The Stature of Waiting

SCM Friends, Doug Dargaville and Lucy Griffiths sent us an email last month and excerpts of it are as follows:

"Life changes from “doing things” to a time of receiving. What Doug found helpful during the broken nights in hospital, was W.H.Vanstone's The Stature of Waiting. The Canon’s book notes that in all the world’s “busyness” we deprecate the times when our abilities are diminished. He gains inspiration from Jesus who worked “while it was day”. But his night began at Gethsemene when “no one can work”. He points out that the real work of Jesus was his Passion, marked by his silence, his acceptance of being handed over, accompanied by a greater sensitivity to the needs of others. The book suggests that the stature of waiting gains its own special dignity, and that stance will grow continually so as humanity progresses.

So we have become very much aware of life’s limitations, but note that the eighties, surrounded by so many friends, it is not such a bad place to be. ..... We just wanted to share these thoughts with you, because you are part of us."

Come Out My People by Wes Howard-Brook -- review by John Dear

'Come Out My People' -- a Review by John Dear (reprinted from National Catholic Reporter online; Feb 8/11)

"Come Out My People!": God's Call out of Empire and Beyond by Wes Howard-Brook (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2010) xvii, 525 pp, $30 USD.

A review by John Dear, S.J.
A year ago, I spent ten days staying at Tahrir Square in Cairo, marching with protesters after 1400 of us were denied entrance into Gaza by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. We were threatened, harassed and followed by undercover police. It was a scary experience of dictatorship, repression, and empire. 

So I rejoice with the crowds who peacefully assembled and marched these last few weeks in Cairo demanding an end to the brutal thirty year, U.S.-backed regime of Mubarak. I hope and pray that the good people of Egypt will find justice, nonviolent democracy, and new freedom. 

The long history of Egypt is a struggle for its people to come out of empire. But one could argue, their story is the history of humanity -- to come out of empire into the new life and freedom of loving nonviolence. 

A ground-breaking new book reads the Bible itself as God’s call to humanity to come out of empire and live in peace in God’s creation. 

Scripture scholar Wes Howard-Brook has published an astonishing commentary -- on the entire Bible! Come Out My People!: God’s Call out of Empire in the Bible and Beyond is a masterpiece of scholarship and political commentary which could help everyone everywhere out of their culture of violence and empire into the new life of God’s love and peace. 

I think it’s a defining moment in scripture study. I urge everyone to get this book, study it and discuss it. It charts a new course for all of us. 

In a nutshell, Howard-Brook walks us through the entire Hebrew Bible and its “war of myths” leading up to the nonviolent Jesus, St. Paul’s writings and the concluding book of Revelation to see the movement of God through history as a call to humanity out of empire into God’s realm of peace, love and justice. 

The cumulative effect is nothing less than a revelation. It’s as if we’ve missed the point of the Bible for centuries, using it to support our wars, injustices, violence and empires. 

Instead, the Bible is a summons to cut all ties with empire -- with all the political structures and systems which claim God’s power -- and to enter the freedom, nonviolence, peace, and justice of God and God’s creation. 

The best scripture commentaries of my lifetime are Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus by Ched Myers and Becoming Children of God: The Gospel of John by Wes Howard-Brook. 

If you have not read them, get them, and take ten years to study them! Another excellent resource is a superb collection of essays co-edited by Wes Howard-Brook and Sharon Ringe called The New Testament: Introducing the Way of Discipleship, which I also highly recommend. 

These two great scholars -- Myers and Howard-Brook -- build on the work of William Stringfellow, Walter Wink, Walter Brueggemann and Richard Horsley to develop the best scholarly studies of the Gospels from the perspective of war and peace, violence and nonviolence, injustice and justice, empire and creation. 

Come Out My People! takes this powerful new political reading even farther -- daring to walk us through the entire bible. It is the first such book of its kind. Orbis is to be commended for publishing it. 

