Faith in Context

The Thinking Primate

by Loren Seibold

It’s the year of analyzing our own consciousness, and the megahit Sapiens, by Yuval Noah Harari rules the field. (Recent others in a similar vein: Leonard Mlodinow’s The Upright Thinkers, Edward O. Wilson’s The Meaning of Human Existence, and The Human Age by Diane Ackerman.)

Naturally, Harari asserts that somewhere along the evolutionary line a bipedal ape developed an astonishing level of consciousness of a sort that was quite different from that of its similarly large-brained relatives. Sapiens is about how we became the thinking primate, and what that led to.

The religious people who reject the initial premise might miss out on the what is a marvelous insight from a secular historian and anthropologist: that the key to humanness is faith, i.e., the ability to believe in things that aren't physically there. These abstract notions are impossible for our nearest primate relations. Writes Harari:

"It's relatively easy to agree that only Homo sapiens can speak about things that don't really exist, and believe six impossible things before breakfast. You could never convince a monkey to give you a banana by promising him limitless bananas after death in monkey heaven."

This cognitive revolution, says Harari, sets the stage for everything that comes afterwards: the agricultural revolution, human cooperation in government, religion and economics, and our advancement into science and discovery. All the great achievements of humanity—tribe, trade, money, corporations, religion, government, scientific theories, mathematics, literature, music and art, rights and laws, contracts, even relationships—are predicated on that ability to create and trust abstractions, an ability that Harari sees manifested in (and possibly first stimulated by) religious faith. 

"[F]iction has enabled us not merely to imagine things, but to do so collectively. Such myths give Sapiens the unprecedented ability to cooperate flexibly in large numbers. Ants and bees can also work together in huge numbers, but they do so in a very rigid manner and only with close relatives. Wolves and chimpanzees cooperate far more flexibly than ants, but they can do so only with small numbers of other individuals that they know intimately. Sapiens can cooperate in extremely flexible ways with countless numbers of strangers. That's why Sapiens rule the world, whereas ants eat our leftovers and chimps are locked up in zoos and research laboratories."

One needn't accept the evolutionary narrative in order to be fascinated by this key point. After all, isn't it the Bible's claim that God breathed into God's most advanced creature a breath of consciousness that made us, in a fundamental way, thinkers like our Creator?  

We religious people know that faith isn't responsible for everything that has proceeded from abstract thinking: the machinery of capitalism, for example, as astonishingly abstract and fictional as it is, is only as moral as its practitioners make it. Nor does the ability to imagine what isn't there mean that everything we can imagine actually is. 

Yet here is at least a small admission, from academic disciplines that Christians sometimes complain has pushed God out of every gap where there were still bits of him to be found, that faith is at the heart of humanness, as necessary as our biological wiring. It's neither a theology nor an incontrovertible fact, but I'll take it. 

Is "Spiritual But Not Religious" Real?

By Monte Sahlin

Nancy Ammerman's new book, Sacred Stories, Spiritual Tribes is excellent. I recommend that you read it! One interesting question she raises is about the category that is currently getting a lot of attention, the people who say, "I am interested in spiritual things, but I am not interested in religion." So much study is currently focused on this category that it now has a label among scholars and professional research writers: SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious)

Dr. Ammerman calls SBNR a "unicorn," a species that does not exist in real life. Closer examination, she reports, finds that the people in her surveys who were "most active in organized religion, were also most committed to spiritual practices and a spiritual view of the world." She suggests that the SBNR thing is simply a device for people to tell their zealous friends to back off and leave them alone on topics related to values, spirituality and religion.

A reviewer in the Feb. 4 issue of Christian Century makes the observation that SBNR may be a media invention. "Dominant U.S. media don't seem to know how to talk about religious congregations" or spiritual life in general, so "lacking such capacity" they pretend that places exist that are not there in reality, observes Anthony Robinson, a UCC pastor.

Unlike Ammerman and Robinson, it seems, I have met a lot of people who are SBNR. Once they trust you as a friend, they are more than happy to talk about both religion and spiritual life. They express concerns, beliefs, emotional connections with the Divine; they pray, express spiritual sentiments and ask religious questions. They are turned off or simply unimpressed by the usual round of things we religious people do to express our faith both in the context of congregations and in our private lives.

