living

Why the Church of N. America will always be (mostly) like it is

May 9, 2012 by Bo Sanders 27 Comments

The church of N. America will always be (mostly) like it is today. When those who think as individuals read a text that is communal, there is always going to be an issue.

I know that there is a real danger in painting in broad stokes and speaking in generalities. I normally steer clear of such dangers but once in a while you find something that allows you to wade out onto the normally thin ice with a certain measure of confidence.

I recently finished a term paper on Alisdair MacIntrye’s opus After Virtue which is his attempt to reclaim the Aristotelian notion of character formation within community (to oversimplify a bit). In preparation for writing the paper I went back over some classics like John Rawls and Michael Sandel (the communitarian) and others.

It just so happens that I have also been reading a lot of post-colonial critique during this year and I have a growing suspicion that I wanted to throw out there:

We have individuals (products of the enlightenment) reading a text that was written in a communal framework (a product of a communal society). That provides a fundamental discrepancy that will never be resolved. It will always provide a disjointed experience and thought process that lacks continuity.

Let’s not pretend that we can think another way. We are heirs of the enlightenment – this is our operating system. We can download a new program like ‘christianity’ but it is operating within the individualist code. Talking with my friends who are from non-European descent (Native American, Pacific Islands or certain Asian communities) it is clear that there is no simple conversion that an individual can undergo and simply start thinking in communal terms. We are cultural creatures and this is our culture.

It shows up when we read the Bible. It shows up when we talk of government (democracy) economy (consumerism), status, value, worth, choice, success, identity, rights, laws,leadership and … well nearly every other aspect of Western society.

The famous example of Philippians 2:12 admonishing us to “work out your salvation with fear and trembling” is but a drop in the pond. It’s not just that the English language doesn’t have a plural ‘you’ (unless one counts the ya’all of the Southern US) but it is bigger than that. It is that we think in individual ‘you’s and there is no way around it.

This will always be an issue. So even when somebody talks about character formation, spiritual community, or some ideal of communitarian discipleship (be it Hauerwas, the Radical Orthodox, or any other innovative group) in the end, the church of N.America will always look mostly like it does now. The reason is that this individualism we think in is not all that compatible with the communal thrust of our very scriptures – and that is unreconcilable at some level. It can not be resolved because we can no more stop thinking as individuals than that Bible can stop encouraging community.

Filed Under: bible stuff, books, church history, engaging, latest, living, thinking Tagged With: Bible, Canada, church, Europe, European, God, Hauerwas, individualism, jesus, MacIntyre, radical orthodoxy, religion, society, spirituality, United States, Western

Dressing up in Justice! Looking for the Reign of God!

May 9, 2012 by Tripp Fuller Leave a Comment

When I was younger, many of my favorite characters on TV, or in print, were those who lived normal lives but also felt a sense of calling or obligation to fight for justice. These characters were all over the place, and in many ways, still fascinate our imaginations.

Why NOT the Avengers Case?

They are names of heroes, superheroes even. Superman, Wonderwoman, Lone Ranger, the Incredibles and even Captain Planet. They were all people who, though having normal lives in one moment, possessed the uncanny ability to transform into a different person when a need or opportunity to help emerged.

What all of these heroes have is common is not simply that they fought for justice, for what was right in the world, but that in their everyday lives they were open to the opportunities to do good where ever it was needed most, right then, in that moment; even if it meant flying across the city to make it happen or spending nights looking up at the sky.

"And heart!"

Look, it took me a long while to realize that many of gospel texts that seem to be about cosmic judgment aren’t really about some cosmic-epic judgment at all. They are really about how it is that we live our lives in the day to day. Stories like that of Christ the king who sits on throne and who draws a line between those who do good wherever they see it, and those who do good when they think others will see it, is not something that should startle us.

Rather, this parable really puts doing good for others back on us. Like many of the other stories that we read in our communities of faith throughout the calendar year, the feasts and festivals that the church holds as part of what it means to do life together shapes us to see the world with a different set of eyes and to hear with a different set of ears.

The parable of Christ the King, one often read as far more judging than calling, beckons us like the batman symbol cast across the Gotham skyline to see justice not as something that will get enacted out in the future, but rather as something that we enact every day, in every moment, with every choice. Or, as Tony Jones suggests at the intersection of our ongoing journey with others.

Look, in a sense, what our Christian readings, prayers, and our table fellowship call us to today, is to dress up in justice and to play our part in the reign of God that exists always before us. And this reign, is not something that happens in one place of creation and not in another. The rule of God always covers us all. The rule of God, the reign of God, is more like the ground of all being that gets glimpsed and tied into than simply put in place when the right people are in power. Rule of God is always happening though not always enacted.

What the church enacts through its readings, liturgies, and prayers, is a calling of Christians (and all who participate in them) to be in the rule of God and to Look (for the good in others, for the good in self); to search for the opportunities and places where we can help the other, where we can do justice in the world, where can do unto others as we would have them do unto us.