The mass of data, brilliant interpretation, and sheer intelligence are overwhelming. They’re also readable and manageable if you take it in small doses. I read about 25 pages a day over the last month, underlined as I went, and pondered his insights. 

Howard-Brook contends that there are two fundamental religions throughout history -- the religion of empire and the religion of creation. (I might have called them the religion of violence and war vs. the religion of nonviolence and peace.) In this sweeping and transformative approach to biblical interpretation, he presents the Bible as a struggle between these two competing “religions.” 

Throughout the stories, struggles, and ages, people have been caught in empire and renounced God and the gifts of creation. Biblical history leads up to the appearance of the nonviolent Jesus who once and for all denounces the religion of empire and proclaims and embodies the religion of creation as the way of love, truth, justice and peace. 

Because Jesus is killed by the empire, his resurrection is the definitive vindication of the religion of creation. Consequently, those who follow him renounce violence, domination and empire to live in the peace of his creation with humanity. Instead of “Onward Christian soldiers,” the mission is “Onward Christian peacemakers.” 

I trust Wes Howard-Brook’s insights because they flow not just from his academic studies, but his activism for justice and peace. 

“I have discovered an exciting, worldwide circle of discipleship that transcends previous denominational divides, ages and nationalities in which people are seeking to discover and to live the authentic Way of Jesus, leaving behind the legacy of ‘Christian’ empire,” Howard-Brook writes in his introduction. 

“Recognizing how Jesus definitely embraced the ‘creation’ story in the Bible while rejecting the ‘empire’ story provides a new foundation for engaging our scriptural inheritance in service of personal, communal and global transformation.” 

It’s impossible to review this book; that would be like writing a review of the Bible itself. My copy is marked up with passages noted for their fresh insights -- from Genesis to Revelation. Here are some of the aspects, themes, or passages which helped me:  

• His opening discussion of the culture of empire and how it co-opts every religion to serve its will. How in the book of Genesis the Creator gives us paradise to live in peace on the land and how we reject that gift for “the Great City” -- for empire as a way of life. 
• The brilliant review of biblical history under various kings and empires. How some people were faithful to the call out of empire; how most not only served empire, but thought they were serving the Creator by doing so; how the Bible became a counter-narrative to the Babylonian worldview which Isaiah and Jesus used to explain our way out of the culture of violence into fidelity to a loving God.
• In particular, his treatment of Genesis was eye-opening, as a counter-narrative to the Babylonian imperial worldview, to Cain, vengeance, agriculture and the “Great City.”
• How biblical Israel rejects reliance on “YHWH alone,” uses the realism and militarism of empire, and never succeeds because it trusts in violence not in the nonviolence of God.
• How attention to how the counter-narrative to empire first begins in the Bible with four women -- two midwives, Pharoah’s daughter and Moses’ mother, who fear God and disobey the king.
• Side comments on the nature of God, such as God’s appearance to Elijah in the silent wind (1 Kings, 19:12): “YHWH is not to be encountered only in external events of visible and audible power, but also in utter stillness. Such an experience is unknown to the religion of empire, where elaborate spectacles visibly linked gods and kings.”
• The differences between the prophets, especially the distinction of Micah who offers a truer creation-oriented alternative, even to Isaiah: “Isaiah’s vision is one that imagines a renewed kingship and a restored Jerusalem in which YHWH’s peace will be found. Micah, on the other hand, foresees revolution: an utter rejection of monarchy as the basis for the end of war and the establishment of justice on Zion.” 
• His discussion of the non-canonical, radical text of 1 Enoch as pivotal to the anti-imperial identity of the Gospels; and his analysis of the apocalyptic writings in Daniel (my favorite book).
• His summation of New Testament studies over the last century, and announcement of a new moment as we understand the anti-imperial thrust of the Gospels in its call for total trust in the peacemaking Creator.
• His reflections on the writings of St. Paul within the context of the Roman empire, showing Paul’s radical anti-imperial stand in light of his assertion that in the resurrection of Jesus, God calls out of us out of empire into the Christ’s communal life of love. 

