Ecclesial Dreamer…

I recently had an opportunity to read Dan Brennan’s book, Sacred Unions, Sacred Passions: Engaging the Mystery of Friendship Between Men and Women. I’ll confess at the outset that I did not have high expectations for this book. However, I was pleasantly surprised by this work.

The forward from Dan’s wife, Sheila Wilson Brennan, explains that Dan Brennan is using this book to counter the myspace/facebook trend to call everyone a “friend.” She explains:

Daniel’s book attempts to recapture a deeper (and thereby narrower) understanding of friendship and a wider understanding of intimacy within spiritual friendship.

With this goal in mind, I think Brennan’s offering is well worth the read. If there is a target of critique in Brennan’s cross hairs, it is the absurd bipolar counsel that the conservative evangelical community offers to non-married men and women who wish to enter into relationship. Brennan points out that for many in this camp, there are only two alternatives. One is the romantic path that leads men and women down the one way path of becoming “one flesh”. This is acceptable for young, single people. However, if either one or both of the people are married then the only alternative for these male/female relationships is avoidance at all costs.

Brennan argues that between these two very narrow narratives of male/female relationships is a very wide, complex and necessary range of appropriate and deeply intimate expressions of genuine, deep, and faithful friendship that does not need to lead to anything sexually inappropriate.

Brennan explores these sacred unions by looking at history and scripture. While there are areas I felt like he was forcing the sacred text in order to make his case, overall I think the book raises some important questions for those in the conservative camp. While there is nothing in the book that would shock “emerging” or “progressive” Christian thinkers, I feel his book hits his intended target.

There were some great quotes throughout:

When conservative Christians adapt a modified Freudian view of sexuality and conflate the romantic myth with the meaning of one flesh, one wonders how Christian husbands and wives are able to pursue deep intimacy and become companions on the marital journey. Perhaps the greatest enemy of marriage when the notion of one flesh has been made synonymous with the romantic myth is the one flesh vision of marriage itself. (p. 43)

The husband-wife relationship doesn’t cover the range of embodied oneness in this age or the next. In fact, it is not even the ultimate picture of union. Paul Wadell suggests that friends in Christ “will have much greater intimacy and unity between them than they would if they lived together but were united over a lesser good.” he suggests, following Augustine, “the greatest possible intimacy comes not from physical closeness or even physical expression, but from belonging to the body of Christ.” Our union in Christ as men and women then, has profound implications for both married and unmarried individuals. (p. 79)

For more information about the book and a video interview with the author, please check the links below.

viralbloggers.com/2010/04/sacred-unions-sacred-passions-by-dan-brennan/

There is an interesting article from Eric Simpson floating through my online social circles titled Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, and Fundamentalist ‘Voodoo’

There are a lot of great bullet quotes worth commenting on in this piece but one thing I find interesting is that it seems to point out that too many of us who claim to live into the Faith of Christ seem to be dying on the wrong hill. Many of my “progressive” friends cannot stand the commentary of Palin, and Beck and others cut from that cloth. So they are quick to embrace the quote from the article that is attributed to Kurt Vonegut:

For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that’s Moses, not Jesus. I haven’t heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere … “Blessed are the merciful” in a courtroom? “Blessed are the peacemakers” in the Pentagon? Give me a break!

While I do find that quote to be a pointed critique against the politically conservative “religious right” I do think it is not entirely accurate. While the politically progressive religious left(??) may not demand the Sermon on the Mount or the Beatitudes be posted anywhere, they do in fact seem to express a strong conviction that the church in this country cannot embody the Sermon on the Mount or the Beatitudes unless the political left of the United States of America (the Democratic party) is in control. I know a whole lot of progressive Christians who invest a lot more of their resources into the Democratic United States political party than they do in their community of faith. Some even see their contribution to the political party as contribution to their community and faith.

From my perspective it seems that in some ways we have lost sight of the politics of Jesus. What we practice and participate in is a contemporary and Americanized version of the Pax Romana. My progressive friends are quick to condemn Bush, Palin or other conservatives who claim divine sanction for their political agendas but don’t realize that they often do the same thing, just for the other party.

There are a lot of hot-button issues that are easily fanned into a flame in our current two party system. This system tends to polarize these issues into opposite extremes that makes it difficult for any real, meaningful dialog to take place. When those who claim to carry the name of Christ step into the debate on one side or the other they continue to use the faulty political paradigm, hoping for some miraculous end.

The article sums things up nicely (and in ways that tie neatly into the Heim book I am currently reading, Saved From Sacrifice):

According to Jesus, who said that it is out of the heart of the man that proceeds his evil deeds, the real enemy is our own greed, lust, and the desire to hold on to our things in which we put our trust, even if it means other people are dying all around us because they do not have what we have — money, housing, food, health care.

