Mclaren: Taking the rough with the smooth
I had never read Brian McLaren up until I read “a Generous Or+hodoxy”, therefore given that I found so much in the book echoing my own feelings and thinking (I filled it with underlinings) it is likely that there is some underlying commonality of philosophy, experience and temperament that has caused this concurrence. One commonality seems to be that McLaren has stepped back to look at the Christian scene as whole in all its historical and contemporary messy reality. Moreover, I suspect that McLaren, like me, has secretly asked himself the probing question that, when all is said and done in Christianity are we left with an authentic phenomenon? Towards the end of his book (see chapter 19) he defines the concept of Church Emergence as a process which like tree ring growth includes and embraces what his gone before: In other words McLaren is not one of those many disillusioned Christian sectarians who bin the past, clear the ground, and start rebuilding yet another bespoke realization of Christianity. And yet he is all too aware of the failings of both historical and contemporary Christianity; else why embark on such a deep reappraisal of the phenomenon?
McLaren says he is a post-foundationalist, (see P206) and by implication a postmodernist, and yet he is not a relativist (P324). I do not think of myself as either post-foundationalist or postmodern but nevertheless I think I can run with McLaren here because, as another emerging church leader once put it, his is the kind of postmodernism that equates to “epistemological humility” rather than relativism – and that I would want to applaud and encourage: No human expression of Truth, whether based on biblical interpretations or other is ever ultimately authoritative or constitutes an absolute foundation. All human understandings and expressions of the Truth are subject to critical scrutiny, further honing and/or possible revision. On page 316 McLaren succinctly describes the “stages of faith” by which one appropriates this important “postmodern” lesson: “simplicity, complexity, perplexity and humility”.
McLaren doesn’t assume that his or anyone else’s particular Christian cultural splinter has all the right answers, or for that matter all the wrong answers. This means that he doesn’t write off any particular cultural expression of Christianity as damned. But although he looks as though he is the sort of person who is able to negotiate with most Christian communities, I get the impression that for McLaren self-criticism is a non-negotiable feature of his Christianity and therefore for him healthy Christianity is in the business of constantly reappraising itself. He warms to the concept of “continuous reformation” (P213), an idea that is close to my concept of continuous rival.
At his own confession there is a streak of cynicism in McLaren. Like myself, therefore, he is suspicious of restorationism; that is, the claim by countless start-up denominations, sects and cults that they have cleared the ground to create a restored church untainted by human foibles and sinfulness. “Oh yeah?” has always been my response to this sort of thing and I think McLaren’s response would be similar (P140)
As I said in my previous post it is difficult to distill McLaren’s views down to simple formula; he is too intellectually mature for that. He knows that unlike the world of the physical sciences where much can be captured in simple formulae, the socio-religious world is a world that is necessarily rife with narrative intense metaphors. Thus, it is difficult to pin the label of heresy on McLaren just by quoting a few sentences on, say, his views of hell and other religions, because there are always qualifications further into the text.
EPC (evangelical, pentecostal, charismatics) sects often require one to swallow whole and digest slowly; that is they require you to eat in one sitting everything on the platter they serve; it won’t do to leave any of it to pick over later, let alone refuse to swallow something altogether. This is where I believe Mclaren wins outright over much of “modernist” EPC; for his twin methodology of acquiring historical perspective and his soft postmodern epistemological humility is scientific in as much as he only allows us to establish what we feel we can establish in our own good time.
Do I disagree with McLaren on anything? I think it is less a case of disagreeing with him than it is taking issue with him where I think he lacks an emphasis. In this connection I feel that he casts the mold too much in terms of dichotomies: modernism vs. postmodernism, mechanism vs. mystery, reductionism vs. intuition – basically similar expressions to the fundamental dichotomy of logos vs. mythos that I keep banging on about. In my view these dichotomies require synthesis and not polarization; or at least be kept in paradoxical tension. In the face of this lack of emphasis by McLaren, I am not surprised that the emerging churches I’m acquainted with tend to resolve the tension between Mythos and Logos in favour of mythos. For someone such as myself who is temperamentally wired up for analysis and articulation and reared in the enlightenment traditions I find such fellowships (which may be full of ex-charismatic refugees) far too touchy-feely for my taste. But I must stress the subjectiveness of my term “taste”; this is not say that those who engage in such fellowships don't do well in them. At least they are free of that “swallow whole and digest slowly” tyranny.