In Jesus, God fulfills the call to humanity to “Come out of empire,” Wes Howard-Brook writes. One passage sums up Howard-Brook’s take on Jesus:

Jesus’ mission was clearly not to ‘bring down’ the Roman Empire in the traditional militaristic sense. At the same time, his goal was not to ‘spiritualize’ political notions such as ‘kingdom’ and ‘messiah’ so as to render his followers either indifferent to ‘the world’ or ineffective in participating in God’s project of renewal and restoration. Finally, Jesus did not ‘inspire’ his disciples to engage the empire’s own social and political machinery in order to ‘reform’ it.

Rather, his purpose -- as seen through a resurrection-oriented reading of the thousand year long storyline we have followed [in the Bible] -- was to bring YHWH’s ancient purpose for humanity to fruition: the bringing forth of a people whose lives would be a light for others to show them how to live in true harmony/shalom with God, one another and all creation. 

This understanding of YHWH’s purpose would have been obvious were it not for the persistent, powerful presence of the religion of empire claiming YHWH’s authority, practiced by the Jerusalem temple, its priesthood, and its collaborators, among both the elite and ordinary people. Jesus, experiencing God’s overwhelming love for him and for all creation, took up the sacred vocation of embodying YHWH’s will by engaging in the two-part mission of denouncing the religion of empire and proclaiming as Good News the religion of God’s immanent and abundant kingdom of peace, justice, love and joy for all. (P. 395) 

“The Gospels portray a Jesus who sides consistently and definitively with the Creator/Liberator God and against the gods of empire,” Howard-Brook writes. 

As I read his clear, stunning analysis, I could not but help wonder at and grieve the great distance we have traveled from this anti-imperial, pro-peace Jesus. 

I only wish Howard-Brook wrote twice as much on the Gospels because his insights are so rich. 

I would have liked 50 pages alone on the Sermon on the Mount, which I consider the ultimate teaching on resistance to empire and the nonviolent life outside empire. But Howard-Brook hints at the end that more volumes may follow, so perhaps he could unpack more of the Sermon on the Mount in the next volume on the early church. 

Come Out My People! is certainly one of the best scripture books I’ve ever read, and one that I will return to for the rest of my life. 

I urge everyone to get it, study it, discuss it, and use it not only to understand the Bible, but to live the biblical mandate to reject empire and choose instead Christ’s way of peace, love and nonviolence.

Tips for communicating with young people using the web

Following recent discussions in SCM on online communication, just came across this interesting paper by Roman Gerodimus from Bournemouth Uni in the UK:

How to Mobilize Young People: Recommendations for NGOs and Civic Organisations

The paper lists a set of criteria for the “ideal online mobilization campaign” and features case studies of campaigns on livestock transport, animal welfare.

Some of the points here may be useful for 

• campaign work SCM wants to do in the future

• efforts to promote SCM to current students.

Each of the following points is expanded on in the paper

The “ideal online mobilization campaign”

1. is relevant to people’s everyday life
2. combines macro-social change with microsocial benefits
3. creates an ongoing narrative
4. reinforces a consistent message
5. sets clear and feasible objectives
6. puts emphasis on results
7. provides citizens with the tools to make a difference
8. maximizes the audience
9. invests in attractive and accessible design
10. (still) depends on the ‘old’ mass media

Turning Toward an Economy of Life by John Langmore

            News reports remind us daily of the economic crises in Europe and the United States.  These began in the US in 2007 and spread to most the richer countries, though not as severely to Australia as to most others.  Even so, serious unemployment has become entrenched in Australia and is now rising again. 

            We have been aware for years of the deepening global ecological crises principally related to growing greenhouse gas emissions, but also to the corrosive impact from the tripling of global population since 1945 and the explosive growth of production and consumption on the natural world. 

