the middle eastern conflict
At Tangent tonight we attempted to work through what we knew about the conflict in the middle east. In some ways it was a sharing of ignorance and in other ways it was surprising how effective the media is at explaining what is going on. Of course it is another matter whether the presentation by the Australian media is balanced or not.
I was reminded again of a former mentor of mine Phillip Hunt who was told me that at the heart of the conflicts in the middle east is not territory, religion or any other factor but rather at the heart is scape goating. Phillip is a former Eastern Europe director of World Vision so knew the area politics fairly well and had spent a great deal of time reflecting on the issue.
Back when signposts was just starting in 2003, I wrote a post about some of Phillip’s thoughts on scapegoating in regard to the Iraq war. Re-reading the words today they also seem apt for this conflict.
As most of you didn’t read signposts back in 2003. In fact I think I knew the three people that did, you can read the post here.
August 2nd, 2006 at 10:33 am
I heave a sigh of frustrated despair when it comes to Middle East politics. This morning on Sydney Radio ABC 702 they had a guy called Jamal recently returned from Lebanon after driving 3 days to Damascus to get out. He had gone to South Lebanon to see his daughter get married a week before the fighting let loose. He described the devastation of his family’s town, watching a 4 story block of units full of people disintergrate into rubble before his eyes as a bomb hit. The despair in his voice evident.
Then within minutes a Jewish lady came on and got stuck into Hezballah. Saying it was there fault that the Lebanese people are dying and the Lebanese should drive Hezballah out. It went back and forward with a Lebanese refutation by another man, then another Jewish lady then another Lebanese man. I could feel the frustration rising in the presenter. But it does become scapegoating someone to throw blame at which ever side you are on.
On the same radio station a week ago I heard someone ring up who said that the only way forward was to get people from both sides together who believed their own sides had committed wrongs. In essence I believe that means people who are humble, People who knowingly or not follow in the footsteps of Jesus’ humility. Then may the myth of Jesus reign.
August 2nd, 2006 at 1:39 pm
I found Phillip Hunts language and characterisations disturbing in the utmost.
This post-modernistic appeal to ‘myths’ and stories leads all down a garden path to a relativism that will not allow truth a voice. He even describes Jesus’s message as an alternative ‘myth’!
This is crazy and dangerous talk IMHO. Jesus in the Christian worldview is the ‘way the TRUTH and the life’ … not an alternative mythmaker.
Both sides in the middle east (in the Israeli question as well as Iraq) could be wrong but believe they are right and have their misguided justifications for such.
One side could be in the right and the other in the wrong.
But if all claims to truth or innocence or moral righteousness are just myths, then all are right and there is no hope of reconciling the problem…
either one myth would have to be shown to be either true or false or both false.
“�When some wild Arab spokesman describes America as the �Great Satan� we know immediately that he is appealing to a myth. But when President Bush puts Iraq and North Korea on the �axis of evil� we react as if he is stating a fact. Are we incapable of seeing in ourselves that which we see in others?�”
this ‘wild arab spokesman’ is not appealing to a myth but a metaphorical characterisation of something he sees as a description of a reality just as the George Bush statement is a version of the same… both are corrupted or tainted views of reality but they must be compared to reality itself, not just seen as another myth among many.
If everything is based on ‘myths’ without possible reference to objective truth then the basis is laid for ‘might being right’ and we in the west can sit pretty as long as we have the bombs.
metanarratives are descriptions of how we see ourselves and are believed as the truth of course… but all metanarratives save the Christian world veiw are worldviews constructed without the grace of Christ as a foundation and are thus fatally flawed because they are not based on ‘real reality’, the absolute truth of Christ.
This doesn’t mean that Christs followers will get his message of truth correct all the time… but the Christian worldview is a subversive Truth that is counterintuitive to the fallen human mind and if we ignore special revelation as truth we relegate it to the insipid status of myth constructivism.
August 2nd, 2006 at 4:55 pm
So there is no absolute truth, is there abtruth?
