Catalyst #7: Homosexuality. They are convinced that sexuality is complicated, are committed to having relationships with all types of people, and live in a tension with the Bible about what to do about this issue.
Huzzah!
Hooray for a more thoughtful, nuanced, and well-informed engagement with this issue...and for genuine relationships that help us to push past caricatures to engaging with real people.
The Danger
A couple of years ago I had an epic conversation with a number of people over this issue. If you missed it, click here. Scroll down to the post starting on Oct. 5, 2006 and read through the comments and then some of the posts afterwards.
My bro also had a really good post (and a long string of dialogue) over on his blog a couple weeks ago.
The Verdict
I think that the homosexuality issue and the "do all religions lead to God" issue will be the two most fracturing questions in all of Christendom over the next fifty years.
The acceptance of homosexuality and homosexual marriage will move more and more front-and-center in our culture--it is already starting to eclipse the abortion issue as the boundary-line of conservative v. liberal politics. If we're going to hold to historically orthodox thinking on the purpose of sexuality, gender, image-bearing and marriage, we better have clear and solid thinking. And then we need clear and solid pastoral answers to the inevitable questions that will come.
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query homosexuality. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query homosexuality. Sort by date Show all posts
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Sunday, October 08, 2006
Responding to Royale
Last week I got some great comments and questions springing from the post about homosexual marriage. I answered one question on Friday, I wanted to answer Royale's question here today because I think it's a crucial issue.
You can see all of Royale's comments under Friday's post, but I'll copy and paste the crux of it here: Here's the deal - the Bible has a lot of plain, straightforward and obvious commands. Many of them appear irrational to our modern perspective. It's not just the OT, but the words of Jesus as well. (turn the other cheek, give the proceeds to the poor, etc...)It's about literalism. Why take the command against homosexuality literal if you do not take the literal the OTHER commands?
First off, the OT, then we'll talk some about Jesus: When people started becoming Christians who weren't Jewish, it caused tons of controversy. Much of the NT and especially Acts is devoted to sorting through the issue of how "Jewish" do new Christians have to be? They quickly came to consensus that the moral law (i.e. the Ten commandments) was clearly still applicable but that ceremonial law (food restrictions and circumcision being the capstones) was not to be applied to the new converts. This line between moral law and ceremonial law may seem arbitrary to us 2,000 years later, but it clearly wasn't to the Jewish folks making the decisions. They knew the difference and were able to communicate it to the new Gentile churches with remarkable unanimity.
Regarding the NT commands, I don't think it's an accident that the examples that Royale chooses are generally mercy-type commands (turn the other cheek, give proceeds to the poor) and so I think this warrants an important aside. While I agree that the Christian church has failed dramatically at living out the commands to care for the sick, the poor, and the marginalized, I also gladly and proudly say that over the past 2,000 years there is absolutely no other organization and certainly no other religion that has done more to help people outside of it's own affinity group than the Christian church. No one has built more hospitals, given more to the sick, cared for more orphans, built more schools or rushed to the aid of a disaster with more regularity than Christians: not the Muslims, not the Jews, not the Hindus, not the Red Cross, not the Shriners, not the U.N. No one. The "high-profile" disasters of the past two years (Katrina and the Tsunami) only serve to highlight was has historically been true.
In light of this I must confess that I'm a bit perplexed by the charge that Christians seem to take these commands of Jesus metaphorically. We are called to love those who hate us and to turn the other cheek when someone strikes us. Really. And for the past 2,000 years, we've done that, mostly falteringly and struggling so, but we've at least struggled to move in that general direction. And in 32 years of being in churches, I've never heard those passages dismissed as just metaphorical. If these commands sound irrational to our modern ears, they also sounded irrational to First-Century Palestinian ears. No one wants to do this. That's part of what makes Christianity different and why people converted by the thousands even as they were being fed to lions and burned alive as human torches to light Roman Emperor's parties.
There is something to understanding the whole of Scripture and reading it thoughtfully and not just taking each isolated incident at total face value, which maybe could be taken for a cop-out or convenient making of metaphors, but I don't think so. For example: Jesus tells the Rich Young Ruler to sell everything he owns and follow him, but he doesn't say that to everyone. And so we have to understand the context of each event and take the whole of Scripture on any given subject to get the full picture. But generally there are clear and remarkable patterns that emerge with a thoughtful reading of the Scriptures from the posture of faith.
If you want woodenly rigid, literal interpretation of the Bible, fundamentalism is the way to go. If you want everything metaphored to death, try the liberal main-line church (holy crap those people have to work really hard to try to keep calling themselves Christians while explaining away just about every truly distinguishing mark of Christianity). If you want a thoughtful engagement of the Scriptures that tries to take the context and situation of each text into account as well as a general posture of submitting to the Scriptures while trying to grasp the larger arc of what's being said on the subject throughout the whole of Scripture, I offer you evangelicalism. Perhaps that leaves us open to the charge of picking and choosing our way through the Scriptures and certainly that is one possible outcome of this way of reading the Scripture. But obviously I think that's the best way to go because it combines thoughtfulness with faithfulness with holy submission.
