Tag Archives: Scripture

Blue Monday “Theology” table

As a Northfield newbie, I am eager for the opportunity to meet some of the many interesting persons in this community. A month or two ago, retired Pastor Phil Eaves invited me to a Monkey Read bookstore book club, and I have participated in two delightful discussions (Unaccustomed Earth & The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo). Last week, as a result of my ELCA convention blog posts, Pastor Keith invited me to visit the theology table, a
Goodbye Blue Monday coffee house weekly gathering of ELCA pastors to discuss the lectionary texts and … whatever else comes up.

Today, I arrived early (local blogmeister Griff Wigley was hard at work at his laptop in the corner) and finished a mug of coffee and cream cheese croissant before the others began to arrive: Pastor Keith, Pastor Paul from St. Peter’s Lutheran, Pastor Joy of Wangen Prairie, University of Mn bound Jake, and Pastors Steve and Joanna of Our Savior’s in Faribault. I also met old friend Pastor Howard of Old Trondhjem Church. Nearly fifteen years ago, Howard worked as the professional fundraiser during a new church building fund drive at my Gethsemane Lutheran congregation in Upsala at a time that I was the congregational president.

I hope I got the names of everyone right and didn’t leave anyone out. I’ll be back.

Then came a great wind: ELCA Convention #CWA09 & #Goodsoil09

This afternoon, a tornado touched down in the environs of the Convention Center in Minneapolis. Within minutes, I stepped outside to find trees uprooted, chairs, tent, and debris strewn about from the outdoor pub set up at Central Lutheran across the street. Some chairs were found atop the four story convention center. The traffic light stanchion was bent to a 75 degree angle. No injuries reported.

Inside, debate continued on the floor of the ELCA Convention. The Sexuality Statement was under discussion.

“Let us go across to the other side,” Jesus said to his disciples. The other side of Lake Galilee was the land of foreigners — unclean Gentiles, according to the traditions of the Hebrews. But a nighttime crossing was dangerous and an unseen storm might come upon them.

This is the story told in Mark, and the gospel text for the Goodsoil service at Central Lutheran this evening. A thousand or more filled the old church pews and the balconies, and heard the sermon of The Rev. Barbara Lundblad, Associate Professor of Preaching at Union Theological Seminary of New York. (I feebly attempt to paraphrase her prophetic words here). When the wind whistled down the gullies of the Galilean countryside, the small boat was tossed about, and Jesus’ disciples were afraid. “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”

Late this afternoon, near suppertime, the tornado and ensuing rainstorm had passed, and the sun peaked through the clouds. Inside the convention center, the amendments had been considered, the arguments had been raised, and the question was called. 1,014 voting members cast their electronic ballots. The measure required a 2/3 majority to pass, or 676 votes. The votes were tallied, and the totals announced: 676 votes for, 338 against. The measure passed, but without a single vote to spare.

Mark’s story continues: “Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm.”

It was a joyous celebration at Central Lutheran this evening; I admit it, I choked up at times –during the procession of more than a dozen gay clergy, at the sight of former Presiding Bishop Herb Chilstrom, at the sometimes soft and sometimes boisterous songs, while tasting the bread and the wine, and while exiting to the pealing bells. And then, too, when the young gay man finished the Scripture reading from 1st Corinthians:

If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. Now you, you, you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.

I will long remember the joy of this night and sharing the bread and the wine with so many children of God.

What is the Bible? A metaphorical answer by Walter Brueggemann

On my list of things to do, I plan to compile a list of definitions of the Bible, and now, eminent professor Walter Brueggemann weighs in, and when Walter speaks, church folks listen. In a post in Theolog, the blog of Christian Century Magazine, Brueggemann suggests that Scripture is “Remembering an Imagined Past.” Hmm.

All too much Biblical interpretation is about the historicity, or lack thereof, of the Biblical accounts, opines Brueggemann, and what is lost is the “confessional passion—not the passion of religious ideologues, but the passion of those whose risky, faithful obedience attests to their memory.” Even when the memory is imagined and mythological. Hmm.

Brueggemann favorably mentions Karl Barth, the German pastor of a century ago, who penned the monumental Commentary, The Epistle to the Romans, that remains a classic of Pauline studies. Barth’s epic work is a probing theological enterprise that asked no historical questions, which were irrelevant for him … perhaps even a distraction. “I felt myself bound to the actual words of the text,” wrote Barth: not the historical context, not the cultural assumptions of Paul, not the contingent circumstances addressed by the letter.

