Bridging Connections and Suburban Isolation

It's been two months since I've posted anything about Bowling Alone, so let me point you to my previous posts which can all be found here. To get back into the groove, I want to reflect on an underlying dynamic that Putnam discusses at length - the distinction and relationship between bonding and bridging social capital:

Of all the dimensions along which forms of social capital vary, perhaps the most important is the distinction between bridging (or inclusive) and bonding (or exclusive). Some forms of social capital are, by choice or necessity, inward looking and tend to reinforce exclusive identities and homogeneous groups. Examples of bonding social capital include ethnic fraternal organizations, church-based women's reading groups, and fashionable country clubs. Other networks are outward looking and encompass people across divers social cleavages. Examples of bridging social capital include the civil rights movement, many youth service groups, and ecumenical religious organizations...Moreover, bridging social capital can generate broader identities and reciprocity, whereas bonding social capital bolsters our narrower selves...Bonding social capital provides a sort of sociological superglue, whereas bridging social capital provides a sociological WD-40. Bonding social capital, by creating strong in-group loyalty, may also create strong out-group antagonism, as Thomas Greene and his neighbors in New Bedford knew, and for that reason we might expect negative external effects to be more common with this form of social capital. Nevertheless, under many circumstances both bridging and bonding social capital can have powerfully positive social effects. (p. 22-23)

Putnam points out that it isn't necessarily easy to reconstruct data on these two types of social capital, that we can only really make inferences from the data that are available. Still, one is left with the impression that it is bridging capital that has suffered the most in recent years. And, in truth, that's intuitive - it makes a certain amount of sense that the social connections more easily lost are those that are more challenging to maintain. In addition, the venues for bridging connections in today's culture are most often those that are most transient - affiliation with a political party, for example.

I think that this loss of bridging connections is connected to the decline of geography as a defining characteristic of a community. Think about it this way - my neighbors are the people in my social sphere with whom I am least likely to have commonality - the only thing that connects us is geography, and to a certain extent socioeconomic status. In my neighborhood are people of varying ethnicities, political persuasions, religious beliefs, interests, and life history. What do we have in common? Primarily that we live in a particular community (and to some extent that we can afford to live in a certain community). And, out of all of those neighbors, I know maybe half a dozen, and of those we are really connected with only one family in any real sense.

Our relationships have shifted to become more of a social network connected by shared interests or identity. In other words, the connections that I think most of us in suburban contexts hold are primarily bonding relationships - connections that are a result of commonality. I know and interact with people with whom I have much in common. And I rarely encounter those with whom I don't in any meaningful way.

What does this mean for a missional faith in suburbia? It means, primarily, that the most radical of missional imperatives - things like loving the enemy, showing hospitality to the stranger, and demonstrating unity in the cruciform love of Christ - are precisely the imperatives that are most difficult to practice in a suburban context.

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Entertainment and the Suburban Condition

Finally (!) delving back into Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone, I want to dig into a phenomenon that Putnam argues is the most significant shaping influence in terms of social capital in modern American life - namely, electronic forms of entertainment and, specifically, television. This particular chapter of the book is both enlightening and depressing, if not entirely surprising. Putnam offers devastating analysis and commentary that relentlessly links television with civic disengagement in measure after measure. In conclusion, he writes:

Americans at the end of the twentieth century were watching more TV, watching it more habitually, more pervasively, and more often alone, and watching more programs that were associated specifically with civic disengagement (entertainment, as distinct from news). The onset of these trends coincided exactly with the national decline in social connectedness, and the trends are most marked among the younger generations that are...distinctively disengaged. Moreover, it is precisely those Americans most marked by this dependence on televised entertainment who were most likely to have dropped out of civic and social life - who spent less time with friends, were less involved in community organizations, and were less likely to participate in public affairs. (p. 246)

I suppose I should be clear that what Putnam is discussing here -and in the book generally speaking - is not in any way isolated to suburbanites. Obviously the influence of electronic media pervades all demographics and communities in our society. Putnam, in fact, relates a story from a town in northern Canada where, due to a topological anomaly, television signals were unavailable until the mid-1970's. This community was studied alongside two neighboring communities that had ready access to television signals. Once television became available, this community demonstrated an immediate, measurable decline in residents' participation in community activities. The other two communities were used as a control to demonstrate that the only variable in play was, in fact, television.

But my concern is specifically with the way in which electronic media interact with suburban culture. I'm convinced that there is a reciprocal relationship between the isolating effects of suburban geography, the counter-competent effects of chronic outsourcing, and the demotivating effects of electronic entertainment. Put simply - these three elements of suburban life reduce the ability, desire, and personal connections needed to make meaningful change in ourselves and our communities. An example perhaps will help to clarify what I mean - take sports, basketball for instance, something that I used to play regularly with friends in high school and college. I haven't played basketball in years, and if I thought of starting again, I'd face three hurdles: it's easier to get my basketball "fix" by flipping over to ESPN, lack of play has atrophied my skills (such as they were), and I don't know anyone else in my neighborhood who would like to get together for a few hoops. There it is - isolation, outsourcing, and entertainment all combine to keep me off the courts. And if I wanted to translate this into the area of Christian faith - well, I don't think I'd have much difficulty, would I?

But here's what I'm currently starting to wonder - would a change in one of these categories be enough to overcome the inertia that keeps me in a rut (in any particular area of my life, but faith in particular) and push me forward towards action? That's the question that I want to take up next.

Technorati Tags: Bowling Alone, suburbs, entertainment

Professionalization and the Suburban Condition

I mentioned in my last post on Putnam's Bowling Alone that I wanted to discuss a phenomenon that I'm calling professionalization. This isn't something that Putnam necessarily addresses directly, but rather I think it's tangentially related to both isolation and entertainment, which I plan to discuss next. This particular concern fits nicely at this point because I think it both follows from and reinforces the trend towards isolation that I discussed previously. By "professionalization", I'm referring in a general sense to what seems to be an increasing trend away from doing things for oneself and instead toward hiring a third party to do things for us or in our stead.

What put me onto this particular train of thought was Putnam's discussion of lawyers and the shift from informal to formal means of conflict resolution and reinforcement of norms. My thought is that we are becoming a society that is less able to disagree respectfully and resolve conflict amicably, primarily because we have outsourced our disagreement and conflict resolution to a professional class of persons who do these things for us. In other words, as we lean more and more heavily on lawyers and other formal means for resolving differences, we as a society gradually lose the ability to do so for ourselves, much like a muscle that atrophies due to lack of use. This prompted me to think of other ways in which professionalization has crept into our lives - and I'm surprised that, the more I think about this, the more confident I am that this is in fact occurring in many ways.

Think, for example, of the decline of the home cook. Gone are the days when a meal was a labor of love, or at least a labor of craft and skill. Go into any supermarket and you'll be confronted, not with aisle upon aisle of fresh ingredients, but with mountains of prepared and packaged foods, waiting merely to be reconstituted into insipid piles of carbohydrates with chemically enhanced flavors. Cooking is more and more a hobby instead of a necessity - we've outsourced our food preparation in the interests of expedience. And, I would wager that this trend is more pronounced among younger folks. According to Food Technology magazine, fewer than one third of all meals in America are still prepared from scratch:

While three-quarters of all adults ate last night’s meal at home, the number of meals prepared at home continues to decline, falling from 64% in 2003 to 58% in 2005 (MSI, 2005). “Scratch” dinners prepared at home dropped another 7% over the past two years and now account for only 32% of all evening meals. One quarter (26%) of last night’s dinners used convenience foods and 17% used restaurant/supermarket take-out, while 23% were eaten at a restaurant.

Think of it this way - for how many people does the process of making cookies begin with opening a box of premixed dry goods? Does tomato sauce begin with a tomato, or a can opener? When was the last time that you took your bread from an oven instead of from a bag? Even our salad comes in convenient packages - we can't even be bothered to cut our own lettuce anymore. But I think we lose something of ourselves when we outsource even our most basic of necessities, something that makes us human. We become disconnected from our very selves, unable to even participate in sustaining ourselves from one day to the next, passive recipients of whatever lowest common denominator has made it through the assembly line and onto our plates. We cede power over our day to day existence to a faceless corporate entity that is most concerned with market share and protecting a brand.

I know there are reasons for this - I know them myself. I am the primary cook in our house, so I bear most of the burden of meal preparation. And there are nights when a pizza just fits the bill. But I try to resist, and I try to do as much from scratch as possible - it's almost a spiritual practice for me, one that I try to maintain as I'm able. But this shift towards professionalization is bigger than just cooking. We could discuss the same trend in any of a dozen different spheres of life. Besides the discussion of lawyers, Putnam also discusses it in the context of social engagement - meaning that, for most people, social action has become more about writing a check than about actually working to implement change. We are chronic outsourcers - we want someone else to do our stuff, and we'll pay good money for them to do so. And people of faith should absolutely recognize this trend - we see it every day as folks outsource spiritual development.

That's a tangent that I'm dying to engage right now - but I want to place a few more pieces in the puzzle before I go there. It's part of a bigger picture that frames where we are, and I want to resist making it the whole scene.

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Isolation and the Suburban Condition

Continuing our discussion of Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone, I want to reflect for a bit on the connection between suburban isolation and the loss of social capital that Putnam describes. While Putnam is clear that this phenomenon is by no means limited to suburban communities, he also discusses in detail the ways in which the suburban condition participates in the decline of social capital through mobility and sprawl. He concludes that suburbanization is a factor in three ways:

• Time - Sprawl associated with suburbanization results in valuable time consumed in commuting, primarily alone.
• Social homogeneity - Suburbanization creates isolation between persons and families of different backgrounds. In other words, when we choose our neighbors, we are more likely to choose neighbors that are much like ourselves. Suburbanization represents in large part the end result of such self-selection.
• Community "boundedness" - This is Putnam's way of discussing what I have elsewhere called the sense of "place" that a community has, its sense of itself as a community. In a vague sense, it describes the sense of commitment and "neighborliness" that a group of geographically located people feel towards one another. It's hard to put into words - but I know exactly what he's talking about here. Suburban living is designed primarily for the pursuit of privatized, personal self-fulfillment and contentment, often in opposition to community well-being.

In short - the suburban ethos drips with isolation. The interconnectedness that characterizes a community with robust social capital finds no purchase in the craggy heights of suburbia, each home a castle surrounded by a moat and walls.

As my wife and I are currently attempting to move to a larger house, I've become cognizant of how even the architecture of the suburban home is oriented towards isolation. Others have remarked on the demise of the front porch and its significance for American social interactions. I'm particularly intrigued by a further move: the emphasis on private spaces in the current market, particularly kitchens, bathrooms, and bedrooms. The elements of a home that are most in demand and most upgraded are also those elements that are most private. In spite of the fact that we Americans seem to be doing less actual cooking, a well-apportioned kitchen is at the top of most buyers' lists. Increasingly, a master suite is also viewed as a necessity, including a private bathroom that is distinct from that used by the rest of the family. In other words, the center of the home - the places in which we invest time, money, and emotion - is increasingly moving farther and farther to the interior, to the extent of even introducing isolation from members of our own families. This is, of course, to say nothing of the desire to have a yard that is hidden from the view of the neighbors, or the prominence of the television in our spatial arrangements. Simply put - the suburban experience is oriented towards privatization, even down to the way in which we position our furniture.

The corresponding trend, then, is most certainly disconnectedness from one's neighbors. Not only do we no longer know our neighbors on any level more than a first-name greeting, we most certainly do not interact with them in any meaningful sense. And, in truth, it is becoming increasingly likely that we no longer even know our neighbors' first names. In the cul-de-sac where we live, my wife and I know the names of six of our roughly sixteen or so neighbors - and we've lived in our home for nearly ten years. Only four of those six have actually been inside of our home. In truth, nearly all of our original neighbors have since moved, leaving us as one of the longest-tenured resident families in our part of the development. This only serves to complicate matters further. Suburban culture lives by the words of the Robert Frost poem, "Good fences make good neighbors."

What has happened in parallel with these trends is a corresponding movement from informal to formal enforcement of norms in suburban life. (Whether this relationship is causative or not is unclear.) Things that were once accomplished through relationships and networks are now accomplished through rules and legalities. If my neighbor's property begins to deteriorate, I can do several things to encourage him or her to pick up the slack: I can approach him or her directly and mention my concern (informal), or I can invoke some sort of authority, such as a homeowner's association, to do so in my stead (formal). Informal ties are reflections of strong social capital - they grease the wheels of society, so to speak. Formal mechanisms reflect a lack of trust and neighborliness and serve in some sense as a substitute for relationships and connection. The shift from informal to formal in our society is not an encouraging sign, and is evidenced by our increasing reliance on lawyers to serve as our intermediaries. Putnam has this to say:

Throughout the American society and economy, beginning around 1970, informal understandings no longer seemed adequate or prudent. The suddenness of this change and its timing seem uncannily similar to trends in other measures of social capital that we have examined. Spouses, neighbors, business partners and would-be partners, parents and children, pastors and parishoners, donors and recipients - all of us abruptly began to demand to "get it in writing." (p. 147)

The problem is that most quality of life endeavors work best when supported by informal, not formal, ties. Formal mechanisms carry significant overhead, as they rely on external structure. In addition, they create less of a reciprocal effect - there simply isn't the sense of shared well-being and neighborliness that undergirds informal ties. They lack the intrinsic motivation that comes with trusting relationships. In other words - I am more likely to do the right thing when I view that thing as a reflection of my relationship with another person, as opposed to a mandate from a faceless entity. Conversely, I am more likely to ignore a request or mandate when it comes from an impersonal representative or group. Deterioration of social capital directly results in a deterioration in the quality of life of a neighborhood, as Putnam demonstrates excellently (and relentlessly).

I'll return to this shortly - I think this has direct and massive implications for the task of communities of faith in suburbia. First, though, I want to comment on a related trend, something I describe as the increasing professionalization of American culture.

Technorati Tags: Bowling Alone, suburbs

Bowling Alone in Suburbia

I can't state enough how riveting I've found Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone. It's been on my list for a long time, but I decided when I last ordered books to pick up a few things that are outside the vein of what I've been reading lately, and this one fit the bill nicely. I dig theology but theologians aren't always the best folks for drawing the connections between theology and everyday existence. Putnam is a Harvard scholar writing from an academic's perspective on social connectedness in America. It has the rigors of an academic study while being accessible to anyone (that is, anyone with a penchant for charts and graphs). And it's surprisingly thick - I don't know what I was expecting but it wasn't five hundred pages, I'm certain. This is a book that is both meaty and engaging, both rigorous and readable, and on the whole utterly fascinating.