This article identifies not what is needed to resolve the conflict, but instead what is wrong with the world’s impotence in dealing with it. For it is a cancerous international (read Untied Nations) belief that there are two rights to the Middle East conflict. Now, both sides could be wrong, or one might be right and the other wrong. However, both cannot be right – unless, of course, “right” is merely a subjective assessment based on our own values – i.e. a myth.
This logic applies whether applied from a secular or Christian foundation. On a secular basis the grievance is this: The terrorist organisation Hizbollah and its Arab sponsors (predominantly Iran and Syria) will accept peace when Israel has been eliminated. The battle also applies to Israel’s supporters (read non Muslims) who have to be converted, killed or conquered. In contrast, Israel’s peace will come when its aggressors accept her right to exist as a sovereign nation, her borders are secure and Israelis can live without treat of suicide bombers or missile strikes. From a secular view point, there is one very definite wrong and one very definite right. Not a very complicated ethical dilemma.
From a Christian perspective, we either accept the Muslim God or the Christian one. According to the two respective holy books, He cannot be one of the same, unless of course He is either schizophrenic or mythical. If He is the former than we are all doomed, in which case both Muslims and Christians are wrong. If He is the latter, then the above secular argument applies. However, it is apparent that He is neither, in which case the conflict involves a right and a wrong. It just depends whether the respective faiths back a right which is right, or a right which is wrong.
So, there is no grey. There may be a perspective to understand, but not to submit to. There can be only one outcome and, if we are to believe the Christian God, then this can only involve the survival of Israel and the subsequent events as detailed in biblical prophecy.
Unfortunately, much as the world would like to believe this is possible, there is no fence to sit on.
August 2nd, 2006 at 5:14 pm
Another way of approaching the issue is to hear whats being said by those in Israel or gaza or lebanon(whether the jewish peace and human rights groups or christians). One such group is the Sabeel Ecumenical theological centre (http://www.faithfutures.org/Sabeel/SabeelLebanonWar.pdf)
August 3rd, 2006 at 10:31 am
I agree Roger…. although my post was more concerned with Phillip Hunts charaterisations of ‘myth’ as to insinuate that there are only different points of view or stories that we enroll ourselves into as opposed to the existence of absolutes that can be known through logic, observation and revelation.
Do absolutes exist? absolutely, as a denial is an expression of absolute truth in itself and self contradicting…
your statement
“There can be only one outcome and, if we are to believe the Christian God, then this can only involve the survival of Israel and the subsequent events as detailed in biblical prophecy.”
this IS a bit of a grey area though as it relies on our trying to piece together and interpret scripture…. the more i look into it the more i am less sure of what has been taught to me over the years…. (you ought to read ‘Warning’ by Barry Smith, his interpretations - including Aust being a cashless society by 1984!! - are just woeful, but we lap them up because we are desperate to know the future)
August 3rd, 2006 at 3:05 pm
I think there are absolutes, but that absolutes are limited to things like “violence is wrong” rather than “X is right and Y is wrong”.
I don’t know much about the Middle East. I do know a bit about conflicts in the Pacific, and I think Alan hits the nail on the head when he suggests that there is a need to listen. There is a need for us in the West to listen to the grievances expressed by people in the Middle East, and there is a need for people in the Middle East to listen to each other’s grievances. Arguments like those made by Roger assume that it’s easy to identify the aggressor and victim, and I think that this is very, very rarely the case - often there are decades, if not centuries of grievances, behind a conflict, and one cannot determine who is right and wrong merely by looking at a rather narrow moment in time.
Roger, can you please explain what you mean by “prophecy” and what you think “prophecy does”?
August 3rd, 2006 at 3:06 pm
Abtruth, I didn’t hear Hunt - but perhaps you are using the word “myth” differently?
August 3rd, 2006 at 4:41 pm
Bec, a quick answer – I still have too much to do today. I mean prophecy as in the foretelling of events that are, as yet, unseen. However, in applying it to the specific case of Israel I would not advocate the dispensationalist belief in a literal restoration of Abrahamic borders. I assume this is where you are coming from in your question. For this could be abused to justify the taking of territory (specifically the West Bank and Gaza) via military force specifically for the purposes of self fulfilment. However, bearing the small amount of Christian influence in Israel, I think this is unlikely.
