FANTASY BY ANY OTHER NAME?

So, the third series of the revived Doctor Who is over. It's a programme I grew up with intermittently in the '70s, and which now seems to be turning viewers and revenue towards the BBC at a significant rate - due to the undeniably artful regeneration worked on it by Russell T. Davies. The genres of fantasy adventure and sci-fi are not ones that really press my buttons, though I can appreciate the ideas they throw up. But when I am in London I share a house with three people very much absorbed in such worlds, intelligently and entertainingly so. Through this I have discovered that it can be fun to live in another universe. Plus I have friends whose kids love the show. All of which means that, when I'm around, and he's on BBC1, I tune in to the Doctor to see what he's up to. I guess I've seen half of this latest series. I don't, of course, pretend to know much about DW. But I hope I know enough to comment on the 'theological projections' some people seem keen to attach to it.

The 'season finale' (which was on Saturday 30 June 2007) is a good example, since it had enough apparently "obvious" reiterations of Christian or religious notions to excite those who look out for these kind of connections. Among whom I am not, it must be said, one. The industry of dismally poor 'Christian' cultural interpretation is depressing enough, without feeding it. (Forgive me if that seems mean, but 'glib' and 'embarrassingly superficial' could be the only responses to a trawl of the dross that's out there on the internet claiming that just about every fictional character ever invented is Jesus in disguise, sort of.)

What one needs to understand, I think, is that to Russell T. Davies 'theology' (I use the inverted commas advisedly) is simply the ordering of another form of fantasy fiction. So while the references in DW are probably deliberate, they function within a set of archetypes which presuppose their redundancy in 'religious' (q. v.) terms. It may be overstating the situation to say that their use is deconstructing religion, but it would be nearer the truth. However, those who look too hard, and who want what they take to be a 'Christian' message affirmed too easily, don't get this. Doctor Who is, it seems to me, fairly discernibly post-Christian and post-religious in its assumptions (while being playfully elusive about this kind of stuff, to keep everyone on board). It absorbs 'religious' tropes into a self-generating science culture fantasy.

So, in Last of the Time Lords, 'prayer' becomes an organic, near-universal wish-fulfilment channeled through a sort of kinetic energy force-field, say. Which is, of course, an idea based on a popular (mis)understanding of prayer as the childish reaching out for help to an all-powerful but non-existent force - a notion now transcended within the 'real' DW world reconfigured by post-atomic and post-silicon based technology. (Actual prayer, by the way, is more to do with abandoning the attempt to turn the universe to one's advantage, though you wouldn't know that from the way it gets spoken about and practiced in many quarters).

Note also the way that forgiveness and nonviolence, though recognised as 'better ways', become antechambers to potentially endless imprisonment, precisely because there can be no final redemption. So The Master, who is about to be a captive in a time machine, ends up being killed by a human, his wife, whose life he took over - and who in an instant puts an end to such well-meaning futility (because, as someone has just pointed out to me, he has hypnotised her). In the bigger narrative this assumes, the power of love is not denied - but being dependent upon creaturely will, it cannot overcome sheer power. Only force can do that. That is the Doctor's fate, too. He defies death and violence as far as he can, often very far indeed. But even he is subsumed by it. This is the type of 'saviour figure' Dr Who is; the best 'incarnation of good' you could reasonably hope for in the absence of God (and the presence of a quantum leap in technology). That's post-theology, or rather (I'd argue) post bad theology - the only kind most people know.

There is much to learn in all this, of course. And like many humanistic visions that start with how good can prevail after it can safely be assumed that God is dead, Doctor Who, even while it is 'only' an entertainment show, has great moral nobility. (I would argue that Nietzsche has a considerably more realistic viewpoint, however, which is how he can recognise the tragedy of God's death in a way that more braggardly non-religion simply can't.)

If I had the time, inclination and ability, I might be be quite interested to explore what kind of 'God' has 'died' (or, rather, ceased to have any kind of meaning at all, outside the pervasive comfort-zone of 'spirituality') in much contemporary popular culture. It is, I am sure, in some way or other, 'the God of metaphysics' (a 'higher power' derived from speculative theory and transcendental analogies of being). And a good thing too. The catch, of course, is that this is taken to be the end of the God story per se, since many people who have left 'religion' or who have never felt its suasion have little grasp of (or patience for, or interest in) how to think beyond what are actually rather naive forms of forensic, positivistic and 'sola empiricism' reasoning in this area. But that is the big intellectual blindfold of Western cultures at the moment. Along with neoliberalism. And therein lies another story...

Incidentally (and excuse the momentary diversion), Jacques Derrida's later fascinating dialogues with academic theology (conversations carried out by a man who proclaimed that he"could rightly pass for an atheist") sprung from precisely this recognition about the naivete of attempts to 'end' God-talk through positivism, showing that you do not have to be a 'believer' to recognise what's wrong with some kinds of atheism. Just a person who appreciates the significance of the 'linguistic turn' and of phenomenology for confounding hubristic, analytically-developed arguments that far too many people on all sides think are (or can be) essentially 'decided'.

Anyway, back to Doctor Who! Rowan Williams made an interesting comment about the programme some time ago. There are also, I'm told, reasonable theological interractions with the Doctor around - such as Philip Purser Hallard's. Ekklesia referenced his 2005 Greenbelt talks here. I ought to look at them more carefully, but I haven't yet. Maybe when I do, and when other people get back to me about what I've written here, I shall discover that I'm on the wrong track altogether. Ah, for an intellectual Tardis, eh?

LISTENING TO McGRATH AND DAWKINS

Professor of Historical Theology at Oxford University and former senior molecular biophysicist Alister McGrath gave a talk earlier in 2007 called "The Dawkins Delusion", which is also the title of his recent book - one I will be reviewing at some point. The lecture is available for download here (sound file), and is copyright St Ebbe’s Church, Oxford (copying talks is prohibited).

As a former atheist, McGrath is respectful yet critical of the movement. In recent years, he has been especially interested in the emergence of what claims to be "scientific atheism", and has researched the distinctive approach to atheist apologetics found in the writings of the Oxford zoologist and scientific popularizer Richard Dawkins. A video of an extended discussion between Dawkins and McGrath on science and faith now available, courtesy of Dawkins' website, here (mov. file)

At present, McGrath is researching the iconic role played by Charles Darwin in atheist apologetics, and the appeal to the controversial concept of the "meme" in recent atheist accounts of the origins of belief in God.

I have a number of differences with McGrath at certain points, but he has made some thoughtful and important criticisms of Dawkins on religion in his recent two books.