When we do this, when we put on the eyes of faith, we come to see that Jesus doesn’t want us to do things in this world because he told us to. Jesus wants us do justice (to do good) in this world because as we do justice, as we do good in the world, we bring a little bit of hope to those that need it most. We bring a little more of that which is sacred to the forefront of people’s experience and vision.

And, if I’m guessing, as we do unto others as we would have done unto us, and as we share our talents with one another, as we gather rather than divide, bind those that are injured, see someone crying and offer a shoulder or help, see someone that is hungry and give them food, see the thirsty and give them water, see those that are cold and give them a jacket; as we imitate the saints living and present among us…we might just figure out that there are a few more heroes out there in the world, and in our communities of faith than we thought.

And that my friends, is pretty super.

Look.

Guest Post From…

Joshua Case is an Episcopal blogger, creative, and public theologian. He is a graduate of the University of Alabama and the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. Known as “Josh” of The Nick & Josh Podcast, Joshua currently works at Holy Innocent’s Episcopal Church in Atlanta. When not curating things religious and cultural Joshua works as a professional golf instructor.

Joshua on Twitter & Joshua on Facebook

Filed Under: bible stuff, latest, living

Hell On Earth: A Sex Trafficking Survivor’s Story

May 2, 2012 by Tripp Fuller 5 Comments

*****Warning: this post contains graphic details of a sex trafficking story.*****

This is the testimony of a young woman I met last week on my trip to Tijuana with Centro Romero. She was extremely courageous to share her story with us. The transcript below is translated from her Spanish:

“I was sold to a gentleman from the U.S. by my sister when I was 13 years old. I already had a baby. In the exchange, I was sold under the agreement that he would help me out with my kid because my baby was ill. I ended up being trafficked to Anchorage, Alaska. He basically kidnapped my baby away from me and didn’t allow me to see him. I was in prison, not able to see anyone for a long, long time. At that time, I was forced to have sex with men and women. Obviously, I was aware that my baby was not getting the care that we were promised. Our diet was basically rice and beans and nothing else. At the main market, at least in my case, I was 14, about to be 15, I was sold to have sex with other women.

“So, unfortunately my baby’s condition got worse. He never allowed me to see my baby and my baby was never provided with the medical care he needed, even when he was in the process of dying, he never thought about providing care for my baby. My baby had leukemia at the time, but of course I didn’t know that.

“Probably because of my mothering instinct, one day I decided that I didn’t care what happened, I needed to take care of my baby. So I found a way to escape and to take my baby to a place in which I was pretty sure that he would get the care that he needed. But the problem was that I didn’t know where I was going, I didn’t know the area or the town or even where I was. And unfortunately my baby passed away.

“When I ended up getting to a place, before my baby passed away, the people that received me didn’t want to take care of my baby. After the baby passed away, due to the lack of care, I noticed that I suddenly started receiving gifts. As I think about it now, I think they were probably trying to keep my mouth shut because they didn’t want me to denounce them or anything like that.

“After my baby passed away, instead of burying him, they invited me to cremate my baby. It was a tough situation for me because I was only 15, so I didn’t know exactly what I was doing. After my baby was cremated, the only thing that I had to be in touch with what I felt was a part of me was the ashes. Unfortunately, he basically kidnapped the ashes and I was recaptured and put out to have sex once again. I used to cry, just asking him to allow me to touch the ashes of my baby, but he never allowed me to do that.

“One time, after the cremation of my baby, I was forced to have sex with a woman and him, and he was so involved with what was happening that I was able to escape through a window. I was able to make contact with a policeman and they took me to a place where they used to take minors who are in trouble. Because I didn’t know any English, they kept asking me where I was from. They kept me in the shelter for minors for a few months.

“I found out that the man who bought me was 33 years-old, that he had a criminal record as a sex offender, and had been involved with minors in the past. But he, as a predator, kept looking for me. After a few months in the care of the police department, I realized that I was once again pregnant.

“He showed up, presenting himself as a relative. He promised me that he would be gentle with me if I came back to his place. Without the support of the police department, being 15, I didn’t have any option other than to believe in him again. At least during my pregnancy he was very loving. But, after the birth of my baby, as soon as my baby was born, he put me under the “care” of the immigration officers. He told them that I didn’t have the capacity to care for my baby and that my first baby had passed away because I physically abused him.

“I was deported from Anchorage to Tijuana. Even under those conditions, I started working at a bar in Tijuana because I wanted to put some money together for airfare in order to go back to Alaska for my baby. And I ended up going back to Alaska. I was looking for my baby and then my abuser kept telling me not to leave him because he was finally in love with me. He was getting government support because he was a single father. He asked the government to facilitate the process of getting a house for the family in San Diego county. Two months after that, we got a house in San Diego and he moved himself to San Diego, but without me because I had to come back to Tijuana. He promised that he would bring my baby girl to Tijuana so I could see my daughter. But, if I wanted to see her, I had to pay him $100.

