Re: Fw: "CREATION" in Stephen Hawking's opinion:THE 4 Sept 10 WSJ "Why God Di...

[Bct...@aol.com]

Willis,

Thank you for this very stimulating posting, along with the essay from the WSJ.  I have just finished reading them, and I just pre-ordered the book. Funny enough, this is one of those rare times that I've ordered the book that is Amazon's #1 bestseller!  Usually my books, as most of our books would be for this group, rank in the hundreds of thousands or even a million or more! 

 

I am just now immersed in deep thought and research on the Prologue to John and Genesis 1:1 to 2:4, and before today is over, I will have written my first words on the section on the Prologue!  I am sitting here with hundreds and hundreds of typed note cards on this subject, plus the works of Philo (I've already rewritten my Philo section). So, I am fascinated and am never going to give up on the meaning for us in Christian theology of what happened "in the beginning."  And, given that you are an expert in many languages, I will share with you that, with my own basic skills, I have read Gen. 1:1-2:4 in several English translations, including in a Jewish Bible and a translation of the Septuagint version, and I've read the Septuagint version in Greek.  I've also read the Prologue in Greek, Latin, and a couple of English translations.  So it's all in my head and heart, and by the end of Labor Day, I hope my labors will have produced one page.

 

I do believe that in the beginning was the Word, and that all things came into being through the Word, and that includes LIFE. I wonder where I will plug that in, as I read Hawkings's book after it arrives?  And of course, where would we be if the Word had not become flesh and dwelt among us, and where would we be if the Word had not revealed the Father to us?  Not to mention all the other things that Jesus Christ has done and is still doing for us.  (Where are my Calvinist-leaning friends these days?  Although I still remember Herb reminding me that not long after the Prologue, John the B. refers to Jesus as "'the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!'"  And of course, there is the Holy Spirit, whom the author of the Prologue somehow forgot to mention. 

 

Thanks for the dialogue, and I hope you are doing well.  I will write more after the book arrives.

 

Jane

 

In a message dated 9/5/2010 11:19:02 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, elli...@charter.net writes:

Fellow-Confessors

 

Tomorrow, the book will be published (released).  Clever PR, to pre-release snippets.

 

Here are my snips into the WSJ snippet (attached):

1

What a relief!  We orthodox theologians now have the support of "the greatest physicist since Einstein" for our belief in from-nothing (Latin *ex nihilo*) creation! 

2

I smile when atheists use "creation," which implies a personal "creator": no creator, no creation.  It's a verbal trick.  They sneak a personal word into science so they can depersonalize it.  And since the English word implies the supreme Creator (who in the Hebrew OT is the only one who "creates"), deicide (i.e., killing God) is the verbal trick's purpose.  /  I smile also when atheists sneak the personal into science by referring to natural regularities as "laws of nature": "laws" are conscious rules initiated by lawmakers.  The Declaration of Independence: "the laws of nature and of nature's God."

3

Materialists commit a philosophical overreach when they assume that a material explanation of something closes the question, ends the argument.  You can spot this narrow-mindedness in certain terms such as "without exception" & "mere."  Examples from Hawkins here: (1) In the universe/multiverse, everything "without exception" follows known physical laws; (2) "Human beings...are mere collections of fundamental particles of nature."

4

Materialists commit a neuroscience overreach in assuming that the latest brain-development, the rational brain, should dominate the whole brain-mind (the inner consciousness of intuition/imagination/feelings/decision-making; Hebrew *lev*).  A silly instance is Rich. Dawkins' explanation of sex, viz., "The Selfish Gene": it's interested only in getting reproduced, & it uses human sex-organs to achieve its goal.  In the materialist perspective, that's all you need to know about sex: it "explains" it (without even mentioning people).

4.1

Just so, "gravity" (says Hawking) now explains existence (unscientifically called "creation") (without even mentioning God, though he does - again, unscientifically - mention God).

4.2

In Western media, the materialist assumption is now general, & especially blatant in "science" news/documentaries.  /  And in Western medicine: I read, a few days ago, that "a chemical imbalance in the brain causes" a certain mental condition.  "Correlates with" would be a scientific verb: the person with the particular mental condition may have some responsibility for it.  But "caused" is a philosophical (materialist), not a scientific, verb.  It's assumption is that we are victims of our bodies, our minds being "nothing but" (or "merely"!) products of our brains.  /  How mind/brain are related is, philosophically, an open question.  Even theologically: e.g., are "the laws of nature" one aspect of God's mind-created physical brain?

5

An oft-remarked irony: Atheists (here, Hawking), more than do believers in God, talk about conscious beings beyond earth.  (Hawking even speculates that we may be taken over by beings who want to exploit earth's resources.)

6

The secular media won't pay much attention to counterings of Hawking by religious leaders, but I must quote one whose comment was the same day as the WSJ excerpt.  Rowan Williams (Abp. of Canterbury): "Belief in God is not about plugging a gap in explaining how one thing relates to another within the universe.  It is the belief that there is an intelligent, living agent on whose activity everything ultimately depends for its existence."

7

While Hawking admits the close association of faith & reason in the early history of Western science, his own assumption is what used to be called "the warfare of science and religion."  His book, it seems, is a triumphalistic announcement that the war has been finally won by science, the last battle being his "M-theory" (a version of string theory) as achieving what Einstein failed to, viz., a unified field theory.  Indeed, he put it precisely so: "M-theory is the unified field theory Einstein was hoping to find."  "Spontaneous creation" occurs in the collision-collusion of gravity & quantum (i.e., matter at the subatomic level).

7.1

Now consider this at the faith level: there is something instead of nothing because two somethings collide & collude.  Don't ask where the two somethings - gravity & quantum - came from: just believe they were there before anything else was.  /  Who finds that easier to believe than Gn.1.1?  All who reject the faith that "God made the heavens and the earth."  /  Two faiths in collision.  But not a collision of faith & reason: materialism is, I believe, less rational than theism.

8

In '88 (in his A Brief History of Time), Hawking said "If we discover a complete theory,...we shall know the mind of God."  How come, then, that in '10, having discovered a complete theory, he concludes that God has no mind (indeed, is not)?  His mathematical reason has so expanded in his consciousness as to become his religion: reality comes into existence "spontaneously," all by itself (as explained mathematically with gravity & quantum).

8.1

So Hawking's book comes out tomorrow.  How does it deal (or does it?) with infinite regress, the fact that faith in God instantly swallows discoveries & theories in science?  Who made "the heavens and the earth"?  God.  Who caused the Big Bang, which was caused by the collision-collusion of gravity & quantum?  God.  Who made gravity & quantum?  God.  /  The last words of the excerpt are "we are the lords of creation."  I wonder what the book's last words are?

9

There is, can be, no scientific basis for the materialist-atheist dogma that personal consciousness is "nothing but" an evolutionary emergent.  Hawking believes that consciousness & its supportive environment emerge together, & I agree with him that this may occur in many places of the universe/multiverse.  Why?  His way of saying he doesn't know is to call it "spontaneous," as only an input.  I see it as an output: Consciousness, God's mind, precedes & intends creation, including the emergence of beings intended for communion with him - in short, the Bible Story.  Which view has a higher potential for motivating humanity to truly human achievements?  Whichever it is, are not its superior achievements cumulative evidence of its truth?

10

World-culturally, what is more worrisome about Hawking is not his ideas but his double authority as Einstein 2 & as a spectacular instance of a high-achieving, severely "challenged" (i.e., crippled) human being.

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

 

[Bct...@aol.com]

Willis,

 

I forgot to also include Targum Neofiti I, trans. by McNamara, in my list of translations that I read on Gen. 1:1-2:4.  What's your take on the targums. I have just this past week read two 2010 books that argue that the Prologue to John has to be read in light of the targums. One book is a revised edition of one of McNamara's books from about four decades ago, and the other was written by John Ronning, who was writing in support of McNamara's ideas.  I understand that scholars go back and forth on the relevance of the targums, which in their written form are of course later than John, but I do find it intriguing to think about the potential influence of the Jewish synagogues and their liturgies on the Prologue.  This is right up the alley of some of my former papers, which were on the principle of lex orandi lex credendi, and the development of Trinitarian theology.

 

Hope you are well. Thanks for making us think.

[Bct...@aol.com]

Dear Willis,

 

This will have to be my third and final posting, given that it will already make me one over for the day.  But, as I said in one of my earlier responses to you, I am going though my hundreds of note cards, and here is what I just found, in a stack of cards stuck in my Philo and Prologue folder.

 

This is about the "God hypothesis" in philosophy and its relationship to science. It's from Keith Ward's book God and the Philosophers (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2009), pp. 72-73.  I think this makes a good contrast to what you and the WSJ wrote about Hawking and his ideas. This hypothesis suggests that God did the selection of our universe, and that God exists by "necessity." 

 

Of course, this is a philosophical argument, and not one based on revelation, but I think it fits for the dialogue you wanted to engage in here, in this Open Forum.  And Ward ends by saying something about science and religion: 

 

    "And that will make an enormous difference to us, since it will enable us to postulate that the universe is fully rational, and to proceed in science with confidence and in religion with circumspection and humility.”

 

From Ward, pp. 72-73: 

 

    “God, on the God hypothesis, is necessary, and the ideas of the possible worlds that form part of the content of the divine mind are not arbitrarily connected and separate elements.  They are the necessarily connected, exhaustive set of all possible worlds, and they are essentially parts of one unitary consciousness that is indivisible and indestructible. It is for that reason that God has been seen by the vast majority of classical philosophers as a coherent final explanation for the universe.

    The God hypothesis is precisely that the cosmic mind that selects a universe for the sake of its distinctive values exists by necessity, that all the possible worlds that partly constitute the mind of God are necessarily what they are, and that the necessary connections of things according to the basic laws of physics are rooted in the necessity of the divine mind.

    God is not a complex being, made up of separable parts, related to each other in wholly contingent ways.  God is a unitary consciousness whose nature is necessary and which is not composed of simpler distinct parts.  ... ”

    

    “... Nevertheless, I think the idea that there exists a necessary being having knowledge and intention is a coherent one. We can postulate that there is such a being, whose final explanation would consist in the full exposition and comprehension of its essential nature.  That explanation will always remain beyond our powers (as Hume always conceded).  But it is still a final postulate of reason that there is such an explanation.  And that will make an enormous difference to us, since it will enable us to postulate that the universe is fully rational, and to proceed in science with confidence and in religion with circumspection and humility.”

 

 

Jane

 

[Willis E. Elliott]

Wonderful Jane!  Except for the comment (tongue-in-cheek?) that the author of the Fourth Gospel's prolog "forgot to mention" the Spirit (I note, mentioned 3x in vv.32-34).  (You may remember getting from me, some months ago, my exposition of the Trinity in Jn.1, written for a non-Christian student of our son Bill in China.)

 

So true: "never give up on the meaning for us of ...what happened 'in the beginning'."

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

 

 Original Message -----

[Willis E. Elliott]

Jane

1

Unless a text reveals ignorance, we are to presuppose that its author was familiar with the worlds he writes of: Jn. (the Fourth Gospel) is aware of the Christian world, the Jewish world (including liturgics), the gnostic world, etc.  /  Most 1st-c. Jews spoke/thought/wrote in Aramaic, the language into which, Shabbat-by-Shabbat in the synagogues of the Jewish world, one verse at a time, the Hebrew Bible was translated (the translating being called targumming).  (The formalizing of the process, with official targums, was largely after NT times.)  /  As I had to learn Aramaic, I'm inclined to see its presence & influence in our spiritual legacy.  /  But as early as '30, E.C.Colwell warned against overstressing Aramaic influence: The Character of the Greek of the Fourth Gospel: Parallels to the 'Aramaisms' of the Fourth Gospel from Epictetus and the Papyri."

2

Seeing the synagogue in targums influencing Jn. is like seeing the church in ancient Greek lectionaries (Bible selections to be read in worship) as influencing the text from which modern translations are made.  (Briefly, beginning in '41, I was on the RSV Lectionary Committee.)  Targums & lectionaries are very minor matters, but life is enriched by (even very small) increases of knowledge (which roughly translates U.Chicago's motto: "Crescat scientia, vita excolatur").  In both cases, the living context is action (viz., worship), not thought, which is secondary: as you say, theology expounds devotion (Latin *lex orandi lex credendi*: the law of prayer/liturgy/worship precedes the law of belief [think of this in the case of Stephen Hawking]).

3

I believe that in some Hellenistic synagogues, the targumming was in both Aramaic & Greek, & in some others (mainly in Alexandrine Egypt) only in Greek.  Imagine the immediate impact of Jn.'s Prolog's Philonic Greek on Alexandrine Jews!

4

What's going on in the Hawking/God flap?  A few thoughts:

4.1

Religiously, a clash of two pieties, viz. the West's formative religion (Christianity) & materialist scientism.

4.2

Culturally, a struggle for intellectual respectability.  When I googled "the struggle for intellectual respectability," the first citation was no help: it quoted me; it never did get around to quoting the Ernest Cadman Colwell book-title of the '30s, "The Fourth Gospel and the Early Christian Struggle for [intellectual] Respectability."  Most of early Christianity's competitors were laughed out of intellectual existence, but the Christians "outthought" as well as "outloved" the competition.  In our '41 course in "The Common Christian in Early Christian Times," Colwell (then dean of UCDS; later, U.Chicago president) was specific about the points at which the Fourth Gospel stopped the laughter of the cultural elite, both Jewish & Gentile.  (On this, see also his ['36] John Defends the Gospel, & The Gospel of the Spirit: A Study in the Fourth Gospel.)

4.3

Hawking (as is clear in his title) is laughing at God as well as at God-believers: God is an unnecessary (& therefore illogical) premise, in violating of the law of parsimony (minimum hypothesis).  This logomachy (word-war) requires counter-laughter, which indirectly I suggest in my 7.1: "Materialism is, I believe, less rational than theism."  David Bentley Hart is (in my opinion), at the present time, the English language's best laugher for God (as Christopher Hitchens is the best laugher against God); we'll be hearing from Hart soon, I've no doubt.

5

Britain & Europe failed to develop adequate laughers against materialism (including the "scientific materialism" of Marxism) & scientism, & Christianity there is in eclipse.  Christianity will be in eclipse in America if we fail to develop adequate laughers against the likes of Stephen Hawking.  Why?  Because the brighter our children, the prouder they are of their reasoning power; & the prouder they are of that power, the easier it is for them to fall victim to materialistic rationalism, which rules our secular schools.  Result?  Gradually, belief in God will correlate with the less intelligent (i.e., less "rational") population, so belief in God will become easier to laugh at (as has happened in non-Muslim) Britain & Europe).

6

Your Trinity PhD theme swims upstream against this scientistic current in the West.  Thank the Lord!

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

----- Original Message -----

From: Bct...@aol.com

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Monday, September 06, 2010 10:05 AM

Subject: Re: Fw: "CREATION" in Stephen Hawking's opinion:THE 4 Sept 10 WSJ "Why God Di...

[Willis E. Elliott]

Thanks, Jane, for adding Ward.

1

I don't like science having "confidence," & religion only "circumspection and humility."

2

"One unitary consciousoness" is monism, incompatible with biblical religion.

3

OK with "a [rationally] necessary being having knowledge and intention."  But this is conceivable as impersonal, whereas biblical religion is not.  The personal includes the interpersonal (thus, tritarian perichoresis), as in G.H.Mead's origin of the person.

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

----- Original Message -----

From: Bct...@aol.com

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Monday, September 06, 2010 10:50 AM

Subject: Re: Fw: "CREATION" in Stephen Hawking's opinion:THE 4 Sept 10 WSJ "Why God Di...

[link...@aol.com]

Dear Willis,

One inconsistency in Hawking's logic is that though he speaks of
"universes," in the end he is still speaking of one universe, as he
indicates in writing in the singular: "the cosmos." Thus he also
writes of us as being "lords of creation" rather than "lords of a
creation." Our positing "multiverses" implies, by virtue of our
comprehension, that this multiverse reality is a universe, otherwise
it would not be conceptually accessible to us. In fact, "heaven and
earth" is a multiverse cosmos. The God of Israel created, preserves,
accompanies and rules this multiverse universe, as the Lord of heaven
and earth, the diverse cosmos in which both law and contingency (many
possible laws) are observable to human beings from within their place
within the differentiated whole.

Jim the Link

>   Jane- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[link...@aol.com]

P.S,

And, of course, based on the Scriptures, I could have written even of
"the heavens" and the earth! The concept of a multiverse universe is
"nothing new under the sun."

Jim

> > - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

[Willis E. Elliott]

Right, Jim, & well put.

1

But give the guy a mite of poetic license, as in pluralizing the number one without changing its number ("uni-verse-s" being oxymoronic).

2

On the other hand; give him none - he gives us none.  It's silly (& dirty, as I implied) to speak of nature's "laws" (instead of the scientific term, "regularities") with no Lawyer-Governor, & of "creation" (instead of the scientific term, "nature") with no Creator.  He makes God jobless by taking away his job-titles!

3

This morning, I read an interview with a nun we knew in Athens.  When she says (in Greek *ho kosmos*) "the cosmos," she does so with the radiance of the Orderer of the order of all that is.  When Hawking says "the cosmos," he means to leave nothing out except the Orderer, whose job he eliminates by tucking the ordering process into everything - a sleight of mind similar to tricksters' sleights of hand.  His fatuous faith: things may be a mess, but - given enough time - they'll straighten themselves out.  (Or, given the correct viewing-distance, they aren't a mess:chaos theory is an alternative angle on this less rational faith: things only seem to be a mess.)   /   But....

4

....the worship impulse is never at rest in human beings.  From its AV (angle of vision), all conflicts are internal or external WORSHIP WARS, each army waving its own comprehensive worldview flag.  At the moment, Hawking is the Supreme Commander of the Army of Scientism, the elitist West's worldview.

5

This collapsing of the Creator into "creation" (i.e., nature) is a world-historical phenomenon (examples: Buddhism, Confucianism, process theology).  Implicit in Buber's "I/Thou" criticism (to Berlin public-school teachers in '25) was that depersonalizing the teacher/pupil relationship to "I/It" is ruinous to education.  Broadly, the absorption of the Creator "I" into creation-nature "It" eliminates "Thou" for humanity: without the Creator/creation separation, we cannot be personally addressed, & become "It-s."  /  It finally got through to Priest Eli that youth Samuel in the temple was being addressed [as a Thou] by God.  Today, for youth who believe in the Creator, the world is that temple.  Without this belief, a youth is, cosmically, only an "I."  For the consequences, Buber's "Ich und Du" ("I and Thou") should still be required reading.

6

No comment on Ward (Jane & I, below)?

[link...@aol.com]

Dear Willis,

I haven't read Ward, so I can't comment other than on what Jane and
you said about him. Given that we are forbidden from putting Him to
the test, I could not in good faith call Him an "hypothesis." Also, to
call Him "a necessary being" seems to confuse Him with the multitude
of beings He deemed it necessary to create in order to fulfill His
holy and gracious purposes in fellowship with His creation. And, as
you said, the personal God of the Bible is not impersonal reason
deified.

Jim

> > - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

[Willis E. Elliott]

Yes, Jim.

1

On BBC's weekly television news (in USA, PBS) last night, Hawking nuanced "necessity": I'm talking (he said in substance) about the inevitability of "creation," given the laws of physics (in light of math, gravity, & quantum): because creation is inevitable, no god need be involved - no god need even exist, & I think none does.  But this does not close speculation on whether God exists.  /   He was responding to philosophers who have been laughing at him for intellectual overreach, closing questions he's untrained even to ask, giving answers (as Obama would say) "beyond his pay-grade."  (He's especially worried about the press's making him a member of the [dysfunctional comicstrip] Simpson Family!  As I've often said, laughter is the most effective way to damage an opponent's respectability.)

