I was talking to Jon the other night about theological stuff, and when we started talking about “new kingdom” kind of stuff, I realized once again that I really can’t imagine a radically new kingdom (even though I was almost convinced during Advent this year), and I don’t know if I want to believe in it either.
Something about believing that God is a creative God, and the world we live in being a creative world, and the fact that destruction and death are also tied up in that creativity – so if a “new kingdom” is supposed to mean some kind of absence of suffering or death, then I don’t think I can believe in that. Or maybe it does allow death and destruction, but we’re all just able to deal with it healthily, and the point of a new kingdom is that everything is “just” – but the whole “lion laying down with the lamb” thing still points to no destruction, no more “cycle of life and death”. So, I don’t know if believing in a heaven-ish realm makes me more a mystic or not, or more of a this world is the be-all end-all kind of person. Because, I tend to believe that there’s this “afterlife” where we all go to heaven and keep on living in some way that’s not really physical and pretty different than this world, and maybe there’s this spirit mass that we all go into, and then people are created out of that to be reincarnated back on this world, or maybe we are still encapsulated souls to a certain extent in the afterlife, and we keep on having particular personalities and growing as individuals, etc. But that doesn’t really take into account any kind of “second coming” or “new heaven and new earth” or thing where we all are just buried in the ground and are brought back to life when a new kingdom reigns or whatever – or maybe it does, if things are just on a much larger time scale, like the idea that universes are created and collapsed, created and collapsed, etc. – and the “new heaven and new earth” will eventually come, but it’s not necessarily anything we necessarily should concern ourselves with because it’s such a long way down the road – but then, if I say I’m trying to bring the “new kingdom” into being right now, how can I even reference something I don’t really believe in and can’t even imagine? I think I might be able to say that in the sense that I don’t really believe in an actual “new kingdom” that will come in the future, but that we’re bringing a new kingdom to fruition every day – but what is that even supposed to mean? It’s not that I actually like suffering/sin/brokenness/addictions/stale-ness/not growing/injustice/war/violence/etc. – but I kind of feel like these are just facts of life/the human experience that we have to deal with, and not necessarily envision a world without them, but envision lives where people grow through them, and where, say, peace is experienced more often than violence, but always in relation to the violence and acknowledging the violence and in prayer over the violence.
As a side note, Jon prayed a little prayer that I would have a dream of the “new kingdom” that night, but I don't think that really worked, because I didn't have any dreams – though I may have, and I just didn’t remember it the next morning. BTW – I think this whole type of thought process is why I think I’m Jewish sometimes (but not really, because I’m kind of uber-Christian).
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Interesting thoughts. Here are some of my thoughts and responses to yours:
In general, the afterlife and whatever the whole “new kingdom” thing means is pretty iffy to me in a lot of ways. But at the same time I have a hard time not believing in promises such as those. I definitely found a lot of hope in passages that talked about the promise of a new heaven and earth where there would be no suffering or pain, so I definitely still believe that there won’t be any in heaven or the afterlife or whatever. At least I don’t think there will be any suffering, etc. in the way that we experience it now. It’s hard to imagine a world in which we could grow and change and overcome if there is nothing adverse to challenge us, but that doesn’t mean that growth isn’t possible without adversity; it just means that we haven’t experienced that type of growth yet. For all we know, adversity on this earth actually hinders our growth and without it we would grow even more. Even when an individual person on this earth does not experience adversity, someone else does and that relationship in itself has some interesting implications. Anyhow, so that’s what I think about that.
In regards to what the afterlife will be like, I am definitely less inclined to believe in some sort of spirit world type thing. I believe that our souls (if we have them)/spirit stuff will resurrect with our bodies, though we will somehow be made new (whatever that means – which, honestly, I don’t think we’ll have any idea what it means until we get there). Maybe we’ll be made more whole. That might be pretty good. I think in some ways the new kingdom will look a little like what we have now, not just because we’re attempting to bring the new kingdom to the here and now but because I think some things will just feel familiar (whether they really are or not), not to mention God might really like some of his creation (sorry for the masculine God use, but I really can’t help myself).