“My pain and suffering was just too much, so I decided to give up and think that my baby was dead in the same way that I lost my first child. I decided to stay away from him. Even though being apart from him would hurt me a lot because of my child, I knew that it was the best thing that I could do for me and for her.”

At this point she was overcome and unable to continue the story.

I’ve struggled with what to say to close this post. The hell on earth that this precious young woman experienced is devastating. Unfortunately, there is no simple solution to the problem of sex trafficking. It is a global and complex problem. But I want to issue a challenge to men: We are the primary source of the demand for sex trafficking and we must begin to challenge the male-culture that says that putting others down makes us feel better about ourselves. Every single time that we make a joke about rape, call a girl a slut or a whore, or objectify women through pornography, we contribute to a culture that makes possible the stories like the one above. The fact that we are unaware that there are literally millions of stories like the one above shows how desperately we try to suppress them. If we want to end sex trafficking, we must start with ourselves.

* This is a guest post from Stephen Keating who is covering this sex trafficking conference for HBC. Thanks to Stephen for sharing what he’s learning with us!

Filed Under: engaging, latest, living, news, politics, public policy

Hit Me (baby) One More Time: on turning the other cheek

April 24, 2012 by Bo Sanders 2 Comments

I’m going to see Slavo Zizek this evening. He is at the LA Library and we got tickets! In preparation I have been listing to all of my archives of his talks – including the last time he was at the LA Library. His conversation partner that night was Jack Miles (author of God: a biography) and the topic that night was violence.

As I listened again I was struck with how timely the dialogue was in light of our conversation about Jesus and (s)words last week – as Tripp and I prepare to go into the podcast studio this week to record a TNT about that, as well as leaving the church.

In his book ‘Violence’ Zizek addresses the idea of emancipatory or redemptive violence embedded in Christianity – a topic that we have discussed at length. But at one point Miles has to correct the philosopher. It concerned that issue of ‘turning the other cheek’. What Miles has to flesh out is that a master would have hit a slave – not by striking him on the right cheek – as he would an equal – but the left with a back hand. The command then is that if someone strikes you in this way (on the left cheek) show to them the right as well and in this way provoke them to a greater of level of violence than they had originally intended – accomplishing two things:

exposing their violence
positioning your dignity in the face of that violence

I have also been reading Walter Wink’s Jesus and Nonviolence. He clarifies it this way:

There are three general responses to evil: 1) passivity 2) violent opposition 3) the third way of militant non-violence articulated by Jesus. … Jesus abhors both passivity and violence as responses to evil.

Wink outlines that third way later in the book with a series of bullet points:

Seize the moral initiative
Find the creative alternative to violence
Assert your own human dignity as a person
Meet force with ridicule or humor
Break the cycle of humiliation
Refuse to submit or to accept the inferior position
Expose the injustice of the system
Take control of the power dynamic
Shame the oppressor into repentance
Stand your ground
Force the Powers to make decisions for which that are not prepared
Recognize your own power
Be willing to suffer rather than to retaliate
Cause the oppressor to see you in a new light
Deprive the oppressor of a situation where a show of force is effective
Be willing to undergo the penalty for breaking unjust laws
Die to fear of the old order and its rules

This type of thinking is as revolutionary as the day it was spoken in that famous sermon by Jesus. The binaries and dualisms that we operate in are just failing us at every turn. The overly simple either-or options are a trap.

Here is the simple reality: loving your neighbor is a big enough challenge that it has kept many thinkers for many traditions busy trying to figure out who (exactly) is one’s neighbor. and what does love look like. We follow a teacher (in this ‘way’) who goes past that debate and says “Love your enemies”. Let’s be honest – that doesn’t make any sense! If I love them … they would not long be to me an enemy

I end with a Wink: Love of enemies is, in the broadest sense, behaving out of one’s own deepest self-interest; “that you may be sons and daughters of your Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:45).

Filed Under: bible stuff, books, church history, engaging, latest, living, thinking Tagged With: Bible, book, books, church, dignity, God, Jack Miles, jesus, Matthew 5, pacifist, Sermon of the Mount, violence, Walter Wink, zizek

Zombies Empire Bible & Theology: TNT April 22

April 21, 2012 by Bo Sanders 16 Comments

In this wild & wooly hour, Bo and Tripp cover 4 diverse topics. The first is a blog-post by Bo’s mentor Randy Woodley over at Patheos .

They also cover Tripp’s post at PoMoMusings(@adamw)

In between, the topic of Zombies (via the Walking Dead) and the Hunger Games is introduced by a call from Tripp’s brother, Steven Fuller

* SUPPORT the podcast by just getting anything on AMAZON through THIS LINK.We really appreciate your assistance in covering all the hosting fees which went up 20 bucks a month due to the growing Deaconate!

Click To Subscribe in iTunes...this SHOW is going SOLO!!!

One Click to the Homebrewed Hotline!

