Dear Brian McLaren
Thanks for reminding me why I love you. We certainly don't agree on everything, but I get you. I really do. You are a good and gracious man. You are needed. God is working through you. Thanks for continually challenging me and not letting me become too comfortable.
Also, I got that Freudian, Brethren slip 
Speaking in sub-rational tongues
Matthew Paul Turner posted this rather interesting clip on his blog yesterday. It's of a Korean congregation speaking in tongues.
Matthew Paul asks,
Maybe it’s just me, but hearing people who speak another language other than English “speaking in tongues” sounds very different than English-speaking “tongue speakers.” I mean, I suppose that makes sense and all… or maybe I’m the only one who thinks this…
But I thought it was interesting enough to mention here because I just assumed that the “language of the Holy Spirit” would sound the same regardless of nationality.
Am I crazy? Or do they sound different to you, too?
I'm no tongue speaker. I grew up in a strictly cessationist church where tongue speakers were seen to be a bit crazy, at best (demon possessed, at worst). So I'm neither an expert nor do I have much of a stake in this - and that most certainly shapes my thoughts on this.
But I see Matthew Paul's point. Korean tongue speaking does sound different than English tongue speaking, which, incidentally, sounds different from Faroese tongue speaking. If you believe glossolalia is actually speaking a heavenly, angelic language then that might be troubling, since what heavenly language one speaks seems to be determined by what earthly language one speaks. Paul speaks of plural tongues of angels, so there might be many different heavenly language, but that geographical/linguistic thing sure seems strange. I wonder what it's like for bi-lingual and more people. And what it's like for people who speak one language and move to a different place and change main languages.
I don't have a problem with this. I don't think glossolalia is speaking a heavenly language, at least not literally. In short, I think there are some emotions too deep to verbalise and a great many of those centre on God and are expressed in worship and praise. These emotions cannot be verbalised, but they are expressed none the less - in tongues. Neurologically, tongue speakers' experience reduced activity in the prefrontal cortices1, the area of the brain which, according to Wikipedia, is implicated in planning complex cognitive behaviours, personality expression, decision making and moderating correct social behaviour. The language centres, obviously, carry on as usual. The emotional content of the Christian's worship of God is sub-rational, then, and too deep for words that make any rational sense. Tongue speaking sounds like regular speaking, in a way, but is devoid of rational, understandable content. If you can call what is expressed words, they are words without meaning. Not because the emotions and worshipful actions are without meaning, but because they are too meaningful for mere words. Words fall short.
More phenomena than just glossolalia can be understood in this way. While I'm no tongue speaker, I'm a bit of a sigher. When I pray, often I simply sigh in front of the Lord. The same sub-rational thing is going on, I think. I have no words, but something inside compels me to do something. Silence, meditation and other spiritual contemplation, too, are particular instances of this general phenomena.
I understand all of the gifts of the Spirit in much the same way as I do tongues: They are "natural" abilities and occurrences that exist in the believer's life that are especially used by the Spirit in service of the church. There's no evidence that people who become Christians suddenly gain all these new talents, these gifts of the Spirit. We are born with our talents and we have our ancestors' stake in the genetic lottery to thank for them. But these natural talents are baptised or sanctified by the Spirit in so far as the believer allows himself to be used, by the Spirit, in the ecclesial context. Take the gift of teaching, for example, that Paul mentions both in Romans 12 and Ephesians 4. I'm sure those who have that gift would be and probably are great teachers in other contexts than the ecclesial one. If they never had become Christians they probably would be lecturers or something. But since they are Christians and to the extent that they allow themselves to be used by the Spirit in the church, their gifts becomes gifts of the Spirit.
There is no magic, then, to tongue speaking. Every religion does it and I'm sure it occurs in lots of other contexts. But in so far as the Spirit uses glossolalia, the sub-rational expression of devotion, in the up-building of the church, it is a gift of the Spirit.
So it's not strange that tongue speaking in different countries doesn't sound the same. That's exactly what you would expect if you see glossolalia as a bit like normal speech, just without the rational content. I got over my cessationism a long time ago and though I don't speak in tongues personally, I encourage anyone to do so - in the Spirit and in service of the church2. As my friend Tony Hunt said recently, the gifts of the Spirit must be regarded as a move of God.
I don't know if my reductionistic account is satisfactory for my more charismatic friends. Do give me your feedback.