2

While I'm on humor, I love this headline which (I'm told) appeared somewhere:

"Stephen Hawking's new book proves that God doesn't exist, or something."

3

I've heard of nine meanings of "necessity."  All thought-systems include natural-physical-intrinsic necessity, which Hawking sees as the existence & co-activity of gravity & quantum.  Jonathan Edwards discoursed in detail on two types of necessity, viz. natural (he also uses gravity) & moral (the will, & "habits and dispositions of the heart").

4

Did Robert Bellah get his "Habits of the Heart" (1985) title from Jon.Edwards?  Seems probable, as both men were concerned about the present & future of the American character (autonomy & responsibility).  Today is Ground Zero Day, "9/11," an historic challenge to who & what we Americans (& "Westerners") are & what our footprint will be on human & global history.  Last evening, Loree & I walked (in Zanney Park) to the center of a repro of the Chartres Cathedral labyrinth: where, now, for America, is the center?  What, now, is necessary?

5

Logically, the antonym of necessity is contingency.  /   Behaviorally, it is freedom.  In the game of chess, the object is to eliminate one's opponent's freedom by immobilization-humiliation: the opponent's "king" can't be taken, but can't move & so is less than a slave.  /   Systemically (formally, as in Euclid & Hawking), the antonym of necessity is non-sense, so chaos or nonbeing.

6

Biblically-canonically, God is known less in his being than in his doing, which reveals his being to the extent of his intended self-revelation.  The category "necessity" applies not to his being but only to aspects of his doing  -  as you say, "necessary to" ("to create in order to fulfill His holy and gracious purposes in fellowship with His creation").

7

Apparently unique among embodied creatures, we humans can attend  -  in addition to the daily middle things  -  to "first things" & "last things."  How we so attend affects the living of our middle life.  The fragilities of life/relationships/achievements ("9/11") & of thought (the Hawking Event) nudge us so to attend.

8

Finally, some concluding affirmations on this email's "Subject: CREATION, necessity, & God":

8.1

God's being is "totally other" than ours in being non-derivative.  (The "infinite qualitative distinction" between Creator/creation.)

8.2

Derivative categories such as "necessity" do not apply to God's being.  Creation was not necessary.

8.3

Some of God's intending & doing involves necessity.  Creation, by his free choice, was necessary to make possible his intended fellowship with us.

8.4

Hawking restates an old truth: God is not necessary to human thought.

8.5

If God were necessary to human thought, we could not freely choose to seek him, to love him, to have fellowship with him.

8.6

Without fellowship with God, our reason for being is unfulfilled.

[link...@aol.com]

Dear Willis,

Very well put!

Not being a physicist, I hesitate to ask the question whether in fact
Hawking ignores contingency within creation (did Edwards, as well,
perhaps?). From what I have read, quantum theory brings into play
probablility at the sub-atomic level. Einstein didn't like this, hence
the famous protest, "God does not play dice with the universe!"
Hawking's "necessity" in a unified set of laws of probability within a
cosmos in its continually throwing of the dice, until, like the
proverbial multiple monkeys at the typewriter producing Hamlet, an
anthropocentric universe came into being.

Jim the Link

On Sep 11, 10:35 pm, "Willis E. Elliott" <elliot...@charter.net>
wrote:

> ...
>
> read more »- Hide quoted text -

[Willis E. Elliott]

Dear Al

 

No problem with what you say; some problems with what you don't.

1

If the human project is how to be human, who gets to sit around the table to work on the project?  A prior question: what "materials" should be spread out on the table as essential to the project?  Or let's mere the two:

The physicist (say, Hawking) puts on the table that we are physical.

The chemist........................................................................chemical.

The biologist,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,alive.

The neuroscientist.........................................our "emotional mind" & our "rational mind."

The religionist................................................our worshiping spirit.

The ethicist....................................................our moral sense.

The philosopher.............................................our powers of abstraction & complification.

The artist (painter/musician/poet/architect).......................................................our esthetic senses.

The psychologist............................................the PERSONAL.

The sociologist..............................................our interpersonal activities & capacities.

The economist...............................................our possibilities of wealth-production & -distribution.

The technologist............................................our building or construction potentials.

The story-teller..............................................our ability to live imaginatively in different worlds.

2

Do we not need all those chairs  (& perhaps even more) to work on the project?

3

In my early teens, in our basement, I had a chemophysical lab I spent at least an hour a day in (in addition to my schoolwork) puttering & dreaming (lesee, a half-dozen perpetual-motion experiments....).  Our parents believed we children should follow our fascinations, & I had plenty of time to follow mine, as I didn't have to "work" & did no dating until after seminary.  /   My early freedom to sit in various chairs around the "human project" table engendered in me a suspicion of any chair beginning to sound like a throne.

4

Hawking's chair has been sounding like a throne.  (I can hear my father saying, "Consider the alternatives.")  What that is truly human (at the heart of the "humanum") is he leaving out?  In a word, the PERSONAL.

4.1

Scientism ("scientific materialism," Marx called it) has no place for the personal - embodied or unembodied self-consciousness, which it reduces to mere sentient awareness of various degrees.  And since purpose is a characteristic of the personal, it exists only as an optional human ad-on.  The option not to add it has been growing cancerously in the West since WW2.  By the late '50s, it was perceivable enough for Roger Shinn to nail it - in the UCC Statement of Faith - as "aimlessness"; &  the spectacular success of Rick Warren's "purpose-driven" writings witness to the void, as does the present post-Protestant non-work ethic (resistance to the work-ideak, alongside the need for work) in America.

4.2

Since science works with/on matter, what is immaterial (the "material" of half of the chairs) is "immaterial" (unimportant) to it.  That's the passive fact.  The active fact is "scientism," the mind-set to which religion, philosophy, even to a large extent the arts, is captive.  The mind-set, the culture: "Our culture...is intensely materialistic and secular," says D.K.Friesen in stating the view of  J.D.Hunter in "To Change the World" (Ox/10, as reviewed in the 9.7.10 Christian Century).  Friesen says Hunter's paradigm for Christians is incarnational "'faithful presence within'" the culture, with cultural change as "'secondary to the primary good of God himself and the primary task of worshipping him and honoring him in all they do.'"  My point, Al: This book (which already is being much discussed) sets over against our culture's mindset the Bible's RADICAL [cosmic-terrestrial] PERSONALISM, which I expressed in sec.8.6  (below) thus: "Without fellowship with God, our reason for being is unfulfilled."

4.3

Indirect evidence of the importance of the personal is science & scientism's sneaking it into what one may call "crypto-personal" (& thus fraudulent) words & phrases:

4.3.1

Hawking's title, "The Grand Design."  He's talking about a pattern he speculates repeats itself throughout existence, viz. gravity + quantum = "spontaneous creation."  But "pattern" does not suggest "patterner" as much as "design" suggests "designer."

4.3.2

Hawkins's phrase, "spontaneous creation."  He's talking about the origin of matter, but "origin" does not suggest "originator" as much as "creation" suggests "creator."  And since creating is the first thing the Bible mentions God as doing, "spontaneous" eliminates the need for God from the kick-off.  And since this verbal trick absorbs the deity into the action (the Bible using "create/creation" only of God), cosmology thus swallows up theology & becomes in itself the cosmologist's religion, the religion of scientism.

4.3.3

Moving from physics to biology, who could forget "natural selection," Darwin's crypto-personal metaphor from cattle-breeding?  Persons (breeders) select, but (to speak scientifically) non-human sexual interactions occur impersonally: "natural" here means "impersonal": God does not personally select (though he may start the process, as indeed he does in the early editions of "The Origin of Species").

5

I'm optimistic.  It's getting clearer that scientism's enemy #1 is science.  Old distinctions -  e.g., reason/revelation & intelligent/personal - are blurring.  On the latter, consider that each cell's life-program is spelled out on its DNA strip (Stephen Meyer, signatureofthecell.com)!

6

Your email is closely & well reasoned.  You ask me a few questions:

6.1

"What does belief in God and his creative activity add to our understanding of the universe as described by science?"  What science?  To scientism, which premises materialism, no nonmateriality can add anything - as you say, "God is irrelevant."  But to scientists (e.g., Stephen Meyer) who premise God rather than materialism, belief in God motivates to the progressive discovery of intelligent patterns in nature, thus adding to "our understanding of the universe."  /  But metaphysically, the question is backwards: God, who is subject, is made the predicate.  Realistically, one should first ask What does science add to belief in God?  Francis Collins' "The Language of God" is a good start in answering that.

6.2

"What kind of God is the basis for the deepest meaning of existence and clarifying humanity's obligation to life?"  As you've long known, my answer is "A PERSONAL God," "personal" as biblically & Christian-theologically defined.  Your question is both qualitative & comparative.  Pragmatically, what does a culture/civilization's "humanum" (human/humane/personal qualities) have to say about its premise (or "faith")?  /  Falsely, scientism exempts itself from cultures/religions/civilizations based on faith + reason.  It claims (& is captive to the illusion) that materialism = fact/reality/truth instead of faith (the faith that personality is only an evolutionary emergent).  This material ghost of biblical religion can be expected to be (indeed, in some instances has been) "the basis for the" shallowest "meaning of existence."  Indeed, from materialism, one is hard put to derive any sense of "humanity's obligation to life."  Quite the reverse from Jesus' incartnation, life, cruicifixion, & resurrection.

7

Yes to your "Science has not produced a meaningful world."  How could an activity of "the rational mind" produce, without "the emotional mind," human meaning?  But neuroscience is improving our understanding of what "human" means, & this may preface a more meaningful world.  Yet every increase in complexity & power is also an increase in fragility - 9/11, cyberwar,....  /  I pray for, & expect, a more human & humane conversation around the table "till Kingdom come."

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

----- Original Message -----

From: Alfred Bloom

To: 'Willis E. Elliott'

Sent: Sunday, September 12, 2010 2:50 AM

Subject: RE: CREATION, necessity, & God - in light of Stephen Hawking's "The Grand Design"

Dear Willis,

I heard an interview with  Hawking and his collaborator, Chopra and a Catholic  teacher  Spitzer. I cannot remember all the names.

 

It seems, however, that while Hawking makes a good target and there are weak points in his system, since the  principles of science neither confirm nor disprove the existence of God. It is not a province of science and it becomes clear when his  ideas are spelled out.

 

However, his weakness does not assure the “truth” of traditional  understandings about God and creation. Even if God may have started the whole system off, what does belief in God and his creative activity add to our understanding of the universe  as described by science? How would it make science more effective or sound as science? As far as science is concerned for its methods and findings, God is irrelevant. Whatever science discovers does not tell us what kind of God may have been at work.  

You have not shown that he is  relevant for science, despite your critique of materialism and secularism.

  

The importance of God for human beings lies not in his relation to science, but  in his relation to human destiny and meaning which are not objects of science, at least the kind of science he is dealing with in theoretical physics. Then the question is what kind of God is the basis for the deepest meaning of existence and clarifying humanity’s obligation to life. I don’t think you  have clarified that, though you  work from a specific interpretation of God based on your reading of the Bible and your personal experience. But this is only something you can advocate but not prove with universal validity. As I recall St. Thomas taught that when the universe is regarded in itself, it would seem to be eternal. We only know the creatorship of God, particularly the God revealed in Jesus Christ,  through revelation. In Christian theology Creation and Redemption are connected. Since God  makes a new creation. But that cannot be rendered scientific. It is faith.

 

I really don’t know why Hawking gets so much attention but I think it is a reaction against secularism generally and the fact that science has not produced a meaningful world, but one filled with threat from nuclear weapons to the domination by media which makes people feel powerless.  We cannot turn science off because we are all trapped and enthralled  by its “benefits.”  But it is harder to live with it in many ways.

 

I don’t think religious people of any stripe can take comfort  from Hawkings  limitations.  There are many problems in religion itself. Epistemological issues remain unanswered as to just  how anyone knows whether religion or one’s own religion is true or necessary beyond the fact that humans have always had some form of religion.

 

I hope that your health remains good and that your eyesight has not too badly diminished as you indicated some time ago.  Best wishes, and thanks for your missive.

 

Aloha

Al

[Herb Davis]

dear Confessors,  I am beginning the Hunter book.  I would enjoyreading it along with others.  Gabe keeps suggesting that this book is a game changer.  I don't know if it is but it could be a good read.  Any friends for the way.  I would be glad to set the pace and to raise some questions.  Herb

[fcba%40comcast.net]

Herb,

 

I just went out and bought it. I should have some time to read it when I am at the Abbey of the Gennesee. Since I have never read A SECULAR AGE nor HABITS OF THE HEART I think that I should atleast get my mind on this one. The concept is quite intreging.

 

Chris

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

[Thomas Dean]

Chris,

I wish I was going to the Abbey of the Gennesee.  I'm glad you found it a good place for a retreat.  I wasn't able to get there this year.  Say hello to Father Jerome for me.

Have a blessed retreat.

Tom

[John Cedarleaf]

Chris:
Great place! It is good to have a CC and Mercersburg colleague in the Finger Lakes if even for a short time. You are about 50 miles south of me.

John

-- 
Rev. Dr.John N. Cedarleaf
Pastor
First Congregational United Chruch of Christ
26 E. Church St.
Fairport, NY 14450
585-223-0224; 585-223-8172

[Gabe]

Hunter readers,

Just in touch with Max Stackhouse who hopes to read along with us.

A clue to the theology at work in this social science/work? Check out
Abraham Kuyper and the neo-Calvinists such as Nicholas Wolterstorff.
Some of us will remember the latter's excellent WHEN JUSTICE AND PEACE
EMBRACE. Sadly, this school of thought is not widely well known in
this country.

Here is a sample of the social science at work in TO CHANGE THE WORLD,
as timely in intepreting our culture as last week's primary and the
rise of the Tea party with their conflation of the public with the
political:

"Politicization is most visibly manifested in the role that ideology
has come to play in public life; the well-established predisposition
to interpret all of public life through the filter of partisan
beliefs, values, ideals and attachments. How does this come about? My
contention is that in response to a thinning consensus of substantive
beliefs and dispositions in the larger culture, there has been a turn
toward politics as a foundation and structure for social solidarity.
But politicization provides a framework of expectations and action and
very little substantive content. In a diverse society, ideological
polarization is a natural expression of the contest to provide
content." (page 103)

Much to think about here as throughout the book and thus an invitation
to do some substantive theology.

--Gabe

[Scott Paeth]

I just received this book the other day, along with Hawking's "The Grand Design." I'm hoping to read along as well, but I'm currently also up to my ears in the Niebuhr brothers for my next book. Wish me luck!

Scott

[fcba%40comcast.net]

Gabe,

 

Again I am speaking beyond my ken but one thing that struck me about the book THE FOUNDING BROTHERS by Joseph Ellis was that partisanship is nothing new in American politics. Washington and Adams wanted to steer clear of partisanship but the battles between Hamilton (The Federalists) vs. Jefferson and Madison (the Republicans) were prophetic about partisanship in our American democracy. We have never really defined what were the freedoms that were fought for in the Revolutionary War and it became apparent by the end of Washington's term that the two parties defined freedom differently. This continues to this day in our present two parties.

 

I have already read the first three chapters of TO CHANGE THE WORLD and I am hooked. So far he has pointed out the problem that is common to both the left and the right using illustrations from Dobson, Colson, Wallis to Mother Teresa. He has only hinted at the answer but I am excited that the book reads very well. It is not dry nor merely acedemic.

 

Chris

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

----- Original Message -----

From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>
To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

[Gabe]

Chris,

Sounds like we are off and running. Hey Herb, what chapters do you
want us to read?

Glad Scott is joining the conversation . Wonderful to hear about the
book-to-be on the two Niebuhrs.

--Gabe

On Sep 16, 4:52 pm, "fcba%40comcast.net" <f...@comcast.net> wrote:
> Gabe,
>
> Again I am speaking beyond my ken but one thing that struck me about the book THE FOUNDING BROTHERS by Joseph Ellis was that partisanship is nothing new in American politics. Washington and Adams wanted to steer clear of partisanship but the battles between Hamilton (The Federalists) vs. Jefferson and Madison (the Republicans) were prophetic about partisanship in our American democracy. We have never really defined what were the freedoms that were fought for in the Revolutionary War and it became apparent by the end of Washington's term that the two parties defined freedom differently. This continues to this day in our present two parties.
>
> I have already read the first three chapters of TO CHANGE THE WORLD and I am hooked. So far he has pointed out the problem that is common to both the left and the right using illustrations from Dobson, Colson, Wallis to Mother Teresa. He has only hinted at the answer but I am excited that the book reads very well. It is not dry nor merely acedemic.
>
> Chris
>

> God Is Still Laughinghttp://home.comcast.net/~fcba

> God Is Still Laughinghttp://home.comcast.net/~fcba

[Herb Davis]

dear Hunter Book readers, Gabe is ready to go. Unless someone wants to
hold off, I would like to get started since I need to finish the book by
10/4. Here is a suggested schedule. Lets see how we do and anyone who
wants to can jump in.
anyone can post any comments when you are ready but we will move to the
next section on dates indicated unless we get too excited.

Read and discuss: Essay 1, chapters 1-4, Sept 20th

read and discuss: essay 1, chapters 5-7, Sept. 23

read and discuss essay 2, chapters 1-4, Sept 26

read and discuss essay 2 chapters 4-7, Sept 29

read and discuss essay 3 chapters 1-3, Oct 2

finish up Oct 7, with input from the Confessing Christ Steering
Committee meeting.

Ready, set go. Herb

[Bct...@aol.com]

Scott, I do wish you well as you write your book, and I will look forward to reading it. 

 

Herb, Gabe, Chris, Scott, and all, I will try to read Hunter's book with you, and I did get the Hawking's book and have started it. It's harder for me to keep up these days.

 

Jane

 

 

In a message dated 9/16/2010 1:48:58 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, scott...@mac.com writes:

I just received this book the other day, along with Hawking's "The Grand Design." I'm hoping to read along as well, but I'm currently also up to my ears in the Niebuhr brothers for my next book. Wish me luck!

Scott

On Sep 16, 2010, at 12:42 PM, Gabe wrote:

[Willis E. Elliott]

Gabe

 

I'll be listening up good on the Hunter thread, & hope Max chimes in.  /  Yes on Kuyper/Wolterstorff.  Perhaps more Am. attention to that school as the depth of Am. discontent becomes more visible, along with the humiliations of our arrogance.  /  And yes to your use of the p103 quote as reading-incentive!  Mark Noll says America had two foundings: we're close now, it seems to me, to having two Americas.

 

COMMENTS on "To Change the World" in light of the 9.7.10 Christian Century review:

1

Hunter's subtitle - "The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World" - suggests a multi-faceted, multi-directional critique leaning away from "We shall overcome" triumphalistic activism toward a lively quietism of "faithful presence within."  At U.Va., he seems to be continuing the work of Robert Wilkens & (I think) should be read in that light.

2

Certainly, this book should be read as a continuation of his "Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define America."  Back to 1951 (H.Rich.Niebuhr's "Christ and Culture"), forward to Hunter's use of a fresh look at "culture" for diagnosing the ills of the present "political theologies."  His goal & resources made this a good book before he began to write it.

3

A third of the book, says the reviewer, aims at "a better understanding of power."  I gotta read at least that 1/3rd!  The specific reason for my being "let go" from the UCC national office (UCBHM) in '69 was a different understanding of power.

4

"Politics as the central means of changing the world," says the reviewer, is (quoting Hunter) "'mostly illusory'."  Hunter says it tempts Christians to view "devotion to God" as only a "tool."  I would add that for many such activists you & I have known, interest in theology has been even less than interest in devotion.

5

But I said I'd be listening, so I'd better stop talking....except to smile at the reviewer's criticizing Hunter for using the Bible's personal pronouns for God.