That may well be the crux of the point. It’s far easier to politicize spiritual life and to blame and scapegoat someone “out there” — the homosexual, the socialist, the leftist, the fundamentalist, the African American, the atheist, the Jew, the illegal alien, the other — than it is to blame oneself, and to actually strive to be virtuous.

As Alexander Solzhenitsyn writes in The Gulag Archipelago, “If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?”

Who indeed? It is easy to pontificate on either side of a polarized issue. In the end, I don’t know that whatever a political nation state chooses to do about its social issues should dictate how the church lives out its calling in the world. There are plenty of faithful people throughout history who have been persecuted for following a different body politic than that of their government. We should not mistake our nationalism and commitments to “freedom” as a divine mandate to support our favorite political parties and social agendas.  I wonder if it is time to expand this observation from Hauerwas to other social issues as well:

I often call attention to that Mennonite poster that says, “A modest proposal for peace: Let the Christians of the world agree that they will not kill each other.” If we could get that, that would be a lot. Christians of the political left often want to get the government to do what we can’t get Christians to do. I want to get Christians to do it. That’s where I start.  (Quoted from here.)

Maybe if Christians start clothing each other, housing each other, feeding each other, and providing care for each other, instead of looking for nation states to do it we would be better off. Of course, that might prohibit us from building that new 2000 seat sanctuary that shows the world how blessed we are because we are doing things God’s way. In the end I don’t think Pax Americana will be any longer lasting than Pax Romana no matter how much we may long for it. There is no lasting city, no “one nation under God,” in this moment of history. But there is a community made up of pilgrims and resident aliens who is about the business of embodying the great prayer, “May your kingdom come, on earth, as it is in heaven.”

I want to be part of that community.

For the past month and a half I have been drifting in the wake of a small group that is meeting in a local area church to discuss “progressive Christianity.” I am one of a couple of people who are participating but are not members of the hosting church. This particular church is a member of one of the mainline denominations, so it is a little different from the typical, Evangelical, non-denominational contexts that I am more familiar with.

The group is great and the primary facilitator is doing a wonderful job of coordinating the discussions, creating space for all the participants voices to be heard and keeping things moving. I was invited to this group by a member of the very inconsistent Emergent Village cohort group (more on that later) and I am thankful that she thought to invite me along for the ride.

In our last session, we spent some time discussing Brian McLaren and some of his work. We discussed some books and watch a few brief videos on youtube. Tonight, we followed up with a short discussion on two books that were published through the Emergent Village publishing partnerships: An Emerging Manifesto of Hope, and The Justice Project.

I am finding the dynamic of this group to be fascinating. My observation is that this group is much more comfortable with progressive readings and imaginations of the sacred texts than my more conservative, evangelical, non-denominational friends and acquaintances. They are comfortable thinking through theological questions that would make the people in the last church I was in squirm. So I expected this group to not have any challenges with embracing and exploring some of these progressive Christian themes.

However, I am finding that in many areas they are still resistant to certain things and using similar vocabulary to my more conservative friends. They are hesitant to say things that they “really” believe because they are not sure how others will interpret that and they don’t want to cause offense. There are some things that are still “untouchable.”

Tonight, in the small group that I was part of our discussion turned towards the last paragraph of C. Rene Padilla’s contribution to the Justice Project:

Christians living under the aegis of a global capitalist system, which takes for granted the benefits of “the invisible hand” of the market, need to take seriously, in both their reflection and in their action, God’s call to the power-holders to do justice. In faithfulness to the teaching of Scripture, their mission includes a prophetic stance against every form of institutional injustice and a lifestyle that illustrates in concrete ways the beaning of the beatitude, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled” (Matt. 5:6).

I made the comment that prophetic stances against every form of institutional injustice may place us in opposition to some forms of embodiment of the institutional church. I suggested that it will be difficult for some communities of faith to offer biblical justice to the world when they themselves are embodying injustice. It seems that while this particular mainline church is open to some progressive things, questioning the institution of church itself may be one of the untouchables.

Very thought provoking and creative video from Northpoint…

“Sunday’s Coming” Movie Trailer from North Point Media on Vimeo.

Importantly, paul does not speak here of any need for mutual reconciliation. “The world” is estranged from God and needs to be brought back into relationship with God.  God, however, is not estranged from “the world.”  For this reason, Paul has no need to show how God can be appeased, how God might be empowered to love again, how God might overcome having been so often scorned and so on. “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself”  this affirmation demonstrates that God’s love has the upper hand in divine-human relations and that the work of Christ has as its effect the bringing of “the world” back to God (and not vice versa).  wherein it is evident that the death of Christ has as its further effect the miracle of new creation.  God has not been “made over,” for the difficulty does not lie at his feet.  Rather, “the world” needs this “make over,” and this is what the cross accomplishes.