I think the question might be more along the lines of, “On what basis do you think Israel defines its borders”: the Abrahamic covenant; a prophetically directed course of events; a secular interpretation of the 1948 declaration; or on a need to establish secure borders in order to survive?
August 3rd, 2006 at 4:46 pm
Myth
A fiction or half-truth, especially one that forms part of an ideology.
A fictitious story, person, or thing: “German artillery superiority on the Western Front was a myth”
basically a myth might be believed as truth but can be shown not to be truth.
Post-modern views on truth reduce everything down to stories or myths that are true to us from our perspective and give us comfort but don’t have to have any bearing on reality (if reality exists or could be known)
of course there are myths but there is also the opposite, reality. Truth that is truley true
in regards to listening… i dunno bec… when it is someones religious conviction that you should be wiped off the face of the earth, how is listening going to help?
every worldview that has claims to universal truth ultimately would have an implicit aim of convincing others of this truth for their own good, ala Christianity… however this extreme form of Islam has no room for rejection it seems, as you either accept thier worldview or die… no correspondance will be entered into… i don’t see what listening to them will achieve.
on a macro scale i believe that there is a right and wrong side.. on a micro scale there are atrocities committed on both sides which is a shame but we must understand that they are humans like us who are capable of cruelty.
August 3rd, 2006 at 5:59 pm
Roger, I was asking what you meant by “prophecy” because there’s at least 3 types in the OT, and foretelling of events is simply one of those. But people much more knowledgeable than I have written on that!
Your second question is, for me, the issue.
Abtruth, I know what postmodernism is…I have Arts/Law degrees which I started in 1998, and I’m very much a postmodernist.
I see postmodernity as an entire culture, a worldview - while you identify one form, that’s just one form, and I and many others who would identify as being postmodern dont’ hold to it.
The Hebrew Bible/Old Testament is full of creation stories, or myths. When I say that, I do not say that they are not “true”. I just don’t think that they’re statements of scientific fact, but rather statements of other types of capital-T Truth.
Re: your question - “when it is someones religious conviction that you should be wiped off the face of the earth, how is listening going to help?”
Um. Well, I believe there’s a place for defence (and I think Israel is presently going further than what is required for this). However I don’t believe that religion exists as some independent entity - I would ask, “what are the conditions that have given rise to this particular ideology?” Religion, like law, is subject to varying interpretations and is not some independently existing, immutable fact - the emphases can change over time, new ways of telling the story emerge. What’s behind that? I would say God, but God works in many and mysterious ways. What are the social pressures and conditions that give rise to these varying ways of telling the story? In other words - what is it that makes my Muslim friends so different to Muslim terrorists? Of course, I’m not denying the role of the individual - some people are self-serving power-seekers and trouble-makers…but there *are* also social processes at work.
When you say “this form of Islam”, who are you referring to? Lebanon is a primarily Christian nation, my understanding (though I’m open to being corrected) is that most members of Hezbollah are Christian.
August 3rd, 2006 at 10:09 pm
Umm no Bec
Hezbollah is a radical Iranian-backed Lebanese Islamic Shiite group sometimes referred to by its English name, the ‘Party of God’. It was founded in 1982 in response to the invasion of Lebanon by Israel that same year, having subsumed members of the 1980s coalition of groups known collectively as Islamic Jihad.
(More from the source but google away.
And plenty of sites on Lebanon around the place too. (CIA factbook for bare facts)
Even so some “Christians” in Lebanon support them although most don’t and some Lebanese Shiite Muslims kind of explain its benevolent activities seen yet again in this conflict. (The German original is here and you wouldn’t want to read some of the other whinging letters if you were ever attacked by Hezbollah.
BTW I thought the faithfutures article was a bunch of propaganda (Israel and the US occupying land? Which land is the U.S. occupying?) - I would have thought that a document from a theological centre would actually…er theologize. But that’s what you get when you make the gospel a dhimmi of bad politics.
