Western Civ and Christianity

In a comment to the last post CZF (owner of the excellent blog The Relative Comment) asks in response to DT's post:

Earlier in that post DT says that one of the issues is that Christianity is now a minority position in western world. Would you agree with this statement? I think i understand the sentiment, but can think of nothing that could possibly have replaced Christianity as the majority position in the west, and certainly not in the US? Maybe it is leading in a plurality of options a la Bill Clinton, but I struggle to see it as a minority position.

To which I replied:

I think you are right. It is one of many. And perhaps the biggest of any distinct ideology/point of view/worldview. At the same time the thrust of the western world is strongly anti-christian. I don't mean this in a political sense or moral sense. Rather, the values of the western world--money, power, easy living--are much more in line with Greek and Roman thought than Christian thought. The church, in its weakness, falls prey to the idols of the west. In that sense Christianity is a definite minority...often among Christians.

I do this not to just highlight the excellent comment, but to expand upon my point of an inherent tension in the Western World.

Christianity has a unique place and role in the creation of Western Civilization. Unlike the other great civilizations of the world, Western Civ's primary religion (Christianity) has always stood in tension with it's primary cultural roots (Roman/Greek/and a bit of German). Christianity's ideals and way of life are antithetical to the Greek and Roman understanding of the world. Though Christianity became dominant the Roman and Greek way did not disappear, but became subsumed into the culture. Compare this to India, where Hinduism was part an parcel of the growth Indian civilization. Christianity was (and is) foreign to the Greeks, whereas Hinduism was native to India. (Please note, I understand that this is gross oversimplification.)

This "foreignness" has caused problems for the Church. Too often in an effort to be relevant, the Church has given up its Kingdom building mission and done what it could for power and money and easy living. Even today the Church too often let's itself be and succumbs to easy answers and a narrowing mission. In America this means the church focuses on things it feels confident about, usually some sort of moral issue. But it does not ask the difficult questions that may tip apple cart, such as question our economic system, justice, etc...

Better Said

On this blog I ramble and write and tell myself I should edit that before I post it, but never do. Fortunately the internets is pretty big, so folks more eloquent than me will say what I'm trying to say in a much better fashion. Today in the Wall Street Journal, John Wilson (of Books and Culture) writes:

But an alarm should sound whenever the word "literal" is used in this context, whether as a badge of pride ("I just believe in reading the Bible literally") or as a hint that low-browed fundamentalists are lurking nearby. No one—no one—reads the Bible literally. But some readers are more attentive, more faithful, more imaginative and more persuasive than others.

Go read it.

True Literalism

Words get bandied about with no care for shades of meaning. In the Evangelical Christian subculture folks seek to defend their interpretation of the Bible by saying that it is the "literal" reading of the Bible. What they want you to hear is, "I'm just telling you what the Bible says and nothing more, like following directions, it says turn right, so I say, turn right." To say you are "literally" reading the Bible is to convey that you are honest with what the text means.

The problem with this degraded literalism is that context and language gets stripped away. In this literalism we start making connections or points that were not intended by the author (or miss the connections that were intended). We forget the poetry and nuance in language and try to read it all in our post-enlightenment mindset. So the story of Adam and Eve becomes simply a story of "what happened in the beginning" losing the sense of God's purpose in our world. Or we see Jesus' words in Mark 13 applying to only the end times when Jesus was referencing the ancient fall of Babylon and the future fall of Jesus. 

Bad literalism gets us into awkward places, contorting our theology and thought. True literalism helps us experience the Bible in all it's glory and craziness.

More on Trees and a Forest OR Straining the Simile

What I was trying to say in my last post is not just that we miss the forest for the trees, but that we build our Christianity on one particular type of tree. We go into the forest and find the tree most to our liking and then say, "this is the tree of the forest. All trees will be compared to this." We focus on that particular tree and ignore anything else.

Alright. I'm done with that.

Trees and a Forest or "Follow Me"

The forest and the trees. Let me tell you something about them. Sometime you see one, but not the other. And other times you see the other, but not the one. Well, you know how that goes, just pick one or the other.

I thought of the forest and the trees as I was reading Matthew, chapters 18 and 19. Like much of the Bible these chapters are full of "wait a minutes" and "uh-ohs" and "yeps" and "ehhs." In a couple of verses (particular when Jesus is about) the Bible has a tendency to have you nodding, "Jesus goes after the one lost sheep, awesome" and awkwardly swallowing "wait a minute, I'm suppose to point out a sin in my fellow church member?".

If you hang around church long enough you'll hear sermons on these different trees. Often the awkward ones will be avoided, but they will be mentioned. Slowly, as you understand more and more trees you think that you understand the forest. Christianity becomes about the sum of the smaller parts.

That, however, is a distorted view. Christianity is much more than the sum of the parts (though the trees matter). We, or should I say, I focus on the trees. I argue with others over the different trees, disagreeing on the shade of brown or the bent of the limb. I stay at the level of the trees because I want to avoid the forest. The trees are interesting, but are small enough to fit into my point of view. I can survey a tree and handle it.

The forest is wild. It is unwieldy. We don't like talking about the forest, because we can't grasp the forest. We can't fit the forest into our horizon. It goes beyond.

Jesus says, "follow me." Pick up your cross, sell your possessions, and follow me. Worry not about the world or the thoughts of your neighbor, but follow me. Do not be afraid, he says, follow me.

Preaching Day...

Today I had the opportunity to preach at Hope Christian Reformed. For the scripture I selected 1 Peter 3:13-18, focusing on the line,  "if someone asks about your Christian hope, always be ready to explain it.” The funny thing about Christian Hope is that it is such a back/forward expectation. It's like how light behaves as understood by quantum physics--it is both a wave and a particle. Measure it one way and you get a nice wave of light, but measured another, you get little packets of information. 