            The Ninth Assembly of World Council of Churches in Porto Alegre, Brazil in 2006 resolved to upgrade study of globalisation through a process entitled Alternative Globalisation Addressing People and Earth, which conveniently has the initials AGAPE.

The AGAPE program has focussed on analysis of the causes of poverty, excessive wealth accumulation, and ecological destruction and their consequences.  It has also extensively discussed the theological bases for a critique of the interlocking economic and ecological crises and articulation of an alternative Christian economic and ecological vision.  On those firm foundations it is also attempting to identify concrete strategies and policies which would contribute to implementing such a vision.

Major steps in the AGAPE process were the holding of five regional meetings in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in 2007, Guatemala City in Guatemala in 2008, Chiang Mai in Thailand in 2009, Budapest, Hungary, in 2010 and Calgary, Canada in 2011.  Summaries of each of these meetings were published in short books with the titles Poverty, Wealth and Ecology in the continent of focus. 

At the end of June a global conference was held in Bogor, Indonesia the aim of which was to draw together the lessons generated by the analyses and conclusions of the continental meetings and to prepare a paper for discussion at the Tenth Assembly of the World Council of Churches.  The Assembly is being held in Busan, South Korea in November 2013 with theme of ‘God of Life, lead us to justice and peace’.

 The Bogor meeting drew together close to 100 participants from more than 30 countries who had mostly been active in the continental conferences.  Each day the Bogor conference opened with the innovative, spiritually enriching worship, which has become the norm at World Council meetings.  This time they were led by an outstanding Indonesian liturgist who included lyrical, globally inclusive and challenging hymns and thoughtful, reflective prayers. 

The call to worship on the first day is a fine example:

Leader: The voice of the God of Life has been heard in the land.

All:         God has whispered in the wind.

  God has thundered in the storms.

  God has washed over the people.

  God has cried in the streets.

  God has spoken in the heart.

Leader:  To whom has God spoken?

Right:    To the prophets,

              to the priests

              to the leaders,

              to the servants.

Left:      To the teachers,

              to the students,

              to the business people,

              to the workers,

              to the property owners.

All:        To the children,

              To the adults.

Leader:  What does the God of Life say?

Right:    God speaks of Good News

              to the poor,

              to the weary,

  to the broken,

              to the privileged          

Left:      God speaks of unity

              to the disciples

              to the churches

              to all nations

              to all humankind.

All:        God speaks of justice and peace

              for all peoples,

              for the whole of creation.

Everyone:  God of Life calls us all (repeat three times)

Leader:  Come to God’s table of fellowship!

              Come to God’s table of love.

The program alternated between panels analysing the themes, offering theological reflections, and reporting on lessons learned about good practices.  Discussions started in small groups which then reported to the whole conference on sections of the proposed final document. 

            The most effective way of reporting on the conference on Poverty, Wealth and Ecology is to summarise the draft Call to Action, Turning Toward an Economy of Life, on which we were working. It is the result of a first draft circulated to participants before the Bogor conference, sustained small group discussion, plenary reporting, rewriting by a drafting group and preliminary redrafting by a plenary of the attendees.  It is therefore not a finalised document but does show the direction of thinking

            Major themes of Turning Toward an Economy of Life include:

·         Affirming that the abundant life which God offers is ‘embodied in practices of mutuality, shared partnership, reciprocity, justice, and loving kindness’.

·         Yet the severity of poverty, inequity and ‘the groaning of Creation’ illuminate how far the global economy and ecology fail to reflect such a vision.

·         Underlying the current economic and ecological crises has been the dominant neo-liberal economic ideology. Powerful causes of these intertwining moral and existential crises include greed and injustice.

·         Radical changes in economic systems are required towards ‘a just, sustainable and post-fossil fuel-based economy’.

·         There are already numerous examples within the churches of transformative movements committed to building an economy of life.