- The measurement of regional cerebral blood flow during glossolalia: A preliminary SPECT study, Andrew B. Newberg, Nancy A. Wintering, Donna Morgan and Mark R. Waldman in Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging 148 (2006) 67 – 71 ↩
- In the Spirit and in service of the Church is a bit of a tautology, isn't it? ↩
Bloggers in the pulpit
I don't know anything about this, nor am I terribly interested in it, but Michael Kaus, a leading political blogger in America, is running for Senate. The Daily Dish quotes James Joyner's very convincing argument for why bloggers never will become politicians.
It seems to me that the chief barrier to bloggers getting elected to public office isn’t so much their typically introverted personalities or lack of access to money but the mere fact that we’ve accumulated a long paper (pixel?) trail of recording every fool thought that’s passed through our minds over the last several years. Even bright, thoughtful, decent types like Douthat and Klein — and Lord knows, Kaus and Joyner — have written things that would kill a campaign dead, dead, dead if it showed up in an attack ad.
Makes sense. And I think the same thing applies for prospective pastors.
Blogging is informal. It's not rigourous. It's not considered. Not elegant. It gets emotional and heated. It gets funny and irreverent. It gets personal. For every measured comment there are ten half thoughts and hunches. The readers knows this and the game proceeds with these rules. Fine.
But what about the church committee? I'm thinking both of content and form here. Churches obviously want a pastor who tows the party line theologically, so to speak. A reformed church doesn't want a pastor entertaining aspects of open theism. Most baptist churches probably don't want someone who has Tony Jones in his blogroll. What if you flirt with universalism? Reject the sinfulness of gay sex? Accept evolution? Given the informal nature of blogs, theological thoughts are thrown out there and forgotten about that may come back to haunt the prospective pastor. Most bloggers are young and curious and change their minds. Something you wrote years ago and don't even believe anymore may cause you trouble.
That's the content. Then there's the form. Say you see a Mark Driscoll video and dish out a few expletives, as is perfectly natural to do. That's obviously not the tone you'd use in the pulpit or while counselling parishioners, but can the hiring committee trust you on that? What if you share intimate details of your former life in sin? What if you link to content on a page which also has some dirty material? What if you upload a video of you pranking your friend? These are things that might be perceived as problematic in the eyes of church officials.
So, while the scrutiny level for pastors obviously isn't as high as for politicians, I think this might be a legitimate concern. Anyone have any experience? Any stories? Thoughts otherwise?
6 reasons why your church needs (more) beer
1. Beer is good for the community. Beer reduced inhibitions and nowhere are people more inhibited than in church. Congregants want at least one chair between them and the person next them. Even better if they get the entire pew to themselves. With a few pints down them, on the other hand, that invisible wall, that awkward space is all but gone. People will start laughing together, they will start crying together. They will even hug! Paul's "holy kiss" might once again become commonplace, and not a relic of the Bible sped through by embarrassed readers-aloud. In addition to strengthening the ties between those already in the local church, the stranger will be welcomed with open arms, both his presence and his strange thoughts. Which leads me to the second point.
2. Beer is good for the church's communal theological inquiry. Here again alcohol's inhibition reduction is beneficial. Imagine if people actually asked what was on their mind and weren't afraid of embarrassing themselves because they weren't among the chosen few in the front five pews, because they didn't know the jargon or didn't worry about having the Bible quoted at them. Imagine if people actually voiced those fleeting thoughts, objections and ideas. Theology would then, at last, actually be done in the church and by the church. Dogmatics, you could say, would finally become church dogmatics. Beer would not only have people doing theology and doing it more freely, but would strengthen people's ties to the church while simultaneously opening the doors to new ideas from outside the church. (Maybe that's why church leaders are against alcohol!)
3. Beer is good for the worship. Have you ever heard drunk people sing? Of course you have! It's about 80% of what drunk people do. They don't do it well, no - but they do it with sincerity! With vocal chords and emotional capabilities lubricated by some good brew, the church's worship would be amazing. It would be loud, brash, unashamed and totally in keeping with that unruly Holy Spirit. Liturgy would be shouted back at the minister. Hymns and choruses would sung on top of lungs along to bands unafraid to actually jam. And I can't imagine what would happen in charismatic churches with all their tongue speaking and other pneumatological craziness.