IDENTITY AND ETHICS IN BLOGWORLD

There's a big discussion in blogworld about the ethics of debate and attribution - Thinking Anglicans had this on ad hominem remarks and anonymous posters. Maggi Dawn has also given a recent example of a style of debate which seems deeply unhelpful. This isn't about limiting free speech, it's about courtesy, respect and the tools of ongoing enlightnment, surely?
Since I 'enabled' comments on FaithInSociety I've had quite a few anonymous responses to posts. I might excerpt and include/respond to a few of the (less abusive!) ones if I get a moment. But I don't post anonymously on the web myself, and I won't, as a rule, be publishing material here from anyone who doesn't include an email or link back to their own website - though I will happily keep a comment anonymous or pseudepigraphic if anyone requests that by emailing me. Hope that seems clear and fair.

As I've said before, a bit of me feels bad that I won't be able to host big debates, and that this is largely a comment rather than discussion forum. It's mainly a matter of time, from my POV. But I also value being able to publish some 'in transit' thinking without making it immediately subject to disputatious interraction... unlike some of the 'public' utterances or activities I am engaged in through Ekklesia. Some people object to that on principle, but for me it is part of the variety of communication we need. The idea that everyone is always obliged to respond can be a bit overwhelming, to say the least. It's an evolving medium.

Incidentally, in accepting me as a friend on Facebook, Maggi said we were "members of the blogosphere". Now there's a thought. Who dishes out those membership cards, eh? If I get one of those, I may be seriously spooked! No thanks, Jack Straw ;)

One last thing. I know my counter has still been chucking up those wretched ILead ads that defy your pop-up blockers. I have saved my Motigo data and switched to another service, the sdmirable Statcounter. Meanwhile, the graphic on this post has been deliberately nicked from a screensaver spam ad. So there, pop-upsters!

KNOWING (AND NOT KNOWING ABOUT) GOD?

Knowledge is not simply a matter of external observation, scrutiny and testing. It is about participation in and relation to what we claim as 'reality', including the reflexive distance of language by which we deduce/adduce something of what it is we participate in or relate to. If the reality at issue is a 'chair', say, there is a huge body of common human experience and observation to go on. Plus there is a universe-pattern that a chair can be shown to be part of, which exists to reinforce and legitimate an agreed account of what this thing is - an account which proves usable and sustainable for our living. That is why we go on 'believing' it.

However, that is not how things work with God, since God is not an object of any kind, not reducible to any particular element of experience, naming (designation) or universal patterning. Rather, when we speak of God we are talking of the mystery that holds the universe in being, and we necessarily speak in tradition-specific ways which involve both contradiction and paradox. Any means of claiming things about God (like 'being' or 'non-being') which does not recognise this as both a pattern and a limitation for reasonable talk about 'the divine' is, in a post/modern context, in deep trouble from the outset. That is a challenge for someone like A. C. Grayling among the 'deniers' of God, and much as it is for those who make claims for God. But it largely ignored. Even in supposedly literate circles.

How we move in a different direction from the current deadlock is, it seems to me, the 'theological issue'. How can we claim to speak with credibility about the nature of God, or to claim we 'know' about God (to affirm or deny, for instance)? It's part of a project I am developing entitled God After Christendom - which will argue that, in spite of massive problems and distortions arising from the near absorption of large elements of historic Christianity into patterns of worldly domination which have often nearly extinguished its soul, the core 'traditional' elements of Christian speech and grammar turn out, surprisingly, to be key resources in helping us to have something significant and genuinely life-giving to say and do about God -- who cannot be written off as dead, but is massively libelled (and mostly by 'the religious').

In the meantime, what follows is adapted from my paper What difference does God make today?, with a couple of small changes resulting from correspondence. The joy of internet publication is that you can go on modifying the text. Hopefully (though not always) to improve it - or, as I think one should say in all modesty, make it less inadequate.

“To speak appropriately of the holy mystery that makes and heals the world, but is not the world nor any item in it, is quite beyond the [analytic] resources of language,” says Nicholas Lash. God-talk is therefore inescapably metaphorical - that is the way its aspiration to truth is necessarily formed. “It is the tragedy of Western culture to have fallen prey to the illusion (widely shared by believer and non-believer alike) that it is perfectly easy to talk about God.” [Holiness, speech and Silence]

Serious religious activity (worship and action that refuses the dominating claims of 'deities', both religious and non-religious in form) involves disciplining ourselves to avoid pinning down and labelling the Holy One - "the unfamiliar Name" (T. S. Eliot). It involves learning how to recognise that we, and all things, are, in the flow of the Christian story at least, lovingly created (gifted) into peace – and that at the end of the day, this is all we ‘know’ – for we are contingent.

To know God in this way is not to know a scientifically or philosophically determinable ‘fact’, or to be able to describe ‘frameworks of cosmic order’, but to enter a personal, communal and narrative relationship, embodied in social practice. Above all, this takes time, patience and cooperation. And it assumes the surprising conclusion of traditional Christian thought, which is that God is disclosed as God within the conditions of the material world, rightly apprehended, and not anywhere else. Esoteric knowledge of ‘another world’ is not presupposed.

To live before God, in a dignified way, is also to acknowledge our radical dependence (the condition of our mortality) without pathology. God is no tyrant, but the life-giver. To be humanly free in the presence of God – a deeper freedom than mere ‘autonomy’ – is to learn how appropriately to handle contingency and brokenness (alongside the abundant joys of life) through mutuality, belonging, listening, forgiving and attentiveness.

The outcome of this is not ‘spirituality’ – a privatised zone of consolation or esoteric ‘knowledge’ – but radical personal, social and political engagement with the pain and noise of the world in the direction of healing (holiness), conditioned by the hopefulness embodied for and with us in the liberating Word that resonates in Jesus Christ and originates in the eternally inviting silence of God.

That will have to do as an interim summary. The rest is here. [Picture: with thanks to http://33ad.blogspot.com/]

CHANGING THE AGENDA - HOW YOU CAN HELP

Received ideas about neutrality, ‘news values’ and the place of reporting in current events must be questioned as a result of the changing global role of the media in an age of conflict, Simon Barrow of the UK think-tank Ekklesia will suggest at a meeting in St Ethelburga's Centre, London, tomorrow night. He will ask why concrete attempts at conflict transformation (rather than just ‘resolution’) rarely feature in mainstream reporting – even though, in places like Ireland, South Africa and the Middle East, they turn out to be of crucial importance. The example of reporting on the Christian Peacemaker Teams 'kidnap in Iraq' story (pictured) will be among those featured.

The discussion on ‘Making peace headline news’ will take place at St Ethelburga's, 78 Bishopsgate, London EC2N 4AG, starting at 6.30pm on Tuesday 26 June. Attendance is open and free (suggested donation £5), but those intending to come along are asked to email the Centre here.