·         At the Busan Assembly the churches must commit themselves to stronger prophetic and transformative action on poverty eradication, wealth redistribution, ecological protection and climate justice.

·         This must include building resistance to structures which deny dignity and human rights to the marginalised; creating space for the marginalised to be heard, and for dialogue between North and South; and the organisation of a broad platform for common witness and advocacy. 

·         This will involve taking concrete action to:

o   Develop indicators of wellbeing

o   Advocate policies aiming at poverty eradication

o   Prepare proposals for a new financial architecture reconnecting finance to the real economy

o   Promote wealth sharing and redistribution

o   Develop ecologically-respectful production, consumption and distribution policies

o   Develop equitable principles for the use of energy, water and air and promote green technology

o   Establish binding principles for reparation for those whose lives have been destroyed by plunder

o   End use of nuclear energy and nuclear weapons

o   Identify accountability for unjust banking practices

o   Encourage churches to divest from destructive investments

o   Reduce military spending.

Worship ended one day with a prayer for God’s blessing to:

Let us go into the world and do whatever is true,

whatever is honourable,

whatever is pure,

whatever is pleasing,

whatever is peaceful, and

whatever is just

and the God of life will lead us to justice and peace,

now and forever.  Amen

    

Professor John Langmore attended this conference on behalf of the Uniting Church of Australia, and is a Senior Friend of the Australian Student Christian Movement

Thoughts on East Timor

‘I feel that, to the local traders, I may as well be wearing an enormous sign saying 'rich foreign sap'. Indeed, given my skin color and height (spectacular even by Western standards, I feel rather like Gulliver happening upon the land of Lilliput), I seem to be an object of almost zoological significance. The common reaction of the locals is to either stare and point openly, if uninterested bystander, or grin expectantly, if they have anything to sell. As if the depth of my pockets should be proportional to the height of my frame. Although, given the standards of the country, it probably is.

My pleasant room in Hotel Audian is comparable to a fairly modest country motel room in Australia, which, by east Timorese standards, is spectacularly luxurious. From my hotel room I can see the corrugated iron roofs of the shacks behind the hotel, thickly dotted with palm trees, rising to a skyline of the mountains which enfold the coastal city. I try to avoid standing outside the hotel, as the drivers of the interminable passing taxis eye me like a hungry fox spotting a fat, lame chicken in the open.

Or perhaps it is not avarice, but poverty that lends hunger to their eyes. For, surely the poverty is inescapable. Everywhere you look there are people trying to scrape enough to survive. The dwellings are hovels, and those with the luxury of painted walls have peeled in the sun. Street traders wander the streets selling water from small carts, or mangos from wooden staves they carry on their shoulders, which I presume to be their richest possessions. Everything is eclectic and improvised. Here and there are works of pitiful construction as shirtless workers toil in the heat. The roads are thick with taxis and motorcycles who beep each other incessantly as they weave in and out of lanes (not necessarily on their side of the road) and traffic. Every so often there is a large, impressive Government building, but vigorously fenced from their surroundings, as if their architects were adamant that the splendor of the state not be interrupted by the suffering of the people. Dogs and children play in the streets, as the adults persist with the business of survival.’

‘The rhythm of life is different here. In Australia everything is regimented, streamlined, ordered. Acts of contemplation and community are in perpetual, irredeemable retreat; our souls groaning beneath the demands of efficiency and accomplishment. Here, the rhythm of life is played at a lazy legato. Despite the poverty and the need, there is a sense of community that is palpable. Children laugh and greet you, and adults wave in the streets.

At one point, people began shouting around us. Apparently, a driver had hit another car in a nearby parking lot. When this occurs in Australia, it is little noticed, and those who do strictly ignore it, to avoid becoming entangled in an affair which doesn't concern them, and have their precious time stolen away. Such is the nature of our individualist lifestyle. But here, all around us, a crowd began streaming toward the incident, to remark upon the driver or render assistance. Ann said that it could be because they were bored and the smallest of things were a source of ‘entertainment’, but I am convinced that it is the natural expression of a community in which curiosity is not an intrusive vice, but the emotional product of caring for those around you.’

