A Call for a New Reformation?

On this day, 488 years ago, the young Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Church. This, of course, was not the first time the Church had been invited to openly discuss important issues, but this was the beginning of a much larger and much more violent exchange involving almost the entire Body of Christ in Europe. As the Right Reverend John Shelby Spong, points out:

Despite the hostile appellations of "heretic" hurled at Protestants and "anti-Christ" hurled at Catholics, anyone viewing this debate from the vantage point of this century would see that, while an acrimonious and unpleasant fight, it was nonetheless a fight that pitted Christian believers against Christian believers. The Reformation was not an attempt to reformulate the Christian faith for a new era. It was rather a battle over issues of Church order. The time had not arrived in which Christians would be required to rethink the basic and identifying marks of Christianity itself.

Now, he claims, is the time to face more fundamental issues.

It should be noted that I find Spong remarkably unprofessional and consistently un-philosophical. Not because he brings up probing questions (questions I myself continue to struggle with), or even coming up with answers that I disagree with (some of which I agree with, but only by degree). Spong repeatedly misinterprets facts to fit his own view of God, the Bible, Christianity and, his favorite bugaboo, "Fundamentalists". Spong has the flair for the dramatic, floating deeply idiosyncratic speculation as if it were solid "scholarship". His worst sin, in my book, is his habit of poisoning the well, labeling his opponents and assuming the worst when he finds something disagreeable. Unfortunately, Spong has a very wide and loyal audience; where other more reasonable liberal theologians get ignored, Spong has a way of hogging the spotlight.

That said, I can respect anyone who seeks the truth. While sometimes I feel Spong is a bit disingenuous about that task, I find his questions extremely worthy of investigation. Some time ago, Reverend Spong posted a list of twelve challenges. I plan to address each, in turn, over the next month. I will attempt to deal with these statements as discreet assertions, working through each on their own merits as philosophical postulates. That is to say, I plan on dealing with each thesis as a texually and philosophically as possible.

1. Theism, as a way of defining God, is dead. So most theological God-talk is today meaningless. A new way to speak of God must be found.
2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.
3. The biblical story of the perfect and finished creation from which human beings fell into sin is pre-Darwinian mythology and post-Darwinian nonsense.
4. The virgin birth, understood as literal biology, makes Christ's divinity, as traditionally understood, impossible.
5. The miracle stories of the New Testament can no longer be interpreted in a post-Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity.
6. The view of the cross as the sacrifice for the sins of the world is a barbarian idea based on primitive concepts of God and must be dismissed.
7. Resurrection is an action of God. Jesus was raised into the meaning of God. It therefore cannot be a physical resuscitation occurring inside human history.
8. The story of the Ascension assumed a three-tiered universe and is therefore not capable of being translated into the concepts of a post-Copernican space age.
9. There is no external, objective, revealed standard writ in scripture or on tablets of stone that will govern our ethical behavior for all time.
10. Prayer cannot be a request made to a theistic deity to act in human history in a particular way.
11. The hope for life after death must be separated forever from the behavior control mentality of reward and punishment. The Church must abandon, therefore, its reliance on guilt as a motivator of behavior.
12. All human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination.

Some notes on Sin

Thomas Aquinas writes:

. . . sin is broadly used to mean any failure of activity, natural or designed, to reach its goal . . . . But the meaning of sin proper to morals is of cuplable failure of will to reach a due goal because it is drawn toward an unsuitable one.

Essentially, sin is "missing the mark", failing to measure up to a proper standard. The "mark", in this case, is God's Law. Biblically speaking, "Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness" (1 John 3:4, NIV) or in the King James, "for sin is the transgression of the law."

So, our duty to God is live our lives in such as way as to avoid clashing with His will. Put positively: Our best interest is served when we are in line His Law. Life should be lived in such a way as to avoid sin, to "hit the mark" as it were. The trick of it is, of course, learning what the mark is. I like how John Wesley's mother explained it (Letter, June 8, 1725):

Take this rule: whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off your relish of spiritual things; in short, whatever increases the strength and authority of your body over your mind, that thing is sin to you, however innocent it may be in itself.

For a more in depth look at a biblical view of sin, check out "What is Sin?" by Tony Warren.

