Film review: "1946: The Mistranslation That Shifted Culture"

Coming soon: Day by day reports from the Congress for the New Urbanism. Check back often... don't miss a paragraph!

Source: lgbtq.yale.edu

1946, a documentary film made in 2022 by Sharon "Rocky" Roggio, refers to the fateful decision by the committee producing the Revised Standard Version of the Bible to render two Greek words in I Corinthians 6:9 as the single word "homosexuals," thus including gays and lesbians with "the immoral, nor idolators, nor adulterers" and others as the "unrighteous [who] will not inherit the kingdom of God." I saw her film at St. Stephen's Lutheran Church in Cedar Rapids.

Watching "1946" at St. Stephen's Cburch

1946 is not about the translation itself, the origins of which remain mysterious even in the committee's archives at Yale University, but about those of us who live in its aftermath. We meet Roggio herself, a lesbian who struggles to maintain her family relationship even as her father becomes a prominent anti-gay preacher; Kathy Baldock, whose dogged research provides the basis for the film's argument; Ed Oxford, a gay theology scholar who works with her; and Davis S., whose 1959 letter documented the committee's error, prior to a long career as a pastor in the United Church of Canada. Each suffers some impacts from the dominant theological interpretation.

Their inquiries are supported throughout the film by a number of biblical scholars, most memorably Rabbi Steven Greenberg, author of Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition (Wisconsin, 2004), whose reflection on the phrase "Fuck you" I will be pondering for a long time.

By the time (1969) the RSV committee, spurred by Davis S.'s criticism, voted to change their translation from "homosexuals" to "sexual perverts," the horse was out of the barn. Other versions of the Bible, like the New International Version and the Living Bible, continued to follow the RSV's use of "homosexuals," and today are in much wider use than the RSV and its successor versions. In fact, according to the film, the Living Bible added five more references to "homosexuals" that don't appear in the RSV.

My third grade presentation Bible, Revised Standard Version

The scholars walk us through the context that is often lost when people quote other Biblical passages that have been used to condemn homosexuality: the destruction of Sodom in Genesis 19 with its echo in Judges 19, a series of verses in Leviticus 18 and 20 known as "the clobber verses," Romans 1:26-27. They argue that the verses condemn sexual exploitation and/or decadent living, not to same-sex relationships.

The personal focus of the film, even as it works through the minutiae of biblical translation and interpretation, is essential. As I wrote concerning Pope Francis a few days ago, so much changes when we make the subject people rather than rules. 1946 clearly shows the damage done by biblical interpretation that casts out gays and lesbians. I don't know, however, that they make the case that the committee "shifted culture" with their decision. As another viewer at St. Stephen's--it was Jonathan Ice, in case you happen to know him--noted, "Homophobia was not invented in 1946." 

But the committee's chosen language was certainly handy in the 1970s when the burgeoning gay rights movement met with backlash. It was 1972, for example, when the United Methodist Church added a statement that homosexuality was "incompatible" with Christian teaching to its Book of Discipline. The 1970s saw the emergence of the Moral Majority, Christian Broadcasting Network, National Christian Action Coalition, and other organizations that the Republican Party led by Ronald Reagan skillfully wove into its electoral coalition. They had the RSV language to draw on, but orthodox Christians and political opportunists probably could have made just as much hay with previous constructions.

I don't know, either, how many minds will be changed by 1946. Textual criticism of the Bible has been suspect in a lot of believers' eyes since its emergence in the latter half of the 19th century. However, I think Sharon Roggio's careful presentation provides a path to reconciliation for those who are increasingly troubled by what they've been taught the Bible says. It surely provides assurance to Christians, like young Sharon and young Ed Oxford, who feel cast out of the presence of God by their sexuality.

So, what did English-language Bibles say before 1946? Fortunately, I have a small collection of my family's pre-RSV Bibles. Here's how they render I Corinthians 6:9-10.

Both my mom and my mother-in-law received presentation Bibles in the King James Version:

Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind. Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

My dad received the Standard American edition of the Revised Version (1901), which varied only slightly from the original King James Version but with possible significance:

Or know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with men...

My copy of The Bible: An American Translation (1935) was formerly owned by my Uncle Ralph and Aunt Margaret:

Do you not know that wrongdoers will not have any share in God's kingdom? Do not let anyone mislead you. People who are immoral or idolaters or adulterers or sensual or given to unnatural vice or thieves or greedy--drunkards, abusive people, robbers--will not have any share in God's kingdom.

The oldest non-KJV translation I found at my church's library was A New Translation by James Moffatt (1935 edition):

What! Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the Realm of God? Make no mistake about it, neither the immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor catamites nor sodomites nor thieves nor the lustful nor the drunken nor the abusive nor robbers will inherit the Realm of God.

"Catamites" are, it turns out, the victims of homosexual pedophiles. Based on the scholarship in 1946, that is a worse translation of the Greek than the RSV.  

Whatever the translation you're consulting, if you want to find the whole population of gays and lesbians on those lists, you'll find them, however uncharitable your quest. As for the "clobber verses," Leviticus spends at least as much time on menstruating women than it arguably does on homosexual men (not lesbians, interestingly). "If a man lies with a woman during her period, and uncovers her nakedness, he has laid bare her flow, and she has laid bare her flow of blood; both of them shall be cut off from their people" (Lev. 20:18, NRSV). Any attempt to make that the foundation of a doctrinal schism, such as the United Methodists lately have experienced, would be ridiculous. If we as a society can get used to the idea that some of us menstruate, we can get used to the idea of same-sex relationships.

SEE ALSO: "Film Review: Stonewall Uprising," 28 June 2015

"1946" official website: 1946 | The Mistranslation that Shifted a Culture

Movie trailer (1:22):

My speech to the graduates

Canvassing for a Vote by William Bingham (1852)

In early April, I was invited by Coe's chapter of Phi Kappa Phi honor society to address their annual induction ceremony and banquet, on a topic of my choice. Of course, it was going to have something to do with urbanism. The motto of Phi Kappa Phi is "Let the love of learning rule humanity."