‘Driving in Dili is a spectacular and terrifying experience, especially at night. The only road law appears to be that you must not hit anyone, and drivers and pedestrians consistently defy the laws of probability and physics in abiding by it. Drivers routinely weave in and out of gaps in the traffic which seem impossibly inadequate, coaxing their groaning engines onto the search for the next customer. How many of these engines continue to run is a mystery surely known only to God.

Of the cars themselves, only the steering wheel is consistently used, with the horn being the favored element. Brakes are only employed as a last resort, when the driver cannot avoid the approaching obstacle simply by swerving into the wrong lane, or off roading. There are never any traffic jams. Cars simply flow through the streets at a lazy 50km/h like the rippling current of a stream, constantly beeping other drivers and pedestrians as they negotiate for more space, or to swerve into another lane.

Whatever the living conditions of Dili, the local environment is surely a miracle of creation. Dili is enfolded within an arc of spectacular forested hills, and occupies a stunning bay of crystal blue water. When driving along the waterfront roads, I could only pray that the driver was not as entranced by our surroundings as I. Although, admittedly he could hardly have driven any more hazardously if he were.’

‘Despite the beauty and brilliance of such landmarks (the statue of Christo Rei), it is always with mixed feelings that I approach them. I cannot help but feel that they are in some sense the brutal symbol of an imperialist church. Surely, I thought, the statue is stained with the sweat and blood of the East Timorese people, just as the Catholic cities of South America and Africa had been by that of their own people. In my view, such monuments are little less than a blasphemy to the Christian gospel of equality and human dignity. It was then with some amazement that I was told that the statue had been built, not by the Catholic empire of Portugal, but by the Muslim occupation of Indonesia. It had been built, not as an act of religious colonialism, but as a monument to the faith of the Timorese people. The statue was, in fact, a remarkable act of kindness and religious pluralism. My heart was greatly lightened by this revelation.’

‘Our first visit was to a place called the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. This organization had been created to investigate and report upon the human rights abuses which occurred during the colonial era and the Indonesian occupation. The place is both poignant and uplifting. It is located within an old prison, which had been used by both Portuguese and Indonesian governments to imprison and torture East Timorese political prisoners and dissidents. We visited what were called the 'dark cells', which are a collection of dark concrete cells, each roughly the size of an average Western bathroom, in which 20-30 east Timorese prisoners could be held indefinitely. The walls are scrawled with the graffiti of the prisoners, emblazoned with expressions of faith and hope, images of Christ and assertions of resistance and defiance, and affirmations of their fight for peace and justice.

It is truly an extraordinary place. The suffering of the East Timorese people, so long shunned and ignored by the powers of the world, were hidden no longer. There was not a trace of the complacency which now marks Western society. What had been a hellish symbol of oppression and injustice had been reclaimed as a most beautiful affirmation of human triumph. The East Timorese people have finally reclaimed their dignity, and independence is worn upon their shoulders like a golden cloak of glory, which not even the poverty of their present circumstances can disguise.’

‘Today, I saw a young Timorese man wearing a t-shirt that said 'Hope is the dream of a soul awake.' Oh, how these people hope. Here in this crystal jewel of the Pacific, hope is the only abundant resource. Their children may die of malnutrition, their only earthly wealth may be strapped to their backs, their survival may depend on the engine of a taxi that by every law physics should have failed years ago, and yet somehow their hope endures.

They have suffered every injury, indignity and injustice known to humankind. For 500 years their reality was death, rape, forced migration, the separation of families, the destruction of culture and the suppression of identity, and yet their spirit could not be extinguished. Somehow they defied all the powers of the world and won their freedom by the very strength of their moral courage.