Let's be honest, a lot of what we do is tradition and ritual, and not all that vital or vibrant even to those of us who enjoy it. To make faith real requires a level of creativity and authenticity that we are usually not willing to invest in. It breaks through at funerals, weddings and similar very important occasions, and sometimes even unexpectedly, but it is almost impossible to sustain daily or weekly or even once a month. That is why many religions invest so much value in "revival" or "renewal" or "reformation."

The incongruous thing about the emphasis on "revival" is that often the people who talk the most about it are the largest opponents to real change. We want the benefits of an edgy, powerful relationship with God while keeping it safely under control and limits. That is the real unicorn! I got news for you; there is no such animal. Either your experience with God is risky and upsetting, turning over things you would like to cling to, or it is boring and meaningless ritual that most of the people around you will not see a reason to give particular respect, time or energy.

SBNR is simply one aspect of being people real about organized religion. We want the riches without paying the price. We are just a little bit cheap and fraudulent, but we want people to treat it as if it were the wonder of the universe. Get real .... one way or another.

New Book About Waco Reopens Questions

By Loren Seibold

When the Waco siege happened, I was a Seventh-day Adventist pastor studying in a Presbyterian seminary. I remember my embarrassment at the questions in class the day it happened. I did what the rest of the Seventh-day Adventist church did: denied that the Branch Davidian had anything to do with us—even though they were a historical offshoot of the church, most of them ex or current Seventh-day Adventists, and studied the same prophecies and prophet (Ellen G. White) that we did.

Clive Doyle was one of the few believers to escape the fire in the Waco compound. He’s now written a new book called Journey to Waco. “If people read this account, they will at least gain a different perspective on who David Koresh was, where he was coming from, who we were, and why we believe the way we do,” he says. “Most people think ‘cult’ about us and think we are people who were brainwashed and deceived. They think our church members don’t know what they’re doing or where they’re going. Hopefully, my story can open their eyes.”

Indeed, most people do think cult. In a review in The New Yorker, Malcolm Gladwell brings together the literature on the subject to show that almost no one tried to understand Koresh or why people were in the compound. The ATF prepared a response for bank robbers, when they were dealing with quiet, principled Bible students. The besiegers mishandled every step of the process. Whatever paranoia the group had extracted from Scripture (it was centered around an interpretation of Revelation's 5th seal) the ATF’s ham-handed raid reinforced.

Koresh was, to be sure, an odd yet charismatic character, and his taking young spiritual brides was repugnant. But it was all based on Scriptural explanations that most of the compound had accepted. As another Branch Davidianist, Steve Schneider, said, “All of these places talk about a man in the last days that’s a sinner. He can do one thing, open up the words of the book, open up the Seven Seals. Can’t do any miracles, doesn’t raise the dead, heal the sick, isn’t a psychic but . . . if people have questions about life and death, eternal life, no matter what the question is, he will show it in context from the book.” And Koresh could, at least to the satisfaction of his followers.

Conspicuously absent from any attempt to solve the standoff was the Seventh-day Adventist church, its theologians and leaders. At the time, the denomination, always nervous about being perceived as a cult, denied any connection to the Branch Davidian. The theologian who stepped in to try to solve the problem by looking at it through the cultists’ eyes was James Tabor of the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. He engaged Koresh on his own terms, Koresh even implying he'd turn himself in when his study of Revelation with Tabor was complete. Writes Gladwell, “Tabor and Arnold made a tape—a long, technical discussion of an alternative reading of Revelation—aired it on the radio, and sent it to Koresh. Koresh listened and was persuaded. He had been called a liar, a child molester, a con man, and a phony messiah. He had been invited to treat his children like bargaining chips and his followers like hostages. But now someone was taking his beliefs seriously.”

But the ATF refused to wait even a few days.

Even if you don’t read the book (and much of it is self-serving, as Doyle is still a believer), do read “Sacred and Profane” by Gladwell. It’s a mind-bending exploration of why we don't listen to people who are different from us.

A Landmark Case Study of a Megachurch

by Monte Sahlin

This in-depth case study of Saddleback Church in southern California and founding pastor Rick Warren was actually published in 2012, but I only recently got around to reading it. It is Sacred Subdivisions by Justin Wilford (New York University Press). Although the author sees Saddleback as an example of post-denominational Evangelical religion, in fact it is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, an idenification that is largely hidden from the local community.