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

 

----- Original Message -----

From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

[Richard Floyd]

In following news of the pope's visit to Britain, I came across a piece in the Christian Science Monitor about the beatification of John Henry Newman, and was delighted to see this:

“Gabriel Fackre, emeritus professor at the Andover-Newton Theological Academy (sic) in Boston, and well-known in the ecumenical community, argues “the heart of ecumenism [or interfaith work] is when each tradition brings its own gifts to the other.”

Newman, Mr. Fackre argues, was known for the idea that theological ideas have a “trajectory” in which “you don’t abandon the teachings but let them flower – the ordination of women might be an example. It is a very supple concept of doctrine that is a long way from Benedict, who seems to rigidify doctrine.””

[fcba%40comcast.net]

Gabe again holds up the honor of Nevin, Schaff & Mercersburg Theology.

 

Chris

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

[Gabe]

Herb and Hunter readers,

(First, congratulations , Jane!)

Some thoughts on Herb's first reading assignment.

"Creation mandate" may come as a puzzle to many of us, me too,
initially. After re-reading a few Dutch Reformed theologians and
dipping back into Wolterstorff (named as one of the people to whom
Hunter is indebted, in the Preface") and Googling the words it came
clear, traceable to Kuyper and now the neo-Calvinists, the latter
ranging from some many of us would find kindred and others of the
"dominion" view. I am trying to avoid the words "left" and "right" for
that is one point Hunter is making, that we sub-consciously import
political terms to describe points of view and thus buy into the
seductions of late modernity. In a Reformed tradition with which we
may be more familiar the creation mandate would be the commission to
to witness to the Lordship of Christ in the world outside the church.
However, the norms we would deploy, beyond the radical love of the
cross, would include those accessible to those outside the church
stated either in terms of "natural law" or "common grace"--justice,
freedom and order, or "truth, "goodness" and "beauty," for example.

Page 17, last sentence, after laying out the 3 strategies--evangelism,
political action and social reform--that come out of the standard
"social imaginary" (a Charles Taylor phrase ), including ours, mostly,
is a shock: "This account is almost wholly mistaken" In describing
why, his illustrations are often from the Colson/Dobson circles,
which, again might be unfamiliar to us in their details. But that is
because he is descirbing the forces since the 1980s that have had high
visibility in efforts at social change, and also because he has been
writing about them in the culture-wars of the last 20 years. It is a
little sobering to think that not much attention is paid to our own
efforts in the mainline Churches to have an impact on culture when
Churches like the UCC have so much invested in the same. However, if
he were writing about an earlier period (civil rights movement, peace
movement), the picture would be different.

In Chapter 4, a question comes to mind. to what degree do the social
dynamics he is describing below the level of "ideas," the church's
witness and the like, enter into the actual changing of culture? Is
this just a new way of talking about "contextual theology" as in
liberation theology? Or is making us aware that this substrate is a
force that the church has to pay attention to along with its usual
commitments? Or are these forces the actually decisive factor in
cultural change? Or something else?

Professor Hunter has graciously agreed to respond to some questions
our Cape Cod Theological Tabletalk group might pose. I could forward
to them/him any that the discussants here agree are important.

--Gabe

PS Thanks, Rick, for passing on that Christian Science Monitor story.
I had not seen it.

[fcba%40comcast.net]

Dear Herb,

 

I just looked at the schedule you have listed and my reaction is that you are going to push us quite quickly through the book. I will be at the Abbey of Gennesee for the first two parts you have listed.

 

The two points that summarize the first three chapters (three quarters of the First essay) are the following.

 

1) Most Christians assume that if you "Change the values of the common person for the better and a good society will follow in turn." (page 9)

 

 

2) To go against this view Hunter quotes Andy Crouch's Culture Making: Renewing Our Creative Calling  on page 28.

 

"...culture changes when new cultural goods, concrete, tangible artifacts, whether books or tools of buildings---are introduced to the world."

 

I can't wait until I see how he deals with this further in the book. The fact that I will not be commenting during the next week only means that I am on retreat. I continue to be very interested. I hope this book brings out a lot of discussion.

 

Chris

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

----- Original Message -----
From: "Herb Davis" <herb....@mindspring.com>
To: confessi...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, September 16, 2010 9:51:02 PM
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

[Willis E. Elliott]

I feel liberated, Gabe, by your jumping in two days ahead of Herb's schedule.

1

I am awed & joyed by the cruising of your mind in/around/under/above Hunter's.  You  make me feel in class, though theologically I'm not in your class.  (The fact that linguistically you're not in my class makes me hopeful that you may find me worth reading.)  /  At a deeper level, love: the fellowship of the saints (the grateful forgiven sinners).

2

Congratulations on being intellectually humble & curious enough to google stuff you already know much about - in this case, "creation mandate."  (Google: "some evangelical Christians" / "God's intentions for humanity" / "our God-given responsibility for His creation" / "the cultural or dominion mandate"....)

2.1

I was astonished at H.'s first sentence (chap. 1): "Out of nothing, 'God created the heavens and the earth' (Gen.1:1)."  The Bible's first sentence!  What a pleasant turn-on to us Bible-believers, though courageous turn-off to (secularist) Western academia!  We are to be (2:15) "world-makers" (+ 1:28 & 2:19-20).  And, in the same paragraph, (1) we Christians have this mandate as "God's people" (with no mention of the Jews), & (2) our Lord is "Jesus Christ, the last Adam (1Cor.15:45), the first born of the New Creation (Rom.8:24; Eph.1:20)."

2.2

H.'s eminence as a U.Va. high-achieving sociologist somewhat protects the book - in spite of that first paragraph - from being slotted into "Evangelical [maybe even "Creationist"] Literature."

2.3

Your mention of Reformed influence on H. fits with his upfront christology as you spell out a Reformed meaning of "creation mandate."  But Peter Berger, the scholar he calls (chap.4, n.12) "my mentor," is Lutheran, not Reformed.  I see H.'s notion of "culture" as a subjective as well as objective construct as in direct developmental line with Berger's social construction of reality.  H. rejects the subjective constructs (& related action-recommendations) of "culture" as the  current "political theologies" perceive-conceive it.  /  When Berger came from Vienna immediately after WW2, he headed for a Lutheran college (Wagner), then stayed in NYC for his PhD (New School).  We had a laugh when I told him that my first secretary at NYTS was a relative of his (also from Vienna).

3

On your second main paragraph, yes to H.'s addressing "forces since the 1980s....the culture wars of the last 20 years."  In chapter 2's 1st paragraph, H. says "everything hinges on how one understands the nature of culture."  Well, anyway, everything in this book hinges/hangs on it.  H. would agree (as his 1st chapter's 1st sentence shows) that what everything hangs on is the nature of nature: God's CREATION, or (S.Hawking) "spontaneous creation."  If one can't manage to swallow the Bible's first verse, its remaining verses are unintelligible, incoherent.  (Again, Gabe, I hope we can soon have a Craigville Colloquy on creation.)  /  Charles Colson & Nancy Pearcy's "How Now Shall We Live?" (2004) has creation as its first theme after an intro chapter.  H. recognizes the book's importance.  I have a few comments on it:

3.1

Yes, as H. says, the book is "hearts and minds": culture changes bottom-up, one "value" (which H. defines as a "moral preference") & one person at a time.  ln the current stir toward the Nov. national elections, the Tea Party & other conservatives are using "values" as code for "pro-life" & "anti-gay-marriage" & "small government" & American individualism (against Obama's "socialism").   While I concur with H.'s challenge to this "political theology," I do want to affirm - by my comments on this book - that ideas do have consequences.

3.2

During his Washington DC rally, Glenn Beck sounded as though he'd memorized gobs of this book, which has the orthodox-Presbyterian confidence I remember from my face-to-face conversations in Europe with Francis Schaeffer '66-'71 (as well as from reading his books he sent me, & our correspondence).

3.3

Schaeffer, of course!  Schaeffer via Pearcey, who was an atheist shortly before showing up in Switzerland at Schaeffer's L'Abri, where she mastered his mind (at about the time Loree & I were visitors there, almost 40 years ago).  The same year the Colson-Pearcey book came out, her "Total Truth: Liberating Christianity From Its Cultural Captivity" appeared.  Unsurprisingly, she's the Francis A. Schaeffer Scholar at the World Journalism Institute & a senior fellow at the (anti-Darwinian) Discovery Institute.

4

As you know, Gabe, I read books back to front (but not because I taught Hebrew!): scanning indexes, bibliography, & endnotes.  In H., all three categories are extensive.  Indexes question: which items have the most references, & why?  (E.g., how come Yoder gets 11?)  Bibliography: which authors have the most publications?  On endnotes, which are the longest, & why?  Now that that's done, I'm ready to read the book, which I may get a library copy of Monday.

 

Grace and peace--

Willis 

 

----- Original Message -----

From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

Sent: Saturday, September 18, 2010 9:34 AM

Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

Herb and Hunter readers,

(First, congratulations , Jane!)

Some thoughts on Herb's first reading assignment.

"Creation mandate" may come as a puzzle to many of us, me too,
initially. After re-reading a few Dutch Reformed theologians and
dipping back into Wolterstorff (named as one of  the people to whom
Hunter is indebted, in the Preface") and Googling the words it came
clear, traceable to Kuyper and now the neo-Calvinists, the latter
ranging from some many of us would find kindred and others of the
"dominion" view. I am trying to avoid the words "left" and "right" for
that is one point Hunter is making, that we sub-consciously import
political terms to describe points of view and thus buy into the
seductions of late modernity. In a Reformed tradition with which we

may be more familiar the creation mandate would be the commission to witness to the Lordship of Christ in the world outside the church.

However, the norms we would deploy, beyond the radical love of the
cross, would include those accessible to those outside the church
stated either in terms of "natural law" or "common grace"--justice,
freedom and order, or "truth, "goodness" and "beauty," for example.

Page 17, last sentence, after laying out the 3 strategies--evangelism,
political action and social reform--that come out of the standard
"social imaginary" (a Charles Taylor phrase ), including ours, mostly,
is a shock: "This account is almost wholly mistaken"  In describing
why, his illustrations are often from the Colson/Dobson circles,
which, again might be unfamiliar to us in their details. But that is

because he is describing the forces since the 1980s that have had high

herb.da...@mindspring.com> wrote:

[John Cedarleaf]

Herb,
I've just ordered the book and it won't arrive until tomorrow! I'll try and catch up as quickly as possible.

John

[Gabe]

Willis and Hunter readers,

Interesting comments...without having yet read the book ? :). Glad
that you are getting it from the library. We will all look forward to
your reflections.And others pitching in make this a really interesting
exchange of ideas.

One preliminary comment. Nice point about Lutheran Berger. However, I
think he is influenced by the sociology of Berger not so much, if at
all, his theology. What comes to mind is Berger's famous comment on
Nicaea. "To understand the council and the creed, you have to know who
paid the boat fare of the bishops." To see the socio-economic factors
at work, however, does not mean that Nicaea's doctrine, as such, is
wrong, as God does use often "the weak things of the world and the
despised," only that ideas, standing alone, do not have consequences.
Hunter takes up the U of C Richard Weaver 1948 book,IDEA'S HAVE
CONSEQUENCES with some probing comments.

Another prelim--on the Index: Yoder..and even more, kindred Hauerwas--
get get many mentions because he is attacking them as spokespersons of
one of the failed models. This got the Christian Century reviewer mad,
as it will the other "neo-anabaptists"

Who doesn't escape his critical scrutiny?

--Gabe

Herb preached another of his great sermons today here on the Cape,
although I did not get to hear it. (My guess is that it was a familiar
Davis sermon in various versions that kept me up and running during
the years of being his parishioner: "Jesus is risen, walk on water!")
But he may tell us he wants this book burned as it calls into question
(maybe) 40 years of trying to change the world (from our days
registering black voters in Mississippi under the gun of the Klan to
organizing the hospital workers on the Cape under fire from the local
establishment). However, I think Hunter's focus is on the US of A from
the 80s forward when the evangelicals came high profile. He does
mention the civil rights and peace movements, however.

To be continued.

--Gabe

On Sep 18, 11:02 pm, "Willis E. Elliott" <elliot...@charter.net>
wrote:

> I feel liberated, Gabe, by your jumping in two days ahead of Herb's schedule.
> 1
> I am awed & joyed by the cruising of your mind in/around/under/above Hunter's.  You  make me feel in class, though theologically I'm not in your class.  (The fact that linguistically you're not in my class makes me hopeful that you may find me worth reading.)  /  At a deeper level, love: the fellowship of the saints (the grateful forgiven sinners).
> 2

> Congratulations on being intellectually humble & curious enough togooglestuff you already know much about - in this case, "creation mandate."  (Google: "some evangelical Christians" / "God's intentions for humanity" / "our God-given responsibility for His creation" / "the cultural or dominion mandate"....)

> 2.1
> I was astonished at H.'s first sentence (chap. 1): "Out of nothing, 'God created the heavens and the earth' (Gen.1:1)."  The Bible's first sentence!  What a pleasant turn-on to us Bible-believers, though courageous turn-off to (secularist) Western academia!  We are to be (2:15) "world-makers" (+ 1:28 & 2:19-20).  And, in the same paragraph, (1) we Christians have this mandate as "God's people" (with no mention of the Jews), & (2) our Lord is "Jesus Christ, the last Adam (1Cor.15:45), the first born of the New Creation (Rom.8:24; Eph.1:20)."
> 2.2
> H.'s eminence as a U.Va. high-achieving sociologist somewhat protects the book - in spite of that first paragraph - from being slotted into "Evangelical [maybe even "Creationist"] Literature."
> 2.3

> Your mention of Reformed influence on H. fits with his upfront christology as you spell out a Reformed meaning of "creation mandate."  But Peter Berger, the scholar he calls (chap.4, n.12) "my mentor," is Lutheran, not Reformed.  I see H.'s notion of "culture" as a subjective as well as objective construct as in direct developmental line with Berger's social construction of reality.  H. rejects the subjective constructs (& related action-recommendations) of "culture" as the  current "political theologies" perceive-conceive it.  /  When Berger came from Vienna immediately after WW2, he headed for a Lutheran college (Wagner), then stayed in NYC for hisPhD(New School).  We had a laugh when I told him that my first secretary at NYTS was a relative of his (also from Vienna).

> 3
> On your second main paragraph, yes to H.'s addressing "forces since the 1980s....the culture wars of the last 20 years."  In chapter 2's 1st paragraph, H. says "everything hinges on how one understands the nature of culture."  Well, anyway, everything in this book hinges/hangs on it.  H. would agree (as his 1st chapter's 1st sentence shows) that what everything hangs on is the nature of nature: God's CREATION, or (S.Hawking) "spontaneous creation."  If one can't manage to swallow the Bible's first verse, its remaining verses are unintelligible, incoherent.  (Again, Gabe, I hope we can soon have a Craigville Colloquy on creation.)  /  Charles Colson & Nancy Pearcy's "How Now Shall We Live?" (2004) has creation as its first theme after an intro chapter.  H. recognizes the book's importance.  I have a few comments on it:
> 3.1
> Yes, as H. says, the book is "hearts and minds": culture changes bottom-up, one "value" (which H. defines as a "moral preference") & one person at a time.  ln the current stir toward the Nov. national elections, the Tea Party & other conservatives are using "values" as code for "pro-life" & "anti-gay-marriage" & "small government" & American individualism (against Obama's "socialism").   While I concur with H.'s challenge to this "political theology," I do want to affirm - by my comments on this book - that ideas do have consequences.
> 3.2

> During his Washington DC rally,Glenn Becksounded as though he'd memorized gobs of this book, which has the orthodox-Presbyterian confidence I remember from my face-to-face conversations in Europe with Francis Schaeffer '66-'71 (as well as from reading his books he sent me, & our correspondence).

[Willis E. Elliott]

Gabe, we're even!

You call "great" a sermon you didn't hear,

I commented extensively on a book I haven't read (except what the net permits).

1

Yes to Berger as more sociologist than theologian.  To my knowledge, his only formal training in higher-ed religion was in college.  /  I don't know what higher-ed training in religion H. had.  At U.Va., he's "professor of religion, culture and social theory."  My impression is that he sees himself more as sociologist than as religionist, & his calling Berger "my mentor" seems to confirm that impression.

2

H.'s project is to comment on the current Am. Prot. pol.-theol. landscape from a unique-personal sociol. perch, viz. his take on "culture."  Any unique perch will give a bird a unique freshness of view & freedom of song (comment).  The critic's most fundamental questioning will be about the perch's security.

3

Yes on Yoder.  He jumped out of the Index, for 11 references, because in his "The Politics of Jesus" he attacks my politics of Jesus; he built a perch for Hauerwas to view & sing from (as Schaeffer did for Pearcey et al.).

[Herb Davis]

Dear Book Readers,  we have already started the discussion on Hunter's book.  those who wish to add or disagree or support Hunter's position post you ideas.  Gabe and Willis are already at it.  John and Chris will jump in when book arrives or prayers end.  My comments on the first four chapters  of Essay one are below:

 

I have often felt that we should burn one book a year just to testify to the importance of books.  My suggestion for this year book burning is Hunter's, "To Change the World."  If Hunter is right I have wasted most of my public witness to the Gospel in trying to bring about change.  My commitment to "bottom up", democratic change, political action, public demonstrations;  my engagement in public debates about ideas, my supporting heroic leaders like Rev, King or Dorothy Day in order to bring about cultural change was "almost totally wrong." p.17 My commitment to grass root groups, such as Confessing Christ, marginal creative social witness, community organization local congregations were according to Hunter to big waste of time.

 

I would like to burn this book but I think I will read it before burning it because he might be right and even in my old age it might want to change trains rather than run faster down the wrong track. 

 

Although the critic is  focused on the 30 year long, courageous and heroic (not that I agreed with it) struggles beginning in the 70's with the Moral Majority and continue with Chuck Carlson's prison ministry and John Dobson's Focus on the Family to change the culture, much of the same commitment for public witness are held by liberal protestant churches.  Our commitment to individualism, democratic change, winning hearts and minds for our cause, creative marginal peoples, deeper commitment to doctrine all are insufficient to effect long term cultural change. 

 

Hunter believes that the creation mandate is to make things better (tend the garden). .   I am not sure this is true, since that was the promise of the snake was to make humans like gods, but Gabe is right that in the Reformed tradition we have a longing and commitment to transform the world, never ending reform.  We need to remember that Charles Taylor claims this is the root of secularization cause by Calvin.  If we are attempting to influence culture we ought to be serious in our task.  Our results are not very promising.  

 

Hunter wants us to know from the start that evangelism, making America more Christian, getting more faithful Christians elected to political office, politics will not change the culture.  The failure of the 30 year evangelical movement is seen in  the success of the gay community and the abortion rights agenda.  Both have minority commitment to the cause but both have changed the culture where the Evangelicals have failed.  Also the Temperance Movement which truly changed the laws for a time but never changed the culture.  We need to listen to what Hunter is trying to tell us as he looks at what is happening in culture.

 

Hunter defines cultural as "how societies define reality, what is good, bad, right, wrong, real, unreal, important, unimportant and so on".p.41  It tells us what is true. p.33  He has seven propositions on cultural and four on cultural change.  Culture is complex, dialectical, historical rooted, not neutral, some institutions are more powerful than others, neither autonomous nor fully coherent.  His four proposition on cultural change are: cultural change from top down, rarely from bottom up,  change is initiated by elites who are not at the center, change is most often accomplished with network rather than individuals, cultural change but rarely without a fight.  Hunter allows for surprises in cultural change but he is certain about the normal movement.

 

I want to see how he understands the civil rights movement, the change in sexuality and women.  I assume he will see the change in sexuality as less to to morality and more to do with the pill. 