With Christian Hope the resurrection of Jesus and our future resurrection happens at the same time. You can't separate them without breaking the thing itself. We look back to the Jesus' resurrection and look forward to our resurrection because of what Jesus has done. A funny little hopeful thing.
 

Your Wild-Eyed Prophet of the Day

It's no secret that some of the Old Testament prophets have a bit of that crazy in them. The mere fact that you'd stand up to kings and nobles and proclaim their coming doom requires a certain amount of unnerving certainty. Nevertheless, certain prophet give off the crazy vibe much more than other prophets. For example, Elijah performs miracles and signs of wonder and dukes it out the Ahab (one of the best scenes in the Bible) yet seems sane. He is man fulfilling God's strange call. Isaiah, to some degree, fits that same category. Sure, he has visions, but his calling to repentance and justice rings true to this day.

On the hand, we have Ezekiel. Like any decent prophet Ezekiel had visions, but he was also called by God to act out God's words, like some ancient performance art (from Ezekiel 12):

"Therefore, son of man, pack your belongings for exile and in the daytime, as they watch, set out and go from where you are to another place. Perhaps they will understand, though they are a rebellious house. During the daytime, while they watch, bring out your belongings packed for exile. Then in the evening, while they are watching, go out like those who go into exile. While they watch, dig through the wall and take your belongings out through it. Put them on your shoulder as they are watching and carry them out at dusk. Cover your face so that you cannot see the land, for I have made you a sign to the house of Israel."

So I did as I was commanded. During the day I brought out my things packed for exile. Then in the evening I dug through the wall with my hands. I took my belongings out at dusk, carrying them on my shoulders while they watched.

It's a reminder that God's call is not necessarily a sane call, or a proper call, or a call to tell your grandma about over a cup of tea.

Constantine Christianity

In recent years much criticism* has been heaped upon Constantine Christianity as a distortion of Jesus and Christianity. Folks criticize this 1700 year old deal with the devil that allowed official, Roman recognition of Christianity at the expense of Christians (particularly the hierarchy) expounding the Gospel. In short, the critics argue that in the battle between truth and power, power won out. Eventually (over a 100 years) Christianity become the state religion, and thus lost its ability to speak, "truth to power." Since that time Christian Bishops and Popes and Patriarchs sacrificed the Gospel for the world.

Some of the criticism of this decisive moment in history is true and right. By willingly aligning itself to the official Roman order, the Christian hierarchy lost some of it's ability to fulfill the Gospel. However, too much of the frustration with Constantine Christianity is based on a poor understanding of history, culture, and Christianity.

First, what was the church suppose to do when Constantine the Great declared that Christianity was one of the state religions? Should they have said, "nah, we don't need that, please keep persecuting us"? Should they have said, "boy, we really need less people to believe and live the Gospel so that we won't be noticed by the Roman authorities and thus won't set Christianity down a path of destruction"? No, they did what any reasonable folks would do, they breathed a sigh of relief and thanked the Lord for their deliverance.

Second, was the devil in the deal or is there a little devil in all of us? Much of the justifiable criticism of Church leaders is because those leaders (popes, bishops, etc...) were venal, greedy, and corrupt, and used the church for their own ends. Plenty of church leaders throughout the middle ages and beyond acted with integrity, and used their power and money for good and justice. For example, Ambrose, a rich and powerful man, became Bishop (from deacon to bishop in a week), then sold his possessions, and more often than not advocated for the poor and the dispossessed. Meanwhile, he was an advisor to Emperors and part of the "inner circle."

The criticism of Constantine Christian System is more a criticism of human nature. I believe that State sponsored church ain't a good thing, nevertheless, we ought to be slow to criticize those decisions that saved people from persecution.

*I know I didn't link to any of the critics on the web, but that's because I'm lazy and tired. Just trust me that they are out there. 

The Problem with Bible...

...is that we've heard the story before. If we've grown up in the church or even lived in a culturally Christian area, we've gotten a taste, of sorts, of what this whole bible/christian thing is about. Everything seems repeated and a little boring. Dot dot dot, Jesus was a cute baby, dot dot dot, did some nice things, dot dot dot, something about dying and then not dying, dot dot dot, boy those christians sure are annoying. Over 2000 years the story of Jesus Messiah becoming the Messiah for the whole world has become routine. Since we know the ending and have heard it all before, we don't really care how the story unfolds.

But as an unrepentant English Lit major, I think that the story matters. How Jesus (and for that matter all of Israel) gets to the resurrection affects what the resurrection means. And then how Peter, Paul, et al share the story shapes the meaning of the story. To understand the Bible and to shake it out of its routine I need to live in the story. I need to feel the free and terror of the Marys at the tomb. I need to accept (and not sanitize) Paul's anger that other disciples believe you need to get circumcised to become a follower of the way.

Incurably Eternal

“By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat unit you return to the ground from which you were made. For you made from dust, and to dust you will return.” Genesis 3:19

In a manner of speaking I work in the construction business and for a variety of reasons I’ve been ruminating upon this verse. As we construct houses, putting forth extraordinary efforts, I’m reminded that these houses will decay, rot, and fall down. The homeowners will move on, this city will grow and fail, and I will die. Even in the next twenty years, effort will be necessary to keep a house in good working order, for the laws of thermodynamics are always on the move. The work of our hands turns to dust. And with enough perspective it seems that all is for naught. We are truly part of nature, becoming the dust of the earth.