A complete community constituted out of several villages, once it reaches the limit of total self-sufficiency, practically speaking, is a city-state (polis). It comes to be for the sake of living, but it remains for the sake of living well.... Hence, though an impulse toward this sort of community exists by nature in everyone, whoever first established one was responsible for the greatest of goods.--ARISTOTLE, The Politics, 1252b25, 1253a30 

Have you ever noticed how you feel different in different places? Maybe it's because of the things that are there to do, or the people you're with. Or maybe it's different qualities of the places themselves.

About 15 years ago, I began teaching a first-year seminar called A Sense of Place. The more I taught the course, the more I read about the phenomenon of place, and the more I encountered a vocabulary of sorts describing how places are put together and why that matters:

• blocks of buildings that are built to the street are more welcoming than when they're stuck behind swaths of parking lots
• buildings with first-story windows are more welcoming than when they present blank walls (like garages)
• buildings that look timeless or historic are more welcoming than buildings that look like they were thrown up yesterday and might not be here tomorrow--and if they actually are historic, they can provide familiarity
  
• wide streets with fast cars are less productive than narrow streets with slow cars
• in general, areas built to human scale--in other words, accessible to people walking--are more welcoming and more productive than areas built to auto-scale

Now, my 20s were by far the most mobile, peripatetic decade of my life, and perhaps you are about to find that, too, to be the case. It can take awhile to find your place in the world, and you can be, as I often was, thrown back on yourself, working through temporary jobs and temporary leases and friends of convenience. But I hope that even amidst the unsettledness, you will take time to notice the place (or places) where you find yourself. I hope that you will come to understand the attributes of good places, to appreciate them, and even to look for them. 

All that will make you a deeper, more informed consumer of places. But I'm not here to advocate consumerism, even the deeper variety. I'm here to advocate citizenship.

We hear a lot about citizenship these days, but rarely in a way that guides our ways in life. Maybe citizenship comes up in the context of the convoluted set of rules that automatically winnow us in because we were born in the United States, while winnowing out immigrants who have to figure out this system while also navigating the turbulence of their own lives. At most, maybe we're asked to stand for the national anthem or get teary when someone mentions the troops.

Well, you should stand for the national anthem, and you should at least appreciate when people commit a large chunk of their lives to service. But there's more to citizenship than that...

Aristotle (384-322 BCE)

One of the earliest, and still one of the best, discussions of citizenship is in Book III of Aristotle's The Politics. Aristotle starts by rejecting definitions of "citizenship" based on residence or legal status; he eventually works round to the idea that "citizen" is not something that one is but something that one does. 

Comparing a community to a ship under sail, Aristotle argues that a citizen--like an oarsman, or a lookout, or a captain--contributes their distinctive skills to the collective effort, but what unites them all is their concern for the well-being of the community--because it is in a strong community that we live our best lives. "A good citizen," says Aristotle, "must have the knowledge and ability both to be ruled and to rule, and this is the virtue of a citizen, to know the rule of free people from both sides" (1277b15). Sometimes you make decisions, sometimes you act on decisions made by others, but both ways you are responsible to a group of people who aren't you, in a place common to you all.

And why do you do this? Why would you do this? Because this is what makes your life better, what makes your life worth living. Aristotle's whole Politics begins with the claim that communities are formed for "the good life"--a quality of life that people are unable to attain on their own, or even in small like-minded groups. 

In the diversity of a large community with all the different skills and ideas and possibilities, our world is broadened in delightful and surprising ways. People who turn their backs on these possibilities, out of fear or narrowness or egoism, miss out on a lot of what life has to offer. "Anyone who cannot form a community with others," concludes Aristotle, "or who does not need to because he is self-sufficient, is no part of a city-state--he is either a beast or a god" (1253a25).

Jose Antonio Vargas (from joseantoniovargas.com)

Depending on which first-year seminar you had, you might have read Jose Antonio Vargas's book Dear America [Dey Street, 2018]. Starting with the subtitle, "Notes of an Undocumented Citizen," Vargas expresses Aristotle's idea of citizenship as a life of participation in community: Citizenship is showing up. Citizenship is using your voice while making sure you hear other people around you. Citizenship is how you live your life. Citizenship is resilience (Vargas 2018: 199-200).

And all that participation and resilience occur in a place. The citizen not only understands and appreciates the qualities of their place, they contribute to making that place better for everyone around them. Maybe you'll teach, or coach basketball, or join a church, or help plant a community garden, or be a regular at a nearby bar or coffeehouse. When you escape the bubble of self-concern that politicians and corporations are always trying to put you in, when you are part of a diverse community, when you worry less about the price of toys or not being able to find a parking place, you will be on the way to the good life.

[I realize what I'm saying here sounds like a challenge, or even a reproof. But I really mean it to be an invitation--to a much richer life than you get from consumption, or achieving individual autonomy, or following "the rules"... whatever they are.]

I feel the need to say this tonight, because as we all know, the siren song of individualism is strong. Sometimes it's born of our own impatience and frustration, but a lot of times it's being used to sell something... some thing we don't need and maybe shouldn't have. In this world we are surrounded by messages telling us we will be happier when we think more about ourselves, because we deserve a better lifestyle--more fun, hipper clothes, better-tasting beer, all with free parking for my new car which by the way is guaranteed to turn the heads of my sourest neighbors. 

Sometimes all we have to do is vote for the candidate who promises to take what we deserve away from whoever has it now, and give it to us, the people who should have had it all along. But more often than not, a product is being sold, or a collection of products, like the homebuyers with their "must-haves" on the cable network HGTV. We are consumers! In a market system! Our job as consumers is to demand! Everything we have, everywhere we go, should have the attributes that we demand. Supplying is the job of the rest of the world.