Putnam's premise is that America has been experiencing a decline in what he calls social capital:

Whereas physical capital refers to physical objects and human capital refers to properties of individuals, social capital refers to connections among individuals - social networks and the norms of reciprocity that trustworthiness that arise from them. In that sense social capital is closely related to what some have called "civic virtue." The difference is that "social capital" calls attention to the fact that civic virtue is most powerful when embedded in a dense network of reciprocal social relations. A society of many virtuous but isolated individuals is not necessarily rich in social capital. (p.19)

It is this "dense network of reciprocal social relations" that Putnam investigates, and finds that in every measure to which we are put, America is losing social capital. The book is a relentless march of data, in sphere after sphere of our collective lives, that documents this trend, along with Putnam's analysis of why this change is occurring and some thoughts on what to do about it.

Anecdotally, this really should come as no surprise to those of us who are involved in some form of ministry or service at this moment in American cultural history. It particularly rings true to me as someone who desires to live missionally in a suburban context. I've written before about my thoughts on the isolation and disconnectedness of the American suburb, about the loss of a sense of place and the redefinition of community around shared values (most frequently leisure) instead of shared geography. And even within this redefined community, the connections to which community refers are themselves weaker and more transient than in times past.

But perhaps I have a unique perspective on this particular topic, as I grew up in an area that could in no way be described as suburban. I grew up in small town America, a distinct slice of Americana if ever one existed. Actually, small town isn't even quite the right way to describe it - my hometown is a rural community in central Pennsylvania where farming forms a large part of the local landscape and manufacturing jobs are still significant employers. And looming large over my childhood is the image of my grandfather, a product of another time and a place that most of you have probably never experienced. Pap, as he was known to his grandkids, was a steel man who worked for Bethlehem Steel for much of his adult life. He was also a man of the soil - not a farmer by trade but a throwback to an earlier time when families would raise their own livestock and produce. Pap kept a garden that was about a half acre of produce that he raised himself, and for much of my childhood he also had several cows, both for milk and for meat. I remember summer afternoons spent pulling potatoes from the ground, fist-sized golden nuggets that the earth would yield only after a struggle. I remember riding on the back of a tractor-pulled trailer in scorching August heat, catching bales of hay that were thrown from the baler to be stacked later in the barn as winter feed for the cows. I remember ears of corn pulled from the stalk and dropped in boiling water before the sap had a chance to dry on the stalk, and watermelons that left trails of juice running down my chin. But over it all I remember my grandfather, a hardworking man who was a pillar in his community, who showed little affection but great love.

When my grandfather died in the early spring of 2001, the funeral was deeply moving. I think the entire county showed up to pay respect to our family and to Pap. We had to hold two days of viewing for hours at a time, and the line of people would stretch out the door and onto the porch of the funeral home, person after person that knew my grandfather and had been impacted in some way by him. That's the way things were growing up - I knew a deep and rich connection to a large community that couldn't be identified on a map. And even if I didn't participate in that community or appreciate it for what it was, still I knew that if something went wrong that there existed a deep network of folks who would support us and that we would do the same for them.

That experience has no parallel in my current context. In truth, those bonds of community are fading even in my hometown - true to exactly the scenario presented by Putnam. But in my current neighborhood, the situation is strikingly different - I know fewer than one quarter of my neighbors. None of them have ever joined us for dinner or drinks. The turnover in our community is high - we live in a townhouse development that cycles neighbors through every several years. We're actually just starting to get to the point where I'd feel comfortable engaging some of our neighbors on a more personal level, but instead we find ourselves searching for another home with plans to move in the next six months or so. And I feel the lack of connection in my bones - I find that loneliness of late creeps upon me with ever increasing frequency.

All of this to say that I find Putnam's description of social capital compelling: compelling in the sense that I've seen what happens when it is present, and compelling in the sense that I know its lack. I think that Bowling Alone touches on something that those of us who desire to be missional would do well to address. More on this next...

Technorati Tags: suburbs, Bowling Alone

Contextuality and Hermeneutic (p. 2)

One of the more challenging issues that is raised by viewing scripture through contextual lenses is the realization that we aren't dealing with just one context. Part of what makes scripture amazing and beautiful is that it was written over a period of roughly one thousand years by dozens of authors in different contexts with different perspectives. On the other hand, part of what makes it complicated and messy is that it was written over a period of roughly one thousand years by dozens of authors in different contexts with different perspectives.

That there is theological diversity in scripture is difficult (although not impossible) to ignore. What that diversity means, however, is another matter entirely. Is it possible to believe in an authoritative text that at times seems to disagree with itself? The short answer for many people of various theological persuasions seems to be that it isn't - and much blood and ink have been spilled in an effort to prove that the Bible does/doesn't "contradict" itself. The assumption seems to be that if the text says one thing here and another thing there that the whole book is rendered worthless and any belief in divine agency in its origin is made laughable.

I posted a few thoughts a while back on Pete Enns's book Inspiration and Incarnation - it's a fantastic book that tackles some of these kinds of questions in a wonderfully accessible way. In it, Enns makes the point that many assumptions that we make about scripture are based on preconceived notions of what it is that a sacred text must look like - in other words, we define our belief on the nature of scripture based not on how it is but on how we would like it to be. So, for instance, if we think that a document that says different things about the same subject can't be divinely inspired, then we'll expend enormous energy attempting to prove that the Bible always agrees with itself, no matter what is actually in the text. I think that he's exactly right on this point, and I think it's unfortunate - we've allowed other priorities to set the agenda for our interaction with our own sacred text, instead of doing so on our own terms.

I think part of the contextual, situated nature of the biblical text as revelation is that it contains diverse opinions. Exodus, for example, lays out an elaborate system of sacrifice and ritual; the prophets denounce that same system. Samuel/Kings portrays David in his unvarnished, sinful brokenness; Chronicles cleans him up significantly. Paul states that we are justified by faith; James suggests that we are also justified by works. It's as though, for any significant theme in the biblical text, we can find one voice that portrays it in a particular way, but if we'll continue reading, we'll find another that says, "Yes, but..." And what I think is unfortunate is that we, by and large, have not allowed that reality to inform how we think about what it means that we claim this text, this narrative, this story as scripture, as the true account of God's way-of-acting in the world, of the people that he's called together to demonstrate that way-of-acting to the rest of humanity.

Is it possible to live in the tension between diverse viewpoints on matters of theology, without attempting to resolve that tension? I suggest that, not only should it be possible, but that it is part of what it means to be followers of a God who has chosen to reveal himself through a text that contains such diverse viewpoints. I'd like to spend a few posts unpacking what such an approach might look like and suggest a few thoughts for further reflection.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, hermeneutics

Contextuality and Hermeneutic

Anyone who's been reading along for any length of time knows that I can't seem to get through a month without posting about contextual theology. I discovered this discipline in seminary, although if you've been exposed to some of the defining concerns of the emerging church or the missional movement then you'll probably have at least an instinctive sense for what contextual theology is all about. In the words of Clemens Sedmak from his excellent book Doing Local Theology:

Theology that tries to do justice to its place in culture and history is contextual. Contextualization literally means "weaving together" and is "thus an interweaving of the gospel with every particular situation"...The process of contextualization includes the reflection on one's own place as a person within a wider horizon. (p. 95)

I threw out a thought late last week on the contextual nature of the gospel on which I'd been musing and received some positive comments. Nobody, though, picked up on what was at the heart of my thought - not that I was that specific, but I was a bit curious to see if anyone would head in the same direction. In truth, I was less reflecting on doing theology in our own context and more thinking of reading scripture as itself an exercise in contextual theology.

Here's what I mean: when I say that all articulations of the gospel are "contextual reflections on a hypercontextual reality", I'm actually talking about hermeneutics. In other words, I'm suggesting that what we read in scripture are local expressions of people in specific settings reflecting on what the gospel is and what it means to live in keeping with the reality towards which it points. I'm suggesting that, even in the New Testament, we do not encounter a "pure gospel" - we read instead of particular people who wrestle with the gospel's breaking into their world and messing up their lives. More importantly, we read over their shoulders as they wrestle together with the gospel and try to discern how to live in its aftermath.

Consider this: the word for gospel, euangelion, is a political term that was used in and around the first century to refer to the good news of Caesar and the celebration of his birth. (See this excellent article by Wright for reference.) Caesar was hailed as Lord, portrayed as the bringer of peace and justice. The people were encouraged (to state it mildly) to trust him - have "faith" in him - for salvation. Paul was nothing if not a masterful contextual theologian. That we miss his cultural resonances is only to our detriment - speaking personally, as I begin to understand more and more of his context, the text continues to come alive, and I begin to see depth and subtlety that I had before missed. Put simply, we can't even trade in the coin of gospel language without picking up some contextual theology in the deal.

So, what does this mean from a practical standpoint? For one, I find myself doing more work to understand the New Testament context. More and more of my reading is in New Testament theology - and it's not the systematic stuff either, but good historical, cultural studies that attempt to bring those insights to bear on the scriptures. It's begun to shape my understanding of what it means to read and understand the text. I mean this on more than just a surface level. I think that we do ourselves a disservice when we assume that anyone can pick up the scriptures and come to a clear understanding of their meaning. While I agree with this in principle - I certainly don't believe for a minute that only the "qualified" should read and interpret the text - I stumble with the realization that, frankly, there are a lot of folks who aren't interested in doing the work that's needed to understand the context. We approach the scriptures too often like we do any other book. We assume that the meaning should be plain and that the authors and their readers inhabited the same symbolic world that we do, when in fact we are separated by nearly two millennia, different languages, different methods of communication, different cultural narratives, etc, etc, etc. This is hard work, and I'm skeptical of those who glibly refer to the "clear teaching of scripture", because it seems to nearly always indicate that someone hasn't done his or her homework.

On the other hand, lest anyone think that I'm attempting to pat myself on the back in some self-congratulatory way and hold up my own reading as a better standard, I've also become more and more aware of my own deficiencies as a student of scripture. If nothing else, having so many of my cherished preconceptions shattered by my own ignorance of the first-century world has (hopefully) led to a bit more humility in how I hold my interpretation. I've begun to try to think more charitably of those with whom I disagree and to give their readings a more sympathetic review. This of course doesn't mean that I succeed at that task - I probably fail at being charitable more than I succeed - but at the least it's something on which I'm trying to improve.

In short - contextual theology, when seen as a means of interpreting scripture, can not only help us to better understand the text, but it can also help us to wrestle with it in a more charitable way.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, hermeneutics

Random Thought

I was musing on something and didn't want to lose it, so I'm posting it here without comment. I'm also a bit interested to see what reactions (if any) you have.

A contextless gospel does not exist. Any articulation of the gospel is a contextual reflection on a hypercontextual reality.

Heretic's Guide - What's Good? (p. 5)

My head feels clearer and my thoughts more coherent, so I thought I'd jump back into things with a more positive note. Thus far, I've been rather critical of Spencer's book A Heretic's Guide to Eternity. But the book isn't all bad - Spencer does, I think, rightly identify some of the problem of the typical evangelical approach to the gospel, and that's a good thing. Spencer and I agree on at least one thing - the gospel is bigger than a transaction and means more than spending eternity in a really happy place.

I'm sympathetic to Spencer's underlying premise, even if I don't buy it wholesale. I'll speak specifically so as to avoid some of what I take to be problematic language on Spencer's part. Conservative Christian religion in the American context has often seen itself as God's power broker. To put it crassly, the way to God is through Jesus, and the way to Jesus is through "us" - whoever us may be. As a result, the Christian faith has been put to the service of all kinds of masters in the interests of power. Let me be blunt - conservative Christianity is not God's power broker. In fact, to the degree that it has failed to recognize its own stance in relation to power, it has also failed in its efforts to embody the gospel as demonstrated by the Cross. Let's not kid ourselves: doctrine is used for threat as well as for welcome, for control as well as for empowerment, for division as well as for cohesion. And that's not just regrettable - it's often simply sinful.

So here's the difficulty - if the gospel is a transaction on the premise of saying a prayer or participating in a liturgy or whatever, then the ones who control that transaction also control eternity. And, yes, that's a ridiculously crass way of putting it. But it's there; it's present in the conservative Christian subculture - a radical minority, to be sure, but at the same time, too many folks pay too much attention to what folks like Robertson and Falwell say for me to think that it's a minor issue. So foreign policy becomes doctrinal and the Pledge of Allegiance becomes liturgical and we all wonder why nobody pays attention to us anymore. When folks like Katherine Harris can campaign for their own election by saying things like to elect people who are not Christians to public office is to "legislate sin", then I have to cry foul. That's not the gospel - it's attempting to make the gospel serve two masters.

So, yes, to the degree that Christian "religion" prevents us from being good neighbors, then I'd say that it's bad. (But I'd also say that it's no longer Christian.) And focusing on a "decision" can, I think, contribute to that. Spencer is right to suggest that Christianity is far, far less about praying a prayer and far more about following Jesus. It's a commitment; it's a way of life. It's something into which we enter as participants and travelers, and not something that we complete. It's more a process and less a moment - although moments, such as decisions or conversions, are absolutely significant and should not be discounted. And it's far, far more about a new creation and God's actions to bring that about than it is about eternal bliss and comfort for the faithful few. It's about the Kingdom being near, and God being with us.

So, then, to the degree that Spencer is critiquing a kind of religion that doesn't represent the fullness of the gospel - then I'm in agreement, even if we may disagree on what to do about it.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, Heretic's Guide to Eternity, Spencer Burke

Heretic's Guide - What About Jesus? (p. 4)

I've said a number of times in the comments that I can't go along with Spencer's understanding of the Christian Story as described in his book A Heretic's Guide to Eternity. Up to now, though, I've just focused on some foundational concepts that I think are at odds in the book. It's time for me to dive in and lay out what I think is the fatal flaw in Spencer's book - his failure to deal with what the text actually says and the picture that it presents of who Jesus was and what he did. Spencer reads the text and finds a guide, a path, a messenger of love and inclusion. In his words:

It is not a question of making claims about Jesus as truth but rather one of experiencing the truth of who he is, outside the confines of a religious system. To claim that other religions are true only to the degree that their views of God are the same as Christian concepts is to make a claim that Jesus himself did not make.

This last claim Jesus made in this troublesome little verse in the book of John is perhaps the key to understanding the others [the way, the truth]. "I am the life." Jesus' life, not just his acts on our behalf but the life he lived on earth, is "the life". Living a life like Jesus' is what it truly means to live. Jesus declared his life to be the way to choose - not the way of zealotry or paganism or compromise, but a life committed to God, committed to God's ways, and committed to grace.

Jesus' vision of God is not for the exclusive use of one community. It is not just for Jews or Christians or any other group. It is for anyone and everyone - Jewish, Christian, Buddhist, whatever...The real story, the real scandal, is Jesus' promiscuous view of God. Whatever the role his religion expected him to play, Jesus ignored it and chose instead to forge a new path that included freedom for him to embrace everyone.