I can’t really imagine that what the world is now is what the world will be when it becomes new, because if it is I don’t know how much I’d want to be a part of it. It’s not much of a promise, I don’t think, to struggle and suffer so much for it to just keep on going. That doesn’t mean there aren’t great things about this world or that we can’t make a difference or whatever, but I like the thought that one day things will be radically different and for the better.
Also, in regards to God being a creative God, I can't imagine that his creativity would be limited to an "only out of death and destruction can God create something new" sort of mentality. Or, for that matter, obviously the end of this world and the new world coming is the ultimate sort of outlet for His creativity. Whatever. You can go anywhere with that.
And as for time, my thoughts on that are "so sci-fi" as one of my friends once told me. But it is the idea that God exists throughout all time and experiences all of time all at once. This could mean that He is outside of time. I haven't reconciled that with physics yet (I need Scott around to go over this with me), so I'm not sure. Clearly, however, we don't and so we experience time linearly. But the point of that is I don't think the idea that if the afterlife or the creation of a new heaven and new earth are "so far away" that we don't need to worry about it is what matters. I think the significance of not worrying about the new heaven and new earth is that we don't know what it will truly be like so we don't need to worry about it. In bringing the new heaven and new earth to the here and now, maybe we just need to interpret the promises as best we can and use that promise as a hope for something better. Because even if it's not better (which would suck) the hope that it might be enables us to bring something better at least right now.
That was sort of a tangent and didn't really say anything. Sorry about that. I was never very good at ending posts/comments.
P.S. I love that you brought in the oscillating theory of the universe, Jessica. Awesome.
A dialogue between Tim and Betsy following Jessica’s post:
Tim: You seem to be arguing for a Daoist-esque dualism which holds good and evil in perpetual tension, in which one cannot exist without the other. This is extremely popular in Process circles, as evidenced by the Center for Process Studies logo. This understanding makes sense in that it attempts to be “earthy” and deal with the complex and muddled realities of human existence. I.e., how do we experience joy without suffering, how are we to understand radical evil, etc.
The only problem with it, from my perspective, is that there is nothing particularly Christian about it. In reality, it runs counter to the Church’s understandings of theodicy, eschatology, and personhood. The eschatological phrase “a new heaven and a new earth” is to be understood not as a disembodied spiritual experience of heaven, in which souls float around worshipping God. That sounds quite terrible, actually. Rather, it is a radically new understanding and affirmation of material, embodied experience; one in which the earth is transfigured, so to speak, towards its ultimate telos (end): harmonious relationship between God, humanity, and the entirety of creation. It has been said that the resurrection of Christ is God’s eternal yes to embodiment. Otherwise, why would Jesus need to have been raised? In Jesus we have the kingdom’s foreshadowing: a body resurrected and transfigured in the likeness of God, utterly different than before. Paul writes about this as well—the need for the body itself to be resurrected in the end—in disagreement with proto-Christian Gnostics who taught body/soul and good/evil God dualisms.
The Greek notion of the soul imprisoned in the body is, similar to a modern process perspective, found not to be Christian either. This is important, because often this is how Christians talk, and it easy to say how they do so reading Paul. A surface reading of Paul can be seen as supporting this—“my flesh is weak, but the spirit is strong.” However, this doesn’t seem to be the case in reality. For more info, see: http://www.christianitytoday.com
/bc/2006/006/16.33.html.
Reclaiming a Christian notion of embodiment is important, because it gives us greater impetus to struggle against injustice and violence. God called the world good, and we are to work through the Spirit to further make it so. We are not to come to accept evil as simply part of life, because it is not God’s vision for the world, and certainly not the end of the story!
Betsy: Just a question for discussion sometime… why does it matter if a concept is not traditionally “Christian”? Isn’t religion here to assist our faith and relationship with God? I guess I don’t understand why that is a legitimate argument for why someone is off-base?
Tim: Gotta situate yourself somewhere, bets. There is no such thing as religion. Only different religions. Postmodernity teaches us there is no special perch from which we can view everything else. You gotta pick a tradition (or anti-tradition) and go with it. I happen to think Christianity offers the most compelling narrative. And if we are going to be Christians, we should probably have some conception of what it means to think Christianly.
