Living Out Faith Loud (Day 15)

I’m blogging my way through Neighbors and Wisemen for Lent. Today we read chpt. 15 where the author tells us a story about Dr. John Perkins’ visit to a packed Reed College auditorium.

For those of you who don’t have the book, here are some selections from the chapter to get you up to speed.

With his simple Southern accent, he set the stage of racial and economic injustice in America. He began with his childhood and walked the room through the essential and painful drama of the 1960s. He unapologetically insisted that the disparities of race and class remain today.

From there Dr. Perkins moved to his own thoughts on the very real plight of America’s disenfranchised and marginalized communities. He expressed how these populations have been systematically removed from the national consciousness, and affirmed the absolute need for a new generation, one fueled by compassion and a sacrificial life.

Tony was shocked at the amazing reception Dr. Perkins got from a student body that allegedly not only had no interest in Christianity but a real and serious dislike of all things Christian. Then he says:

“Reedies want the same thing that Jesus wants. They want authenticity, not hypocrisy. They want faith that leads to activism, not institutionalism. They want to believe in something not because it is redundantly preached but because it is sacrificially lived.”

Yesterday I mentioned Christianity’s territorial participation in the Culture Wars that developed in the 20th century. Whether you think I was too partisan or pessimistic in my assessment of the situation, what you can not get around is that there is a problem.

We have a problem.

More specifically, we have a problem with how we frame the cultural conflicts. When we use the militaristic language of “combat” we miss what may be really going on. As I said earlier this week, our language about combat not only influences how we interpret our experiences, it is actually creating those experiences at some level.

I’m going to say this again: while I do not like drawing lines and attempt to be generously orthodox, it seems to me that there is a kind of christianity that the world is fine to let us hold and actually finds quite intriguing. Dr. Perkins has that kind of faith. He even gets to use Jesus’ name without folks getting offended or upset.

There is however another type of Christianity that is not as well received. This other kind of Christianity, in many ways, is seen to make the world a worse place. I think that I know at least part of why that is the case.

Modern Enlightenment Christianity – an inheritance from Christendom and the Inquisitions – seeks to categorize, compartmentalize, then control the categories. It is forceful, muscular Christianity. Much more like the Romans in power than the type of power we see Jesus utilizing.

Think that I am over stating it? Look at Dr. Perkins. What if it came out that he did not have perfect theology? What if he held some views about social issues that did not meet the litmus test contemporary clashes? Would he be discounted? Marginalized? Attacked and discredited? I don’t think that there is any doubt.

Part of this comes from our categorization of ortho-doxy and ortho-praxy. We live in a climate when the former (right-belief) is far more scrutinized than the latter (right-action).

The seminary that Tony and I went to tries to correct this by adding another overlapping area called ortho-pathy (right feeling). This is a spiritual formation-discipleship emphasis.

That is a move in the right direction. What I fear is that we have become so ingrained with this rabid obsession with our form of orthodoxy that we not only neglect the other two but would discount someone like Dr. Perkins who’s life speaks so loudly about Jesus that his words do not have to.

Our contemporary spiritual climate is so inflamed with animosity, conscientiousness, adversarial approaches, combative critiques, and dismissive polemics that we become gun-shy about adopting the kind of faith that makes the world a better place and shines a welcome light in dark situations.

If you think that this world is full of spiritual poo and it is only a matter of time before Jesus steps back in with vengeance and flushes this world down the eternal drain … then any good we do now is no more than rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

In that case the only thing that really matters is right belief (orthodoxy) for which we will be judged …

Well, you know the rest. The us-them mentality becomes completely acceptable. The neglect of right-living (orthopraxy) and right-being (orthopathy) becomes justifiable.

I would simply say that Jesus’ story of the sheep and the goats seems to put far more concern on being judged by our right actions than any theological litmus test. So not only does God seemed more concerned about it, but the world what God loves seems more attracted by it.

I loved this story about John Perkins’ visit to the college. I am inspired at one level and completely discouraged at another.

Is it just me?
Am I overstating the scope of the problem?

kenalto9

Thanks for introducing me to the concept of ortho-pathy. And for using the Venn diagram to remind me there might be some intersection of pathos, praxis and doxos(afraid I don't know how to break it down to belief)

Your mention of "a kind of christianity that the world is fine to let us hold and actually finds quite intriguing" reminds me of the interview with Tony when he describes Portland as post-Christian, so Christians are now some sort of quaint cultural artifact, not relevant enough to be threatening.

Dr. Perkins talking about praying for the white policemen beating him reminded me of the Dalai Lama talking about another venerated Tibetan leader who was imprisoned for a very long time by the Chinese regime. He spoke of there being a time during his imprisonment when he became fearful. The Dalai Lama expressed empathy with the hardships and mental distress he must have been subjected to. No, said the monk, it had nothing to do with my own suffering, I began to fear I would lose compassion toward the guards who held me prisoner.

