Aedificium

Well, the time has come. I haven’t done a seriously political piece since my inaugural post. I was asked today why I support the Democratic Party and not the Republican one, and the question was basically qualified with the suggestion that “when you don’t like either candidate, vote for the Republican one” because that’s the more Christian and trustworthy party.

No. No no no no no no no no no no! I understand the sentiment; I was myself seduced by the 2000 Bush campaign’s “compassioniate conservatism” and voted for a regime that year that has proven to be anything but. I see very little that is Christian coming from the Republican party. Taken collectively as a whole, I don’t really see much of it coming from the Democratic side either.

But I do see it from individual candidates, and when the candidate in question is running for president, I am willing to take him or her as representative of their particular party. And of the two candidates remaining, I am convinced that Senator Obama exemplifies a far more biblical position on ethics, religion, and public policy than any candidate in the 2008 campaign. For me, that is why I support the Democratic party. I believe the overarching rule that guides Obama’s position on policies and issues (to the extent we’ve seen from previous writing, speeches he’s given over the last four years, and current campagining so far) is more biblical than any Republican campaign in recent memory, perhaps since Abraham Lincoln.

I do not say “more Christian.” That is deliberate. It is my studied opinion that, at least in politics, this label is more divisive than unifying. (See yesterday’s post for an example.) “Biblical” may not be any better, but this is at least something I’m willing to take a chance on.

Recently I watched the film Amazing Grace, which is the story of William Wilberforce’s career in the English parliament and in particular his crusade to end the slave trade in the British Empire. Gifted with oratory and strength of will, we see Wilberforce at the beginning of the film struggling with the decision to enter a career in politics or the ministry. Wilberforce’s erstwhile friend and future prime minister of England, William Pitt, convinces him that he can serve both God and the state by using his gifts to challenge the ethics of the empire with the ethics of the kingdom of God.

I see the Republican party as being rich in moralistic ideology, but ethically bankrupt. There is no William Wilberforce in the Republican party, or if there is, he or she has yet to reveal him or herself. Yet I do see a lot of Wilberforce in Senator Obama. While I have no idea if Obama has ever held any dreams of ordained ministry. his faith clearly informs both is private life and his public politics. I believe Senator Obama to be a model for how prophetic faith can speak to political influence, and in how political attentiveness to the Biblical tradition, shared to varying degrees by Jews, Christians, and Muslims, can help the state do a better job of aligning itself with the Kingdom of God, even though it cannot - and will never be - the Kingdom.

I contend that Obama knows this. Read his 2004 speech at the Democratic Convention in Boston. Read his 2006 Call to Renewal Speech. To accuse Obama of having a distorted view of the Bible, as James Dobson does, or to outright accuse him of not being a “real” Christian, as Alan Keyes did in 2004, is to reveal how shallow the conservative understanding of Christian faith is on the one hand and knowledge of the Bible is on the other. There is more to Christian faith than simply being “born again” (which Obama is, in the authentic experience of a life-changing conversion), and there is far more than abortion or gay marriage in the Bible (in fact, the Bible is completely silent on both issues).

So, using Obama’s own 2006 speech as a basis for how his faith and how his deep understanding of biblical ethics informs and influences his life and career, what do we see? (I’m not going to single out issues; I trust you to do your own homework…) IHow about these:

“The majority of great reformers in American history were not only motivated by faith, but repeatedly used religious language to argue for their cause. So to say that men and women should not inject their “personal morality” into public policy debates is a practical absurdity. Our law is by definition a codification of morality, much of it grounded in the Judeo-Christian tradition.”

“And in its historical struggles for freedom and the rights of man, I was able to see faith as more than just a comfort to the weary or a hedge against death, but rather as an active, palpable agent in the world. As a source of hope” (A Call to Renewal).

“But kneeling beneath that cross on the South Side, I felt that I heard God’s spirit beckoning me. I submitted myself to His will, and dedicated myself to discovering His truth.”

“Democracy demands that the religiously motivated translate their concerns into universal, rather than religion-specific, values. It requires that their proposals be subject to argument, and amenable to reason. I may be opposed to abortion for religious reasons, but if I seek to pass a law banning the practice, I cannot simply point to the teachings of my church or evoke God’s will. I have to explain why abortion violates some principle that is accessible to people of all faiths, including those with no faith at all.”

“If we scrub language of all religious content, we forfeit the imagery and terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personal morality and social justice. Imagine Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address without reference to “the judgments of the Lord.” Or King’s I Have a Dream speech without references to “all of God’s children.” Their summoning of a higher truth helped inspire what had seemed impossible, and move the nation to embrace a common destiny.”