A different, related issue: Last Friday a student was concerned that his parents were leaving their church denomination that was moving towards ordaining homosexuals. Isn't all sin the same? Why leave a church over this issue? But there's a crucial difference. It's one thing to say that lying is a sin and yet we see Christians lie--that's hypocrisy and it must be dealt with. It's a completely different matter to say that lying isn't a sin at all any more, and so anyone who lies is really just fine like they are.
Similarly, it's a different thing to charge Christians with not living up to the code of conduct commanded by Scripture (that's hypocrisy) than it is to say that we make things to be metaphorical simply to suit us (that's cutting-and-pasting the Bible recreationally). If the charge is hypocrisy--i.e. we don't turn the other cheek when Jesus commands us to or that we pick and choose our Biblical sexual ethics, then we certainly stand guilty as charged (even granted the generally extraordinary track record noted above).
But it is not up to us to nullify the arc of the commands of Scripture (either about sexuality or about giving to the poor) and decide that they are no longer commands because we find them annoying, awkward, they don't fit our politics, or are not politically correct. This is why I'm so deeply troubled by the Christian-Republican marriage, even though I tend to vote that way. We are not to be in any one's back pocket. We are to engage the full measure of the Biblical commands about the poor, about sex, about marriage, about worship, about prayer, etc. and live those out as faithfully as we can. Some passages aren't clear, other passages were more directly applicable to the immediate context, but taken as a whole the clearer Scriptures help us to interpret the less clear Scriptures and most issues can be addressed with reasonable clarity in a context of holy humility.
And so the sexual ethic over the whole of Scripture is very clear. The creation story is to be taken realistically--it is poetry with a point. What is being communicated there about Who created and the purpose behind creation, including male-female relations, be fruitful and multiply, and leave and cleave is very much the point of why that's been written down for us. Marriage is a sacred thing, even if the people who enter into it don't think so or aren't aware of it.
Why are we gendered beings? Why did God create us with gender in the first place? It is difference that blesses, just as the nature of the Trinity is that it is 3 differentiated Persons who are One God. The Father is the Father, the Son is the Son, and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit; each is delighted to be Who they are, each delights in the othes, none of them tries to be the other or do exactly what the other one does. Each aspect of marriage is to mirror that relationship, including the sexual aspect of marriage--"the two shall become one." Throw in the functional pro-creational aspects of marriage inherent in the command to "fill the land and subdue it" and you've got a pretty clear mandate for a male-female marriage relationship.
So Romans 1 talks about homosexuality in a way that comports with much of the rest of the sexual ethic in Scripture--the clear assumption of a sexual relationship exercised in a male-female marriage based on the creational purpose of gender in the first place and the pro-creational aspect of sexual relations. If it were an aberration, then maybe we could talk about the need to find a reason for Paul to rant on about it and could reasonably dismiss it. But it's not, and so we must submit to it or stop calling ourselves Christians--there's lots of other options out there.
The trouble with this discussion is that I don't really expect to change anyone's mind with this post. Change is a process for most anyone. My mind won't change with a few very thoughtful objections, I don't expect any of my readers to change their mind's because of a few scattered thoughts on my blog. I just hope that maybe this exchange can be helpful in shedding a little bit of light on some small part of this pretty significant cultural debate.
You can see all of Royale's comments under Friday's post, but I'll copy and paste the crux of it here: Here's the deal - the Bible has a lot of plain, straightforward and obvious commands. Many of them appear irrational to our modern perspective. It's not just the OT, but the words of Jesus as well. (turn the other cheek, give the proceeds to the poor, etc...)It's about literalism. Why take the command against homosexuality literal if you do not take the literal the OTHER commands?
First off, the OT, then we'll talk some about Jesus: When people started becoming Christians who weren't Jewish, it caused tons of controversy. Much of the NT and especially Acts is devoted to sorting through the issue of how "Jewish" do new Christians have to be? They quickly came to consensus that the moral law (i.e. the Ten commandments) was clearly still applicable but that ceremonial law (food restrictions and circumcision being the capstones) was not to be applied to the new converts. This line between moral law and ceremonial law may seem arbitrary to us 2,000 years later, but it clearly wasn't to the Jewish folks making the decisions. They knew the difference and were able to communicate it to the new Gentile churches with remarkable unanimity.
Regarding the NT commands, I don't think it's an accident that the examples that Royale chooses are generally mercy-type commands (turn the other cheek, give proceeds to the poor) and so I think this warrants an important aside. While I agree that the Christian church has failed dramatically at living out the commands to care for the sick, the poor, and the marginalized, I also gladly and proudly say that over the past 2,000 years there is absolutely no other organization and certainly no other religion that has done more to help people outside of it's own affinity group than the Christian church. No one has built more hospitals, given more to the sick, cared for more orphans, built more schools or rushed to the aid of a disaster with more regularity than Christians: not the Muslims, not the Jews, not the Hindus, not the Red Cross, not the Shriners, not the U.N. No one. The "high-profile" disasters of the past two years (Katrina and the Tsunami) only serve to highlight was has historically been true.
