Healer Dealers

Miraculous Healers: Be careful that no one puts the wool over your eyes.

Christianity magazine (see christianitymagazine.co.uk) specializes in a very candid take on the Christian faith. One of the themes treated frankly in the October issue of Christianity was healing.

Broadcaster and Christianity help page columnist Steve Chalk gives advice to a correspondent “crushed” by the experience of nine months of prayer and fasting by a church for a cancer victim who eventually succumbed and died. Moreover, this wasn’t done in a corner and apparently the local community was aware of the prayer effort. Steve was really only able to offer the correspondent empathy because, to cut a long story short, Steve's been there and got the T-shirt. But he does plead for honesty and points out that as far the public community is concerned openness, vulnerability and the resilience of the fellowship are “compelling”.

The next healing story comes from an ex-tabloid reporter who writes in Christianity pseudonymously under the name of “Ruth Roberts”. Ruth admits to wrestling with questions about healing and miracles. She says that at her (charismatic) church they pray a lot for healings and miracles but in spite of really wanting to believe she doesn’t think she has seen a real, proper cast iron one. She confesses that she (cynically) groaned one day in church when her pastor said he felt there were people in the congregation that God wanted to heal. What's this pastor think he is doing given that week in week out what he claims "God wants" doesn't come about in "a real proper cast iron" way? He must be deluding himself. Ruth ends the article with Lord, please show me a miracle.

My last healing story is provided by Jeff Lucas on the last page of Christianity. He says he believes God heals today, but he then tells us of a case where a claim of miraculous healing certainly proved false. He is also implicitly critical of those who see healing being willed by the power of their belief and those who refuse to concede that healing has not come. He also frankly tells us the story of how gut wrenchingly hard it was when he himself had his own serious health scare.

Well, these columnists get full marks for being honest people and full of faith. You certainly cannot criticize them for lacking faith; their's is the sort of faith that remains in place in spite of…. Anyway, all credit to Christianity magazine for publishing these candid columns. It is worth comparing these ground zero accounts with the accounts coming out of the heady meetings of the healing evangelists who appear to heal on an industrial scale (except amputees). I have to say that I have yet to be a ground zero witness of a genuine miracle - although I do occasionally hear those messages coming out of a healing ministry production line, but more often than not they have travelled a long way through the rumour mill before these accounts reach me! Any attempt to probe these rumors by asking for solid evidence is often greeted at best with askance looks and at worst with less than subtle hints about "blaspheming the Holy Spirit" and questioning the work of the most high God who sits on Heaven's throne and judges us. What these spiritual bullies fail to realize is a) the question mark is not over God, but rather the human ability to provide reliable reports in an exhilarating and intoxicating crowd atmosphere and b) discouraging critical validation actually works against the very claims of healing that this discouragement, in its perverse way, is seeking to support, because it suggests that gullibility rather than criticism is the mode of validation.

Many of the rumours of miraculous healing that have come my way have propagated themselves much like one of those threatening chain letters that we used to get in the post before the days of viral email scams: “Pass this on or else…” was the subtle and sometimes not so subtle subtext, a subtext that on occasions exploited mankind’s instinctual fear of the numinous and the unknown. As Lovecraft said: The oldest and greatest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and greatest type of fear is fear of the unknown.

Do I believe in healing? Of course I do: So far I have been healed of every illness I have had (although not miraculously). But one day I will have my last illness…..

Michael "Hell-Fire" Voris is Back With a Vengeance

Angry Catholic Voris: Just look at the picture top right: Heronymus Bosch would be proud. Need I say more?

After publication of his Catholic Dictatorship video on militant atheist PZ Myers' blog (See my last post)  it seems that Real Catholic Michael Voris is none too pleased with his foul mouthed treatment by PZ Myers' coarse speaking "raiders". But poor PZ will find that he and his raiders' puny anti-superlatives are utterly out classed; after all, they can only resort to an assortment of body parts, excretions and private acts to use as insults. This school boy invective pales compared to the spiritual "invective" the Michael Vorises of this world can muster from a deep supply emanating out of what in some people's books is a terrifying world view. They can call on the gravitas of eternity and presumed knowledge of the human spiritual predicament to insult, condemn and above all curse, really curse. And don't forget that they really mean it and believe it; it therefore carries far more anti-value and is far more cathartic than saying something like "You w*nker!". Here's just some of it transcribed from the above video; it sounds a lot like some of the protestant fundagelical language of spiritual condemnation I have heard, and which I myself have also been on the receiving end of:*

They hate the Catholic church and what she teaches because they hate themselves...They are in love with evil. They are entrapped by it and enslaved by it and rage against the good....adulterous...money worshipping...power hungry, attention crazed, pride filled, promiscious lives...chained by their passions and fears...they will die in their sins...deep down they know the spiritual ship wreck their lives really are or will become...monarchy of hate...who do you prefer for your monarch, Christ or Satan? (and the following is really ironic - ed)... you really need check your hate speech, it is way too revealing...

It's no surprise that in the depths of the Middle Ages the Catholic church, in its dungeons, knew just what to do with some of those body parts that PZ and his raiders speak so lightly of; and, moreover, it "knew" it had the right to do it!

Characters of the Wild Web: PZ Myers dreaded raiders strike again, but when it comes to Real Cursing the Real Catholics provide a much more professional service.

* For reference read the book of Jude.

One Ring to Rule Them All

(Note: 18/8/10: The Real Catholics have pulled the video: Perhaps to spite the people they thought were "wrenching it out of context to try to make a weak point" to use the words of one of my detractors)

When I watched the above video on PZ Myers’ blog my first reaction was that it must be a trolling spoof or at least a tongue in cheek production with the aim of baiting the PZ Myers of this world. But seemingly not: The man in the Video, Michael Voris, a Catholic who talks and sounds very much like a fervent Protestant fundagelical, has a series of YouTube videos promoting Catholic religious hegemony. Nothing unusual about that you might think given that this blog is always criticizing the authoritarian spiritual hegemony of some Protestant sectarians. So what’s new here?

Voris tells us that “Our nature is fallen” and is “self absorbed”. Fair enough, I can go along with that; its core Christian doctrine. But then suddenly out of the blue we get this:

….Only virtuous people should be allowed to vote! … Limit the vote to faithful Catholics…. Only true Catholics look at God. …. When true Catholics vote they cast them with an eye to what God desires not fallen human nature …. Democracy is doomed to failure… The only way to run a country is by benevolent dictatorship – a Catholic monarch.

Surely this man can’t be serious! He must be having us on! The last time I saw a very similar looking manifesto was when I read “Mein Kampf”. It is difficult to credit that anyone, in the light of Western History, can still hold such views.

Isaiah Berlin has made us very conscious of the difficult balancing act between positive and negative liberty that must be maintained in a democracy. Given the human nature that we all share, both extremes of positive and negative liberty have undesirable consequences: Positive liberty can drift toward dictatorship; negative liberty drifts toward market chaos.