4. Beer is good for moral reflection. If you're like 90% of Evangelicals, you've been taught that beer is bad. Consuming of alcohol is something that heathens and liberals do. But look at it this way: Drinking a beer is a physical manifestation of you re-evaluating your morals, of you thinking through, maybe for the first time, how you act out your faith. And it will be an entry into wider reflection, a small, very fun step in the direction of the examined life. And in light of the points raised previously, you'll do it with your friends and you'll have a great time.
5. Keeping with the morals, beer supports Christian brothers and sisters. Or, more specifically, brothers. Some of the best beers in the world, Trappist beers in particular, are made by monks in Belgium and Holland. Trappist monastics brew this heavenly ales in order to keep their communities afloat and to support charitable causes. By buying Trappist beer you not only get some of the best tasting beer you'll ever try, but you'll also keep some of your brothers in Christ in their special monastic service.
6. Beer will introduce you to the finer things in life. Not all beer will do this, granted, but if you do take my advice and buy some Trappist beer you will be introduced to a fascinating world of subtle flavours that will titillate your taste buds and satisfy your soul. Now, I'm not suggesting hedonism for it's own vacuous sake. I'm suggesting that enjoying God's gifts can be a worshipful activity and experience. Slowly savouring a glass of fine beer will inspire deep gratitude to the Lord for the blessings he has bestowed upon you, your ability to enjoy them and for existence itself. Fine beer will further introduce you to other tasty beverages like wine, whiskey, brandy and the like. Which means even more thanksgiving. This thanksgiving is great in solitude, but fantastic communally, with brothers and sisters in the church. Imagine a service of beer tasting. No, imagine the Eucharist with gourmet beer. Beautiful!
While writing this post Christian Nightmares posted this little video which kind of threw a spanner in the wheels of my large parts of my argument. But this Chimay blue I'm drinking makes me not care so much!
Scientists in the church
Tim Stafford writes about how Christian scientists feel that their scientific vocation disconnects them from their fellow church goers. He shares stories of three of his friends, about one of whom he says,
He was loyal to his church and appreciated its work in his life. But his life as a scientist was completely excluded. Most of his day was spent in the laboratory. His ambitions and joys were largely wrapped up in his research, but he felt that talking about it with church friends was awkward, almost embarrassing—as though he were describing an intimate bodily function in mixed company. As the years went by, and he became an increasingly prominent scientist, this split existence became more and more uncomfortable to him. He grew increasingly detached from the life of the church.
He diagnoses the problem like this,
A large number of evangelical Christians in America (not Europe) are stuck in an intellectual trap. They live and breathe in a world built on science, but they are fundamentally suspicious of science and think of it as an alien force. Surely this is a problem for evangelicals. They are excluding themselves from our era’s prime intellectual force. It is also a problem for scientists because they are excluded from the resources of a robust, biblical faith, and left to an arid materialism.
Internet Monk responds with a story of his own, a true story about a girl he calls Niki.
Her name is Niki. (Not her real name.) She’s a Japanese student who lived with an American family for a year and attended a Christian school. She took a year of Bible. She attended worship and heard lots of preaching. The Gospel was explained to her many times. She was well liked and sociable.
A very smart girl. A great student, much advanced over the average American student. She made A’s in everything, including Bible.
She left America after graduation and went back to Japan.
She came to America an atheist and she returned to Japan an atheist, and very aware that she had rejected Christianity.
Before she left, she talked with one of her teachers.
“I am an atheist because I believe in evolution. When people here explained to me what they must believe as Christians, I always ask them about evolution, and they say “You cannot be a Christian and believe in evolution.” So I cannot be a Christian, because I believe that evolution is true.”
Michael sums the true tragedy up like this,
For many Christians, that will continue to be an acceptable outcome.
Moltmann on believing
To believe means to cross in hope and anticipation the bounds that have been penetrated by the raising of the crucified. If we bear that in mind, then this faith can have nothing to do with fleeing the world, with resignation and with escapism. In this hope the soul does not soar above our vale of tears to some imagined heavenly bliss, nor does it sever itself from the earth. For, in the words of Ludwig Feuerbach, it puts ‘in place of the beyond that lies above our grave in heaven the beyond that lies above our grave on earth, the historicfuture, the future of mankind’. It sees in the resurrection of Christ not the eternity of heaven, but the future of the very earth on which his cross stands. It sees in him the future of the very humanity for which he died. That is why it finds the cross the hope of the earth. This hope struggles for the obedience of the body, because it awaits the quickening of the body. It espouses in all meekness the cause of the devastated earth and of harassed humanity, because it is promised possession of the earth. Ave crux – unica spes!