St Ethelburga’s is five minutes walk from both Bank and Liverpool Street stations (Zone 1). You can walk over the bridge from London Bridge Station in about 15 minutes. View the location online at Streetmap.

THE OTHER SIDE OF SILENCE

“If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel's heart beat and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence. As it is, the quickest of us walk about well wadded with stupidity.” George Elliot.

My friend Alison Goodlad has an fine, thoughtful and moving piece up on Ekklesia (Culture and Review) on Finding at-one-ment in Middlemarch, in which she re-reads Eliot’s classic novel – and discovers that its apparently provincial and culturally-bound narrative has some powerful things to tell us about loving purpose in life, atonement and even Eucharistic living. It has been adapted from an address given at St Stephen's, Exeter, earlier this month (June 2007).

FACEBOOKING THE FUTURE?

According to the estimable Sunny Hundal over on Pickled Politics, Facebook (the social networking site that's seen as cool and well tooled up, now that MySpace is creaking a bit - unless you are a musician) has significant potential for getting people to think and mobilise. It certainly is impressively constructed. Ekklesia now has a page. And on a personal note, so do I. You have to register to see them, but it's worth it. (Actually, my public interface is available. I have discovered that it is to be found here)

When you have set up your own Facebook page, which is very simple to do, the system will automatically search your email address book (if you allow it to) to discover who else you know is already on the site, so that you can add them as 'friends'. There are numerous features you can add, from a 'message wall' to books to maps, as well as various groups and causes. Not that I'm advocating relocating your life online, but I have found it a useful way to link with other media people and to look up some people with common interests.

CAN THE MEDIA SEE BEYOND VIOLENCE?

You are invited to a discussion on Making peace headline news, on Tuesday 26 June 2007, at St Ethelburga's, 78 Bishopsgate, London EC2N 4AG, starting at 6.30pm. Ends by 8pm. All welcome. Feel free to spread the news.

"War reporting is long established, but the press often struggles to pick up on peacemaking and conflict transformation initiatives. Simon Barrow, co-director of the religious think tank Ekklesia and a journalist with 25 years experience, talks with other practitioners and interested observers and participants about how to get peace into the news in an age of conflict. Practical examples and ideas for at all who need to work in, or with, a fast-changing media environment."

Suggested donation £5 for the session. You can let St Ethelburga's know you're coming here. The Centre is five minutes walk of both Bank and Liverpool Street stations (Zone 1). You can walk over the bridge from London Bridge Station in about 15 minutes. View the location online at Streetmap.

SEEKING REFUGE TOGETHER

Refugee Week is a UK-wide programme of arts, cultural and educational events that celebrate the contribution of refugees to the UK, and encourages a better understanding between communities. Refugee Week 2007 is taking place from 18 to 24 June. That is, right now.

As in 2006, there will be no specific theme for Refugee Week 2007. Rather, the week is a space of encounters between different communities and an opportunity to use more creative ways to bring refugee experiences closer to wider audiences.

Every year during Refugee Week hundreds of events are organised across the UK. Last year, there were over 450 small and large events, ranging from big music festivals and art exhibitions to political debates, film screenings, conferences, school activities, sports and community events, church and faith groups meetings, and so on.

Definitely worth supporting, and obviously a concern which is highlighted in one particular week - but actually vital for the other 51 in the year.

HIGHLIGHTS AND SHADOWS

"To go into the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is travelled by dark feet and dark wings." (Wendell Berry)

NEGOTIATING THE SPIRIT OF UNREASON

Since I co-run a think tank (and in the process write, comment, speak and occasionally broadcast on issues of religion in society), some people readily assume that I must "enjoy the cut and thrust of debate". Well, I don't mind a good argument, and I'm happy to participate in serious (and enjoyable) conversation about things that matter to me and others. But actually, much of the bruhaha about religion right now - both from 'religious' and 'non-religious' sources - strikes me as bad (rather than good) argument, and a great deal of it is faintly depressing... not because of the validity or otherwise of what is being said, but because of the way it proceeds.

The level of anger, disrespect and sheer inattention to the fabric of argument and what makes people different can be truly numbing. Remarking on the trail of insults that invariably follows any attempt to talk about religion in any register whatsover on The Guardian Comment-is-Free (hmmnn, haven't written anything in my column on there for a bit), a friend of mine, no believer herself, remarked: "Well, any idea that if you call yourself a rationalist you must be rational looks to me to be just as incredible as the idea that if you call yourself religious it makes you spiritual. The evidence suggests it is often otherwise."

It was that thought (thanks, Jane), together with some reflections earlier on this blog, that lead me to write my latest Ekklesia column, Religion, anti-religion and the perils of being right.

That and the encouraging advent of The O Project, which "champions the contributions that humanists and other atheists make to wider society and encourages good relations between atheists and religious people." If they'll forgive me, I say "amen" to that, and not just because they are kind enough to quote me.

It is a true sign of humanism (which can be both a religious and non-religious virtue, and which doesn't, incidentally, have to sink into anthropomorphism or speciesism) that we value the humanity of those we disagree with above the actual disagreement -- either because we believe that humanity is in the end all we've got, or, in my case, because we see the gift that makes us human as precisely that (a gift, and therefore a pointer to a 'giving' that transcends our capacity to imprison gifts in networks of assertion and reinforcing interest).

Reason (the ability to recognise and act on the coherence that holds our living and thinking together), like faith (which is essentially trusting that 'the good' is neither ephemeral nor pointless - and therefore to be lived), is a distinctly human capacity. That means it proceeds not just by abstract rational construction, but by feeling, experience, relationship, instinct, embodiment and sensate response. To "be rational" is to learn, in conversation with others, to sustain the relationship between all these things -- not to reject or suppress one at the expense of the other. And for that you need people who are different to you, who see things at variance, and who can point you to new experiences, analyses and possibilities.

That's what makes a good argument - one that enhances the good, rather than one which ensures 'victory'. Sadly, this isn't what is widely perceived as making "a good story" in the media. For that you need warring parties asserting incommensurable claims, apparently. So, lo and behold, that's what you get! The bridge-builders are often written out of the script or accused of being vacillating or "over-complicated". To which the only response should be: tough, you destroy and see where that gets you (and the rest of us). We'll go on building, thank you.

It's called hope. And if you are a Christian it resides in the fact that the Word comes to us through flesh, not stone.