The problematical question that never occurs to anti-democrats is this: Just who is going to decide who is virtuous enough to rule autocratically? Who is going the “morally bootstrap” the first virtuous autocratic government? Can fallen beings trust themselves to identify, let alone implement, the absolute government of the virtuous? Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Voris ought to learn the main lesson of that famous book by fellow Catholic J. R. R. Tolkien where the tempting and corrupting effects of absolutism find an excellent metaphor in the One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.

Oliver Cromwell did away with the crypto-catholic dictatorship of Charles I and consolidated parliament. Trouble was, Cromwell himself didn’t understand or know how to handle parliament. He was repulsed by the cacophony of voices of competing (self) interest that was the English parliament and so he effectively dissolved it and became dictator; although credit to Cromwell, true to his beliefs, he was probably a reluctant dictator. Cromwell blew his chance and failed at the test of getting the balance between positive and negative liberty right. The Protestant Cromwell, like the Catholic Voris, was of the opinion that once you’ve got rid of “all them others” somehow the rule of the virtuous and Godly would just emerge. But it didn’t: Parliament became a forum of argument and counter argument expressing the inevitable balance of interest of a democracy; that is what authentic parliament is all about - we must simply accept it and run with it. But the puritanical Cromwell couldn’t accept it. The only solution Cromwell could think of, like Voris, is to enforce the autocracy of a self-righteous and probably self-appointed oligarchy. However, we have to make all due allowance for Cromwell: In the history of Western government Cromwell was breaking entirely new ground without the hindsight of past models to go on. Voris does not have that excuse, and ought to know better.

Ironically, anti-democratic leanings are also a recrudescent phenomenon among Protestants in spite of their Biblio-centric individualism. Hierarchal absolutism is not far under the surface of the mindset of some Protestants as typified by the following quotes taken from a ministry that shall remain nameless:

Some have wrongly taught that the local churches are autonomous, that once an apostle establishes a local church and appoints the elders, he is through with that church and should stay away…..The leaders in the church must take the lead in all things. They must be the leading sheep, the head sheep, in the flock. When the sheep at the head of the flock move, the rest of the sheep follow ….The elders should be regarded, obeyed, and honored by the saints.

The tempting and corrupting effects of the "One Ring" are, alas, as real in church government as they are in society at large (See my last post).

The two faces of English democracy:

Cromwell: The uncompromising face of positive democracy

Walpole: The compromising face of negative democracy

The fact is that truly democratic government will always have to emerge from an ongoing and contradictory tumult of voices, interests, perspectives and viewpoints that tug in different directions; such are the consequences of the ambiguities and sinfulness inherent in our world. Sir Robert Walpole, England’s first prime minister, well understood the underlying self interest that often motivated democratic rule and referred to it as “the natural state of human affairs”.

There is no one party that has a monopoly on righteousness any more than it has a monopoly on sin. As the good book says:

For there is no difference, for all have sinned and come short of the Glory of God (Rom 3:23)

****

During the last 'benevolent' Catholic dictatorship even dissenters were given a stake in government.

Disney Land Christianity

Why doesn't Hinn just 'Jacket' in?

Two articles in the August "Christianity" magazine are notable.

The first article is about excess in some churches and is entitled “Money, Sex and Power”. Although the churches concerned are largely American Charismatic churches, it is usually not long before UK churches pick up the baton.

The article starts by dealing with the money and sex scandals that are now all too familiar, but my own opinion is that this is really a distraction from the main problem. Sex and money tempts people in all walks of life and a fall here can happen to anyone. When the Christian showman and “miracle” entertainer Todd Bentley came a cropper over his affair and divorce, some parts of the church reacted as if this was the only problem with his ministry. Some even tried to spin doctor it by making a virtue out of it: It was all down to poor brother Bentley’s “burn out”; poor guy, he was so over worked! Trouble was he was burning himself out peddling junk spirituality egged on by a gullible crowd who were baying for “more Lord, more…”. In fact as far as I’m concerned Bentley’s marital infidelity is the least of his sins and arguably could be excused as having mitigating circumstances. Basically fundagelicalism never learned from the “Bent Oddly” affair and never took the cue to take a good long hard look at itself. In fact by implicating sex and money fundagelicalism could get itself side tracked by putting it all down to a good old fashioned sin that is easily identified. But I’m of the opinion that the real sin is endemic to fundagelicalism itself. The problem will not go away unless fundagelicalism reforms itself.

The article in “Christianity” leaves the subject of power until last. This matter, I suggest, is much closer to the nub of the real issue than is sex and money. Under the subtitle of “The Abuse of Power” the article tells the story of a church where:

The issue was over the pastor’s teaching on a variety of issues including creation, tithing and the nature of spiritual authority. He insisted that these teachings were central to the faith and that dissenters from his line were in serious error that threatened their eternal destiny. It reached a head when one Sunday during a sermon the pastor launched into a personal attack on those in the church who disagreed with him. Naming them – and most were in the congregation that day – he called on them to ‘repent’ and then proceeded to pray for this to happen. During the prayer these people stood up and left the building. Within ten minutes other members of the congregation, some in tears and others heckling the pastor walked out. The meeting ended in chaos.

The article claims that this story is “the tip of the iceberg”, and like all such icebergs it is the “sea of faith” that is keeping it afloat: It is not a case of people occasionally (or even frequently) being tempted by the lure of power as they might also be tempted by sex and money. The problem is to be found in the underlying ethos of fundagelicalism, particularly charismatic and Pentecostal fundagelicalism. That ethos is one of a brash, positively affirming and assertive Christianity flowing naturally out of a culture that, as an affected reaction to its marginalization, is so totally convinced it speaks with the very words and authority of God. I suspect that the pastor referred to in the above quote was less tempted by sheer power per se than he was tempted by the common fundagelical delusion that he was the mouth piece of God. It’s not that this culture is necessarily peopled by the authoritarian, the arrogant, the gullible and the stupid, but the cultural mores of fundgelicalism helps feed authoritarianism, arrogance, gullibility and stupidity.

If the authoritarian, the arrogant, the gullible and the stupid start to populate institutions and sects whose ethos attracts them, then naturally enough one is going find them giving a very hyperbolic explanation of what they are doing. This brings me to the second article in “Christianity” by regular writer Jeff Lucas. In a column entitled “Mind your Language” Lucas acknowledges that many Christians give a fabulous account of their doings using a language of spiritual superlatives that raises the prosaic into an ethereal grandiose realm. Lucas kindly calls it “metaphor and shorthand” but a case could be made out for calling it “spiritual spin”. Lucas, in fact, gives an example that he himself is guilty of:

I used to describe prayer as a conversation, until, decades on, I came to realize that it could be misleading. ‘God spoke to me this morning’ I would announce breathlessly, perhaps suggesting that (a) I awoke to the sound of a booming voice that rattled the alarm clock and (b) I have an ongoing hotline to God and am enjoying happy little chats with him through each and everyday. In truth 99% of my praying is me doing the talking.

Lucas also says:

.. after a while we start to believe in the Magic Kingdom ourselves as I found out when I went to Disney land and actually approached Mickey Mouse and asked for an autograph. Only as I walked away did I realise that I’d just asked a sweating college student togged in furry fancy dress to honour me with a signature. I’d bought in to the myth myself.