Brueggemann didn’t mention Julius Wellhausen, the preeminent scholar of 19th century historical criticism, but he could have. Late in his career, Wellhausen ceased teaching the historical critical method, not because he no longer believed in its accuracy but in its utility to uplift the hearts of the faithful.

What is the Bible? It is certainly not an accurate historical account of either the Hebrew people or of Jesus of Nazareth, and Brueggemann would not disagree. Brueggemann answers with a metaphor: a memory of an imagined past.

Brueggemann attempts to find his way between unthinking literalism on one side and what he sees as sterile scholarship that strips the Bible of meaning on the other (I think he’s more than a little harsh on the Jesus seminar types). It is a precipitous path, to be sure. As Brueggemann suggests, “serious remembering—in a community of self-awareness, moral passion, knowing discipline and generous hope—is thick, elusive and multidimensional.”

Yes, but Walter, what do we say to the folks in the pews who don’t understand the nuance of metaphor and who aren’t disposed to deal with “thick, elusive and multidimensional”? As the article acknowledges, “In some quarters, there is the hope that ‘church people’ will simply fail to notice the shaky grounds of historicity on which so much is based.” What happens when they do notice, or ask hard questions?

It would seem that a necessary starting point must be an honest appraisal of what the Bible is — and what it is not — and that is where the answers of historical criticism must be offered. And this is the profound difficulty of Biblical preaching. Honest appraisal will often jar the innocent views in the pews.

Thanks again, Walter, you always make us think.

Anti-Semitism in the New Testament

Methodist professor of Religion and Bible, Joel Allen, offered an insightful blog post this week entitled, Be Fair to the Pharisees: Guarding Against Anti-Jewish Attitudes. There is a persistent sense that the Pharisees were the bad guys in Jesus’ life and ministry, Allen suggests, and he offers his own daughter’s silly campfire ditty as exhibit A. “I don’t want to be a Pharisee, ‘cuz they’re not fair, you see,” sang the nine year old.

Allen offers a cogent rebuttal to the view that the Pharisees were self-righteous, legalistic hypocrites who emphasized the letter of the law over its spirit. His argument is that this is an over-generalization, a broad brush attitude that overlooks the many Pharisees who had the same critical attitude toward the “system” as did Jesus. “While Jesus certainly had abuses in the practice of Pharisaic piety and hypocrisy to condemn, he was not alone. Other rabbis had similar criticisms of their fellows,” says Allen. He calls on history and mentions Hillel, the leading Pharisee sage who offered his own version of “The Golden Rule,” a generation before Jesus.

I think that Professor Allen’s well written piece is right on, and I wholeheartedly subscribe to his views. Here is my basic view: The New Testament wrongly characterizes Israelite religion in general and the Pharisees in particular. The New Testament demonizes and scapegoats the Pharisees, and even more hurtfully, all the Jews. As Allen reports, following his time spent at Hebrew Union College of Cincinnati,

One of the things that surprised me in studying the Bible with rabbinical students was the degree to which they perceived the New Testament to be fundamentally anti-Jewish. As an orthodox Christian, I found it troubling to hear the teachings of Jesus described as ‘anti-Jewish’ and as contributing factors to Jewish suffering.

Allen suggests that the gospels lack a balanced view that fails to include the whole cloth of Pharisaism. Let me carry the argument a step further by offering two historical reasons why the New Testament offers only a partial and biased view of Pharisaism. What is important, I think, is a further evaluation of the history that occurred between the life and times of Jesus and the time when the books of the New Testament were written or compiled. Jesus’ ministry is commonly dated to around 30-33 CE, the letters of Paul to the 50’s, Mark’s gospel to around 70, Matthew and Luke to the 80’s, and John to the 90’s.

I suggest that two historical factors were at play that caused the New Testament writings to become ripe with anti-Jewish polemic and to grossly overstate the conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees, erroneously lumping them with the aristocratic Sadducees, and between Jesus and his fellow Jews. The first is the conflict between Paul’s Gentile mission and the Jewish, Jerusalem followers of Jesus led first by Peter but soon by James, the brother of Jesus. The second is the cataclysmic Jewish civil war and the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple by the Romans circa 70 CE which obviously occurred several generations after the time of Jesus but during (Mark) or before the compilation of the gospels (Matthew, Luke, and John).