Standard Podcast [ 1:03:40 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Filed Under: engaging, features, living, podcast, thinking, TNT Tagged With: Bible, book, books, Brother Fuller, empire, God, Hunger Games, jesus, Pomo musings, Randy Woodley, Walking Dead, Zombies

Reflecting on the Resurrection part 2

April 20, 2012 by Bo Sanders 8 Comments

Resurrecting space for belief

Easter is a big deal. Passages like Paul’s claim in 1 Corinthians 15:13-15 (NIV) tell us:

13 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised.

As I a pastor I looked forward to Easter so much. I knew, however, that we would have visitors, family members, and friends who would come to our services out of relational obligation or for social interest in the event. I knew that some of these would not believe in the literalness of the resurrection of Jesus’ body.

I always had to think through how I was going to talk about this in a way that was both faithful in proclamation for us as a community of faith, while also attempting to be invitational and sensitive to potential objections or barriers from our guests.I have no interest in apologizing for what we believe as a faith community. But neither do I want to dogmatically push an ancient worldview that may, to the listener, be suspicious at best and incompatible at worst.

In light of the conversation that we have been having with Philip Clayton [around his new book] and my articulation between the miraculous and the ‘super’natural- the resurrection takes on an interesting twist.

Here is the thing: as in so many aspects of our modern life, we exist in a world dominated by dualism and presentation designed for polarity. The resurrection is no different. The two options seems to be:

A) it happened literally just like the Gospel accounts portray
B) the laws of physics can not be broken by even God and so the Gospel accounts are literary creations designed to portray theological themes.

I get both of those perspectives. I myself have no problem with the bodily resurrection as a miraculous event that carries deep theological implications (like prolepsis, ontological priority of the future, etc.)

But … in the same way that Jesus’ walking on water is not the POINT of that story. The point was to hear the word of Christ “be not afraid” . It was not simply to understand the physics of how Jesus might have walked on the water or to add it to a checklist of things you must believe even if you don’t understand them.

This is where Clayton’s idea is so powerful.

In Acts 9, Paul experienced Jesus post-ascension and he was also powerfully changed. It was that same guy (now named Paul) who penned the words that I quoted earlier (1 Cor. 15) . But Paul did not encounter the biological body of Christ. He experienced something we can call the ‘real presence’ of Christ.

Various options are open to those who accept this hypothesis, which we might call the personal but nonphysical theory of Jesus’ post-mortem presents. There can be no talk of proof here, but there may be ways of showing that, at least in principle, a real albeit nonphysical presence of a person after death is compatible with the presumption against miracles to which the problem of evil let us in chapter 3.

One of these approaches involves postulating that the early disciples must have experienced a certain kind of event that no longer occurs today. Advocates of this view seek to do justice to the indications in the New Testament texts that, even if Jesus remains somehow present, the nature of his presence changed radically after the finite series of events that occurred soon after his death. They reason that something must have been different in the days or weeks after Jesus’s death, even if what occurred did not involve the resuscitation (even in some significantly transform condition) of the physical body. - Predicament of Belief p. 97

My question is ‘why could that not have been what the disciples experienced?’ I know full well that the more progressive members of the Homebrewed community will say ‘Duh – we have held this for a long time.’ Please understand A) I was certainly not raised to think this way and did not know it was even an option B) most of the people I know and talk to panic when something like this is proposed.

I want to be clear: I am not trying to get everyone to believe this option. I am simply trying to highlight an alternative to the modern either-or argument that is stuck in an endless round-and-round stand off.

My only point is that those who buy into this third (real presence) option count as “believing in the resurrection”. Those who subscribe to a literal-physical option often claim that only their option (#1) counts as legitimate. Those who hold to option #2 roll their eyes and look down their nose (not easy to do at the same time) at those who have not accounted for the literary devices employed in the Gospel accounts.

I’m interested in the ‘Big Tent’ here. To get there we must first concede that the point of the text is not about physics or biology. Even if we hold to that element of the story, we have to remember that understanding or believing in the physics is not the point. To experience the risen Christ and be changed by that presence is the point.

So I wanted to ask

What have you found helpful to include in the conversation that I am leaving out?
What seem to be the sources of folks’ major hesitations that I have not accounted for?

I could really use some help thinking this through. Since I left behind my Josh McDowell evidence that demands a verdict and my Lee Strobel case for the resurrection, I am working diligently to both think and present a broader approach without going all the way to Marcus Borg-land.

[part 1 can be found here]

Filed Under: bible stuff, books, church history, engaging, latest, living, thinking Tagged With: Bible, book, books, Easter, God, gospel, jesus, john cobb, NT Wright, Pentecost, Philip Clayton, resurrection

Leaving the Church – Staying at Church

April 16, 2012 by Bo Sanders 30 Comments

Rachel Held Evans had a post last month that she has graciously allowed us to utilize here. In this week’s TNT podcast, Tripp and I are going to talking about Jesus & His (S)words - which should be fun as Tripp lays the smack down on a pacifist metaphysic – but, as a pastor type, I also wanted to pair it with something ecclesiastic.

