Telos and Metanarratives

One of the movements I am tracing in this conversation between Queer Theology and Spiritual Formation is the loss of telos. This Greek word refers to the purpose, end, the state of flourishing any being is meant to exemplify. The telos of a watch is generally to tell time accurately; it may be digital or analog, clad in gold or plastic, but if it at a glance it supplies you the hour and minute and even second, then it is a good example of its kind. (In some situations the telos of a watch, however, may be status, so that the gold band and precision of the gear works are inseparable from its function in context.) If you wish to see the telos of a dog I point you to the example of Arete, my German Shepherd-yellow lab mix, who lives up to her name (virtue).

Telos seems essential from the reference of spiritual formation; for, if we think there is a character being shaped within us, we must have an idea of what shape would be good to take on, a telos for humanity. But this is just what Queer Theory would push back against, citing the ways these norms become oppressive and diminish our awareness of the flux and instability of human experience and expression. Indeed, telos is out of vogue for most modern and postmodern philosophy, and theology is running along to catch up.

One of the threads I would trace in this development is the movement of narrative in moral discernment. For, as Alasdair MacIntyre argues in After Virtue, those moral theories which take telos into account always lean on a wider narrative structure for practical reasoning. One can’t just make general rules or principles; to discern the good, one must take into account one’s situation, context, supply a narrative (who am I, what would goodness mean for one in my role, what kinds of obstacles or challenges are at play, what tensions in need of resolution) in order to make specific applications.

But narrative, too, has become suspect, with postmodern theorists like Derrida and Foucault emphasizing the way grand meta-narratives — stories providing context and meaning to all of human life and action — are usually a cloak that obscure power dynamics.

I would trace a general movement in Western culture, from narrative to meta-narrative, to incredulity toward meta-narrative, in broad terms as follows:

What I will want to argue is that stages 4 and 5 are entirely correct to reject the monolithic attempts at Universal Reason of stage 3, and that we should indeed again embrace the nature of our stories as local and contextual, rather than universal. But what I will also want to suggest is that this does not prevent us from having and providing good reasons for holding that our story in some way describes reality accurately, to the best of our ability as limited human agents. The conversation between alternative stories turns out to be essential to having good reasons for holding our particular story as true. I will also want to suggest that it is best for Queer, oppressed and marginal voices for us to have a means of moral discernment between competing narratives, because only then can their voices truly count in shifting horizons toward a more adequate and more nuanced conception of human telos.

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