 

I am not going to burn this book yet.  We might change the culture, transform the world if we learn something.   What do you think?  Herb

[Herb Davis]

From: fcba%40comcast.net

Sent: Wednesday, September 15, 2010 4:31 PM

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

[Herb Davis]

Dear Readers of Hunter's book, "To Change the World."

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>
Sent: Saturday, September 18, 2010 10:34 AM

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

> Herb and Hunter readers,

[Gabe]

Herb,

Thanks for the helpful introduction.

Some things I'll be wondering about as we go along:

1) The "top-down" he seems to be arguing for is off-putting for bottom-
uppers. However, something Marx and Engels said in the Communist
Manifesto may be similar. That is, if I remember aright, a forecast
that an enlightened fraction of the ruling class will break off and
join the proletariat. This is a concession by these notorious bottom-
uppers of the role of elites, even in a revolution. Of course, it
looks like a bit of self-justification by Marx and Engels, but it is
also true that intellectuals have played a critical role in mass
movements that affect change. He cites somewhere in the book, or maybe
an interview, Martin King as an example of the same in the civil
rights movement. It would also be true of Gandhi. And the peace
movement featured such as Bill Coffin, Spock and kindred others, not
to mention students from privleged universities.

2) Does his thesis contradict Hoover's bell curve, as for example the
role of the 2 1/2 % as critical to innovation, bringing aborad the
31/2 % early adopters and the 34 % early majoritarians? I asked him
that. We'll see.

3) Separable for the elite thesis (even as he challenges "elitism"),
is the point that culture-changing ideas only get traction when
grounded is social forces. We can certainly learn something from that.

--Gabe

P.S. Willis, touche.

--Gabe

On Sep 20, 1:12 pm, "Herb Davis" <herb.da...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> Dear Book Readers,  we have already started the discussion on Hunter's book.  those who wish to add or disagree or support Hunter's position post you ideas.  Gabe and Willis are already at it.  John and Chris will jump in when book arrives or prayers end.  My comments on the first four chapters  of Essay one are below:
>
> I have often felt that we should burn one book a year just to testify to the importance of books.  My suggestion for this year book burning is Hunter's, "To Change the World."  If Hunter is right I have wasted most of my public witness to the Gospel in trying to bring about change.  My commitment to "bottom up", democratic change, political action, public demonstrations;  my engagement in public debates about ideas, my supporting heroic leaders like Rev, King or Dorothy Day in order to bring about cultural change was "almost totally wrong." p.17 My commitment to grass root groups, such as Confessing Christ, marginal creative social witness, community organization local congregations were according to Hunter to big waste of time.
>
> I would like to burn this book but I think I will read it before burning it because he might be right and even in my old age it might want to change trains rather than run faster down the wrong track.  
>

> Although the critic is  focused on the 30 year long, courageous and heroic (not that I agreed with it) struggles beginning in the 70's with the Moral Majority and continue with Chuck Carlson's prisonministryand John Dobson's Focus on the Family to change the culture, much of the same commitment for public witness are held by liberal protestant churches.  Our commitment to individualism, democratic change, winning hearts and minds for our cause, creative marginal peoples, deeper commitment to doctrine all are insufficient to effect long term cultural change.  
>
> Hunter believes that the creation mandate is to make things better (tend the garden). .   I am not sure this is true, since that was the promise of the snake was to make humans like gods, but Gabe is right that in the Reformed tradition we have a longing and commitment to transform the world, never ending reform.  We need to remember that Charles Taylor claims this is the root of secularization cause byCalvin.  If we are attempting to influence culture we ought to be serious in our task.  Our results are not very promising.  

> ...
>
> read more »

[Jean Easland]

Herb: I just got the book today so I am just a couple of chapters in. But now I have to read it with your condemnation in mind. It seems like in the past I have heard you condemn the "carrot and the stick" model of American success as one the contributors of our moral decline. But did not or does not the liberal church fall into the same simplicity as stately for social change? Then the conservative church used some of the same strategies, modeled after the civil rights movement.            It hurts to be called a failure. Do not the philosophies of pragmatism, utilitarianism and social Darwinism still play into the cultural way of seeking and finding the "American dream"? I'll keep trying to get it------it is pretty slow out here on the prairie---------Roger

----- Original Message -----

From: Herb Davis

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

[Herb Davis]

dear Book Readers, Gabe, I think Hunter always qualifies his statements,
because cultural change is very complex. I will be looking carefully for
how he understand the Civil Rights movement, The Feminist Revolution, and
the Gay Rights Movement. as well as the demise of the union movement. He
claims any cultural change that is lasting is top down or is located in
centers of influence that are very powerful. In our cultural the NYT and
the Universities are much more powerful than the Mega Churches. In some
respects the Episcopal Church maybe more powerful than we think. What was
most effective in his argument was the analysis of the Conservative Church's
Moral Majority and Allies who won many of the political battles, I.e.
marriage amendment in Calif, Texas Board of Education book selection, Save
Marriage Act but seem to be losing the war. They have the troops in the
field but no cultural support at the top, universities, major newspapers,
media, entertainment etc. In a sense I think he is saying without support
of major language/image making, intellectual institutions you cannot bring
about lasting change. He will support this in chapter 5. This is why he is
not convinced that winning the political battle is the most important. What
is interesting to me is why is their a natural connect (or it may seem that
way) or what makes the powerful connection between these institutions and
Gay Rights, Women's movement, Civil Rights? Why is the Mega Church pastors
and Chuck Carlson, etc minor players? I think he is right calling us to
take institutions seriously. I think he is right that individuals cannot
bring about social change. My sense is that the church in the west and
especially American church has assumed cultural support, we assume we were
major players and now realize we are not. Not just UCC but all the Purpose
Driven Churches in the country. It will be interested to see how he
supports his argument and what he suggest as an alternative. It is clear
that the church has lost almost all its influence in the areas of education
and family. Herb

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>
Sent: Monday, September 20, 2010 9:31 PM

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

>> read more �
>

[John Cedarleaf]

Herb,

The book came yesterday and so I'm a bit behind, but into it and
hopefully will catch up, maybe before Chris stops praying and starts
reading!
Your initial comments about wasting your public witness on changing the
culture are on target. We have a penchant for bottom up social change
and that is what the Tea Party movement is supposed to be about. On the
other hand, look at how "nutty" many of these primary winners are. They
base their campaigns on anger and frustration, but I think if they are
elected they will find that they are in a different arena and won't last.

Taylor's comments on the gay community are on target, I think. Just the
other night I heard on NPR an interview with the leader of the "Log
Cabin Republicans" . These are the Gay friendly Republicans. He said
that the issue of gay marriage, etc. is not really on the front burner
of the Republican party. He said that politicians follow the culture and
that as gays have been more and more accepted etc. that even so called
conservatives will follow along and not spend their time on that issue.

Change is always messy and when we fall into the trap of "purity" we are
in trouble. Those in political parties, churches etc. that want to purge
all b ut the true believers, will never really make any meaningful
change, whether of the left or the right.

John

[Gabe]

John,

Good to have you in the discussion.

There is a chapter ahead on the Christian Right.Hunter says their
influence peeked in the 2004 elections has declined since although
they are not dead by any means. We'll see if the Tea Party as a
continuation of them has any lasting influence.

--Gabe

On Sep 22, 9:21 am, John Cedarleaf <j...@choiceonemail.com> wrote:
>   Herb,
>
> The book came yesterday and so I'm a bit behind, but into it and
> hopefully will catch up, maybe before Chris stops praying and starts
> reading!
> Your initial comments about wasting your public witness on changing the

> culture are ontarget. We have a penchant for bottom up social change

> and that is what the Tea Party movement is supposed to be about. On the
> other hand, look at how "nutty" many of these primary winners are. They
> base their campaigns on anger and frustration, but I think if they are
> elected they will find that they are in a different arena and won't last.
>

> Taylor's comments on the gay community are ontarget, I think. Just the

> > newspapers, media,entertainmentetc.  In a sense I think he is saying

> > without support of major language/image making, intellectual
> > institutions you cannot bring about lasting change.  He will support
> > this in chapter 5.  This is why he is not convinced that winning the
> > political battle is the most important.  What is interesting to me is
> > why is their a natural connect (or it may seem that way) or what makes
> > the powerful connection between these institutions and Gay Rights,
> > Women's movement, Civil Rights?  Why is the Mega Church pastors and
> > Chuck Carlson, etc minor players?  I think he is right calling us to
> > take  institutions seriously.  I think he is right that individuals
> > cannot bring about social change.  My sense is that the church in the
> > west and especially American church has assumed cultural support, we
> > assume we were major players and now realize we are not.  Not just UCC
> > but all the Purpose Driven Churches in the country.    It will be
> > interested to see how he supports his argument and what he suggest as
> > an alternative.  It is clear that the church has lost almost all its
> > influence in the areas of education and family.  Herb
>
> > --------------------------------------------------

> > From: "Gabe" <gfac...@comcast.net>

> ...
>
> read more »

[Scott Paeth]

Well, to an extent the tea-partiers mute the appeals to the kinds of issues that motivate the religious right in preference to economic issues, but the religious right sentiment is still very much there -- witness Christine O'Donnell as but one example. I strongly suspect that by the next presidential election, you won't see much distance between Christian Right voters and tea partiers at all. They will have fused into one right wing populist movement (which, to be sure, isn't really in its heart very populist, but has been fairly effectively manufactured as an ersatz populist movement).

Scott

[Gabe]

Scott,

Yes. The Glenn Beck rally is an interesting phenomenon in that
respect. Tea Party types plus Christian Right plus...but the
organizing principle was God/nation. Hunter has some interesting
things to say about this mix too.

I am trying to diagram Hunter's social theory, very complex: 'world"
cum creation mandate with "culture" at its heart as where reality is
defined and the norms of truth , goodness and beauty are lodged, and
these appearing in institutions and networks with their narratives,
myths and symbols, in turn expressed in politics and the economy.
( The old "orders of creation/preservation" supported by "common
grace" are somehow mixed in here) Provocative puzzles abound.

--Gabe

> ...
>
> read more »

[Scott Paeth]

Hopefully Max will chime in with some thoughts about the Kuyperian dimension of all of this. Although "creation mandate" has more of a Lutheran sound to my ear (perhaps overly influenced by Bonhoeffer), as described it seems much more along the lines of Dutch Reformed Calvinism.

Scott

[Richard Floyd]

I have ordered the book, and will try to catch up. I am still reading Taylor! I did finish Home a few months after the discussion was over.

Rick

[Richard Floyd]

Gabe mentioined that the Christian Century review of Hunter’s book was not as glowing as it could be because it offended the reviewers Hauerwasian faith.  I just ran across this humorous interchange between Hunter and an interviewer about just that.

 

James K. A. Smith asked Hunter in an interview: “Imagine that a generation of young people from across the spectrum of American Christianity were convinced Hauerwasians. How might things look different in fifty years? How would American Christianity be different? How would American culture at large be different?”

 

Hunter replied:  “Like the Old Order Anabaptists whose style and life practices are frozen in the mid-nineteenth century, here too style and life practices would be frozen in the 2010s. The neo-Anabaptists in fifty years would all wear Toms, be locavores, play guitars, patronize microbreweries, and worship in ugly buildings. Their pastors would all have soul patches (and other finely groomed facial hair) but operate great Web sites and tweet all of the time. The tour buses will drive by and . . . ”

He continues in a more serious vein.

 

See the whole interview at http://www.theotherjournal.com/article.php?id=1029

Rick

[Herb Davis]

Sermon Note: Sept .26, Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Luke 16:19-31

Thanks for you input on the parable Jim. It is good to have you back in the
pulpit. I take a little different view, see below.

The parable is about two different theologies of wealth and money. The
audience for the parable are the Pharisees (v.14) who are described as
"lovers of money" v.14 and "what is prized by human being is an abomination
in the sight of God." v.14 The Pharisees are not godless materialist but
have comfortable joined God and riches. They have endorsed a "prosperity
gospel." Such a theology is called Deuteronomic because the 5th book in the
Torah claims, obey God and you will be blessed, you will flourish, you will
be victorious, you will be rich. Deut 28 In Jesus' theology of wealth he
separates God and money. "You cannot serve God and wealth." v.13 They are
not comfortable connected, in fact wealth can be a barrier to God. The
Pharisees laugh at Jesus, they know the "law and prophets." Who is right?
Who understands the Law and Prophets, Jesus or the Phraisees? If the
Pharisees are right Jesus could not be the Messiah. He is not victorious.
He is not rich. He has no place to lay his head. He depends on others for
his daily bread. Luke insist that the Law and Prophets rightly understood
affirms Jesus as the Messiah and the resurrected one. It is Jesus
interpreting "Moses (law) and all the prophets" Lu 24:27 to the disciples on
the road to Emmaus that allows them to affirm "the Lord is risen." Lu 24:34

I like Jim's joke note. Jesus sets up the Pharisees. Here is a truly rich,
victorious, wealthy and healthy blessed man. Surely he will end up in
heaven. There is the loser. Lazarus bears all the marks of an unrighteous
man, poor, sick, hungry, despised and rejected. His only company is dogs
who lick his sores. They is no question of his sinfulness and his
destination. Yet Lazarus ends in the bosom of Abraham and the rich man in
the fire where he longs for a wet finger to dampen his lips. The rich man
did not understand the law and the prophets rightly. There is something
wrong with the Pharisees theology. He wants to make sure that his family
will be saved. He pleads for someone from the dead to give them a powerful
warning about riches. But that is not necessary, the Law and the Prophets
is all we need. Rightly understand they are enough.

Luke insist that the Old Testament rightly understood points to Jesus Christ
as the Messiah.

By the way what is your theology of wealth, Deut. or Is. 58?

Any additions or corrections? Any liturgical resources? Peace, Herb

[link...@aol.com]

Dear Herb,

We are not so different and I think you are right in your
interpretation, but I think it goes even deeper than a prosperity
gospel. Notice the whole range of behaviors that Jesus deals with in
Chapters 15 and 16 of Luke. This story sort of sums up the whole
question of the misuse of the law and the prophets, although it does
deal with the particular question of alms, which has not otherwise
been raised and which would seem to be the Pharisees strong suit but
truly is not because, as the story indicates, the Pharisses would have
to teach the Law and the Prophets in such a way as to make clear that
fellowship with the poor is a call to life (generous fellowship) from
death (wealth) and thus a call to repentance in light of the promise
of life! We as teachers and the churches we teach may very well co-opt
the "law and the prophets" in order to gain the rewards of status (I
should know, I just signed a new contract as interim pastor!). But
the hyperbolic (rich man-poor man) language of Jesus' story shows
where this leads: true life has been offered all along in the living
witness of the law and the prophets, even where they have been
misused. The Law and the Prophets cannot be co-opted, they are either
welcomed as messagers risen from the dead (dead being lives of self-
centeredness) or they are misincorporated (in everthing from rules on
table fellowship to almsgiving to divorce) into a quest for status
that finally will be revealed an the abomination before God that it
is. This what the Pharisees have done, but they are confronted by
Jesus as the Resurrection and the Life who rightly interpretes the law
and prophets in the freedom of obedience to the living Father.

Jim

[Gabe]

Rick,

Very helpful interview. Thanks for connecting it to us. How about
sharing it with the "rat pack" :)

--Gabe

On Sep 22, 12:19 pm, Richard Floyd <rfl...@berkshire.rr.com> wrote:
> Gabe mentioined that the Christian Century review of Hunter’s book was not as glowing as it could be because it offended the reviewers Hauerwasian faith.  I just ran across this humorous interchange between Hunter and an interviewer about just that.
>
> James K. A. Smith asked Hunter in an interview: “Imagine that a generation of young people from across the spectrum of American Christianity were convinced Hauerwasians. How might things look different in fifty years? How would American Christianity be different? How would American culture at large be different?”
>
> Hunter replied:  “Like the Old Order Anabaptists whose style and life practices are frozen in the mid-nineteenth century, here too style and life practices would be frozen in the 2010s. The neo-Anabaptists in fifty years would all wear Toms, be locavores, play guitars, patronize microbreweries, and worship in ugly buildings. Their pastors would all have soul patches (and other finely groomed facial hair) but operate great Web sites and tweet all of the time. The tour buses will drive by and . . . ”
>
> He continues in a more serious vein.
>

> See the whole interview athttp://www.theotherjournal.com/article.php?id=1029

> ...
>
> read more »

[Herb Davis]

Rick,
amen on the review of Hunter's book. An excellent way to understand what he
is about. Herb

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 9:55 PM

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

> Rick,

>
> Very helpful interview. Thanks for connecting it to us. How about
> sharing it with the "rat pack" :)
>
> --Gabe
>
> On Sep 22, 12:19 pm, Richard Floyd <rfl...@berkshire.rr.com> wrote:

>> Gabe mentioined that the Christian Century review of Hunter�s book was

>> not as glowing as it could be because it offended the reviewers
>> Hauerwasian faith. I just ran across this humorous interchange between
>> Hunter and an interviewer about just that.
>>

>> James K. A. Smith asked Hunter in an interview: �Imagine that a

>> generation of young people from across the spectrum of American
>> Christianity were convinced Hauerwasians. How might things look different
>> in fifty years? How would American Christianity be different? How would

>> American culture at large be different?�
>>
>> Hunter replied: �Like the Old Order Anabaptists whose style and life

>> practices are frozen in the mid-nineteenth century, here too style and
>> life practices would be frozen in the 2010s. The neo-Anabaptists in fifty
>> years would all wear Toms, be locavores, play guitars, patronize
>> microbreweries, and worship in ugly buildings. Their pastors would all
>> have soul patches (and other finely groomed facial hair) but operate
>> great Web sites and tweet all of the time. The tour buses will drive by

>> and . . . �

>> read more �
>

[Herb Davis]

Dear Book readers, I hope everyone is getting up to sped with Hunter. This
is not hard reading. I would like to push on to finish Essay I.

First an incident. Some years ago a member of the congregation I was
serving won a Nobel Prize in medicine. He was faithful in worship and a
member of Science Theology discussion group in the church. The Science
Theology group was an out growth of a laity ministry research project in
which the congregation was participating. One of the goals was to help
understand Christian vocation. I informed the UCC of the Nobel Prize winner
and the national office interviewed him by phone and reported the event in
the UCC News. That was extend of the Church's involvement. This is what
Hunter means (I think) by a weak Christian Church. There was no possibility
of connecting this Professor in a major university with a network of fellow
scientists, theologians, church men to celebrate and be a creative
Christian presence in his sphere of work. There was no celebration of
Christian vocation. We just can't think in those terms.

Now back to the book, Essay 1, chap 5,6 and 7

Hunter's thesis is to change the world the church must engage the elite
institutions that shape the culture. Change does not come about by
transforming individuals or from grassroots' efforts or by being more
faithful to the gospel. He claims idealism, individualism and piety are the
three fatal obstacles to changing the world. If we are serious about
changing the world we must have strong Christian presence in the elite,
powerful institutions.

In chap 5 with broad strokes he traces why the church changed cultures in
the past. In Rome the church became the best educators of young Roman
leaders while at the same time making the radical move of including the poor
as honored members of the community. Europe was convert by the Monk and
Monastery movement which cared for language, law, learning as well as music
(chant), and community. The Reformers were all involved with the elites of
the time. Luther would have been burn at the stake if it weren't for
powerful princes. Calvin has elite supporters in Europe. Hunter points out
that all culturally important change is rooted in powerful networks, more
than individuals, that shape culture. When the church does not take these
elite institutions seriously it declines in influence.