Betsy: Yeah I get that… but why if we realize the limitations of religion then why do we disregard ideas outside of our tradition? Picking a certain tradition does help us navigate a web that we cannot understand in its entirety… because there is no perch, like you say. But why is it wrong to think beyond our tradition if it is simply a facilitator. Is the truth in the religion or in God who religion tries to help us reach?
Tim: I guess I think there is a lot of truth in tradition, if properly appropriated in our context. Pick and choose spirituality (Christian church, Buddhist meditation, Hindu ideas of reincarnation) is a rather consumerist way to approach God. One which suggests your deepest faith is in philosophical and economic liberalism, which defers solelyto the individual. Immersing yourself within a particular tradition, you are provided with a community of the faithful who can hopefully (though not typically) resist such cultural temptations. That is, to think that ultimately it is all about you and your quest for truth. It’s not.
Betsy: See I would say that picking one tradition and not being able to see outside of that is a more consumerist approach to God! To think that the truth of God lies solely in one tradition seem egocentric to me. It’s not pick or choose where I see God or where I want to be in conversation with God… its saying that religion is a tool for many many people who are all on a journey. That is our community. And if you think that the destination of your journey is a tradition then you are saying God is created by man and by community. I think that we reach God through tradition and through community. That is the truth and richness in it.
Plus, the only place that we hear that other traditions are “wrong” is through our church where rules were written to gain followers. The Church as a political and social institution would be stupid not to say that other traditions have it all wrong. THAT seems like more of a cultural temptation than an ecumenical approach to experiencing God through the greatest number of channels possible.
Tim: I never said the truth of God lies solely in one tradition. It’s egocentric to think that you as one person has the right to arbitrate between the different truths! Who made you the boss, and why do you get to pick what’s right and what’s wrong? It’s not that Christianity or Islam or Buddhism owns God, it’s that you trust yourself over to the tradition because you are humble enough to realize you’re not God, and outside of authentic community you have no way of knowing who God is.
Also, I would not agree that we are all ‘on a journey.’ Lots of people don’t give a shit. Their only journey is to get more.
Religion is not a tool. Christianity, Judaism, etc. are ways or journeys into deeper relationship with God and one another. To say that religion is a tool assumes it can be discarded for some ‘pure experience’ of God. I am not sure this is possible for us.
“Where rules were written to gain followers” clearly demonstrates your understandable hang-ups with the Roman Catholic Church. The practices and beliefs of the Church or Temple are ultimately not rules to gain adherents, but fallible attempts at delineating and differentiating the people of God from the dominant cultural ethos.
So I'm perusing the Apocalypse discusison guide Sojo just put out to look for ad copy, and the articles are pretty interesting. Rose wrote one that was particularly relevant to me. She talked about hell on earth v. the idea of the eternal hell. Her emphasis was on the hell on earth side, but without dismissing the idea of an eternal hell. She then talked about the changes that the doctrine of hell has gone through, starting with Pope John Paul II's switch to hell as a condition rather than a physical place and ending with Billy Graham's change to take the conceptions of hell a little less literally (actually, those are the only two she talks about). She ends with a great story about a cross in Bosnia that was erected by some Franciscans there with Jesus portrayed as the eternal judge on one side and the resurrected Jesus of hope on the other. Though she was drawn to the resurrected, the people there were drawn to the eternal judge because knowing the wrongs that had been committed against them would one day be judged was more liberating for them.
Anyhow, if you're still interested in this, you should all check out the dg.
Very interesting discussion, folks. I'll try to keep to a few broad thoughts rather than adding my 2 cents about specific arguments people made.
First, I found everyone's musings about "kingdom" and "afterlife" very beautiful and creative. They were all honest and thoughtful and - to be honest - better than anything I could have offered. While I personally think that such creativity is refreshing in many ways (especially for a recovering evangelical like myself), I think the point that Tim is making is that - if we claim to stand within the Christian tradition (even broadly) - we are tethered in some meaningful way to the beliefs that the Christian tradition espouses. I think he is standing up for the identifier "Christian" as meaningful and consistent in some significant way; practically, it means that our creativity of belief - while certainly still possible - has certain bounds. In a philosophical way, it is an issue of properties. If I claim to be an elephant but have no trunk, no tusks, walk bipedally, and speak English, then maybe I should rethink whether or not I am, in fact, an elephant.