Telling, truthful, candid, sobering stuff. But Lucas is taking a big risk: He could be in for some brickbats on “Christianity’s” letters page if the religious fanatics who speak for God decide to mobilize.

The following is an example of the output of one Christian sect very sure that it has an ongoing hotline to God, a line that needs no interpretation:

The all-inclusive Christ, who as the life-giving Spirit indwells our spirit, is everything to us. We must believe the clear Word in a pure way, saying, "Amen," to whatever the Bible says, and we should take care of our experience. There is no need to interpret. Simply take whatever the Bible says and believe it.

No need to interpret: That's right, no need to think about it, just get a direct download from the Almighty Himself and you're away; in fact no need to even bother to get the download as we have it already, so just come to us and we can tell you what to believe. One little problem though: A million and one fundagelical ministries, sects and cults, all with their proprietary and mutually inconsistent authoritative downloads, can't all be right.

Over confidence, over certainty, and spiritual arrogance are the inevitable products of the false belief that Christians somehow speak the very words of God, and this very naturally leads into the abuse of spiritual power and authoritarianism.

The Myth of God Incarnate

Who needs a liberal theologian to interpret the Bible’s message when we’ve got Saint Paul here to do the work for us? (This picture of PZ Myers was taken while he was playing on the rides at the local creationist doctrinal bargain basement)

I was fascinated to see this post by militant atheist blogger PZ Myers. Myers says that he likes the liberal theologian’s metaphorical view of the Bible because:-

The idea that the Bible should be interpreted as a metaphor is a good one — because it melts the superstition away. The metaphor is a powerful tool.

And because (and this may be the chief reason):-

…opening the Bible up to metaphorical interpretation rips the heart right out of Christianity, and makes central dogmas of the faith untenable and painfully ridiculous.

Or does it? I personally might have a vestigial “superstitious” belief in a real God, a real incarnation and a real resurrection, but I would nevertheless go along with PZ’s view that much of what I would call the “Word of God” is compellingly conveyed through metaphor and many of the moral lessons of those metaphors stand regardless of the ontological significance one attaches to them. This means that the profound teachings inherent in those metaphors can be appropriated by theist and non-theist alike. And if these teachings actually constitute the core “central dogmas of the faith” then the heart of the faith remains in place. Moreover, the Good Book itself says:

Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, 15since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.) 16This will take place on the day when God will judge men's secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares. Romans 2:14-16

In other words the “Word of God” reaches the places in (wo)men’s hearts that our religions do not reach. For this reason I have never been at all keen on attacking atheists by suggesting atheist philosophy inclines people toward immorality. This kind of attack is especially rich in the light of the excesses of some very religious people. Believer’s and unbelievers have the same God given conscience that informs them about right and wrong and if unbelievers follow their consciences for good that is something to write home about.

Anyway, in his post PZ precedes to lampoon the literalism of the Ken Ham’s of this world, but then he embarks on a consideration of what is left if the Bible is interpreted metaphorically:

Of course, I'm a right cruel bastard, so when a liberal Christian tells me that Genesis and the sacrifice of Christ are metaphors, I just ask "Metaphors for what?", and then they usually stand there gape-jawed like a fish and flounder trying to figure out what I'm asking. Calling something a metaphor is not a get-out-of-jail free card. It means there's a deeper meaning to extract.

So let’s see what deeper meaning PZ extracts ( *1)

The book of Genesis is telling us that human beings are flawed, that we're all burdened with impulses and desires that are not necessarily good for our society: greed and selfishness, for instance, or violence and deceitfulness. (And also, to a patriarchal society, disobedience — conscientious objections don't seem to have much support in such cultures). The whole of Genesis, not just the creation stories, is about the natural wickedness of human beings, and how we have to be constantly chastised.

You won't find a single rational person who disagrees with that. (but you might find quite a few rational persons - and Christians - who don’t live up to it – ed) We are not angels by nature. We biologists would go even further and say that by nature, we're fractious, squabbling apes. Read that as the lesson of Genesis, and you'll find even us rabid militant atheists in full agreement that it is right. The mythological details are nonsense, of course, but they're just there to make it an interesting and persuasive story.

Excellent! So PZ is admitting that humanity by nature struggles with itself, with its self-centeredness and selfishness; intrinsic traits of human nature that are contrary to good society. That sounds suspiciously like the myth of original sin, yes “sin”, the word with the “I” in middle.

PZ then goes on to consider what he calls the “Jesus myth”. Given that PZ has identified humanity’s problem as being with its intrinsic nature (that is, with its “original sin”) can he now extract the essentials of salvation? This is what he says about the “Jesus myth”:

That's a hero story, a narrative about someone we should emulate, whose greatest virtues are self-sacrifice for the common good. We're wicked deep down as Genesis tells us, but we can also aspire to believe in humanity and give our lives over to charity and justice.

Again, this interpretation is not going to conflict with most godless values (well, unless you're an Ayn Randian, but those are psychopathological aberrations). We're combative apes, but our species also succeeds through cooperation; we have a 'higher' nature to which the best of us can appeal, which has and will help us succeed. Maybe believing in something greater, like sacrifice and hope, can help us be better people.

Not bad, not bad at all! We seem to moving in the right direction. OK, so PZ finds all the suffocating ontological trappings of piety surrounding this basic “myth” repugnant, and he believes these trapping to be dispensable as one would expect of an atheist. And yet look at the comments about Someone we should emulate, about wickedness deep down and above all that last sentence about the transforming power of sacrifice and hope. That’s core Christian values to my mind, or even, if you like, the “central dogma” of Christianity! It is precisely here that the “Jesus myth” is, in my opinion, unparalleled and compelling. That “myth” is about recognizing the “old nature”, repenting of that nature and putting on with hope the “higher nature”, the nature that Christ presents us with. Viz:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.5Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:

6Who, being in very nature God,

did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,

7but made himself nothing,

taking the very nature of a servant,being made in human likeness.

8And being found in appearance as a man,he humbled himself

and became obedient to death—

even death on a cross!

9Therefore God exalted him to the highest place

and gave him the name that is above every name,

10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,

in heaven and on earth and under the earth,11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the Father. (Philipians 2:3-11)

This “myth” is a story about the greatest sacrifice imaginable: He who has most to lose voluntarily losing everything; God giving up being God and becoming a humble servant, obedient to the point of humiliation and death. This is the myth of the Grace of God that utterly flaws one’s own superficial morality and shows it up for what it is: Hypocrisy. But if we immerse ourselves in this myth it inspires us and proves to have the power to change our lives. It focuses our minds on the concepts of repentance, forgiveness, love, hope, and above all the Grace Of God. Now, I personally am still superstitious enough to believe that this life transforming myth about the higher nature was acted out for real in some higher plane. But perhaps the story of Christ has power to make us better people whatever our views on its ontological status.