To be born again, according to Jesus, is to commit oneself to the kingdom of God's purposes. It is to begin a journey with God in order to make the world a place of grace. It doesn't mean "getting religion"; it means committing ourselves to Jesus' vision of God's kingdom. What did Jesus say that is? In a word, love, plain and simple.

Spencer, I'm sorry. I wish I could go along with you here. It would make my life a lot easier. It would make my task as a person of Christian faith much simpler. It would make my message as a missional believer much more palatable. It would be fun; I could be Tony Robbins or Mr. Rogers or Joel Osteen. (Oops, how'd that get in there? ;)

But I can't.

I can't go along with hippie Jesus who has smiles and lollipops for everyone. It's just not there. It's a painfully selective reading of the text. Yes, Jesus preached a gospel of love and inclusion. Yes, he broke boundaries and welcomed "all and sundry", as NT Wright would say. Yes, he broke the "rules" and did things that offended religious people. But he offended more than just the scribes and Pharisees. He didn't pull punches. He offered a choice: two ways, one of life and one of death. And, he said, most people don't really care to find the first one. (Matt 7:13-14, in case you're wondering.) He said that he didn't come to bring peace, but a sword. He said that judgment was barreling down on the nation, and yet they refused to repent. He said that, in the end, it would go better for Sodom than it would for the cities where he preached and did his miracles.

Was Jesus inclusive? He was - scandalously so. But he was also sharply exclusivistic, and no amount of polishing him up so that he won't offend our postmodern sensibilities can remove it. It's what a professor of mine has called the dark side of the gospel - the awful truth that rejecting his work has a cost, a price that we may find more than we can bear. It's painful and uncomfortable and ugly. But it's there - and to remove it or to ignore it is to do damage to who Jesus is and what he says.

The message of the kingdom isn't that everyone is in. Jesus never said that. It's the announcement of the world's true King and the coming of his Kingdom. Mark says it this way: "The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!" And good news it is - but it has a warning as well, lurking just between the syllables, a warning that we fail to heed to our own detriment.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, Heretic's Guide to Eternity, Spencer Burke

Heretic's Guide - Scandal of Grace (p. 3)

As I've mentioned previously, Spencer's categories in A Heretic's Guide to Eternity are religion and grace. I've already touched on his treatment of the term religion; now I want to tackle his definition of grace. In his words:

Could it be that love finds us no matter where we are and we don't have to do anything more to get it? Could it be that - beyond religion, reason, and conventional wisdom - grace is something to be opted out of rather than opted in to? Is it not something you get but something you already have?

What is grace? For me, it is a subversive and scandalous twist in human history - an unexpected and revolutionary turn of events that offered a new way of relating to the sacred and each other. Religion declares that we are separated from God, that we are "outsiders". Grace tells us the opposite, that we are already in unless we want to be out.

The problem, I think, at least in the Christian tradition, is that grace seems to have no meaning apart from sin. The two concepts are always linked. It's not that I think sin is a myth or that everyone is perfect; it's just that I believe linking grace to sin detracts from its beauty and intensity.

The problem with Spencer's definition here is precisely that last bit - the two concepts are linked in the Christian tradition because that's at the very heart of the Story. Wanting them to be disconnected does not make it so - grace, which I'd describe more in terms of favor or kindness that is unearned and undeserved, is subversive and scandalous precisely because of sin. This goes back to the very beginning of the narrative in Genesis. It's beautiful and intense because it is undeserved, because it is freely given, because it is unconventional and it smashes boundaries and breaks down the dividing walls that separate us from the love of God. But without that separation, where's the beauty? Where's the scandal?

Don't get me wrong - I know what Spencer's trying to say. But I don't like how he's saying it. I think what he's going after is what Scot McKnight has called "grace-grinding". But I think he fails somewhat by minimizing the problem of sin. As I mentioned in my last post, part of the role of a religious system is to define the problem - what's wrong with the world? (I'm borrowing that straight from Wright's NTPG, btw.) Grace is God's response to the problem - it's inextricably linked to sin in our experience, because that's how we describe what is wrong. Spencer would be well served here to reflect on a Christian description of the problem.

The concept of sin is meant to address the quality of our relationships, with each other and with the world in which we live, but the church has turned it into a "petty moralism that no longer speaks to...human persons in their complete intermingling."...Although the link between grace and sin has driven Christianity for centuries, it just doesn't resonate in our culture anymore. It repulses rather than attracts. People are becoming much less inclined to acknowledge themselves as "sinners in need of a Savior." It's not that people view themselves as perfect; it's that the language they use to describe themselves has changed. "Broken," "fragmented," and "lacking wholeness" - these are some of the new ways people describe their spiritual need.

Two thoughts to conclude. First, just because an idea is unpopular isn't an indication of whether or not it's true. And that's particularly true, I think, for those of us who claim the Christian faith as our own. Pacifism, for example, is unpopular - but I still hold it to be a true description of a Christian ethic. How much more, then, the core narrative that holds all Christian ethic together? Second, Spencer offers what I think is a better, more compelling definition of sin than "moral misdemeanors" - right before he abandons the concept almost entirely! Frankly, I don't get it - instead of advocating a disconnection of the ideas of grace and sin, why not simply rehabilitate the concept of sin so that the concept of grace means more of what it's supposed to mean in the first place? Then, Spencer, you can stand in a healthy place of tension between the scriptural narrative and common interpretations of it - as it is, you abandon a thoroughly useful concept that is absolutely central to the biblical text and that would lend support to your argument rather than detract from it, for what I can't see as a gain of much of anything.

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A Heretic's Guide: Picking Good Examples (p. 2)

One of the primary challenges I'm facing in reading A Heretic's Guide to Eternity is the suspicion that I'm being faced with a false dichotomy. Ok, that's an understatement - I don't buy the principle division of the book, namely that of religion vs. grace. I touched on this in my previous post, and I thought I'd be able to move on to the first part of the book. But I find that it's a difficulty that keeps hitting me in the face. I can't get past it. A few examples may help:

Admittedly, all religions probably have a fringe element, but just the same, what is it about traditional religion that breeds dogmatic, sometimes fanatical, and even violent responses to the rest of the world? Over the years, terrible things have been done and justified in the name of God. Just look at any history book. Is it any wonder the world's population is beginning to look for alternatives? Frankly, fundamentalists of all kinds are scaring people off. The more zealous and powerful these people become, the more potential followers they drive away.

We need to move past religion. I believe the time is right for another way of looking at the Christian message, freed from the confines of religion and open to the possibility of a radical new incarnation and manifestation. The message of Jesus needs to evolve for our times.

I believe that the next phase of faith is to move beyond religion. Nowhere does Jesus call his followers to start a religion. Jesus' invitation to his first disciples was to follow him. It was a call to journey, a process that leads us away from some things and toward others. It wasn't a call to adhere to a set of rules for all time. In fact, one of the most commonly heard critiques of the Christian message is that it is out of touch with what is really going on in the world around us.

I guess I'm just not really sure what all of this means. Spencer, I think this argument is beneath you - I'm being serious on that statement. You're pitting the worst of "religion" against the best of - well, whatever else there is, I suppose. Have atrocities been committed in the name of religion? Absolutely. Please find one person of religious belief that will deny that, because I don't think they exist. And, yes, fundamentalism can lead to oppression and violence. But "progressives" have committed their share of atrocities also - let's not forget that there's been just as much violence done against religion in the past century as there has been for it. Evil doesn't need to borrow the name of God - it does just fine in human guise.

My question, though, is whether religion is the problem in and of itself. Frankly, I don't see it. Religion has just as often offered a critique of power as it has misused it. Slavery, civil rights, terrorism - all are issues where the problem might be seen as religion, and yet the resources for resolving the problem also come from religion. Religion, at its best, serves as a voice for justice, for the oppressed, for peace, and for understanding. It's simply not tenable to lay all of society's ills at the feet of organized religion as though just removing the "external and dogmatic belief systems" will usher in an era of warm fuzzies and hugs all around.

Let me offer my definition of religion, or specifically, what I take to be the core of the Christian faith qua religion. Is religion - is faith - simply an "external and dogmatic belief system"? Frankly, I hate that definition. It sounds violent and coercive - it makes it seem as though, if I were more spiritual, I wouldn't hold to my belief system. But that's untenable. Religions - faiths, and the Christian faith in particular - offer a particular view of the world, a particular story about what it means to be human, what is wrong with us, and what the solution to our problems might be. It's that story, that narrative, that forms the basis for a religion - not dogmatism or rules. Religions exist because we as people need a way to explain our experience as humans. As a Christian, I hold to a particular telling of that story. Other religions, of course, tell the tale differently. And, yes, those differences sometimes lead to conflict. But I believe that we, as humans, are storied people - we simply can't help crafting narratives in which to live. In the absence of religion, other narratives will be told as well. One currently powerful narrative is that told by consumer capitalism - it's not a "religion" in the technical sense, but you'd better believe it has the power to shape the way we think and interact with one another in ways that are undeniably religious.

So, from the beginning of the book, I feel as though I'm being fitted for Procrustes' bed - I'm given the choice between fundamentalism or freeform spirituality, and I frankly think it's a false dichotomy. I'm quite convinced that one can hold to the historic Christian faith and still offer a critique of "power-based interpretations of foundational texts". In fact, I think that the Christian story by its very nature critiques such interpretations.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, Heretic's Guide to Eternity, Spencer Burke

Heretic's Guide: The Question of Language (p.1)

I'm about halfway through Spencer Burke's new book, A Heretic's Guide to Eternity. I thought I'd go ahead and start my interaction, because I'm finding that I have a lot to say and I don't want to lose my thoughts as I go forward. Before I begin, I want to reiterate my respect and appreciation of Spencer as someone I've had the opportunity to meet and get to know just a bit. I've said previously and will say again that he's one of the nicest and most winsome guys I've ever met, and his love for and appreciation of people is profoundly evident from the moment he walks into a room. I've struggled, consequently, with this review, because I have some challenging things to say as a result of the book thus far. I want, then, to be crystal clear that my differences are not with him as a person, but rather with his ideas as presented in AHGtE. Ultimately, though, I've come to two conclusions that I must hold in order to speak with integrity: first, when I'm asked for my opinion, I have a responsibility to present it honestly and fairly and to not cover it for the sake of maintaining an appearance of camaraderie; second, respect means not minimizing the differences between two positions, but recognizing them and speaking truly about them. With that said, Spencer, if you're ever in the Philadelphia area again, you have an open invitation to call me up for a beer or coffee or dinner. My treat. ;)

So, now that I've completely telegraphed where I'm headed with this, I want to begin by expressing something of why I find this book frustrating to read. Bob has already commented on this; so has Scot. But I want to reiterate what others have said: Spencer's use of terminology in this book is maddening. Maddening as in water torture maddening. Put briefly, Spencer is using language in unconventional ways in this book - and it makes digesting it difficult. The title is a case in point, although one that I won't belabor - what Spencer means by "heretic" is not what is normally meant by the term. Read Bob's post for further interaction with this point - I don't see a reason to restate what he's already done quite well. That's not the point of language that's a sticking point for me. The premise of the book, as I'm tracking it thus far, seems to be the contrast between "religion" and "grace". But here's where Spencer begins, I think, to invest these words with something of a different sense than what is commonly meant by them. For example:

To be honest, religion doesn't really work for me anymore. Being aligned with an institutional church or a particular system of worship seems increasingly irrelevant to my ongoing journey with God. In my experience, the customs, traditions, and even language of religion often seem to get in the way of honest dialogue about God. What's more, religion's airtight explanations and all-or-nothing theological arguments seem out of touch with the complexities of twenty-first-century life.

So, as Spencer continues through the book to engage this idea of religion vs. grace, I have to ask myself to what it is that he's exactly referring. The description that he gives doesn't seem to me to be religion per se; if that is, in fact, what he's saying, then I have to cautiously suggest that the entire book is based on a false dichotomy, and I think Spencer is no doubt smarter than that. Is he saying that all religion functions this way, or only some types of religious expression? I think the latter - but I'm not sure, because he never comes out and says it. As a result, I'm left with a choice that I have to make as a reader - is he being either frustratingly imprecise in his use of language, or harmfully stereotypical in his view of religion? I'm attempting to read generously here, so I'm opting for the former - but I concede that I might be wrong on that assumption. And I'm not going to begin to tackle the question of what he means by "grace" - that's for another post.

Some will no doubt say that I'm being needlessly pedantic about the meanings of words, that Spencer is merely being creative and pushing the language in a different direction, that it's helpful and challenging and stretching and all kinds of fun stuff like that. And I concede that I may have less patience for that sort of thing than I once did; I've become used to a certain level of technicality when reading theology, and Spencer is clearly not attempting to head in that direction (not a criticism, just an observation). But at it's most basic, language is about using shared symbols to communicate meaning. There is a sense in which it can be stretched and pushed, and then there is a point after which it looses its capacity to perform its intended function. In other words, stretch the meaning of a word too far and it looses its meaning altogether, like expired elastic that can no longer maintain its shape. And what is true of language is true of an intimately connected means of communication - that of story. But that's another post.

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Inspiration and Incarnation: The NT's Use of the OT (p. 4)

Jumping back to Inspiration and Incarnation, I want to briefly summarize Enns's third point of difficulty in understanding the nature of scripture. Enns contends that the NT authors' use of the OT is itself particularly challenging for evangelical hermeneutics, primarily because the NT authors didn't follow what is often portrayed as normative hermeneutical practices in interpreting the OT. This is something that, I think, often escapes contemporary readers - we are, unfortunately, sufficiently far removed from the OT narratives (generally speaking) that we don't catch the subtle oddities in the NT texts. As a result, when we run across something that we do recognize, we assume that the author is doing something that he may not in fact be doing. More on this in a second.

Enns supplies a wealth of information about both the actual uses of the NT by the OT. I simply can't begin to summarize it all - to be honest, I think the discussion of second Temple writings alone is worth the price of the book. An example will have to suffice. In 2 Tim 3:8, we find this statement: "And just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses..." Jannes and Jambres are the names that are assigned to the Egyptian magicians spoken of in Exodus 7. But even a cursory reading of the passage in Exodus will reveal that, not only are these names not mentioned anywhere in the narrative, the number of magicians in question isn't even provided. So where do the names originate? While we can't be certain of their origins, we do know that they also occur in the writings of Qumran, as well as one of the targums. What we see in this instance is that Paul is participating in an established interpretive tradition and incorporating its assumptions and conclusions into a writing that we hold as inspired. Other examples abound, some more troubling - Matthew uses Hosea in ways that, were I to emulate, would have resulted in my failing any number of theology assignments; Paul on a number of occasions quotes an OT passage, but actively alters the passage so that the quotation more adequately presents the perspective he is attempting to communicate; and Jesus himself takes passages out of context in order to prove a point, such as his use of Exodus 3:6 in his argument with the Sadducees in Luke 20.