[See also: John Milbank, “Can a Gift Be Given? Prolegomena To a Future Trinitarian Metaphysic,” Modern Theology 11, January 1995. Picture: Goya's The Sleep of Reason]

WITHOUTING THE 'WITH-IT'

On an entirely theologically and socially void point, there's something about the term "rock-and-roll vicar" which brings a deep chill to my spine. And not in a good way. So when the TV fantasy-property show A Place In The Sun (just lurking in the background while I do some Important Things - honest!) used that very term to introduce one of today's house hunters, there was only one thing I could do... anticipate some delicious car-crash telly. This, of course, is unfair and unworthy of me. And to give "parish priest and rock musician Andrew Harding and his wife Leanne" who "are looking for a heavenly retreat in Western Crete" (latest7) their due, he seems a nice bloke. Indeed he's rather archetypally vicary, that tell-tale earring aside. Plus he almost certainly cringed at the intro, too, and he thankfully spoke not once of "divine guidance" or "gettin' dahn wiv da posse" (yeah, yeah, cod rap not r&r). So if The Village Green Preservation Society can be the result of an, um, "credible popular music combo", why not Hoo St Werburgh Parish Church, I ask? Let's, like, totally rockit, dudes.

AAAGHHH... A Place In The Sun is over (phew), but there's a titanic toilet roll bust-up just starting on Big Brother. I mean, Fateh and Hamas? Get real, this is serious. Pampered bottoms are at stake.

Hang on, who said modern life is rubbish? Blur, if I recall correctly... But the best comment on BB has to be Germaine Greer's. "People say that Big Brother is the end of civilisation as we know it. Wrong. It is civilization as we know it." Checkit.

Update: they're onto a nuclear-sized "whose f*****g bananas?" crisis now (see pic). Somebody call the UN!

GETTING THEIR PILLARS IN A RIGHTEOUS TWIST

The recent Church of England strop over Sony using part of Manchester Cathedral as a backdrop to the game Resistance: Fall of Man echoes back to Canterbury Cathedral's wrangle with Koch over one called War on Terror exactly a year ago. My London housemate Mark Clapham, a good urban atheist, has written an eminently sensible GI.biz piece to add some 'insider' context. You can find his article ('Reality Bites') here. He points out that even Tony Blair has now felt the need to chip in on the debate, adding: "Doesn't he have packing to do?"

Mark observes: Regardless of the legal merits of the case, discussed widely on this site as well as legal blogs, the Church's position is far from incomprehensible. A church is, after all, a place of peace, and it is understandable that the sight of such a building as an arena for a gun battle - no matter how fantastical - might cause offence, especially considering problems with gun crime in the city.

I suppose you could say that Ekklesia's response (Church on the wrong track in suing Sony over war-game, says lawyer - scan to the end) has been a little less sympathetic. The Established Church frequently lauds its links to military endeavour. Its buildings are, as I pointed out in my comment, stuffed full of insignia and memorials. I've no objection to that. It's part of history and it serves as a useful reminder of the traumas and tragedies that are part of all of us, in different ways. But it also reminds us that the Church has, on many occasions, wrapped itself in the flag, sought the comfort of arms, and blessed all kinds of dubious weaponised conflicts. It is far from innocent either of organised violence or its imagistic perpetuation. When striking a righteous pose, you'd think it might just be a bit mindful of this. But that connection just doesn't seem to occur. Why not?

The answer, partly, is the overwhelming 'Christendom mindset' (the assumption that what the church wants and values is what everyone else should be made to want and value). This entices church leaders to reach immediately for their high horses, dictats and lawyers, it seems. The tenor grates with many people, myself included. When the Canterbury row surfaced (May 2006) Ekklesia did some radio and newspaper comment, having written to the Dean and Chapter suggesting that a more positive media strategy could be pursued - in everyone's interest. Emphasise the positive: use the 'Warrior Chapel' for an exhibition on conflict mediation/transformation, invite the games company to support it (or make it refuse to do so); try an approach which is a bit more imaginative and community-focussed rather than instantly confrontational. We got a note saying they'd get back to us. They never did, and the case itself was dropped. Little has been learned, apparently.

From a strictly legal viewpoint, it's hard to see that the Cathedral and the Church are going to get very far with Sony. That isn't to say that there aren't interesting and even significant issues involved; just that the balance of forces in an adversarial process will struggle to surface them constructively. Moreover, rather than merely trying to 'defend' its symbols, buildings, texts and trdaitions as 'intellectual property' (a commodity to be fought over), might the Church not be better seeking to develop those resources positively as cultural and spiritual resources for the twenty-first century?

To put it another way: The Gospel message is about the power of love subverting the love of power. I'm not clear how throwing legal threats around is designed to demonstate this. And they're darned expensive. On the other hand, try to scrounge a few quid from church institutions for peacebuilding initiatives in Somalia (let's say), and you'll find "sorry, there's just no money". What was it Jesus banged on about? "Where your treasure is, there too is your heart". Hmnnn...

Mark Clapham (whose roll back... and mix blog is here) also draws an interesting distinction about the Sony game here. "This is fantasy games violence, heroic rather than criminal." Good point. And one which nods in the direction of 'just' rather than 'unjust' violence, upon which the Church pinned its doctrine in defence of the Christian Empire it became identified with. But of course 'heroic' killing is much more dangerous than the criminal kind, because it enshrines what theologian Walter Wink calls "the myth of redemptive violence" - the idea that slaughter aimed at making people good (or at least bad and dead) is normative, efficacious and morally fruitful. That's the unhelpful - and in many cases disastrous - lie that human beings have been telling themselves, with sanction from both religious and non-religious ideologies, since ancient Babylonian times.

Wink's own view is that TV and gaming simply institutionalises this myth as entertainment. To an extent that's obviously true. But it's also in danger of becoming a rather two-dimensional argument. Fantasy violence has cathartic properties too, and learning to distinguish between imagination and reality (though the two can never be separated) is a vital part of learning how to think and behave responsibly. Philosopher and intellectual guerilla Jean Baudrillard famously stirred the hyperreal plot by suggesting that, in a sense, the first Gulf War "didn't happen", because most of it was actually played out as a real-time computer game. And wouldn't it be better, he added, if we abandoned actual killing and handled all conflict 'virtually'?

It's a tantalising thought that begs a lot of further questions. Violence and revenge are primal urges built into our evolutionary survival mechanisms. Civilization is about learning to reframe and re-channel (rather than simply deny or suppress) them. That's why conflict transformation rather than "resolution" is what is needed. And why the Christian tradition speaks of 'redemption' (literally re-deeming things) as a relational process of moving from anomie to connectedness. Not banning things. (The Decalogue is a description of the commitments that make a moral community possible, not an arbitrary set of prescriptions to be imposed).

So... reality and fantasy does, indeed, bite. And in ways which are more interesting and challenging than a slightly naff spitting match between C of E Plc and an entertainment giant.

Don't play the game, people. Change it.

Also on Ekklesia: Canterbury Cathedral invited to turn tables on war games (29/05/06); Canterbury Cathedral urged to turn wargame row into peace pledge 26/05/06; Religion not solely to blame for global conflict, says WCC chief (08/07/07).