Detail from The Temptations of Jesus (1481-1482)
by Sandro Botticelli (c. 1445-1510)

Rugged individualism-with-cool-new-stuff is an attractive illusion now, and probably always will be with us in some form. Even Jesus had to deal with it.... It's a strange story, about the one Christians believe is the Son of God, but it appears in two of the four gospels [Matthew 4:1-11, Luke 4:1-13] and is mentioned in a third [Mark 1:12-13], so it must be important. Before Jesus begins his earthly ministry, he is driven out to the wilderness where he fasts for 40 days--that's Bible-speak for "a really long time"--and is tempted by Satan. Satan invites Jesus to turn stones into bread, to accept power over all the kingdoms of the world, and to throw himself off a high place to see if angels would catch him. Each time Satan tempts him, Jesus refuses, with a well-chosen verse from the Torah thrown in for good measure. Eventually the Devil gives up.

A story like this has a lot of dimensions, and a lot of potential meanings. I think it is intended to show Jesus's essential humanity--that while on earth he dealt with the same fears, the same needs, the same desires we all do. The political philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) called them "gain, glory and security," the three reasons humans are inclined to "invade" or act violently towards one another. In the wilderness, Satan offered Jesus ways--corrupt ways, but ways--to satisfy those needs. In each temptation, Satan was inviting Jesus to fulfill his own desires, to relieve his own suffering, to enjoy himself for once, and in all things to think of himself first.

Just like Jesus, we get hungry. The challenge is when we get so hungry, or frightened, or frustrated, that we act to the detriment of others.

Moreover, a lot of the time, your ability to act for the greater good is constrained by public policy decisions made long ago. (Try living car-free in Cedar Rapids!)

For example...

• For decades American towns have been marred by traffic engineering efforts to move motor vehicles through them faster, turning livable places into "auto sewers" (cf. Marohn 2021). Interstates have been built through what were once thriving neighborhoods--think I-94 in Chicago or Minneapolis, or I-380 here for that matter--where mostly nonwhite residents lacked the political power to protect themselves or their places. Elsewhere, widened city streets encourage vehicles to go faster, resulting in higher numbers of pedestrian deaths. And traffic still is terrible.
  
• Franchise chain operations proliferate, often abetted by local policy favors (cf. Mitchell 2006), though there's plenty of documentation that locally-owned small businesses keep more money in the community. I understand the attraction to local public officials of big projects with "game-changing" impacts, and the attachment people have to brands like Red Robin or Starbucks, yet those places don't build our communities the way local business does.
• Do you hunger to look good at a low low price? Last week a nearby church showed the 2015 documentary The True Cost, which depicts the heavy environmental, social and health costs borne by people around the world--particularly in textile-producing places like Bangladesh, Haiti and Vietnam--by so-called "fast fashion" sold in stores like H & M. The low prices we pay at these stores come at substantial cost to others.

Even when structures force our hand, as educated people, we at least have the obligation as well as the ability to think about changing policy when we can, and in the meantime about the consequences of our decisions beyond our narrow desires. 

So what am I selling here, self-denial and privation? Good heavens, no, I'm not as sad a sack as all that. As an introvert, I'm not opposed to autonomy, either. But as educated people, we know that autonomy is not ultimately fulfilling, any more than stuff or privilege is. As both Aristotle and the authors of the gospels knew, the good life is unthinkable outside of community. What brings people the most joy, the most inspiration, and all the skills we ourselves don't possess is... other people. Other people! And that includes family, friends, neighbors, random encounters with strangers--everyone who populates our community. 

I hope you will find pleasure in your lives, that you will find plenty of enjoyment and amusement and love and security and rest. I hope, if you drive, you'll have some place convenient to park your car. But as a professor, for a few more weeks at least, I'm here to profess something, and what I'm professing is this: Don't settle for going through life as a consumer. Be a citizen. 

SEE ALSO: 

"Young People of Today, Embrace Walkable Urbanism!" 22 April 2022

"Jesus in the Polis?" 16 August 2013

2022 homily on the temptations of Christ by Pope Francis

Economic development--how cities differ

 

(Source: fpccr.org. Used without permission.)

I

Are there moral imperatives in local economic development policy? In August I will be speaking to First Presbyterian Church about this very topic. First Presbyterian has also asked presenters in this series to consider the question: "What role does economic inequality play in causing positive changes?"  I could, I suppose, stick to summarizing some of the issues and policy options, and let the Presbyterians make their own moral connections, but where would be the sport in that?

As I wrote in 2013, the Bible, particularly the Christian Bible (a.k.a. the New Testament), has very little to say about the city as an institution. The earliest Christians were far from the seats of power, and neither Jesus nor Paul nor any of their comrades have much to say on the subject of social, political or economic arrangements. Though the fellowship of the earliest Christians is intriguing to ponder (see Acts 2:42-47), probably the best New Testament description of a fully-fledged city is the New Jerusalem in the Book of Revelation:

Then he said to me, "It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life. Those who conquer will inherit these things, and I will be their God, and they will be my children. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, the murderers, the sexually immoral, the sorcerers, the idolaters, and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death. (Rev 21:6-8, NRSV)

Darveza Gas Crater, Turkmenistan
(Wikipedia Creative Commons)

It is difficult to find lessons for today's earthly city in John's post-apocalyptic vision, particularly if the city's infrastructure does not include a lake that burns with fire and sulfur. If God provides for all immediate material and emotional needs, while anyone who doesn't fit in--that's quite the list, is it not?--is sent off to second death, it definitely simplifies much of the planner's job. The everyday citizen would need to be watching every step, though! The implications for city building of verse 8 (and, indeed, the vaster part of the preceding 20 chapters) are alarming. The Book of Revelation has its devoted following, but I am not among them. 