Rachel’s post [link] and it’s follow up “15 Reasons I Returned to the Church” are wonderful. Here is her initial post and then I was hoping to hear from the Homebrewed crowd. Why did you leave the church? If you haven’t left, Why have you stayed? What would be the reason you leave?

___

Eight million twenty-somethings have left the church, and it seems like everyone is trying to figure out why.

Last week, Christian Piatt offered seven reasons here, and four more reasons here. David Kinnaman recently authored a book entitled, You Lost Me, which details the findings of Barna researchers who interviewed hundreds of 18-29 year-olds about why they left the church.

I left the church when I was twenty-seven. I am now thirty, and after trying unsuccessfully to start a house church, my husband and I are struggling to find a faith community in which we feel we belong. I’ve been reluctant to write about this search in the past, but it seems like such a common experience, I think it’s time to open up, especially now that I’ve had some time to process. But let’s begin with fifteen reasons why I left:

1. I left the church because I’m better at planning Bible studies than baby showers…but they only wanted me to plan baby showers.

2. I left the church because when we talked about sin, we mostly talked about sex.

3. I left the church because my questions were seen as liabilities.

4. I left the church because sometimes it felt like a cult, or a country club, and I wasn’t sure which was worse.

5. I left the church because I believe the earth is 4.5 billion years old and that humans share a common ancestor with apes, which I was told was incompatible with my faith.

6. I left the church because sometimes I doubt, and church can be the worst place to doubt.

7. I left the church because I didn’t want to be anyone’s “project.”

8. I left the church because it was often assumed that everyone in the congregation voted for Republicans.

9. I left the church because I felt like I was the only one troubled by stories of violence and misogyny and genocide found in the Bible, and I was tired of people telling me not to worry about it because “God’s ways are higher than our ways.”

10. I left the church because of my own selfishness and pride.

11. I left the church because I knew I would never see a woman behind the pulpit, at least not in the congregation in which I grew up.

12. I left the church because I wanted to help people in my community without feeling pressure to convert them to Christianity.

13. I left the church because I had learned more from Oprah about addressing poverty and injustice than I had learned from 25 years of Sunday school.

14. I left the church because there are days when I’m not sure I believe in God, and no one told me that “dark nights of the soul” can be part of the faith experience.

15. I left the church because one day, they put signs out in the church lawn that said “Marriage = 1 Man + 1 Woman: Vote Yes on Prop 1,” and I knew the moment I saw them that I never wanted to come back.

“I am convinced that what drives most people away from Christianity is not the cost of discipleship but rather the cost of false fundamentals.” – Evolving in Monkey Town, p. 207

“We aren’t looking for a faith that provides all the answers; we’re looking for one in which we are free to ask the questions.” – Evolving in Monkey Town, p. 204

In the weeks to come, I’ll be sharing more about why I stayed with the Church–with a capital-C-- and about our search for a local faith community.

Why did you leave the church?

Why do you stay?

Filed Under: conversations, engaging, latest, random, thinking Tagged With: Bible, book, books, church, Forget the Church, God, jesus, Newsweek, rachel held evans

Jesus and His (S)words

April 12, 2012 by Bo Sanders 38 Comments

Jesus tells his disciples to sell their bags and buy swords. Why? And why then does he reprimand Peter for using a blade at the moment when it seemed to be most appropriate? Was Jesus being inconsistent? Did he change his mind in the moment? Was it a test? Did he set Peter up to fail? Why did he say that ‘those who live by the sword, will die by the sword?’ and then tell his disciple to buy them?

I am asked about Jesus’ relationship to swords as much as anything I get asked about. Good hearted people are quite baffled by the whole subject.

Jesus did after all say that he came to bring a sword.
As the word of God, he is said to be sharper than any two-edged sword.
He is pictured with a sword coming from his mouth when he ‘returns’.
and there is this matter of him telling his followers to buy swords

As a former apologist, I have gotten pretty good at helping the baffled work through these passages. I even has a presentation I do called jesuSword that incorporates Jesus, his words, and these passages about swords.

In order to facilitate a lively give and take, we will take this in 3 quick addresses over the next 24 hours.

Part 1: Jesus says that he came to bring a sword.

Matthew 10:34 “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to turn “‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law— 37 Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38 Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.

Is it possible that Jesus was being ironic and that his sword is actually an un-sword. I say this because Jesus’ sword does the exact opposite thing that normal swords do. His sword divides family. Traditional swords are used their swords to defend their kin and kind.

Jesus was using a play on words.

Jesus was using hyperbole. In his day swords were actually for defending one’s family – for guarding me and mine. In this sense, Jesus’ “sword” is an un-sword… or an anti-sword. It does the opposite of what human swords are used for. Jesus’ sword is not for defending family but for dividing family. Jesus did not come with a human sword but the opposite!!

John Caputo puts it this way:

The kingdom reigns wherever the least and most undesirable are favored while the best and most powerful are put on the defensive. The powerless power of the kingdom prevails whenever the one is preferred to the ninety-nine, whenever one loves one’s enemies and hates one’s father and mother while the world, which believes in power, counsels us to fend off our enemies and keep the circle of kin and kind, of family and friends, fortified and tightly drawn.”

