We want to reclaim both the word [religion] and the thing the word signifies. Yes, it is a way of pushing back at what I would consider an overly simplistic, overly smug argument that is made these days by people who, for one reason or another, are alienated from the idea of people of faith coming together. I am not arguing for the immaculate nature of institutional faith, but I do believe that there is a tendency in our culture toward solipsism, toward an individualism so radical that it becomes essentially meaningless for the public square. If everyone is living privately inside their own heads, then the religious phenomenon has no public center of gravity and there’s no communicable experience. I don’t think that all institutional religion is the work of the devil. Frankly, it remains durable. Public living traditions of faith continue to have a huge impact, for better or worse, on our world. And to somehow hold yourself aloof from all that seems to me to be a little coy, honestly.
"I keep thinking about Ahab, our great hero and reformer, the man who was blessed by St. Savin."
"Why Ahab?"
"Because he could see that even the most insignificant of actions, however well intentioned, can destroy everything. They say that after he had brought peace to the village, driven away the remaining outlaws, and modernized agriculture and trade in Viscos, he invited his friends to supper and cooked a succulent piece of meat for them. Suddenly he realized there was no salt.
"So Ahab called to his son: 'Go to the village and buy some salt, but pay a fair price for it: neither too much nor too little.'
"His son was surprised: 'I can understand why I shouldn't pay too much for it, Father, but if I can bargain them down, why not pay a bit less?'
" 'That would be the sensible thing to do in a big city, but in a small village like ours it could spell the beginning of the end.'
"The boy left without asking any further questions. However, Ahab's guests, who had overheard their conversation, wanted to know why they should not buy the salt more cheaply if they could. Ahab replied:
" 'The only reason anyone would sell salt more cheaply than usual would be because he was desperate for money. And anyone who took advantage of that situation would be showing a lack of respect for the sweat and struggle of the man who labored to produce it.'
" 'But such a small thing couldn't possibly destroy a village.'
" 'In the beginning, there was only a small amount of injustice abroad in the work, but everyone who came afterwards added their portion, always thinking it was very small and unimportant, and look where we have ended up today.' " (48-49)
[W]e must remind ourselves that the Catholic righteousness by good works is vastly preferable to a Protestant righteousness by good doctrine. At least righteousness by good works benefits one’s neighbor, whereas righteousness by good doctrine only produces lovelessness and pride. Furthermore, we must not blind ourselves to the tremendous faith, genuine repentance, complete surrender and the fervent love for God and neighbor evident in the lives and work of many Catholic Christians. The Christian life is so rich that it develops its full glory not just in a single form or within the walls of one church.
Every once in a while, I either come to a point where I feel as if I have nothing to say or I have so much going on in my head that I don't know what to say. In the last few weeks it has been the latter, hence the relative infrequency of posting here.
In the interim, then, I offer this delightfully inflammatory quote from one of the essays in James K. A. Smith's book, The Devil Reads Derrida, as a filler. Personally, I tend to opt for subtle provocation, but since this is a quote, I (somewhat) absolve myself of responsibility for what is said—though, I should add, for the most part I agree with the analysis. This particular essay focuses on some of the arguments in Greg Boyd's, The Myth of a Christian Nation. Let me anticipate what might be going through your mind—ultimately he takes Boyd to task for constructing his arguments on a number of false premises; it is the larger overall points with which he resonates.Smith begins with a brief discussion of some of the evangelical figures who, in the early 1970s, began to make American Christians aware of the fact that they lived with a duality, one that had them altogether focused on redeeming the souls of individuals at the expense of redeeming the rest of the created order. Richard Mouw, for example, "invited evangelicals to take up the Cultural Mandate as a complement to, and expression of, the Great Commission." Only, it didn't quite go as planned.
A funny thing happened on the way to the Capitol. If [people like] Mouw were trying to pull evangelicals back from their isolation out on the pietist end of the pendulum's arc, they didn't likely anticipate the degree to which the pendulum would swing the other way...In fact, evangelicals became such zealous converts to the Cultural Mandate that it has pretty much trumped the Great Commission. Christians leaders spend more time worrying about activist judges, Venezuelan dictators, and constitutional amendments than their evangelical forebears could ever have imagined. Devoting themselves to political strategizing and marshaling the machinations of government, evangelicals have so embraced participation in the 'earthly city' that one wonders whether they've lost their passport to the City of God. Worse yet is the suspicion that evangelicals in America have just collapsed the two, such that the City of God is just downright confused with America as a city set on a hill...[We must denounce] the nationalistic 'idolatry' of American evangelicalism which fuses the kingdom of God with a preferred, made-in-America version of the kingdom of the world, confusing and conflating the cross and the flag (98-99).