from Recovering the Scandal of the Cross: Atonement in New Testament & Contemporary Contexts.  Joel B. Green & Mark D. Baker

A final thought for Holy Week comes from Richard B. Hays’ remarkable book, The Faith of Jesus Christ:

However, it should be beyond dispute that the “righteousness” in question in (Romans) 3:21-22 ¹   There is no difference between Jew and Gentile,is God’s own righteousness (subjective genitive), just as in 3:3-7 and 3:25-26. Paul is framing an argument concerning theodicy, insisting that God’s way of dealing with humanity through the gospel is a manifestation of his justice, not an arbitrary dissolution of his promises to Israel. Romans 3 is a defense of God’s justice. Once that point becomes clear, the objective genitive interpretation of pistis Iesou Christou becomes virtually unintelligible. What would it mean to say that God’s justice has been made manifest through our act of believing in Jesus Christ? This, if it means anything at all, verges on blasphemous absorption in our own religious subjectivity. God’s eschatological justice can only have been shown forth by an act of God: Paul’s claim is that the death of Jesus is just such an apocalyptic event.

1. But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. ²² This righteousness is given through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ to all who believe. [back]

Another  excerpt  for thoughtful reflection during Holy Week. This lengthy quote comes from Jurgen Moltmann’s contribution to the book, Cross Examinations: Readings on the Meaning of the Cross Today. (click the link to read the whole chapter.)

At the beginning of Christianity there are two crosses: One is a real cross, the other a symbol. One is a murderous gallows of terror and oppression, the other a dream-cross of an emperor. One is for victims of violence, the other for violent conquerors. The one is full of blood and tears, the other empty. The first stands on Golgotha, and Jesus hangs on it, the other is the victorious dream of the Emperor Constantine in the year 312 C.E. What has the second to do with the first? How could the memory of a victim of injustice and violence be changed into a symbol of victorious injustice and violence?

When Emperor Constantine saw a cross at night and heard the voice, “In hoc signo vinces” (In this sign you shall conquer), he ordered his soldiers to paint a cross on their shields, and lo, they fought and won the battle at the Milvian bridge and conquered Rome for their Lord and master. This –and not Golgotha—was the beginning of the Christian Empire, destined to conquer the world for Christ and his anointed Caesar. One can still see the cross associated with military victory depicted on the ceilings of old Byzantine churches: There is Christus Pantocrator (Christ the Almighty Ruler) in heaven, and here is the anointed emperor as Christ’s representative on earth. And because there is only one God and one Christ in heaven, there can be only one ruler and one empire on earth. This Christian Empire claims that it will be the kingdom of peace that will never end (in reference to the book of Daniel, chapters 7, 14, and 27). Salvation is inside this Christian Empire, damnation outside. In the Crusades and Holy Wars, non-Christian people were confronted with only two alternatives: baptism or death.

…The triumphal dream-cross of Constantine continued as the symbol of Christian Empires: Charles the Great subjugated the Saxons with cross and sword; Otto the Great did the same with the Slovenians. Knights of the Cross, St. George’s Knights, Temple Knights, Knights of Malta, and other Christian conquerors set up this cross in “barbarian” countries and brought the “heathen” peoples into a supposedly saving kingdom, or Heilige Reich. Their intended world domination was also later called “the Christian Civilization,” “the realm of freedom,” and multiple other titles. One can find the imperial cross in the orders and medals of most of the Christian nations: The Iron Cross in Germany, the Victoria Cross in Britain, the St. George Cross in Russia, the Cross of the League of Honor in France, and so forth. You can see the victorious cross on most of the flags of Christian nations. The decorative golden crosses on the necklaces of beautiful women are banal remnants of the holy triumphant cross. Decorative and military victory crosses, however, don’t depict and actual crucified person—ever since Constantine’s time, they are empty.

May our reflections turn our thoughts and hearts toward Golgotha…

As I enter in to this year’s Holy Week, there are several things that are percolating in my mind that are shaping my posture as I prepare to  live into this redemptive story. One is this excerpt from S. Mark Heim’s book, Saved From Sacrifice: A Theology of the Cross:

Is this God’s plan, to become a human being and die, so that God won’t have to destroy us instead? Is it God’s prescription to have Jesus suffer for sins he did not commit so God can forgive the sins we do commit? That’s the wrong side of the razor. Jesus was already preaching the forgiveness of sins and forgiving sins before he died. He did not have to wait until after the resurrection to do that. Blood is not acceptable to God as a means of uniting human community or a price for God’s favor.  Christ sheds his own blood to end that way of trying to mend our divisions. Jesus’ death isn’t necessary because God has to have innocent blood to solve the guilt equation. Redemptive violence is our equation. Jesus didn’t volunteer to get into God’s justice machine. God volunteered to get into ours. God used our own sin to save us.

May we all keep in step with the Liberating King as we follow the way of Jesus Christ.