All wound up

Christian Century, Dec 10, 1997 by Martin E. Marty

Pelagius came to mind recently as I browsed a Skymall catalog while waiting to deplane. Pelagius and Pelagianism regularly cross the minds of us Augustinians especially we of the Lutheran brand. We worry about those who rely less on grace than on their own "works" for salvation. Could some of my co-deplaners be Pelagian? They might well be if they purchased an item I saw in Skymall. This little catalog is full of items that no one needs and that no one knew they wanted until they saw it in Skymall. The item that caught my eye was designed to be put to work, and it demanded more work. All to supplement what grace would have done.

The item: a Watch Turner. Who needs it? My $29.95 digital timepiece--a nerd's watch, I'm told--uses a little cell that lasts three or four years, usually longer than the metal watch-band Old-fashioned watches that you mindlessly, reflexively wind once a day if you are a semi-Pelagian allow freedom to respond to the grace of timekeeping almost effortlessly.

Skymall explains the benefits of the battery-powered ($63.95) or plug-in ($51.95) Watch Turner. "This unique gift keeps your watch running to the minute and allows the rotor to remain in constant movement when not in wear. The constant motion eliminates the need for resetting the time and date, prevents overwinding and lengthens the overall life span of your watch. It is this movement, similar to that of your wrist, which is reproduced by the MTE Watch Turner."

Let me get this straight. I buy a watch grace-fully designed to save me work, to free me from winding and setting. It assumes I am "in constant movement." My movement shakes the watch enough to serve as a surrogate winder-upper. So far so good. Now Skymall worries about me when I sleep.

This time-saver will require me to decide which of two models to buy, where to ship it and how to explain this package to my family. Every night I shall have to remember to take off my watch. That will steal some of my reading time. I would lose sleep checking on whether my Watch Turner was turning my watch.

What happens when the batteries in my $63.95 version wear out? I will be awakened by the interruptive silence that follows the quitting of my Watch Turner, will have to go to the convenience store and get in line behind all the other sleepy battery-purchasing owners of Watch Turners. And if there's a power outage I will have to get up and shake the $51.95 plug-in version.

I'm puzzled by the claim that the Watch Turner's movement is "similar to that of your wrist." The picture and description suggest that the Watch Turner will simply rotate. Have you ever rotated your wrist, or all of you including your wrist, to keep your watch going?

Augustine, the great enemy of Pelagianism, once said that he always knew what time was, until someone asked. For him timekeeping was easy: one semi-Pelagian effort per hour saw him overturning his hourglass, leaving him free the rest of the time to watch the sand while he wrote anti-Pelagian classics. He would have it much harder now, in a time when labor-saving devices create more labor. He had been converted when he heard a child's voice say, "Tolle, lege," and he "took" and "read" a scripture. His conversion happened in a garden. My deconversion came during deplaning. Goodbye, labor-saving technology.