I'm going to resist attempting to draw conclusions at this point. Instead, I want to quote something that Enns says that I think encapsulates the issue nicely, and summarize my thoughts in my next post.

Furthermore, it will not do to argue that Jesus and the apostles adopted such tainted exegetical techniques simply as an accommodation to the faulty thinking of their contemporaries. There simply is no indication of this anywhere in the New Testament...To argue in such a way reveals more about our own assumptions concerning the supposed universal validity of our own hermeneutical standards than it does about apostolic hermeneutics. But apostolic hermeneutics is not to be explained in such a way as to conform to our expectations, nor should we be embarrassed about it or make excuses for it. It is to be understood. (p. 132, emphasis added)

Technorati Tags: books, Inspiration and Incarnation, Peter Enns, scripture

Inspiration and Incarnation: The OT and Theological Diversity (p. 3)

Continuing my discussion of Pete Enns's book Inspiration and Incarnation, I want to pick up briefly a subject that I think is particularly challenging to the traditional evangelical perspective on scripture. In particular, Enns discusses the difficulty that the theological diversity of the Old Testament presents to that perspective. I think that it also bears repeating that Enns is approaching this question from firm evangelical commitments himself - his presentation of these issues isn't meant to undermine a high view of scripture, but rather to bring the nature of the written text itself into conversation with that perspective, resulting in a more robust understanding of what it means to claim that scripture is God's self-revelation. In his own words:

One way that critical biblical scholarship takes diversity into account is to say that the Old Testament is full of contradictions and, hence, a quaint record of conflicting human opinions. Such an approach will never be an acceptable option for Christian thinking. An evangelical counterattack, however, is to defend the Bible against accusations of diversity by showing that such diversity is not there, involves only minor issues, or can be resolved in theory at some future time. But this alternative creates tensions of its own, and it runs the risk of avoiding the difficult issues altogether. (p.73)

I'm tempted at this point to delve into some of the texts that Enns highlights. I've decided against doing that. Anyone who has read the Old Testament at any level beyond a surface reading has no doubt begun to encounter the issues that Enns is discussing. If you are unconvinced that such diversity exists, I would humbly suggest a reading to illustrate: compare 2 Sam 11 and 1 Chron 20. Notice the tiny slice of history that the Chronicler omits following 20:1. It's absolutely fascinating the way these two narratives are constructed. I could suggest a number of others; however, the point isn't at all about exegeting specific difficulties. In fact, that may be precisely not the point. Enns goes on to state the following:

What the diversity of the Bible tells us is that there is no superficial unity to the Bible. Portions of the Bible are in tension with each other, as we have seen. That these tensions exist is a matter of simple observation. A better question is why they exist and what this tells us about the nature of the Scriptures and, by extension, the nature of God. (p.108)

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Inspiration and Incarnation: The OT and Ancient Literature (p. 2)

The first "problem" that Enns tackles in Inspiration and Incarnation is that of the Old Testament's relationship to other Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) literature. Enns demonstrates the difficulty in three areas:

• Creation and the Flood: Is Genesis Myth or History?
• Customs, Laws, and Proverbs: Is Revelation Unique?
• Israel and its Kings: Is Good Historiography Objective or Biased?

Tackling each of these areas is far more than I can begin to attempt in the format of a blog post. Instead, I'll post a few excerpts and then offer some thoughts of my own.

To give a hint of where this discussion is going, it is worth asking what standards we can reasonably expect of the Bible, seeing that it is an ancient Near Eastern document and not a modern one. Are the early stories in the Old Testament to be judged on the basis of standards of modern historical inquiry and scientific precision, things that ancient peoples were not at all aware of? Is it not likely that God would have allowed his word to come to the ancient Israelites according to standards they understood, or are modern standards of truth and error so universal that we should expect premodern cultures to have understood them?(p. 41)

I question how much value there is in posing the choice of Genesis as either myth or history. This distinction seems to be a modern invention. It presupposes - without stating explicitly - that what is historical, in a modern sense of the word, is more real, of more value, more like something God would do, than myth.(p. 49)

I could go on - there is a wealth of information in this section. For anyone who has done any amount of reading in ANE literature, there isn't a lot of surprising information - I was familiar with most of the texts that he was referencing just from my seminary training alone. He draws on examples that are fairly common knowledge, such as Enuma Elish, Gilgamesh, and the code of Hammurabi. But the point that he makes is profound. Enns is proposing that evangelicals, by and large, have entered into the text with an assumption about what scripture is and does, and that our doctrine of scripture is shaped far more by those assumptions than it is by the text itself. This is most telling in his discussion of the ancient approach to historiography, and in particular the contrasts between Samuel-Kings and Chronicles. Enns uses the example of the differences in Nathan's challenge to David; I can just as easily see the same dynamic in the telling of the census of the fighting men. Evangelical exegesis has often bent over backwards to reconcile these passages. But the simple fact, on first reading, is that they contradict each other - the texts present different factual summaries of the same events. And this has caused no end of difficulty for evangelical interpretation - but the reason for this difficulty is found, not in the text itself, but in the approach to scripture that makes contradiction a problem! Put succinctly - the fact that the accounts in these books differ is only a problem because we make it a problem. We assume that God has the same epistemology as we do, and that his conception of truth is the same as ours. So, for example, when Samuel-Kings and Chronicles give different facts about the same events, the assumption is that both cannot be true as written - it must be explained as to how these accounts can both be true while saying different things.

But what if, for example, "true" historiography in the ancient sense isn't historiography that is factually accurate in the way that we would think of accuracy? What if "true" historiography is the telling of the tale that presents the desired perspective most compellingly? What if the interpretation of the event is more important than the event itself? And what if all of these things mean that two accounts can tell different facts about the same event and yet still both be "true"? The point that Enns is making is that the Bible isn't the word of God because it is completely different from its context. In fact, it speaks very compellingly in contextual forms, including the approach to history and interpretation of events. And evangelicals have not wrestled with the implications of that contextuality for a robust doctrine of scripture - in fact, by obscuring the difficulties, we have participated instead in a sort of docetic bibliolatry, a belief in a scripture that is so far removed from the human author that it only appears human but, in fact, is nothing of the sort.

Technorati Tags: books, Inspiration and Incarnation, Peter Enns, scripture

Inspiration and Incarnation (p. 1)

I mentioned last week that I wanted to spend a bit of time blogging through Pete Enns's book Inspiration and Incarnation. This is a fantastic book that addresses in a very honest, direct, and respectful way the difficulties that evangelical doctrines of scripture create for exegesis. In his words:

My concern is that, at least on a popular level, a defensive approach to the evidence tends to dominate the evangelical conversation...I want to contribute to a growing opinion that what is needed is to move beyond both sides [of the liberal-conservative debate] by thinking of better ways to account for some of the data, while at the same time having a vibrant, positive view of Scripture as God's word. By focusing on three problems raised by the modern study of the Old Testament, my hope is to suggest ways in which our conversation can be shifted somewhat, so that what are often perceived as problems with the Old Testament are put into a different perspective. (p. 14-15)

Enns's basic premise is that evangelical approaches to scripture, by failing to deal with the issues that he will raise in an intellectually honest way, actually contribute to a devaluing of scripture and a failure to submit to its authority by attempting to make it into something other than what it is. The issues that he raises fall into three categories:

• The Old Testament and other ancient literature: Why does the OT so closely resemble other ancient near-eastern (ANE) literature? Does that mean that the OT isn't unique? "If the Bible is the word of God, why does it fit so nicely in the ancient world?" (p. 16)
• Theological diversity in the OT: Why does the OT appear to have different perspectives and, at times, "say different things about the same thing"? (p. 16)
• The way in which the NT authors use the OT: Is the NT's use of the Old really fair? It appears odd at best, arbitrary at other times, and simply distorting at others.

The rest of the book is an attempt to place these questions in the context of other ANE literature. In some sense, it may be fair to say that what are issues for us were not issues for the ancient readers of the text - it's rather a failure to understand why the authors said and did what they said and did. More to come!

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Interview with Shane Hipps (p. 2)

Part 2 of my interview with Shane Hipps, author of The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture:

Interview with Shane Hipps (p. 1)

I've had the privilege of discussing a few thoughts from The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture with Shane Hipps. Shane's website, by the way, can be found here. The interview is full of great thoughts, so I'll be posting it in two parts.

Look for part two tomorrow evening!

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Media and Choice (The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture p. 3)

In my previous post, I discussed the Four Laws of Media that Shane Hipps presents in his book The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture. The underlying premise, of course, is that the forms of media that we use shape the way that we use information. I want to further those thoughts on the effects of media by considering something that I discussed some time ago about the nature of culture. I suggested then, following the lead of sociologist Edward Hall, that culture is simply the collection of semantic systems of a society - in other words, culture is communication. It's the aggregate of all of the meaning-making elements that allow us to transfer messages from one person to another.

This intersects, I think, squarely with the Four Laws of Media that Shane has discussed. Media are integral to our communication systems. Media shape the way in which we pass messages and, in many ways, frame the meanings that can be assigned to those messages. Take the clock, for instance. The clock is a medium that we utilize to communicate and measure time. It also shapes the way we think about time. For western cultures, time is linear and perishable. Each moment is unique and will never come again. Time, as a result, is seen as a commodity; we are obsessed with it. In some sense, time can even be seen as wealth - to have time for leisure is a mark of affluence. This view of time, however, is not at all ubiquitous. The clock is what enables western cultures' perception of time to even exist - without a means of measuring it and marking it, our view of time would likely be cyclical and seasonal, as it is for many cultures across the globe.

The complication, then, that this presents for our consideration of the effect of media on culture is simply this: we are faced with two different kinds of media choices. Some of these choices are explicit and controlled. For example, a decision to use PowerPoint (or whatever you Apple folks use ;) during worship gatherings is an explicit decision that can be evaluated as such. The use of the media is at the discretion of the community. However, other media choices are implicit and unconscious. Or, perhaps better stated, there are some media shifts that are so massive that they change an entire culture or cultures. The printing press was one such shift. Electronic media are another. We, as a culture, think differently at a foundational level as a result of the explosion of new media. This is not a choice that we can make - we can't opt into the Internet, for example. It's already pervasive and shifting the way in which we think and communicate as a culture. Our systems of meaning have already changed. These kinds of media choices are less about whether we will utilize the new media - frankly, those choices are irrelevant when the shift is significantly fundamental. The choice that we face instead is more about contextuality. We need to understand what the gospel that we present means in the new systems of meaning and thus begin the task of recontextualizing the message for a new world.

I don't like to talk about postmodernity. I think it's overdiscussed and misunderstood. And, on some level, it misses the point entirely. What we as a culture are currently facing is, at least in part, the result of more than a century of significant shifts in our cultural media. Our systems of meaning have shifted entirely, and far too few of the people who want to engage in discussions of epistemology and the nature of truth have even thought to ask the questions of the effects of new media on those systems.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, Shane Hipps

The Laws of Media (The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture p. 2)

As I mentioned previously, one of the central premises of The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture is that media are not value-neutral. Rather, they influence what and how we think about the message. This matter of shaping, however, isn't always apparent. McLuhan proposed four laws of media that describe the process by which media influence the way in which we give and receive messages. Shane summarizes these laws as follows:

• What does the medium extend?Media enhance some function of human existence. The telephone, for example, extends the voice by allowing us to communicate over great distances.
• What does the medium make obsolete?New media change the relationship between humans and previous media. At times, this means the previous media are eliminated; at others, their function changes. For example, email makes postal mail obsolete in that it changes the function of postal mail as a primary means of personal communication.
• What does the medium retrieve? There is a sense in which new media borrow from the past, retrieving a prior (sometimes ancient) media or experience. For example, radio retrieved oral storytelling.
• What does the medium reverse into? In Shane's words, "When pushed to the extreme, every medium will reverse into its oppposite intention." This is probably the most counterintuitive of the laws, but I think it makes sense if it's approached from the perspective of strengths which, when taken to extremes, can become weaknesses. For example, television extends the voice, but it reverses into a medium that silences by shutting down conversation and interaction.

It's helpful, I think, to look at this by example. Shane mentions the effect of the printing press on Christian thought (and culture in general) by applying the four laws to the printed book. I've added somewhat to his thoughts here:

• The printed book extends memory and intellectual reason. It extends the personal encounter of the individual and God.
• The printed book makes communal faith obsolete. It changes the role of the community from the place of encounter with God and memory of the Story to a dispenser of instruction.
• The printed book retrieves individual, personal knowledge of the scriptures. It retrieves the disciplines of study and the personal task of knowing and understanding the text.
• The printed book reverses into a lack of knowledge of the text. When the content is immediately available, there is less a need to know and remember the Story. The book, when taken to extremes, actually harms memory by making it unnecessary. It also harms synthetic, holistic thinking by reducing the ability to think in nonlinear, intuitive ways.

This framework is extraordinarily helpful in thinking through the question of how a given medium shapes our perspective. Next, I want to consider a tangent question that the book doesn't explicitly address: how much choice do we really have in the media that we employ?

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, Shane Hipps

The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture

I mentioned previously in my posts about the Taxonomy of Emergence that I was reading The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture by Shane Hipps. I want to spend a few posts blogging about this book, because this is one of those fascinating reads that puts words to things that you've long suspected but couldn't articulate while also challenging you to significantly rethink some assumptions that you may not have realized that you've held.

The premise of the book follows largely Marshall McLuhan's famous dictum, The medium is the message. In other words, media are not value-neutral. The form in which we present a message influences the content and meaning of that message. In the author's own words:

To perceive media and technology with both eyes open, we cannot simply list the various benefits and liabilities of all new and existing media in hopes of understanding their power and meaning. Instead, the task before us requires an entirely different approach to analyzing media, recognizing them not simply as conduits or pipelines (i.e., neutral purveyors of information), but rather as dynamic forces with the power to shape us, regardless of content. Such an approach invites us to ask different questions, better questions, and moves us beyond the oversimplified but common belief that media forms can be deemed good or bad based on how they are used...It is imperative that we move beyond this paradigm and realize that our forms of media and technology are primary forces that cause changes in our philosophy, theology, culture, and ultimately the way we do church.

This is such a significant question for anyone wanting to approach our present context from a missional perspective. Over the next few posts, I want to discuss the basic framework that the author proposes in which such questions can be approached, examine some of the ways in which this framework can both encourage us and also help us to rethink some assumptions about ministry in a technologically saturated culture, and finally, offer a few additional thoughts that Shane has graciously provided on the subject.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, Shane Hipps

A Gospel for the Suburbs

To bring this series to a close, I want to reflect briefly on a question posed by Steve McCoy over at Reformissionary. Steve asks:

Do you think the suburbs are so difficult because by their nature they are a salvation from something else, a gospel delivering people from "sin," poverty, homelessness, interruption, filth, etc? In other words, when we try to give them the Gospel they generally won't listen because they already have one in the suburbs?