IT'S A CRAZY, CRAZY OLD PLANET

You think the relationship between (deformed) religion and (degenerate) politics is pretty mad in the US and other parts of our beautiful, tragic world? Just imagine how it must look from an intergalactic perspective... Working for Change recently offered this amusing cartoon take on 'faith' and 'ideology'. The solution, it suggests, is to stop believing this rubbish. Quite right. But the real issue is: what could persuade human beings to stop chasing fantasies, whether in the name of religion or some other totalising claim?

Many early Christians were among the first to be given the honour of being called 'atheists' - because they refused to bow the knee to the Roman pantheon. What they disavowed was not the life-changing taste of unconditional love they had met in the community of Christ (a love so manipulation-free that they realised that it went beyond all human bargaining). Rather, they rejected attempts to reduce the gift/giver/giving of this love - the God beyond 'gods' - to 'religion', the kind of packaged spiritual system which proves itself amenable to bolstering self-serving political ambitions. Modern disbelief, on the other hand, seeks to fight superstition by refusing any notion of transcendent value, believing such a notion to be nothing more than unprovable metaphysical speculation.

This is a rather damaging category error, to put it mildly - but it is one the church kick-started itself. The reasons why and how this is so are set out by Michael J. Buckley in his subtle, compelling and significant book, At the Origins of Modern Atheism (Yale University Press, 1987). It is the ultimate 'baby confused with bathwater' story. For if the Gospel is to be believed (that is, tested and validated through prayer, thought and action - rather than dogmatically asserted), God is neither a metaphysical proposition competing for space with human reason, nor a tribal deity who sponsors our religious fantasies and props up our damaged egos. Rather, God, improbably enough, is best understood as the kind of vulnerable, inviting, non-coercive and costly love that we meet in Jesus; one who shows us in word and deed what it is like to experience life as a gift rather than a possession. [Thanks to Johan Maurer for the cartoon tip-off]

FREED BY THE DARKENED IMAGINATION

"Mainline theology needs to understand [both] how we are part of the problem and how resistance can be formed. The primary issue is not first of all advocacy, in the form of doing things for others in ways that leave the self intact, but self-critique." [Joerg Rieger, God and the Excluded: Visions and Blindspots in Contemporary Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001), pp. 190f.]

Karl Marx once said that the premise of all criticism is the criticism of religion. This was, in its own way, a supreme compliment, because although he disavowed its transcendentalism (which he wrongly mistook for nothing more than philosophical and political idealism), Marx recognised the power of "religious" language and sentiment to deal in hopes and possibilities which the grinding wheels of production and consumption otherwise drain out of people. In the end he substituted a myth about history and a messianic class for religious eschatology, living up to his reputation as the last (and least obviously theological!) of the great Hebrew prophets.

Of course it is no more or less meaningful to talk of "religion" in the abstract than it is to talk of "humanity" in the abstract. People are not one-size-fits-all. They only come in gendered, cultured and socialised forms - in different, sometimes contradictory shapes and sizes, that is. So it is also with religion - a fact which those who try to sweep it all away with a cavalier hand and an indiscriminating mind fail (or refuse) to notice.

It is unavoidable, then, that Riegler is talking here, in the first instance, not about "religion" but about Christian and Hebrew theology - where (though you might not know it from the behaviour of many of their adherents) self-critique is, in both traditions, constituitive of any capacity they have for meaningful speech and action. It isn't an add-on, after-thought or optional extra.

For example, there is no Christianity which can properly avoid its own confrontation with the Cross, the place where our human and religious propensities to demand sacrifice, to create systems that kill, and to legitimate injustice are exposed to the searing and unanswerable criticism of the innocent victim - the one who has to be killed becuase his existence exposes the non-necessity of such regimes.

The cross is also the place where the perpetuators of the cycle of violence are undone by a response which is truly radical precisely because (at great cost) it refuses to perpetuate the core problem: "Forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing...". By contrast, to strike back is to "curse the power [at night], and live by it by day."

In the midst of its internal warring and its external anxieties about cultures which are less well disposed to it, organised Christianity urgently needs to re-capture that sense of theological self-critique. Criticism of its own failure to live truthfully in the light of unconditional love should become the premise of any criticism it engages in the wider culture. Not out of masochism (as some will claim), but out of reflexivity and faithfulness.

At which point the same question also reaches out to Muslims, to humanists, to those of many faiths, no-faith and anti-faith. Where is the self-criticism intrinsic to your patterns of thought and behaviour which enable them to acknowledge betrayal and victimisation - and not just to see betrayal and victimisation as someone else's fault? This is the truly redemptive question of the darkened imagination.

ETHICS, BOOKS, FILTHY LUCRE ... AND DOVES

Has Ekklesia sold out to a global conglomerate to raise a few more bucks? We certainly hope not. And you can still buy books from Metanoia (our peace, justice and theology online bookstore) and from Eden (a general bookstore where our affiliate deal puts cash back into the work we support). In fact I'd urge you to do so. But for more info on how and why we have started to allow Amazon links on our pages too, see here: Buying books helps to fund the quest for peace with justice.

Your comments really would be welcome. Write to me on this email rather than the one on this blog (which is largely a spam-blocker, though I do check occasonally). Promoting alternatives and surviving with some ethics in the financal jungle isn't easy. But we're trying. We value the help and critical support of those who use and contribute to Ekklesia's work.

Meanwhile, happy reading ;)

Oh, yes: the logo/artwork here ['Cross into Dove'] belongs to our friends at the London Mennonite Centre, who run Metanoia Books. It was originally an exquisite piece of fine art by Priscilla Trenchard, who now lives in the US, I believe, with husband Lynn Failing and at least one child, Charlotte. They're wonderful people who I have sadly lost contact with. And, surprisingly, Google hasn't helped on this one. So if they (or anyone who knows them) reads this, hopefully the link can be re-established. That would be terrific.

Incidentally, I recall that Priscilla wasn't hugely thrilled that the design had been adapted as a logo, though she understood why. And it is undoubtedly the case that the subtlety, scale and detail of her work is somewhat smudged by all-purpose and low-res versions in different sizes. Another "wise as serpents, gentle as doves" challenge in the advertising viz-a-vis truth'n'beauty arena, huh? But I can think of few images which convey the integral character of peacemaking to the Gospel than this one. It has inspired many, both within and without the Christian community. If you use or reference it please don't forget to credit and link LMC.

ENCOUNTERING STUFF AND GOD

Three ways to make sense of one God (Ekklesia). To some the ancient and central doctrine of the Trinity looks to be modern Christianity's intellectual achilles heel in a rationalistic age, but Simon Barrow argues that rightly understood it points to the coherence of God-talk as well as the challenges the Gospel poses.

