Friday, June 22, 2007

EVANGELICALS:
ELECT or ELITE?


The book "Father and Son" by Edmund
Gosse is an autobiographical account
of Gosse's relationship with his
evangelical father while growing up
in the mid nineteenth century. Some of
his observations and experiences resonate
with my own spiritual journey so it was a
fascinating and touching story. In many
respects his criticism of evangelicalism
(his parents were part of the Plymouth
Brethren) are ones I would endorse.
Gosse is right to point out the dehumanising
nature of religion when innocent pursuits
are arbitrarily counted as 'sinful'. And it
wasn't that Gosse's father was meaning to
be a dreadful ogre - his actions were meant
for the best - and that is the real issue isn't it?

What turns a reasonable, loving, caring father
into an ogre if it wasn't his evangelicalism?!

I believe that we can pinpoint the problem:
there is just a great a danger in living above
the line of God's Word as living below it!
(A crucial distinction between 'evangelicalism'
as a sociological phenomenon and the ideal
of the body of evangelical doctrine to which
all evangelicals ostensibly hold).

What does that distinction mean in practice?

The Pharisees of Jesus' day were orthodox,
upright people whose lives, in many respects,
were praiseworthy. The problem is in their
desire to remain unsullied by the world they
hedged themselves around with religious
requirements which God never asked for.

Not surprisingly they came to see themselves
as God's elite and that fed their spiritual pride.
Spiritual pride is an abomination to God.
They didn't just presume they were 'okay' -
they presume that they are better than okay!
Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, said
"Beware of practising your righteousness
before other people in order to be seen by
them..." Jesus challenges us with the question
'who are you trying to impress?' It is perfectly
possible to have orthodox beliefs but use
them in a self serving way - God says to
such people 'you sought the admiration of
your contemporaries.... and that is the only
reward you will get!'

It isn't wrong to seek to love and serve God
with all your heart - but it is possible to want
to do this in such a way as to be admired by
other people for it! And that poisons our
relationship with God. It is the comparing
which reveals the true state of our hearts.
Are we doing something solely to please God
or to compare ourselves favourably against
others?

'Others may be content to serve God to "X "
extent', we say, 'but I can do better'. Gosse's
father confused being "elect" with being "elite",
just as the Pharisees did, and as we continue
to do! Not surprisingly when life does not
follow the contours they had confidently
predicted - they felt some degree of grievance
against a God who had not come good on the
bargain they had foisted on Him; holding
God to account for promises He had never
made. God will not be so manipulated.


Their sense of grievance at the 'sacrifices' they
had made to no effect on a God impervious to
their demands is testimony to the nature of
the bargaining relationship they had with God
belying the evangelical doctrine they wore as
a badge of distinction!


It is not surprising that Jesus preferred the
company of prostitutes and swindlers because
they understood what the sheer grace of God
means: they had no spiritual pretensions, they
were 'elect' (that is, chosen by God to receive
His mercy) but they also knew they were not a
spiritual 'elite' - and that is the point every
true Christian needs to come to; where do you
really put your trust - in Christ's righteousness
alone or your own self righteouness?
There is no middle ground.

I should know because I was once full of it... my
spiritual credentials! Now I'm an evangelical:
elect but not "elite"!

Thursday, June 14, 2007

ISLAM, EVANGELICALISM &
THE INDIAN MUTINY of 1857.



This is a letter I e-mailed to "History Magazine"
published by the BBC in response to a piece
entitled "Clash of Civilisations?" published in
the May 2007 edition, Vol 8 no 5.
http://www.bbchistorymagazine.com/

"May I take issue with some opinions within
the above article? Diarmaid MacCulloch makes
the point that Wahhabism had no influence
on 19th & 20th Century Islamic calls for
Indian Independence; but Charles Allen,
in his book "God's Terrorists" charts a direct
link between the two and one which
incidentally predates any Evangelical
influence which MacCulloch blames for
religious tension.
If Charles Allen is right, then to term The
Indian Mutiny "The First War of Indian
Independence" is a misnomer because it
was in reality a Jihadi movement which had
no common ground with the majority Hindu
population - no wonder the latter were
uncertain how to respond to The Mutiny.
I should add that these observations aside it
was a very thought provoking article."



"GOD'S TERRORISTS: The Wahhabi Cult and
the Hidden Roots of Modern Jihad" by
Charles Allen, published by Abacus 2007,
see http://www.godsterrorists.co.uk/
ISBN 978-0-349-11879-6.


ps I hope to 'blog' a piece on the theme of
"The Clash of Fundamentalisms" in the next
month or two.

Friday, June 08, 2007

LUCA - our part time cat!

Readers of this blog will remember that
last Summer we were adopted by a cat we
called Luca and I thought that it was time
to give you all an update.