The book describes at great length how it fits the social context in which it exists, post-suburban America with its dis-integrated community structure. The patterns of a megachurch look much like those of its niche in the world; fragmented nodes of participation connected by the automobile and facilities much like shopping malls. The home and family have become the center of life and other institutions (work, community, politics and culture) are marginalized around the private center of each nuclear family's life.

And Saddleback Church is centered in home-based small groups. The entire purpose of the sermons, worship services and other programs is to make friends with people and get them involved in one of the small groups.

Wilford observes that the Evangelical megachurches have become expert at providing many different modes of worship, each appealing to a specific subculture. They are dispersed, multi-modal networks that only appear to be mass organizations. They best fit the endless suburban-like social context of California which is replicated to some extent around all major metropolitan areas in North America.

What does this mean? That the megachurch most likely will not be the primary shape of the Christian church in the 21st century, but it is a specific form limited to a specific context. Another indicator of this is the shift underway in the last five years or so to multi-site churches. Most of the largest congregations in American now have multiple, smaller campuses or venues, each with an on-site primary leader. And the largest of the megachurches are beginning to look like smaller versions of denominations, although they prefer the terms "network" or "association" or "coalition."

 

 

Scott Stossel and the Pros and Cons of Telling All

by Loren Seibold

Confession has never been out of style. Three millennia ago King David set down his sinfulness (Psalm 51), his depression (Psalm 6) and his paranoia (Psalm 31) in sometimes embarrassing detail—and people still sing his poetry in church. In his Confessions Augustine of Hippo roamed between theology, debauchery and penitence, and shaped Christianity for the next 2000 years. Much later Victorian author Thomas De Quincy revealed his opium addiction in a book-length essay. “I am bound to confess that I have indulged in it to an excess, not yet recorded of any other man,” he says. (Though he adds that he has an unrecorded acquaintance—known to be Samuel Taylor Coleridge—whose drug usage quite left De Quincy in the opium dust.)

Even in the age of the tell-all, Senior Atlantic editor Scott Stossel’s new book (excerpted in a cover story in the January Atlantic) is still shocking. For a world-class editor like Stossel to admit that in professional settings he is often drugged and half drunk and searching for a bathroom to vomit in, is more than just a disturbing picture. True it may be, but it’s also a reminder that only the financially and professionally secure have the freedom to tell the whole truth. Could you admit all of that and still climb to the top of your profession?

I have mixed feelings about the published confession. “Nothing, indeed,” writes De Quincy in the introduction to Confessions of an Opium Eater, “is more revolting to English feelings, than the spectacle of a human being obtruding on our notice his moral ulcers or scars.” Yet if it is so revolting, why is confession (and its sibling, the memoir) so eagerly devoured? Why is his wandering the slums of English cities the only thing we still remember about Thomas De Quincy? If the problem confessed about isn’t yours, the likely payoff is a kind of self-congratulation: “God, I thank you, that I am not like the rest of men.”

Those who nowadays write bold confessions often say they want to lift the veil, to empower sufferers to seek help. A pastor breaks the silence about his pornography addiction, a pharmacist about pushing pills, a TV star about childhood abuse. My Age of Anxiety falls into this category: after all, 40,000,000 Americans (Stossel’s number) suffer from his problem. So unlike some confessions, Stossel’s is not spiritual or moral, but medical and psychological. He’s a victim of crippling anxiety that he can trace far down his family tree. Fortunately, he can also trace down that same tree enough talent, intelligence and privilege to give him the wherewithal to try every therapy on the planet, and have an audience when he writes about it. 

What is anxiety, exactly? At bottom it’s a natural coping mechanism, the fight-or-flight response that keeps creatures alive. But for people like Stossel, it’s all gone terribly wrong. Quote: 

“The truth is that anxiety is at once a function of biology and philosophy, body and mind, instinct and reason, personality and culture. Even as anxiety is experienced at a spiritual and psychological level, it is scientifically measurable at the molecular level and the physiological level. It is produced by nature and it is produced by nurture. It’s a psychological phenomenon and a sociological phenomenon. In computer terms, it’s both a hardware problem (I’m wired badly) and a software problem (I run faulty logic programs that make me think anxious thoughts).”

