I have a friend, a Canadian geek and great dad and adoring husband, who considers himself an atheist. We exchange IMs and emails - mainly nasty jokes and pop culture oddities, occasionally interrupted by news in the lives of former colleagues. I IMed him a while back, asking him what kind of reaction he got from people of faith - he said that he got very little positive, that most treated him like a leper or person with a brain injury. I suggested he must have no use for people who express themselves as having faith in one of the world religions.
There was a long pause in his IM prep, then he unleashed a powerful metaphor. He said he thought of people of faith, in the body of humanity, as the appendix, a troublesome and seemingly useless body part, whose primary function is this:
It produces and protects good germs for your gut.
After several minutes of being awestruck on my end, I suggested in an IM that he consider publishing a book of theology or even becoming a seminar prof. He got it.
He got it - and so often, it seems that people of faith don't.
Instead, whether intended or not, people of faith - people like me - are often seen as producing bile, that bitter acid that makes ingesting fats easier. Rather than being counter-cultural, we are seen too ofetn as pawns of the empire. Rather than standing with the outcasts & those on the margins, we take first place in the rat race for crumbs of luxury and status. Bile - not a welcome metapohor, not a welcome reality - scorching your throat as you struggle to keep it down.
In my faith tradition - Christianity - it is hard to look away from the consequences of this spewing of bile. Just take a look at the number of young people who do not consider themselves Christians, at the hostility toward Christianity expressed by the
next generation of non-Christians, in a new book from David Kinnaman :
The study shows :
that 16- to 29-year-olds exhibit a greater degree of criticism toward Christianity than did previous generations when they were at the same stage of life. In fact, in just a decade, many of the Barna measures of the Christian image have shifted substantially downward, fueled in part by a growing sense of disengagement and disillusionment among young people. For instance, a decade ago the vast majority of Americans outside the Christian faith, including young people, felt favorably toward Christianity’s role in society. Currently, however, just 16% of non-Christians in their late teens and twenties said they have a "good impression" of Christianity.
This book - unChristian, about why people don't like Christians - has spawned a meme that attempts to catalog these negative perceptions - they include:
Christians are arrogant.
Christians are difficult.
Christians are hypocrites.
Christians are judgmental.
In Brian D. McLaren's new book, he seems smack dab in the middle of this meme. McLaren characterizes the posture that people of faith can fall into as excessive confidence:
— confidence we are right
— confidence we possess an intellectual framework that is absolute, objective & universally accessible
— confidence that our power can be used for what is right
I suspect McLaren will generate a fair amount of bile for this characterization, with people ironically manifesting that very same excessive confidence in their posts and book reviews about this simple book. McLaren seems to be committed to the story of Jesus, rather than simply the case for the facts of faith. He seems to contrast those facts, presented with excessive confidence, with a story embodied in humility and hospitality.
Like any great story-teller, McLaren connects this books to others he has written, building on the theme of his 2006 book The Secret Message of Jesus—that bringing about the kingdom means transforming the world we live in—to propose that we create a hope insurgency:
“one that offers good news for both the living and dying, that speaks of God’s grace at work both in this life and the life to come, that speaks both to individuals and to societies and to the planet as a whole”
Today is a day that many people around the globe come to worship in this faith tradition that I am a part of. In lives that are often dwarfed by the struggles with prosperity, equity and security, people turn to spirituality for meaning or sustenance. In their guts, they need good germs produced and protected. They are desperate to join a revolution of hope:
“one that offers good news for both the living and dying, that speaks of God’s grace at work both in this life and the life to come, that speaks both to individuals and to societies and to the planet as a whole”
Thought you might like to check out this interview I conducted with UnChristian co-author Gabe Lyons:
http://www.goodwillhinton.com/good_will_hinton_weekly_podcast_gabe_lyons
Posted by: Will Hinton | Tuesday, October 09, 2007 at 11:02 PM