Chap 6, he looks at the cultural of economy of American Christianity not
through the powerful Christian ministries that are evident but through
faith- based patronage "for it is here that one finds the main resources
that fuel its cultural economy." p.81. He points out that both liberal and
conservative Protestants put little or no money into the development of
Christian scholars to inter face with elite institutions. Liberal
Protestant has no cultural producting institutions that are self conscious
Christian that matter in the culture. The National Council of Churches is a
marginal force. The UCC voice can not be heard outside of its own
community. We have no schools that reflect the Reformed tradition, little
literary or art output and no intellectuals. The Catholic are little
better, they have some intellectuals, a literary tradation, some
publications (First Things), some colleges, but most of their efforts serve
their own community. The Evangelical have a vast output of cultural
products, books, music, films but few if any are taken seriously by NYT,
NYRB or Hollywood. Most of their production is aimed at their own community
and have little impact on elite culture.

Hunter writes, "The most important point is institutional. Since the
1960's, none of the movement in contemporary Christianity have been
prominent in creating, contributing to, or supporting structures in the
arts, humane letters, the academy and the like; structures that either
explicitly express their faith tradition or that are implicitly compatible
with or reflect the assumptions of their tradition." p.88 and "Christians
in America today have institutional strength and vitality exactly in the
lower and peripheral areas of cultural production. Against the prevailing
view, the main reason why Christian believers today ... have not had the
influence in the culture to which they have aspired is not that they don't
believe enough, or try hard enough, or care enough, or think Christianly
enough, or have the right worldview, but rather because they have been
absent from the arenas in which the greatest influence in the culture is
exerted." p.89 And of course, "A second matter, in this reguard, concerns
the strong indicators that for all the deep belief, the genuine piety, the
heroic faith, and the good intentions one finds all across American
Christianity today, large swaths have been captured by the spirit of the
age. ...This problem is especially acute among the young, where at
Christian Smith observes, a "moralistic, therapeutic deism" has triumphed
over historical creedal faith and pratice." p.92

In chapter 7, Hunter pushed the church to accept the creation mandate, to
change the world for the better. Willis will love this! Hunter sees the
dilemma between a Christian faith that loves populism and hates elites and
the truth that to change the world you must work with the elites. He
writes, "The significance of every person before God irrespective of worldly
stature or accomplishment and the care for the least are the ethical
hallmarks of Christianity, for they mark every human being and every human
life in the most practical ways with God's image and therefore as worthy of
respect and love....This is why elitism a disposition and relationality of
superiority, condescension, and entitlement by social elites is so abhorrent
for the Christian......At the same time, the populism that is inherent to
the authentic Christian witness is often transformed into an oppressive
egalitarianism that will suffer no distinctions between higher and lower, or
better or worse. At it worse it can take the form of tyranny of majority
that will recognize no authority, nor hierarchy of values or quality or
significance. The dilemma...Is it possible to pursue excellence and under
God' sovereignnty, be in position of influence and privilege and not be
ensnared by the trapping of elitism?" p. 94 Or do we want to give up on the
creation mandate and change the world.

What say ye? Herb

[Herb Davis]

I think you mailed it Jim. I couldn't fit in the divoice and adultery and
so you were very helpful. sNot only the Phraisee but all hve a way of
distorting the law and the prophets for our own will. Hope to see you in
Cleveland. Herb

--------------------------------------------------
From: <link...@aol.com>
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 8:11 PM

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

Subject: Re: Sermon Note: Sept.26, Eighteenth Sunday aftr Pentecost, Luke
16:19-31

[Gabe]

Herb,

Good points, especially about the Nobel prize winner.

However, the science and theology group you started at Eliot Church
was an expression of the (in part) UCC's seminary, Andover Newton's
effort it explore the ministry of the laity. More and more I am
thinking that Hunter's "faithful presence" proposal is much like the
effort to stress the ministry of the laity in the world which goes
back to Hans Rudi-Weber and others in the World Council of Churches
from the 40s forward to Dick Broholm and others.. Hunter stresses
within it the leadership/elites whereas the movement of the laity did
not particulalry accent that. However the church "academy" network of
movers and shakers in Europe did stress that. And in Lancaster we
gathered at the seminary a small group of such (Mayor Monahan, Ken
Shirk, head of the Republican party, the person in charge of
redevelopment whose name escapes me, Glass the head of the school
system, the leader of the union movement, the president of the
NAACP...) . The group read Jane Jacobs on urban America and tried to
find some common ground to work on in the city. This plus your effort
at Eliot seem like good models. I don't think Hunter knows that much
about these earlier mainline church efforts, as he grew up later and
is focused on evangelicals as representative of Protestantism. More's
the pity. However it is a sobering reminder of how little visibility
the so-called mainline Churches of which we are a part figure today in
the discussion of these matters.

--Gabe

[Bct...@aol.com]

I am too tired to take in Herb's and Jim's discussions, but I did read the  scripture reading, because I wanted to read what they said. 

 

To me, and this is a simplistic view, this reminds me of the parable of the Good Samaritan. Just as I "confessed" to you Confessors that I have not acted as a Good Samaritan in the past, I also once altered the time that I drove to work, so that I wouldn't have to see someone who I thought was something like a Lazarus. I even knew what I was doing and thought about Lazarus at the time.

 

On the other hand, I lived in Chicago for six years, and I lived right downtown, on Lake Shore Drive, and I walked everywhere, including to work and in the snow and cold. And street people used to take up residence on bridges and narrow walkways, where you could not avoid them. And I used to go boldly forth, and I always gave them some money. And I gave others money too. And even though I did some very exciting things in Chicago, including going to lots of theater (oh, the theater was great in Chicago, and they had real plays, and not just musicals!), the only thing I really remember is some of the street people who deliberately positioned themselves on those walkways or bridges where people had to go by them.  I remember the ones I did give money to, and it was of course nothing at all, maybe a dollar or two, once a ten because they had a baby with them.   But I do remember them.  I can see many of them in my mind's eye. And I remember only one or two of the wonderful plays I saw.

 

So, it is possible both to avoid Lazarus's, and to walk boldly up and give them something.  Not sure what the right answer is, but maybe we need to see them as real people, regardless of what we think of giving money to people on the street (lots of moral controversies there). 

 

And this does have something to do with Jesus.

 

Jane

[Herb Davis]

dear Gabe, theMinistry of the Laity Project which you mentioned was shaped
by a heavy egalitarian focus. I can remember refusing to receive Holy
Communion at one of the event because it was celebrated by a lay person. I
think Hunter is reacting to an evangelical style that really doesn't trust
academia and is focused as he claims on the middle and lower culture. Since
he is in academia he may feel this isolation. At the same time the I think
he is on to something. The Protestant Church at present does not have the
resources to compet in high culture. We have become moralist. I see
Hunter's book as a sign that maybe we are beginning to realize the church
makes little difference at present in changing the world. We can tag along.
We can be supportive but we don't change much. Herb

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Gabe" <gfa...@comcast.net>
Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 4:43 PM

To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

> Herb,

[Willis E. Elliott]

I like your diagram idea, Gabe.

It's more sober  than the image I suggested, viz. that culture is the particular song H. sings on his bird-perch high above the variegated landscape he's commenting on.

But then again....

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

[John Cedarleaf]

Herb and other book readers:
I got the book and am plunging along. Yesterday I spent six hours with
my wife while she was getting chemo and read. Fascinating piece of work!
I was thinking that we in the UCC(at least at the national level) like
to think that we are in with the elite, cutting edge and all that, but
of course we define elite in our own way(political left, green folks,
interfaith etc.) and often we take the cue from them to the point that
we aren't really a strong Christian presence.Of course the right likes
to think they are also in with the elite, as they define them: business,
Republican party etc. As far as developing Christian scholars go, our
seminaries are struggling to keep up enrollment and so we partner with
Jewish schools, Moslem schools etc in order to pay the bills. And there
is among many a feeling that the direction is to soft peddle the
Christian faith in an interfaith world.

And we continue to push a "you can change the world" way of
thinking,both from the national church and frankly from pulpits(even the
one I occupy, at least from time to time......) Also, and excuse me for
rambling, there is a concern for "purity" among both left and right. The
right wants to purify the Republican party and the left wants to purify
the Democratic party. So, Obama gets it from the left who say that he
has disappointed them because he hasn't been pure enough. Mike Castle
got it from the right and lost....accused of being a Republican in name
only.

Well, enough, I need to finish off my sermon for Sunday.

John

[link...@aol.com]

Dear Herb,

What you had posted really helped me think about the question of what
I would call "appearances to the contrary"and I''ve thus expanded my
Sermon Help contribution. Jesus' joke adresses misuse of Moses and
the Law to try to gain status before God and others, striking at the
Pharisaic trifecta of alms, burial practices and family obligation
(the five brothers!). And I wonder if this isn't the same trifecta
also present in the UCC in our quest for honor as pastors.

God bless you, and I do hope as well to see you in Cleveland!

Jim

On Sep 23, 3:20 pm, "Herb Davis" <herb.da...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> I think you mailed it Jim.  I couldn't fit in the divoice and adultery and
> so you were very helpful.  sNot only the Phraisee but all hve a way of
> distorting the law and the prophets for our own will.  Hope to see you in
> Cleveland.  Herb
>
> --------------------------------------------------

> From: <linkc...@aol.com>

> >> Any additions or corrections?  Any liturgical resources?  Peace, Herb- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Herb Davis]

Hi John, Glad you are into the book. It is a good read. Maybe he is
right. At least one senses how complex and difficult it is to understand
change. You wonder how serious folks are who talk about it so easily. Hope
you wife is doing well. We have her in our prayer. Herb

--------------------------------------------------
From: "John Cedarleaf" <jn...@choiceonemail.com>
Sent: Friday, September 24, 2010 9:23 AM

To: <confessi...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

> Herb and other book readers:

[Jean Easland]

John: Blessings on your wife in her suffering.---- Back in the American
Agriculture Movement, I headed a local meeting, the discussion at the time
was how to get the big well financed farmers to go alone with our effort to
NOT PLANT a crop. Thousands of small farmers we on the verge of bankruptcy.
The "Farm Stirke" was to force change in Gov. policy which was set to put
small producers out of business and keep surplus production which created
cheap food. After the meeting an old sage came to me and simply said; "
Roger the big snakes don't feed the small snakes they eat them". He was
right, thousands upon the thousands of small farmers went under and large
farming has taken over. The elite political and big money eats the Church
(right or left) for lunch all the time. We are easy to dine on. And how
impressed the Church hierarchy is when they are invited into the inner
circle. I don't trust either party nor should the Church. We are to speak
truth to power from the vantage point of the Kingdom. We should gladly make
fools of ourselves in calling for repentance and grace where needed.There is
a nauseating amount of energy talking and not evangelizing.----Herb's first
impression was probably right on the book but lots of other things should be
burned first. Blessings
on your ministry John----Roger

----- Original Message -----
From: "John Cedarleaf" <jn...@choiceonemail.com>
To: <confessi...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, September 24, 2010 8:23 AM
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

[Gabe]

Herb,

Hard to generalize based on that experience. In fact, the notion that
laity have as much right to celebrate the eucharist as those ordained
to that office is at cross-purposes with the rationale for the
movement from WCC days in the 40s up through Broholm , Specht et al,,
namely ministry in "the world" laity not focused on intra ecclesial
issues. The Peck/Hoffman book, THE LAITY IN MINISTRY coming out of the
ANTS Center for the Ministry of the Laity looks at many aspects of
that. as, for example, you may remember, exercising the three-fold
office--prophetic, priestly and royal-- in the work world. So the much-
discussed "fatal comma" in earlier translations of Ephesians 4:12 ,
now translated and interpreted as "...pastors and teachers[through
Word and Sacrament]...to equip the saints for the work of
ministry...." My guess is that Hunter does not know much about this
history. It would feed into his thesis, I think.

--Gabe

On Sep 23, 9:25 pm, "Herb Davis" <herb.da...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> dear Gabe,  theMinistry of the Laity Project which you mentioned was shaped
> by a heavy egalitarian focus.  I can remember refusing to receive Holy
> Communion at one of the event because it was celebrated by a lay person.  I
> think Hunter is reacting to an evangelical style that really doesn't trust
> academia and is focused as he claims on the middle and lower culture.  Since
> he is in academia he may feel this isolation.  At the same time the I think
> he is on to something.  The Protestant Church at present does not have the
> resources to compet in high culture.  We have become moralist.  I see
> Hunter's book as a sign that maybe we are beginning to realize the church
> makes little difference at present in changing the world.  We cantagalong.
> We can be supportive but we don't change much.  Herb
>
> --------------------------------------------------

> From: "Gabe" <gfac...@comcast.net>

> Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 4:43 PM
> To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>
> Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World
>
> > Herb,
>
> > Good points, especially about the Nobel prize winner.
>
> > However, the science and theology group you started at Eliot Church
> > was an expression of the (in part) UCC's seminary, Andover Newton's

> > effort it explore theministryof the laity. More and more I am

> > thinking that Hunter's "faithful presence" proposal is much like the

> > effort to stress theministryof the laity in the world which goes

> >> Theology group was an out growth of a laityministryresearch project in

> >> powerful princes.  Calvinhas elite supporters in Europe.  Hunter points

[Herb Davis]

Dear Book readers and others, Thanks for your input. I am not very good
at this and don't get too much response. this book is a very insteresting
read for me and I suggest we move on to the second essay, chapters 1-3,
pages, 99 - 131. In Hunters 2nd essay he defines his understanding of the
cultural of American and looks at three Christian responses,s Christing
Right, Christian left and Christian Neo Anta Batpist. We will look at his
first three chapter for the next couple of days which outline his position
on the culture and reviews the Christian Right.. At the end of the week we
will look at the last four chapters in this essay.

Hunter presents his anaylsis of American culture in our time in relationship
to power and politics. He has three basic convictions:
1. Politics define meaning, person and relationship. He writes,
"Slowly, often imperceptivity, there has been a turn toward law and politics
as the primary way of understanding all aspects of collective life." P.108
"In this turn, we have come to ascribe impossibly high expectations to
politics and political processes. As I noted before, we look to politics as
the leading way to address our common problems and implicitly hope that
politics, broadly defined will actually solve those problems." p.106

2. When politics become the primary way of defining groups, meaning, life
and furthering the specific interest of group, then the final arbiter within
most of social life is not tradition, common sense , consensus, story but
the coercive power of the state. He writes, "politicization is the turn
toward law and politics - the instrumentality of the state - to find
solutions to public problems. The biggest problem is how to create or
reinforce social consensus where little exists or none could be generated
organically." p 102 "Again my purpose here is not to suggest that the
outcome of any particular issue is good or bad but rather to observe that
historically tendency, in recent decades, toward the politicization of
everything.This turn has brought about a narrowing of the complexity and
richness of
public life and with it a diminishing of possibility for thinking of
alternative ways to address common problems and issues." p.106 "This is
demonostrated by the simple fact that the amount of law that exist in any
society is always inversely related to the coherence and stability of its
common culture: law increases as cultural consensus decreases." p. 102 He
claims that postmodernists would assume this is the way it should be, " the
justifications we create are of no real account anyway; no matter how you
dress it up, every aspect of social life comes down to power and
domination." p.106

What boggled my mind was this what I assume. I do have a lot of confidence
in the political process. I assume if a teenager has a problem with school
with the length of his hair we go to court. I assume you vote to see who
wins an issue and who loses. Hunter wonders why we have such confidence in
the political process to solve our problems. Do we place too much weight on
the political process? He writes, "Our times amply demonstrate that it is
far easier to force one's will on others through legal and political means
or threaten to do so than it is to persuade them or negotiate compromise
with them. " p.107

3. The result of the political process of couse is winners and losers.. The
result of losing is what Nietzsche called "ressentiment." English
translation would be "anger, envy, hate, rage and revenge as the motive of
political action." p.107

"Ressentiment" is not necesarly supported by real experience but by the
perception of injustice, injury, oppression. He writes, ""Resentiment is
grounded in a narrative of injury or, at least, perceived injury; a strong
belief that one has been or is being wronged. ...The sense of injury is key.
Over time, the perceived injustice becomes central to the person's and the
groups identity. Understanding themselves to be victimized is not a passsive
acknowledgement but a belief that can be cultivated." p.107 The victim then
has to idenify the oppressor and defeat him or her. "Ressentiment, then, is
expressed as a discourse of negation; the condemnation and denigration of
enemies in the effort to subjugate and dominate those who are culpable."
p108

He probably wrote this before the Tea Party and Beck's "Restore America" but
this sense of "ressentiment" seems to be real in these events, as we will
see in his analysis of the Christian Right. The victims only solution is to
dominate the oppressor which result in victims.

A couple of years ago the MASS Conf. UCC began to realize that this may be
the reality in our church life. Annual Meeting was focused on passing
justice resolution to "change the world." The result was winners and
losers. In the last annual meeting there was an attempt to find
alternative means other than political process (voting) to deal with issues.
I think some of the social votes felt like they were victims.

We need to be careful that we do not see all victims as perceived. There
are some issues that will need the forces of law and police power. How does
the church relate to public issues? this is the question Hunter is looking
at. "the concern of this essay, then, is primarily with how Christians from
different perspective relate to the larger public culture. In this way I am
less concerned with the patterns of Christian political engagement than with
the nature and character of that engagement." p. 110 Now we look at the
Christian Right, Neo Anabaptist and the Christian Left. Today the Christian
Right (CR), tomorrow Neo Anabaptist NA) and Wednesday the Christian Left
(CL).

The Christian Right
Hunter claims the CR peaked in power in 2004. Yet it seems to be popping up
in other arena such as the Tea Party. The issue of the CR are alive and
well in our culture today.

The power of the CR is the desire to "have a world in which we live that
reflect our likeness." p.111 It is a vision of human flourishing that is
framed by their worldview. That worldview is under serious challenge today
in the area of heterosexuality, monogamy and life long committed marriage,
sacred responsibility of parenting, the authority and autonomy of family,
the sanctity of human life (beginnings and endings), the challenge to
Christian truth and to truth itself and the authority of the church. These
challenges are expressed intellectually, educationally, artistically,
commercially, by the media and supported in the courts. their world view is
under attack.

In addition to the world view the CR have an historical myth about the
ordering of society. As a general rule the CR are animated by a mythical
idea concerning "right ordering" which focus on the founding of American as
a Christian or Jewish/Christian or I might add Biblical nation. p.112 the
nation accepts that it is not final authority but is under the sovereignty
of God. The First Amendment makes this clear. Government is limited and
there are areas of life which the government should not order.

The centralization of power in the federal government and the politicization
of life is seen as a threat to this understanding of proper order and a call
to restore American to its true nature. The CR believe this is possible
through the political process where the enemy is define, confornted,
dominated. The only proper outcome is to destory the enemies of the Lord
through (I hope) the ballot box.

The sense of alienation in the CR is Hugh. They sense defeat. The fear
persecution. They have stories of children being demeaned in school because
of their Christian belief. They can recount incidents in which anyone who
makes a public confession of Christ Jesus as Lord is rejected. They see is
the rejection of Merry Christmas as a greeting as Christmas greeting as a
sign of secularization domination. They can tell you of pastors or
chaplains being disciplined for praying in the name of Jesus in public.
They know that it is a fight between evil and good, Christ and Satan, and
the only way to win is through the ballot box.

They claim to be non partisan and inform the congregation on values not
party but they have been wed to the Republican your years. This is
beginning to unravel because the sorry results. John Dobson recently
threaten not to vote for McCain. The CR has become a political force. The
result has not been
successful but the model of trying to dominate has aliened many against the
faith, has fostered anticleargicalism and has not encouraged any creative
alternatives. The CR is locked is a fight to the death battle, no room for
compromise, no way to see the enemy as human. In a way this reflects the
mood the nations.

How would you theologically disagree with the Christian Right on the
political issue>

What say yea? Herb

Sent: Friday, September 24, 2010 10:16 PM

[John Cedarleaf]

Herb:

Pertaining to the decision of the MA. Conf. re: resolutions: a few years
ago our congregation, in the midst of the "same sex marriage debate:"
passed a resolution not to make resolutions on such matters! A
resolution against resolutions!!