This is a great question. In fact, it's probably the most important question to ask. My purpose in taking up this series in the first place was to construct a framework in which to think about exactly this, and Steve states the question about as succinctly and accurately as anyone I've seen. Unfortunately, there isn't an easy way to make the answer nearly so succinct. This is a question that cannot be casually dismissed - it's the sort of question that we need to invite to become a part of our rhythms of life, a part of our narratives and practices both personal and communal.

One of the significant challenges that we face in answering this question is simply defining what, exactly, the gospel is. For my part, I see the gospel as an integral part of the biblical narrative - in other words, any framing of the gospel that doesn't make sense in the context of the whole of the Story is at best incomplete. In order to grasp the gospel, we need to begin to inhabit the biblical narrative, allowing it to define the problem to which the gospel is the solution. And we need read no farther than Genesis 3 to discover that any description of the problem that doesn't include our fractured relationships with God, each other, and Creation is woefully inadequate. This narrative grounding is what sets the Christian story in context; sin is tragic at least in part because of its scope. It's not just about me - it encompasses the entire cosmos.

But if we define the problem in a smaller way, so that the problem is my personal contentment and well-being, then a "gospel of the suburbs" becomes an easy remedy. And this gets to the heart of Steve's question. The "gospel of the suburbs" is tenable only when we've defined the problem in a way that fits such a response. But, I must ask, how small is that leap from the gospel as often articulated in twenty-first century American evangelicalism? If the gospel is personal, spiritual, and eternal - as opposed to cosmic, holistic, and present - then, I'd suggest, we've left a lot of room for other answers to the problem. The gospel of personal relationship is really no threat to the gospel of suburban existence - they can coexist peacefully, as should be patently obvious to anyone paying attention. So I can enjoy the pursuit of happiness now, so long as I don't offend God, and get to heaven when I die. It's the perfect suburban life.

I don't know another way to say this - we should be disturbed, profoundly disturbed, that this telling of the Story has such a grip on American Christianity. God's actions through the biblical narrative are always about calling a new people to practice redemptive living - to participate in a new way of being human, in opposition to the ways defined through sin and curse. How we tell this story makes all the difference - I can't emphasize this enough. Part of what we need to be doing as missional people is creating dissonance and dissatisfaction among our friends and neighbors so that we can realize together that the problem is bigger than can be solved by a nice house and an SUV. The gospel of the suburbs is ultimately a hollow one - but that realization is a stretch for many of the folks with whom we live and serve. In truth, it's often a stretch for me. Only through continual retelling and reenacting of the Story can we free our imaginations from the suburban ethos enough so that we can begin to truly live in the ethos of the Kingdom.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, gospel, narrative

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 10)

I have one final post on a theological response to the suburban ethos, and then I think there's something of a wrapup post floating around in my head with a few concluding thoughts and some questions for further consideration, if anyone wants to take me up on that. ;) This has been a fascinating series on a personal level, as it began with a few guys from my MDiv cohort sitting around over lunch one Saturday afternoon trying to get a group project pulled together. I hadn't intended to keep it going this long, but there are so many elements to bring to the table in this discussion that it's not something lightly abandoned. I still feel as though I've only scratched the surface on this, so I wouldn't be surprised to see myself come back to it at a later point.

At any rate - the last bit that we discussed in relation to the suburban ethos was the fruit of isolation and rootlessness. When I wrote the original post, I was thinking largely in terms of geography, or about the suburbs as locations without a sense of place. We work in one place, we shop in another, our kids attend school in yet another, and our church is in still another. Geography has simply ceased to serve any sort of unifying or cohering function in suburban life. This results in dislocation, isolation, and what I'm choosing to call rootlessness, or lack of connection to our own homes and neighborhoods.

This presents a formidable challenge to any attempt to bear witness to the gospel. I want to suggest what might seem a surprising narrative response, followed by two significant practices. The narrative resource that we can offer in the face of isolation and rootlessness is, I believe, the hope of New Creation. Eschatology gets a bad rap these days, and frankly, for good reason. Most of what seems to get attention anymore sounds like horoscopes and tea leaves - and I think I'm being quite generous with that description. And let's be honest - Left Behind is an eschatology for the suburban ethos, marketing machine and everything. Why are we surprised that a theology that's all about escape and comfort - let's be honest here - should appeal to such a large segment of American Christianity?

I'm suggesting that we recover a true, robust, and deeply Christian eschatology, one that has its roots in the Old Testament promises of a New Creation and looks forward to mercy, justice, and shalom reigning forever. I want to hear about death passing away, about all things being made new, about oppressive empires being toppled and the poor and oppressed being lifted up. I want to hear about the restoration of the Image of God in humanity and about our final return to our true purpose. I want to hear about the restoration of right relationships between us and God, each other, and Creation itself. I want to hear, not about our escaping to some home far away in the clouds, but rather about home coming to us, right here, in the middle of the mess that we've made, when God takes what is broken and restores it to what it was intended to be all along. Christian eschatology is not about escape - it is about the Kingdom's fullness finally breaking into the present, resulting in the restoration of all things as they were always intended to be. And that's a narrative that makes the other version seem all pale and hollow, a pretender masquerading as something grand and glorious.

Why this narrative response? I contend that isolation and rootlessness had their origins in Genesis 3. More than anything else, Christian eschatology is about the final defeat of the power of the curse, the power from which isolation and rootlessness spring. And, in truth, we fool ourselves if we believe that anything less than the fullness of the Kingdom can bring them to an end. They find their source in our own brokenness.

To conclude, I offer two practices for consideration. The first is hospitality. I won't say much on this point - I'll instead point to an excellent bit of thought by David Fitch here on the subject. My thoughts are simply that I cannot think of a better way to live incarnationally in an isolated context than by making connections and by taking the startling steps of opening our lives to our neighbors.

The second practice is one that I think is fitting to bring these thoughts to a close. A recovery of a robust theology of the Eucharist would do much for churches that minister in suburban contexts. It has to become more than crackers and grape juice to us. The Lord's Table represents so much of what suburban culture does not. It celebrates our unity in a way that specifically critiques a culture of isolation. "Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf," Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 10, and we would do well to remember that and celebrate it. In addition, more than any other element of our shared practice, the Eucharist is an eschatological tradition. It is a simultaneous looking back - "we proclaim the Lord's death" - and a looking forward - "until He comes". We are not, in truth, a rootless people. We are instead a community, bound together in hope, looking forward to the renewal of all things. And that, I believe, is a perspective that the suburban ethos can never offer.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, eschatology, hospitality, Eucharist

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 9)

We've discussed the question of the primacy of the economic domain in suburban contexts, as well as the emphasis on the pursuit of happiness. I next want to take up the central praxis of suburban life, which I take to be the exercise of control-through-choice. This, I remain convinced, is a power dynamic that enables the suburban ethos to exist and to flourish. How are we to think of this dynamic in terms of the Kingdom?

First, I want to be explicit about one thing - there is nothing inherently wrong with choice, or even with power exercised through choice. It is a tool, nothing more. I am glad that I can choose - I can choose where I work, how I spend my leisure time, how and where I worship, and how I will spend my money. These are great things. Oppression, in some sense, is the removal of such choices; it is the removal of the freedom that is in some sense present even in the Creation narrative, where man and woman are granted the authority to act in God's stead to order Creation. What I think should concern us as those attempting to bear witness to the Kingdom in suburban contexts is the way in which we exercise choice. Choice is power, and as I've discussed elsewhere, the Kingdom demands of us a particular way of approaching power. We can exercise power in service of self, or we can choose to use power in the way of the Kingdom, by giving it away and using it to both serve and empower others.

For our narrative grounding, we need look no further than the Cross. I see no need to expand on these words from Paul:

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death - even death on a cross! (Phil. 2:5-8)

I suggest here two practices that should work in tandem. The first is simplicity. In a context where happiness is defined as bigger-better-faster-more, a Kingdom ethos will instead look to live more responsibly. Rather than submitting to the will of the Market in its incessant drive for production and consumption, we should instead look to be economically responsible, being content with less, and seeking to use our resources in the way of the Kingdom - not in service to self, but in service to others. That, naturally, leads to the second practice - generosity. Besides being a practice deeply rooted in the Christian faith tradition, generosity can become the means by which we share our power in service to others. We give away the power of choice by enabling others to do the same, and in doing so, we identify more closely with the generosity demonstrated by Christ towards us.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, simplicity, generosity, Kingdom

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 8)

In my previous post, I discussed the centrality of the economic sphere to the suburban ethos. One question that I raised to which I provided only a partial answer was this: who is telling the stories that shape the imaginations of those in suburban contexts?

This question is critical to addressing the idea of the pursuit of happiness as the focus of the suburban lifestyle. As I've mentioned before, happiness in this context is typically defined in terms of comfort, security, and personal fulfillment. And who is it that does the defining? I'd argue that it's primarily the voice of marketing and consumption. The stories that are told that give shape to the suburban ethos are, interestingly enough, primarily stories about lack. The irony is biting - the affluent are being told that they need more stuff to find fulfillment, and the story is being accepted and owned.

I've been listening to a lecture by Walter Brueggemann called The Narrative of the Gospel Vis-a-vis the Narrative of Our Consumer Society. (Thanks Chris! ;) One of the things that Brueggemann compares in the lecture is the Exodus story and the modern rat race. He makes the point - in typical Brueggemann fashion - that the Israelites were two verses out of Egypt before they wanted to go back. They leave in Exodus 15; by 16:2 they're already complaining. Although they left Egypt, they brought it along with them. The ideology of the empire is harder to defeat than its military, it seems.

The narrative response, then, to the pursuit of happiness is the Exodus story. We need to recognize that the stories that legitimate happiness as comfort and security are being told by those with a vested interest in our ever-increasing consumption and production. We need to recognize that our stories have been hijacked by this agenda, and that we haven't truly left Egypt behind. We have much in common with the people of Israel, it seems.

I'd like to suggest two practices that can help us to recognize the stories of our culture for what they are. One is personal, the other communal. First, on a personal level, I suggest that regular practice of silence and solitude constitutes a resistance against the omnipresent stories of advertising and marketing. Silence and solitude disrupts the continual refrain of advertising that comes to us through multiple channels - print, television, radio, internet, and the omnipresence of corporate logos. While it is surprisingly difficult to isolate oneself fully from these voices, even little resistances such as turning off the car radio and driving in silence can create a space in which the voice of marketing is not welcome - and, as a result, a space in which the voice of God can be heard.

The second practice is a communal one, and in some sense is perhaps the most basic of Christian practices in which we engage as a community. I think that the regular telling of the Story can serve to reorient ourselves away from the stories of the market. We tell the Story in our worship, in our preaching, and in our shared practices such as baptism and eucharist. But I think that, often, we assume that the meanings behind the practices are known, and we fail to give attention to the larger themes of scripture in our worship and speech. We don't tell the story as Story, but as disconnected bits and pieces of disembodied truth statements that have no coherence and no greater reference. Instead, we must enter into the Story, tell it as Story, and find our place in the Story so that we can tell it as our own.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, Exodus

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 7)

I'm going to endeavor to wrap this series up in short order here - I've been mulling on a lot of stuff for a while now, and it's time for me to put my thoughts in order. For a quick review of where I'm heading, my summary post is here; all of the posts can be found here. I want to begin by tackling the question of the dominance of economics in the suburban ethos.

One question that I asked previously that still keeps me up at night is this: who is telling the stories that shape the imaginations of those in suburban contexts? This question is the reason that I've chosen to begin here. The pursuit of happiness may be the central concern of the suburban ethos, but the economic sphere provides the system of meaning in which the question of happiness is asked. This means, simply, that the way in which suburbanites think about happiness is primarily defined in terms of economics. And, consequently, the stories that we tell, the metaphors that we use, the very structures of our thinking are constantly being shaped by economic forces - marketing, employers, merchants, educators, and so on. In short, human worth is derived from the ability to produce and consume. Through the surrender of our imaginations to the Market, we become little more that units of production or members of a market segment - mere cogs in the wheel of commerce.

Our narrative response must begin here, with the recovery of a robust theology of the imago dei. For an absolutely wonderful treatment of this subject, I have to again plug Richard Middleton's The Liberating Image. Middleton suggests that the concept of the image of God in Genesis has its origins primarily in two ancient customs: the practice of kings setting up representations of themselves in distant lands to remind the inhabitants of who rules the land, and the practice of referring to those kings as the image or representation of the gods. In short, the ancient context for image was a legitimization of the divine power of kings and the subjugated nature of the people. The king, as the image of god, demanded the loyalty and service of the people, primarily in terms of their economic production. Genesis, however, subverts that view completely by stating that all people are created in the image of God. There is no divine prerogative of rulers here - all people have been granted authority to rule, to subdue and order the earth in keeping with the task assigned by God. In short, a theology of vocation has its beginnings here, with the granting of authority to continue the divine task of creation.

This, then, stands in sharp critique of the current elevation of the Market as the driving force behind suburban lifestyles. Human worth, human dignity, is not predicated on one's ability to produce and to consume. Human dignity comes from the divine task and the corresponding authority to carry out that task - the care of Creation itself. Economics - the Market - is a tool that, when used well, can help further the pursuit of that task. Nothing more.

This deserves a longer treatment. I offer these thoughts as a humble beginning of what I think is an absolutely significant and critical line of thinking that needs to be taken up by those of us in suburban contexts. But there is a practical connection as well. The Christian tradition, and the Jewish tradition from which it grew, offers a key practice that in and of itself critiques the dominance of the economic sphere. I am, of course, thinking of the practice of Sabbath keeping. Sabbath places bounds on the economic realm - it declares, on the one hand, that we are free from service to the Market, and on the other, that we are dependent on God. Sabbath breaks the rhythm of producing and consuming that defines life in suburbia and carves out sacred space in keeping with the praxis of God Himself. Is it any wonder that Sabbath is so rarely practiced, or that we who struggle to practice it are so much at the mercy of the Market? Keeping Sabbath is part of what it means to be human - to rest, to worship, and to be free from the domination of the Market.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, imago dei, Sabbath

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 6)

Last week, I began reflecting on the subject of race and, in particular, how the question of the suburban ethos intersects with questions of race. I want to pick this up with some specific thoughts on the basic framework that I've proposed as a means of discussing the suburban ethos. I think it provides a helpful way to approach this discussion - we shall see, I suppose, if this proves to be true. To restate, my categories for this discussion are:

• Pursuit of happiness - the suburban context is oriented towards procuring comfort, security, and self-actualization for suburbanites.
• Centrality of economics - most suburbanites, consciously or unconsciously, approach life through the dominant sphere of economics. The primary metaphors, symbols, and values of suburban contexts are economic in nature.
• Control-through-choice - the attainment of happiness is accomplished through the exercise of choice in the market. Choice is used to control one's life circumstances; economics drive the power of choice. Power, therefore, is centered in the ability to exercise greater choice through purchasing power.
• Rootlessness and isolation - this exercise of power has the effect of insulating suburbanites from the impact of their choices. The result is a geographically disconnected world which is impermanent, transient, and increasingly isolated.