Finally, in my conversation earlier, it came up that the Democrats place no value in the family, and that Obama hasn’t done anything to change that perception. This is simply not true; Obama has two young children himself and supports a traditional one-parent-staying-at-home environment, as well as families having the final right to determine what is best for their children. But more than that, Obama is on record in his support of the family as the fundamental social unit that will ever be the strength of the nation, and it is one that is similarly grounded in the biblical family ethic.

“Of all the rocks upon which we build our lives, we are reminded today that family is the most important. And we are called to recognize and honor how critical every father is to that foundation… But if we are honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that what too many fathers also are is missing – missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it” — Father’s Day Speech, Apostolic Church.

I confess that I have been a fan of Obama since his Boston speech in July of 2004. I distinctly remember saying to myself “if this is what the Democratic party is about now, I’m in.” Not to say that I agree with all of Obama’s policies or even that i think he interprets individual details of the Bible the same way I do. But I do believe that his vision, like that of William Wilberforce 180 years ago, is more consistent with Biblical ethics and the Kingdom of God than the competition’s. Should the Republican party be able to trot out a Wilberforce or an Obama or another Abraham Lincoln, I will be more than willing to give the party a fair hearing. Until then, for this blogger faith and understanding lead me to break ranks with my evangelical brethren and cast my vote for the Democratic candidate for President. Barack Obama in 08.

Ken raised a question in his comment to the last post about being uncertain over how Christianity should be defined. This has actually been in the back of my mind for some weeks.

As an historian of religion as well as someone who identifies himself as “Christian,” I’ve been trying to make some sense out of this. Ancient Christianity, for example, as as diverse as it is today, and the arguments over defining what it is are not new. I think there are two different ways to approach this: 1) asking “what is Christianity” as an institution, and 2) “what (or who) is a Christian?”. I think that breaking it down this way yields different answers.

Institutional “Christianity” seems to have been defined according to subscription to specific doctrines, beliefs and ideas at least since the second century. Right doctrine was the point of departure. We have texts that describe that the only way you could tell a “heretic” in may places was by talking to one of them privately and casually outside of church meetings, because in their practice they appeared to be the same as everyone else. Irenaeus, for example, notes that it is this very thing that makes “those guys,” according to him, anyway, so dangerous to “us.” They sneak up on you, because if you don’t really know them, you have no idea what kind of system of doctrine they subscribe to (if they subscribe to any at all) and therefore have no grounds for figuring out if they are “Christian” or not. Christians who followed a different set of doctrines and mythology than the ones Justin, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, and a host of other early proto-orthodox writers, saw the proto-orthodox set of doctrines and ideas as ridiculous, and thought of themselves as nothing other than Christians following Christianity.

So the question I have is this: is subscription to a certain set of doctrines, platitudes, propositions, and so on a realistic mark of Christian identity? Can Christianity be reduced exclusively to this? If so, how many, and which one? And can one subscribe to doctrines, yet not really believe it? I think that for many in the churches today, this latter question is perhaps the most pertinent, yet one that hardly anyone will touch.

Now what about ritual and liturgy? Even if we grant that doctrine is at least one defining element, there’s the ancient question of whether or not someone who participates and observes the liturgical and ritual structure, defined by some authoritative figure and yet doesn’t “do it right,” is a “christian.” It’s easy enough to look for examples in antiquity; one might be the observation and celebration of the feast of Easter Day. There were those (many, in fact) who believed that the Lord’s resurrection should always be on the 14th of the month of Nisan, regardless of what day of the week that happened to fall on. Others (the winning party, at least in western christendom) believed that Easter should always be on the Sunday on or after the first full moon of the spring equinox. Both said they were Christians; both denied full “Christian” identity to the other. The same situation pops up in issues over Baptism (in antiquity as well as now), Eucharist (then as now), and so on. In other words, it’s the same problem as doctrines. And of course, could you observe Jewish rites, holy days, practices, and so on, and be Christian? The authoritative answer from many powerful figures, such as John Chrysostom, was “no way,” and that if you do participate in, say, a Seder or a Purim carnival, you were Jewish, not Christian.

What about ethics and morality? Day-to-day life? Now here is where things really start getting interesting. Because we have evidence from early christian texts that suggest that the ONLY difference between some groups was in ordinary life practices, and this starts with Paul in the letters to the Corinthians and continues until the present day. So this doesn’t appear to be very helpful. Usually these were issues over sexuality, food, and social roles. Again, what was true in the first century was true in the 4th and true in the 21st. Nothing’s changed. Denominations that ordain women are rejected by some as not really christian. Churches that take a disparaging attitude to the joy of sex and to celebrating the beauty of the body’s sexuality cannot understand why others who seem to delight in physical beauty can think of themselves as Christians. Can one be an environmentalist and “green” and be a real Christian? This is not a flippant question (sadly!).

Enough. Let me propose something of a tentative “description” for discussion.