August 3rd, 2006 at 10:10 pm
Oops original letter in German here.
August 3rd, 2006 at 11:09 pm
“I’m very much a postmodernist.
I see postmodernity as an entire culture, a worldview - while you identify one form, that’s just one form, and I and many others who would identify as being postmodern dont’ hold to it.”
with reality being subjective there are over 6billion possible alternative interpretations of postmodernism
you say that you are very much a postmodernist … i am sorry as i thought you were a Christian
i am not a postmodernist nor am i a
modernist
capitalist
socialist
communist
democrat
facist
evolutionist
materialist
humanist
utilitarianist
i am a Christian
(sorry bec but this is going to sound harsh which is not intended)
you in your arts/law degree have obviously spent much time immersed in studying certain worldviews but your alliegence with postmodernism exposes your lack of understanding of the Christian worldview or what a worldview actually is.
Being a Christian is a complete worldview that subverts every vain philosophy that the world puts up to cope with the position of falleness that we find ourselves in… a capitalist puts faith in money (the profit motivation - based on selfishness) to cure the worlds problems… a communist believes in command economies and redistribution of wealth…
more careful consideration is needed of the concept of “in the world but not of the world” … we live and work in a capitalist democracy… but we are neither capitalist or democrats.
the Western Church has syncretised its beliefs with non-Christian worldviews so seemlessly that it can’t now comprehend that God is opposed to those beliefs
you say
“The Hebrew Bible/Old Testament is full of creation stories, or myths. When I say that, I do not say that they are not “true”. I just don’t think that they’re statements of scientific fact, but rather statements of other types of capital-T Truth”
i don’t think it is ‘full’ of creation stories… there is only one big one. don’t confuse the word ‘myth’ which necessarily entails something as untrue with a metaphor…
there is only one type of capital T truth bec… postmodernism believes that no capital T truths exist … if you do then you have blended postmodernism with something else… how one gets to know the truth is another debate but Christianity holds to a correspondance view of truth
Christianity - if it is really the truth - is a self existing immutable fact. there are different ways of telling the gospel to different cultures but they are to bring people to the knowledge of this central immutable truth, that we are separated from the God who is there, by our sin, and that the only way of return to the relationship we were designed by him to have is through his son Jesus Christ…
although this is not the main thrust of my posts I think that Israel has shown incredible restraint…
if there are 1000 people armed, who have taken vows not to rest until they have killed you - how many of them do you have to kill until you are safe?
August 3rd, 2006 at 11:13 pm
POP QUIZ
who am i
what is my purpose
what went wrong
where do i go from here
these questions are answered by the Christian worldview in a complete and non contradictory way
and the thing is whether your a stay at home mum, dying of cancer in hospital, running the country or starving in africa .. we all have a lifelong quest to answer these questions… as Christians we believe that we have answered these questions… the problem the church faces is how do we get our answers across to our neighbours when (in one sense) they seem to be speaking another language?
August 4th, 2006 at 10:06 am
The attached analysis by Tony Blair is worth reading. http://www.number10.gov.uk/output/Page9948.asp
August 4th, 2006 at 10:09 am
oh woah…um, yep, that WAS harsh. It’s also rude and patronising. I am a Christian first and foremost. But I am also a lot of other things because of the culture I have grown up in.
How many of us, if we are entirely honest and self-critical, can possibly say that we have not been shaped by a huge variety of forces? If we are not shaped by many and varied forces then we would all believe the same things. We would not debate politics, we would not debate the meaning of biblical texts etc etc.
Christians have not believed the same things all through time. Even in the Bible we see different cults, different emphases among the early Christians. We desperately seek the truth, but only the Holy Spirit can reveal it to us. I can no more read the bible through a modernist lens than I can read it with the eyes of a black South African. When I say that I am a postmodernist, I am making a statement of fact about who I am and what has shaped my beliefs. I am not saying that I hold anything higher than God, and yet this is what you suggest.