Re: Hunter's "faithful presence" model: is this the old "in but not of
the world?" I don't see the UCC adopting this style any time soon. We
like to assume we have more power than we do.

John

[fcba%40comcast.net]

"I want to see how he understands the civil rights movement, the change in sexuality and women.  I assume he will see the change in sexuality as less to to morality and more to do with the pill."  Herb Davis

 

 

 

Herb,

 

Hunter does speak to this on page 135.

 

"Mainline Protetant activisim in the US also weakened in visibility and influence. This was in part because of the demographic base of the mainline churches declined so precipitously in these years. It is also because the mainline social agnda---including most prominently, civil rights, the war in Vietnam, and women's rights, among others---was realized."

 

Chris

 

PS Though I can't remember anything about the pill being mentioned.

[Herb Davis]

Dear Chris,  What I mean by the Civil Rights movement is the fact that it was highly political.  The Church was deeply involved in the political process.  I believe that the church's involvement In Civil Right became the model for much of our social action ministry.  Which included a deep distrust of local communities (especially small towns and rural area) and a move to put more trust and decision making in the General Synod and regional conferences.  Local congregations could particpate mostly by following the lead of the national church.  Now this has been the model for women's and homosexual movements.  I believe real cultural change has taken place in these political actions.  I don't know how these changes could have come about without politicization.  The old Jim Crow common sense and story had to be destroyed for a new story to develop. I think what happened was not just politicization but that central institutions, colleges, churches, (Southern Baptist Convention supported the Supreme Court desegreation ruling), NYT, think tanks all affirmed the new story and common sense.  I think this is also true of the women's movement and maybe so with the homosexual movement. I don't think this was just a repeat of the Temperance Movement (political change but not cultural change). I don't think we can just dismiss political action but I wonder if we can again develop trust in local congregations, where the richness of the culture and the stories my also come alive. 

 

By the way I think David Brooks would support Hunter in his thesis.  I enjoy Brooks and he is one of the better theological writers in secular print today. 

 

I hope to post some final comments on the 2nd essay later today.   Herb

 

Peace, Herb 

From: fcba%40comcast.net

Sent: Tuesday, September 28, 2010 6:17 PM

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

[fcba%40comcast.net]

Herb,

 

What you say about the political in these movements is correct. Hunter's little statement aboujt realizing certain agendas is also helpful since without that statement I wonder how close he comes to merely being neo-anabaptistic in disguise. That is when one has a moratorium when does one return? I think there is another way to say what he has said. That is merely saying moratorium is confusing to me. To say we should have a moratorium I seem to find too shallow.

• Yes, we should be humbled under the might hand of God.
• Yes, we should not think that our only work is the political work of changing the culture.
• Yes, we should be humble enough to realize that God is sovereign and we are "unprofitable servants."
• Yes, we should realize that other Christians may have differing ideas and maybe ours are wrong.
• Yes, we should come to grasp that politics is not the only way to serve Christ.
• Yes, we should realize that our decisions sometimes have unintended consequences.
• Yes, we should honor our Christian bothers and sisters even when they disagree with us.
• Yes, we should remember that we are not the Messiah.
• Yes, our escatology should leave room for a dramatic change in the great consummation instead of thinking that we can change everything ourselves.
• Yes, we should be Calvinists & Wesleyans & Aquinasians etc but we should never be Pelagians.

But merely to stop working for things politically is too much. We can only do what we can do. What Hunter (in the end) is asking us to be is the church and not a subsidiaalry of any political party. He may say it better and the timing is better now to say it but I (humbly) think I got that before. His help was (like H. Richard N.) to label things as a good theologian should.

 

Chris

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

----- Original Message -----
From: "Herb Davis" <herb....@mindspring.com>
To: confessi...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 2010 1:17:56 PM
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

[Herb Davis]

Final Note on Essay II, p 150-193, "TO cHANGE THE wORLD"

Chap 6, The Neo AnaBaptist

What marks the Neo Ana Baptist (NAB) is the rejection of any common grace in the world.  The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ did not effect the world now,  only in the future.  Everything is at the end.  The defeat of the powers and principalities in the cross of Christ is a future reality.  If the Christian left understand history as progress, "everyday in every way things are getting better", the NAB understand the world as fallen, separated from God and the world needs to be negated.

 

The major error of Christian history was the alliance of the church with Rome under Constantia.  "With the conversion of Constantine and the Ediate of Milan in AD 313, came a rapprochement between piety and power that compromised the church's distinctiveness and thus its inimitable witness to the world...Rather than challenging the principalities and powers, the people of God became united with the powers; rather than proclaiming the peace, the church embraced an ethic of coercion, power and, thus, violence; rather than resisting the power of the state, the church provided divine legitimating for the state.." p.153  This error keep popping up so that any alliance with the state or the dominate institutions of late modernity is a betrayal of Christ.

 

The second critical error is the church's relationship with capitalism, "American Capitalism, ... is the political economy of the culture of death, and the business corporations is its bogus ecclesial vehicle." p.154f

 

The enemies of the NAB, and remember everyone has enemies, are Michael Novak, Jean Elshtaik, George Weigel, Richard Neuhaus, and other embedded Christian intellectuals and the Niebuhr brothers.  The Christian Right and Left are both errors.  The bright lights of the NAB are John Yoder, Stanley Hauerwas and the Radical Theological theologians.

 

The NAB also politicizes the faith.  The language about Jesus' death and resurrection is in political terms popular among many in the UCC.  Jesus death was the result of his threat to the earthly rules of Rome and Jerusalem.  The hope of the world is in a pure church, in the sacrificial life of Christ and in the witness of the political suffering of the believers. 

 

Chap 7, Illusion, Irony and Tragedy

 

In the final chapter of Essay II Hunter affirms the following:

 

1.  "the forces of secularity in contemporary America, within such institutions as higher education, public education, the news media, advertising, and popular entertainment, are very powerful and their agenda (deliberately or not) is fundamentally at odds with traditional Christian morality and spirituality." p.167  So there is a real issues.

 

2.  Each Christian group Right, Left and ANB have good reasons to be worried about what is happening in the culture.

 

3.  All sides politicize their concerns:   "To use Charles Taylors helpful concept, politics has become a 'social imagery' that defines the horizon of understanding and the parameters for action. " p.168  "..the Christian Right and Left and the neo-Anabaptists operate with an understanding of the good society through the prism of politics." p.169

 

4.  He states that there are two illusions:

    a.  "That 'democracy' and 'the state' are related so that the state is an expression of the sovereign will of the people.  hunter claims this is an illusion, "There are two critical implications of this situation.  The first is that the state is not subject to electoral will.  What this means is that political participation both for politicians and citizens is less about the expression of their sovereignty over the state than it is a surrender of their will to various political experts and technicians and the rules they established." p.170  We see this illusion played out in the TEA Party that thinks the state should do the will of the people who vote for them.

 

    b.  The second illusion is that politics can solve the problems most people care about.  Politics can help, laws can support justice and punish injustice and we need to be involved in shaping laws but the state cannot provide a satisfying answer to our deepest problems.  "What the state cannot do is provide fully satisfying solutions to the problems of values in our society.  There are no comprehensive political solutions to the deterioration of 'family values,' the desire for equity, or the challenge of achieving consensus and solidarity in a cultural context of fragmentation and polarization." p.171  "At best, the state's role addressing human problems is partial and limited.  It is not nearly as influential as the expectations most people have of it." p.171  "Values cannot be achieved politically  because politics is invariably about power ." p.172

 

The final illusion is according to Huntger, "The deeper irony, though, is that in the Christian faith, one has the possibility of relative autonomous institutions and practices that could in both judgment and affirmation be a source of ideals and values capable of elevating politics to more than the quest for power.  But the consequence of the whole hearted and uncritical embrace of politics by Christians has been in effect, to reduce Christian faith to a political ideology and various Christian denomination and para-church organizations to special interest groups." p.172

 

Key leaders and movements (R,L,NAB) have cultivated collective identities that are constituted in distinct ways by a sense of injury to the faith and the America itself .  We see ourselves not as "more than conquerors, but as victims, which is a weak identity.  This is also the identity of political parties who see themselves at victims and see the other side as traitors to American and Christ.  Unfortunately the Christian witness by R,L NAB has only supported this corrupt views of life.  "What this means is that rather than being defined by its cultural achievements, its intellectual and artistic vitality, its service to the needs of others, Christianity is defined to the outside world by it rhetoric or resentment and the ambition of a will in opposition to others."  p.174

 

I think we can do better.  What say yea?  Herb   Next review of Essay 3 on  Oct 2

 

 

         

[fcba%40comcast.net]

Herb,

 

What Hunter points out quite clearly is that ironically both the right and the left believe that the government is extremely powerful.

 

This is ironic for the right since the bottom line for many of them has been that the government's only real work it to defend the borders, keep order and punish criminals. Yet the right believes that the Supreme Court has turned this country away from God by not allowing prayer in school. Yet they believe that unless we elect the right President with the correct views the nation is not savable in the near future. Etc. The right sees that the government is very powerful in MAKING PROBLEMS.

 

The problem here goes back to how the church has become cultrualy captive to politics. Politics runs on exageration. That is how one fires up the base so that it will go out and vote especially in mid-term elections. The right prophecied that the passing of the recent Health Care Bill would do all sorts of immediate things such as "death panels" etc.

 

Obviously the Left also exagerates. But at least the left believes that the government should be large and should effect life in a powerful manner. The left's problem is that they tend to have an idealistic view of how government can SOLVING PROBLEMS.

 

I am still more on the left side of the issue and Hunter (I think) tries so hard to be even handed that he does not stress that the left has used the government to solve problems that certainly the church did not solve on its own! Think of integration and Truman and the army, the Supreme Court and integration...women's issues etc that he did have one statement on.  I still say that a total moritorium is wrong. Maybe I still don't get what he means.

 

Chris

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

----- Original Message -----
From: "Herb Davis" <herb....@mindspring.com>
To: confessi...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, September 29, 2010 10:35:28 PM
Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World

[John Cedarleaf]

Dear Herb:

Again, "the hope of the world is a pure church....." NAB find it difficult to compromise with the world, though in reality folks who are part of this tradition do compromise all the time. Most today do not live "apart from the world", unless you are Amish, and even among them there is compromise. We have a farmer's market each Sat. There are some Amish there, and they certainly don't drive their horse and buggy......rides from the "English" get them here.

The "Tea Party" is an example, I think, of NAB way of thinking; clean out everyone but the true believer.....they all missed the Sunday when the parable of the wheat and tares was taught!

Re: chapter 7. I like the second illusion: "politics can solve the problems most people care about." The OT lesson for this Sunday, Habakkuk 1:1-4 and 2:1-4 speak to this: "O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen." Habakkuk spoke these words 700 years before Christ and there is still destruction and violence; strife and contention and the law still becomes slack and justice never prevails and judgment is perverted.
Since the time of Habakkuk, there have  been countless attempts through politics etc to change these basics and yet they are still there.....attempts can be made at the margins and sometimes there is change,but when you put your trust in princes, you are always going to be disappointed. Witness the 2008 election and now those who feel let down because Obama hasn't delivered on all his promises....duh!

The UCC, at least in its "official" expression often sounds like a remnant of un-reconstructed liberals who really believe that if only our people had the reigns of power, we could goose the kingdom along a  bit faster.

John:

[Herb Davis]

Dear Chris and John,  I think the last  essay will make it more clear what he means (Chris mentioned this earlier),  I like your comments the Right thinks govt needs to be limited (stop it from causing problems) and the left think it needs to be expanded (solve more problems).  I agree that the state can help to solve problems and Hunter agrees but he says the state can't giving fully satisfying solutions.  I think he is suggesting that the problems the the right, left and AnaB see are real problems, but we need a deeper and more inclusive analysis of the American culture which has not been done by Christian theologians.  I think he will help us see this in essay 3.  

 

The Mass Confessing Christ visited a Russian Icon Museum yesterday.  It was a wonderful experience. The collector of the Icon told us that for 70 years in Russia Icons were illegal.  If you had one in your home you were punished.  Yet for some reason the laws and practices of the Communist did not really change the culture.  Icons are back, so is the Church.   Herb   

[Jean Easland]

Dear Herb: To Russian & Eastern Orthodox Hunters book would be completely irrelevant since they believe that the Orthodox Church IS the Kingdom of God on earth. Fall blessings --Roger

[Herb Davis]

Hi Jim, Hope to see you Monday or Tuesday for lunch. Herb

--------------------------------------------------

[Gabe]

Herd and Hunter readers,

Sorry I have not been present lately, a bit under the weather.

However, here is an introduction done for the Cape Cod Tabletalk group
also reading Hunter, of the beginnings of Essay 2.

I am beginning to figure him out, I think, seeing both the strengths
and weaknesses of this work. Bill McKinney was with our group last
week and remarked to me the other day that one gets a better take on
Hunter by having read his previous books on the culture wars, which I
have not

--Gabe

................................................................................................................


Introduction to Chapters 1, 2 and 3, 4-- Essay II, Hunter, To Change
the World


A lot of the working assumptions of some/many of us are challenged in
these chapters. We ask, once again, “Where is Hunter coming from”? It
helps to check the endnotes. Who has influenced him—in social theory
and theology? Jacque Ellul the Barthian social critic? Nietzsche on
power? Peter Berger certainly. Abraham Kuyper on the “creation
mandate” (but Hunter in a recent interview said no he was not a
Kuyperian since he came out of an era of 19th century nation-building
with more of a political turn than Hunter would espouse.) However,
Nicholas Wolterstorff and the ‘Reformed philosophers” are a good
guess.

Chapter 1. How to respond faithfully to the “creation mandate”? First,
understand the “dynamic of power.” So the church can make better use
of it? No way.

Chapter 2. The thesis? The public weal depends on something of a
consensus—the definition of reality, norms of right and wrong shared
myths….. However, when this shared consensus erodes, power, understood
as coercion or the threat of its use comes to the fore. ( Max Weber’s
distinction between power and authority seems to be at work here) The
state is the principal embodiment of this “legitimate force.” The
trouble is that since the 1930s in the US, politics (and the law) as
the attempt to use the organs of state to enforce a view of how the
world works. (The market, of course, continues to play its role, as do
the cultural forces of the media, entertainment, the arts,
education….) And with the politicization of the public arena came
attendant ideologies with their Manichaean us/them mind-set, the
diminishment of the richness and complexity of public life, the
possibility of conversation, compromise and a shared working out of
public problems. And inextricable from these processes comes
Nietzsche’s “ressentiment” Christians have in their current social
imaginaries (Charles Taylor) and derivative strategies (3 to be
examined) have fallen prey in one way or another to the
politicization/ideology/ressentiment temptation. Lurking in the wings
is Hunter’s alternative to be developed in Essay 3 (faithful presence,
Christian vocation and the alternative world of the church)

What does the group think about this thesis and its development? Is
it a fair reading of Hunter? Is his thesis and its development good
sociology and solid theology?

Chapter 3 While speaking in 2004, according to Hunter, the Christian
Right remains a power to contend with. Speaking of power, that is,
Basically, what they have been all about—the use of the state organs
to coerce the public to accept its agenda. The myth that animates and
suffuses the Christian Right’s strategies is the past golden age of
America cum faith and values. Hunter lists the organizations and cites
the policy statements of their spokespersons. He qualifies the
politicization thesis a bit, noting a questioning in some quarters of
that strategy, but sees continuities in the quest mentality.

A couple of comments. Most of the many illustrations of leaders and
movement are from the 1980s forward. Does this have implications for
Hunter’s theses?
In an article in the New Yorker back in the 1970s, Jerry Falwell is
quoted as saying he learned from Martin Luther King, Jr., the
importance of politics in making an impact on society. It is true that
“political fundamentalism” of the Falwell/Robertson/Dobson/Perkins et
al sort is not native to fundamentalism in America, which movement
has, ads far as I can see, been apolitical until the times Hunter is
dealing with.


Chapter 4 Take that, Christian Left! Ouch. Although only 3 of these
pages are about the mainline Churches, compared to 12 of “the
evangelical left,” my guess is that some of us can recognize ourselves
in the portrayal. Hunter’s case is that those of us who fit the
picture have fallen into the same traps as the Christian Right—
politics is the way to change the world accompanied by the ideological
us/them divisions and the anger, etc that goes with it.

Is this an accurate characterization of the Christian Left?


--Gabe
..

[Willis E. Elliott]

Herb (& Gabe)

1

When all else fails, try "faithful presence": is that fair to H.'s use of "f.p."?  (I'm no longer a lurker, & it seems fair.)

2

The more we learn of the Early Church (especially from class analysis of its literature), the clearer it is that Christians aimed at "faithful presence" at all societal levels, though beginnings we're mainly with the urban (non-rural: the rural were [Latin] *pagani*) lower classes (1Cor.1.26 NLT: "few of you were wise in the world's eyes or powerful or wealthy [or "high born"] when God called you.").  /  Paul was capable of addressing all classes, & did.  Christians generally outloved their neighbors, & some of them (Paul, the Fourth Gospel, Justin Martyr, et al.) could  (at least in rising public opinion) outthink the cultural elite among them.

3

But winning "the struggle for respectability" at all cultural levels was (always is, for the gospel) an ambiguous victory - a kingdom of this world (Lord Constantine's), not the full-come Kingdom of God (Lord Jesus').  The King has come (the incarnation), & he has won the battles over sin & death (the crucifixion & resurrection), & we his community share in / live / proclaim his victories (Gal.2.20).  But Christian "worldly" successes open us to the temptations/corruptions of power, & our institutions to cooptation by rivals (as "German Christians," by Nazism; & Western universities, by materialistic secularism, including historicism).

    Charles Taylor & James Hunter are prominent among thinkers puzzling over this ambiguity, a puzzling which must continue "till Kingdom [full-]comes."

4

The above is context for responding to your "ministry of the laity" witness & adding my own.  First, your paragraph.

4.1

Your first sentence reveals that the prevailing cultural wind was at that time (the '40s-'80s), & still is, "egalitarian."  My metaphor is deliberate: high winds level: an egalitarian "ministry of the laity" raises the laity by lowering (leveling) the clergy: the movement is implicitly (but need not be explicitly) anticlerical.  The same wind is also anti-ecclesial: it raises the "worldly" institutions in which laity work by lowering the institutions (churches & parachurches) in which clergy work.  /  After this prevailing egalitarian wind has done its work, everything is level - but I hasten to call attention to the fact that everything also is in ruins.  /  For some decades now, my cultural analysis of religion in America has been the warfare of two religions, viz. Christ-ianity & egal-ianity.

4.1.1

The behavioral signal that a commitment is religious is the ultimate sanction: do I obey no matter what, or only after calculating the consequences to myself?  Bill Webber's definition of a Christian was somebody who does God's will in Jesus "and takes the [negative personal] consequences."  /  Now, note how this works out in American egalian politics.  "Don't ask, don't tell" must be eliminated in the military because straights & gays are "equal"; the fact that it frees gays to cruise for sexual partners is a "consequence" which "justice" must accept.  Again, the gay/straight "equality" demands that "marriage" be open to both regardless of the linguistic corruption & other problematic consequences.  Again, every American is entitled to "equal" healthcare; so Obamacare now demands that insurance companies must pay whatever a customer needs even if the bill is a million $ per year - a formula for bankruptcy of the company or (if we move to "single payer") the country.  /  Such irrationality as in these three examples is evidence that egalianity is a religion.  Another evidence is the attitude of the egalians to those who oppose their positions: the opponents are blasphemers!  /  The present anti-egalian "values" movement (Tea Party +) may not be strong enough to take over Congress next month, but it does help to clarify the existence & nature of America's current internal religious warfare (alongside the unacknowledged warfare against one denomination of Islam, obscurely called "terrorism").