This begs the deeper question of what constitutes this "thing" known as Christianity. Basically, who says? This is the postmodern problem in some senses, because - as has been noted - some are now inclined to think that even if there is such a thing as Truth, we as finite beings can never know it in full. From here, I see how one can logically go Betsy's OR Tim's way (or others). If any access to "Truth" is heavily or even fully contextual, perspectival, mediated, etc., then with Betsy, it makes sense to put all traditions essentially on the same level and say that we all - in our different, beautiful (that's for you, Bets) ways - are sojourners on a journey, and in good anthropological form (read: cultural relativism), we cannot very convincingly argue that one particular understanding - especially of something etherial like "God" - is Right in some absolute sense. This view is appealing b/c it takes seriously the postmodern critique of truth and knowing (epistemology), and it's softer, more creative, more interfaith, and less judgmental elements definitely sit much better with folks of our age and sensibilities. When I think deeply about all the problems of knowing stuff and then claiming it for all people, I get squirmy. So I see where this comes from. (It still has to make sense of how it can claim anything at all, as in, why is social justice right or genital mutilation wrong, etc., and on what basis can you tell me MY way is wrong... but that is for another time.)
However, this crisis of authority and knowing can also lead one to Tim's position as I perceive it. If we realize that truth is perspectival and mediated and that the individual is a pretty poor place to start for arbitrating truth, then it makes sense to give oneself to a tradition. Some friends of mine in college converted to Catholicism for this very reason - they decided to give themselves over to a higher authority, the Church. It wasn't because they believed everything the Catholic Church does, but their plan as a Catholic was to grow into those beliefs rather than subvert them. They gave up their place as the arbiter of truth. I think this is what Tim is driving at with his "egocentric" thing. He is alluding to the way in which a western, individualistic, consumeristic mentality has led us into our contemporary situation in which each individual person can state what they think God is like or is true about the afterlife or whatever, and that person is affirmed and told that that's fine of that's what s/he has come to. One can pick and choose spiritualities like they were items on an ala carte menu. Now... if there is no truth or if truth is not knowable, then this approach is fine and probably preferable - who doesn't want us all to worship our own God our own way and just love each other in the end? This is where I start siding with Tim a bit (or at least want a mediating position)... while ala carte spirituality sounds neat, I question whether it is really consistent (as in, adopting things that are mutually exclusive or contradictory), and I worry about handling "truth" so indifferently. While I squirm at the absolutism of fundamentalist faith, I also don't sit well with a spirituality in which each person can essentially make their own deity. Again, the ala carte brand, besides being individualistic and likely logically inconsistent, fails to submit itself to any greater authority, fallible as that authority may be.
In closing, this is where I think the whole community piece comes in in a new and powerful way. In the absence of a long list of absolute truths (thanks, postmodernity), I think the best we can do is join a community of faith and seek to be submitted - in some substantial way - to it/them. This doesn't mean being non-thinking or non-creative, but it does mean that I cannot just craft my own faith and call it the community's faith (unless, of course, the whole community adopts it or you leave and start a new community, i.e. sect or cult). This also comes back to the properties thing. I think traditions DO matter because they are all we have. We have living, breathing, active communities of fallible people trying - together - to walk towards God with God's help. But those communities and their identities and their essential properties and their narratives matter. I am a Christian because I participate in the Christian narrative, which has distinct properties and is not the Jewish narrative or the Muslim narrative or the Buddhist narrative (not saying that these narratives can't talk to each other). So no one is stopping me from jettisoning parts of the Christian narrative i find uncompelling (like heaven or hell or kingdom or Jesus' resurrection), but I think one has to ask how much of the Christian narrative can one jettison and still claim that narrative as one's own. There is no hard and fast rule on that universally either; even in that, each community (defined both broadly and narrowly) makes those decisions. But I would argue that boundaries still matter, even if we also argue that they are primarily socially-constructed and community-policed.
Okay... no one has read this far. I may go back and read this and disagree with myself. But here's hoping that A) there are some valuable thoughts here or B) I can turn this into my next MA thesis.