What is a “Christian worldview”? Even in Australia alone there is immense diversity, and it is nigh-on impossible to identify a “Christian worldview”. The worldview of the average attender at Hillsong has very little in common with the worldview of a liberation theologian. They would each answer those questions in quite different ways.
August 4th, 2006 at 10:19 am
Roger - Waleed once said to me that he hated the term “moderate Muslim” because it was an insult. I agree. How many of us would like to be called “moderate” Christians?
August 4th, 2006 at 12:53 pm
Bec, would it work for you if I was describe Chrisitanity as more closely linked to post-modern thought than to modernistic thought?
Like you, I consider myself to be more far more PM than M (I wrote a final paper called ‘Jesus: The 1st Post Modernist’), but recognise AT’s point (in it’s ‘black/white good/bad’ kind of way)
There are plenty of Christians who see the world through a modernist POV - I’m just not one of them! (mostly) I still wear a watch, and I shave occasionally because others expect it, but that’s about it!
AT - Being a christian means a have a relationship with Jesus. Being married means I have a relationship with my wife. The only thing I have in common with other Christians and other husbands is the passion I feel for Jesus & my wife. I talk to them differently than other Christians/hubbys, I have different expectations, I spend different amounts of time with them! However, when I stand in a room with other passionate hubbys, the only thing we are likely to have in absolute common is the passion we feel for our wives.
In church on Sunday, when I meet with a couple of hundred other Jesus freaks, we will all have different ways of praying, ministering, worshipping, understanding etc - BUT!! We will have our ‘freakedness’/passion in common. That is the tie that binds me to other Christians - not our behavioural patterns!
Because, the behaviour of Christians in Busselton is quite different from Christians in Bolivia, Bonnydoon, Balmain, Brazil and anywhere else starting with B. Christianity is NOT about behavioural modification - it’s about RELATIONSHIP modification! As relationships are different, so behaviours are different!
(’That’ll do, Pig! That’ll do…’)
August 4th, 2006 at 1:21 pm
Personally I don’t think labelling ourselves is really all that important, because what we do and say will inevitably define who we are.
Back to Phil’s post however, yes the middle eastern conflict is a completx issue, one in which we all have opinions yet not all the facts. So how do we respond? Information is filtered through bias and agendas. Our Australian media speaks a truth but not necassarily ‘the’ truth.
A friend of my once said, ‘God gave me two ears and one mouth, so I would use more of this (pointing to ears) and less of this (pointing to mouth)’. It seems our opinionated mouths can get us into trouble sometimes.
Whether it be out of a modernist or post-modernists response is irrelevant, but love is a universal language that spans culture and time. To embrace another or ‘the other’ is the most powerful act in times of conflict. Imagine what some senarios might look like if there was more embracing and less scape goating. But I guess if someone wanted to label me, I’m an idealist so I’ll live with it.
An act of love is more powerful and has a greater impact than 1000 bombs. As Toddy says, “As relationships are different, so behaviours are different.”
This is what made Sojourners e-zine quote of the week recently when they talked about Christians embracing 1000’s of Shiites in Lebanon. Part of the quote says, “This is the story of the Good Samaritan at a mega scale! And to think that this is the outcome of a strategy that meant to rouse anti-Hezbollah feelings among the Lebanese population and government.”
So that’s 1 for love, war is yet to score.
August 4th, 2006 at 2:05 pm
So, John & Paul were right!
(’… all you need is love! Ya-ta-da-da-daa’)
Great story, and great quote KC
August 4th, 2006 at 2:05 pm
Great post KC.
August 4th, 2006 at 2:12 pm
Toddy…I guess I was reacting to the conflation of postmodernism with no beliefs. I get sick of the way many Christians talk about postmodernism as if it’s the source of all evil, yet knowing very little about it. Abtruth says that postmodernism says that no truth exists, yet that’s not true at all. And as I’m sure you’re aware, lots of Christians have found postmodern theorists like Derrida really helpful! (Not that I’m claiming to be any expert on Derrida - far from it - I’ve just dipped in a bit, and I find a much of what he’s written very helpful).