The extraordinary courage and solidarity of these people endured to the end, as will the shame of the world, who permitted the oppression of these people for so long. Such is the distinct suffering of the people of East Timor that the complicity of the world's politicians transcended political boundaries. Gough Whitlam endorsed the Indonesian invasion in 1975, and Bob Hawke permitted the deal with Indonesia which divided East Timor's oil and gas reserves, and which Australia continues to steal to this day.’

Love Wins

Several years ago a friend of mine informed me that he’d read a fantastic new book by an author who was “completely your kind of writer, Ros. You should check out the book. It’s called Sex God.”

Needless to say, I was a little shocked – my friend was, after all, a Pentecostal pastor, and it just didn’t seem like the kind of book a pastor would recommend, let alone read, and think relevant to me!

Several years passed. I remembered that conversation and the name of the author of the book, Rob Bell, but didn’t get around to reading it. And then, not so long ago, I came across a link on a friend’s Facebook page about Rob Bell’s latest book and how its publication had led to huge controversy among Christian circles. No wonder, I thought, if the title was anything like Bell’s previous book.

It turned out that this new book, however, had a fairly mainstream-sounding Christian title: Love Wins. Its subject matter, God’s love, seemed harmless enough. What, then, was all the controversy about? A quick internet search revealed that not only conservative Christians were denouncing the content of the book. Some online commentators claimed that Love Wins was an attack on Christianity itself, and that Bell was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. ‘Heretic!’ shouted some; ‘postmodern propagandist’ declared others; and still more voiced their disappointment that a good man like Pastor Bell could stray from the fold. Good grief. It was time to buy the book, and have a read for myself.

Rob Bell is the founding pastor of American megachurch Mars Hill Bible Church. The church’s name is taken from a reference by Paul to an altar he had found in the city of Athens, dedicated to an ‘unknown god’ (Acts 17). Bell no longer serves as pastor of the church, but focuses now on his busy writing and speaking schedule. He’s a bestselling author, and his sold-out speaking tours have been held in North America, the U.K. and Ireland. In 2011 Time magazine listed him as one of the 100 most influential people in the world. Clearly, then, Bell is a man with considerable influence and this, perhaps, is why he – rather than many others like him holding similar views – has become the centre of recent controversy over the issues of universalism, ‘popular Christianity’, and what could be ironically termed ‘the [not so] Good News’.  From the Salvation Army to Assemblies of God, various people within my own very small circle of Christian acquaintances have warned me of the danger of Rob Bell’s new book. To a certain extent their views are understandable, given the questions raised by Bell that could, in the minds of many, threaten accepted versions of Christianity.

The thing is, Bell doesn’t ask any new questions. The questions he asks, in fact, must surely at some stage be asked by most thinking Christians, or by anyone merely curious about Christianity. In the opening pages of Love Wins Bell writes about his shock at seeing a note posted at an art show at his church, declaring that Mahatma Gandhi had gone to hell because he wasn’t a Christian. “Really?” Bell writes. “We have confirmation of this? …Somebody knows this? …And that somebody decided to take on the responsibility of letting the rest of us know?”  He further relates how a Christian, upon hearing about the death of a young man who was an atheist, declared that “there’s no hope then.” Is this the Christian message, he asks. Is this what Jesus offers to the world?

These questions lead to further questioning of what comprises hell, if indeed hell exists. Bell argues that heaven and hell have become so central to contemporary Christianity that the ‘true Christian message’, of abundant life now, is forgotten. He argues that “it often appears that those who talk the most about going to heaven when you die talk the least about bringing heaven to earth right now.” Without the existence of hell, he suggests, many contemporary Christians would stand on shaky ground, because they are focused on a future heaven, rather than God’s will being ‘done on earth [today] as it is in heaven’, and on them being active agents in that process.