Must Gentile Christians follow the ceremonial and symbolic rules of Torah, including circumcision, dietary practices, and Sabbath and festival observance? That was the basic issue between Paul and the Jerusalem church that came to a head nearly a generation after the death of Jesus. An “apostolic assembly” occurred in Jerusalem in the late 40’s to consider the issue, followed immediately by the “Antioch incident” in which Paul broke with James and Peter and set out on his independent missionary journeys. Much of Paul’s subsequent theology grows out of this basic dispute with the “Judaizers,” and the tone of his writings often became intemperate. He referred to Jerusalem emissaries as “peddlers of God’s word,” “false apostles,” “deceitful workers,” “false brothers,” “dogs,” and “evil workers.” Often, his polemic against the ceremonial Torah and those who promoted it sounded distinctly anti-Semitic, a sad irony for the Pharisee born of the tribe of Benjamin.

“The Jews, who killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out, they displease God.” Paul’s improvident words contained in 1st Thessalonians, the very first writing of the New Testament, indict not only the apostle to the Gentiles but subsequent generations of Christians who uncritically accepted his words at literal, face value. The danger of treating Paul’s writings as the infallible, inerrant Word of God becomes obvious.

While doing research for my own novel about Paul, I read a fascinating series of essays entitled, “Jesus through Jewish Eyes”, a collection of views of current rabbis and Hebrew scholars. In general, Jesus was treated quite well as a long lost Jewish brother, a Torah teacher who spoke with the cutting voice of a prophet. In private correspondence with one of the contributors, I asked a related question, “What do Jewish scholars think of Paul?” The answer was decidedly different. Paul was the apostate who perverted Israelite religious rituals, symbols, and myths into a Hellenized amalgam that splintered Christianity away from Jesus’ Jewish roots. Hyam Maccoby, a particularly anti-Pauline Hebrew scholar, has authored two books entitled, “Paul, the Mythmaker” and “Jesus, the Pharisee.” His titles say it all.

We don’t need to go nearly so far as Maccoby to understand that Paul’s tone is decidedly discordant to Jewish ears. We must also recognize the hostility between Paul and the Jerusalem church as the bass line of his disharmonious writings.

In 66 CE, the political firestorm in Jerusalem burst into the conflagration of civil war: sect against sect, class against class, brother against brother. Josephus, a Hebrew aristocrat who later joined the Romans, provided an eyewitness account.

Now after these were slain, the zealots and the multitude of the Idumeans fell upon the people as upon a flock of unclean animals, and cut their throats; and for the ordinary sort, they were destroyed in what place soever they caught them. But for the noblemen and the youth, they first caught them and bound them, and shut them up in prison, and put off their slaughter, in hopes that some of them would turn over to their party; but not one of them would comply with their desires, but all of them preferred death before being enrolled among such evil wretches as acted against their own country … the terror was upon the people so great, that no one had courage enough either to weep openly for the dead man that was related to him, or to bury him.

When the Romans moved in and finished the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, Israelite society was forever changed. Over a decade later, the Pharisees regrouped as rabbinical Judaism, but any affinity with the Jesus sect was long forgotten. The rabbis now contended with the Jesus movement for the synagogues. The church of Jesus had become associated with the Gentile enemies, and the Christian writings reflected the new political realities. It was the Jews, not Pontius Pilate, who bore responsibility for the death of Jesus, and the gospel compilers washed their hands of their Jewish roots. The political undercurrents of the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s wafted through the Jesus stories of the gospel accounts.

The writings of the New Testament sound anti-Semitic, at least to Jewish ears, and Christians must come to grips with this reality. Even more importantly, Christians must accept that Jesus had much in common with many of his Pharisee peers, his Jewish brothers. As Allen concludes, “Let’s be fair to the Pharisees, or we’re not being fair, you see?”

Pentecost – three perspectives (Update plus a 4th)

An African Pentecost

In the calendar of Christendom, Pentecost is celebrated each year fifty days after Easter. The gospel writer, Luke, tells the story in his second book, The Acts of the Apostles.