4.2

Later in your paragraph, you correctly say that "The Protestant Church at present does not have the resources to compete in high culture."  In my opinion, this weakness is mainly due to its having lost the battle with egalianity: the higher the cultural level of a Protestant, the more apt s/he is to be a convert to egalianity (with, as you say, moralism as piety's replacement [as in that book you love, "Piety and Moralism...."]).  I disagreed with Billy Graham's decision to avoid seminary lest he lose his religion (especially since he'd have gone to the Chicago seminary where I taught, & which his Wheaton friends attended), but he had a point: American academia is, generally, toxic to biblical faith.  But (as you may tire of my saying!) middle- & lower-class Christianity cannot win "the struggle for respectability."

5

Has anybody written the story of the U.S. "ministry of the laity" movement?  You two speak of it in the Boston area.  My experience was in NYC - full-time at NYTSeminary, '69-'79.  As dean of exploratory programs, I was free to innovate in stuff involving lower/middle/upper classes, & several of those programs still exist and are prospering.  But they haven't been specifically associated with any particular denominations.  /  Cultural analysis, it seems, is inevitably (whether or not explicitly) autobiographical.  Obviously, H. has the courage & knowledge to pull it off with sufficient flare to get important attention.  He has his predispositions, but he's modest enough to be a cautious prophet.  /  I'm not pessimistic about the potential of learned evangelical Protestantism to make a difference.  Some years ago, I met with a group of evangelical PhDs brought together by Lilly Foundation, whose project was to see them placed in secular universities: a top-down institutional project aimed at Christian influence in our culturally most influential secular institutions.  For the project, Lilly had no interest in Christian PhDs who'd been so changed by the world that the difference was insignificant for "changing the world."  /  I would not be pessimistic about liberal-progressive Protestantism's potential to change the world if it had an adequate from/to narrative (with clarity about both "from" & "to" - e,g,, from impersonal "scientism" to personal "creation").  (As you know, I hope for a Craigville Colloquy to address this need, with the code word "creation.")

6

Comment on the irony of Europe's secularization despite Christianizing efforts after WW2.  (Got a phonecall from Europe while writing section 5.)  Three personal experiences:

6.1

Gabe mentioned the Evangelishe Akademie ("Evangelical Academy") movement in Germany, to train lay Christians for ministry in their worlds.  Loree & I attended the one in Tutzing palace.

6.2

The industrial ministries movement, to put a trained lay chaplain (+ some ordained clergy) in every factory in Germany.  This was the final project in the life of Horst Symanowski, a Barthian frequently imprisoned by the Nazis.  In '45, he moved to Mainz, where he became a worker priest in a cement factory.  (Loree & I visited him & his wife in their Mainz home.)  Last year, he died in Mainz at age 97.

6.3

The World Council of Churches Humanum Project, to train laity for Christian witness in their worlds.  At the WCC study center, Bossey Sw., I got to lecture in a well-attended course designed for mayors of European cities ("The Kingdom of God and the Cities of Today").

7

To H., my #1 question is this: is "culture" the best locus for puzzling out the massive success of secularization in Europe & its increasing success in America?

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

 

----- Original Message -----

From: "Herb Davis" <herb....@mindspring.com>

To: <confessi...@googlegroups.com>

[Herb Davis]

Dear Willis,  Thank you for the comments and insights on Hunter.  I am never sure how to answer a question you raise, but in # 7 you asked, "is "culture" the best locus for puzzling out the massive success of secularization in Europe & its increasing success in America? "  I  think Hunter would say Institutions is the place that changes and effect culture so we need to work with institutions.  He is clear that the present American culture is a real threat to the Christian tradition.  He echoes' many of your concerns.  I think his move to  institutions is a move away from egalitarian ministry. I experienced the Laity of Ministry Project at Andover Newton as egalitarian.  Gabe did not.  Herb 

[Willis E. Elliott]

Thanks, Herb, for your crisp summaries.

 

This is just a quick biblical note on the three positions Hunter attacks:

 

Since God has made the human mind capable of simultaneous occupany of past/present/future, these are categories, within movements, of (1) thought, (2) literature, & parties (Hunter's defensive/relevant/pure).  My point: Since the NT is largely movement literature, all three of Hunter's parties can make strong cases for themselves out of NT materials.  Christian movement-theologies are past-, present-, or future-oriented.

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

 

 

[Willis E. Elliott]

Dear Herb

1

Institutions, yes.  Especially K-12 + higher ed.

2

You say Hunter says "work with institutions."  Before church yesterday, a retired prof of biology said it's increasingly hard: American lower ed (i.e., K-12) has virtually taken over Sundays & isn't interested in "working with," nor is American higher ed.  That correlates with your next sentence, that "the present American culture is a real threat to the Christian tradition."  Scientism is the intellectual root of the threat, yet I've not gotten any response in our Open Forum to my cries that we address the threat, nor from our Colloquy Committee (currently, that we confront Scientism with Creation [not creationism!]).

2

And I agree that "his move to institutions is a move away from egalitarian ministry."  On p132 he puts it in nuce: "If conservatives are animated by a mythic ideal of the right ordering of society, and thus see modern history as a decline from order to disorder, progressives have always been animated by the myth of equality and community and therefore see history as an ongoing struggle to realize these ideals."

[fcba%40comcast.net]

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

 " Scientism is the intellectual root of the threat, yet I've not gotten any response in our Open Forum to my cries that we address the threat, nor from our Colloquy Committee (currently, that we confront Scientism with Creation [not creationism!])."

Willis Elliot

 

 

Willis,

 

My response it that your comment is wonderful but I am not the one with the gifts or the interest to fight this battle. I will pray for someone who is. I will also continue to thank God that you are.

 

Chris

[Gabe]

Willis and Herb,

As two stalwarts in the 20th century ministry of the laity movement,
you will remember that it had and has to do with recovering the New
Testament teaching of Ephesians 4:11-12: "Some would be apostles, some
prophets , some evangelists, some pastors and teachers to equip the
saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of
Christ...." Supplemental passages in the ecumenical exploration of it
( as, for example, the Roman Catholic Decree on the Apostolate of the
Laity of Vatican II and the convergence documents Baptism, Eucharist
and Ministry, "The Calling of the Whole People of God" section) are I
Cor 12 and Romans 12. In the Reformation traditions it is traceable to
such as Question 32 of the Heidelberg Catechism in which all
Christians share the 3-fold ministry of Christ--prophetic, priestly
and royal. The ecumenical consensus/convergence expresses itself in
the emphasis on the pastoral office as '"equipping the saint" for
their ministry in the world, not in the church. Hence the affirmation
of the singularity of the pastoral office of Word and Sacrament and
the singularity of of the 'office" of the laity as called to witness
in word and deed in the world. This has nothing to do with an
"egalitarian" impulse to take over the pastoral office, just the
opposite, developing a complimentarity and mutuality along with the
singularities.

The hopes for a living out of the eqipping/equipped mandate of the New
Testament are still far from realized, hence the welcome accent by
Hunter on the vocation of the laity in the institutions of society.

I have never been convinced of Willis on "egalitarianism."Our dialog
about it goes back maybe 25 years and I'm not going to rehearse all
the arguments pro and con. However, I firmly believe that the
orientation point for any discussion of equality in wider cultural
issues must be the nature of the triune God. One of the fundamental
Christian teachings about the immanent Trinity is the co-equality and
coinherence of the three Persons. Of course we are not going to
replicate this divine inter-relationship in any human ordering of our
life together. But they remain the lure and judge of our this-worldly
relationships.

--Gabe

> > From: "Gabe" <gfac...@comcast.net>

> > Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 4:43 PM
> > To: "Confessing Christ Open Forum" <confessi...@googlegroups.com>
> > Subject: Re: Reading Hunter's book, To change the World
>
> >> Herb,
>
> >> Good points, especially about the Nobel prize winner.
>
> >> However, the science and theology group you started at Eliot Church
> >> was an expression of the (in part) UCC's seminary, Andover Newton's
> >> effort it explore the ministry of the laity. More and more I am
> >> thinking that Hunter's "faithful presence" proposal is much like the
> >> effort to stress the ministry of the laity in the world which goes
> >> back to Hans Rudi-Weber and others in the World Council of Churches
> >> from the 40s forward to Dick Broholm and others.. Hunter  stresses
> >> within it the leadership/elites whereas the movement of the laity did
> >> not particulalry accent that. However the church "academy" network of
> >> movers and shakers in Europe did stress that. And in Lancaster we
> >> gathered at the seminary a small group of such (Mayor Monahan, Ken
> >> Shirk, head of the Republican party, the person in charge of
> >> redevelopment whose name escapes me, Glass the head
>

> ...
>
> read more »

[Herb Davis]

Dear Willis,  I know you are not anti science.  I remember your stories about your boyhood chemistry kit.  As you know I was a high school science teacher.  I am not sure the best way to interact with science is by attacking "scientism".  There are some interesting conversations going on between theology and science.  Dick Coleman a UCC clergy is a good guide in these discussions.  There are hard liners on both side.  One of Hunter's concern is the evangelical obsession with Darwin and evolution.  In some ways science may need our help.  The global warming debate which the scientist cannot close may result from their isolation from other segments of society, such as the Church.  Hawkins recent theological comment that "God is not necessary for creation" is true for many Christian theologians, the absence of God or God removing self so creation has room to exist is no problem for us.  You cannot prove God by looking at creations, natural theology is very limited.  At the same time Hawkins maybe making an either or , science or theology the reasoned position.  Rather than joining that position I think we should push for both and.  It is sad when many reject science as a gift to us or reject theology as a gift.  We need both.  I don't think "scientism" even with your wise use of the term helps in the discussion.  

 

Saw Mark on Sunday at South Church is seems to be doing well.   Herb  

[Herb Davis]

Sermon Note:  Oct. 17, Twenty First Sunday after Pentecost, Luke 18:1-8

In the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus Jesus disconnects richness from faithfulness.  The poor man goes to heaven, the rich man ends up in hell.  In the parable of the Judge and the Widow Jesus disconnects success from faithfulness.  Most of us pray daily, "Thy Kingdom come" and sometimes we experience persecution and hardship, often we experience dying congregations and persistence injustice.  Sometimes we "lose heart", get depressed, become bitter, drive ourselves harder or maybe we sense we are threatened and become afraid. The response to fear is not to work harder but to "prayer always."  The response to defeat is not to give up but to "prayer always."  Pray is confidence that God hears and acts on our petitions.  Pray is confidence God is not a crooked judged who needs to be bribed, not even an honest judge who acts in fairness but a heavenly Father who sets aside his anger and hears the prayers of the faithful.

 

The woman in the parable is a model of Christian piety.  She refuses to be denied justice.  Her only defense is her persistence faith that justice will be done by a corrupt judge.  She know a loving heavenly Father will hear her prayers, accomplish His purpose and vindicate His elect.

 

Will the Som of Man find faith when he comes?  Will he find fear?  Will the church be at prayer, convinced that the promises of God are true? I would agree faith without works is dead.  The barrier to works is fear and faith without prayer leaves us hopeless.  So pray always.

 

Any additions or corrections?  Any liturgical resources?  Herb

[John Cedarleaf]

Dear Herb,
Both and! Excellent. Once again whenever we seek "purity of thought" we get into trouble. Indeed there are fruitful conversations going on in this area. When Francis Collins was tapped to hear NIH he ran into trouble from his atheist colleagues because as a Christian they thought he was in some kind of cult, and that his Christianity would trump everything else. There is an excellent article about this in the New Yorker of a week or so ago. God gave us a mind to use.

John

[Herb Davis]

Dear John,  You are so right on Collins appointment.  I guess there are fundamentalist who are scientist. 
Thanks for the reference in the New Yorker.  Herb

[Jean Easland]

Dear Herb: I believe that environment is one of the factors that shapes culture and has an influence on religious ideas. We have three distinct cultures hear in this small Capital City of only 14 thousand: Folk who live in town and work for the government, farmers and ranchers who surround the town and Indigenous Peoples who live on the Reservations near by. All three have some differing and various religious ideas, experiences and practices. There are only 750 thousand people in the whole state. It is relatively easy to get to know political leaders. I know the last three Governors personally. Some have attended worship where I have and am serving, one had me come to the hospital and pray for him as we both have a ranching background and our fathers did business with each other. The Christian communities here look more like 1980 than 2010. The interface between the Church and the State is obvious. Yet we suffer the same overarching cultural influences as all Americans and most of the people of the world. We have a South Dakota Association of Christian Churches which is quite ineffective and mute most of the time. If the Church is to become the effective witness we long for in Confession Christ then it must return to the ecumenical movement that Gabe Fackre struggled so hard to create. All the other peripheral in house theological issues, important as they may be to particular traditions, fail to effect real change in political policies that affect all Americans. One of the main thrusts of CC should be to network to create a unified and effective witness that can speak truth to power. I speak only the obvious. Blessings     Roger

----- Original Message -----

From: Herb Davis

[link...@aol.com]

Dear Herb,

I wrote a little something this week for the CC site, again. The only
thing I would add to what you said is to highligth the eschatological
dimension to prayer in the Luke text and context: time is on the side
of God's elect, who shout to him, day and night! Time is not the enemy
of the church, insofar as it heed's God's invitation to pray, in and
with the coming Son of Man.

God bless you!

Jim

[Herb Davis]

Dear Roger,  Hunter would agree with you.  He believes that to incarnate Christ in the world the church (right, left and Neo Ana) must love each other and love the world.  He points out how we hate each other and the culture sees us as a joke.  CC has consistently urged the national church to make ecumenical witness important.  WE have a long way to go before this can happen but you are right we need to walk that walk.  Herb

[John Cedarleaf]

Roger,
Thanks for your comments. Ecumenism on the local level does exist, but for the most part churches go their own way because they are afraid of doing anything that will detract from themselves. The community in which I live has a fairly strong ecumenical enviornment. There is what we call the "Lay Clergy" Council(Council of Churches really!) and they come together and do ecumenical services and service projects. We also have two other organizations Perinton Ecumenical Ministries,  and Ecumenical Ministries of Perinton, one of which is the "holding company" for a hospice and the other which does VBS etc. Clergy meet monthly, both Prot and RC, although the Port are mainly mainline types. Still, trying to get the churches themselves to do things ecumenically, menaning education etc. is difficult.

John

[Jean Easland]

Dear Herb: I just returned from 3 hr.. of ministry in our maximum security Federal hold over prison. What a mix of joy and pain you find there. It is obvious once you past the superficial that God the Holy Spirit has visited and touched lives if wonderful and breath taking ways none of which is/are dependent on culture etc. but the open wound of the human heart/soul. A testimony and prayer from a Lakota man who has been institutionalized 10 years of his 28. He has learned several languages in prison, Spanish, Lakota,  and Chinese. He has tattoos on his face symbolizing good and evil and other tattoos I won't mention. Just a brilliant soul that is biblically literate and loves his fellow inmates. He has been told by the "system" that his institutionalization has made him unable to live in "normal society". What a sentence by the "righteous culture" in which we live! God has his ministers in places beyond recognition by about everyone particularly some times the Church. There must be a HUGE undercurrent of GRACE running through the blood stream of the human family. The Church is established to MINISTER first and analzy second. When this is turned around nothing of God can happen. Blessings we anxiously await Rick Floyd and his darling to show up and stay with us next week. I have a 2250 sqare foot building ready to be a school of practical theology in Ft. Pierre S.D. SEND HELP, LETS GET GOING, WHAT ARE WE WAITHING FOR? The Three-a-logians have all the tools and gifts to get this going--------"Come on Man"--Roger

[Willis E. Elliott]

Yes, John, "God gave us a mind to use."

1

"God gave" is creation.

No Creator, no creation.

"Spontaneous creation" (Stephen Hawkings' oxymoron), no Creator mind.

No Creator mind, no intellectual basis for biblical religion.

No intellectual basis for biblical religion, "purity of thought": The Bible is pure myth.

SCIENTISM teaches that the mental basis of Christianity is pure myth.  John, this is the "purity of thought" dominant in American academia.  Responses to my online "OnFaith" columns often express surprise that I seem to be intelligent: how could that be, seeing that I claim to be a Christian?  Really, the common assumption: since Christianity lacks an intelligent foundation, Christians are not intelligent.  (So, as you say, Francis Collins is an anomaly to his atheist colleagues.)

2

For reasons I"ve stated in earlier emails on the subject, I hold that "spontaneous creation" is (1) the best explanation of scientism, (2) to date, intellectually, the phrase most threatening  to biblical religion, & (3) the best counter-attack point for biblical polemics.

3

Hunter is deeply concerned about the present American culture's "threat" to the Christian worldview (or mind).  For facing this threat, what are the responsibilities of Christian readers of his "To Change the World"?  How respond to threat?  Circling the wagons may achieve survival, but the wagons cannot both circle & move toward their destination.  Contrast the ancient Greek square phalanx, which provided for both protection & attack.

4

Good theology is phalanx-like: "apologetics" for protection, "polemics" for attack.  Confessing Christ & the Colloquies are for good theology, so here are two criteria for planning & judging : (1) How does this proposal protect the Christian mind?  (2) How does it challenge other minds, especially the contextual-cultural mind?

4.1

Of course theology should concern itself with the dyad, threat/promise, not just threat.  Jonah couldn't comprehend God's love or Al Qaeda (I.e., Nineveh, center of what Jonah's people saw as their world's most violent people).  Colloquy '10 celebrated "common grace" in grace's presence in great common films.  In academic lingo, it was a course in film appreciation with the thread of a common theme.  Grace in common film is a bridge between the culture & the Christian mind.

4.2

Perhaps Colloquy themes should alternate between bridges & battles.  On this pattern, Colloquy '11 should have a battle theme (in the spirit of Hunter's view of the present American culture as "threat" to the Christian mind/world).  I think so, & proposed

CREATION AND THE CHRISTIAN TASK TODAY

The Use and Abuse of "Creation" - the Word and the World

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

----- Original Message -----

-- 
Rev. Dr.John N. Cedarleaf
Pastor
First Congregational United Church of Christ
26 E. Church St.
Fairport, NY 14450
585-223-0224; 585-223-8172

[Jean Easland]

Wonderful Willis: Most clear ever! Thanks, this one is a compact thinksheet! Thankyou and love, Roger

----- Original Message -----

From: Willis E. Elliott

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

[Willis E. Elliott]

Glad you're preaching in son Mark's church these two Sundays, Herb.  He's been enjoying chairing the search committee.

 

+++

 

Thanks for your word-use comment.

1

Yes, theology & science are both gifts, not either/or.  So, as you say, "how do we push for both and"?  (I've been doing so since '37, so the question could hardly interest me more.)

2

How did you, as a highschool science teacher, push for both/and?  I've pushed science teachers to use Darwin's classic as an example.  So many positive references to "the Creator" & "creation"!  Instead of using only secondary sources, children should be exposed to "The Origin of Species" as the primary source of the evolution debate.

2.1

Two nights ago, on the PBS "God in America" series midsection, twice it was falsely said that in Darwin's opinion, God had nothing to do with evolution.  Sad that in the '25 "monkey trial," Brian didn't quote Darwin, who clearly saw evolution as God's idea & innovation (as iterative bioprocesses, not as punctiliar events).  But (as Paul Krugman evidenced recently on his blog), people's opinions are based more on their beliefs than on reality.  Brian was unaware that Darrow's opinion of Darwin/God was based on atheist belief, not on Darwin fact.  In proving this, a science teacher is teaching what is basic to intelligent science & intelligent theology, viz. how to think / doubt / be suspicious.  A science class, after experiencing the half-hour Brian/Darrow on PBS "God in America," might be asked Was the program scientific?  Clearly, it was based on scientistic myth, not scientific reality.