Bell goes on to emphasize a certain inclusive interpretation of Jesus’ statement that he is ‘the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.’ This kind of inclusivity, Bell writes, “insists that Jesus is the way, but holds tightly to the assumption that the all-embracing, saving love of this particular Jesus the Christ will of course include all sorts of unexpected people.” And then, if “the door is opened to Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, and Baptists from Cleveland, many Christians become very uneasy.” Uneasy indeed, if the internet response to Love Wins is any indication of broader reactions to Bell’s views.

“For some,” Bell writes, “the highest form of allegiance to their God is to attack, defame, and slander others who don’t articulate matters of faith as they do.” It is no wonder that many in the world want nothing to do with God, he says, because they see the actions of his followers and declare that they want nothing to do with a God like that. This version of God is not the true God, he says, because that God is love: “Love is what God is, love is why Jesus came, and love is why he continues to come, year after year to person after person.” Bell implies that true Christians are defined by their love, not by their destination in the afterlife, for they are so busy walking in the footsteps of Jesus that they have no time to pour out condemnation on others or contemplate the ‘fires of eternal torment’ that he calls into question.

Bell’s writing style is easy to read, approachable and understandable. It is perhaps no wonder that he is a bestselling author – or was a bestselling author, for who knows whether his reputation as a mainstream Christian author has been tarnished beyond repair because of the questions and answers he poses in Love Wins. Will people who have never heard the ‘Good News’ go to hell? If I died today, having never ‘given my heart to Jesus’, am I condemned forever more? Would a creator God, who goes to endless lengths to establish relationships with his children, really send them to a place of eternal torment? These questions are not new; in fact, they are questions asked by millions over the past two millennia. Yet, Bell’s fall from grace and exile from mainstream Christianity would seem to have been decided, all summed up in the label ‘universalist’ that many online reviewers applied in their critique of Bell.

What’s especially sad about the controversy surrounding the publication of Love Wins is that one book, asking difficult, age-old questions about heaven, hell and God’s grace, could spark such outrage in the Christian community, while very public homophobic expressions of hatred towards gays, and frequent anti-Muslim and anti-atheist sentiments – both expressed in churches – do not provoke such a fiery response. Have Christians, perhaps, become so caught up in disputes over doctrinal differences, over denominational divides, over theological issues that have little relevance outside seminaries, that we have forgotten the central message of Jesus’ story, “the love of God for every single one of us”, as Bell points out?

Love Wins is a book of questions, and a book of suggestions of ways in which those questions could be answered. Perhaps it does fall within the framework of ‘postmodernist Christianity’, but it should not be discarded, unread, simply because it dares to ask those questions. At a time in the western world when many refuse outright to be associated with any form of religion, perhaps – as critical readers, as thinkers, as concerned adherents of a particular faith in a multicultural, multi-religious world – we should be taking note of the issues raised in books like Love Wins. We might not endorse or agree with Rob Bell’s ideas, but that is no reason to dismiss them outright, nor forget that the path to true belief traverses the valleys of questioning and the hills of understanding.

Rosalind Hewett

New Christian Lobby Group - your thoughts?

A NEW CHRISTIAN LOBBY GROUP SOON TO BE ESTABLISHED

On Wednesday, 23 May, a group of Christians met to establish an association calling itself A Progressive Christian Voice (Australia). It seeks to contribute insights from progressive Christianity into the public discussion of contemporary issues in Australian society.

One can describe the group's approach as follows:

Progressive Christians value the defence of human rights of all, especially the vulnerable. It critiques both Christian theology and Biblical statements that directly or tacitly support social structures and power relationships that disempower people.

Progressive Christians welcome contemporary scholarly study of Christianity and of the Bible. Fresh insights from feminist, ecological and liberationist biblical study, in particular, are welcomed.

These contemporary Christian streams would inspire PCV to seek to contribute to such current issues as the same-sex marriage debate, human involvement in climate change, as well as issues relating to refugees, the financing of education in Australia and the underrepresentation of women in leadership roles in Australian churches and society.

From Rev Dr Ray Barraclough, Queensland SCM