The man from Galilee has one more challenge for us all before I finish. PZ Myers would not doubt regard with angry contempt the views of many Christians on the ontological realities associated with the above myth. Conversely there are many fundagelicals out there who treat PZ Myers as if he is the very distillate of the anti-Christ. These two sides, it seems, are beyond reconciliation. If we now set this implacable stand off against the words of the man from Galilee whilst He hung on The Cross we realise just how high the moral bar has been set:

Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. Luke 23:34 (*2)

Footnotes:

*1 PZ actually says “These are interpretations that liberal theologians make, but surprisingly, they're also perfectly copacetic with atheist and humanist ideals.” So it seems that the Liberal Theologians have achieved something!

*2 Some early manuscripts do not have this sentence

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more: Mythos versus Logos

The following two videos are worth comparing. The first, which I found on PZ Meyers' atheist blog here, shows a passionate evangelical (?) Christian vehemently praying at a graduate congregation. She starts by repenting of the sin of worshiping the intellectual mind. The passion in her prayer increases until it reaches an orgasmic crescendo; she starts quaking, breaks down and faints. Some of the correspondents on PZ's blog think she shows evidence of nevertheless being in control and thus of consciously manufacturing this display of spiritual exhibitionism.

Here is the video:



The second video was linked to from the Intelligent Design blog “Uncommon Descent” (See here; the comments on UD are also very worthy of note too; one correspondent wonders if it is a spoof!). This video shows a group of people that the voice over tells us are an extremist ecology group called “Earth First”. To the Christians of Uncommon Descent these people are worshiping nature, but the activity of the group shown in this video looks all but indistinguishable from the passionate prayer of the fervent evangelical Charismatic. One of their spokespersons speaks of the debilitating effects of hi-tech industrial society on spiritual life. So here is my second video:





It is amusing to think of the atheist PZ Meyers and the theists on Uncommon Descent both triumphantly finding these examples of “kookiness” respectively caricaturing what they despise most.

No doubt the Ontology of God accepted by the two groups in these videos are very different, but ostensively their relationship with the mystical entities they are praying to bear striking resemblances. Both are fine examples of a “mythos” religious reaction against the hi-tech, hi-cerebral “logos” society; both express great diffidence toward the intellect and its products. It is ironic that PZ Meyers and Uncommon Descent should stand together in relation to these similar hi-mythos, hi-passion expressions. And of course both accuse one another’s communities of harboring these irrationally religious elements!

I have written many times on the mythos/logos tension in our society. See here, here and here for example.

a Generous Or+hodoxy: Part 2

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.

The Suffocating Trappings of Piety

A Christian journalist by the name of H. V. Morton visited the Holy Land between the wars and subsequently wrote a book entitled “In the Steps of The Master”. Here is his reflection after visiting the Mt Calvary of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher:

....Calvary, the holiest place on Earth. I looked round hoping to be able to detect some sign of its former aspect, but that has been obliterated for ever beneath the suffocating trappings of piety... I went away wishing that we might have known this place only in our hearts.

In summer of 1997 I was on business in Israel. During that visit I managed to squeeze in a “Jerusalem pilgrimage” and for a day I became a “pilgrim” doing the usual Holy sites. I too was left with my own reflection on “the suffocating trappings of piety”. Here is a short passage from the story of my visit

The religious mentality has something about it that renders it unselfconscious. Perhaps this is a consequence of devotion so intense that it becomes lost in itself. But whatever the cause, this context blindness means that this extreme devotion leads to an inability to stand back and examine itself. Thus in its obsession with devotional minutia it is unable to see the aggregate effect of its activity, and is thus unaware of the incoherent and implausible jumble its religion has become. One man's iconic elaborations are another man's blasphemy. And so there is a tendency for these elaborations to be repeatedly destroyed and remade as people wipe away the elaborations of their forerunners or contemporaries and start all over again with the construction of fantastic new cultural forms, forms often thought to represent a return to genuine and original simplicity. Thus, the ground is successively cleared and replanted and the net effect is that there springs up a thick undergrowth of diverse groups.


The generic concept here is summed up by the word “Restorationism”. Freedom permitting, Christians (and in fact religious people in general) are forever rebuilding their faith in reaction against the other believers around them, thus restoring or returning to what they believe to be the right way. This tendency is particularly marked in Protestantism where a power vacuum attracts self proclaimed authorities.

With this background behind me it was with a somewhat perturbed fascination that I recently noticed yet another form of Christian restorationism popping up on a Network Norwich & Norfolk thread (See here - this link no longer exists 20/2/10). This form of restorationism actually goes back a few decades and has its origins in the ministry of a Chinese Christian called “Witness Lee” whose views, in turn, are partly founded on the teachings of another Chinese Christian called “Watchman Nee”. Unlike the Christian house church restorationists of the late seventies the Lee sect doesn’t use the word “Restoration”, but a word like it: “Recovery”; it considers itself to be the Lord’s “recovered” church.

I have had a quick look at the teachings of Lee and Nee using links furnished by the NN&N thread (Especially the links provided by a correspondent called “The Terminator”). In order to assess a movement as quickly as I can, as a general rule I go straight to a sects publications dealing with leadership, authority and church. This is because the subject of church management will reveal any cult ethos, if it is to be found. In this case I focused on two publications called “Authority and Submission” and “Leadership in the New Testament”. To cut a long story short these publications suggested to me that we have here a group ethos with a very strong view of its spiritual authority. This was no surprise. Moreover, in the NN&N thread one of the sect members is caught in the act of trying to administer that authority online. Clearly annoyed by the obstinacy of The Terminator a sect member called “a believer in Norwich” does the equivalent of excommunicating The Terminator:

We are left with no other recourse but to follow our Lord’s directive to treat him/her, according to his /her own attitude, as those who are outside the realm of the people of God .

And this is carried out on the basis that The Terminator’s behavior:

reveals little care for the headship of Christ or the body of Christ

This online disfellowshipping is a rather a futile gesture as clearly “The Terminator” is not part of the Lee sect fellowship in the first place. What little gravitas this “excommunication” has comes about as a result of the sect’s view of spiritual demographics: The sect divides the world into three populations: the favoured “blended brothers” (sect members, it seems), the apostate church of “divided brothers” (all other sects and denominations of Christianity) and finally the pagans and atheists on the way to hell. It is to the latter group that the excommunicated Terminator has been consigned. The “headship of Christ or the body of Christ” referred to above is none other than the authority of the “recovered” church of Witness Lee: This much becomes clear when one reads the publications cited. It is this authority that has been exercised in excommunicating The Terminator. (I doubt the Terminator gives a damn). It was the basis of this authority that I expected to find and found when I started reading the sects literature; any sect/cult that maintains a strong sense of communal identity and belongingness requires an exalted notion of the group’s religious authority in order keep discipline. This notion of authority can be found in other sects/cults.

The Lee sect members who meet in a city call themselves the “Local Church”. This may seem a rather bland name, a name that is just about as uninformative as calling oneself a “church”; such terms are over allocated. Moreover the qualification “local” adds little distinction, since all churches, accept perhaps for web churches, are local. However, as is always the case with restorationist startups there is a hidden qualifier tacked on to the front of its prosaic and affectedly primitive self designation. In its view they are not merely “a local church” but “THE local church”.