But on the other hand, all this must inevitably mean that the man who thus hopes will never be able to reconcile himself with the laws and constraints of this earth, neither with the inevitability of death nor with the evil that constantly bears further evil. The raising of Christ is not merely a consolation to him in a life that is full of distress and doomed to die, but it is also God’s contradiction of suffering and death, of humiliation and offence, and of the wickedness of evil. Hope finds in Christ not only a consolation in suffering, but also the protest of the divine promise against suffering. If Paul calls death the ‘last enemy’ (I Cor. 15.26), then the opposite is also true: that the risen Christ, and with him the resurrection hope, must be declared to be the enemy of death and of a world that puts up with death. Faith takes up this contradiction and thus becomes itself a contradiction to the world of death. That is why faith, wherever it develops into hope, causes not rest but unrest, not patience but impatience. It does not calm the unquiet heart, but is itself this unquiet heart in man. Those who hope in Christ can no longer put up with reality as it is, but begin to suffer under it, to contradict it. Peace with God means conflict with the world, for the goad of the promised future stabs inexorably into the flesh of every unfulfilled present. If we had before our eyes only what we see, then we should cheerfully or reluctantly reconcile ourselves with things as they happen to be. That we do not reconcile ourselves, that there is no pleasant harmony between us and reality, is due to our unquenchable hope. This hope keeps man unreconciled, until the great day of the fulfilment of all the promises of God. It keeps him in statu viatoris, in that unresolved openness to world questions which has its origin in the promise of God in the resurrection of Christ and can therefore be resolved only when the same God fulfils his promise. This hope makes the Christian Church a constant disturbance in human society, seeking as the latter does to stabilize itself into a ‘continuing city’. It makes the Church the source of continual new impulses towards the realization of righteousness, freedom and humanity here in the light of the promised future that is to come. This Church is committed to ‘answer for the hope’ that is in it (I Peter 3.15). It is called in question ‘on account of the hope and resurrection of the dead’ (Acts 23.6). Wherever that happens, Christianity embraces its true nature and becomes a witness of the future of Christ’.
– Jürgen Moltmann, Theology of Hope: On the Ground and the Implications of a Christian Eschatology (New York/Evanston: Harper & Row, 1967), 20–22.
HT: Per Crucem Ad Lucem
Photo: Response
Your gay neighbour is a better Christian than you
Given Christianity's history of exclusion and often outright homophobia, and the current bloodletting over their role, why do homosexuals bother staying, not to mention believing?
They do both in numbers that might surprise you: A new survey of 9,000 gay, lesbian, and bisexual Americans from George Barna, a well-known evangelical pollster, showed that 70 percent of gay adults describe themselves as Christian and 60 percent say their faith is "very important" in their lives. Granted, those figures are lower than the population as a whole, which register 85 and 70 percent on those rankings, respectively. But Barna, himself a Bible-believing, born-again Christian, points out that the numbers demonstrate that "popular stereotypes about the spiritual life of gays and lesbians are simply wrong."
"People who portray gay adults as godless, hedonistic, Christian bashers are not working with the facts," Barna said. "A substantial majority of gays cite their faith as a central facet of their life, consider themselves to be Christian, and claim to have some type of meaningful personal commitment to Jesus Christ active in their life today."
Moreover, while Barna's data indicate that homosexual believers tend to avoid active participation in an institutional church, both anecdotal evidence and some research shows that gays and lesbians who are involved in their churches and denominations are often more committed to the church and more involved in ministry than their straight brethren.
Politics Daily, "Why Gay Guys Are Churchier Than Their Straight Brethren"
The problem with a traditionless tradition
I'm a member of a Plymouth Brethren church. I've been a member all my life, and although I've moved on in many regards, both theologically and ecclesially, I still consider myself Brethren. My Brethrenism is kind of geographically compartmentalised. In two ways: When I originally moved to Scotland and my theological class mates were asking around to see which denomination we belonged to, no one believed me, with my long hair, beard and band T-shirts, that I was Brethren. There is a disconnect between the Faroese Brethren and the British. Not so much theologically: Faroese Brethren are still dispensationalist, premillenial, whatever. But ecclesially, how church is done, it's different. It's much less conservative and exclusive. This is probably due to sociological factors. An added pressure, as one of the very few alternatives to the Lutheran state church, to cater to a wide variety of people has forced it to diversify (something that it has been surprisingly well endowed to do - more on this later). So first there the fact that my particular Brethrenism is Faroese in character. Second there is the fact that I only attend a Brethren church when home in the Faroes. In Aberdeen, I attend a Church of Scotland church.