If Jesus was being ironic or using hyperbole, it would make so much more sense than the way this passage gets used to justify violence and militarism.

I would love to hear your thoughts – I just have one request: please don’t use the word ‘Pacifist’ when speaking of Jesus. That set of commitments belongs to a distinct school of thought that did not exist in Jesus day so it is anachronistic to use in that way. He was certainly into non-violence and radical peace-making but Pacifism is a unique configuration of convictions.

_______________

Part 2:

There are lots of swords in the New Testament. The Word of God is compared to a double-edged sword and Jesus comes back wielding a sword. Maybe the Bible is more than ‘O.K.’ with swords and sword imagery?

Let me throw out two things:

In the context of the Roman Empire and its occupation of Jewish lands in the 1st century, swords would have been a common item that drawing imagery out of would have been appropriate.

A well-known pastor in Seattle, Washington is famously quoted as saying “Jesus is a cage fighter with a tattoo on his thigh and a sword in his hand, determined to make someone bleed”. He said this in reference to the fact that he “could not worship somebody that he could beat up.”

Some people dismiss statements like this and chalk it up to testosterone fueled, overly inflated, pumped up hyper-masculinity. I worry that there is something much deeper and much more sinister involved. I think that it is a fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of God and the interpretation of Christian scripture.

What is noteworthy in Revelation 19, is that the sword is not in Jesus’ hand but it comes out of Jesus’ mouth. That seems important in the poetic/prophetic nature of Revelation. This sword is not your average sword. It is not in Jesus’ hand and that makes you wonder if the way in which this sword “strike down” the nations is not in bloody violence but in a kind of destruction that would happen as a result of a sword that proceeds from the mouth of God? Let’s ask ourselves “is there something that comes from the mouth of God that radically impacts or consumes peoples and nations?” Is there something sharp that comes from the mouth of God … something sharper than any two edged sword?

Oh, here we go: Hebrews 4

12 For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

So far so good! ‘It’ judges the thoughts and heart… but here comes the twist:

13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from His sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

Hold the phones! … the Word of God (it) is a person? Yes. Guess who?

14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.

Jesus is the Word of God? (I’m being funny but you may want to check out John 1 for clarification).

In conclusion: the use of sword imagery in both Revelation and in the book of Hebrews needs to be taken with a poetic grain of salt. Yes, the Bible uses sword imagery. The thing is that if Jesus’ (S)word, from part 1, is a non-sword or an un-sword and in Revelation is comes from Jesus’ mouth and in Hebrews it is a person … then none of these passages, thus far, can be utilized to justify what so many Christian (s)words are used for.

I’ve obviously been having fun here, but the bottom line is that just because the Bible uses swords as analogies – it isn’t a wholesale validation of swords nor a justification for using them as the world does.

________

Part 3: Jesus tells his disciple to buy a sword?

We come to that famous passage in Luke 22 where Jesus tells his disciples to buy a sword.

35 Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?”

“Nothing,” they answered.

36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. 37 It is written: ‘And he was numbered with the transgressors’[b]; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment.”

38 The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.”

“That’s enough!” he replied.

Here are two readings you may want to consider:

Earlier this week I engaged a political reading of Moses and the waters of Meribah from Numbers 20. My question was “why, if Moses was going to ultimately speak to the rock, did the Lord even mention the staff?” The answer was that it was a symbol of power to be carried – yes – but ultimately resisted in favor of a better present option that might be overshadowed by the most obvious option.

It takes strength to turn the other cheek. If you don’t have the ability to retaliate … it is just being a doormat or victim? That is how I have always thought about it.

In that perspective, I have read Jesus’ odd command with Peter in mind. I see that fateful night where Jesus tells him to ‘put away your sword’ and later tells the authorities ‘if my kingdom was of this world my followers would fight.’ The implication is that Jesus’ kingdom is not of this world and so his followers don’t fight.

The sword for the disciple, then, is what the staff was for Moses in Numbers 20: a powerful option to be resisted in favor of a preferable option that is less obvious because it is less forceful.

I used to reconcile ‘buying swords’ as a sort of object lesson or training excersise for the disciples. One lesson (trust and supply) is over – next lesson: You can’t resist temptation is one of the options is not even available.

Then, in 2007, I discovered that Biblical Scholars have a different way of handling the passage. Here is Ben Witherington:

Lk. 22.36-38. What is the meaning of this little story, taking into account the larger context of Jesus’ teaching? Vs. 37 is the key where Jesus quotes Is. 53.12—“he was numbered with the transgressors”. Jesus is saying to the disciples—you must fulfill your role as transgressors of what I have taught you!!! They must play the part of those who do exactly the opposite of what Jesus taught them in the Sermon on the Mount. The disciples become transgressors by seeking out weapons and then seeking to use them. This much is perfectly clear from the context for the disciples then go on to say “look Lord here is two swords”. They already have such weapons and Jesus responds in disgust to the fact that they are already transgressing his principles of non-violence by responding “that’s enough” (of this nonsense).