2.2

Now, Herb, in the immediately above sentence, what word would you substitute for "scientistic"?  "Atheist"?  Too broad: we're talking science, & "scientism" is the atheist philosophy which presupposes scientific support: the opinion, scientism, is based on the belief that science & theism are incompatible - either/or.  Can you suggest a synonym for "scientistic"?

2.3

"Scientism," I claim, is necessary as the antonym of "creationism."  You've heard/read me quote Trueblood that "It's what you leave out that wrecks you."  Leaving anything out narrows the thought range, is "narrow-minded."  So, the inane debate on what to leave out continues: leaving Darwin out is "creationism," & leaving God out is "scientism."  (To Marx, leaving God out seemed to be a good idea at the time; but on the common people, the working class, Marxist governments have had the opposite effect from Marx's hope.)

2.4

In said PBS "monkey trial," Brian's opposition tried to force him into the fundamentalist-literalist mode: a "day" of creation must have been 24-hours - which Brian denied.  Well, then, said the opposition, if "day" is a metaphor in the Bible's first chapter, why not see everything in Scripture as metaphoric?  Brian was not prepared for the question, & the media - who hoped to see him defeated - chalked up the event as a defeat for Brian (even though he won the trial).

3

Herb, your choice of venue, for science/religion "interaction," is not debate but (as Dick's two excellent books, which I got to read as manuscripts) exposition.  I agree that "creationism"/"scientism" are not cool, academic terms.  They are, as I've often said, war-words (Greek, "logomachies").  In America, the deepest, most consequential culture war is between personalism & both its fudgings (e.g., "process theology") & its direct denial (e.g., the impersonalism of Hawkings' "spontaneous creation").  The PBS "monkey trial" makes clear Brian's concern about what will happen to America with no divine support for human purpose/ideals/morals.  /  The other hour of the series that night was on American slavery, the Civil War, & (excellent!) Lincoln's developing God-idea.  Until his favorite son Willie died (& Lincoln asked his Presbyterian minister for a copy of the funeral sermon - with this which deeply impressed him: "a loving God who acts in history and does all things well"), Lincoln did not believe in a personal God.  (The reverse of Darwin, who stopped believing in a personal God when his teenage daughter died.)  /  When God became personal for Lincoln, his thinking included wondering about how God was giving personal attention to our Civil War.  In connection with the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln said, "God has decided to answer this question in favor of the slaves."  (A number of times, we hear MLKing's "I want to do the will of God" as an audio-sidebar.)  In his Second Inaugural, Lincoln expressed his conviction that God had given his personal attention to America in afflicting us with the Civil War as punishment for 200 years of Negro slavery.  (Northerners who wanted the Inaugural to be a triumphalist oration against the South got, instead, a call to national repentance.)

4

The dominance of scientism in America's science classrooms assures the continued "isolation" (a word you rightly use) of American academic science from the general public.  I would use even a stronger word: "alienation."  It's a factor for the Republicans Nov.2, & it threatens America's future.   The ignorance & arrogance of the scientistic establishment makes "interaction" with religion/theology impractical as a hope for movement from either/or to both/and: I'm more hopeful of progress by (1) the conversion of scientists to personalism ("Creator," etc.) & (2) increasing public opposition to scientism in our schools (improved biblical-theological education in our Christian congregations being one hope in this fundamental culture-war).

5

As you know, Herb, I've personally suffered more from narrow-mindedness on the right ("creationism") than on the left ("scientism").  But a "faithful presence" seems to me to involve carrying on the war on both fronts.

6

Finally, a few comments on other matters in your paragraph:

6.1

Paul (Ro.1.20) is in direct contradiction to your statement that "You cannot prove God by looking at creations."  It depends of who's doing the looking: before his Christian conversion, Francis Collins (former head of the Genome Project) agreed with you; now, he agrees with Paul.  Seeing is believing, believing is seeing.  /  But of course the trick is in the word "prove": scientifically, nothing can be proved about anything personal, divine or human.

6.2

I know of no Christian theologians who believe "'God is not necessary for creation.'"  Who/what do they think is necessary?  But you seem to suggest that creation happens when God gets out of the way, makes space for it, "removing self so creation has room to exist": spatial deism? open theism?  I agree that "natural theology is very limited"; but so, for the full range of human experiencing, is "natural science."  I think what you're getting at here is creation-nature's freedom to fail/succeed, including humanity's freedom to sin/repent.  I sense that you're saying something important, & I'm not getting it: the alternative is to think you're wrong, which (from my experience of you) is improbable.

6.3

Finally, what "discussion" is the word "scientism" not a help in?  My guess is that you're thinking of your Eliot Church group involving some scientists.  In that group, did you have one word for the position of anti-God scientists?  Not that one word is necessary, but it's handy - precisely as it's handy to have one word, viz., "creationism," to describe anti-Darwin six-day fundamentalist literalism (which position, despite press reports, no one took in the '25 "monkey trial").

 

A good trip to FL!

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

----- Original Message -----

From: Herb Davis

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

[Jean Easland]

Brother of Us: In my ministry to mostly Lakota men and women in prison I often start discussions with emphasis the Creator, some have absorbed a grasp on natural theology from their root religion which does tend toward monotheism(Great Spirit-Wakontanka) and is creation centered(animated). As Paul teaches in Ro. 1:20 many people start their search for God as deism, I did, and should discover some God reality by observing the creation.  I think that your drive to have this be the starting point of theological discussion is manifestly essential to a new process of evangelism. Fundamentalism has attempted this but leave so much out and skew their language with political posturing. Sadly, due to urbanization many in the modern world do not get an opportunity to fully experience the Creators presence in His Creation---but with your thrust toward the scientific community you touch the "technological" mind/world view of atheistic scientism.The new "land" for the new generation is their techno/gadgets which increasingly absorb their attention and  and forms their mind/world view. I fear this is a desolate "land" which further alienates humans both from the creation and the Creator.  I hope you stick to this like honey on toast! May the Lord continue to bombard that big brain of yours with good ideas, dreams and visions.    Blessings and love----------Roger

----- Original Message -----

From: Willis E. Elliott

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

[Willis E. Elliott]

Bill (Herzog), is it true that you've suggested environmentalism (concern for the ab/use of God's creation) as the Colloquy '11 theme?  If so, it's a large overlap with my suggestion (to which Roger Easland's below is a response).

1

We care about what we've made & why we made it, so the supreme support for the environmental cause is the fact that "nature" is "creation," a work & concern of God.  And (according to J.D.Hunter's "To Change the World") God's supervening assignment to humanity is the "creation mandate," which Hunter expounds upfront in the book (pp3-5).  While he criticizes the religious left for overattention to "relevance," his book centers on the relevance of one divine mandate (the earliest) to life today.  He couldn't be more serious about it.

2

The prior question, of course, is whether there's Anybody "out there" to mandate anything to our species.  No Creator, no mandate.  Hawkings' "spontaneous creation" is, currently, the most serious challenge to the intellectual "plausibility structures" of biblical religion.  The brighter an American child, the less apt the survival of his/r biblical faith given "the constant acid drip of sneering and mockery that marks American academia today" (p3 of the Nov/10 First Things feature article "Degrees of Faith: A First Things Survey of American Colleges and Universities").

3

Theological colloquies should be about matters of fundamental seriousness, but will people come?  I believe that our "base" (in the demographic sense) is deeply concerned about both serious matters I've mentioned  -  what is happening to the outer environment, the biosphere; & what is happening to the inner environment of the American mind  -  both issues deeply theological.  Indeed, I think recruitment to a colloquy converging these two issues would "draw" better than one on something less serious & less urgent.

4

As one who did the Bible Reflections at several Craigville Colloquies, & got to observe your reverent competence in that role at your first Craigville Colloquy, I can imagine your excitement at the prospect of providing the biblical basis for this

 convergence of relevance & revelation.  And I'll throw in a third "R," reconciliation of religion & science, as in Darwin's last sentence of "The Origin of Species" (unchanged in the 6th ed., in which  he made numerous changes): "There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one...from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved."

5

Though I've not sent much on this theme to our Colloquy Committee, I have to Confessing Christ's Open Forum.  But in this email I must mention two unavoidable difficulties in the title use of the word "creation":

5.1

Politicization.  Even before the Bryan/Darrow '25 encounter, the secular media didn't distinguish between creation & (six-day) creationism.  And the fear of being smeared as fundamentalist steers liberals-progressives from "public square" use of the word.  /  In a July NYT piece, Paul Krugman reported a study indicating that "politically sophisticated thinkers" are "even less open to new information than less sophisticated types."  /  On p211, Hunter says "Culture is most powerfuil... when it is self-evident."  On the left, it's self-evident that anybody talking about "creation" is conservative: on the right, it's self-evident that anybody defending "evolution" is atheist.  Rescuing "creation" from both left & right would be one side-benefit of a colloquy with "creation" in its title.

5.2

Dissolution of the historic bond between the word "creation" as assuming the Creator & the word "creation" as only the world of nature-in-itself (i.e., "nature" as an adequate synonym for "creation" - as in so much tree-hugging literature).  (This postmodernist dissolving of the word/world bond is a major theme in Hunter, e.g. pp205-210 - a "subjectivist cul de sac.")  This "exchange"-of-meaning phenomenon desensitizes Christians to the seriousness of Hawkings' elimination of the Creator from "creation" in his new phrase, "spontaneous creation."  (I put "exchange" in quotes: a reference to Ro.1.23  [the "exchange" of the transcendent God for something other & less]).  /  Semantic dissolution encourages the reification of metaphors.  E.g., a "covenant" is interpersonal; but Buddhist environmentalism is singing "the covenant with the earth."

6

Elsabeth asked me for a subtitle to my suggested CREATION AND THE CHRISTIAN TASK TODAY.  i submitted it (together with an explanation, which I'll not burden you with here): The Use and Abuse of "Creation" - the Word and the World.

7

Could be, Bill, that I'd have more enthusiasm for your theme-&-title submission than I have for mine.  I await eagerly!

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

----- Original Message -----

From: Jean Easland

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com

[Andy Lang]

Is everybody on this list? I see that Dave Debick (debic...@yahoo.com) has been dropped.

 

Andy
 

Andy Lang
Cleveland, OH
216-926-6262
lang...@sbcglobal.net
http://langohio.blogspot.com
http://facebook.com/andrew.lang

http://twitter.com/langohio

---

From: Willis E. Elliott <elli...@charter.net>
To: To: Andy Lang\(home\) <lang...@sbcglobal.net>; Bill Herzog <whe...@ants.edu>; Claudia Demick <cpde...@yahoo.com>; Craigville Conference Center <craigv...@capecod.com>; Dick Coleman <rcole...@earthlink.net>; Elizabeth Vincent <ea...@yahoo.com>; Elsabeth Hilke <elsabe...@comcast.net>; Esther Haskell <esm...@massed.net>; Gabe Fackre <gfa...@comcast.net>; Jurgen Hilke <jhi...@comcast.net>; Lelly Smith <lelly...@verizon.net>; Mary Herzog <mher...@gmail.com>; Mary Woodbury <maryaw...@yahoo.com>; Ray Kostulias <ray...@yahoo.com>; Roberta Barr <robert...@comcast.net>; Tomi Zobrio <tomi...@gmail.com>; Willis Elliott <elli...@charter.net>
Sent: Sat, October 16, 2010 5:57:46 PM
Subject: Colloquy '11: theme suggestion



[fcba%40comcast.net]

He was "cc-ed."

 

Chris

God Is Still Laughing
http://home.comcast.net/~fcba

[Jean Easland]

Dr. Elliott:

Great are You. O Lord,

and wondrous are your works,

and no word will suffice to sing Your wonders.

For You by your will

have out of nothingness brought all things into being and by Your power sustain all creation,

and by Your providence direct the world.

You from the four elements have formed creation and have crowned the cycle of the year

with the four seasons.

All the spiritual powers tremble before You;

the sun praises You; the moon glorifies You;

the stars in their courses meet with You;

the light hearkens unto You:

the depths shudder at Your presence;

the springs of water serve You.

You have stretched out the heavens as a curtain;You have founded the earth upon the waters.

You have bounded the sea with sand;

You have poured forth the air for breathing;

the angelic powers minister unto You.

The cherubim and the seraphim,

as they stand and fly around You

veil themselves with fear of Your

unapproachable glory.

For You,

being boundless and beginningless and unutterable, came down on earth, taking the form of a servant, being made in human likeness.

For You, O Master, through the tenderness of Your mercy,

could not endure the human race tormented by the devil,

but You came and saved us.

We confess Your grace;

we proclaim Your beneficence;

we do not hide Your mercy.

You have set free our mortal nature.

All creation sings praises to You

who have revealed Yourself.

For You, our God, have appeared upon earth

and have dwelt among us.

You have sanctified the Jordan streams.....

 

EXCERPT FROM THE GREAT BLESSING OF WATER----------------EASTER ORTHODOX

 

I thought this fit your theological thrust on creator/creation/science. It could be used as a devotion in preparation to Colloquay or be a study on Patristic theology as it relates to the theology of today.  Blessings and love --- Roger

 

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Willis E. Elliott

To: To: Andy Lang\(home\) ; 'Bill Herzog' ; 'Claudia Demick ' ; 'Craigville Conference Center' ; 'Dick Coleman' ; 'Elizabeth Vincent' ; 'Elsabeth Hilke' ; 'Esther Haskell' ; 'Gabe Fackre' ; 'Jurgen Hilke' ; 'Lelly Smith' ; 'Mary Herzog' ; 'Mary Woodbury' ; 'Ray Kostulias' ; 'Roberta Barr' ; 'Tomi Zobrio' ; 'Willis Elliott'

Sent: Saturday, October 16, 2010 4:57 PM

Subject: Colloquy '11: theme suggestion

[Willis E. Elliott]

Wonderful, Roger!

My spirit grew lifting wings as I read on!

Eastern Orthodoxy is so solid on creation as the foundation of the Christian heart & mind, liturgy & theology.

If Creator/environment is the Colloquy '11 joint theme, how about you helping on worship?

+++

After church this morning, I wrote a poem on this joint theme.  Most so-called "praise songs" depress me, but my poem contains a fragment from one I like.  Instead of seeing it as sentimental, I hope you'll experience my poem with the Eastern Orthodox resonances of David Bentley Hart's "The Beauty of the Infinite: The Aesthetics of Christian Truth."

+++

 

TO MAKE A BUTTERFLY

 

To make a butterfly -

    a living cosmos of breathlike lightness -

first,

you make carbon.

You explode or implode stars

in a chaos unimaginable till Hubble.

 

"In His time,

 in His time,

 He makes all things beautiful in His time."

 

Grace and peace--

Willis

 

---- Original Message -----

From: Jean Easland

To: confessi...@googlegroups.com ; To: Andy Lang\(home\) ; 'Bill Herzog' ; 'Claudia Demick ' ; 'Craigville Conference Center' ; 'Dick Coleman' ; 'Elizabeth Vincent' ; 'Elsabeth Hilke' ; 'Esther Haskell' ; 'Gabe Fackre' ; 'Jurgen Hilke' ; 'Lelly Smith' ; 'Mary Herzog' ; 'Mary Woodbury' ; 'Ray Kostulias' ; 'Roberta Barr' ; 'Tomi Zobrio' ; 'Willis Elliott'

Sent: Sunday, October 17, 2010 4:17 PM

Subject: Re: Colloquy '11: theme suggestion

[Jean Easland]

Brother, Father: Yes I will come if Creator/environment is the theme!!! Love your poem, yes a lot of so called "praise" music is a poor substitute for sound liturgy----but is an attempt to rediscover liturgical/vocal beauty in the worship experience. It sure would be good to worship together. Rick Floyd and his wife are due to visit tomorrow so I am anxious to meet them.-------------As you know I do not like the book report/study on line and I wish we could draw in more working pastors and engage in more dialogue of pastoral issues. l will send you a personal note on it.   Blessings and love Roger

[Janet Keyes]

To our dear brother Willis-

I read your poem on a day when life was filling me with stress, and felt an overwhelming sense of peace and comfort.  During my writing group in the afternoon I tried to write a poem to express my gratitude.  It follows below.

Poem by Another - with thanks to Willis Elliot

 

When I peruse a poem

painstakingly constructed by another,

I often feel confused,

or indifferent,

unmoved,

or mildly revulsed.

I sometimes feel intrigued,

or slightly curious.

 

But on a warm October day

when trees were glowing red and gold,

I found a precious nugget-

a poem by a man who’s old.

He called it "To Make a Butterfly"

but could have named it "Creation."

It filled my soul with a burst of joy

and breathless bright elation.

He quoted from a song of praise,

Reluctantly, I’d say.

The praises spoke his thought sublime.

I want to write that way.

 

He penned, "To make a butterfly-

a living cosmos of breathlike lightness-

first

you make carbon.

You explode or implode stars

in a chaos unimaginable until Hubble.

‘In His time,

In His time,

He makes all things beautiful in His time.’ "

 

With butterfly tears I wept

and wished I had written that.

 

Janet

---

Internal Virus Database is out of date.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 9.0.851 / Virus Database: 271.1.1/3159 - Release Date: 09/25/10 13:45:00

[Herb Davis]

Sermon Note:  Oct. 24, Twenty-Second Sunday after Pentecost, Luke 18:9-14

 

This parable is rich in Christian theology.  We find Jesus and Paul on the same page, the "just shall live by faith." As Jim noted last week these parables have an eschatological note.  In the parable of the Judge and the Widow we are asked, "Shall not God vindicate his elect?"  The question is answered with a resounding YES. In this parable we are asked who is the elect?  The answer is a Hugh questions mark.  If you are one of the righteous you maybe surprised.  In the end the first is last, the rich are poor and the meek inherit the earth. Be careful!

 

The longing to know we are saved runs deep in our souls.  The Pharisee by all humans standards is righteous.  He is no straw man.  He is a responsible citizen, an excellent churchman and a generous giver. By all comparison with "thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even tax collectors" he is one of the elect.  The suprising turn around is that the tax collector goes home "righteous" while the Pharisee is not among the elect. 

 

New England Congregationalist in order to confirm they were among the elect may have erred like the Pharisee.  I wonder if "The Scarlet Letter" was not a mediation on the Pharisee and the Tax Collector?  I wonder in our day if there is not a note of the Pharisee in denoting congregations with special designations?  Is it possible that we who are faithful, generous, just, peace making , green, welcoming will be surprised when the fundamentalist,  global warming deniers,  and tea party members go down as the elect. 

 

How do we live if we are uncertain about the elect?  Maybe we live with a little humility.  Maybe we see the other  as more than a tax collector, fundamentalist, right winger but as a brother or sister standing in the need of "atonement", "be merciful unto be a sinner."

 

This parable seems to teach that righteousness is a gift of God granted by the means of atonement sacrifice to sinners who come to Him in confession of their sins and in full awareness their own inability to achieve righteousness.  The atonement sacrifice is worthless if we can make ourselves righteous. So Jesus and Paul are joined.  Paul's teaching on justification has its roots in the teaching of Jesus.

 

Any additions or corrections.  Peace, Herb 

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Dear Herb,

Well put!

I have written something on the CC website Liturgy Section. I think
the "surprise" or punchline comes a little earlier in the narrative
than you do. The pharisee presents himself in court to the Judge as a
competent judge of himself as righteous and others as unrighteous, and
prays (petitions) for, well, nothing! He asks the Judge of all:
"Nothing!" But the surprise is that he has totally misjudged the
publican, and is thus an incompetent, unjust judge. He judges the
publican as one in contempt of court, but he is the one in contempt,
an unjust judge, standing in supreme self-justification, who asks
nothing of the God who judges all.

But, of course, the verdict comes to both, both the one who asked
mercy and the other who asked nothing.

God bless you!

Jim