As I stated previously, the discussion of race issues intersects with this context in complex and convoluted ways. My own reflections make me wonder whether the suburbs are a cause or a symptom of racial inequality; I suspect that's something of a chicken/egg question, to be honest. If power is economic, then it follows that those who have access to capital are those with power. If power is exercised through choice, and the desired outcome is comfort and safety, then neighborhoods that begin to suffer depression and hardship will invariably begin to be abandoned by those with the ability to do so - a power dynamic if there ever was one. The result is an increase in the concentration of power (as capital) in the hands of those who are fleeing impoverished neighborhoods, and those who remain are derived of both power and choice because the capital has also left the neighborhood. And those individuals are more likely to be non-white.

That's really abstract and sterile. If you want to see what this looks like in practice, remember the images in the aftermath of Katrina. Again, it's a complex situation. But here's what Barack Obama, Senator from Illinois, had to say in the aftermath of the disaster:

Obama, the only African-American in the U.S. Senate, says "the ineptitude was colorblind." But he argues that while...there was no "active malice," the federal response to Katrina represented "a continuation of passive indifference" on the part of the government. It reflected an unthinking assumption that every American "has the capacity to load up their family in an SUV, fill it up with $100 worth of gasoline, stick some bottled water in the trunk and use a credit card to check into a hotel on safe ground." (source)

The power of choice, predicated on economic ability and exercised in pursuit of comfort and safety, has thus far resulted in greater racial isolation and has at the least contributed to the removal of that power from those in impoverished areas, who statistically speaking are much more likely to be of ethnicities other than white. And, as Landon rightly noted earlier, any theology of the suburbs that fails to address such concerns is one that is not true to the gospel. But I'm interested in your thoughts as well - does this ring true to you? Or have I overstated, understated, or otherwise misspoken?

Next up - the Kingdom response to the suburban ethos.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 5)

A few days ago, Landon asked a question related to my thoughts on a theology of the suburbs. He writes:

have you thought of how race would intersect with your statement of "the suburban lifestyle is predicated on the pursuit of happiness, primarily defined in a sort of neo-Epicurean desire for comfort, ease, and personal fulfillment"? if not, what would a shoot from the hip thought be on that for you?

I've been mulling the question ever since. To be honest, I have been thinking about it all along - it's been in the back of my mind through the whole series. However, I'm going to be forthcoming - I wasn't certain that I wanted to make my thoughts explicit. It's not that I don't think the topic is important - far from it! It's rather that I feel most unqualified to speak here. I have rarely felt as out of my element as I do at this very moment as I write this post. I feel as though I should be asking the questions and doing far more listening here than speaking. I am a thirty one year old middle class caucasian-American male, and I am about to step into waters too deep for me.

But step I will, even if I must do so cautiously and clumsily. First, in the interests of being a good host, I feel an obligation to my guests to respond. But, more importantly, I think that part of the problem that faces us is this reticence to enter the waters, so to speak, to join in constructive dialogue and thought and reflection and repentance. And, if I may speak frankly, this reticence is symptomatic of everything else that I've been discussing. I can avoid discussing these things, because I do not live them. In other words, my thoughts on race intersect with my thoughts on the pursuit of happiness in precisely this location: it is easier to seek my own comfort while I am ignorant of the suffering of others. I know of no other way to say that more plainly. We (I) avoid the conversation simply because we (I) can. Others, on the other hand, do not have that luxury. So I enter this question with a degree of hesitancy and a consciousness of my own inadequacy, asking for patience and grace for my own halting missteps as I do so.

To begin with, I want to describe my own context and identify the ways in which this particular question hits close to home, in fact quite literally. I live in the western Philadelphia suburbs in a neighborhood that's experiencing expansion and growth. According to the latest Census data (from this widget, which by the way is a fantastic tool that combines census data with Google Maps), within 1 mile of my home the population is 91% white, with a median income of nearly $70,000 and a median housing value of over $150,000. Those numbers are five years old now so the housing value is vastly understated, but it's important for the comparison I'm going to make. Now, when I pull the data for the next zip code over, I find a significantly different picture. Within one mile of that location, the population shifts to over 40% ethnicities other than white. However, the median income plummets to approximately $40,000, and the median housing value to around $95,000. If the data were available for smaller slices than an entire zip code, I can guarantee that the numbers could become even more stark.

I'm going to pause here. I want to reflect on those numbers, and more than that, on what (and who) those numbers represent. Obviously this is a small, small picture. I could provide more data like this, but to what end? I knew what I was going to find before I ran the search - the data only proved what I already knew to be true. In category after category, the contrast between these two neighborhoods is stark. The reality is that, although they are touching on the map, they are worlds apart. And I would wager that many, if not most, folks reading this post can recognize a familiar context in numbers such as this, one that could likewise be proven with a few clicks of a mouse but which is readily identified even without.

So how does the suburban ethos contribute to this contrast? More thoughts tomorrow...

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs

A Theology of the Suburbs - Restatement

I feel as though I need to pause for breath here, to summarize what I'm proposing as descriptive of the suburban ethos. I want to do this so as to frame my coming thoughts succinctly and to provide some structure for this. The reality is that, from this point, there are many directions that I desire to take. A part of me wants to continue this particular thread - there are elements that I haven't touched that desperately need addressing. A few that I would dearly love to tackle:

• Pace - The tempo of suburban life is one of continual acceleration. This deserves a response. I'm going to forgo this for the moment, because one of the books on my stack right now is Carl Honore's In Praise of Slowness, which I suspect will provide a better framework for approaching this question than I currently have.
• Networks - Although I believe isolation to be a significant force in suburbia, it is tempered by the transition from neighborhood to social network. What was once geographic and local is now something else - relationships are increasingly structured more like networks, with hubs around common interests or life situations. They also seem to be more ad-hoc and mobile. This has significant impact on how we approach any sort of incarnational ministry.
• Technology - much of the suburban ethos is predicated on a particular approach to technology. I have a lot to say on this one too, but I'm again going to punt until I get an opportunity to discuss The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture by Shane Hipps, which I'm currently finishing.

And I could go on - but I want more to begin to tackle the constructive work of building a response. So, with the caveats that this is incomplete, provisional, and certainly a generalization, here is the framework in which I'm approaching the question of the gospel in suburban culture. First, I'm suggesting that the suburban lifestyle is predicated on the pursuit of happiness, primarily defined in a sort of neo-Epicurean desire for comfort, ease, and personal fulfillment. I'm also suggesting that the dominant sphere in suburban contexts is economic. People in suburban contexts look to the economic realm for the stories, metaphors, values, and symbols through which meaning is assembled. This economic lens means that the pursuit of happiness is accomplished through the exercise of control-through-choice, resulting in a power dynamic in which the ability to choose and to shape the choices of others is the chief form of power. The power of choice exercised in pursuit of happiness has resulted in an increasing isolation, as happiness becomes defined in terms of economics, namely the ability to pursue safety and comfort through the acquisition of goods and choice of environment / neighborhood.

More could - and should - be said, but this should be sufficient to begin. I realize that much of what I've stated thus far has slanted towards the negative, even when I've tried to present things from as neutral a perspective as possible. This may make it seem as though I don't find much of redeeming value in the suburban lifestyle. I hope that, as we walk through the next few posts and begin to construct an approach, the redemptive possibilities will begin to become evident.

Lastly, a word about method. I'm interested in a model that is functional as well as theoretical, that is holistic and imaginative, and that provides its own opportunities for revision. As a result, each of the following posts will contain two proposals: the narrative approach, and the resulting spiritual practice. The idea is to suggest a true suburban praxis in the technical sense, which is a dialectical engagement of reflection and action - in other words, acting reflectively and reflecting on one's actions, to borrow from Bevans. First up: imago dei as critique of the Market.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 4)

I believe that, when I think of suburban life, what I think of more than anything else is rootlessness. If control-through-choice is at the core of the ethos of the suburbs, rootlessness is its fruit. Disconnection, isolation, transience, impermanence - all of these characterize suburban life; all are symptomatic of a culture that has no connection to place, no connection to history, and no connection to the other.

I do want to pause here and mention that, as James rightly noted earlier, some of these things aren't going to hold true in a particular context. I think of a neighborhood near my home that is an honest neighborhood, with local businesses and front porches - the whole package. And it's not just surface, or at least not all of it - I have friends that actually know their neighbors and the folks who own the businesses they frequent. On the other hand, a group from my cohort at Biblical sat around a few weeks ago and talked about all of the ways that we, and the folks in our faith communities, experience isolation on a daily basis. Just noting that the average commute (one-way) for American workers in 2003 was 24 minutes (just over 30 in Philadelphia) should tell us something about this (source).

I don't want to oversimplify this. I think it's complicated and multilayered. But I think that, for many in suburban contexts, isolation is a reality. More and more, the thought of "settling down" sounds hopelessly quaint - there seems to be an increasing expectation that a family will live in several different homes over the course of their lives, "trading up" as the family grows in both size and wealth. Speaking personally, my family has lived in our current home for almost eight years. In that time, we've had at least four different neighbors in the home on our left, and three on our right. But, truth be told, I can only remember some of them - by and large, we simply never connected with the people who lived literally next door. And, this summer, we're also preparing to move. At least in my area, this is not unusual - it is, rather, the norm. But at the end of the day, it's a phenomenon that results in a disconnection from our neighborhood - there simply is nothing tying us to this particular area, other than preference and convenience. And I don't think I'm alone in my experiences here - I know too many folks who simply assume this to be the way things are, a sure sign to me that there are particular values in play here.

By and large, the suburbs seem to me to be places without a sense of place. It's a context in which the question, "Who is my neighbor?" isn't really all that rhetorical. Practically speaking, this is a challenge for those of us who want to embody the gospel in our communities. For one thing, it completely rearranges our metaphors - for example, we simply can't speak of "home" in a theological sense in the same way that we could in the past. But there's a bigger challenge - how do I demonstrate the love of God in a context where I'm challenged to even know the name of the person next door, especially when the turnover rate for residents in my community seems to be a scant few years? To put it more succinctly, how does one embody the gospel as a part of a community in a context where the very idea of community seems more a quaint anachronism?

I think it's about time to start synthesizing some of this - more to come...

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs

MereMission

I've joined a bunch of other folks over at the group blog at MereMission.org. Todd has done a great job of putting everything together, and there's still an opportunity for more contributors to jump in, so if you're interested or if you just want to read some good thoughts about missional theology, head over and check it out. Should be fun!

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, missional theology, MereMission.org

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 3)

Chris brought up an excellent thought in the comments on my last post. Chris has this to say:

I think that too, like the early Christians, choice is mediated by economy. I know that you alluded to it, but I don't think that you can emphasize enough the power of economy in the control structure.

This brings up another concern that I've hinted at but haven't discussed explicitly here. Robert Schreiter, in his excellent book Constructing Local Theologies, defines culture in terms of semiotic domains, which he describes as systems of signs, symbols, metaphors, and meanings that operate in a particular sphere. In his words:

When this complex sign, code, message, and metaphoric process spreads itself over an area of culture and brings it together as a constellation of meaning, we have a semiotic domain. A semiotic domain could be considered an assemblage of culture texts relating to one set of activities in culture (economic, political, familiar), which are organized together by a single set of messages and metaphoric signs...A culture can be seen as a series of linking (sometimes hierarchically organized) semiotic domains: religious, economic, political, social, sexual, and so on. Often one or other of the domains will be given priority over another.

Schreiter suggests that, in Western urban cultures, the economic domain dominates. I think that's true - and I think it reaches its pinnacle of domination in the suburban context, where economics often trumps entirely the systems of meaning found in other domains.

Let's think about this practically and experientially for a moment. One of the things that defines suburban existence is the need to commute. It's part of what it means to be suburban - home is in this place, and work is in this other place, and my children go to school in another place, and shopping is in another place, and entertainment is over there, and then once in a while I get to travel great distances to another place entirely to spend my leisure time doing much of the same things I'd do at home - shopping, eating, and being entertained - but with new scenery. And I'd suggest that the relationship between all of these places is primarily grounded in economics. I live where I can afford the mortgage and taxes for a home of reasonable size surrounded by reputable neighbors. I work where I can get the most money and best benefits for my efforts expended. My children attend school where they will be positioned most advantageously for future opportunities, with the ultimate goal of finding employment that will grant self-sufficiency.

It's all economic - everywhere I look, I'm confounded and confronted by the all-pervasive influence of the market. I can't even type these words without being assaulted by dozens of logos and other subtle imagination-shaping devices that sit silently and effortlessly fulfilling their purposes in my own living room. And the degree to which the economic sphere is spilling over its bounds is frightening; even religious imagery is being co-opted by the business world in ways that leave me dumbfounded. In a context where product advocates and salespeople are increasingly becoming known as "evangelists" - bearers of Good News - we sit by, oblivious, complacent, and complicit.

A Christian theology of the suburbs that fails to challenge the all-pervasive influence of the Market is no theology at all - it is a weak and anemic thing with no voice and no power.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, economics, Schreiter

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 2)

I want to think a bit more on the idea of choice as power. I mentioned yesterday that the suburban ethos reflects the centrality of control-through-choice. In the comments, we were discussing the relationship between choice and structure; my thoughts are that the true power of the suburbanite is in the ability to choose one's structures. In other words, neighborhood isn't a given for a suburbanite - it's a choice. Education is a choice between structures. Employment is a choice between structures. Everywhere one turns in suburbia, one is confronted with an opportunity to exercise choice. This is a power dynamic in the sense of power as the ability to act. There is a lot of power in being able to choose one's structures - power that, in some ways, is localized in suburbia in a way that it simply is not in urban or rural contexts.

What I mean is this - in suburbia, I choose my neighborhood by virtue of my power to purchase a home. This choice is also rescindable - if I find that I don't care for the neighborhood, I can choose again by exercising my power of purchasing a second time. In the same way, if I don't want my children to attend a particular school, I exercise my ability to choose by sending them to a private school, by homeschooling, or by moving to a different school district. Power is choice in middle- and upper-class America. Even our system for distributing political power is premised on the fundamental ability to choose those who will govern us - to choose our authorities, in some sense.

Choice is powerful. But - and this is significant - choice is limited to one's perceived options. And perceived is the operative word in that sentence - power in suburbia is bounded by imagination, by the ability to recognize one's options. And typically those options are limited to what will produce comfort and security, as I proposed earlier.

