Christian Monolithism
Sometimes, but not frequently, I walk around the religious sections of bookstores. While there, I am reminded of why atheists target Christianity preferentially when ranting against religion in general. The fact is that Christianity is the biggest target. Fully represented on every continent and with its religious book the world's best-selling volume in history and every year since inception, Christianity is a big business.
In a sense, Christianity as a monolithic institution, a kind of religious abstraction, has nothing to fear from atheism. The percentage of atheists might grow, but in absolute terms the Christians willing to buy Christian books will always outnumber the atheists willing to buy atheist books.
Atheism is too weak a faith, too contrary a belief unto itself. The point is that it is an anti-faith faith. It relies on the idea that a specific paradigm is more useful to humans because of greater reliability, validity and utility — which are themselves the underpinnings of that paradigm. It is the ultimate (and pretty convincing) demonstration of circular reasoning, much as mathematical axioms, unquestioned and ineffable, will always lead to 'right' answers.
But back to Christianity...
In these bookstores, I find literally hundreds of titles purporting to be 'A Christian Perspective on [some current topic]', 'The Christian (and) [whatever]', 'Christianity and [some other thing]' and so on. Each of them assumes a monolithic perspective, totally disregarding in most cases the fact that Christianity is certainly the most diverse of all the major religions except for Hinduism, in matters of creed and practice.
St Paul was the ultimate exponent of that diversity. In his first epistle to the believers at Corinth, he hammered home the point that while there was one faith, yet each person was to build their own work on the foundation of Christ. Subsequently, "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God."
The credo of the early church was minimal in its conformity; in Paul's letter to the Ephesians, he writes, "I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ."
In letter after letter, line after line, the apostles preached organisational unity, but diversity in practice and interpretation. They had frequent disagreements, made compromises, and agreed a very little list of key beliefs— although that 'very little' was the central essence of the faith. Much of the rest — for example, observances of feast days, ideas about eating, proper ethical conduct, the importance of gifts — was treated with apostolic disdain. In fact, it's amazing how much Paul said was NOT important.
The point is that EVERY Christian is entitled to have her or his own personal opinion on global warming, dancing, smoking pot, listening to loud and discordant music (especially in 'charismatic' churches, I suppose) and many other issues. Some of these opinions may be right and some may be wrong; but Christians are told that there is freedom until the final judgement. That means that they should be careful with their freedom and they ought to try and get things right, but that's what we tell our children anyway, and there's nothing exceptional there.
There are immutables and firm guidelines, but not as many as the prescriptions in the bookstores seem to imply. For Christianity is no monolith; rather it stresses diversity of perspectives and gifts revolving around a single source of illumination. In that sense, it is more like Stonehenge than Babel, and the world ought to be the richer for that.
In a sense, Christianity as a monolithic institution, a kind of religious abstraction, has nothing to fear from atheism. The percentage of atheists might grow, but in absolute terms the Christians willing to buy Christian books will always outnumber the atheists willing to buy atheist books.
Atheism is too weak a faith, too contrary a belief unto itself. The point is that it is an anti-faith faith. It relies on the idea that a specific paradigm is more useful to humans because of greater reliability, validity and utility — which are themselves the underpinnings of that paradigm. It is the ultimate (and pretty convincing) demonstration of circular reasoning, much as mathematical axioms, unquestioned and ineffable, will always lead to 'right' answers.
But back to Christianity...
In these bookstores, I find literally hundreds of titles purporting to be 'A Christian Perspective on [some current topic]', 'The Christian (and) [whatever]', 'Christianity and [some other thing]' and so on. Each of them assumes a monolithic perspective, totally disregarding in most cases the fact that Christianity is certainly the most diverse of all the major religions except for Hinduism, in matters of creed and practice.
St Paul was the ultimate exponent of that diversity. In his first epistle to the believers at Corinth, he hammered home the point that while there was one faith, yet each person was to build their own work on the foundation of Christ. Subsequently, "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God."
The credo of the early church was minimal in its conformity; in Paul's letter to the Ephesians, he writes, "I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ."
In letter after letter, line after line, the apostles preached organisational unity, but diversity in practice and interpretation. They had frequent disagreements, made compromises, and agreed a very little list of key beliefs— although that 'very little' was the central essence of the faith. Much of the rest — for example, observances of feast days, ideas about eating, proper ethical conduct, the importance of gifts — was treated with apostolic disdain. In fact, it's amazing how much Paul said was NOT important.
The point is that EVERY Christian is entitled to have her or his own personal opinion on global warming, dancing, smoking pot, listening to loud and discordant music (especially in 'charismatic' churches, I suppose) and many other issues. Some of these opinions may be right and some may be wrong; but Christians are told that there is freedom until the final judgement. That means that they should be careful with their freedom and they ought to try and get things right, but that's what we tell our children anyway, and there's nothing exceptional there.
There are immutables and firm guidelines, but not as many as the prescriptions in the bookstores seem to imply. For Christianity is no monolith; rather it stresses diversity of perspectives and gifts revolving around a single source of illumination. In that sense, it is more like Stonehenge than Babel, and the world ought to be the richer for that.
Labels: Christianity, Diversity
etched with acid at 2:46:00 pm
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home