Abtruth, when I talk about there being many viewpoints to this conflict, I am not denying that there are objective, ascertainable truths. I don’t think I’m even being particularly postmodern - one can be a modernist and see that there Hezbollah, the Israeli state, and Hamas have different views here, and within each there is some validity. One simply cannot say that the Israeli state is a complete victim, that it has never done wrong. Conversely, one simply cannot say that Hamas has come out of nowhere, that people are not motivated by some genuine grievances. Yet that is what you seem to suggest. I think conflict is always an awful lot more complicated than that - if for no other reason than the fact that humans are involved, and they’re driven by many and varied motivations!!
August 4th, 2006 at 2:15 pm
Good call Bec. Very similar to the standpoint that a lot of people took when Bush came up with his ‘axis of evil’ to describe everyone outside of RW American thought, rather than acknowledging that, as bad as the attack was, the anger felt by the attackers was founded in validity.
Right becomes might becomes right far too quickly when you can’t see the plank of wood in your own eye.
August 4th, 2006 at 2:19 pm
Axis of Evil. Yeah. Talk about a great marketing ploy!
I don’t think these issues are confined to the nation state, either. I mean, there’s plenty of churches that are riddled with this kind of conflict - factions fighting against each other, genuine grievances existing on both sides, but also an awful lot of black and white “they hurt me first” kind of stuff. Grrrr.
August 4th, 2006 at 4:08 pm
“Some christians upport them(hez)but most dont”
Lance,Radio National this morning reporting on a recent poll conducted in Leb by Leb, found that some 85% of the pop support Hez, and since the recent bombing 80% of christians also now support hez.
August 4th, 2006 at 4:11 pm
sorry lance,really mean saint (11)
August 4th, 2006 at 5:13 pm
Bec.. i truley apologise for the offence (i knew it would happen to an extent but to avoid a post of ‘ben hur’ proportions i was straight to the point rather than diplomatic)
you say
“But I am also a lot of other things because of the culture I have grown up in.
How many of us, if we are entirely honest and self-critical, can possibly say that we have not been shaped by a huge variety of forces? If we are not shaped by many and varied forces then we would all believe the same things. We would not debate politics, we would not debate the meaning of biblical texts etc etc. ”
This is not what i am talking about and i completley agree.
you say
“Christians have not believed the same things all through time. Even in the Bible we see different cults, different emphases among the early Christians. We desperately seek the truth, but only the Holy Spirit can reveal it to us.”
I disagree… Christianity today (and i mean the essentials that all orthodox Christians agree are necessary to be called Christian) is the same today as it was 2000 years ago. Truth does not change… we can be wrong in certain areas of course but that is why we have the thing called theology (the science of God) passed down and refined, and santification, growing in knowledge and wisdom in our struggle to be disciples and ambassadors for Christ.
Sects can still exist in communion with the Church at large but only if differences are on non-essential beliefs. Thus Gnosticism and Arianism were not seen as Christian sects as such but heretical worldviews. The church has strayed from the Truth but the fact that the truth was known gave the church something to come back to.
further you say that it is only the holy spirit that can reveal to us the truth
to this i say a qualified no. the truth can be given to all but not all will accept it, this is special revelation of God and his plans as revealed in the scriptures… it is faith to believe the truth when revealed that is given by the holy spirit… there is also general revelation which is truth revealed in the natural order which says a lot about God and who he is to all… (a fool says in his heart there is no God)
you say
“I can no more read the bible through a modernist lens than I can read it with the eyes of a black South African. When I say that I am a postmodernist, I am making a statement of fact about who I am and what has shaped my beliefs.”