All restorationist startups face one impossible logical conundrum. As an almost invariable rule they rail against the denominational divisions, but in a monumental and yet completely unself-conscious act of collective egotism they never see themselves as just another denominational start-up: They get round this by taking it for granted that unlike all those other corrupt and apostate churches they are THE church; church in its best and purist manifestation. They are, in their opinion, the church restored (or recovered) to what it should be; primitive and simple. This is ever the story one finds amongst JW’s, Mormons, house church restorationists and the like. They usually have novel elements found in no other contemporary or historic churches and thus they have little option but to explain themselves as a modern recovery of what should have been.

However, to talk of some of these restorationists as just another denominational start-up is to do great disservice to the average mainstream denominational church, because the restorationist churches usually have a much stronger sense of their identity and belonging than the average denomination. Moreover, that identity is maintained by the administration of authority, an authority wielded by a strong leadership. So in a sense restorationist sects are a form of deniminationalism++. But this takes us back to my introduction: Sect and cult members are utterly and genuinely unaware of themselves as just another division of Christianity and they too, in their elaboration of belief and practice, are tempted to bury the true Calvary under the suffocating trappings of piety, particularly the trappings of, submission, authority and control.

There is a story of tadpole that mocked frogs for their ill favoured looks and yet the tadpole himself grew up to be an ugly toad. This story is a fitting metaphor for the cult startups who forever criticize and denounce the denominations of the mainstream EPC (Evangelical, Pentecostal, Charismatic) community. But it is out of the EPC community from which many sects are spawned. The authoritarian parody of faith that we see in the cult-startups is often prefigured, albeit a less pronounced form, in EPC itself: Spiritual pride and elitism, anti-intellectualism, intense and affected spiritual expressions, haughty condemnations of sin etc. In some ways the restorationist sects are a mirror of EPC, a mirror that exaggerates its less desirable aspects. That mirror needs to be looked by into by the EPC community and the lessons learned. We currently have an opportunity to look into that mirror on the NN&N website.
.

"a Generous Or+thodoxy": Part 1

Can Brian Mclaren save Protestantism from the chaos monster?

I have at last got round to reading one of Brian Mclaren’s (the emerging church leader) notorious books - namely “a Generous Or+thodoxy”. Before I comment on this book I shall have to give some preamble.

Broadly speaking EPC (= Evangelical, Pentecostal, Charismatic) Christianity approximately clusters around two classes of groupings. If I am allowed to recycle two historical terms in order to designate more generic phenomena then I would describe these clusters as “The Gnostics” and “The Strict and Particulars”. “Gnostic” Christians are those who place a premium on spiritual intuitions, esoteric experiences and sublime initiations. The Strict and Particulars (Or “Straps” for short) are those for whom the spiritual premium is upon “Obeying the Word of God”, that “word” usually being identified with a bespoke interpretation of the Bible. Different fellowships and churches will show differing degrees of pronouncement of these two categories. In some cases a benign and happy mean may be settled for, but in my experience there is often a tension in EPC churches between proponents of these differing emphases on revelation. In fact, in extreme cases a belligerent sectarianism can result. Complicating matters further is the fact that it is also possible for a single sect to display both characteristics at once: A soft gnostic centre may be protected by a hardened shell of strict “Word of God” doctrine. When manifested in extreme form gnostic Christianity is akin to a kind of spiritual delirium whereas strap Christianity looks like a kind of spiritual autism; and I suppose it is also possible to have a form of delirious autism!


Gnostics and straps are not specifically an EPC phenomenon and one can find the same clusters in other religions. This clustering is what Karen Armstrong generically refers to as the Mythos or Logos manifestations of religion (See here for more details). My hunch is that the basis of this division is to be found in temperamental, psychological and other human factors. As I have remarked before, the divisions may have something to do with the left-right brain partitioning. EPC sects and subcultures will, needless to say, be very unlikely to admit that they are manifesting psychological traits beyond their control as they will much prefer to think of themselves as having made a choice in favour of what is absolutely true rather than succumbing to a human foible. EPC sects and subcultures are jealous defenders of their bespoke version of the faith and as a consequence they can be very partisan. Because these groups may regard their renditions of the faith as the last word in truth one finds not only finds gnostic vs. strap tensions, but gnostic vs. gnostic and strap vs. strap conflicts.

My understanding of the Christian faith is that it’s kernel idea, in contradistinction to the concept of a self help salvation, is that of the condescension of a God who reaches down to the human level (and beyond) in an act of saving grace thus adopting as spiritual children all those who are willing to become “sons of God”. Christianity is about an undeserved gift of salvation; a robust fault tolerant message of salvation for all those who, though they grasp truth imperfectly, have appropriated grace and are on the road to salvation by the sustaining grace of God revealed in Christ.

One would expect that the Christian message of grace would by its very definition be extremely robust and tolerant of the faults of its recipients. But it seems that this is not the view of many who, though they have appropriated the of Grace God in spite of themselves, then go on to attempt to take full control of the message; for they often suggest that God’s Grace is all but unavailable to those who do not share certain bespoke doctrines and gnostic blessings. For the erstwhile recipients of grace may be unwilling to accept that others beyond the domain of their bespoke practice and belief have the cry of “Abba Father” in their hearts. At best they may recognize them as inferior Christians and at worse consider them beyond the pale. Thus in a travesty of the very grace they themselves have accepted they are quick to deny that the (full) favour of God’s blessing is on to those who don’t share their numerous and ramifying particularities of faith. As a result there are often some pretty venomous inter sectarian altercations within EPC. EPC is very schizoid and the more extreme subcultures and sects within EPC will criticize one another from variety of a spiritual hobby horses: Restorationism, Young Earth Creationism, spiritual authority, fideism, conspiracy theory, right wing politics, bespoke revivals, blessings, miraculous healings and prophecies. (This list is not exhaustive!)

***

I have engaged on this rather long preamble because it seems that Brian McLaren has been subject to the kind of criticism I have referred to. Given my understanding of the gospel it would seem clear to me that Mclaren is, as far as his book “a Generous Or+thodoxy” is concerned, very much in the Christian fold: He understands and accepts grace, he understands that it’s Christ work and not his that brings salvation, and he knows God as father through Christ – read part 1 of his book. But as one reads McLaren one must be aware that he does not readily parrot EPC formulae and confessional quips; if one wants to verify that McLaren supports an EPC confessional formula one may have to read many pages in order to “distill out” that formula. Spiritual quips and cliché surfing, which are often required to authenticate one’s faith to one’s target Christian subculture and to win acclaim from that subculture, are not readily available in McLaren’s writings and this certainly brings a freshness to his work.