In light of this I must confess that I'm a bit perplexed by the charge that Christians seem to take these commands of Jesus metaphorically. We are called to love those who hate us and to turn the other cheek when someone strikes us. Really. And for the past 2,000 years, we've done that, mostly falteringly and struggling so, but we've at least struggled to move in that general direction. And in 32 years of being in churches, I've never heard those passages dismissed as just metaphorical. If these commands sound irrational to our modern ears, they also sounded irrational to First-Century Palestinian ears. No one wants to do this. That's part of what makes Christianity different and why people converted by the thousands even as they were being fed to lions and burned alive as human torches to light Roman Emperor's parties.
There is something to understanding the whole of Scripture and reading it thoughtfully and not just taking each isolated incident at total face value, which maybe could be taken for a cop-out or convenient making of metaphors, but I don't think so. For example: Jesus tells the Rich Young Ruler to sell everything he owns and follow him, but he doesn't say that to everyone. And so we have to understand the context of each event and take the whole of Scripture on any given subject to get the full picture. But generally there are clear and remarkable patterns that emerge with a thoughtful reading of the Scriptures from the posture of faith.
If you want woodenly rigid, literal interpretation of the Bible, fundamentalism is the way to go. If you want everything metaphored to death, try the liberal main-line church (holy crap those people have to work really hard to try to keep calling themselves Christians while explaining away just about every truly distinguishing mark of Christianity). If you want a thoughtful engagement of the Scriptures that tries to take the context and situation of each text into account as well as a general posture of submitting to the Scriptures while trying to grasp the larger arc of what's being said on the subject throughout the whole of Scripture, I offer you evangelicalism. Perhaps that leaves us open to the charge of picking and choosing our way through the Scriptures and certainly that is one possible outcome of this way of reading the Scripture. But obviously I think that's the best way to go because it combines thoughtfulness with faithfulness with holy submission.
A different, related issue: Last Friday a student was concerned that his parents were leaving their church denomination that was moving towards ordaining homosexuals. Isn't all sin the same? Why leave a church over this issue? But there's a crucial difference. It's one thing to say that lying is a sin and yet we see Christians lie--that's hypocrisy and it must be dealt with. It's a completely different matter to say that lying isn't a sin at all any more, and so anyone who lies is really just fine like they are.
Similarly, it's a different thing to charge Christians with not living up to the code of conduct commanded by Scripture (that's hypocrisy) than it is to say that we make things to be metaphorical simply to suit us (that's cutting-and-pasting the Bible recreationally). If the charge is hypocrisy--i.e. we don't turn the other cheek when Jesus commands us to or that we pick and choose our Biblical sexual ethics, then we certainly stand guilty as charged (even granted the generally extraordinary track record noted above).
But it is not up to us to nullify the arc of the commands of Scripture (either about sexuality or about giving to the poor) and decide that they are no longer commands because we find them annoying, awkward, they don't fit our politics, or are not politically correct. This is why I'm so deeply troubled by the Christian-Republican marriage, even though I tend to vote that way. We are not to be in any one's back pocket. We are to engage the full measure of the Biblical commands about the poor, about sex, about marriage, about worship, about prayer, etc. and live those out as faithfully as we can. Some passages aren't clear, other passages were more directly applicable to the immediate context, but taken as a whole the clearer Scriptures help us to interpret the less clear Scriptures and most issues can be addressed with reasonable clarity in a context of holy humility.
And so the sexual ethic over the whole of Scripture is very clear. The creation story is to be taken realistically--it is poetry with a point. What is being communicated there about Who created and the purpose behind creation, including male-female relations, be fruitful and multiply, and leave and cleave is very much the point of why that's been written down for us. Marriage is a sacred thing, even if the people who enter into it don't think so or aren't aware of it.
Why are we gendered beings? Why did God create us with gender in the first place? It is difference that blesses, just as the nature of the Trinity is that it is 3 differentiated Persons who are One God. The Father is the Father, the Son is the Son, and the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit; each is delighted to be Who they are, each delights in the othes, none of them tries to be the other or do exactly what the other one does. Each aspect of marriage is to mirror that relationship, including the sexual aspect of marriage--"the two shall become one." Throw in the functional pro-creational aspects of marriage inherent in the command to "fill the land and subdue it" and you've got a pretty clear mandate for a male-female marriage relationship.
So Romans 1 talks about homosexuality in a way that comports with much of the rest of the sexual ethic in Scripture--the clear assumption of a sexual relationship exercised in a male-female marriage based on the creational purpose of gender in the first place and the pro-creational aspect of sexual relations. If it were an aberration, then maybe we could talk about the need to find a reason for Paul to rant on about it and could reasonably dismiss it. But it's not, and so we must submit to it or stop calling ourselves Christians--there's lots of other options out there.