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the spirit gave them ability. Acts 2:1-4 NRSV

From Christine Sine at God Space, a blog of spirituality:

Pentecost is coming. Pentecost, fifty days after Easter Sunday celebrates the coming of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the church. As the Holy Spirit fell on the disciples, the barriers of language and culture were broken down – not so that everyone thought and looked the same, but so that everyone understood each other in their own language and culture. This festival draws us beyond the resurrection to remind us that through the coming of the Holy Spirit we become part of a transnational community from every nation, culture and social class.

“My peace I leave with you.” The story of Pentecost is a story of a wonderful international cross cultural gathering. God’s Holy Spirit draws us all into a new family in which we are able to understand and break down all the cultural barriers that separate us and create conflict. In spite of our cultural differences we are, through the power of the Spirit, enabled to understand each other and treat each other as equals, with love and mutual care.

From Dignity USA which believes that “gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Catholics in our diversity are members of Christ’s mystical body, numbered among the People of God.”

Noise, wind, fire; things which bring consternation and confusion, not peace and security. Have you ever seen a painting or stained glass window which actually depicts the event as Luke describes it; people’s clothes blowing in the wind, hands covering their ears? We usually see a group of people piously sitting or standing with neatly formed streaks of fire hovering over their bowed heads.

Luke deliberately chooses these disturbing images because his community has already experienced the Spirit at work in its midst, especially on such occasions as the controversial opening of their faith to non-Jews – an event prefigured by the non-Jewish languages the Spirit-filled disciples are now able to speak.

Those who believe their church already possesses all truth will be greatly disturbed to discover that, according to Jesus’ plan, there’s always more truth to be discovered.

The Christian celebration of Pentecost grew out of the Hebrew Festival of Shavuot, which jointly celebrated the spring harvest of barley and wheat and God’s gift of Torah on Mt Sinai. Rabbi Arthur Waskow offers these comments on God’s Politics blog:

The ancient rabbis assigned a special reading for Shavuot: the book of Ruth, which focuses on harvesting, on tongues of native and “foreign” speech, of wealth and poverty. What does Ruth mean to us today?

For Christians, that day became Pentecost, now counted 50 days after Easter (this year on Sunday, May 31), when the Holy Spirit came like the rush of a strong and driving wind, helping the early community of believers speak and understand all the languages of every nation under heaven.

When do we ourselves experience the Holy Spirit, that rushing wind that intertwines all life? The Holy Breath that the trees breathe out for us to breathe in, that we breathe out for the trees to breathe in? The Holy Breath that now is in a planetary crisis?

Both of these festivals look beyond the narrow boundaries of nation, race, or class.

In the biblical story, Ruth was a foreigner from the nation of Moab, which was despised by all patriotic and God-fearing Israelites. Yet when she came to Israel as a widow, companion to her widowed mother-in-law, Naomi, she was welcomed onto the fields of Boaz, where she gleaned what the regular harvesters had left behind. Boaz made sure that even this despised foreigner had a decent job at decent pay. When she went one night to the barn where the barley crop was being threshed, he spent the night with her — and decided to marry her.

But if Ruth came to America today, what would happen?

UPDATE: A fourth perspective

In a recent editorial of The Jewish Daily Forward (Online), we are reminded of the obligations of sharing the harvest, by “Leaving the Gleanings“.

Shavuot, the biblical Festival of Weeks, arrives on May 29 this year, with a special urgency. Holidays on the Jewish calendar often speak to us with particular force at pivotal moments in our communal lives – Passover, for example, with its theme of freedom, or Yom Kippur with its call for repentance. This year, we need to be reminded of Shavuot, the spring harvest festival with its often-overlooked — or suppressed — teachings about the rights of the poor and the dangerous seduction of wealth.

The text spells it out as plain as day: “When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap all the way to the edges of your field, or gather the gleanings” — the bits that fall to the ground — “of your harvest; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger. I am the Lord.”

The message of Shavuot is that the harvest you’re celebrating isn’t yours alone. Part of your crop belongs by right to people you don’t even know, simply because they don’t have as much. And if we restate this as a broad principle, as most of us agree the Bible is supposed to be read, the rule is this: A portion of one’s income shall be redistributed to the poor.

Nor is this to be taken as a recommendation of charity or generosity. It’s intended as a legal obligation, “a law for all time, in all your dwellings” — not just on the farm, and not just in the Middle East — “throughout your generations.” It’s almost as if the ancients knew we were going to try to wiggle out of it.