So, if any non-Faroese Brethren reads this and doesn't recognise his denomination in it, it is probably because we do things differently in the Faroe Islands.
What I want to address is a peculiar struggle I had for many years now as a youth leader and introducer of new ideas in the Brethren church. From the outset, the Brethren church was antiauthoritarian. It rejected the human hierarchy of the Anglican church and with it the written down tradition, holding to a strict Sola Scriptura principle: The old creeds was not recited or new ones developed, the theological "learning of men" was treated with suspicion and there were no official church documents pertaining to church order. The Brethren tradition is, essentially, traditionless.
Which means two things.
First, it's pretty easy to come up with new things. While most of the Brethren I know subscribe to some sort of doctrine of Biblical inerrancy, even they must admit that the Bible doesn't say much about how church services should be conducted. So when you suggest crazy things that could be done, no one can point to a verse and say, "Nono!" And because there's no official tradition of how things are done, any resistance to an idea is reducible to personal preference, which, despite strong emotions involved, is hard to make a case for in a rational debate. This extends, too, to doctrine, although not to the same degree as practical matters. If you can make a good case for your ideas, you'll be accepted to some degree. This is the diversification endowment I mentioned earlier.
On the other hand, the lack of a definite tradition means that it's very, very hard to argue against what you see as wrongs. The case for structural discrimination of women, for example, is very hard to make. The fact is that I don't remember the last time a woman preached in my church or any other Brethren church I've attended. It happens, but very, very rarely. Women are allowed to sing, teach Sunday school and fix coffee, but that's about it. But I can't say that. No one is stopping them. There's no official Brethren document forbidding female preaching. And, so the argument goes, if they want to preach, the pulpit is open for anyone that the Spirit leads. No one is stopping them. Because there's no tradition. But the fact remain, however elusive, that there is a deep discrimination going on, perpetrated by both men on the pulpit and women in the kitchen. But, again, there's no piece of paper with bullet points to present as evidence.
This makes it immensely difficult to convince people who don't see eye to eye with you. It often feels like you're fighting shadows. You can see the problem, but you can't pin point the cause and thus, you can't really solve it nor convince anyone who might be of a different opinion than your own that it needs solving. There's no root to uproot. Someone can always say, "That's not true! No one has ever said that!" And they will be right. In a way and partly. The things is that someone doesn't have to say it for it to be true.
The problem with a traditionless tradition is much deeper and elusive than, I imagine, the problems with other, more conventional, traditions. At least they can say "Document, page, paragraph, whatever" and fight what's there. We Brethren, we have to contend with the shadows.
Hatred = Love?
I love homosexuals and welcome them into the church and have no problem with them in our society. However, marriage and sexuality is solely between a man and a woman and I stand by that.
This is a strange notion of love. I love you, but I reject the relationships that you desire. If you are heterosexual think for a second what this means. Would you in your right mind step into any organization that did not recognize the relationship you have with the person who is closest to your self as any human has ever been? Would you respect an organization that rejects the one to whom you have bonded yourself as "one flesh"? If the organization rejects your relationship, they are also rejecting you and your partner. So how then is this rejection…"love"? This is not an addiction, it is a relationship. The difference there is so obvious it's frankly stupid to debate.
"if you object to homosexuality, at least be honest" from my new favourite blog, Notes From Off Center
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Planned books:
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- The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution by Richard Dawkins
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Rowan’s Rule: The Biography of the Archbishop by Rupert Shortt
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The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power by Jeff Sharlet
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The Case for Religion by Keith Ward
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The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ (Myths) by Philip Pullman
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The Word of God?: The Bible After Modern Scholarship by Keith Ward
Recent books:
- Satan in America: The Devil We Know by W. Scott Poole
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- Is God a Delusion?: A Reply to Religion’s Cultured Despisers by Eric Reitan
- Sum: Tales from the Afterlives by David Eagleman