The trouble with this discussion is that I don't really expect to change anyone's mind with this post. Change is a process for most anyone. My mind won't change with a few very thoughtful objections, I don't expect any of my readers to change their mind's because of a few scattered thoughts on my blog. I just hope that maybe this exchange can be helpful in shedding a little bit of light on some small part of this pretty significant cultural debate.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Church, Community, Membership
I had a conversation with someone from our church last night who was floating the idea of a "graduated membership" in the church. His main concern is to have a membership which is open to all irrespective of commitment to Jesus or the basic doctrinal standards of the church.
He sees this as a way to have folks folded into the community, to be a part without feeling like they are on the outside looking in, a way to signal to the world that we are a truly welcoming community, happy to have "whosoever will." The "graduated" part does set up an additional "hurdle" for serving in certain capacities (for taking communion, depending on the congregation), etc.
While his proposal was initially shocking to me, it did make me stop and think. In dealing with homosexuality, for example, churches will sometimes call themselves "welcoming but not affirming." Ok, then what does the "welcoming" part look like, and would anyone ever know it?
My first theological reaction was something like: "No, church membership is a human representation of the spiritual reality that someone is a member of the Church, which is the body of Christ--i.e., a Christian." But then there was a counter voice in my head as well: "Jesus comes not just to redefine a religious group, but all humanity; he is the sacrifice of atonement for our sins, and not ours only, but also for those of the whole world."
So is there something theologically sound in an open and/or graduated church membership? Does this idea freak you out? Does it sound good? Heretical? I know, I know, half of you are thinking, "That's what you get for having church membership in the first place..."
He sees this as a way to have folks folded into the community, to be a part without feeling like they are on the outside looking in, a way to signal to the world that we are a truly welcoming community, happy to have "whosoever will." The "graduated" part does set up an additional "hurdle" for serving in certain capacities (for taking communion, depending on the congregation), etc.
While his proposal was initially shocking to me, it did make me stop and think. In dealing with homosexuality, for example, churches will sometimes call themselves "welcoming but not affirming." Ok, then what does the "welcoming" part look like, and would anyone ever know it?
My first theological reaction was something like: "No, church membership is a human representation of the spiritual reality that someone is a member of the Church, which is the body of Christ--i.e., a Christian." But then there was a counter voice in my head as well: "Jesus comes not just to redefine a religious group, but all humanity; he is the sacrifice of atonement for our sins, and not ours only, but also for those of the whole world."
So is there something theologically sound in an open and/or graduated church membership? Does this idea freak you out? Does it sound good? Heretical? I know, I know, half of you are thinking, "That's what you get for having church membership in the first place..."
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Who's Got Time to Blog?
In the last two days I've met with exactly twelve students, all one-on-one.
The topics of discussion have included the following: predestination and
freewill, how does prayer work, do all religions lead to God, homosexuality,
the problem of evil (twice), dysfunctional community and unhealthy
relationships, breaking up with a significant other, dealing with family
issues that came up over Thanksgiving, Guatemala or East Africa, Romania or
China, obey God or honor parents, depression, and putting the finishing
touches with my Coordinating Team on plans for next semester which could
quite possibly be the most creative and thoughtful semester of ministry that
I've ever been a part of in my thirteen years on campus.
Good thing the semester wraps up next week. I get a whole lot more done
around here without all these students getting in the way.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
8 Catalysts
This month, author/theologian/blogger Scot McKnight has an excellent piece on the Emergent Church in Christianity Today. The article is talking about what has shaped what is often called the "post-evangelical" movement. These are Gen X-ers and Y-ers who have evangelical Christian roots but who have made decidedly different choices in how to live out the faith while still claiming an essential loyalty to following Jesus.
McKnight breaks down eight catalysts that have shaped this movement and the people who are leading it. These eight catalysts have pushed the emergent movement to re-think how they were brought up and how they were taught to think about Jesus.
I want to sum up McKnight's points here today and then briefly take on a couple of them over the next several days: the good, the bad, the ugly. I think the catalysts that McKnight briefly explains in the article are exactly the issues that my students face and the conversations that I have all the time.
For those of you who are students, I hope that this might help inform your journey. For those of you who aren't, my guess is that you'll find some of your own struggles/questions/faith challenges here as well. And I hope that this might help you prepare for my students who are coming your way.
McKnight talks about these eight catalysts as challenges that have forced many evangelicals to either radically re-think the faith that they received or abandon it altogether. This is, indeed, what I see going on around me.
Without futher ado, here are McKnight's Eight Catalysts for the "ironic" faith of the Emergent Church:
1. The word "inerrancy" as it pertains to the Bible is "the wrong word at the wrong time, though it might have been the right word for a previous generation.