Peace out, playas...
oh... and another quick thought. when i reread the title - "radically new kingdom" - i thought one more thing. we also have to ask about our metaphysics (aka what we believe about the nature of reality, visible and invisible). is there such a thing as reality, and if so, do our thoughts/wishes affect it? is "the kingdom" a real thing? is it one thing, or is it everything at once? is "the kingdom" ours to create? (as in, if my 8-year old cousin wants heaven to be full of video games and sour patch kids, will it?) in the same way, we 9 interns likely have 9 views on the kingdom... does that mean it will be that way for each of us?
okay, okay... one last last thing. i worry that from what i've written, folks like our dear jessica - who are working through some gray areas and questions - will somehow feel not christian. while i do think it is important to have some sort of framework for what constitutes a christian (logically, there must be some point when someone goes from christian to buddhist, for example, if they alter enough of their beliefs to be "buddhist" beliefs), i also know that boundary maintenance is a topic all its own. historically, the christian tradition has included a lot of diversity, and each group/community has made its own decisions about who's "in" and "out." i know some protestant denoms that don't think other prot. denoms down the street are christian by their definition, while other groups cast a very broad net and draw the circle extremely widely. and in the end, how do we arbitrate between these communities? some say scripture, and i think that to a point, but that assumes 1) a certain thing about scripture (which is ultimately a matter of faith) and 2) we can interpret it realiably (and there are different views on that). this is where i like to fall on the confessional, historical christian tradition. i like to see as "christian" what the historical faith has affirmed throughout the ages (in the broadest sense)... something like the nicene creed. but obviously, that is debatable.
another caveat is that sometimes, at least regarding non-essential things (like non-nicene creed things), views that start out as non-mainstream end up being dogma (in good and bad ways), like views of the afterlife (read: dispensational theology), slavery, certain social mores, etc. so when bart campolo questions traditional views of the afterlife in a way that does square with his community, is he no longer a christian? i'd say no. but it may mean that he need another community eventually, he transforms his own, or he sits with the tension. maybe his views become more accepted over time (then he's a visionary), or maybe not (he is an outsider). but if he questions some of the key doctrines (like the creeds), there just may come a point when he might wanna ask himself if he (or anyone else) is holding to enough strings to still identify as a christian.
make sense?
I really appreciate Bob's comments here... (and yes I did read the whole thing :) ). I think he eloquently expresses the tension that I definitely feel in my own faith journey (though do not express nearly as well). The one thing I would add to it is that I dont think the idea that I previously expressed of religion being a framework to help us understand God rather than our only way to see God neccessarily leads to cafeteria Christianity. In fact, I very much agree with this notion that you do end up on a very slippery slope if you just pave your own way, drawing your own conclusions about God and our human relationship to God. In order to avoid basically developing an individual morality, we do "sign up" for a tradition and (as Tim just sang, ironically) take the good and the bad with it. However, its incredibly constraining and ultimately unrealistic to say that every one who is an active member of the Church believes what the Church says because that is the tradition they have chosen. Most Christians don't! The difference, though, is that as a member of the Church we are called to engage each of those questions and struggle with them on our journey.
Cafeteria Christianity implies that you take some convictions when convenient and disregard others. Another option is to take all the beliefs of the Church and engage each in dialogue with your life journey, your personal relationship with God and your relationship with humanity. This is HARD! its not choosing the spirituality that fits your whims but diving into your tradition in the deepest way and wrestling with it til it hurts because you are honestly trying to reconcile your own journey with this guiding tradition that is supposed to show the way!
The thing about this constant deep engagement is that, like any dialogue, it goes two ways. Bob wrote a lot about being part of this community of believers. This is an awesome concept, but also a very active one where everyone, including the community, is constantly bending and changing and adapting to every other member. While I can understand the comfort of saying, "this is my tradition and it is right and if I follow it i am on the right path", it eliminates the possibility of being part of that community. It ceases to be a dialogue and becomes very hierarchical in that we are submissive followers rather than contributing members. This is where I come back to that distinction between God and religion. We are followers of God. If we had a clear and unmistakable picture and mandate from Him/Her, we could follow it. But we dont. We have an interpretation that comes through the Church... a holy one and a good one, but not a perfect one. We are members of the Church... contributing members that are called to dialogue with one another and the rest of the world to continue defining our relationship with God.
There is a difference between backing out of the dialogue and being unsure of all the issues.
Ok im done writing now... back to work.
peace all! bets
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