As I said above, I agree with the overall point being made, though I would make a few qualifications. However, this is not the time to get into those, lest this turn into something of a tome. Ultimately, what Smith is attempting to bring out is that American evangelicalism is characterized by an over-realized eschatology. One need not look any further than the pervasive rhetoric of superiority, the quasi-divinization of the Founding Fathers (or Reagan, for that matter), and the unquestioning ascent to the supposed biblical principles of the Constitution to see the evidence of this.
By no means should Christians abdicate their responsibilities with respect to the cultural mandate; Smith is not advocating a return to isolationist pietism. Neither is he vilifying America or its principles (nor do I). Instead, this is meant to remind Christians that our citizenship in the Kingdom of God and resultant designation as resident aliens in this world calls us first and foremost to the task of being ambassadors of the King, of being a sign and foretaste of His Kingdom and bearing witness to the rule of our Sovereign Lord over all of creation. It is to this Lord that every knee shall one day bow.I have stirred the pot with the ladle that is Smith (and Boyd) long enough. What do you think?
Yesterday I briefly mentioned Abraham Kuyper, and wanted to post more from his discussion on the role of tradition and the Church's confessions. As I mentioned, in his Encyclopedia of Sacred Theology: Its Principles, he writes that in doing theology one should begin with the assumption that the Church is right (577). This idea is later drawn out further:
An objective condition lies in [the churchly confession]. It is a product of the life of the Church, as in the ever richer form it has revealed itself officially, i.e. in ecclesiastical assemblies, under the special guidance of the Holy Spirit. Two things are contained in the confession. First, the self-consciousness of the Church, as it has developed itself historically, which, consequently, is the result of a spiritual experience and a spiritual struggle that fills in the gap between the present and the first appearance of the Christian Church. And in the second place, the result of the special leading of the Holy Spirit, vouchsafed in the course of ages to the Church, and to the knowledge of God that has developed itself within her pale. For this reason the theologian should not undervalue the confession of his Church, as if in it a mere opinion presented itself to him over against which, with equal if not with better right, he might place his opinion. The life of the Church, and the forming and reforming of her self-consciousness, is an action which is uninterupptedly continued...That life pursues its own course, the stream of that life creates a bed for itself. To the theologian, therefore, the confession of the Church does not merely possess the presumption of truth; it appears objectively before him clothed with authority; with that authority which the many wield over the individual, with the authority of the ages in the face of ephemeral excitements; with the authority of the office in distinction from personal life; and with the authority which is due to the churchly life by virtue of the guidance of the Holy Ghost. It is not lawful, therefore, for him simply to slight this confessional life of the Church in order, while drifting on his own oars, to construct in his own way a new system of knowledge of God. He who undertakes to do this is bound in the end to see his labor stricken with unfruitfulness, or he destroys the churchly life, whose welfare his study ought to further (591-592).
Kuyper offers, I think, a great deal of wisdom with this insight. It is certainly worth our time to consider these points. I have one more post with another excerpt from this chapter on the docket. Look for it in a day or two.
The only way that Jesus could become the resurrection and the life was by dying Himself…Jesus comes up against moral and spiritual death and gives life by dying Himself…What we must see is that these sorts of themes (sin, death, substitution, redemption, resurrection, etc.) are central to the Bible, central to the gospel, and these are the frameworks in which we need to address people. It is right to say that the gospel comes along and improves your marriage, challenges you about how to handle your finances, or rear your children—the gospel has all of those peripheral benefits, sure—but at the end of the day, it deals with the ultimates of life and death and sin and guilt and resurrection and eternal life. It deals with these ultimates…Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die” (John 11:25-26). It transforms absolutely everything.
This comes from the end of the third session he led at Mars Hill Church's recent conference, "A Day with Dr. Don." Click here for the media from that conference. I recommend it highly.