2. The gospel that emergents heard as children they believe is a caricature of Paul's teaching--Brian McLaren (often seen as the poster-child for the movement) calls it "Paulianity." The re-discovery of Jesus' teaching about the kingdom and the poor and life changing here and now (not just salvation when you die) creates a tension--if this is what Jesus talked about, why don't we talk about it, too? Why aren't we preaching Jesus' message? This message is often more political and social and global in its' scope.
3. Their educational history and experiences have led emergents to disown the idea that when science and the Bible contradict that science must step aside. They refuse to give the Bible the "trump card." They remain committed to it, but with a different view as to what it actually is and how it works as a piece of literature to describe the workings of the cosmos. They are both left and right wing, committed to the Bible and open to new ideas.
4. Emergents grew up in a time of serious public failings of evangelical leaders (Ted Swaggart and Jim Baker). This amplifies the feelings of cynicism towards the church as a viable institution...and creates the felt need to start over with greater authenticity.
5. The public schools message of multi-culturalism and pluralism conflicted with their church's teachings that those outside of Christ were doomed. "Possessing both a faith that is particular and an intimate knowledge of religious pluralism prodcued a tension that was nearly intolerable." This leads them to a religious pluralism or a much broader interpretation of what it means to be "a Christian."
6. For some the Bible has portrayals of God that does not square with their understanding of God as loving. So often they will mythologize or allegorize some portrayals of God (often in the OT) and say that later pictures are the real thing--i.e. Jesus as the perfect picture of the God who is altogether gracious and loving.
7. Homosexuality. They are convinced that sexuality is complicated, are committed to having relationships with all types of people, and live in a tension with the Bible about what to do about this issue.
8. That all our theology is language-based, which is shaped by culture. Can any one language or culture tell the whole story of God? Emergents by and large plead for a multi-lingual approach to telling God's story, which fits with their earlier influences of pluralism and mulit-culturalism.
McKnight breaks down eight catalysts that have shaped this movement and the people who are leading it. These eight catalysts have pushed the emergent movement to re-think how they were brought up and how they were taught to think about Jesus.
I want to sum up McKnight's points here today and then briefly take on a couple of them over the next several days: the good, the bad, the ugly. I think the catalysts that McKnight briefly explains in the article are exactly the issues that my students face and the conversations that I have all the time.
For those of you who are students, I hope that this might help inform your journey. For those of you who aren't, my guess is that you'll find some of your own struggles/questions/faith challenges here as well. And I hope that this might help you prepare for my students who are coming your way.
McKnight talks about these eight catalysts as challenges that have forced many evangelicals to either radically re-think the faith that they received or abandon it altogether. This is, indeed, what I see going on around me.
Without futher ado, here are McKnight's Eight Catalysts for the "ironic" faith of the Emergent Church:
1. The word "inerrancy" as it pertains to the Bible is "the wrong word at the wrong time, though it might have been the right word for a previous generation.
2. The gospel that emergents heard as children they believe is a caricature of Paul's teaching--Brian McLaren (often seen as the poster-child for the movement) calls it "Paulianity." The re-discovery of Jesus' teaching about the kingdom and the poor and life changing here and now (not just salvation when you die) creates a tension--if this is what Jesus talked about, why don't we talk about it, too? Why aren't we preaching Jesus' message? This message is often more political and social and global in its' scope.
3. Their educational history and experiences have led emergents to disown the idea that when science and the Bible contradict that science must step aside. They refuse to give the Bible the "trump card." They remain committed to it, but with a different view as to what it actually is and how it works as a piece of literature to describe the workings of the cosmos. They are both left and right wing, committed to the Bible and open to new ideas.
4. Emergents grew up in a time of serious public failings of evangelical leaders (Ted Swaggart and Jim Baker). This amplifies the feelings of cynicism towards the church as a viable institution...and creates the felt need to start over with greater authenticity.
5. The public schools message of multi-culturalism and pluralism conflicted with their church's teachings that those outside of Christ were doomed. "Possessing both a faith that is particular and an intimate knowledge of religious pluralism prodcued a tension that was nearly intolerable." This leads them to a religious pluralism or a much broader interpretation of what it means to be "a Christian."
6. For some the Bible has portrayals of God that does not square with their understanding of God as loving. So often they will mythologize or allegorize some portrayals of God (often in the OT) and say that later pictures are the real thing--i.e. Jesus as the perfect picture of the God who is altogether gracious and loving.
7. Homosexuality. They are convinced that sexuality is complicated, are committed to having relationships with all types of people, and live in a tension with the Bible about what to do about this issue.
8. That all our theology is language-based, which is shaped by culture. Can any one language or culture tell the whole story of God? Emergents by and large plead for a multi-lingual approach to telling God's story, which fits with their earlier influences of pluralism and mulit-culturalism.