I think the “doctrinists,” those who argue that you have to truly, authentically, and unquestioningly believe and subscribe to certain doctrines and to “the Bible” (another complicated topic for another day), have one thing right. I think there IS but a single doctrine that, without which, I can’t see identifying with Christian faith, and that’s the doctrine of the lordship of Jesus the Christ. That is to say, a confession that Jesus is my/our Lord should be the doctrinal base for the Christian religion. After that, there are a million variations on the theme, and propositional theology becomes mere details. But for someone who professes Christianity and who yet denies Jesus’ lordship, either in word or (more often) in deed, I can’t see how this can be the case. In other words, I think it is entirely possible for people to believe all the right stuff and not be a Christian. Now, what “lordship” means is the sticking point, but that’s to be expected. Everything else after Jesus’ lordship is conditioned by memory, history, psychology, experience, geography, and so on.

Ethically and morally, my years of studying the Abrahamic religions suggest to me that there are far more similarities than differences, not to mention local variations within each tradition. And so I don’t feel that ethics and morals are much good for defining one from the other, and I’m grateful for this. I do believe that when apply the lordship criteria, however, we see how each tradition nuances the ethical and moral common ground (or, perhaps, holy ground). A truly Christian ethics and morality, I think, stems from where we put the role of Christ. For me, an understanding of Christ’s lordship means viewing - and following, as best as I am able and as far as I can understand - Christ as the quintessential representative of ethical justice as was revealed in Hebrew Scripture and the Gospels of the New Testament. It is a conscious decision to model our ethics after those of Jesus, who was our prototype for applied ethics in a life in imitation of the ethics and morality expected by God as revealed in the Hebrew scriptures. Removing Jesus from this equation obviously denies lordship to Him. One may still follow an ethics of the Scriptures, but there is little that will distinguish Christian ethics from Islamic or Jewish without the confession of Jesus’ lordship and accepting his role as an ethical and moral prototype. Another way to put this is that I recognize that one can lead a life of “christian” ethics without being a Christian.

Finally, rite, ritual, worship, liturgy, and so on. I have been to so many churches that call themselves Christian, who confess his lordship, and who strive and struggle to live a life based on ethics they feel derive from Jesus’ lordship. And yet for some of them, they can be so different, even to the point that visitors may wonder if they are, indeed, in a Christian church or setting. Wine or Grape Juice? Bread or wafer? Dunked or sprinkled? Children or Adults? “Classical” or “contemporary?” King James or Today’s English? Consubstantiation or transubstantiation? Organ or Band? And so on. All of this makes about as much difference, as Frederick Buechner says, as whether we pray sitting down or standing up. I find my present house of worship to have one of the most consistently creative, beautiful, and meaningful worship services that I have ever been a part of. It glorifies God and emphasizes his justice and recognizes the role Christ plays in Christian narrative and action. I love it, and it is the primary form of spiritual nourishment I receive from the place. Some argue that it doesn’t pay enough attention to Christ’s lordship and defeat of “sin.” Perhaps. Others recognize that the worship is thoroughly Christian, but that it seems to be through appearances. Maybe so. In other words, simply having “Christian” worship and rites and liturgy doesn’t necessarily mean the church or house of worship is a “Christian church.” Worship alone does not demonstrate a church’s “Christian-ness.” Worship, I think, is the expression of loving God and enjoying him.

Procrastination needs to stop here. Back to the dissertation.

Just came across this, in the latest Orion Magazine:

Doctrine

I love the church
of the osprey, simple
adoration, no haggling
over the body, the blood,
whether water sprinkled
from talons or immersed
in the river saves us,
whether ascension
is metaphor or literal,
because, of course,
it’s both: wings crooked,
all the angels crying out,
rising up from nests
made of sticks
and sunlight.

- Todd Davis

Indeed. It sounds like it could have come right out of Aldo Leopold or something.

Last week I wrote a bit of my personal, experiential observations of our local homeschool coop. So tonight I’m looking to make good on the promise I made that I’d write a follow-up that was more analytical and reflective. So be warned: this is more of an essay than the last piece, but I think it’s a useful exercise for me and perhaps for others as well.

As a preface to my analysis of Homeschooling, I should state up front what I feel the business of education is, or perhaps more accurately, what I believe it ought to be, whether it is college and university education, graduate education, or grade-school education. At the end of the day, my evaluation of education draws most of its inspiration from Wendell Berry, who has not really written systematically about his educational philosophy (so far as I know), but who nevertheless has plenty to say about it scattered throughout his writings. My thoughts on it, likewise, are directly related to my work in the academy, which is to say that it influences what I do in my teaching on the one hand and that my subjects of study shape the reasons I teach at all.