As Christians we are to read the Bible through Christian ‘lenses’ and not through modernist or post modernist lenses or any other lenses. This is where you are getting confused i think…
it is only through ‘Christian lenses’ that we read the Bible as the word of God revealed to us by people chosen by him and see it as an authoritative guide to the truth and the ultimate and true metanarrative for all humankind… it can only be read this way as a Christian
a modernist reading of the Bible sees it as a collection of primitive stories and fable by ancient primitive people who believed that they were in communication with a god who does not exist and although of historical value are of no use to us today as science and evolutionary materialism has rendered any truth claims of the bible obsolete
a post modernist would look at the bible as a collection of narratives or myths written by the victors as narratives to make sense of their world as they saw it from their perspective… the truth claims were acts of violence by elite against those they wished to control (as a broad Focoultian explaination) or were existentialist constructions to give meaning to life (as a broad Derridian or Rortian explaination) or were stories for every culture to make meaning for themselves in their own interpretive structures (as stanley fish would have us believe)
do you see what i am saying here??? these are worldviews that are totally incompatable with each other… you can’t read the Bible as a postmodernist and say you are a Christian as a ‘post modern Christian’ is an oxymoron…
as i said before ‘the Western Church has syncretised its beliefs with non-Christian worldviews so seemlessly that it can’t now comprehend that God is opposed to those beliefs’
Toddy
you say
“Because, the behaviour of Christians in Busselton is quite different from Christians in Bolivia, Bonnydoon, Balmain, Brazil and anywhere else starting with B. Christianity is NOT about behavioural modification - it’s about RELATIONSHIP modification! As relationships are different, so behaviours are different!”
behaviour of people is influenced by the cultural mores but as Christians we are to be in a culture (the world) but not of the culture .. different cultures may express the truth of Christianity in different ways but it is the same truth that they are expressing.
This is what should be making us stand out in the world. We should be different as our worldview is not one of power politics or truth enforcement but of Grace self sacrifice and supplication to the will of God and not that which would suit ourselves… more often it is the Christians in the western world that are invisible because we have blended worldviews .. CS Lewis called it ‘Christianity and…’
i see what you are saying re relationship modification but i think that characterisation a little too simplistic… sophisticated things like Christianity should be explained as simply as possible but not more simply than it is…
August 4th, 2006 at 5:40 pm
Sorry Dude - christianity is not sophistocated. My 6yo gets it, my dead grandmother got it.
I believe that you have over simplified by suggesting that we can (effectively) remove ourselves from the culture in which we live. For more on that, read some thoughts on the other link about monatries - it will make far more sense!
Admittedly, I’m getting a little het up (on the inside?), not in order to degrade anyone, but because I think the fact that this discussion is happening between people of fervent faith (and yes, I am!) demonstrates that culture, personality, context, time, age, etc go somewhere to shaping the outward expression of that fervent faith.
And that’s the point (well, my point…) - faith is an internal thing… a relationship is something ‘felt’ on the inside. The outworking of it is then how we demonstrate that relationship to the other person (in this case, God) involved and to others. It also goes a long way to form the nature and type of mission that we will embark on. The only thing AT, Bec, Lance, Phil etc need to have in common is that we are ON the mission, not just talking about which one is right and which one is wrong.
I’m very comfortable in pubs with a beer in my hand.
Another Christian is not.
Yet another has their buttons pressed by the corporate jungle, and loves the comradarie and battle that occurs in tall buildings.
We all love Jesus, so we’re working together, even if we don’t know each other. Our inward faith is having it’s outward expression shaped by the various factors that make us up as a person.
Sorry AT, but I’m right, and that’s the truth - PM or not!
August 4th, 2006 at 6:16 pm
Couldn’t agree more! The gospel of Jesus, the kingdom of His grace inaugurated through His death and resurrection is incredibly simple — my daughter was able to express the heart of it in her own language when she was still in infants school. But how we express it, what language we use to communicate its reality, which image or approach encapsulates it best for us, what unique combination of personality and gifts we struggle to communicate it through .. ah, there you can be as postmodern, sophisticated and varied as you please…
August 4th, 2006 at 10:11 pm
“Bec.. i truley apologise for the offence (i knew it would happen to an extent but to avoid a post of ‘ben hur’ proportions i was straight to the point rather than diplomatic)”
Can you please be diplomatic next time? It’s very hard to feel like engaging with you after a post like that.