Friday, October 06, 2006
Responding to Thoughtful Comments
I got a couple good comments from yesterday's post questioning key points in the whole gay marriage debate: 1. lots of things are commanded in the Bible that we don't do (i.e. don't eat pork) and 2. if someone's not following the ways of the Bible then should they be forced to do what the Bible prescribes?
First off, thanks for the comments, these are crucial questions. That's why instead of simply responding in the comments I thought I'd do a post on it.
I think there's a couple ways to come at this and I'll admit up-front that some of this is half-baked in the sense that I've had this stuff rolling around in my head in the past but haven't cogently articulated all of it in one setting. Let's see how it all comes out...
To start with, let's talk about worldview. The Christian story has an internal logic to it that does not make any sense at all apart from accepting certain primary suppositions. So yesterday's post about God being love itself only makes sense if you accept that there is a God at all and that He has revealed Himself in some way. "Jesus is Lord" is a fundamental assertion of the Christian story. So is the idea that Jesus came not only to be nice and show us how to be nice but to die and rise again so that we might have access to the Father. So also is the idea that Jesus came to inaugurate a Kingdom, and that he would do so primarily through his people, the church.
Most everyone has some sort of worldview, most everyone has some story that they believe to best explain how the world works. Most of those worldviews have practical applications that make sense given those suppositions but might be disputed by people who hold different worldviews.
Because I believe that Christianity is the proper and real story of how things are, then I think that the closer anyone gets to that story the better off they will be. So a moral pagan will live a qualitatively better life than a porn star alcoholic crack addict serial arsonist, even though both might reject the Christian story. And both, according to that story, are still in need of the exact same serious redemption, rescue and healing.
I believe that some of the internal logic of Christianity can be applied to the broader world or culture while other things cannot. So while I deeply believe that everyone would be better off reading the Bible and praying each day, I don't think legislating that make any sense. However, murder has a broader consensus of worldview support, so it makes sense in a pluralist society to legislate against murder--which is why I would push for the end of legalized abortion. It not only has internal logic grounds (which is enough for me to believe it privately) but it also has life-and-death outcomes to protect the weak from the strong (a generally accepted purpose for having laws in the first place) and it also shares plenty of common ground with other worldviews (most all of which have some echo of God's goodness in them, however distant or faint).
Given those things, I'm against homosexual behavior period and certainly and obviously against homosexual marriage because of the internal logic of the Christian story. I believe certain things about God, Jesus, and what Jesus has done through the church he inagurated and so I trust that what the Bible clearly teaches about homosexuality is true. Do I think that there should be a Constitutional amendment to keep marriage as man and woman? No. Do I think it's inevitable that in our country we'll have gay marriage as commonplace? Yes. Do I think we'd be better off as a people if that were not the case? Yes. Can I make that happen any more than I can make everyone read the Scriptures and pray each day? No. If I weren't a Christian would I support gay marriage? I think I probably would be hesitant but have no clear reasons why.
Regarding the issues of Old Testament laws and why we follow some things and not others, that's probably another post for next week, since this has gone on quite long enough!
First off, thanks for the comments, these are crucial questions. That's why instead of simply responding in the comments I thought I'd do a post on it.
I think there's a couple ways to come at this and I'll admit up-front that some of this is half-baked in the sense that I've had this stuff rolling around in my head in the past but haven't cogently articulated all of it in one setting. Let's see how it all comes out...
To start with, let's talk about worldview. The Christian story has an internal logic to it that does not make any sense at all apart from accepting certain primary suppositions. So yesterday's post about God being love itself only makes sense if you accept that there is a God at all and that He has revealed Himself in some way. "Jesus is Lord" is a fundamental assertion of the Christian story. So is the idea that Jesus came not only to be nice and show us how to be nice but to die and rise again so that we might have access to the Father. So also is the idea that Jesus came to inaugurate a Kingdom, and that he would do so primarily through his people, the church.
Most everyone has some sort of worldview, most everyone has some story that they believe to best explain how the world works. Most of those worldviews have practical applications that make sense given those suppositions but might be disputed by people who hold different worldviews.
Because I believe that Christianity is the proper and real story of how things are, then I think that the closer anyone gets to that story the better off they will be. So a moral pagan will live a qualitatively better life than a porn star alcoholic crack addict serial arsonist, even though both might reject the Christian story. And both, according to that story, are still in need of the exact same serious redemption, rescue and healing.
I believe that some of the internal logic of Christianity can be applied to the broader world or culture while other things cannot. So while I deeply believe that everyone would be better off reading the Bible and praying each day, I don't think legislating that make any sense. However, murder has a broader consensus of worldview support, so it makes sense in a pluralist society to legislate against murder--which is why I would push for the end of legalized abortion. It not only has internal logic grounds (which is enough for me to believe it privately) but it also has life-and-death outcomes to protect the weak from the strong (a generally accepted purpose for having laws in the first place) and it also shares plenty of common ground with other worldviews (most all of which have some echo of God's goodness in them, however distant or faint).