Book Review: The Myth of Certainty

"Doubt is not a pleasant condition," Voltaire tells the Prince of Prussia, Frederick the Great, "but certainty is an absurd one."

I'm not entirely sure I agree with Voltaire on this one, but I will say doubt and certainty are both my constant companion. I have always felt caught in the middle between two powers, intellectually speaking. My commitment to secular progress, rationality and open-mindedness sometimes feels at complete odds with my commitment to my Christian faith. And vice versa. So, when browsing the bookstore earlier this summer, I stumbled upon The Myth of Certainty by Daniel Taylor, I felt like, just maybe, there was someone else out there like me. The back cover reads: "Do you resent the smugness of close-minded skepticism on the one hand but feel equally uncomfortable with the smugness of close-minded Christianity on the other? If so, then The Myth of Certainty is for you."

The Myth of Certainty: The Reflective Christian & the Risk of Commitment is a fascinating read for someone like me who has been steeped both in academic liberalism AND conservative Christianity. All subcultures require certain degrees of uniformity; all institutions, secular or religious, require a certain degree of unquestioning loyalty. The Church's job on earth is to be Bride of Christ, to witness and to serve. As Taylor points out,

Certainly these are the goals of the church, realized here and there, now and then. The parallel reality, however, is at the same time the church is an institution which operates, consciously or not, like other human institutions.

The primary goal of all institutions and subcultures is self-preservation. Preserving the faith is central to God's plan for human history; preserving particular religious institutions is not. Do not expect those who run the institutions to be sensitive to the difference. God needs no particular person, church, denomination, creed, or organization to accomplish His purpose. He will make use of those, in all their diversity, who are ready to be used, but will leave to themselves those who labor for their own ends.

Nonetheless, questioning the institution is synonymous, for many, with attacking God.(pp. 29-30)

Every question raised becomes a mini-crisis of faith. Questions make people uncomfortable, in whichever subculture you find yourself in, religious or secular.

". . . each group is impatient with the recalcitrant who wants to retain parts of both worlds. Conservative Christendom will allow you to think, as long as you think 'correctly,' or keep dangerous thoughts to yourself. The secular world will allow you to be a Christian, as long as your faith is kept in quarantine and not allowed to influence your judgments or lead to you to question secular presuppositions. (p.60)

That is the difficulty addressed in this book.

The Myth of Certainty is a fascinating read and I should like to recommend it mostly to those of you who are firmly in one of the opposing camps, whether firmly secular or firmly conservative Christian. Taylor's honest approach is refreshing and non-threatening. Both sides could learn quite a bit about the other from this. In addition, it might just open some eyes to the condition of "reflective Christian".

Catholic High School Teacher Forced Out over Flag

This summer, Stephen Kobasa, a teacher at Kolbe Cathedral High School, a Catholic high school in Bridgeport, Connecticut, was forced out of his job because he refused to have an American flag in his classroom. "Everything in the Gospel rejects what flags stand for: boundaries, hatreds, creation of enemies," Kobasa says. "For a Catholic Christian school that holds up the crucifix as a symbol of God's love, the flag can only be a contradiction. The Church can only function with its prophetic voice by standing outside the state."

I'm not entirely sure I agree with his entire assessment--especially "hatreds, creation of enemies"--but I do sympathize with Kobasa's point of view. There's something unsettling about a flag-waving church. Don't get me wrong: I'm awfully glad to be living in the United States. I feel that this country truly was God-inspired, but I can also see where Kobasa is coming from.

Christianity is about bringing people into the Kingdom of God. We, Christians, are sons and daughters of Christ, and "there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for [we] are all one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:26-28). We are neither American or German, Chinese or Angolan and our first responsibility and our loyalty should be to the Kingdom of God first and foremost. We cannot serve two masters, God and money or God and country. While we operate in the world with both money and country, there are some obvious (or maybe not so obvious) difficulties involved.

That said, just to be clear here, I see nothing wrong with honoring our country, its myths, symbols, military personnel, etc.. Even actively participating in politics should be one of the ways in which we witness the truth of Christ's love and life in us. Finding ways of recognizing the importance of earthly citizenship during times of high patriotism while remembering our spiritual commitments takes some work; I can attest to this!