Like Berry, I see the education of young people as being centered on developing the creativity of the individual person in a way that encourages responsible action in the local community and the larger society as a whole. Education needs to embrace a role that leads students develop their humanity in relation to other people and to the physical land where they live. What we teach should be somehow connected to where we are in life (geographically and otherwise) and to where students are. Berry would say that education’s primary role is to instill knowledge that is experiential, relational, creative and imaginative, democratic, local in its orientation, and fundamentally interactive with the natural ecology of where we live. Just so. To the extent that education is individual-centered, I maintain that this individualism (in the classic liberal sense of developing the full potential of the student) is, nevertheless, rooted in the local community in that the “potential” is precisely the ability of the student to contribute to the life of the community through his or her own gifts, place, and so on. Finally, the purposes of education needs to encompass the concepts of goodness and wholeness, which is to say that we need to teach our young people the ability to judge what is good and whole.

Much of contemporary education, however, focuses on the development of “skills” that will make people productive not in their own local community, wherever that may be, but in the global industrial and consumer-capitalist economy. I agree again, here, with Berry, who argues that schools - by which Berry means public schools - are “mind dominated” by outside forces (the global industrial/capitalist doctrine) that essentially dictate what students are to take away from their education. In my work in New Testament, Judaism, Greco-Roman religion, Early Christianity, and Islam, scholars know this kind of imposed “mind domination” by the terms of “cultural hegemony,” stemming from work of Antonio Gramsci. Cultural hegemony is the essentially the ability of those in power (from small communities to global industry and national governments) to package thoughts. It is the ability to control “knowledge production” by packaging the hegmonic power’s ideology into the distillation and dissemination of culture. (more…)

Dilapidated Barns: A Sermon for Proper 13/Ordinary Time 18
Hosea 11.1-11; Colossians 3.1-11; Luke 12.13-21; Psalm 107

One of the most common scenes when you drive through rural New England, particularly in Vermont and New Hampshire, is the old, run-down, partially flattened, crooked, caved in or otherwise dilapidated barn. Some of us perhaps don’t need to even go very far to see one or two; I have to look at ours pretty much every day of the week in the summer when we’re here in New Hampshire. Most of us, perhaps, look at them and think nostalgically back to days when beautiful barns stood proudly in a field of carefully tilled soil, like a symbol of good, hard work, provision, care, and extended family. Others drive by these collapsed structures and perhaps think to themselves “For heaven’s sakes, that thing is an eyesore! Why don’t they just knock it down and build something new and better, something that will hold old all their stuff, or at least make the yard look better?” Where the former observer might feel a sense of sadness, the latter is more disgusted.

Our dilapidated barns are indeed good symbols of our society today. Our society is littered with storehouses of various types that are old and run-down and decrepit, signs of what is always, invariably, the final result of investing so much into a close-to-suicidal consumerist economy that places such a premium on cheap-junky stuff that surpasses our needs and instead satisfies our whimsical desires, as well as our real needs, at the cheapest price possible. Worse still, our participation in this state of affairs fattens the bank rolls of the very people who confidently tell us that participation in their system is all to our benefit. “Soul, store up, hoard, and consume for many years, and you will be happy, taken care of, and provided for.”

Regardless of where we find ourselves here, the Scriptures from today’s lection do not permit us the luxury or thinking along the lines of the world today, and for that, I think, we should be grateful. Hosea 11.1-11, today’s first lection, reads:

When Israel was a child, I loved him,
and out of Egypt I called my son.
2The more I* called them,
the more they went from me;*
they kept sacrificing to the Baals,
and offering incense to idols.

3Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk,
I took them up in my* arms;
but they did not know that I healed them.
4I led them with cords of human kindness,
with bands of love.
I was to them like those
who lift infants to their cheeks.*
I bent down to them and fed them.

5They shall return to the land of Egypt,
and Assyria shall be their king,
because they have refused to return to me.
6The sword rages in their cities,
it consumes their oracle-priests,
and devours because of their schemes.
7My people are bent on turning away from me.
To the Most High they call,
but he does not raise them up at all.*

8How can I give you up, Ephraim?
How can I hand you over, O Israel?
How can I make you like Admah?
How can I treat you like Zeboiim?
My heart recoils within me;
my compassion grows warm and tender.
9I will not execute my fierce anger;
I will not again destroy Ephraim;
for I am God and no mortal,
the Holy One in your midst,
and I will not come in wrath.*

10They shall go after the Lord,
who roars like a lion;
when he roars,
his children shall come trembling from the west.
11They shall come trembling like birds from Egypt,
and like doves from the land of Assyria;
and I will return them to their homes, says the Lord.