JESUS' SUBVERSIVE 'FAMILY VALUES'

This Thursday (31 May 2007) there is a unique chance to engage with Professor Deirdre Good about why the church may - ironically - be overlooking Jesus and the Gospel message of inclusive community in its increasingly anxious quest for 'family values'.

The event, sponsored by Ekklesia, and chaired by Fr Kevin Scully, will take place at St Ethelburga's Centre for Reconciliation and Peace - a couple of minutes' walk away from Liverpool Street Station, from 11 AM - Midday. Refreshments, and interviews afterwards. Full details here: http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/5297.

Dr Good is Professor of New Testament at General Seminary in New York, USA. Her new book Jesus' Family Values is available now. It argues that Jesus replaced his family of origin with differently configured communities and households.

All welcome. Please pass this on to people you know in the London (UK) vicinity, if you see this before the event.

TREADING (BLOG) WATER

Apologies for the lack of updates here (and, indeed, on Ekklesia). Both my hard disc and I have been unwell of late - and we have had various contingencies 'in the office', too. Things should be getting back to normal from tomorrow...

TALKING SENSE ABOUT MOVING PEOPLE

In the UK tabloid media, migration is "an issue". Actually, it's about people - and often their great pain. This much is made clear by Christian Aid's splendid new report, which (inter alia) blows the lid on the paranoid fantasies of The Mail and The Express - who are always talking in lurid and threatening terms about 'economic migrants' (people disenfanchised by the institutional inequity of the global financial system), asylum seekers and refugees.

What Human Tide makes clear is that there is a migration crisis. But it is at its greatest in the South, not the North; and equally its causes lies in the kind of policies we try to protect with barriers, not in the vulnerable people we scapegoat for their plight or the consequences of their exploitation. Of course there is the sickness and corruption of the people-trafficking trade, too. But again, many media portrayals segue the victims into the perpetrators. They fail to point out that movement takes people 'out' as well as 'in' (part of the issue behind a sane migration policy for Europe is how to help people move as a result of choice not compulsion). They don't recognise that development and security are the things that help people take root rather than being displaced. And they ignore the fact that in a word of dissolving borders and transparency to instant capital movements, trying to cage people just doesn't work - apart from being based on immoral premises.

None of this makes solutions to the global crisis that Christian Aid describes easy, of course. But it does suggest that the parameters of a sane and humane conversation about migration will look radically different to the one we have now, where electorates are scared by papers hunting fear-fuelled profit, and politicians bow to the climate of prejudice - in spite of their denials - with a weather eye to their electoral fortunes.

There are all kinds of reasons why Christians should care about this: about people, as well as policies. Among them is the simple fact that Christianity itself is constituted by journeying - in mission, in pilgrimage, in hospitality, in aid, and in flight from mistreatment and oppression. It is our history and our desiny we are talking about - and a growing understanding that the 'we' is a human family, not a self-preoccupied tribe. The Gospel, rightly understood, is always about enlarging the circle of our love, and developing our habitual capacity to respond to a barrier-breaking welcome which goes beyond the limits of human specification and subjectivity. God's, in other words.

Meanwhile, you can download Christian Aid's report, Human Tide: The Real Migration crisis here: full graphic version) (2mb *.PDF- this file may take time to download) or low graphic version (748kb *.PDF).

INVESTING IN THE FUTURE

People are more and more wary of 'religious charities' these days, fearing that good-will can easily become a cover for proselytism or self-interest. No doubt collectors for Christian Aid Week 2007 will face this kind of suspicion in some quarters - but Christian Aid is one church-backed organisation that unequivocally works with those of all creeds and none, builds alliances for social justice, and supports some of the world's most effective NGOs in combatting poverty and inequality on the ground in five continents. It is also a leading campaigning organisation on debt, aid, trade, corporate accountability and global warming. I've seen its work first-hand and have no hesitation in commending it. This week Ekklesia will be specially highlighting the work of CA. You can donate online via this link. This year's Christian Aid education materials feature inspiring stories of how poor communities in El Salvador, Senegal and Afghanistan are growing a future in spite of seemingly impossible odds. With a bit more help they can make an even bigger impact.

MISSION IMPROBABLE

Last week the Archbishop of Canterbury made an important statement in Malaysia about the purpose of Christianity. “Our mission”, he declared, “is not to conquer the world, to subdue others… our mission is to draw people to the company of Jesus; new words to speak, new thoughts to think and new love rising in their hearts.”

If the church really did take that as its starting point, and if it fully recognised that Jesus was crucified by precisely the kind of religio-political system it has historically been tempted to impose, a huge amount could change in its life, and in the life of the world.

It isn't too much to ask. But it is still an awful lot.

KEEPING FAITH WITH THE SCHOOLS DEBATE

Earlier this month, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) decided to have a meeting on faith schools at its annual conference - following up on their constructively critical position paper (pictured below). I spoke at it, on behalf of Ekklesia. So did Andrew Copson from the British Humanist Association. The organiser tried hard to get speakers (especially an Anglican and a Catholic) who would put the view for advocates of religiously-affiliated schools.

When the Church Times reported this on 30 March 2007, they said there was "an 11th-hour invitation had been sent to the C of E and the RC Church to attend the ATL debate". That's funny, because I know from my own correspondence that the organiser was making approaches two weeks beforehand - and that the union got some, shall we say, "sniffy" responses in some quarters.

It has also been suggested to me that "the timing was wrong for the churches, because of the run-in to Holy Week". This is an interesting argument. First, having worked both for the C of E and ecumenical bodies, I know that, although it can be a busy period, people are available. If clergy can't be, there are many lay people with plenty of professional experience in the area.

Second, the complaint once again illustrates "the Christendom mindset". When the church and its message was fully ingrained in the culture and its institutions, it could be taken for granted that other people would know and fit in with the Church Calendar. But that is no longer the case. Indeed a couple of people who I chatted to after the ATL meeting had little or no idea what Holy Week was.

If Christians wish to engage with others, they can no longer assume that it will always be on terms which are convenient to them. The onus is on them to go out of the way (in a manner that Jesus described the priestly class as struggling to do in the parable of the Good Samaritan). And insofar as this represents a shift away from ecclesiastical presumption, it is a healthy spiritual state of affairs for the church, I'd say.

The ATL argues that publicly-funded educational institutions should be accountable and open to all, which is not the case when faith schools are almost wholly financed by the taxpayer but can turn down pupils and teachers because they have the wrong beliefs . On Ekklesia we go further. We think that privileging the interests of church-going parents and children over others goes against the Gospel message of favour-free love, and we think that a "Christian school" would be one that favoured those excluded or at the margins of society, not people who have the time, money or possibility of jumping church admission hoops.