McLaren says he is a post-foundationalist, (see P206) and by implication a postmodernist, and yet he is not a relativist (P324). I do not think of myself as either post-foundationalist or postmodern but nevertheless I think I can run with McLaren here because, as another emerging church leader once put it, his is the kind of postmodernism that equates to “epistemological humility” rather than relativism – and that I would want to applaud and encourage: No human expression of Truth, whether based on biblical interpretations or other is ever ultimately authoritative or constitutes an absolute foundation. All human understandings and expressions of the Truth are subject to critical scrutiny, further honing and/or possible revision. On page 316 McLaren succinctly describes the “stages of faith” by which one appropriates this important “postmodern” lesson: “simplicity, complexity, perplexity and humility”.
McLaren doesn’t assume that his or anyone else’s particular Christian cultural splinter has all the right answers, or for that matter all the wrong answers. This means that he doesn’t write off any particular cultural expression of Christianity as damned. But although he looks as though he is the sort of person who is able to negotiate with most Christian communities, I get the impression that for McLaren self-criticism is a non-negotiable feature of his Christianity and therefore for him healthy Christianity is in the business of constantly reappraising itself. He warms to the concept of “continuous reformation” (P213), an idea that is close to my concept of continuous rival.
At his own confession there is a streak of cynicism in McLaren. Like myself, therefore, he is suspicious of restorationism; that is, the claim by countless start-up denominations, sects and cults that they have cleared the ground to create a restored church untainted by human foibles and sinfulness. “Oh yeah?” has always been my response to this sort of thing and I think McLaren’s response would be similar (P140)
As I said in my previous post it is difficult to distill McLaren’s views down to simple formula; he is too intellectually mature for that. He knows that unlike the world of the physical sciences where much can be captured in simple formulae, the socio-religious world is a world that is necessarily rife with narrative intense metaphors. Thus, it is difficult to pin the label of heresy on McLaren just by quoting a few sentences on, say, his views of hell and other religions, because there are always qualifications further into the text.
EPC (evangelical, pentecostal, charismatics) sects often require one to swallow whole and digest slowly; that is they require you to eat in one sitting everything on the platter they serve; it won’t do to leave any of it to pick over later, let alone refuse to swallow something altogether. This is where I believe Mclaren wins outright over much of “modernist” EPC; for his twin methodology of acquiring historical perspective and his soft postmodern epistemological humility is scientific in as much as he only allows us to establish what we feel we can establish in our own good time.
Do I disagree with McLaren on anything? I think it is less a case of disagreeing with him than it is taking issue with him where I think he lacks an emphasis. In this connection I feel that he casts the mold too much in terms of dichotomies: modernism vs. postmodernism, mechanism vs. mystery, reductionism vs. intuition – basically similar expressions to the fundamental dichotomy of logos vs. mythos that I keep banging on about. In my view these dichotomies require synthesis and not polarization; or at least be kept in paradoxical tension. In the face of this lack of emphasis by McLaren, I am not surprised that the emerging churches I’m acquainted with tend to resolve the tension between Mythos and Logos in favour of mythos. For someone such as myself who is temperamentally wired up for analysis and articulation and reared in the enlightenment traditions I find such fellowships (which may be full of ex-charismatic refugees) far too touchy-feely for my taste. But I must stress the subjectiveness of my term “taste”; this is not say that those who engage in such fellowships don't do well in them. At least they are free of that “swallow whole and digest slowly” tyranny.
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