What I want for you to see here in this passage is the heavy dose of Exodus imagery that appears all over this passage, and I also want you to see how important the theme of idolatry is here as well. Both themes are two of the central elements in the story of Israel and, I submit, of God’s chosen generally, whether Jews or Christians or anyone else. There is also the theme and threat of exile sounded in verse 5. We also see God portrayed here as a nurturing mother in one of the most moving descriptions of God’s tenderness in all of Scripture in verses 1-4 and 8-9. We need to unpack this a bit.

In Egypt, Israel built up storehouses for their Egyptian rulers and overlords. They were caught and stuck in a system that created profound need for those with little while simultaneously creating-and attempting to satisfy-want and desire for those with much. By introducing the theme of Egyptian slavery and building the Egyptian storehouses, the writer of Hosea sounds a note that was profoundly sensitive to his 8th century hearers. For Israel had spent 400 years in Egypt, the world’s most powerful nation, a nation who wrung their bread from the sweat of Hebrew faces. And yet God, in his tender mercy and fierce justice, heard their cries for help, justice, salvation, and deliverance from Egypt even while they continued to build the barns and storehouses to preserve and store up the things of earth.

In antiquity, these storehouses and barns were the equivalent of today’s stocks and investment accounts. People believed that a full barn or storehouse was their security for a future of eating, drinking, and making merry all the days of their lives. But Hosea reminds us that the lesson of Egypt is that our storehouses, no matter where we put them, are no guarantee of security, and indeed, they could prove to be a profound security risk and liability, just as they are today. Ancient empires were founded on their ability to consume the resources of other nations, especially successful ones, and the result was always the same cycle of conquest and reconquest to determine control of the barns and coffers of rival and successful states. The story of Egypt reminds us that not even putting faith in carefully planned provisioning will provide security and safety from the justice of God, as the 10 plagues show, and Hosea warns his contemporaries from 2800 years ago that Israel, who has similarly placed her faith in places where it ought not be placed, is about to suffer the same fate as the might Egyptian empire did at the hands of the Assyrians (v. 5-6). As the storehouses of the Egyptians ultimately proved to be their undoing - twice! - so Israel’s faith in gods other than yhwh would be theirs.

Hosea pleads with Israel to abandon her dependency on things that do not satisfy. He begs Israel to cease making sacrifices to Baals and idols, reminding Israel that it is the LORD who nurtured and loved her, who called her out of Egypt, to taught her to walk and who took her in her arms, who healed them and who led her with kindness like a mother who lifts her babies to her cheeks and who bent down and fed (nursed?) them. We see here the agony of God, whose heart recoils within him as he struggles to uphold justice against his wayward child even while nurturing his warm and tender compassion (v.8). Our provision comes from the LORD himself, who loves us with a mother’s love, but who also disciplines us as a father might; desist from counting on our plans, our barns, our accounts, to be there for us in our hours of greatest need, for this is the world’s way, not the way of the heart of the LORD.

Like Hosea, the apostle Paul warns us against putting our faith in the world and in the world’s “solutions”.

So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, 3for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4When Christ who is your* life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.
5 Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). 6On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient.* 7These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life.* 8But now you must get rid of all such things-anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive* language from your mouth. 9Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices 10and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. 11In that renewal* there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!

(more…)

One thing that I hear a lot about is idea of “a” or “the” Christian worldview. In high school I voraciously read everything I could find by the late Francis Schaeffer, to many the patron saint of the idea of a Christian worldview. In college, the “Christian worldview” seemed to be the operational principle behind the entire curriculum. I still read about it in our alumni newsletters and magazines, and see or hear about conferences where “Christian worldview” is the entire focus. It’s an ubiquitous phrase on the radio, and it’s all over the various newsletters and other types of mailings we get several times a week. And thanks to an old friend, who recently emailed me his enthusiastic endorsement of “The Truth Project,” which I had forgotten about and which is intimately affiliated with James Dobson and Focus on the Family, it’s kind of recaptured my imagination for the moment. In other words, a “blogworthy” topic.

So, I have to make a confession.

I have absolutely no idea what it is, and even less of an idea of where to find it.

But I do know what people think they mean when they refer to “a” or “the Christian worldview.” Not coincidentally, it is primarily conservative and evangelical Protestants who have been the leaders in this pack, since its primary characteristic is its dedication to the Bible. In fact, although there are (and should be) major differences between a “Christian worldview” and a “Biblical Worldview,” in most of the discussions I have seen or heard in print, online, and on-the-air the two of them are used interchangably. Rhetorically, this has the effect of saying that a Christian worldview is a Biblical one, and if a worldview is not fundamentally based on the foundation of the Bible, it is definitely not Christian. It ignores the possibility that one can have a profoundly Biblical worldview and not necessarily be a Christian worldview; and it also cannot conceive of the possibility (even likelihood, unfortunately) that a profoundly Christian worldview is not at all biblical, no matter how much Bible goes into such a worldview’s prooftext(s).