So for spiritual guidance on urban matters I find myself turning to the Hebrew Bible. The people of Israel were self-governing for most of the time period it covers. And God has some things to say about governing in the course of these 39 books, including this version of the New Jerusalem spoken by the prophet Zechariah:

Thus says the Lord: I will return to Zion and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem; Jerusalem shall be called the faithful city, and the mountain of the Lord of hosts shall be called the holy mountain. Thus says the Lord of hosts: Old men and old women shall again sit in the streets of Jerusalem, each with staff in hand because of their great age. And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets. Thus says the Lord of hosts: Even though it seems impossible to the remnant of this people in these days, should it also seem impossible to me, says the Lord of hosts? Thus says the Lord of hosts: I will save my people from the east country and from the west country, and I will bring them to live in Jerusalem. They shall be my people and I will be their God, in faithfulness and in righteousness. (Zech 8:2-8, NRSV)

Boys and girls playing in the streets: Mississauga School Streets Project
(Swiped from 880cities.org. Used without permission.)

As I read this, Zechariah sounds a lot like Guillermo Penalosa. Gathering people together, with particular concern for 80-year-old "old men and old women" and 8-year-old "boys and girls"--and in other parts of the Scriptures, for widows, orphans, day-laborers, and refugees--it is fair to argue that God cares about both the material well-being of God's people and their opportunities to enjoy life, and is particularly concerned about the weakest and most vulnerable. (See also Isaiah 1-12 esp 1:17, 5:8, and the condemnation of bad use of power in 10:1-4.) To the extent we urbanist-believers have influence in our city we ought to seek to make it prosperous, safe and inclusive. (See the discussion of human thriving, environmental stewardship, and justice in Jacobson 2012: 215-238.)

II

Today cities face age-old questions of how to arrange common social, economic and political life, but while dealing with a novel historical context, including rapid economic change, climate change, uncertain government finances, and huge sunk costs in unproductive suburban development.

Development pattern:

• After World War II a huge wave of residential and commercial development in suburban areas drew white residents and retailers away from central cities. Central city populations became on average older, poorer, and more nonwhite, with lower educational attainment.
• In an auto-centric world, with people and destinations increasingly spread out, it has been difficult to resolve traffic congestion, keep streets in good repair, or supply alternatives like mass transit. Meanwhile, much potentially-productive land in the center of town has been given over to surface parking lots.

Parking crater, Charlotte city center, June 2023

Economy/jobs:

• The industrial era of the American economy ended rather abruptly in the 1970s, with employment shifts away from manufacturing to the broad service sector. Service includes well-remunerated STEM jobs, of course, but also retail and hospitality positions that pay much less well than factory work did. Economic inequality within and between places is as large as it's been in a century (see Piketty 2014).
• Technology has allowed industry and commerce to cross state and national lines to an increasing degree (globalization), offering more choice to consumers, but also creating a winner-take-all economy in which workers and firms and towns have to tread water faster to keep from drowning. 
• The mechanization of agriculture has drastically reduced the need for farm labor, which had formed the basis of many small towns. This has led in most cases to shrinking and aging populations while decimating local economies.
• Small business starts, despite encouraging recent data, have been impeded by single-use zoning, development patterns, the difficulty of attaining start-up capital, and the structure of health care and retirement systems.

16th Avenue SW, 2018:
Obsolete big box retail spaces, like industrial sites, blight the landscape

Other social policy challenges:

• Climate change has brought a variety of weather-related crises, with the threat of more and worse in the future, leading to exponentially increasing refugee flows. 
• Housing is in short supply everywhere, especially but not limited to booming metros like Atlanta and Charlotte. Increasing the supply is politically difficult because it threatens the value of existing housing for many families, and is perceived to threaten their quality of life as well.
• Though violent crime decreased dramatically across America between 1990 and 2015, it has since flared up in some places. Police relations with poor and minority populations have been strained by a series of incidents like the 1992 beating of Rodney King and the 2020 strangulation of George Floyd.
• The resurgence of some central cities since 2005 has provided an influx of people and resources in under-invested areas (gentrification), but the benefits have not been widely shared and relations between newer and longtime residents are often strained.
• The COVID-19 pandemic exposed vulnerabilities in our settlement patterns, health care systems, and office-service-based downtown economies. (See Loh 2023, Anderson 2023.)

Civil rights protest, Cedar Rapids, 2020

Political context:

• Misfortunes and mistakes have left most cities' finances vulnerable, and older cities in particular are dealing with huge repair bills for aging infrastructure. (See Marohn 2020.) 
• In the American federal system, city policy choices are constrained by state governments, particularly in states like Iowa where the state legislative majority perceives cities to be alien places. (See Riverstone-Newell 2017, Daigneau 2017.) 
• In particular, the national and state governments have preempted revenue from income and sales taxes, leaving most towns unable to capitalize on economic activity in their places.
• Traditional American cultural cynicism towards government has become more ingrained and affects local as well as national government.

Cedar Rapids Washington High School, 2016:
Proposed sidewalk draws outrage

III

The reasons for the existence of towns--economic opportunity, quality of life, and security for all its citizens--haven't changed since the days of Isaiah and Zechariah and Aristotle. Cities have always had to respond to economic challenges. In the 20th century, economic change to improve the lives of all individuals seemed more possible, but today, in the face of these recent trends, towns' capacities to achieve their goals is uncertain.

In a 2016 post, I reviewed a number of ways American cities were trying to change their economic fortunes. Now we can revisit that set of policy options, with these criteria for what it means for those policies to "work." 