Given those things, I'm against homosexual behavior period and certainly and obviously against homosexual marriage because of the internal logic of the Christian story. I believe certain things about God, Jesus, and what Jesus has done through the church he inagurated and so I trust that what the Bible clearly teaches about homosexuality is true. Do I think that there should be a Constitutional amendment to keep marriage as man and woman? No. Do I think it's inevitable that in our country we'll have gay marriage as commonplace? Yes. Do I think we'd be better off as a people if that were not the case? Yes. Can I make that happen any more than I can make everyone read the Scriptures and pray each day? No. If I weren't a Christian would I support gay marriage? I think I probably would be hesitant but have no clear reasons why.
Regarding the issues of Old Testament laws and why we follow some things and not others, that's probably another post for next week, since this has gone on quite long enough!
Thursday, October 05, 2006
And then There's the Liberal Guy
History: About 50 years ago or so an organization developed called The World Council of Churches. The WCC eventually decided to the whole Christian church part was a bit cumbersome and decided to basically become a glorified Salvation Army. Nothing wrong with the Salvation Army. It's just not really the church.
So there was a WCC guy on along with the Christian Coalition guy and of course, since this was NPR, he got very little heat and lots of backing from the callers.
What was particularly vexing, although of course not surprising, was his argument surrounding gay marriage. He had a reasonable point that Scripture has a variety of odd marital arrangements/customs in it--fair enough. But his bottom line? "God just really wants us to love people."
The early church had a variety of Greek words to choose from for the word "love." They chose "agape" which to that point was a seldom-used word. This suited their purposes perfectly, as God's love was beyond any human experience of love and the fact that this word was rarely used gave them permission to freight it with their own meanings.
It's unfortunate that in the English language we've only got one word for love. And the WCC guy was glad to tag God with being "loving" which of course meant we just leave people alone to do what they want to do.
It's interesting that when parents do that, they call it neglect. When God does it, they call that love.
God DOES want us to love people. His love also includes limits, just as any good parent offers limits. There's lots of times my son does not understand my 'no.' There are some 'no's' from Scripture that I do not understand. But I submit to them, because God is God and I'm not. He is love, and I am not. I am not free to take my own definition of love and thrust that onto God. God is love, and so whatever he gives me, whatever blessings he sends my way, whatever he says no to, all that is necessarily what love truly means. If my own definitions do not fit God's actions, it must be my own definitions that are skewed.
And so I'm opposed to gay marriage, even though I think it's truly a raw deal for people who have those inclinations (and I do think that some folks are genetically pre-disposed to homosexuality, just as some folks are genetically pre-disposed to alcoholism). It's not that I hate gay people or am closed off to their struggles, it's just that it's pretty clear from the Scriptures that the God who loves people says that this is not His way.
So there was a WCC guy on along with the Christian Coalition guy and of course, since this was NPR, he got very little heat and lots of backing from the callers.
What was particularly vexing, although of course not surprising, was his argument surrounding gay marriage. He had a reasonable point that Scripture has a variety of odd marital arrangements/customs in it--fair enough. But his bottom line? "God just really wants us to love people."
The early church had a variety of Greek words to choose from for the word "love." They chose "agape" which to that point was a seldom-used word. This suited their purposes perfectly, as God's love was beyond any human experience of love and the fact that this word was rarely used gave them permission to freight it with their own meanings.
It's unfortunate that in the English language we've only got one word for love. And the WCC guy was glad to tag God with being "loving" which of course meant we just leave people alone to do what they want to do.
It's interesting that when parents do that, they call it neglect. When God does it, they call that love.
God DOES want us to love people. His love also includes limits, just as any good parent offers limits. There's lots of times my son does not understand my 'no.' There are some 'no's' from Scripture that I do not understand. But I submit to them, because God is God and I'm not. He is love, and I am not. I am not free to take my own definition of love and thrust that onto God. God is love, and so whatever he gives me, whatever blessings he sends my way, whatever he says no to, all that is necessarily what love truly means. If my own definitions do not fit God's actions, it must be my own definitions that are skewed.
And so I'm opposed to gay marriage, even though I think it's truly a raw deal for people who have those inclinations (and I do think that some folks are genetically pre-disposed to homosexuality, just as some folks are genetically pre-disposed to alcoholism). It's not that I hate gay people or am closed off to their struggles, it's just that it's pretty clear from the Scriptures that the God who loves people says that this is not His way.
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
The Gospel In a Pluralist Society
Being in the midst of a group of university people discussing how we should engage matters of faith and conscience in a public university has made me think more and more about how the gospel message (and the messengers with whom that message is inevitably attached) can and should operate in a pluralist society. I posted once before about my response to 'all religions are really just one' (see Response to Religious Convergence: A Parable) but there's so much more at stake here.
I'm stealing both the title for this post and lots of the thoughts I'll present here from one of my author-drinking buddies, Lesslie Newbiggin, who thinks about these issues far and away better than just about any Christian in church history.