Conservatives in Washington these days like to dismiss taxes and regulation as “socialism.” But if you read your Bible, that’s just a fancy name for traditional values.

The National Voice of Jewish Democrats also comments on this editorial.

Prima not Sola Scriptura (Updated)

A twenty-year old seminarian, Blake Huggins, suggests that the Reformation cry of Sola Scriptura is outdated, but that substituting Prima Scriptura suggests a continued reliance on the primacy of Scripture. I think the young man is right, and I recommend reading his entire blog post at Emergent Village Weblog.

So, admitting the immanent [sic, but interesting] end of Sola Scriptura is not a categorical rejection of Scripture as much [sic, less interesting]; rather, it is a coming to terms with our own limitations and finitude as human beings and adopting a certain humility about our readings. I seriously doubt whether the Bible is infallible since it was written by pre-modern men (yes, they were men). But that doesn’t mean I don’t think the Bible is authoritative or instructional.

This ties into the discussion on Doug Kings’ blog, Cyber Spirit Cafe, in which he suggests that our ELCA is not honest about Scripture with the people in the pew. See my earlier post on the subject. I like the line, which I paraphrase, our seminaries teach the historical critical method, but whisper on the way out ‘don’t tell anyone’. Doug is especially critical of the ELCA “Book of Faith Initiative” which he sees as a wishy-washy, don’t offend anyone, response to Biblical illiteracy, which only perpetuates the problem.

Doug also suggests, rightly I think, that ambivalence about how we read Scripture is at the core of denominational struggles with issues such as gay clergy. In the ELCA, the conservative opposition to all things new calls itself, “Word Alone”, which confirms that the threshold issue is how we relate to Scripture.

Doug suggests we deal honestly with what Scripture is and what it is not and let the chips fall where they will.

UPDATE:

In a hard hitting and incisive post, Pastor John Shuck of Shuck and Jive, criticizes today’s California SC Prop 8 decision by challenging a “high view of scripture”, ie the sense that the Bible is divinely inspired and hence beyond criticism. He argues that certain Christians, in reliance upon their misguided interpretation of scripture and fundamental misunderstanding of what Scripture is, are responsible for the California decision.

If there is going to be any forward movement for humanity, we will need to relieve ourselves of our superstitious past. This will include the evolution of Christianity into something that is reasonable and decent. The key will be discarding the authority of any supposed “special revelation.”

The Bible is a book. It is like all books, creeds, liturgies, songs, and rituals, created by human beings. Most of the Bible isn’t even that good. Until we can admit that reasonable piece of common sense, we will continue to make life more miserable for our fellow creatures and for Earth itself.

Whew. Tell us what you really think, Pastor Shuck! Read his rant in his blogpost, but its not for namby pambies. Shuck and Jive: Prop 8 and Superstition

Church of Scotland affirms gay clergyman (Updated)

scott-rennie The Church of Scotland is part of the Presbyterian tradition. A gay clergyman, Scott Rennie, was recently appointed to Queen’s Cross Church in Aberdeen, but the bigger news is that his appointment was affirmed this past week by the churchwide assembly. “In a ground-breaking move, the church’s ruling body voted by 326 to 267 in support of the Rev. Scott Rennie, the church said in a news release Sunday,” according to CNN.

Elisabeth Kaeton, in her blog, Telling Secrets, includes a copy of a different news release from Ekklesia with more details than the CNN report.

In his blog, Madpriest, (an Anglican priest in England) commends the Scots for putting principle ahead of concerns over possible schismatic fallout.

What really struck me about how the Scots handled this potentially damaging matter was this. Although the reactionaries, as reactionaries are wont, immediately played the schism card at the start of the troubles, the elders of the Church of Scotland pretty much ignored it. When they came to debate the matter they concentrated on theology and the constitution of their church not on pragmatic issues concerning the future of their church. They consistently refused to be blackmailed or intimidated.

As my own church (ELCA) prepares for contentious consideration of gay clergy issues this summer at their churchwide assembly, church unity is often raised as a reason against affirming gay clergy. The fractious experience of the Episcopal church is cited as an example. But, the polity over principle argument merely postpones and does not resolve the issue, and is inherently unfair. Neither Martin Luther nor Martin Luther King shied from the unsettling consequences of their actions, and kudos to the Scots for their courage.

