Robert Pirsig, in ‘Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance’, describes two forms of human understanding – the ‘classical’ and the ‘romantic’.
A classical understanding sees a world of rules, laws and reason with structure and facts, science and technology; everything’s analysed, controlled and measurable.
A romantic understanding sees a world of inspiration, imagination and creativity; it’s about feelings, intuition, beauty and emotions.
Pirsig sees this as a dichotomy: ‘Persons tend to think and feel exclusively in one mode or another and doing so tend to misunderstand and underestimate what the other mode is all about.’
On Saturday we celebrated our tenth anniversary of our Men’s Shed with an open day. The workshop, garden and pool table showed what we do; displays and photographs showed what we’d made.
What wasn’t displayed was the friendships and comradery that have developed over the ten years, the abusive banter, the creative ideas, the personal empathy, the unseen support.
Men’s Shed can be analysed classically or appreciated romantically. Both are true and important.
On Saturday afternoon, at the football we lost 1-0 – our fifth successive defeat. Post-match analysis on the radio, in the press, from fans concluded that we would win if we had different tactics/ a different sporting director/ different players…
There was also a lot of passion – from players and manager in post-match interviews, from fans and reporters in conversation and social media, calling for inspiration, motivation, emotional commitment…
Classical match analysis sits alongside the romance of team passion.
I could view Sunday morning’s church or yesterday afternoon’s gardening in a similar way…
This morning, reading Luke’s gospel… Jesus says, ‘Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies?’ Traders and finance; classical rational fact. ‘Yet not one of them is forgotten by God.’ God is present there. ‘…Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.’ We don’t have to be fearful. We can feel valued in God’s
Jesus brings together facts and feelings, classical analysis and romantic appreciation… through a God who won’t forget us.