Local economic policies can be sorted several ways:

• Supply-side policies seek to improve areas' attractiveness to investors by reducing costs; demand-side policies seek to improve existing qualities of the area, or better communicate what's already there.
• Narrow benefits target resources at a small number of recipients, anticipating that their actions will in turn result in better outcomes for all. Broad benefits are less targeted, but more people have access to the program's benefits. Typically programs with broad benefits are less dramatic and maybe even less visible, but they also can be more resilient in the face of economic, environmental or political changes. (See this site plugging broadly-based "economic gardening.")
• Scalability, like resilience, are criteria for long-term success. If the program succeeds, can it be repeated or expanded? Once the program is implemented, will there be additional ongoing maintenance costs? What happens if some of the assumptions behind the program are mistaken? 

It's worth noting that nothing works or fails to work everywhere, so the takeaway from this post is going to be complicated. But if you've been reading this blog for any length of time, it will come as no surprise that I'm plugging demand-side policies with broad benefits and demonstrable scalability and resilience. Those are the ones that are best suited to benefit all members of the community, and best adaptable to financial and environmental stress.

Supply-side policies, narrow benefits

(1) Financial incentives. Since the peak of the industrial age towns have pursued large firms with tax benefits, subsidies, and land grants. The poster child for this is the circus engineered a few years ago by Amazon's search for a secondary headquarters. The idea is that large employers bring a pile of jobs, and potentially increase quality of life for residents (more interesting recreational choices, better infrastructure, e.g.). However, sad stories have become common, when businesses fail to achieve the promised outcomes, or to make a long-term commitment to the community. Pennsylvania invested $90 million in the 1970s to lure a Volkswagen plant that closed in ten years; three decades later Ohio provided $123 million to Amazon distribution centers where wages were so low 10 percent of employees qualified for food stamps (Preuss 2021: 33-37). The advocacy group Good Jobs First estimates state and local incentives average $456,000 per job created. Not resilient, not scalable, not inclusive. (See also Cortright 2016, Badger 2014, Zimmerman 2011, Swenson and Eathington 2002.)

Supply-side policies, potentially broad benefits

(2) Regulatory relief. Towns can also pursue firms by reducing the amount of regulations businesses must follow. The logic is the same--make your place more attractive by lowering the cost of doing business--but in this case there are efficiencies to be gained that can facilitate economic activity more broadly. Zoning restrictions (Gray 2022), parking minima (Grabar 2023), and licensing requirements can inhibit the development of walkable neighborhoods and inhibit the restoration of historic buildings. A presentation at the last Congress for the New Urbanism highlighted the use of pre-approved housing plan packages in Spokane, Washington, which are intended to streamline the development process (cf. Steuteville 2023). [P.S. Another article on pre-approved housing plans adopted by Groveland, Florida has appeared on Strong Towns (Abramson 2023).]

All regulations have reasons for existing, so the benefits and costs of deregulation ought to be carefully considered, but sometimes deregulation is a good course of action. Can be resilient, scalable, and inclusive.

Demand-side policies, narrow benefits

(3) Big attractions. The attraction of "game-changing" big amenities like casinos, stadiums, and convention centers is easy to understand but difficult to justify. With exceptions of hotels in existing tourist towns like Las Vegas and Orlando, cities rarely make back their initial investment, and benefits don't reach most people. Where people are displaced, as with the removal of housing to create the sports complex in downtown Washington, people who lack political power are directly harmed. Not resilient, questionably scalable, inclusive only if you like gaming or sports or conventions.

Hotel and concert socialism? the City of Cedar Rapids retains ownership
of the Doubletree Hotel and Alliant Energy Power House

(Museums would go here, too, but the research is more mixed on their effects.)

(4) Eds and meds. The benefits to the city of higher education institutions and major health care centers are clearer. (See Mallach and Brachman 2013, Abel and Deltz 2009.)   Both are labor-intensive (cf. Dorsey 2016), have sunk costs in their campuses, and universities can produce spinoff businesses and spur development of adjacent areas. In contrast to a tech company or auto manufacturer, they are unlikely to decamp for happier shores. Not everyone can be a doctor or professor, of course, and higher education is going through some changes right now; although flagship universities seem exempt, it seems likely that both markets can become saturated at the regional level. Impact is uncertain: Cleveland and Baltimore are national health care centers but still struggling as cities. 

(5) Cultural openness to diversity. Richard Florida in particular [Who's Your City, Basic Books 2008] has argued that an open social culture attracts the "creative class," his term for the knowledge workers who make the economy go in the 21st century. You could argue that an open culture provides broad benefits, because people in marginalized groups could benefit even if they're not creative types. Resilient and scaleable, arguably inclusive.

Demand-side policies, broad benefits

(6) Place marketing. Cities can identify advantages they already have, develop them, and amplify them through place branding and place marketing. (See the profusely-illustrated Ward 1998.) These can include accidents of history--why is Charlotte a transportation and financial center and Seattle a tech hub?--natural attractions like mountains and lakes, thick labor markets (many employers and workers of diverse types), and nationwide reputation. This is going to be easier for a successful city than a struggling place like Baltimore, St. Louis, or rural Iowa.

Cedar Rapids will have a new, magnet high school
with a downtown location starting fall 2023

(7) Educated work force. Cities can seek to improve education, of a technical nature as well as K-12 education, as a means of improving the attractiveness and potential of their work forces. (See Naik et al. 2015.) Richard Florida, again, this time from a speech in Michigan last month (Saunders 2023): 

This once-in-a-century transformation is both an enormous opportunity and an existential challenge for the state as it faces growing competition in these critical new technologies from high-tech hubs across the United States and the world. To ensure the long-run prosperity of its industries, communities, and people, Michigan must focus its economic development strategy on bolstering and aligning the capabilities of its leading corporations, universities, and startups in critical transformational technologies. As importantly, if not more so, the state must enhance its strategies for generating, retaining, and attracting the talent required to compete in this new economic environment.”