So either Jesus was saying that two swords was enough for the revolution (not likely) or Witherington has this right.

Conclusion: We have looked at these four famous passages now and it seems clear that although Jesus talked about swords and the writers of scripture utilized sword analogies, none of these passages is a validation of the type of violence these verses are used to justify.

Filed Under: bible stuff, books, church history, conversations, engaging, latest, thinking Tagged With: Bible, book, books, God, guns, Hebrews 4, jesus, John Caputo, Matthew 10:34, Military, non-violence, pacifist, peace-making, Revelation 19, swords, violence, Weakness, word, words

A Most Interesting Reading of Moses at Meribah (Numbers 20)

April 11, 2012 by Bo Sanders 7 Comments

Recently I stumbled on what might be the most interesting reading of Moses at Mirebah I have seen. It comes from the book Emergency Politics by Bonnie Honig (also on Kindle). In it, she is engaging the theology of Franz Rosenzweig – a contemporary and rival to the German (later Nazi) Carl Schmitt who famously said “” Sovereign is he who decides on the exception.”

In Numbers chpt 20, Miriam passes away. She had been a prophetess for the people and had challenged Moses’ authority on occasion. Immediately after her passing (this will become important) the people realize that there is no water and press Moses and Aaron for solutions. Moses and Aaron step away from the people to seek God and receive instruction to “take the staff and speak to the rock – it will pour out water before their eyes”.

Moses, as you may remember, doesn’t follow instructions to the ‘T’. He ad libs a little bit. He does indeed gather the people but then he veers from the plan. He chastises the people and then strikes the rock. Two things happen:

water does indeed come out
God is displeased with Moses and will not let him enter the land that is promised.

I have preached this passage many times and have read lots of treatments. I am intrigued by this passage and have always been unsettled by one detail in the story, which I have never been able to resolve:

why does the Lord tell Moses to take the staff if he is just going to speak to the rock? Why even mention the staff?

Here is where Honig and Rosenzweig bring a unique reading. The staff represent something magical like sorcery – or the miraculous for the early 20th century. This is a political theology and what is at stake in the suspension of law in emergency conditions. Can a sovereign power suspend law in the same way that God suspends the laws of physics in order to preform miracles? Leaders, being empowered by God, the thinking goes, could suspend ‘normal’ activity if they determined an exceptional circumstance.

In Honig and Rosenzweig’s hermeneutic the dispersed empowerment of the people (multitude) is the location for God’s will and is intended to be home to the will/voice of the Lord. But, as we know, this responsibility had been too overwhelming and was resisted by the people in selecting Moses as a king type who would speak to God for/instead of them (Exodus 20:19). This was an abdication by the people of what the Lord had desired for them as a people – to be prophets all.

This resistance is reinforced when the voice of the people rises in the absence of water, and Moses (along with his brother Aaron) turn away from the ‘stiff necked people’ and receive instruction to speak to the rock. Moses then, probably importing the top-down authoritarianism of his Egyptian upbringing, disobeys the command to speak and instead, chastises the people and strikes the rock with his staff in an act of magical sorcery. God, though it produces water, reprimands this act, and Moses is disallowed from entering the promised-land with the people.

This event is placed within the historical context, earlier in the passage, where Miriam passed away and immediately the people realized that they had no water and held a council against Moses and Aaron. Miriam’s name alludes to water and she was the sister who placed Moses in the Nile’s water when he was an infant. She had been the only one to challenge Moses’ authoritarian ways and she provided, as a prophetess, a check to Moses’ power. Without her, this reading states, Moses proved he will give the people … “not authentic prophecy, but sorcery.” In not recognizing the predictive prophecy of the people (and Miriam), Moses loses his leadership of the people.

Honig utilizes Rosenzweig’s two types of prayer – one that spontaneously arises in a situational moment, and another that is used by the community and creates an openness or receptivity – to analyze the judicial deliberation surrounding the Bush v. Gore presidential ruling. By imagining that the people could have risen up in expectation of a serious effort to count valuable democratic votes instead of waiting for a Schmittian top-down rule from the authorities. The sovereign power might have been within the people prepared for and receptive to the sign instead of what came from above it – a rupture from beyond them. This expectation is foreshadowed within the Mosaic tradition that one day all of the people would be prophets (like Miriam).

Honig asks if this metaphorical reading (which it expressly is) is a good model for democratic politics and a comparison of the “state of legal exception to the divine rule of god”. The people, she says, when bound together can give to themselves the powers of state and can again decide to suspend them when, as a multitude, they are oriented and receptive (having been prepared) to the consequences of such action and what they point toward as a sign.

This, in the end, is the problem with magical thinking! We abdicate our power as the people – to be receptive to and bring forward the voice and will of God – in favor of looking to magically empowered leaders to suspend the rules that govern due to exceptional (or emergency) circumstances and hand down solution (metaphorically) through sorcery.