As painful as this book is to read, its vivid prose unmasks the problem in a way that might open doors for other sufferers. Yet I wouldn’t be surprised if the readers who find it therapeutic are well outnumbered by those who are merely indulgent upon another’s misfortunes.

Related articles

My apology to Scott Stossel, or, The Atlantic article about anxiety that hit too close to home

Louis Menand: What does anxiety mean?

Will Social Networking Change Religion the Way Gutenberg Did?

It is well known that Gutenberg's invention of printing technology greatly encouraged, if not made possible, the Protestant Reformation with its emphasis on each individual reading the Scripture and finding the truth about God for themselves. It shifted the focus of the Christian religion from social conversions in which a clan leader or a price or an emperor decided for groups, large and small, if they would follow Jesus or not, to individual salvation. It gave birth to what may well be some unintended consequences, such as today's extreme forms of individualism.

What if a new communication technology becomes more dominant than the printed page? How will that change Christianity and other religions? The Internet, web sites, Email, Facebook, Twitter and texting are already beginning to move into the church. Two or three or more generations from now, how will this technology have changed the nature of faith itself?

Leonard Sweet has written more about the impact of contemporary social trends on Christianity than just about any other author around and his brand-new book is Viral: How Social Networking Is Poised to Ignite Revival. It is a must read, in my opinion.

Sweet points out that Christ was "a master Storyteller ... a crafter of parables for the artists of everyday." He uses the parable of the mustard seed to explain the situation that is about to begin. He points out that the mustard plant was an invasive plant like dandelions in your lawn. "The subversive mustard weed is nearly impossible to get rid of. Once it takes root, it takes over and invites every insect, pest, and rodent to live within its leaves. It spreads quickly and can grow and thrive almost anywhere." (page 188)

He asks, "What does infectious faith look like? It erupts in amazing beauty and resilient brilliance. It pricks with an occasional thorny thistle. It incites passion, spreads love, breeds kindness, generates compassion. While it infests the mind and heart with Jesus, it revives the body with the Holy Spirit. ... The Body of Christ." (page 189)

"Jesus was a master of stories and ... a healer of the body ... a holistic blend of mind/heart, soul, and physical body ... [a[ living organism." What will happen when a generation of young people invest the Jesus way of life with house churches, Skype Bible studies, Second Life enterprises, Facebook pages, and Twitter streams of prayer? What will be the common expressions of faith among my great-grandchildren? What is your speculation? Please share ... and read this book.

How to Change the World

How does Christianity impact today's world and make significant changes? This is the focus of the new book from James D. Hunter (professor of religion and culture at the University of Virginia), To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy & Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World (2010, Oxford). He summarizes the history of three contemporary Christian movements:

1. The Christian Right who are motivated by a religious vision of the right ordering of society and "see modern history as a decline from order to disorder."
2. The Christian Left who are driven by compassionate concern for the marginalized and impoverished and see today's society as deformed by social injustice.
3. The "neo-Anabaptists" who believe that the New Testament calls the followers of Jesus to a life ordered around Christian community, not cultural dominance, and are equally dismayed by unrestrained tolerance of the Christian Left and the unrestrained free market advocated by the Christian Right.

The Christian Right has become the most visible and numerous of these three approaches to changing the world, but because of its aggressive, confrontational tactics and widespread cultural naivete has not realized many of its goals. The Christian Left is much smaller in numbers but more influential because of its adept approach to social change, yet it may have been more completely co-opted by its political allies in the Democratic party. The "neo-Anabaptists" are the fewest in number and almost invisible, yet increasingly influential. (See The Politics of Jesusby John Howard Yoder.)

Hunter points out the facts well known to sociologists: massive rallies, angry speeches, and maverick figures do not make much real change in any society. The Civil Rights Movement was able to pass landmark legislation ending Jim Crow only because quiet allies in the Kennedy-Johnson administration and the Congress, as well as universities, research centers, labor unions and established churches joined in. Change in America and any other truly democratic society becomes a reality as new ideas become widely adopted among the professional class and institutional middle management.