(8) Neighborhood development. Cities can support viable core neighborhoods (Mallach and Brachman 2013: 24-29). Walkable core neighborhoods seem to be in great demand, with condo prices in Cedar Rapids fetching higher price than my house on the toney southeast side. Done wrong, this can funnel money to developers and firms that don't need the help viz. the Opportunity Zones created by the 2017 tax bill (Preuss 2021: 38-42), displace vulnerable residents through gentrification, and/or build redundant retail space that goes unused (Loh 2023, Preuss 2021: 44-47). My reading of the Loh article is that we a country have built too much retail and not enough housing, and the sudden change in office habits comes on top of this. (For an argument that missing middle housing, often prevented by zoning codes, is often the "sweet spot" for new construction that is both affordable and profitable, see Herriges 2023.)

Still vacant, seven years later:
1115 6th St SE, 2016

Done right, neighborhood development can improve quality of life for all, preserve open spaces, and preclude unproductive sprawl, while allowing the city to ride out whatever work changes are happening (cf. Gehl 2010). Downtowns that are heavily focused on offices can maybe pivot to more residential, though for a variety of reasons (Badger 2023, Abramson 2023) that's not easily done, as some of the bold conversions in our downtown are showing. Boston is trying to facilitate such conversions with massive tax breaks (Woodhouse and Albright 2023).

(9) Local business development. Cities can provide support for local/small businesses as an alternative to looking for a game-changing deal with a big firm. In Stacy Mitchell's 2016 annotated bibliography she concludes:

local and dispersed business ownership strengthens the middle class.... Locally owned businesses employ more people per unit of sales, and retain more employees during economic downturns.... Locally owned businesses are linked to higher income growth and lower levels of poverty.... 

The Institute for Local Self-Reliance lists an array of pro-local business policies, as well as examples of cities where they have succeeded (Mitchell 2017, Donahue Mitchell and LaVecchia 2018; see also LaVecchia 2016 on managing rent surges.) Ilana Preuss (2021: 68-70) commends attention to small-scale manufacturing (of whatever can be packaged and sold e.g. hardware, handbags, hot sauce), typically an existing local asset that is not being leveraged, which can create a sense of place while providing inclusive employment.

Metro trails network is fun and soon to be fully functional

(10) Physical improvements can make a place more functional for everyone as well as more attractive to investors, employers, and potential residents. These can include improvements to streets, transit lines (Higashide 2019), telecommunications, plenteous public realm like parks and squares (Garvin 2019, Rose 2016 ch. 7), street trees, and pedestrian/cycling infrastructure (Speck 2012 esp steps 5-8). Return-on-investment should be rigorously questioned; a lot of these projects have visual appeal for politicians but streets in particular have long-term environmental and financial impacts (Marohn 2020) that are easy to overlook in the initial euphoria. Streets should be built or rebuilt inclusively, i.e. with the safety of all users in mind, not merely as a conduit for motor vehicles (Marohn 2021, Schmitt 2020).

Framed this way, the prescription is for a series of small-scale policies with broadly-distributed benefits i.e. that aim to improve opportunities for the most vulnerable citizens, and to improve the climate for small business starts and growth.

IV

Thomas Piketty

By now the patience of the hardiest reader is exhausted, and we still have yet to consider the church's question "What role does economic inequality play in causing positive changes?" I'll settle for referring you to my 2014 review of Thomas Piketty's Capital in the Twenty-First Century (Belknap/Harvard, 2014), which amounts to an extended musing on the other side of the coin i.e. at what point is inequality a problem? Some degree of inequality is probably inevitable; even the most idealistic example in this chart has 30 percent of the wealth owned by 10 percent of the population. Inequality may even be functional, as a reward for initiative or socially valuable work, and as a pool for investment or philanthropy. 

Inequality becomes problematic when the wealthy are able to buy political power to sustain their advantages, to skew production to luxury goods for the over necessities, and to preclude the opportunity for the rest of the population to advance; arguably the U.S. is at that point now, at least it seems so to me.

SOURCES WITHOUT LINKS

Eric O. Jacobsen, The Space Between: A Christian Engagement with the Built Environment (Baker Academic, 2012)

Ilana Preuss, Recast Your City: How to Save Your Downtown with Small-Scale Manufacturing (Island, 2021)

Jonathan F.P. Rose, The Well-Tempered City: What Modern Science, Ancient Civilizations, and Human Nature Tell Us About the Future of Urban Life (HarperWave, 2016)

Jeff Speck, Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time (Farrar Straus and Giroux, 2012)

Stephen V. Ward, Selling Places: The Marketing and Promotion of Towns and Cities, 1850-2000 (E & FN Spon, 1998)

10th Anniversary Post: Neighbors

The complete community, formed from several villages, is a city-state (polis), which comes to be for the sake of living, but it remains in existence for the sake of living well.

--ARISTOTLE, The Politics, Book I chapter 2 (1252b27-30)

You can learn a lot about people when you find out what they mean by the word "we."

--PARKER J. PALMER

July 2013 was not only the last month in which I posted in double digits (10), it was the month in which I received, from Jane Addams via Judith Unger, the felicitous phrase "our common life" to describe what I was writing, as the blog began to coalesce around the theme of community.

Ten years ago this month, I recorded my first encounters with Ray Oldenburg, Parker J. Palmer, and Donald Shoup--quite the month for both mind and heart! Each of them has something to say about our common life, from the third places that bring us together to the parking lots that push us farther apart.