And yet on McLaren’s Wiki page one reads of one EPC commentator confidently declaring: “As kindly but as forcefully as I can, that to my mind, if words mean anything, both McLaren and [Steve] Chalke have largely abandoned the gospel”. From a movement that itself so often parodies the gospel of grace it is difficult to take statements like that very seriously. Whatever Mclaren might have said elsewhere, it appears from my reading of “a Generous Or+thdoxy” that his basic gospel credentials are assured. But if one is going to question McLaren’s faith this sets a precedent which prompts me to in turn question the Christian credentials of those sub cultures and sects in EPC (Perhaps like McLaren’s critic) who trammel the gospel with so many bespoke conditions and offer up a travesty of its message of grace. If McLaren has abandoned the gospel then so have many ungracious divisions within EPC. Commentators like McLaren’s critic are setting a very dangerous precedent indeed, a precedent that subverts Christianity to its core. People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.


As you can perhaps see from the foregoing, even before I started reading McLaren’s book I sensed I was going to find a lot in common with him: I held off the evil day knowing that if I got too close to McLaren I would be accused of abandoning “The Truth”. In fact as I stood in the queue waiting to buy my copy of “a Generous Or+thodoxy” I met a much respected minister acquaintance who jokingly said to me that the book set him on the road to wrack and ruin! But then one can hardly get much more ruinous than EPC culture itself, so what’s there to lose? Like myself, McLaren appears to have attempted to raise himself above the EPC scene in order to take in a wide breathtaking overview of the chaotic shipwreck that is EPC (and also of the broader sweep of Christian history) and then been prompted to ask: “What can we salvage from the chaos?”

To be continued….

Serpentine Logic

That devolved legless reptile is doing its damnedest to stay in the picture

Interesting is this post on Uncommon Descent concerning ID guru William Dembski’s book “The End of Christianity, Finding a Good God in an Evil World”. This is what Dembski says about the book.

My book attempts to resolve how the Fall of Adam could be responsible for all evil in the world, both moral and natural IF the earth is old and thus IF a fossil record that bespeaks violence among organisms predates the temporal occurrence of the Fall. My resolution is to argue that just as the salvation of Christ purchased at the Cross acts forward as well as backward in time (the Old Testament saints were saved in virtue of the Cross), so too the effects of the Fall can go backward in time. Showing how this could happen requires extensive argument and is the main subject of the book. As for my title, “End of Christianity” involves a play on words – “end” can refer to cessation or demise; but it can also refer to goal or purpose. I mean the latter, as the subtitle makes clear: Finding a Good God in an Evil World.

The link to the interview with Dembski also worth looking at.

Some comments
1. Although he minces his words and hedges (Not surprisingly given his particular Christian sub-culture) my guess is that Dembski is an “Old Earth” believer; otherwise his attempt to explain pre-fall evil as a “retroactive” result of an anthropocentric fall would seem rather futile. (Note: If the act of God in Christ is a powerful symbolic declaration of covenant by God and revealed in the fullness of time, then its ability to dispense grace retroactively is less enigmatic, whereas I can make little sense of a retroactive fall in this light)

2. In line with Young Earth Evangelicalism’s world view Dembski assumes evil and suffering to be largely sourced anthropocentrically. And yet the serpent in Genesis 3 could be construed as a symbol of the presence of extra-human evil. The person(s) who penned Genesis 3, as is the wont of arcadian folk, would be ever aware of the lurking presence of evil in an unseen world. There is also the question over the interpretation of the enigmatic Romans 8:18-23 , a passage which hints that the cause of evil and suffering is not quite so crisp and clear cut as traditional Young Earth Evangelicalism would have it.

3. The problem Dembski is addressing comes out of contemporary Young Earth Evangelicalism’s world view and is thus very pressing in his own intellectual circles. Some of us, such as myself, who feel that there are deeper mysteries surrounding the source of suffering and evil have a less pressing need to explain pre-fall suffering. According to my concordance the word “good” of Genesis 1 is not quite the same as the word perfect (~ completion). I wonder what Dembski teaches his seminary students?

I have been a close witness of evangelical philosophy for over thirty years and its sometimes cursory and shallow treatment of suffering and evil is not its only short fall. So much about standard evangelical explanations fail to make sense of the world around us, not to mention its inconsonance with aspects of my own personal experience. It’s no wonder that when pressed the fallback position of many evangelicals is fideism: Viz: “Faith is not always logical, if it was it would not be faith.” In the fideist mind the ability of faith to accommodate mystery is conflated with the ability to swallow illogicality. But I’ll hand it to William Dembski, he is brave guy (and a nice guy as far as I can tell) and he is making a very valiant attempt at being be logical. Pity about some of his fellow pilgrims.

To P or not to P

Just when you thought you could at last stand up and be counted as a man here are two up and coming students of theology who find profound exegetical problems with Pastor Anderson's theology of urination (see my last post). Can theologians please make this little conundrum a real priority issue as we in the church certainly need to have it sorted pronto; like before we next use the small room.

Modern Theologians are rethinking toilet training in the light of scripture

Feelings of Unreality

Here's another case where am I at a loss as to whether we are dealing with a hoax, send up or the real thing! Anyone? Will this go down in history as the "Pissing Blissing"?

Forget Gideon; Pastor Anderson has a real test that sorts out the men from the girls.

The Pastor is my Shepherd.

After a quick investigation on the web I wasn't able to determine whether the above was a piece of satire or the real thing. Then I thought to myself shouldn't I be able to tell anyway? Fact is, I can't tell the difference and that's a little bit worrying. The man pictured below might have something to do with it.

The God Father

Virgo: Father to the Bride of Christ?

As I indicated in my previous post on emerging church, the Restoration movement came to my notice at the beginning of the 1980s. I was somewhat alarmed because their take on Church Unity seemed to be a rediscovery of the old social technology of the Christian cults whereby unity is maintained by the presumed spiritual authority of its leaders. For example consider the following quote taken from an article entitled “Unity: Is it Possible?” which appeared in the “Restoration” Magazine of July & August 1979 telling the story of three churches that “put themselves under the covering authority” of a Restorationist “apostle”:

The most significant element in the unity of the three churches was the recognition of Apostolic authority

The Berean tradition which acts as a bulwark against authoritarian leadership was also being challenged by Restorationist patriarch Arthur Wallis:

The Teaching or Interpreting of the Word of God is perhaps the most important way in which authority (i.e. Authority of Leaders) is exercised for doctrine determines practice.*


Thus, challenging a Restorationist leader from a Berean perspective was probably about as futile as challenging the Pope, because in both cases their interpretation of scripture holds precedence by virtue of its assumed authority; end of story.

One doesn’t hear about Restorationism anymore. The early days of a movement riding high on the crest of a wave of expansion are long since over, as are the optimistic pronouncements from leaders who, intoxicated by being on the growth part of the curve, were prone to triumphalism and hype. They proclaimed God’s new thing that was taking the Christian world by storm and they even went as far as suggesting that Restorationism was ushering in the Millennium rule of Christ. Today the Restorationist prophecies about a church restored and united under the strong leadership of authoritative patriarchs are now all but forgotten. Like so many other cheap and ephemeral throw way blessings that string along the faithful for five minutes at a time, the angst of failure has been lost in sweet forgetfulness.

