion. If transmission is a casting outward of messages the ritual model is a gathering-in of people in communion.
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Ritual view
Maintenance of society through time
It is the maintenance of a society through time, the passing along of wisdom and learning from one generation to the next. Societies live and thrive through communication of this sort.
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We're together
even when we're apart
Dewey believed that what made a society was not physical proximity nor even working for a common purpose. But if the common purpose guided people's lives from moment to moment, then they would form a community— and they'd do so through communication.
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Social Communion
- Life together IS communication
- All communication is about learning
- Learning widens our experience
- A vital community learns together
For Dewey, a vital community is one that is learning from its experience in communion together. Life together IS communication. Communication is not just a product. It's a living process.
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Communication is a symbolic process whereby reality is produced, maintained, repaired, and transformed.
-- James Carey
Out of all this Carey puts forward a simple definition of communication, one that reveals this vital life together.
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When we think about what motivates and moves people, it begins with information. But information needs interpretation—the role of education—in order to inspire and move us. Dewey would say that education IS ultimately communication and that empowerment of people comes through our communion of a shared purpose and vision.
June 5, 1968
On June 5, 1968 Robert Kennedy was assassinated. I was sixteen. The next day I stopped listening to rock 'n roll on my transistor radio. It may seem like a trivial thing, but I think it was a primitive, instinctual reaction of grief. Silence was called for, a still point in the turning world.
Sometimes our lives are shaken to the core. We stumble back, we recoil. Slowly we regain our balance. We simplify our lives, we find the essentials again, we see our lives from a distance with clarity.
Sometimes our lives are shaken to the core. We stumble back, we recoil. Slowly we regain our balance. We simplify our lives, we find the essentials again, we see our lives from a distance with clarity.
Something gives way inside . . .
Something gives way inside and we find ourselves choosing another path.
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Still point
We come to a still point, a moment of profound stillness, a true listening to the Spirit.
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For many of us the events of this past General Conference session in which the world church—not without dissent—voted not to recognize women in the role of pastors was a turning point in our relation to the church. It is a time to simplify our lives and take another path.
"I pray not for hope in the future but for trust in the present."
Barbara Brown Taylor
It's an opening to the present.
Rilke says, "What is required of us is that we love the difficult and learn to deal with it. In the difficult are the friendly forces, the hands that work on us. Right in the difficult we must have our joys, our happiness, our dreams there against the depth of this background, they stand out, there for the first time we see how beautiful they are."
Rilke says, "What is required of us is that we love the difficult and learn to deal with it. In the difficult are the friendly forces, the hands that work on us. Right in the difficult we must have our joys, our happiness, our dreams there against the depth of this background, they stand out, there for the first time we see how beautiful they are."
I do not need more advice, but strength. I do not need new information, but courage and freedom . . . in the gospel.
Walter Brueggemann
We've got what we need to be free in the Gospel.
"You cannot teach a man what he thinks he already knows." Epictetus
The way forward for our community is through our relearning together what the Gospel means. That way is one of willingness to learn, the way of humility.
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Humility, grace, and faith—a trinity of gifts to us as individuals and to our community.
Humility
the beginning point for learning
We need humility in order to learn without prejudice.
Grace
Sustainable Credit for learning in life
Grace is like sustainable credit for learning in life. It gives us the means to experiment, to learn on the fly, to come back from setbacks.
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Faith
Incarnational Transcendence
Finally, we need faith as a bridge between this present and our hopes for the future. It is an incarnational transcendence, God with us.
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Hope may be closer than we imagine!
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That is why Ray Tetz, Alberto Valenzuela, Zack Plantak and I are launching a website, Stilladventist.org, in November. Along with our present Facebook page [stilladventist.com], it will be a wide tent where people can come to learn, to understand their identity, to enjoy the company, and to be in communion with each other.
"There remains, then, a Sabbath rest for the people of God."
- Hebrews 4:9
This Sabbath rest is a gathering of strength as well as an encounter with God in stillness. We will be offering short meditations from a variety of writers, longer pieces on thoughtful reflection, the occasional sermon, and art. We have plans for live streaming of services from Adventist churches across America. We invite you to be part of a communion created through lively communication.
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Thanks
- Adrienne Asher, Autumn Leaves
- James Carey, Communication as Culture
- John Dewey, Education and Nature; Democracy and Education
- Romil Daquila, photos of his son, Gabe
- Randy Preston, photo, Farm Morning
- Ray Tetz — chart, ideas, shared vision
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