Evangelical Christianity has largely failed to take this reality into consideration. They have failed to make a compelling argument to the educated elite about abortion, gay marriage, stem cell research, etc. And they have been inconsistent in applying the same Bible ethics to capital punishment, war, health care and immigration. (Unlike Catholic social teachings.)

Hunter's book could be seen as a road map for the Christian Right to take advantage of its more dominant position and define the new politically correct ways of thinking. Will they take it?

[I confess, I am turned off by the politics of both the Christian Right and the Christian Left and tend to see myself among the "neo-Anabaptists" where my spiritual heritage comes from.]

Unknown Figure, but Powerful Biography

To me this is a "must read" for anyone who cares about Biblical faith and issues of race and social justice. It is hot off the press, a biography by a professional historian, Lewis C. Sheafe: Apostle to Black America. You likely have never heard of Sheafe, he was a community activist and a pastor for both Baptist and Adventist churches from the 1880s through the early decades of the 20th century. He had the ability to gain the respect of key leaders on both sides of the race line at a time when America was retreating from the idealism that ended slavery just prior to his birth. To him, a heartfelt relationship with Jesus centered in Bible truth was just as important as working for social change, the betterment of the poor, etc. In fact, the two were entirely fused!

The value of this biography is its careful research, readable narrative and attention to the sociological and religious context of Sheafe's life. It will speak to your soul as well as your mind. The author is a good friend, Dr. Doug Morgan, professor of history at Washington Adventist University (Takoma Park, Maryland) and coordinator of the Adventist Peace Fellowship. I do not know if it is up on Amazon.com and the other online booksellers yet; if you have difficulty finding it, let me know and I will share more information about access as I get it. But, do not neglect to read this book, even if you are not interested in the history of the Adventist movement or the Baptist church.

Dan Brown's Novels: Major Source of Religious Information

The Da Vinci Code  has sold more than 80 million copies. One trade journal says that is more than any other book in print, ever. I think he may mean since the publishing industry started keeping track of sales several decades a go and he probably is not including the Bible in that. Nonetheless, the novelist Dan Brown has become a major source of religious information in the western world, especially among the unchurched.

The Da Vinci Code  explored the feminine side of the spiritual. Angels & Demons plays around with the new physics and what it may or may not tell us about God. (The movie version was recently released.) Brown's newest novel is The Lost Symbol. What is it really about? There is an interesting clue in a new book by Simon Cox, a writer who has made an industry of pulling together factual information related to each of Brown's novels.

Cox quotes from the Encyclopedia Britannica summary of the beliefs of the Church of Jesus Christ of Later-day Saints, often called Mormons: "Mormon doctrine diverges from the orthodoxy of established Christianity, particularly in its polytheism, in affirming that God has evolved from man and that men might evolve into gods." Then, Cox makes a very interesting observation: "No better description could fit the concept that Dan Brown is exploring with the pages of The Lost Symbol." (Page 183, Decoding the Lost Symbol: 2009, Simon & Schuster.)

Not All Print Media is Disappearing

Bible Study Magazine is a new journal that comes out six times a year and just completed its first year with the Nov-Dec 2009 issue. Interestingly enough, it is published by a software company, Logos Bible Software. So there are currents flowing the other way!

This journal is very well done. The graphics are exceptional; highly useful as well as beautiful. For example, page 30 includes a graphic that quickly tells you how many early manuscripts of various ancient writings are available to scholars today: 6,000 of the canonical New Testament, but only 650 of the runner-up, Homer's Iliad, and just 4 of the Gospel of Thomas. On the next page a chart shows the number of manuscripts from the 5th century and earlier for each of the books of the New Testament.

The journal tends toward a high view of Scripture and excellent, contemporary scholarship. It includes interviews with practitioners of Biblical preaching and teaching, as well as articles the focus on books of the Bible and short passages. It is very useful, in my opinion, for anyone who takes seriously teaching Bible lessons in SS, leading a small group, preaching regularly to the same congregation, etc.

My hat is off to a software producer that sees a continuing role for print media in its mix of products. I think this kind of multi modal information service is probably the real future for publishing, computers, the Internet, etc.

For more information: www.biblestudymagazine.com

PS: I paid for my own subscription. The publisher gave me no incentive for my opinion.