With my memories of the history of Restorationism still clear in my mind I was very interested to read an article in the July “Christianity” Magazine about Terry Virgo. Terry Virgo was one of the leaders of Restorationism. I am not sure what has happened to the other leaders of the halcyon days of Restorationism, but apart from ex-restorationist David Tomlinson, Virgo is the only other leader I hear about nowadays. One of Virgo’s virtues seemed to be that unlike some of his fellow Restorationists of the 1980s, he was less up front about leadership authority. His emphasis was more on leadership than headship and that may be why his Newfrontiers group of churches seems to be the only prominent group around today that might still classify as a Restorationist group. Even so, reading the article in “Christianity” it seems the old doctrines of patriarchy are still a big theme with Virgo. For example he says this:

Paul clearly limits authoritative doctrinal teaching to elders who care for the flock and are gifted and appointed to do so (Act20:28)… Paul is making clear that becoming a Christian means being placed under the authority of Christian teaching. The teaching had authority to give form to the New Testament churches and shape to the life of the believers….people would subsequently be added to the church and come within the shepherding care of its pastors and teachers.

And that is exactly what the Restorationists were saying 30 years ago. Moreover, like the Restorationts of the 80s Virgo is adamant that women are not allowed to teach. I’ve never got into the argument about the role of women in church as I prefer to leave that subject in the very capable hands of women like Elaine Storkey who could no doubt tell Virgo a thing or two about the role of women.

The article in Christianity tells of a visiting speaker at a Newfrontiers rally who broached the subject of the aging Virgo conceding his leadership. In the words of Christianity magazine the speaker diplomatically likened Virgo to “…you (Virgo) taking Newfrontiers down the aisle, like the father of a much loved daughter”. That this speaker could talk of Virgo almost as a father to the bride of Christ is eloquent comment about Virgo’s God father status amongst Newfrontiers churches.

Quite apart from the question of whether Virgo has any authority to hand over what is not really his to give, he does seem to be rather “hanging in there”. Is he reluctant to pass his leadership on? Is this because he is anxious of what might become of his “daughter”? From Virgo’s perspective perhaps his anxiety is understandable; his “daughter” could go either of two ways: She may be given to a far more authoritarian patriarch than Virgo, such as was Bryn Jones one of the founding fathers of Restorationism. But perhaps even worse from Virgo’s point of view Newfrontiers might become a standard denomination; that is, a loose affiliation of local churches (and much better to my mind). That, I suspect, is in fact the destiny awaiting Newfrontiers, and I think Virgo knows it; as he says in “Christianity” magazine “I have asked our international leaders, When I snuff it will you all go your separate ways?”. Trying to get into the head of a Restorationist “apostle” that responsible and mature Christians don’t need authority to cooperate is like trying to teach a chimpanzee to do calculus. However, to Virgo’s credit I feel he hasn’t been authoritarian enough to extinguish the taste for the freedom and responsibility amongst his churches that is the birthright of all Christians.


* Unfortunately I can’t locate the source where Wallis penned this sentiment

More On Emerging Church

The post is based on a short talk I gave on emerging church. I’m not an authority on emerging church, and the following is really a personal view based on my rather limited contact with the subject.

Shortly after my commitment to Christianity circa 1973 I started studying a variety of quasi Christian cults such as the Mormons, the Jehovah’s witnesses and the Children of God. As a result of this study my faith was later to receive a sharp jolt when the Restoration movement arrived in Norwich (in the form of Norwich Christian Fellowship) and came to my attention circa 1981. This movement majored in contending for the authority of Christian patriarchs to direct the affairs and beliefs of its followers. For me this potentially authoritarian ethos was too close to the cult model for comfort. During the study of some of Restorationist literature I came across the name of David Tomlinson, a leader in the movement. Amidst a movement that was still in its triumphal early days Tomlinson proved to be something of anomaly: I sensed even then that he may have been experiencing the first onset of diffidence toward standard EPC (=Evangelical, Pentecostal, Charismatic) Christianity. I flagged this suspected diffidence with a note in my file on the Restorationism and that note is there to this day.

Tomlinson’s name came up again in about 1995 when I read a review of Tomlinson’s book “The Post Evangelical”. By this stage I had witnessed the full spectrum of EPC manifestations from the lauded “Sound Doctrines” of strict evangelicalism, to the constant round of spiritual novelties delivered by Charismatic Christianity. To name but a few of the latter: Restorationism, the Toronto blessing, various failed healings and prophecies, authoritarianism, preliterate dualism, and above all large dollops of spiritual spin. In particular I had become disturbed by how close some charismatic expressions were to Gnostic elitism and fideism. By 1994 the strange objects that flitted by my window on EPC had taken their toll on my attitude and a measure of cynicism had set in. Not surprisingly, then, the title of Tomlinson’s book struck a chord with me, and without even reading the book I somehow felt that Tomlinson was thinking what I was thinking; enough was enough. Tomlinson had secured a following and set up his own church, but it seems that many Christians were taken by Tomlinson declaration of a post-evangelical era; perhaps it even started to assume the status of a kind of mini-reformation.

In my experience most post evangelicals are from charismatic fellowships. They are genuine and emotionally intense people who are looking for something real, but who have become somewhat disaffected by EPC authoritarianism, spiritual spin, hype, general lack of authenticity and the social pressures of the spiritual equivalent of the Emperor’s new clothes. They are less post evangelicals than they are post charismatics.

Post evangelicals find themselves caught in the middle of a triangle of three Christian movements:

1. Charismatic Christianity: this is the sub-culture from which disillusioned and disaffected post evangelicals have, in the main, emerged out of (for reasons already mentioned).

2. Conservative and Strict Evangelicals: Dowdy, ultra traditional, condemning, uncompromising and lacking the dynamism of charismatic fellowships. They are very ready to deny that God’s grace is available unless their idiosyncratic take on “sound doctrine” isn't followed to the letter, which needless to say limits that grace to their own spiritual subcultures. They seem confused about the difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. They have a low view of Bible interpretation, taking it for granted that meaning resides intrinsically in the words themselves rather than being supplied by open ended cultural resources. The upshot is that they insulate and disconnect Biblical interpretation from the wider cosmic context. Their so called “plain teaching of scripture” usually means their traditional interpretations of scripture that have done the rounds for such a long time that they can think of nothing else. The look and feel of strict evangelical groups is often not very much different from countless other religious sub cultures for whom salvation is conditioned on a strict and narrow view of life’s cultural shape. The strict evangelical ethos can sometimes be found in a very toxic blend with Gnostic Christianity.

3. Liberal Christianity: The post evangelical may feel that Liberal Christianity is dangerously liable to throw the baby out with the bathwater resulting in a faith that is no longer recognizable as Christianity. Liberal Christianity may even go as far as to terminate in what, to all intents and purposes, is a form of atheism, an example being Don Cupit of “Sea of Faith” fame. Cupit’s God is a “constitutional” God in that like a constitutional monarch God is thought to only have a symbolic or metaphorical existence.