Over the past several years, for better and for worse, Christianity has been 'prime time.' We've got a card-carrying evangelical president, we've had a blockbuster movie (The Passion of the Christ), we've sold billions of books and trinkets (Purpose Driven Life). The two issues that I suspect will push us back into the margins (where I think we are generally better behaved) are homosexuality and secular pluralism.
Secular pluralism seeks to affirm all cultures everywhere (except Western culture, which is generally targeted for pinata-like critique [I can never figure out how to get that squiggly over the n!]). As such, it is often married to a religious universalism--all religions are a-okay. Christian pluralism radically affirms that cultures are good--but then it also radically calls all culture to repentance, transformation and change--and yes, let's please start with Western culture. Just like in the individual, God meets a culture as is and then invites it enter into the process of redemption and sanctification. Believers in every culture are called to participate in that process.
So what exactly does that look like? Newbiggin offers us some helpful places to start our dialogue in a pluralist society.
First off, all worldviews have some sort of core faith-assumptions: Jews, Muslims, Christians, Atheists, Pluralists, etc. Every world view not only has it's own core faith assumptions, it also has explanations for every other world view's faith assumptions. Since we are all coming to the table with our own core faith assumptions, which include explanations for everyone else's faith assumption, no one world view can presume to have 'higher ground' with which to see everyone else's faith.
In other words, FUNCTIONALLY, as Christians in this conversation with a variety of people and perspectives, we do not come to the table arrogantly or presumptuous that we have all the answers locked in already. We have our answers that make sense from our faith perspective, and so do the other folks at the table. In Christ, we believe that we have been given the ultimate revelation about who God is and how we are to relate to him. We share that message unashamedly but also in great humility because it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit that someone else can and will affirm that statement. We will not win over others through pompous certainty nor through our own wisdom but through the Spirit at work in the hearts and minds of our listeners. Our own humility in the conversation is a participation in the Spirit's work of showing what truth actually is, humility seasons the conversation for receptivity.
As Christians we must learn this skill-set of humble conversations around a pluralistic table. We no longer have a monopoly on our cultural understanding--which in some ways is good because, like I said earlier, I think we behave much better from that place of margin than monopoly. In order to engage conversations with others, we engage in authentic dialogue that means a genuine exchange of ideas...and trust that the Holy Spirit is at work in our encounter to bring people to Himself.
I'm stealing both the title for this post and lots of the thoughts I'll present here from one of my author-drinking buddies, Lesslie Newbiggin, who thinks about these issues far and away better than just about any Christian in church history.
Over the past several years, for better and for worse, Christianity has been 'prime time.' We've got a card-carrying evangelical president, we've had a blockbuster movie (The Passion of the Christ), we've sold billions of books and trinkets (Purpose Driven Life). The two issues that I suspect will push us back into the margins (where I think we are generally better behaved) are homosexuality and secular pluralism.
Secular pluralism seeks to affirm all cultures everywhere (except Western culture, which is generally targeted for pinata-like critique [I can never figure out how to get that squiggly over the n!]). As such, it is often married to a religious universalism--all religions are a-okay. Christian pluralism radically affirms that cultures are good--but then it also radically calls all culture to repentance, transformation and change--and yes, let's please start with Western culture. Just like in the individual, God meets a culture as is and then invites it enter into the process of redemption and sanctification. Believers in every culture are called to participate in that process.
So what exactly does that look like? Newbiggin offers us some helpful places to start our dialogue in a pluralist society.
First off, all worldviews have some sort of core faith-assumptions: Jews, Muslims, Christians, Atheists, Pluralists, etc. Every world view not only has it's own core faith assumptions, it also has explanations for every other world view's faith assumptions. Since we are all coming to the table with our own core faith assumptions, which include explanations for everyone else's faith assumption, no one world view can presume to have 'higher ground' with which to see everyone else's faith.
In other words, FUNCTIONALLY, as Christians in this conversation with a variety of people and perspectives, we do not come to the table arrogantly or presumptuous that we have all the answers locked in already. We have our answers that make sense from our faith perspective, and so do the other folks at the table. In Christ, we believe that we have been given the ultimate revelation about who God is and how we are to relate to him. We share that message unashamedly but also in great humility because it is only by the power of the Holy Spirit that someone else can and will affirm that statement. We will not win over others through pompous certainty nor through our own wisdom but through the Spirit at work in the hearts and minds of our listeners. Our own humility in the conversation is a participation in the Spirit's work of showing what truth actually is, humility seasons the conversation for receptivity.
As Christians we must learn this skill-set of humble conversations around a pluralistic table. We no longer have a monopoly on our cultural understanding--which in some ways is good because, like I said earlier, I think we behave much better from that place of margin than monopoly. In order to engage conversations with others, we engage in authentic dialogue that means a genuine exchange of ideas...and trust that the Holy Spirit is at work in our encounter to bring people to Himself.
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