It is also worth pointing out that I can understand why many think that such a thing exists and why, if we could actually achieve it, it would solve all the social and moral ills of our society, which in turn would bring us back to formative Christian ideals of the United States in the 18th century. It is a rhetorical move against increasing tendencies to secularize the founding fathers of the United States; by demonstrating that the Fathers in fact were Biblical in their religion and morality, combined with the above observations that a Biblical worldview must necessarily be a Christian one, these modern-day apologists are able to essentially impose a particular twentieth century interpretation of Christian faith to enlightened Deists who would be flabbergasted to know what is being done to them today for predominantly sectarian Christian political interests. In other words, the idea of a Christian worldview serves rhetorical and political purposes for those who hold to its possibility. But this is not helpful, because in a nation that Constitutionally cannot mandate any particular faith as “preferred,” let alone enforced, there are simply too many varieties of Christian experience for a singular Christian worldview, as much as I might admittedly wish for otherwise from time to time.

So. “The” Christian worldview is simply not possible. We just need to ask “which one should it be?” The “liberal” one? Or the “evangelical” one? Or perhaps we want to go with a denominationally sanctioned worldview. The Methodist one? The Presbyterian? Or the Baptist one? Or, even if we settled on The Baptist Christian Worldview, would it be the Southern Baptist, the General Associatoin of Regular Baptist, the Conservative Baptist, the American Baptist, or Independent Baptist, Fundamental Baptist … and so forth.

But I did give myself an out; I said “a singular Christian worldview” about eight lines up. If there can be no question of “the” Christian worldview, what about “a” Christian worldview, and allow for the fact that there are many Christian worldviews that, unfortunately, think tanks like Focus and Truth Project and Battle Cry and so on would cringe at being associated with as “Christian worldviews?”

I actually do not really like the term worldview all that much. I see it as a convenient catch-all term for pigeon-holing “group think.” For this is basically what a worldview is. It is a way of admitting that we all have a way in which we view life that consists of the sum total of our experiences as individuals and as members in various networks of communities. Each of us probably has an individual worldview that might consist of “categorical imperatives,” to use Kant’s phrase, which are either adopted wholesale and uncritically by what we have experienced, or which are hard-earned and fought out through serious criticism of our experiences as individuals within communal histories. In this light, to earn this kind of worldview is to earn a way of coming to terms with who we are as individuals and as members. We are always both. It is possible to speak, perhaps, of my worldview, and it may be possible to speak of the specific worldview of a local community in place. But as a rhetorical and political term, and an apologetic one, it pigeon-holes groups who fall outside of what “we” think and who are in opposition to us.

I do not believe that there is such a thing as “the Christian worldview,” but I do think there is the Christian Apologist’s Worldview that, despite making a lot of noise, in no way speaks for the rest of those of us who do not consider ourselves members of that ideological community. In another post, after we’re done with exams and papers and so forth, I’ll follow this up with the importance of local education in developing an authentic worldview that leads to ethical action and that I believe might justifiably be called A Christian and A Biblical worldview that may even be consistent with a worldview of the founding fathers.

Kudos to JakeB for posting this site as a reminder that while we sit around and lament the state of the world on our fancy laptops and blogs there’s real work being done by real people in a part of the world that many of us prefer to pretend does not exist.

You especially need to check out “The Miniature Earth” link on Aaron’s site, which hypothesizes what our global village would look like if there were only 100 people in it. JakeB says it’s haunting; it is that, and I think its convicting.

In the spirit of the Frog Has A Point, I give you the latest installment of our organic heroes as they battle for the ways of the Farm. Starring Cuke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Cannoli, and Princess Lettuce Organic as they battle the evil lord of the supermarkets, Darth Tater…

Regular readers of this blog (and of others where I’ve left comments) know that we homeschool our kids and also that while I support teaching religions in schools I’m not so keen on teaching “The Bible.” (I have a feeling this could be a longish post. You are forewarned. ) And now, suddenly, I’m confronted with the necessity of choosing a homeschool curriculum that includes, of course, “The Bible,” for my second-grader.

Homeschool parents know that the three big clearing houses for educational supplies and curricula are Evangelical and/or Fundamentalist in orientation. Some of them, such as Bob Jones Press (representing the Fundamentalist wing), write their own stuff. Logos is another one that is very focused in its stuff, not necessarily following the Fundamentalist curriculum (it does not, in fact) but in its very particular conservative Reformed/Providential emphasis. Logos does not market itself as a “home school clearinghouse” so much as it does its “classical-Christian” educational program, but with a decidedly conservative evangelical slant toward providential history and historical biblicism. The third, and biggest, player here is Veritas Press. Officially, Veritas is “unaffiliated,” and they carry everything from Penguin Classics to classical apologetics. It is, however, very much an Evangelical outfit that places the Bible at the center of its educational philosophy and markets its material specifically for Christian schools and for Christian homeschools.