The post evangelical usually means business with God, so given the foregoing where does he go as he “emerges” from EPC Christianity? For a start, he has many questions buzzing around in his head. (At this point in the talk I illustrated this with a picture taken from “Christianity” magazine showing a Christian removing a suit and revealing a T-shirt with a giant question mark on the front –see the picture at the head of this post)

….well, he becomes an “emerging church” Christian. This doesn’t necessarily mean he has joined a group but has, in fact, ended up in the emerging church by default. Putting the best complexion on the matter the term “emerging” signifies a decentralized system where each bit is working independently and yet like the “boids” of system theory it is hoped that this decentralized ecology will, in God’s economy and timing, result in something fresh and worthwhile. The central notion (or rather hope) well expressed in the term “emerging church”, is that something good is emerging, something that has yet to run its course.

In spite of their radical pretensions, emerging church Christians hang on to scripture because they don’t want to lose what is good and stable from the past. But all in all tensions and contradictions are created that are often difficult to resolve. There is a mixture of a sense of betrayal, confusion, and a loss of focus and anchorage. A postmodern reaction sets in; the post evangelical is to evangelicalism as the postmodern is to modernism, in that there is a general pessimism about what at one time seemed so sound, bright, shiny, optimistic and full of hope. When emerging Christians do come together to form fellowships, they tend to adopt a contemplative form of worship in line with their largely touchy feely charismatic background, and yet they often look back to the pre-modern era for liturgical inspiration as they attempt to re-anchor their faith.

Summing up the character of emerging church:

1. Post-evangelical: They are seeking a religious authenticity that they feel is so often absent from EPC.
2. Reevaluating and reinterpreting scripture, but not wanting to over throw the Bible, they use scripture in an informal non-systematic way. Gone is dogmatic theology.
3. Postmodern: although they identify with the angst of postmodern disaffection, in most cases emerging church would not accept the hard postmodernist thesis which asserts with great paradox that life makes no absolute sense.
4. Experimental touchy feely meditative worship; a looking back to the Christian past for liturgy, context and perspective.
5. Political and Social: Loss of scriptural bearings leads to compensatory political and social action. Social concern and lobbying seems at least an uncontroversial component of Christ’s teachings.
6. Prepared to review some traditional alienating doctrines such as Hell and Christian exclusivism.
7. Personalities and leaders: The unassuming tones of Brian McLaren and Rob Bell represent a move away from the plastic, “knows what he’s talking about”, impassioned, formula spouting, cliché surfing preacher.

Pending Position Statement

As a result of direct inquiries I intend to produce, at some stage, a position statement regarding my views on Christianity. However, I am currently absorbed with one two other matters that I am following up; hence this promissory note.

Postmodernism and Emerging Christianity Part 3

In this third part I juxtapose the two articles on Emerging church in the April issue of “Christianity” with one final article that appears in the same issue. This article tells a story that has now become an almost dated cliché in EPC circles: That of the solid bible based traditional evangelical church which undergoes a “charismatic” revival/renewal….. except that it doesn’t actually have a revival at all, but rather a sudden membership turn over – non-charismatics out, charismatics in. Or at least that’s the admission of the article where it claims that the church concerned (which is in America) only retained around 25% of its original “conservative” membership.

The story is a classic: a restless pastor or group within the church, bored with what otherwise appears to be a successful if rather dry, stuffy and stolid church is looking for “more”. After the aforementioned congregational replacement the church is labeled “charismatic” and with the new temperamental cross section a new speak enters the church. We hear of healings, prophecies and even angelic visitations. The new members think in gnosto-dualist terms and the philosophy of the church becomes a de facto dualist philosophy which emphasizes the differences between the spiritual and physical worlds. It adopts a power vs. word paradigm of spiritual life, which is ironic given that so much of church life is now explained and reinterpreted by the “new speak”. The leadership is apt to become authoritarian, despising accountability for the simple reason that in the face of a catastrophic loss of support the leadership can no longer function with a consensus. The 75% majority of Church members who don’t go for the new speak have to be ditched. The new speak provides a ready explanation (or spin) for this situation; hemorrhaging membership is clearly down to fear and spirit quenching. The previous work of the church is evaluated negatively as at best “lacking in power” and at worse not being “in the Spirit”. Finally, the leaders of the latest blessing try to make inroads into the UK which they see as a plum ripe for the plucking. To this end these prophets of blessing may get a recommendation from some well known EPC figure in the UK.

I’m the very last person that should be labeled as “anti-charismatic” – I have no quarrel with those who believe they have had a sublime Christian epiphany which they may call, rightly or wrongly “Baptism of the Spirit”. But unfortunately the charismatic is often conflated with the gnostic, and my argument is with the elitism, dualism and fideism of the latter. Christian gnosticism thrives on those bored with their lives and who are looking for a “shake up” or the next big thing. They can make little sense of stark cosmic realities and by way of escape and compensation need a constant supply of rumors about the miraculous. These rumors do the rounds uncritically and their authenticity is utterly impossible to disentangle from spiritual spin, gullibility logic, spiritual bullying and authoritarianism. The lauded renewals are less revivals than a case of replacing a congregation with those who are sympathetic and/or susceptible to the new interpreting spin.

Significantly such moves make little headway amongst many traditional Christians who are, needless to say, regarded as Spirit quenchers. The failure of such “moves of power” to work other than by the self selection of a minority not only challenges the authenticity of such “moves” but, moreover, the very authenticity of Christianity itself. For if Christianity in the absence of one these vaunted “renewals” is regarded as just so much powerless marking of time, then that entails that a very large percentage of Christian work is lacking in spiritual vitality. This is a short step away from conjecturing that perhaps Christianity as whole is vacuous.

The final twist to this story brings me back to the theme of postmodernism in the church. Other authoritarian gnostic groups (like say Potter’s House) may well rubbish the latest revival because it has not happened amongst them and they, of course, regard themselves as being where it is at. Thus gnostic Christian groups form an inconsistent mass of believing partisans. No attempt is made to resolve the contradictions amongst them and such mutually inconsistent groupings may be regarded as being in the power of God simply because their conviction, vehemency, and spin are taken as self authenticating. If this insensitivity to inconsistency isn’t postmodern enough consider also the fact that April’s edition of Christianity magazine makes no attempt to resolve the apparent incommensurability between Emerging church and the revivalist churches, two Christian groupings who seem to be working with very different paradigms, spiritual weltanschauungs and agendas. Moreover, many “Emergers” in their search for Christian authenticity seem to be reacting against the hype and spin of the revivalists. But revivalist churches are apt to take the view that unless a church undergoes a gnostic revival, spiritual life is at best a preparatory period prior to full conversion or else a powerless marking of time. Thus, as far as the revivalists are concerned all the angst and hard thinking of the Emerging church is effectively down time between renewals. This is a serious charge and yet Christianity magazine doesn’t attempt to resolve the issue – it leaves the two community weltanschauungs as incommensurables. This, above all, is a very postmodern reaction – not postmodern in the soft sense of a humbled epistemology, but in the absolute sense that life doesn’t make sense, so don’t bother with any grand explanations that attempt to give it sense.