"We become gun-shy about adopting the kind of faith that makes the world a better place and shines a welcome light in dark situations." For myself, my life was the Titanic before I came to faith. More than hope for eternity, I need help to stay afloat now - and I have found it! It was right there all around me while I was steaming into the iceberg!

I'm enjoying these conversations precisely because the evangelical background Tony describes is so unfamiliar to me, and I am now enough of a Christian to want to try to understand it better, so am less dismissive than I would have been in the past. Dr. Perkins personifies a living breathing social gospel, he is real enough for the Reed audience to hear and respond to.

John Cobb is another figure that resonates as real, and I hope his message of needing to get focused on what we are doing to the planet will also gain traction with students at places like Reed, and places not like Reed.

TonyKriz

@kenalto9 Your comment struck me as particularly lovely. Thank you for taking a moment to write them. I am also very much enjoying @thebosanders processing through this series and particularly the conversations he is inviting all of us to join (and contribute to... readers like you have been great.)

The main reason I wanted to respond to you is because this line made me laugh out loud and resonated with what I experience very day: "Christians are now some sort of quaint cultural artifact, not relevant enough to be threatening" It is both poetic and accurate.

-tony

kenalto9

@TonyKriz @thebosanders thanks for writing your book, and to bo for introducing us to it.

TonyKriz

@kenalto9 The honor is mine... and thanks to Bo as well.

BoSanders moderator

@TonyKriz @kenalto9 I like so much of what is being said ... except one thing ...

I don't think that Dr. Perkins' faith is not relevant. or not threatening. I think that it is both of those things -Bo

just trying to clarify.

kenalto9

livefyre isn't going to sort these out the way i would have preferred but,

Dr. Perkins faith is very relevant to this world and to the students at Reed, as tony shows us, but for most of the media consumers in the post-Christian world "our contemporary spiritual climate is so inflamed with animosity, conscientiousness, adversarial approaches, combative critiques, and dismissive polemics "that a lot of people think Christianity is about putting women or gays in their place, or denying the reality of science. A lot of people think that christianity has lost touch with Dr. Perkins.

prophetsandpopstars

@BoSanders @TonyKriz @kenalto9 And yet another great book to add to the pile.

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_JacquiB

Bo, I'm with you. I was awestruck by this chapter. As someone who has heard (and very briefly interacted) with Dr. Perkins on a few occasions, I can attest to the beauty of Tony's story. There is something very sacred and powerful, almost mythical, about this man. I have watched him, a small, stooped, shuffling man in his 80s, shake from a mixture of age and passion as he spoke, fearing that he would either work himself into a heart attack or tumble off the stage in his fervor. But let me assure you, in spite of that appearance, there is nothing quaint about this man or his message. This man has spoken words over me that have entirely reshaped the course of my life. His words and the way he speaks them have, in many ways, completely wrecked the life I once knew. There is nothing irrelevant or non threatening about that. But there is something incredible about a hard word spoken in love. I was with a group of more progressive pastors earlier this week who were discussing the book #Occupy the Bible. They continually called the author a prophet and affirmed her anger at economic injustice, because of course prophets are angry. I may have already said this here this week, but that created a problem for me. Because prophets see the world as it should be and us into a different way of being. There is nothing different about anger, even righteous anger. Everyone is angry and yelling about something. And from what I've seen, in scripture and in my own experience, prophets are not angry. Prophets are heartbroken. They speak not from a place of rage, but from a place of love and mercy, however hard the truth. That is different. That looks different to a world accustomed to yelling and anger. That is the kind of blatant Jesus-talk that will invite people in, because that is what we all thirst for at a human level.

@_JacquiB I am with you in all this. My one addition would be: Our problem is NOT that we have too much anger (in fact I think we have too little anger), the problem is we are angry at the wrong things and we are angry in the wrong ways. -tony

The scope of the problem is quantum and cosmic. The Venn praxes are a picture of what we experience in the words, actions and e-motives of Christians (like me). At the moment I'm caught in a meditation between Christian Piatt's "religious independents" which certainly have a legitimate place in the mainstream now, and Jonathan Fitzgerald's description of the "New Sincerity".

Authenticity, especially quiet authenticity, as a private means of personal discourse seems like it's worth the time it takes to ask better questions. Are we as concerned with being interested as we are with being interesting? Are we asking questions that we are willing to listen to the answers to? Are we taking time to invest in the narrative of the people around us? Or are we only out to replace it with some version of our better, righter-er narrative? Add another million questions here.

Compassion and self-sacrifice are what make words, action and emotions authentic, and ultimately point to Jesus.

And...It's not just you.

Claremont School of Theology

Living Out Faith Loud (Day 15)

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