In his latest post, Madpriest suggests a movement is afoot by some dissenting Church of Scotland congregations to withhold funds from the churchwide organization.

UPDATE:

Tennesee Presbyterian minister John Shuck suggests this morning that the celebrations over the Church of Scotland sitituation may have been premature. While the ordination of gay clergyman Scott Rennie stands as reported, other actions by the church body are less progressive:

Mother (Dearest) Church Reconsiders

John Knox struck up the alleluias too soon it appears. The Church of Scotland (behaving like all superstitious and fearful cults–like the PCUSA) gave into its homophobic element. I praised it yesterday for approving an openly gay man as minister. The backlash has begun.

Instead of outright rejecting a motion similar to the PCUSA’s G-6.0106b (effectively banning gays without mentioning them), the General Assembly decided to set up a commission. From the BBC:

At its General Assembly in Edinburgh, it was decided instead that a special commission should be set up to consider the matter and report in 2011.

There will be a two-year ban on the future ordination of gay ministers.

Church of Scotland has avoided a potentially damaging debate about whether gay people should be allowed to become Kirk ministers.

“Avoided a potentially damaging debate” says the news. Potentially damaging to whom? Those of us who have watched commission after commission in the 35 year struggle in the PCUSA know what these commissions end up doing.

The Church of Scotland will experience a shit storm of fear-mongering for two years. At the end of this time, the beleaguered commission will come up with some report. It makes no difference what the report will say. Fundamentalist forces will wrest control and tell the same lies and offer the same threats that have been made here for the past third of a century. Then they will come up with some horrific rule (just like G-6.0106b).

The Church of Scotland will be no further ahead then than they are now.

It was fun for a day.

Favorite Quotations

I have added a permanent page to my blog entitled “Favorite Quotations”. Here they are in post form.

A mortal, born of woman, few of days and full of trouble, comes up like a flower and withers, flees like a shadow and does not last. Do you fix your eyes on such a one? Job 14:1-3a NRSV

The grand premise of religion is that man is able to surpass himself; that man who is part of this world may enter into relationship with Him who is greater than the world; that man may lift up his mind and be attached to the absolute … How does one rise above the horizon of the mind? How does one find a way in this world that would lead to an awareness of Him who is beyond this world? It is an act of profound significance that we sense more than we can say … concepts are second thoughts. All conceptualization is symbolization, an act of accommodation of reality to the human mind. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel

I believe that Christ was a man like ourselves; to look upon him as God would seem to me the greatest of sacrileges and an evidence of paganism. Leo Tolstoy

Paulinism has always stood on the brink of heresy. Karl Barth

It may be said that myths give to the transcendent reality an immanent, this-worldly objectivity. Myths speak about gods and demons as powers on which man knows himself to be dependent, powers whose favors he needs, powers whose wrath he fears. Myths express the knowledge that man is not master of the world and his life, that the world within which he lives is full of riddles and mysteries and that human life also is full of riddles and mysteries. Rudolf Bultmann

It is time that Christians were judged more by their likeness to Christ than their notions of Christ. – Lucretia Mott, Quaker abolitionist and women’s rights advocate (1793-1880)

I am powerless, and my life is unmanageable, but a power greater than myself can restore me if I only let go. AA Twelve steps (paraphrase)

The decline of religion (UPDATED X 2)

My new best blog-friend (Doug Kings at Cyber Spirit Cafe) and I have exchanged posts and comments about the decline of religion, and today he raises the topic again by referencing a recent post of Andrew Sullivan. In the London Sunday Times, Sullivan says:

[R]eligion must absorb and explain the new facts of modernity: the deepening of the Darwinian consensus in the sciences, the irrefutable scriptural scholarship that makes biblical literalism intellectually contemptible, the shifting shape of family life, the new reality of openly gay people, the fact of gender equality in the secular world. It seems to me that American Christianity, despite so many resources, has ignored its intellectual responsibility.

If Sullivan is right, why? Why have religious progressives surrendered the podium to the religious right? Why have we allowed others to claim theirs is the only voice of christendom? Blogger Rich Warden suggests “that the far right has given religion a bad rap, made it untouchable in the progressive community.”