So, here’s my dilemma, and it is largely the same dilemma I have with the idea of teaching the Bible in public schools. The reason why I can’t support teaching Bible in public schools is primarily because in the public, government supported schools, the curriculum is written and backed by the state, which would be tantamount to officially endorsing, in fact officially creating, a state-sponsored, official interpretation of the Bible. Not only would this be unconstitutional, but, especially in the current political climate and in the US’s role in the global economy, it would be especially dangerous and undesirable. No thanks.

Even supposing that such a curriculum could be written that was as value-neutral and non-sectarian as humanly (heck, even divinely) possible, there is the issue of Who is going to teach this? What criteria of qualification to teach the Bible in a public school will satisfy the parents and students? It simply won’t work. Churches can’t even agree on a Bible curriculum. Fundamentalist parents would never permit their kids to be taught Bible by a biblical scholar of any denomination that isn’t Fundamentalist in its outlook no matter how conservative or pious that scholar might be. Evangelicals committed to an Evangelical worldview and interpretation of the Bible would be only slightly more accepting of the same figure. But even here it would be rather out of the question to accept a completely secular Bible teacher who is unaffiliated with any church and/or trained in a “secular” university. Mainline Protestants, as well as students whose families are not committed to any flavor of Christianity (to say nothing of Jewish or Muslim students) will reject a bible teacher from Bob Jones or Liberty. It goes both ways.

This brings us back to “Christian schools” and “Christian” homeschools and the curriculum. Christian schools largely arose in reaction to political decisions to not include (or no longer include) Bible in the public school curriculum. Over time, these schools became the training grounds for kids (again, see yesterday’s post) to combat rising tides of secularism and moral deficiency in the broader American culture, and the solution to this in Evangelicalism has been “more Bible!” and, especially in Fundamentalist schools, hyper-isolationism. So the schools continued to emphasize the centrality of the Bible in every aspect of the curriculum, and the curriculum for the Bible became the centerpiece of the entire endeavor. But here the problem is fully illustrated; the only Bible curricula out there for primary and secondary education are defined, written, supported, and distributed by Evangelical or Fundamentalist clearing houses and distributors like CBD, Veritas Press, Logos, and Bob Jones. It may not be the State, but the impression is that if you’re going to do Christian ed, you have to do it this way or it’s not Christian. There are, of course, much smaller places that do in fact have more mainline Bible curricula, but these are primarily geared towards Sunday Schools and not for large-scale, institutional Evangelical primary and secondary education.

For those of us who homeschool, who are Christian, and who are (at best) highly suspicious of the Evangelical agenda and of its particular spin on history and biblical interpretation, this creates an ethical dilemma. Indeed, homeschool teachers, by definition amateurs in most of the subjects in the curriculum (if not completely ignorant!) are more or less at the mercy of the defined curriculum they settle on, or, if done in a local cooperative network, on whatever the board of directors settles on. If you as the parent of a homeschooled child do not agree with the cooperative’s adopted curriculum for the Bible component, or don’t like the choices available to do it on your own, and lack the competency (or the time) to draw up your own curriculum, well, good luck to you.

As someone who emphasizes the need for local, community-oriented education and economy and who tries to resist our dependencies on large-scale, institutionalized forms of education and economics (see some of my earlier posts), homeschooling is perhaps the best option we have. Part of good stewardship is being a good steward to our children, and not simply to our land our our heritage. Small, local cooperative networks of homeschooling has tremendous potential to offer an education to our kids that advocates the kind of ethical education that is lacking elsewhere. It is, by necessity, local community oriented. However, I have not seen this, despite its potential. From what I can see, homeschooling goes either in the direction of individualism, whereby individual families insulate their kids from anything that could contaminate the indoctrination they are giving their kids, while coopting the word “education” in the process. Or it takes the approach of parochialism, where similar and largely like-minded homeschool parents band together in a kind of wagon circle to protect what’s inside from outside influences, including the influences of “formal education” that Christian schools have adopted from public schools. In such groups, I’ve learned from experience that it’s their way, or the highway. Their Bible curriculum is nothing short of the gospel, as defined by the experts in Christian education. Take it … or leave it. This isn’t local, community oriented education at this point. It’s ghettoizing indoctrination.

Now, I’m a classical historian, a biblical scholar, and historian of religions by training, was “brought-up-born-again,” an active member of a left-leaning mainline suburban church, and a certified lay minister in my denomination. Beloved wife is a former public school elementary teacher, private tutor, current Sunday school teacher, church elder, and chair of the children’s ed committee at said church, and she’s also a leader in our local SBC evangelical church’s MOPS and AWANA groups. If ever there should be a couple who could figure out a good history and Bible curriculum for kids, we’re it. What might this look like?

