Paul Tillich is perhaps the greatest U.S. theologian of the 20th century. However, in the UK, a book on modern theology fails to mention or even list him in the index.
I went to a seminar today entitled 'The Religious Meaning of Culture,' which plays off the title of Tillich's book:
The Theology of Culture. The subject was about reviving a "Neo-Tillichian systematic theology," which of course must apply itself to the contemporary landscape of culture.
Now, although I have read two of Tillich's work, I do not know enough about his systematic theology nor do I know him well enough to speak, with thoroughness, of the seminar today.
What I would like to do here is pick up on, what was really, the end point of the paper. Today we are living in a capitalist society and there is no room for change. Capitalism is here to stay, or so the speaker says. We cannot envision an alternative. We are strained by this form of economy and any vision for a "utopia" is actually blocked off because of the possibilities we have today. The speaker calls it a culture without a future. This sounds much like Francis Fukuyama's
The End of History. Because of these constraints the 'Ultimate Concern,' which is what is identified with religion becomes unimaginable and impossible. I'm not sure if I summarized this part of his argument correctly but let's posit it for the sake of fun and this post.
Given this "culture without a future," which I myself don't necessarily agree with, I would like to make the parallel of religion's ultimate concern and the art. Two artists came to mind while this talk was being given, Duchamp and Basquiat. Artists who in a way shook the art world. Duchamp brought in a urinal, put his name on it, and placed it in a gallery and challenged the very concept of what art is. This is perhaps a definitive moment of begging the question. It is avant-garde to the contemporary landscape of the art scene. This action alone by Duchamp has propelled the discussion of art, art theory, and art criticism. My parallel here with the "culture without a future" and the constraints imposed by capitalist possibilities, is the occupy movement. I think today we are beginning to question the economic system more and more. Occupy Wall Street was not a temporary thing. It is still moving forward and still alive. My sense is that the disgust and disdain for the economic system today is still there. In this sense we question the economy. Much like Duchamp's urinal questioned art and propelled the discussion.
My second artist is Basquiat. Picked up by Andy Warhol, he is perhaps one of the representative artists who made the transition from street art to canvas. He represented the marginalized, the unexpected, the one's outside of the box of culture but still permeated with their own sense of style and culture. They were the one's outside of the art world. The marginalized. The analogy is the art world to Tillich's 'Ultimate Concern', the 'Unimaginable.' If we cannot find anything new or any fresh possibilities, what does shake the box is the work from what has been marginalized. Another good example is hip hop, which generated new styles of music, art, and dance.
So I would beg the question of what the 'Ultimate Concern' for the present culture would be. Does an 'immediate concern' collapse with an 'ultimate concern' and is in fact that concern? If we are strained by the broad range of possibilities of capitalism such that it inhibits the imagination to the extent that we can no longer envision what a utopia would be, does not the act of questioning and threatening 'art' and the marginalized shake-up of the box not give possibilities and imagination to the unimaginable? Is it not time to reconsider what the 'Ultimate Concern' is and perhaps look to the marginalized thinkers for what may be the realm of the 'unimaginable'?