Lake Michigan at sunset, Chicago 2013

I also wrote about the need for quiet spaces in the midst of the city. We need to be engaged, but we also need to rest and relax. In chapter 6 of Happy City: Transforming Our Lives Through Urban Design [Farrar Straus and Giroux, 2013], Charles Montgomery describes a residency in New York's East Village, in which a day of epiphanies was followed by a sleepless night:

The city found its way inside from my very first night. Shortly after turning out the light, I heard laughter on the street. Then singing. Then, as the hours wore on, the singing devolved into sustained, college-grade hollering, then quarreling, and, finally, the choking gurgle of what could only have been full-force vomiting--right beneath my window.... The place began to wear me down.... I would walk in and feel a simultaneous mix of claustrophobia and loneliness. (2013: 124-125)

He concludes: What we need are places that help us moderate our interactions with strangers without having to retreat entirely (2013: 128).  I'd found two or three such places in Chicago.

Parable of the Good Samaritan, by Balthasar von Cortbemde (1647)

Early in July 2013, I posted some reflections on Jesus's parable of the Good Samaritan. By elevating love-of-neighbor to equality with love-of-God as the greatest commandment(s), and then giving a long complex answer to the lawyer's question "Who is my neighbor?" Jesus makes common life a sacred calling. Our circle of care is as wide as we are able to see.

Parker J. Palmer (from couragerenewal.org)

At the end of that post, I asked if neighborly care was a practical as well as moral imperative. I was still asking that question two weeks later when I posted about Palmer's joint appearance in Cedar Rapids with the singer Carrie Newcomer. Ten years later, I've come to the conviction that it is both of those. Palmer argues that when evils befall us in this life, as they inevitably do, our hearts can be broken open (to compassion for and community with others) or broken apart (withdrawing into anger and alienation). It's the first way that enables life to go on in the face of depression, illness, loss, and injury. 

We not only have a moral duty to care for those around us, but doing so is part of the civic engagement that makes us more fully human. By caring for our neighbors, we enable ourselves to live well.

SEE ALSO: Parker J. Palmer, Healing the Heart of Democracy: The Courage to Create a Politics Worthy of the Human Spirit (Jossey-Bass, 2014)

Lyz Lenz, "We All Need Somebody Somewhere," Men Yell at Me, 5 July 2023

Post No. 400: Thorns in my urbanist side

"Sermon of St. Paul Amidst the Ruins" by Giovanni Paolo Pannini (1691-1765) (Wikimedia commons)

Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me... (2 Corinthians 12:7b-8, NRSV)

Paul described himself as being plagued by a (surely metaphorical) thorn in part of a long passage where he defended himself against critics in the church he had established in the Greek city of Corinth. What was that pesky thorn? Leaving aside sci-fi explanations (Gooder 2006), it could have been a chronic illness, a physical disability, one or more persistent critics, or even homosexuality (Spong 1992; a long list of historians' conjectures is in J. Paul Sampley, "The Second Letter to the Corinthians," in The New Interpreter's Bible [Nashville: Abingdon, 2000], XI, 162-168).

Whatever it was, Paul clearly felt it was important to God that it remain (v. 9), and that it served the function of keeping him "from being too elated." As he traveled the Mediterranean world, convincing people to become Christians, his message arguably was made more effective because the Christian life was (somehow) not easy for him, either.

Having taken this blog into its eighth year, and today reaching another milestone post, I remain committed to the urbanist approach to place making. Yet though I may spray words into the Internet like the Trump administration spraying tear gas into our cities, I should tell you that living my urbanism has not been as easy as I would like. Urbanist solutions, it would seem, are easier said that done, and it's important that I know this. It's important for you, beloved reader, to know that I know this.

1. I am an introvert. I have handled the pandemic shutdown--in Iowa, it's been a sort-of-shutdown--with remarkable aplomb because I was already somewhat inclined to social distancing. I don't like crowds, noise, or unstructured social situations, and after awhile being around even nice people tires me. I prefer a quiet evening at home, and have rather enjoyed the extent to which the pandemic has forced more of these to occur. Enough of such evenings adds up to a boring life, and I understand the need for human interactions of various levels of intensity. I want to help build my city. I wish it weren't so tiring, but it helps me relate to others' reluctance to participate and/or need for places of quiet retreat (See also Kelly 2020).
2. The dementors next door. Urbanism is rooted in strong neighborhoods, and neighborhoods are made out of neighbors. Neighbors are made by everyday interaction, not merely by physical proximity (Marohn 2020). But some people are... difficult. There is, to be specific, one couple in my neighborhood who I avoid as much as I can. Years of complaints, criticism, and unsolicited advice flowing from them to us has made me chary of any encounter I can possibly avoid. That's not very urbanist of me, is it? And yet there remain some people who are toxically negative, violent, manipulative, or hateful (see Peck 1983; Martha Nussbaum, The Monarchy of Fear [Simon & Schuster, 2018], esp. pp. 81-84). The neighboring couple dwell well within my circle of care, but nothing I say or do is going to change them. My own preservation limits my neighborliness.

One thing I missed: coffeehouses. Trying to catch up!

 

So I struggle, and as I do, I recognize that urbanism is not always pleasant or easy. If it were, there would be no need for me to write about it! Speaking of which, the most read posts since April of  '13:

1. A Silent But Needful Protest, 1 November 2016 [Coe College responds to the defacing of Multicultural Fusion posters]
2. Snout Houses? In Oakhill-Jackson??, 16 October 2016 [Suburban style development in a historic Cedar Rapids neighborhood]
3. Crime and Our Common Life, 1 August 2016 [The mysterious rise and fall and possibly now rise of violent crime rates in America]
4. Let's Hear It for Cedar Rapids, 5 September 2016 [The Mayors Bike Ride and everything else going on Labor Day weekend]
5. Gentrification: What Do We Know? 26 July 2016 [literature review analyzing a complex and controversial phenomenon]

And in the interest of balance, the least read posts:

1. City Design after the Pandemic, 3 June 2020 [what might last, what might not]
2. Strong Towns' Bottom Up Revolution (III), 31 March 2020 [covering chapters 5-7 of Charles Marohn's book]
3. Race Relations after the Pandemic (II), 2 September 2020 [responding to the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha]
4. Halloween 2013, 1 November 2013 [Halloween as civic holiday] 
5. Maple Syrup Festival, 1 March 2014 [a community rite of spring in Cedar Rapids!]
6. Interesting Place for a College, 17 April 2014 [a sense of place at Park University]

Whether this is the 400th post you've read, or the first, thanks for sticking with me!