Perhaps the better question is not “why”, but “how”. How do we take it back? How do we put a progressive face on American religion?

UPDATE: In a May 22 post, Soong-Chan Rah, offers an optimistic take. He suggests that Christian immigrants will keep Christianity vital and breakdown Christian “racial and ethnic lines with a shared value system rather than a political agenda.”

When I was a pastor in Boston, I consistently heard the lament over the decline of Christianity in the city of Boston. However, the Boston I knew was filled with vibrant and exciting churches. New churches were being planted throughout the city. Christian programs and ministries were booming in the city. Boston is alive with spiritual revival, particularly among the ethnic minority communities. But very few seem to recognize this reality, even as this trend begins to appear nationally.

UPDATE # 2: Here’s a post that ties together my discussion on the decline of religion with my discussion of Douthat and Dan Brown. The Naked Theologian, references Douthat’s article about Dan Brown:

[R]eligious trends are shifting toward a “generalized ‘religiousness’ detached from the claims of any specific faith tradition.” While a growing numbers of Americans are abandoning organized religion (Douthat bases this claim on recent polling data), they are, by and large, not opting for atheism. The stay-at-home religionists are actively seeking and building their own eclectic and high-personalized theologies “with traditional religion’s dogmas and moral requirements shorn away.”

The Naked Theologian, a UU PHD candidate, makes a Bonhoeffer like charge of “cheap grace” that has diluted American religion.

Another answer: many of us are quasi-universalists–any God worthy of that name loves us and is simply too good to condemn us. We’ve removed God from the judge’s bench in the sky. The all-about-love God, the one to whom we’re willing to pray, no longer sits in judgment of us. God loves us, unconditionally.

And since God loves us, unconditionally, God loves us regardless of how much money we make (how we made it and what we do with it) or how many times we’ve been married (even if our kids end up with exponentially-more-difficult lives).

So, is the unconditional-love God really the kind of God we want?

Just what is the Bible and how do we use it?

A recent post by Doug Kings has stirred things up at the BOFI (Book of Faith Initiative). BOFI is an ELCA effort at energizing Bible study, but Kings, a Chicago pastor, is skeptical.

The church does indeed have a Bible problem but it’s not people’s ignorance about it. The question is whether the church can let the Bible be what it is: the collected thoughts of a particular ancient people, containing their prejudices and ignorance but also some genuinely profound insight into living with God and with one another in our paradoxical world of beauty and pain, purpose and confusion.

The sexuality task force, with commendable candor, admitted the ELCA lacks a basic consensus on how to read the Bible. Without such a consensus, we will continue to flail about, squabbling among ourselves, uncertain of our mission. How the Bible should be read today is not obvious.

As one who has taught adult Bible education in my own parish for a number of years, I share Kings’ critique of the church’s ambivalent attitude towards the institution of scripture. Kings suggests the ELCA seminaries teach the historical critical method, but whisper on the way out, but don’t tell anyone. The “Word of God” is understood as the “words of God” without correction.

I belong to a men’s group at my present parish consisting of retired, mostly professional men with long histories in the church. Nearly a quarter are retired clergy. Yet, I bite my tongue at the misconceptions: John the apostle was the same person as John the evangelist; the same for Matthew; 2nd Peter’s comment about the transfiguration proves that it was a historical event (after all, Peter was there!); the consistency of the synoptics proves their truth. And these all just at yesterday’s meeting!

Yet, I challenge only selectively.

Wellhausen, the 19th century scholar most associated with the Documentary Hypothesis (JEPD) and the historical critical method, supposedly stopped teaching it near the end of his career because it didn’t lift up the faith of his students but actually detracted from it. He didn’t reject the accuracy of the approach but the utility of it. So too is the church’s ambivalence and my silence in the face of the misconceptions of my men’s group.

Kings suggests that we simply need to be honest about what the Bible is and especially what it is not:

Modern scholarship has actually discovered a great deal about the Bible but much of it is ignored because it doesn’t tell us what we want to hear. Modern biblical study’s totally unsurprising conclusion is that the Bible is theology, through and through. Thus, it isn’t history, biology, geology, astronomy, economics, political science, psychology or any of the other contemporary subjects which so fascinate us and about which we have so many questions. For answers to them, we must look elsewhere.

He is right, of course, but the difficulty lies in challenging inbred assumptions without seeming to question faith.