I don’t know yet, but we’re working on it. In the next few days, maybe, look for a post on some criteria that such a curriculum might contain. And as always, I’m happy to take suggestions.

In the last few weeks in class, we’ve been discussing popular culture, religion, and the media, so Jeff Sharlet’s (of The Revealer) recent article in Rolling Stone and his comments on NPR come at an opportune moment. (BTW, JakeB has a good thing going over at his blog, and Sharlet even responded, so I encourage you to check it out.)

Sharlet’s article documents the alarming growth of a new evangelical youth movement known as Battle Cry, whose mission is to destroy “pop-culture terrorism.” Battle Cry strikes me as being a combination of Billy Graham Crusades, Promise Keepers, and Campus Crusade, only for kids. The leader of the movement, Ron Luce, is hell-bent (literally, it appears) on making sure that the “culture wars” survive at least one more generation. Apparently Luce is terrified that today’s youth will have nothing to contest when they grow into adults. Rest easy, Ron, there’ll be PLENTY, but you may be right that the issues that you think are life and death issues won’t be nearly as interesting or important as they were 15 years ago.

What we’re seeing here is the manifestation of fear, specifically the fear of losing a worldview that was so absolutely central to an earlier generation of a specific “community.” The Evangelical Community has prided itself on being the watchdog of morality since the 1950’s and was ideally placed (historically speaking) to confront what it perceived to be the secularist assault of subsequent decades. However, evangelicals are turning more and more to the more pressing issues that involve ethics and stewardship and justice more than they do individual morality. People like Ron Luce are feeling absolutely betrayed by their heritage, and it takes a media master like Luce to fuse this watchdog-mentality with the flotsam and jetsam of Evangelical Crusades, Billy-Graham and Campus style, and the Promise Keepers into a jihad like Battle Cry that targets the only real audience that has the emotional and hormonal capital to spend on stuff like this: today’s youth.

I’m certainly not going to deny that there is a whole lot of dehumanization and objectification of much of the pop culture that Luce and his Battle Crying minions feel they need to combat. The women’s lingerie industry, a favorite whipping boy (girl?) of Battle Criers and of the evangelical right in general, is a case in point, as Sharlet and Luce both recognize. (As would be the cover of the latest issue of Rolling Stone, where Sharlet’s article appears!) Objectification of women: bad. But, to deny women the right to take a little pride in their physical appearance, as Luce would seem to advocate, is absurd. Sure, there is wisdom in Jesus’ hyperbolically metaphoric injunction to cut off what causes you to sin, and if –if!–your latest issue of the Victoria’s Secret catalog causes you or your brother to sin, by all means, cancel your subscription, especially if you object to the fetishization of the sex goddesses in the thing. If drinking leads you or your brother/sister/neighbor into a life of sin and debauchery and violence, then cut it. But taken to the extreme, you get brainwashed kids who swear off A+W Root Beer (See the Stones article, referenced above). Reminds me of a fellow my dad once met years ago. Dad: Hey, can I get you a Pepsi? Friend: Nope, thanks, though; gave it up, gave it up when I found the LORD, when Jesus saved me. (pauses) But, I’ll take a beer if you got one of those…

In any case, while Luce’s furious criticism of the “secular media” and of the usual suspects of secularists, abortionists, liberals, Muslims, gays and lesbians, and so forth who are “conspiring” to destroy Christianity is the same schtick we’ve been hearing now for decades, he completely refuses to consider that there are more important issues we need to confront today. And as I’ve said, I think this stems from his own feeling of betrayal by the greater evangelical community. He cannot identify with the contemporary evangelical ethos that is growing on a daily basis, and so, like a jilted lover starving for the eros of his old passion or, like a former community member without a community to return to, (and we’ve all been there), rather than identify with another community he undertakes to practice jihad against his former confreres and form his own.

I use the word jihad here deliberately. Ron Luce and Battle Cry represent the mirror image of militant jihadist movements within Islam, which appeals to the young, the jilted, and the emotionally ideological who believe that everything their leader(s) believe in is under attack by some outside force. It fosters hate for those who are unlike them, and is violently antithetical to Christ’s injunction to love our enemies and to do good to those who hate us. For those of us who come from an evangelical heritage and who are participating in the growing movement of neo-evangelical ethics centered on justice, stewardship, and compassion, indeed, the culture wars aren’t over, but the site of the battle has shifted. For these neo-evangelicals, the battle for the minds of today’s youth isn’t going to be fought over lingerie and rootbeer and MTV, but over the ideologies of hate and injustice that, knowingly or unknowingly, Ron Luce and his Battle Criers promote in our young people. The trick is to engage without using the weapons of the enemy.