The Church of England and the Roman Catholic hierarchies see things very differently. So there is a debate to be had, and it shouldn't just be conducted in the corridors of power or at the Athenaeum Club (where Jonathan Bartley and I were invited for one conversation some months ago). The defensive shields need to come down and the talking needs to get more positive on the part of those who run religiously-affiliated schools.

That's why I welcome the ATL's position. Not just because I agree with their concerns, but because they are trying to address them constructively. They also have a lot of Christians on their side, even if they are not official church spokespeople.

See also: Teaching union defends its calling of faith schools to account and Time to end discrimination by faith schools, says teaching union. ATL's position statement on faith schools can be accessed here.

A SOCIETY OF STUFF AND STRANGERS

As New Labour contemplates a degree of electoral meltdown on Thursday 3 May, the word from the camp is that its new idea is "progressive self-interest" - trying to make social justice more amenable by showing how everyone can benefit from a fairer society and will lose from a more divided one. That was, of course, the logic of the Brandt Report on world development in the 1980s - but the gravitational pull of market liberalisation, individualisation, game theory, organisational change and consumerism has been in the opposite direction, and democratic politics struggles to move to a different drum. The role of civil society initiatives and movements is vital in keeping alternative visions alive, and those who have lived within the constraints of Westminster politics know this too.

Turning to the bigger picture Clare Short (formerly Labour development secretary, now independent, MP) declared today: “You can’t take the evil of slavery out of the world and abolish it without making the world more just. You will never prevent people living in bonded labour or from getting caught up in sex trafficking while they are so desperate that they have no other choice but to sell themselves. As long as we in the West crave ever more excess, we conspire in their desperation, exploiting it and make ourselves sick in the process. We are well off, yet our society has never been more miserable. We suffer today from the disease of excess, from obesity, drug and alcohol abuse and resulting family breakdown. We must change the way we live, change the way the world is governed and create a new world order, both for ourselves and globally.”

She will, of course, be accused of miserablism for her initial judgment and damned for idealism with her last flourish. But the essence of Short's complaint (which is not invalidated by criticism of her own past performance, either) is based on stark realism, albeit of the kind we are ill-inclined to recognise. I'd put it this way. A society over-mesmerised by acquiring things has become more and more a collection of strangers who clash legally, struggle politically, by-pass socially, divide economically, narrowcast culturally, turn inwards spiritually and plunder environmentally.

You don't have to be a sandal-wearing Cassandra or a denier of the numerous benefits of modernity to see this downside, and to recognise that the most basic question we have to handle is what constitutes our common humanity over and above the technologies that mediate it. Given the magnitude of the forces that maintain us in our current materially-bound dilemma, steps in a different direction are going to seem small. But they are vital. And they will only be sustained by faith - not dogmatism or refusal of evidence, but reasoned trust in a greater future rooted in something that cannot simply be reduced to a function of what now-is and now-rules. This is what "undergoing God" (as James Alison delightfully puts it) is all about, and those who do not see that as a possibility have a responsibility for elucidating the grounds of hope, as much as those who do have a responsibility for elucidating the grounds of belief.

THINKING FOR THE DAY...

One of the trials of writing commentary for a wide audience is that you are always having to ask yourself, "how could this be misunderstood?" Then you try to be clearer. Then you have to face up to the fact that you still get it wrong. The onus of communication is on the communicator, but it's a two-way street... more than that, it's a multi-channel zone with loads of interference. Getting heard is a human privilege. Getting through is a grace.


All of which is a prelude to saying that, after some useful feedback, I changed the title of my latest Ekklesia column from Why we need to rid ourselves of 'God slots' to this one: Why we need to rid ourselves of the 'god of the slots'. The reason is this: given that there is a question in the air about 'Thought for the Day' on BBC Radio 4 (some of us want it open to people of different life stances, the churches and its producers only to "the religious"), it could have been construed as somehow anti-TFTD. This is far from the truth. Ekklesia - which has a stake in the programme, since Jonathan Bartley is a contributor - wants to see it as a slot for a wide range of takes on life, not a narrow "God slot" (as people like to call it). This article is, in a sense, a contribution to that debate, but its main concern is to show wht "the god of the slots" in culture is the equivalent of "the god of the gaps" in science -- a related, but distinct, issue.

As I've also added: "TFTD is an important space for looking at how beliefs-in-practice view the task of living, but it does not have to exclude those who do not fit a questionable definition of "religious". See some more detailed comments on: Losing our (radio) religion?

NOT EXPECTING SOCIETY TO DO GOD FOR US

Why we need to rid ourselves of 'the god of the slots' The church looking for ‘God slots’ in relation to culture is like religion seeking a ‘God of the gaps’ in relation to science: a huge mistake. The Gospel points us elsewhere.

In a post-Christendom era, Christians cannot expect the education system, government or the media to do their job for them or make other people Christians. If they do that they will be constantly disillusioned, they will be despised, and they will lose the capacity for independent thought and subversive action.

There are two sides to this: exercising freedom, and recognising limits. Rowan Williams put it well in his BBC Newsnight interview on Tuesday 24 April 2007. First, in response to the question about whether Bush and Blair had prayed over the Iraq war, he turned the issue on its head. Politicians are not there to pray. But if, by chance, these powerful individuals had prayed, maybe they would have opened themselves to a decision that went against their instincts and interests – maybe the Prince of Peace, whom they both name, would have convinced them not to put their trust in armies. Who knows?

Then Dr Williams said this: “I don't expect government to be talking religion. I do expect government to be giving space and opportunity for the kind of moral discussion informed by religion, as by many other strands of humanistic thought.”

That is both pluralistically defensible and theologically appropriate. Taking “religion” to mean, in this case, the life and testimony of a group of people (rather than the institutional abstraction I have criticized), the Archbishop seemed to be suggesting that both those of faith and those whose commitment to human flourishing is otherwise defined should be part of a conversation sustained by public space, but without expecting government to talk their language or do their work. (He then spoiled it all by defending bishops in the House of Lords, but no-one is perfect).

All of which makes me wonder… if Christians were to stop bleating on about protecting their preferential “slots”, and were instead to focus on what they had to offer in terms of peacemaking, hospitality, community-building, forgiveness, and many other gifts of the Gospel, people might just be interested in broadcasting them – not because of a “religious label”, but because they had something worthwhile (and a bit quirky) to say. More here.

BLOG ON EKKLESIA

I am splitting my endeavours between FinS and my Ekklesia weblog, which is here: http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/blog/3

A SYMBOL OF FAITHFUL NON-CONFORMITY

Waiving the flag? Simon Barrow, Guardian Comment-is-Free, April 23, 2007 5:55 PM Printable version Despite the jingoism surrounding St George, his story has another side that goes well beyond narrow nationalism.