Last year I put a collar on her (along with
our phone number) and the curious thing
was after a few weeks she pitched up with
someone else's collar (sans contact details)!
Hmmm... I can't help feeling that the little
minx was out for some free veterinary
treatment! Not that we begrudge her that
because we've grown very fond of her.

Taking a pet to the vet's was a whole new
experience for me. The pets created a
bond between all the people in the
waiting room - unlike any similar
situation I've been in for sure. A little girl
came over to me and said how lovely my cat
was and I got to tell her Luca's story (normally
the little girl would probably have been
discouraged [quite rightly!] from approaching
strange men!) One chap was there with an
elderly spaniel - he was quite tearful: the dog
had been his mother's who had passed
away the year before and now the dog
itself was ill. He had brought it in to be
put down. I really felt for him; this wasn't
just an animal it was a family member and
a connection with his mother!

Despite Luca's shenanigans she still comes
by - and when its wet she'll curl up by the
radiator and sleep before heading off to
her mystery home in the evening.

She claimed a fleecy blanket as her own.
Luca stood on it, purring like crazy and
spent half-an-hour gently kneading it
with her paws. A cat loving friend said
that that could be a sign that she was
deprived of her mother at an early age.
But then again this was the same expert
who was convinced Luca was a tom cat!
(We had originally called her Lucas
until we realised our mistake!)

Friday, June 01, 2007

ARTHUR C CLARKE,
PROFILES OF THE FUTURE
and A SPIRITUAL ODYSSEY.


As a teenager I read all of Arthur C Clarke's
books. He is widely known as a writer of
science fiction, but he also wrote articles
about the future of science and technology.
As an ardent teenage atheist I shared in the
rosey technocratic vision of the future when
humanity would shake off the petty
superstititions of the past and launch itself
into the Cosmos to forge a brave new
world. Of course it was rather naive but
it was the 1970's and I was a teenager,
come on!

One book by Arthur C. Clarke was called
"Profiles of the Future" and it made a
real impact on me at the time.
If I recall correctly it was in this book that
he made a startling assertion; that there
was a 'timebomb ticking underneath
Christianity' and went on to say that
contact with Extra Terrestrial Intelligence
would deliver a fatal blow to the Biblical
worldview that mankind was made in
God's image and, as such, is the pinnacle
of God's creation. As a juvenile argument
this might pass muster, but the question is
what "image" does AC imagine God
shares with humanity? And, in any event,
I fail to understand why extra-terrestrials
wouldn't share God's 'communicable
attributes' - after all what have those to
do with mere physical form? Since then,
the reader will realise, that I have come
to a much richer understanding of who
God is.

Any student of the history of the sciences
will realise that ever since humankind
realised that the points of light in the night
sky we called planets are worlds in their
own right it was commonly supposed that
they were all inhabited. This caused no
great problems theologically for the
millions of believers at the time. Allan
Chapman wrote an excellent article on
this topic in "Astronomy Now" magazine
a few years ago.

In fact the Christian author CS Lewis wrote
a series of science fiction novels which
predate AC Clarke's work. CS Lewis had
no problem with non humanoid extra
terrestrial intelligent beings. If you read
his novels you will realise that the people
he had most problem with were the
de-humanised humans bent on cosmic
colonisation not these other much more
sympathetic beings to whom the Earth
is known, not without reason, as "The
Silent Planet"!

As a teen I was also deeply impressed by
AC's "2001: a space odyssey", this novel
(and movie) had the fundamental merit
of ending in mystery as mankind makes
its first contact with a higher extra
terrestrial civilisation (there was a
numinescent encounter with beings
utterly "other"). "2001" was based
on AC's previous novel "Childhood's End"
and a short story "The Sentinel". The
subsequent sequels "2010" and "3001"
clarify AC's vision of this mysterious alien
civilisation - a rather creaky computer
programme, with some dodgey ethics
(actually they are only us writ large aren't
they?) to which plucky humanity upload a
computer virus in the name of "deicide"!
AC's vision of God is very limited and, not
unlike Philip Pullman's interpretation
of God, is ultimately a reassuring comfort
blanket to the atheist. Incidentally isn't
the Pullman series 'His Dark Materials'
just Terry Pratchett's 'Discworld' with
the humour stripped out?!

AC's understanding of religion in "3001"
seems shockingly one dimensional and
ignorant (sorry, that's the only word
which will do!) and it isn't surprising
therefore that he regards "religion"
(whatever that means!) as a "socio-
pathology".

Most atheists - and I used to be one -
are surprisingly ignorant for intelligent
people... I guess that's why they hold
such rosey views about humankind...
most atheist visionaries do... but the
reality when such visions become
concrete is always hideous. Atheist
visionary utopias always are.