 

The future of religious spaces (VI)

 

Every year about this time, Faith and Form produces its worldwide survey of the best in religious art and architecture--mostly architecture, because "[f]or the second year in a row, the jury was concerned about the low number of Religious Art entries" (Crosbie 2019). It's fascinating, eye-catching, and an opportunity to reflect on the roles religion and religious places play in our common life.

It's also the time when Christians like me celebrate the birth of Jesus. We have appropriated Jewish prophecy like that of Isaiah, who may or may not have been discussing the Messiah when he wrote:

A shoot shall come out of the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.... He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear; but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. (Isaiah 11:1, 3b-4, NRSV)

Hearing these familiar verses again this year, I was struck by the seemingly casual reference to the killing that needed to happen to achieve the peace and justice of the "holy mountain" eventually proclaimed in verse 9. Again with the killing! which seems to be a prerequisite for Biblical promises. God's ways are beyond the scope of this blog, but it altogether too tempting to believe that things will be great once we (the hands of God?) first get rid of all the wicked/idiots/haters/evildoers. This is a prime example of what philosopher Martha Nussbaum (The Monarchy of Fear, Simon & Schuster, 2018, pp. 81-84) calls the "just world hypothesis"--the belief that I would get what I want if I weren't thwarted by bad guys--a worldview that leads to destructive, retributive anger. Instead of anger we need to affirm a common life, right this very minute, to deal with all humanity has to deal with. Excising the other only saps our energy and most likely adds to the evil instead of solving it.

The Christian apostle Paul offers us a rhetorical way out of this trap. In his letter to the Roman church, he writes of the believer dying to sin (see esp. ch. 6). How this death is accomplished seems to be a combination of divine grace, individual effort, and good old-fashioned Christian orthodoxy (see O'Brien 2012). That need not detain us here; we need only to accept that religious language about killing the wicked can apply to the evil within each of us, rather than some definitive expulsion of some individuals for the ultimate happiness of others.

Back to this year's award-winners. Leaving judgments about art and architecture to the professionals, and recognizing that what happens within places is as important as how they're designed, we urbanists can ask: How do the physical features of religious places help us achieve connection in a disconnected world?

One way is to bring us, for a time, away from the world into a place apart. Spectacular sanctuaries, like Boston's Cathedral of the Holy Cross, can achieve that by creating its own world of wonder.

Cathedral of the Holy Cross won an award for renovation

Usually these grand sanctuaries have spectacular acoustics as well, so those who raise their voices in song or prayer become part of a greater whole. Through our encounter with the divine, we are re-centered for life in the world.

Another way is to arrange seating in a circle around the altar, rather than having everyone in the congregation facing the same direction, as in Seattle's St. Anne Church.

St. Anne Church won an award for renovation

Author James F. White (Protestant Worship and Church Architecture, Oxford University Press, 1964) argues this older form, abandoned for awhile, emphasizes communal worship rather than individual emotional reaction in a hierarchical setting. (See especially chapters 4 and 5.) Shifting from my experience to our action also re-orients us to a world of diverse people.

Most urbanist of all is the religious building that is accessible to the street, such as St. Bartholomew's Episcopal Church, which fronts directly onto Park Avenue in Manhattan--a block from the #6 subway line.

St. Bart's Church won a restoration award for its dome, which is not relevant to this post

This is the "meaningful destination easily accessible on foot" commended by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zybeck and Jeff Speck (Suburban Nation, North Point Press, 2010 rev. ed., p. 64). In fact, it contributes to all four of their prerequisites for the street life--meaningful destinations, safe streets, comfortable streets, interesting neighborhood--needed to support community. Contrast that with the award-winning new church, St. Luke the Evangelist in suburban Ankeny, Iowa...

St. Luke the Evangelist Catholic Church

...which opens onto a parking lot accessible from Weigel Drive only by a long driveway. Neither it nor the school next door will ever be walkable. (It's not even clear how you would walk from one to the other.) No one will ever happen by.

Jane Jacobs (The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Random House, [1961] 1993, pp.72-73) waxed eloquent about the social utility of public spaces like sidewalks that are building blocks of connected neighborhoods.

They bring together people who do not know each other in an intimate, private social fashion and in most cases do not care to know each other in that fashion....

The trust of a city street is formed over time from many, many little public sidewalk contacts. It grows out of people stopping by at the bar for a beer, getting advice from the grocer and giving advice to the newsstand man, comparing opinions with other customers at the bakery and nodding hello to the two boys drinking pop on the stoop, eying the girls while waiting to be called for dinner, admonishing the children, hearing about a job from the hardware man and borrowing a dollar from the druggist, admiring the new babies and sympathizing over the way a coat faded....

The sum of such casual public contact at a local level--most of it fortuitous, most of it associated with errands, all of it metered by the person concerned and not thrust upon him by anyone--is a feeling for the public identity of people, a web of public respect and trust, and a resource in time of personal or neighborhood need.

The intentional design of religious places, new and old, architectural wondrous and humbly utilitarian, can contribute substantially to the public identity that will sustain us all through whatever lies ahead. Or not.

Primary Source: Michael J. Crosbie (ed), "2019 International Awards Program for Religious Art and Architecture," Faith and Form 52:4 (2019). All photos are from the article, and are used without permission.

Last Year's Model: "The Future of Religious Spaces (V)," 28 December 2018