I'm afraid I come down on the fence when it comes to making public pledges of allegiance to any earthly institution. I certainly don't disparage anyone who take such oaths and I certainly can understand that there may be situations where refusing to display symbols or take a pledge that would offend the conscience. In Kobasa's case, I cannot pass judgment on either side; both obeyed their conscience (I will assume).

Book Review: Being Logical

Since taking my first philosophy class some 20 years ago, I have always been struck with how ubiquitous bad thinking is. In my estimation, it's gotten worse in since then, especially on account of the rise of the Internet. That's not to say that the Internet is not a good place to have philosophical discussions, rather, the Internet seems to be a place where really bad thinking flourishes; you aren't required to have an editor when you write for the Internet!

In Being Logical: A Guide to Good Thinking, D. Q. McInerny presents informal logic in a meaningful and non-technical manner. In part one, McInerny sets the stage by preparing the mind to engage in logical discourse. In part two and three, discusses the basic principles of logic, gray areas, explanations, definitions, crafting a strong argument. Here's the meat of the book, for, after all, philosophy really is the activity of creating and evaluating arguments. The last two parts deal specifically with how to identify bad thinking, evasive agnosticism, emotionalism, common sense along with a fairly detailed list of informal fallacies.

Even at only 137 pages, including a reasonable index, this is a very nice read. After reading Kant's Logic or Quine's Elementary Logic, you can get a real appreciation for something that is written simply, and without a lot of tedious technicalities.

Spong's Second Thesis

2. Since God can no longer be conceived in theistic terms, it becomes nonsensical to seek to understand Jesus as the incarnation of the theistic deity. So the Christology of the ages is bankrupt.

Assuming the first thesis is valid, this second would follow nicely. When I was an atheist, I could agree with Spong on this. The idea of God was simply a human invention used to control and give superficial meaning to lives. Therefore the stories set down in the Bible concerning Jesus as the "Son of God" was pure propaganda. This became my first concern: was Jesus who the Bible said he was?

For my part, it seemed rather elementary; either I accepted what the New Testament had to say about Jesus or I reject, in its entirety, the whole "story". Everything found in the last 27 books of the Bible is predicated on the idea that Jesus was somehow simultaneously a mere man AND God, from its basic intent to its historicism, especially its metaphysics and ethics. While the Bible MAY contain some good and helpful advice, its underlying view of the world is warped and suspect, if there was no incarnation. Essentially, Spong is correct: IF the Bible is wrong about God, it is also wrong about Jesus as well.

On to the real issue at hand. Is Jesus God incarnate? Spong thinks that this is an impossibility, or, more to the point, nonsense. Spong sees Christ as the "hero of a thousand faces" and no one can make a concrete claim about who or what exactly Jesus was (except Spong, of course). Jesus was whatever your influences indicate he was. Whatever the case, Jesus was "love"--From which Spong can make the claim that Jesus could not endorse such notions as hell, guilt of sin and Judgment. While I cannot formulate an iron-clad argument for Christ's divinity, neither can Spong refute such a claim, except through recourse to a particular view of materialism and advanced physics--even these raise as many questions as they do answers. In the end, this may simply be a matter of belief, of faith, one way or another. I can live it as such; Spong seems to be unable to do so.

Unfortunately for Spong, while conceiving of God and Jesus in theistic terms does not make it true, there are still many people, myself included, who can quite easily conceive of God in theistic terms. I wouldn't go so far as to accuse Spong of lying, as some have, on this point, but I will say, he's being very loose with his language. Again, if Spong can no longer conceive of a theistic God, then that is a failing on his part. (Note that the standard he sets here is only having a conception of a certain kind of deity.)

High Court Clashes Over Assisted Suicide

Seems we're at it again. Attorney General Gonzales has taken up where Ashcroft has left off, seeking to weaken the Oregon Death with Dignity Act at the Supreme Court. Arguing that doctors do not have the right to prescribe federally controlled substances for the purpose of causing death, Gonzales is not seeking to overturn the law, per se. Rather, he seeks to establish who has the right to regulate certain drugs.

Frankly, the legalities of this boggle my mind. On the one hand, I certainly agree with Gonzales on this: states shouldn't be allowed to change federal guidelines on drug use. On the other hand, it seems to me that the only ethical use of drugs is to make people more comfortable, reduce symptoms, and, if possible, eliminate or slow the progression of disease. It certainly will be interesting to see how our new Chief Justice handles this case.