Here's where things get complicated. Everything in suburban existence is oriented around these values of comfort and security. Everything. These values are inculcated in children from before they can speak. Our education system is oriented to create good producers and consumers for the marketplace - children are trained to want good paying jobs and to find satisfaction in goods and services. Mass media is driven by advertising from companies whose entire purpose is to meet the needs of comfort and security. Of the thousands upon thousands of messages with which we are confronted daily, how many are centered on specifically orienting us towards these values? How many promise their fulfillment? How many reinforce their centrality? Walter Brueggemann calls this mindset the "royal consciousness" - The Way Things Are™ as an unassailable mindset in service to the powers that be that is often in opposition to the purposes of the Kingdom.

The end result is a stunted imagination. Choice is bounded by the marketplace, and imagination is taken captive. Try challenging these assumptions and see what happens. As a youth pastor, I had a conversation with a graduating senior trying to decide between serving for a time with a missions agency or going directly to college. She felt as though she should pursue the missions opportunity; I concurred. One of our adult leaders was present for the conversation and expressed shock that I'd advise someone to forego college - she'd never even considered that there would be another possibility and clearly didn't think that my advice was wise.

The most powerful forces in a context are often those that are assumed, that are implicit and unconscious. The questions that need to be asked as part of shaping a theology of the suburbs are these: who is shaping the imaginations of the people? What are the dominant values, and who benefits from their reinforcement? Who is telling the stories that give shape to the suburban ethos?

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, imagination, power, choice

A Theology of the Suburbs (p. 1)

A few weeks ago I mentioned that I wanted to start delving into a theology of the suburbs. American suburbia is, in my opinion, a sometimes hostile environment for ministry - for Kingdom-centered ministry, at any rate - at least moreso than is usually assumed. There are some reasons for this that I'd like to throw around before beginning to think about how a community of faith might begin to respond missionally to the challenge of incarnational ministry in the suburbs.

My caveat - I'm not a sociologist, and I don't pretend to understand the complex evolution of what has become the American suburbs. Wikipedia has an article that summarizes the high points and generally coincides with what I know. My interests are less in what they were or how they began and more with what they've become - not that there aren't insights to be gained by discussion of origins, but my suspicions are that suburbia as a phenomenon in twenty-first century America is significantly different from that of its post-WW II explosion.

Where do we begin to approach this question of suburban existence? What are the patterns of meaning in American suburbia, and where do we find either intersection or conflict with the Kingdom? That's the question we'll be attempting to answer over the coming posts.

If I had to define suburban existence within a succinct framework, I'd do so in terms of the pursuit of happiness. That's purposefully a distinctly American phrasing - having secured life and liberty, two of the inalienable rights upon which our country was purported to be founded, what remains for suburbanites is to secure happiness. Describe it in terms of Maslovian self-actualization, the American dream, or any of a dozen other ways of speaking about middle- and upper-class concerns, the focus is personal fulfillment, contentment, and comfort. More and more, this is accomplished through an ever-increasing emphasis on control through choice - the ability to control one's economics (wages, spending, etc.) and environment (proximity to employment and shopping, a desirable neighborhood with reputable neighbors, a good school district so as to ensure the future option of choice for one's children, etc.).

I suggest that this pattern of control-through-choice is central to the suburban ethos. This should immediately raise some connections with Kingdom concerns, but I want to hold on doing analysis until a few more pieces are in place. Thoughts so far?

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs

The Heart of the Story

We had an interesting discussion in class on Saturday about the primary narrative. Our prof listed two statements, both of which Christian theology would consider to be true, pretty much across the board. The question that was asked, though, was this: which of these is the primary statement or, put another way, which more truly describes our present existence?

• Human beings are created in the image of God. Since the fall, the image has been defaced - but not erased.
• Human beings are fallen creatures. Now, depraved in nature and rebellious in action, the human reflection of the Divine image has been seriously tarnished.

I have to be honest, I don't like the question. The point that he was making was that various traditions tend to emphasize one of these over the other. My thought is that both must be held in tension. It seems to me that failing to do so, that emphasizing one of these over the other, leads to serious distortions in the way that we approach our faith.

Take, for example, an emphasis on the image of God over against a recognition of our sinfulness. This approach can do much to explain great beauty in the world. It can help to explain why we are moved at stories of selflessness, or why we enjoy good art as opposed to bad, or why we tend towards a little virtue called hope. But, I wonder, can it explain the retched atrocities that we are capable of? Can it explain Darfur, or globalization, or slavery, or why children on playgrounds everywhere need no lessons in cruelty?

On the other hand, an emphasis on our depravity has no difficulty explaining these things. But it, I think, struggles in the other direction. It doesn't explain any of a thousand acts of selflessness in which people of all stripes participate every day. It doesn't explain loyalty, or deep friendship, or any other thing that we would prize that comes with deep costs and at times only tangible benefits.

The Story in which we participate, I'd argue, is one in which both of these premises are true. Human beings are created in the image of God; human beings are completely sinful. That is the essence of the primary narrative, I think. But one thing I would say: pushed to choose, I would have to say that, of the two, I hold the first to be of greater priority. Why? Because Christian hope is, I think, at its core the desire for a restoration to the-way-things-ought-to-be. In the end, we believe that sin, that evil, that depravity and rebellion do not have the final word - hope and a new creation do.

What does this have to do with contextual theology? I'd suggest that, at its core, contextual theology is an attempt to align our stories with the Story. The challenge that we face is that we, generally speaking, have difficulty in holding things in tension. We tend to want things to resolve, to come to completion, to be nice and neat and tidy. But our Story isn't like that. It's messy and challenging and full of tension, particularly between the now and the yet-to-come. But if we miss or ignore one of these pieces, then we're telling a story that's incomplete - and that's not the gospel, I'd suggest.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, story

The Boy's Club

Rachelle has a challenging, troubling post here about her experiences as a woman attempting to minister in Seattle in the shadow of Mark Driscoll and Mars Hill. I'm not going to attempt to summarize it - go and read it. It's deeply moving and deeply troubling.

I'm a day late on this, but I hope I can still chip in. There are many things I want to say about this. I could talk about bringing the resources of contextual theology to bear on this question. I think it needs to happen; I think it is happening. I think that it's naive, incredibly naive, to say that the complementarian position is just a straightforward reading of the text, as I mentioned in the comments over at Bob's blog. The bottom line is that all theology is as much a product of its context as it is a product of its content. I think that the challenging thing is to be able to hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches, to do the hard work to determine what scripture meant and what it means. Culture is so much a part of meaning that simply extracting any of the texts about women and men and who can do what, where and when, and assuming that those texts say the same thing now as they did back then is, frankly, more than naive - it's dangerous. And besides, we don't do that anyway, except when it's convenient. I mean, when was the last time that you heard a sermon on circumcision? But for Paul in Galatians, it was the very antithesis of the gospel. For some reason, we don't really wrestle with that issue so much anymore. If I were a cynical man, I'd ask why that is. And I'm cynical, so I'm asking.

But I don't really want to talk about contextual theology.

I also could talk about a biblical view of gender, about what it means to be created female and male, about why it's significant that we're created in the image of God. I could recommend Middleton's excellent book The Liberating Image and suggest that we absolutely need to begin with image when we talk about this - but I'm going to save that one for when I get around to Middleton. I could talk about how hierarchy and patriarchy are a pattern rooted in the fall, as I've done here. I could also talk about how the gospel is at its core a call to a new social reality, to be a new people practicing new ways of being people together, and that as a result Paul isn't just talking about getting into heaven when he says that in Christ there is neither male nor female. Which is, I hasten to add, not to diminish the fact that we are gendered persons - rather, it's to recognize that we contribute to the Kingdom precisely as gendered persons, and that those of us who are of one gender should not hinder those who are of the other from being full persons in Christ. That is, after all, the gospel, and part of what it means to be "in Christ" in the first place.

But I don't really want to talk about biblical theology.

What I want to say is this: first, as a male, I want to offer my apologies to my sisters on behalf of my brothers. We have not treated you like sisters. We have not done what is necessary. For this, I am sorry. There are a few of us who have things together, but most of us live oblivious to our own privilege. And theologies of privilege must be torn down, like all idols. The fact is that, while a lot of us express sympathy and support for you, it's not tangible. It isn't a matter of constant prayer. It isn't something that we actively struggle against by your sides. We've casually participated in the systems that exclude you, and offer our condolences from inside the circle. It's something that I think we rarely consider, and even more rarely act to change.

Second, I want to say this to my brothers in Christ: if we have been complicit in this, it must end. We need to renounce our membership in the Boy's Club. We need to walk away, and to not do so quietly. A friend of mine who is intelligent, articulate, and deeply spiritual once told me that, as a woman, there were things that she could say that would never be heard. She can struggle against this system from the outside and be quietly ignored. Things will only change when we stop lending our tacit support and speak out as men on behalf of our sisters in Christ. Not because they are unable to do so for themselves - far from it! The women I know are overwhelmingly more than capable of speaking out eloquently, intelligently, and coherently. But, unfortunately, their voices will never be heard by some, simply because they are women. That is, frankly, appalling. It's a denial of the gospel, and we need to recognize it as such.

I can't do much. But I can do small things. I can, for one, begin asking seminaries that I consider if they support ordination of women, and refusing to attend if they do not. It's a small thing; it feels minuscule. But it's what I can offer.

I can lend my small voice.

Grid blog for International Women's Day: Find the posts here

Technorati Tags: Grid blog for International Women's Day, egalitarianism

An Exercise in Contextual Theology

I hit a place this week where I needed to let all this stuff sit for a bit - too many thoughts to come together into something coherent. I think this class has had the best texts so far of any that I've taken at Biblical; the Sedmak book was excellent. The problem with talking about these sorts of things is that it's really hard to be concrete. That's the point, I suppose - local theology is by nature, well, local. Start talking about it outside of a local context - especially at the conceptual level - and it starts to become rather vague. Personally, it's something of a challenge to wrap my brain around; I'm an inductive learner by nature, so I need to get into the guts of something to really understand it.

Today, though, a few of us sat around after class to talk about our upcoming group project on contextual theology. We'd settled on tackling suburban culture in our group, and as we threw ideas around I realized again that those of us in suburban contexts in America are faced with an unbelievably challenging task. How do you live missionally in a geographically decentered world, where there simply is no space to inhabit? How do you love your neighbor when the question, "Who is my neighbor," is no longer rhetorical? How do you speak prophetically in a context where challenge is entertainment and choice is the trump card of the consumer? At some point, I began thinking that what's really needed is a local theology for the suburbs.

I think it's past time that we begin to think of living missionally in the suburbs. Suburban culture needs challenged, true - but more importantly, it needs redemption. (Right, Jared? ;) David Fitch wrote a fantastic post about this a while back that's well worth a read. Todd has written about it as well. I'd like to throw my small contribution into the mix and see if I can connect some dots with my recent string of thoughts on contextual theology.

What does Jesus say to the American suburbs?

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, suburbs, missional

Good Theology

I'm all over the map lately. I'm working on yet another book that's prompted a few thoughts. This one is Clemens Sedmak's book Doing Local Theology, which is a nice little volume talking about how this contextual theology stuff actually works in practice. (Anyone getting sick of this yet? My class is over in only four more weeks... ;) Anyway, Sedmak proposes three criteria for "good theology" that I thought were just fascinating. He writes this:

What is "good theology" according to Jesus? As we have seen, theology is not exclusively an academic endeavor. It is about personal and communal transformation, based on a relationship with God....Jesus emphasizes the practical consequences, the fruits. He emphasizes the spirit with which theology is done. He emphasizes the need to care for the people and to be with the people.

He goes on to discuss his three criteria for good theology:

• Realness - Realness means that the theology is true to life. Reality also serves as a check to our own thinking, to constructing systems that are intellectually coherent but practically unworkable.
• Fidelity to the founder - In his own words, this means being "faithful and honest to the mission and message and person of Jesus".
• Practical consequences - What is the fruit? What are the practices that naturally flow from the theology? Again, in Sedmak's words, "Theology is a way of following Jesus."

True to reality, true to Jesus, and resulting in true praxis - what more can we ask? I think that's as fine a definition of good theology as I've ever read. If what I write and dream and think and live could fit those three criteria, then I think I would count myself successful.

Technorati Tags: books, contextual theology, Sedmak

Culture as Meaning - p.2

One of the challenges of talking about culture is that it's so much a part of who we are that it's functionally invisible to us. We typically only notice a small part of what makes up our culture - much of our context only becomes apparent in contrast with another context, where the differences illustrate our own cultural patterns. A case in point that Hall discusses is the way in which many of us in western cultures approach time. The notion of time is completely contextual - even trying to define "time" is extraordinarily difficult. We can only grapple with its meaning by assigning context to it through the use of units and measurements. But even these are somewhat arbitrary, and the importance we place on those segmentations is a matter of context. Most of us in western cultures are used to dealing with time in a linear fashion. Each moment is perishable and unique - once it is past, it is unrecoverable. Consequently, we value our delineations of time and place a high priority on adhering to schedules and being mindful of days, hours, minutes, etc. But other cultures may not approach time in this same way - time might be viewed as cyclical rather than linear, and units of time as arbitrary. In some cultures, schedules carry far less weight than they do in mine - I have difficulty grappling with the implications of that, but it enlightens me to an aspect of my own culture which otherwise would be invisible.

Now, to get back to the question of meaning and its relation to context, let's consider this from a different angle that Hall also touches on: space. Spatial relationships and orientation is also a contextual concern - the use of space carries particular meanings in some contexts that it does not carry in others. The best way that I can think of to approach this is by way of example. A few years ago, a friend and I were discussing the arrangement of the worship gathering at our church with the pastor and another member of the church. At the time, we were meeting in a high school auditorium. The pastor was expressing concern that the worship team led from the stage, while he preached the sermon from the floor in front of the stage. Here is the significant point - the meaning that he assigned to the spatial location of worship and preaching was that we were demonstrating that we valued worship over scripture. I argued the opposite - by locating himself closer to the people, we were conveying that we valued scripture, and in particular that we valued it as a community.

In both arguments, the meaning that we assigned to the location of the preacher and the worship team was limited by our context. For the pastor, the meaning was a function of an unstated understanding that elevation conveys significance. For me, the understanding was different - proximity conveys significance. Now, bear in mind that neither meaning is inherently correct - both are contextual projections onto spatial arrangements. The question, though, that must be answered is this: which meaning is in play?

The pastor's decision was to move the preaching to the platform and to teach the reasons that we were doing so, to instill an understanding in the community that we were demonstrating significance through elevation. Here's the problem - the community didn't share that underlying assumption. The range of meanings that could be assigned to the spatial orientation was limited by context, and that meaning simply wasn't available. No amount of communicating would change this - instead, what happened was that a disconnect was created between what was said and what was done, with competing messages coming from word and deed. By distancing himself spatially from the people, he instead created a relational distancing as well - a very slight one, to be sure, but it was present nonetheless and exacerbated other concerns related to his exercise of authority.