It makes sense then why the Lord even mentions the staff if Moses is ultimately to speak to the rock. It is a metaphor (symbol) of concentrated power that is present but to be resisted in lue of the prophetic possibility of speaking. In that speaking, which is to be located in the people (multitude) prepared by prayer, that a sign is revealed that points to a greater reality. We never hear that voice if a receptive people continually abdicate that potential to exceptional leaders who are expected to provide magical results.

Filed Under: bible stuff, books, church history, engaging, latest, living, politics, speaking, thinking Tagged With: Bible, Bonnie Honig, book, books, Carl Schmitt, church, democracy, democratic, emergency, empower, Franz Rosenzweig, God, jesus, law, magic, magical, multitude, political, politics, power, prophecy, sorcery, the people

Considering Clayton’s Conundrum

April 5, 2012 by Bo Sanders 10 Comments

Guest post by Peter Bannister

The Predicament of Belief by Philip Clayton and Steven Knapp is a first-rate book – both highly thought-provoking and courageous. Philip Clayton has consistently shown himself to be one of the Church’s most creative thinkers and is perhaps unequalled in offering imaginative tools for re-invigorating our approach to Christian faith ‘after Google’. For catalyzing and hosting constructive debate with a combination of intellectual vigour and graciousness there simply seems to be no-one better on the horizon of the contemporary theological landscape. So I’m a fan.

The first philosophical chapters of The Predicament of Belief, making a powerful case for the rationality of believing in a personal, benevolent Ultimate Reality, are ones with which I find myself agreeing without reservation. I start getting nervous when the authors’ ‘Christian minimalist’ position is taken as more than a pragmatic expression of what can be adduced without stepping beyond rational justifiability. When minimalism becomes a preferred option in the search not merely for human consensus but for truth about Ultimate Reality, my theological nerve-endings start jangling.

Adoptionism – the only solution ?

Here I would particularly like to focus on Christology. I’m torn between admiration for the authors’ brave attempt at a minimal ‘core Christian proposal’ that can function as a rallying-point for the contemporary Church and ambivalence towards their constructive suggestion. Is it a) the only viable truth-claim available in the present climate or b) a simple working hypothesis whose interest lies in its usefulness for stemming the decline in American mainline Protestantism, an attractive proposition to those alienated by traditional dogma? While I agree that sensitivity to those suspicious of doctrine in general is highly desirable, I find The Predicament overly pessimistic about rationally justifying anything approaching an orthodox theological viewpoint: their assumption that such a position cannot stand in the 21st century seems a little hasty. Especially as my experience is that the ‘spiritual but not religious’ constituency which minimalism hopes to attract is just as resistant to the ‘left-brain’ logical argumentation represented by The Predicament as to an insistence on literal adherence to ancient creeds.

In the book, adoptionism is presented as an option ‘that does not include the claim that the same person who became the man Jesus already existed in divine form before Jesus was born’. Instead, ‘after Jesus’s death, God somehow took this individual’s subjectivity into the divine subjectivity, commingling them in such a way that they came to dwell within each other and even to become identical to each other.’ This supposedly offers a way out of the ‘dichotomy that either Jesus continues as the identical person within the godhead or Jesus is a merely human model for others to emulate.’ This ‘may be attractive to those contemporary Christians who can’t quite believe (even if they have no way of definitively denying) the complicated assertions of classical Trinitarian thought, but who nevertheless find themselves believing in Jesus’ continuing personal presence’.

Towards the end of his concise Emergent Village presentation of the book (around the 30 minute mark on the HBC podcast), PC puts his theological hands up and admits that his preference goes to ‘adoptionist’ Christology because the alternative of an eternal preexistent Logos is not persuasive now that static Greek metaphysics have landed in the trash can of history. Not unless you believe in a ‘three bears with three chairs’ Trinity (don’t worry, you’ll understand if you listen to the audio…).

The pre-existent Logos: an obsolete accessory ? [Read more...]

Filed Under: conversations, engaging, latest, living, science, thinking Tagged With: belief, book, books, church, creation, Elizabeth Johnson, Emergent Village, evolution, faith, God, Hans Kung, jesus, NT Wright, Philip Clayton, philosophy, resurrection, Roger Olson, science, Steve Knapp, theology, Ultimate Reality

Why the Church of N. America will always be (mostly) like it is

Dressing up in Justice! Looking for the Reign of God!

Hell On Earth: A Sex Trafficking Survivor’s Story

Hit Me (baby) One More Time: on turning the other cheek

Zombies Empire Bible & Theology: TNT April 22

Reflecting on the Resurrection part 2

Resurrecting space for belief

Leaving the Church – Staying at Church

Jesus and His (S)words

A Most Interesting Reading of Moses at Meribah (Numbers 20)

Considering Clayton’s Conundrum

Search

Support the brew

The latest

Transforming Christian Theology

The Homebrewed Hosting Service

Friends