CompuChaos

Ehoarder: CompuChaos

At some time in my past, a high school teacher or college professor said “a neat desk is a sign of an orderly mind; a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind.” Or it may have been my wonderful seminary professor Reginald H. Fuller, whose office was tables piled high with papers, yet knowing what he wanted, he could go directly to a stack, leaf through quickly, and grab anything he wanted instantly. In my Navy days, especially on shore duty when the Navy always assigned me a secretary, it was easy for me to keep a neat desk and an orderly office. And to maintain the semblance of an orderly mind at least for my own self-image. Upon retiring from the Navy nearly thirty-five years ago, thinking to continue this, I converted a spare bedroom into an office, and have done so ever since. And found it not so easy to keep neat and orderly, increasingly so with the passing of the years. And those early years were the days of “hard copies,” which is to say sheets of paper: sheets and sheets and sheets of paper, clutter, unfiled, disorder and chaos. 

It didn’t end with the electronic age, the coming of personal computers. Some folks keep a neat, orderly, clean and clear “computer desktop” with nothing on it but the default icons the machine arrived with from Apple or Dell or Sony or HP or whoever, and one or two folders or documents that are being used at the moment. My desktop is a jumble of icons and little squares, files, folders, pictures, a few colored so they can be found, most crowding anonymously thicker and thicker and more and more into the past; the only order being going to the top bar now and then, clicking View, scrolling down to Arrange By and clicking Name; then clicking View again, scrolling down to Show View Options, and sliding the Icon Size bar farther and farther to the left so that the dozens, scores, hundreds?, I haven’t counted them, of files will fit on the desktop.

Clicking and arranging this morning, I noticed three web archive files that one would not want Senator Joe McCarthy to spy on one’s desktop had he lived into the computer age. “Marx Engels Manifesto” and “Economic Manuscripts - Das Kapital” and “In Defense of Marxism.” What?! Well, our First Lesson for Sunday, April 15 was Acts 4:32-35.   

Acts 4:32-35 (NRSV)

32 Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. ³³With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. ³⁴There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. ³⁵They laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. 

Thinking for Sunday school class and Tuesday Bible Seminar preparation, this lesson led me to read the Communist Manifesto again -- not read since an economics class at UFla in the nineteen-fifties -- and parts of Das Kapital and the borderline rabid website “In Defense of M...” Because, run and hide and deny and rationalize how we may, that’s what the lesson brought to mind.

So, why not communism -- seeing that’s what an early group of Christians were tring to practice -- why not? 

For one thing, it didn’t adequately consider human nature developed over millions of years: we like to think and decide for ourselves. We are not rats, each one acting predictably and the same; every human is different. And while our spiritual nature may admire selflessness, our animal nature is self-preservation. And regardless of the idea of it, the “theory,” somebody has to administer -- at Acts 4 it was the apostles. And every age of human history shows the selfishness and greed that sooner or later surfaces in administrators whether they be elected, appointed, or victorious in a struggle. Even the Church: didn’t anyone ever notice how fat bishops are? Not to mention priests. And didn’t anyone ever read Philip Jenkins  Jesus Wars: How Four Patriarchs, Three Queens, and Two Emperors Decided What Christians Would Believe for the Next 1,500 years. When I was an EfM mentor it was “required” summer reading to prepare for EfM year three.

The most popular and frequently asked question in a class or seminar discussion of Acts 4:32-35 is, “Whatever happened? Did they continue that lifestyle?” One of many lessons to be drawn out of Bible study is that if something is discussed for a bit and then never mentioned again, is that it likely was tried and found wanting: that is to say, failed. The lectionary for April 15th only showed us what a great idea the apostles had of administering an eleemosynary society. Not to diminish the apostles, but they did found the  institution of the Church -- in which fat bishops recently castigated nuns for feeding the poor instead of teaching against contraception and homosexuality.

The rest of the story, which the lectionary thoughtfully omits, continues and ends at Acts 5:1-12:

But a man named Ananias, with the consent of his wife Sapphira, sold a piece of property; ²with his wife’s knowledge, he kept back some of the proceeds, and brought only a part and laid it at the apostles’ feet. ³‘Ananias,’ Peter asked, ‘why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the land? ⁴While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, were not the proceeds at your disposal? How is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You did not lie to us^* but to God!’ ⁵Now when Ananias heard these words, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard of it. ⁶The young men came and wrapped up his body,^* then carried him out and buried him.

7 After an interval of about three hours his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. ⁸Peter said to her, ‘Tell me whether you and your husband sold the land for such and such a price.’ And she said, ‘Yes, that was the price.’ ⁹Then Peter said to her, ‘How is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test? Look, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out.’ ¹⁰Immediately she fell down at his feet and died. When the young men came in they found her dead, so they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. ¹¹And great fear seized the whole church and all who heard of these things.

Though still no neatness freak, I have moved those three web files to the Trash bin.

TW+