The implications for this are huge. If we approach a context with forms already established, we risk actually damaging the message. This is why, on some level, describing the emerging church as concerned with "coffee, candles, and couches" is simultaneously both accurate and dead wrong. Forms in and of themselves are absolutely unimportant - that's why they are critically important. In other words, what is important about form is not the form itself, but what the form communicates, specifically in a given context. Forms should be seen as fluid and ad-hoc, able to change at need to convey the desired meaning in a given context.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, Edward Hall, culture, meaning

Culture as Meaning

I've been reading another book with bearings on my recent thoughts on contextual theology. The book is The Silent Language by Edward Hall - it's a fascinating discussion of the nature of culture from the perspective of an anthropologist. This is actually something of a complicated subject to approach; before picking up the book, I thought I had a good grasp of what culture is. As it turns out, I've been continually surprised by how much I take my own context for granted and how inextricably I am bound to it.

One of the questions that it's raised for me is the purpose of theology, and in particular, the purpose of a contextual, local theology. Hall argues that, on some level, all culture is a matter of communication. Culture represents the conscious and unconscious systems that represent the frameworks in which we approach and describe experience. This includes elements such as language but also includes things like understandings of time and space, to name a few. In other words, culture represents all of the shared mechanisms that people in a particular context use to extract meaning from experience.

This question - meaning - gets to the heart of theology. Theology, after all, concerns itself with questions of ultimate meaning. After all, when we talk about matters of faith, we aren't talking about experiences per se, but rather about their meanings. Theology is, in some sense, the attempt to make sense of experience in light of faith. I think this definition would be somewhat contentious in some circles; many want to remove experience from the equation entirely. But even if we hold to the belief that theology is an attempt to understand revelation, isn't the act of revelation in and of itself an experience? At the very least, we have to make sense of what we have received and attempt to put it into practice.

Hall's point through much of the book is that culture - context - frames the way in which we approach this question of meaning in such a way as to define the possible meanings that we extract from those experiences. Put another way, I can approach a given experience from a variety of angles, but those angles are defined by my context and, ultimately, do not exhaust all possible meanings.

Wow, that's horribly abstract. Here is the point - as a male, as an American, as a thirty-one year old, as a resident of suburban Philadelphia, as an employee of a large financial firm, as a theology student, etc - I can think about theology in a number of ways. But there are a number of ways that are not available to me, simply because my context doesn't make them available.

I think I need an example for this.

Technorati Tags: contextual theology, Edward Hall, culture, meaning

Bevans's Models and the Emerging Church

I've put off posting this for a bit because I'm sorting through the implications of Bevans's categories as I think about the emerging church. I think I have a framework I'm comfortable with, so I'm going to throw out some thoughts and see where they land. Besides, I do my best thinking in process anyway. ;)

As I discussed in my earlier post, Bevans presents six models for approaching the question of contextual theology. I want to reiterate his thoughts that no model exists in isolation - all of the models are, to some degree or another, in play at all times. But by identifying a primary model that is in place in a given system, we can identify something of the shape of that particular model and also discuss its similarities and dissimilarities to other systems. In other words, this isn't meant to identify deficiencies in any particular system so much as it is to identify the distinctions and provide a framework for thinking through the differences. With that said, here are my thoughts: the emerging church is characterized, for the most part, by an approach that is rooted in praxis while many of the critics are more comfortable in a translation framework.

One of the common statements that seems to be heard when discussing critics like Carson (for example) is that the emerging church is primarily a movement of practitioners, not academics (and let's not have the movement/conversation discussion, k?). On the surface, I've always thought this sounded like a weak defense. On some level, practitioners are in just as much need of good theology as academics - more, in fact, given their close connection to the body-at-large. But I understand the concern that's being articulated, even if it could be framed better - practitioners have different concerns than academics, and, generally speaking, don't spend their time constructing airtight systems but rather look at theology from a rubber-meets-the-road perspective. And this, of course, is exactly what is described by the praxis model, as defined by Bevans - "acting reflectively and reflecting upon one's actions". Putting this into the context in which many of us serve, the movement (in a personal sense) towards an emerging theology was driven precisely by this reflection - reflection on the fact that the old formulations were inadequate, that they addressed concerns which no longer existed, and that they produced Christians who looked strangely unlike this Jesus who we claimed to follow. So we started to change our approach. I'm going to speak personally here, but the stories I've read lead me to believe that I'm far from alone in this. My context was youth ministry, and my problem was that the gospel I was preaching of what amounted to salvation through right doctrine failed to create followers of Jesus. So I began to change my approach. I swapped games for prayer, speaking for discussion, loud for quiet, spectating for participating, and entertainment for service. And I lost students in my ministry - but I gained Jesus-followers, a trade about which I have no regrets. And as I reflected on what had happened, I came to believe that somewhere along the line I had gotten the gospel wrong, and that what I thought was translation was actually something else, something distorting.

And there, I'd argue, is the rub. Many of our critics are firm believers in the translation model, assuming that all we do is take unchanging truth and translate it into the context. And there is a sense in which they're correct; the gospel doesn't change. But the question that I confronted was whether we ever encounter that gospel outside of the bounds of a culture - is there such a thing as a disembodied, uncontextual gospel? Can we simply translate what has come before, without doing the hard work to discern if what we received is accurate and in line with our Story as told in scripture? I think that the gospel, as we tell it and receive it and pass it along, always carries along contextual baggage - our tellings of the gospel are always a mix of participation in and critique of culture. And there, I think, is the second sore spot - both the emerging church and its critics hold to a countercultural model, and hold to it strongly. The distinction lies in defining in what way we are countercultural - but that is a subject for another post.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, contextual theology, Bevans, praxis, translation

Bevans's Six Models

So it's been over a month now since I decided to work through Bevans's Models of Contextual Theology and, while I've played around with the subject since then, I haven't actually gotten to the meat of the book yet or why I think it's significant for the emerging church. Hey - at least I've stuck with it this time! At any rate, I thought I'd post a brief description of each of the models that Bevans uses along with a few of his caveats and then, using this as a springboard, talk about why the emerging church rubs some folks the wrong way. And if I can do it without making anyone too angry, so much the better. ;)

Bevans says this about models:

[I]t is my contention that no one model can be used exclusively and an exclusive use will distort the theological enterprise. While every one of these models is in some sense a translation of a message, an adequate theology cannot be reduced to a mere application or adaptation of a changeless body of truths. Even the biblical message was developed in a dialogue with human experience, culture, and cultural and social change, and a theology that neither issues forth in action nor takes account of the way one lives one's life can hardly be theology that is worth very much. At the same time, any theology that is not in some sense countercultural cannot be a truly Christian theology. (p. 33)

So with that in mind, Bevans outlines the following models by which we can approach the question of contextual theology:

• The Translation Model - This model focuses on the gospel as an unchanging message, and seeks to translate that message into the verancular of the context in question. The context matters only insomuch as it sets the agenda for the translation.
• The Anthropological Model - This model sees cultures as the places of God's revelation, and approaches each context asking the question, "Where is God already at work here?" It emphasizes present experience moreso than received tradition.
• The Praxis Model - Bevans has a great quote here; I'm tempted to steal it for my tagline. He describes praxis as "acted-upon reflection and reflected-upon action" (p. 72). Theology arises from this interplay of reflection and action - it is a model in which thought and deed are linked.
• The Synthetic Model - Bevans describes this as sort of a middle-of-the-road model, one that tries to take seriously both the tradition that has been received while taking seriously the context in all ways, including, as he states, the fact that context sets the theological agenda in some sense. He goes on to further describe this as a dialectic in some sense between faith and culture, with each informing and correcting the other. (I think I'm doing justice to him here - this one was somewhat vague.)
• The Transcendental Model - Ok, I'm going to confess right away that I didn't particularly follow this one at all. What I gathered here is that this model is more concerned with how one goes about the theological task than it is about what is decided or understood. It seems to be rooted primarily in the experience of revelation as an event or happening instead of as something received or passed on. Bottom line - I wasn't experiencing much of anything except frustration here.
• The Counter-Cultural Model - This model focuses on the challenge that the gospel issues to every culture. But, Bevans notes (rightly, I believe), that while the gospel offends, we should take care that the offense is from the gospel itself and not from our own poor attempts at enculturation. This is an absolutely significant point, one that I'm going to return to eventually. Suffice for now to say that Newbigin and Hauerwas, two of my significant conversation partners in my own theological journey, were both mentioned here, as was the Gospel in Our Culture Network.

I'd be interested to hear of any thoughts that strike you immediately as you read through this list. My own personal excitement from reading this book was in finding language to express what I think is my own theological approach in some of these models - for me, it was sort of like a theological personality inventory, I suppose. At the least, I can talk about why I approach theology the way that I do.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, contextual theology, Bevans

And Now For Something Completely Different...

Cup holders do not count as contextual theology. Discussing their addition to a new $24 million building erected by Eagle Brook Church in Minneapolis:

"Our little coffee shop is humming on Sunday mornings," Anderson said. "It's a huge hit."

But church leaders figured it was difficult to stand, sit or praise the Lord with your hands in the air while worrying about dumping a hot latte onto fellow Christians. So they decided to add cup holders - anything to boost their reputation for putting people at ease.

"You can't underestimate the value of energy and buzz," Anderson said. "Those things bring people through the door."

You can't make this stuff up. Unfortunately. This one earns the tag "pathetic".

ht: blind beggar

Technorati Tags: megachurch, coffee, cup holders, pathetic

N.T. Wright on Contextual Theology

Ok, not exactly - but I finished The Last Word over the weekend (thanks Jared!) and found a number of insights that are cogent for what I'm trying to think through:

To affirm "the authority of scripture" is precisely not to say, "We know what scripture means and we don't need to raise any more questions." It is always a way of saying that the church in each generation must make fresh and rejuvenated efforts to understand scripture more fully and live by it more thoroughly, even if that means cutting across cherished traditions.

Which is the bottom line: "proving the Bible to be true" (often with the effect of saying, "So we can go on thinking what we've always thought,") or taking it so seriously that we allow it to tell us things we'd never heard before and didn't particularly want to hear?

Fantastic little book - I read it in a few hours and found an incredibly helpful way of articulating some thoughts that I've had percolating under the surface for a while now. But to the point at hand - Wright reminds us of what I mentioned previously about the necessity of doing theology contextually. Critics of the emerging church (to take one example) often suggest that to consider context as a dialogue partner for theology subordinates doctrine to culture, or some such. But that's more a danger, I think, of theology that is unconsciously contextual. Our context always affects our theology. So what is better - to recognize context and attempt to consciously engage scripture from a recognized vantage point, or to ignore context and pretend to an objectivity that is impossible to realize? Isn't the one who is unconscious of culture at more risk of syncretism than one who is consciously attempting to engage scripture from a certain vantage point?

I would suggest, along with Wright (I believe), that approaching the theological task with context firmly in mind is to recognize the authority of scripture. It is to ask scripture to speak into a context, to challenge and redeem it. Failing to do so is to perhaps miss God's activity in the present and to instead seek for God's activity only in what has already been said, instead of what God is now saying.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, contextual theology, N.T. Wright

Why Contextual Theology?

I'm finally getting to my posts about Bevans's Models of Contextual Theology. I ran into a surprise at the end - my initial thoughts were that the emerging church tends to work out of a model of praxis while the traditions often critical of the emerging church work out of a countercultural model, leading to some (but not all) of the criticisms. When I finally read the chapter on the countercultural model, I changed my mind completely. I still think that some of the differences are rooted in these models, but I think it's significantly different than I first thought. But I'm getting way ahead of myself - first things first. I want to talk about why we should be thinking in terms of a contextual theology in the first place. I then plan to briefly review Bevans's six models, wrapping up with my thoughts on how this line of thought is helpful for engaging the approach of emerging churches.

Bevans describes contextual theology in this way:

We can say, then, that doing theology contextually means doing theology in a way that takes into account two things. First, it takes into account the faith experience of the past that is recorded in scriptures and kept alive, preserved, defended - and perhaps even neglected or suppressed - in tradition...Second, contextual theology takes into account the experience of the present, the context. While theology needs to be faithful to the full experience and contexts of the past, it is authentic theology only "when what has been received is appropriated, made our own."

This line of thought to me seems self-evident. But for many people - especially some critical of the emerging church - this is not only less than obvious, it's actually offensive. A favorite verse of these folks is Jude 3: "Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt I had to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints." This actually makes me chuckle. Jude is one of the most self-consciously contextual books in the New Testament, making liberal use of such Second Temple era writings as the Assumption of Moses and the Book of Enoch.

So why do contextual theology? When we do contextual theology, we take the faith which has been passed down to us and make it our own. We preserve it, live it, believe it, treasure it, share it, and pass it down to those who come after us, encouraging them to do the same. We do so conscious of what we bring to the theological enterprise, and we do so with a mind to speak faithfully to a particular context. If this sounds unremarkable, that's because we do it all the time - the importance of thinking contextually about theology isn't because we have an option, but rather because it allows us to be conscious of the tools that we choose to bring to the task at hand.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, theology, contextual theology, Bevans

Thoughts on Contextual Theology

One of the books that I've been working my way through is Models of Contextual Theology by Stephen Bevans. It's a fantastic little book that's very easy to read but packs a lot of content into the pages. Bevans's basic premise is that all theology is contextual - in other words, all theology is influenced by the "present human experience" of the person or community crafting the theology. As Bevans states:

There is no such thing as "theology"; there is only contextual theology...The contextualization of theology - the attempt to understand Christian faith in terms of a particular context - is really a theological imperative. As we have come to understand theology today, it is a process that is a part of the very nature of theology itself.

I wonder what it says for my faith journey that I take this premise to be simply a matter of course? He might just as well have said that the sky is blue. And yet, five years ago that statement would have set my teeth on edge... At any rate, I think this little volume is absolutely fascinating. Bevans sketches six models or approaches to contextual theology - or, in truth, theology as practiced in general, given that all theology is contextual - giving some positives and negatives to each approach, as well as several examples.

I'm going to follow Bevans here for a few posts. I'd like to briefly summarize the models he's suggesting and then discuss how I've seen them applied in emerging churches. One of the things that became clear to me almost immediately was that Bevans has provided some excellent language here to talk about some of the ways that emerging churches differ from more traditional bodies; some of the conflict and criticism, I think, can be traced to these distinctions. Having a language to talk about the how and why of theology is often as important as its content - I think that developing that language will be of immense benefit for those of us with connections to the emerging church.

Technorati Tags: books, emerging church, theology, contextual theology, Bevans