ON A MUCH LIGHTER NOTE

I never could resist a good lightbulb joke: on which note, see C of E lightens up. For followers of the UK political scene, the Gordon Brown and David Cameron ones came straight off the top of my head. Though that isn't saying someone else hasn't thought of them too. The 'freemarket' one I started as an anti-monetarist quip in 1981, and a year later it came back to me. Dozens of others probably had the same idea. Duff 'memes' theory is not needed for this kind of thing to happen. Btw, for real aficionados, how about: Q. How many David Milibands does it take to change a lightbulb? A.Gordon is the man for that job, without a shadow of a doubt. Footnote from Matt Foot. (Btw, Jonathan Bartley tells me the counsellors one is too old. But I still like it. Sorry, Jon. Shine on, you crazy diamond...)

HEADING FOR UNCHARTED DEPTHS

"Because we have not sought the safety of familiar, wide-buoyed waters, but claim a wide universe for our domain, we shall always find ourselves sailing towards continents of spice and treasure. We will be asking questions of import, for which there are no certain answers." --Anthropologist Frederica de Laguna (1906-2004).

Of course there was a bit of looting to complicate things in practice, but as a metaphor it works very well indeed.

Hat tip to Michael Marten... who tells me to thank Laurie King.

FALLIBILITY AND TRUTHFULNESS

"...The culture of thinly disguised nastiness [which we see in some religious communities] is also a more general feature of public life. We say we want politicians to admit errors and apologize (Des Browne being a recent example). But when they do so, we say they are weak and unfit for office – and we do so with little sense of irony or self-knowing. In the process any possibility of achieving common truthfulness is lost. Disagreement is an unavoidable part of human development. Argument is a good thing. Suspicion towards power is vital. But without a sense that we are held in love these things lose a sense of proportion and can spill over into contempt or even hatred."

See further: How these Christians hate one another.

(While I'm talking about apologies - please accept mine if you are annoyed by the intrusive 'pop ups' - iLead in particular - which seem to occur when visiting this site. They are planted by my stat counter, I think. I'll see if I can find another at some point)

RETHINKING ISLAM CHRISTIANLY AND HUMANLY

I have substantially redrafted and added to an earlier review article about Kenneth Cragg, including two of his more recent books, in the culture and review section of Ekklesia: Muslims, Christians and the global human challenge.

In addition to developing a fascinating Christian interpretation of Islam which he then offers back in friendship to Muslims, recognising both points of contact and significant differences, so Cragg has also tried to forge a new kind of relationship betwen 'the religious' and 'the secular' (to use two masively overgeneralised current categories).

"Just as he illustrates so tellingly how ideological secularism is (quite literally) incomprehensible from the perspective of Islam, so many secularists will want simply to reverse [the] sub-title [of one of his books] so as to render it ‘divine meaning in human question’, and thus dispose of God. The author is well aware of this challenge. What we do with the divine Name is crucial for him. His response, however, is not some unfeasible pan-religious apologetic. Nor is it over-accommodation to populist critiques of religion which have failed to take it seriously. Instead he concentrates on exposition of 'the good' (starting from particular traditions) on the one hand, and the allocation of different (but shared) ethical responsibilities, on the other. In the same way that Cragg has humbly walked with other religions and cultures in order to discover both common hope and divergence among them, so he courteously invites those to whom faith is anathema to reconsider how human beings and the world might be positively reconstrued by what they reject."

THE SHOCK OF THE NEW

Being stuck with a God who raises the dead (Ekklesia). Easter is awkward for the church, because its revolutionary message leaves it nowhere to hide religiously, politically or intellectually, argues Simon Barrow.

LIFE BEYOND THE WAR ZONE

Brian McLaren: Which Holy War? (SojoNet). "We've probably heard many people here in the US ask, 'Why aren't there more moderate Muslims speaking out against the violent extremists and calling for reform in Islam?' As I reflected on Roland Martin's editorial on Good Friday, 2007, I couldn't help but think, 'Maybe around the world, "behind our back," so to speak, people are asking a similar question about Christians in the US.' These reflections stayed with me over the weekend and were with me still on Easter Sunday. In Romans 8, St Paul says that the Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead lives in us. Those words challenged me to believe that the impossibility of resurrection is indeed possible ... not just in our individual lives, but also in our religious communities, if we are truly open to the life-giving, death-defying Spirit of God."

MAKING A TRIAL OUT OF CHRIST

This from an excellent article in the Observer by Richard Harries on the dilemmas faced by Rowan Williams - and, inter alia, on the difficult business of being a Christian in a culture (and that includes a church culture, sadly) marked by virulence and easy self-regard.

"[H]is style is hardly made for our simplistic, untruthful, soundbite culture. A good example is contained in his book, Christ on Trial. Rowan reflects on the silence of Christ, as recorded by Mark's Gospel. Jesus simply refused to answer the questions put to him about who he was and Rowan writes: 'What is said will take on the colour of the world's insanity; it will be another bid for the world's power, another identification with the unaccountable tyrannies that decide how things shall be. Jesus described in the words of this world, would be a competitor for space in it, part of its untruth.' Rowan will know, better than most of us, that anything he says will be part of the world's untruth and the more he conforms to the expectations of a headline culture, the more untruth there will be in it.

"One of the threads running through his writing is the idea that true religion always leads one to question oneself, rather than make claims over others. Jesus is not a possession or a badge of superiority, but the one before whom you stand, in gentle self-questioning."

Incidentally, the headline writer has, I fear, missed the point of this piece. It isn't a plea for the church to "ease the pain of Rowan's Passion" (except in the rather prosaic, though not unimportant, sense of "stopping being so nasty") -- rather, it's a plea to understand the issues he is wrestling with, and the way he is trying to wrestle with them, as part of a passion which isn't finally about "them and us", but concerns a new creation wrought from pain, difficulty and failure. In other words it is a call to stop casting stones and start listening to the Gospel. Something all-too-easily bypassed by institutional 'christianism' - a term I think we should use for the painful distortions of Christianity wrought in its name.

I can't recommend Christ on Trial highly enough, by the way. A superb book which, as the blurb says, "draws not only from the Bible, but also from contemporary fiction, film and theatre... [to] explore the ways society continues to put Christ on trial today. In fact, all Christians stand with him before a watching world. How we respond to this challenge is the focus of Christ on Trial. It increases our confidence in the faith we have received, and invites us to discover 'what we are and what we might be in God's sight'."

See also: Why Rowan Williams helps stem the drift to idiocracy.

CHURCHES PLEDGE TO MAKE PEACE HISTORIC

See here for details of the International Ecumenical Peace Convocation.

EXPLORATIONS INTO GOD TODAY

I have just published what I must admit is a fairly dense (though I hope not opaque) essay for Ekklesia entitled What difference does God make today? Let me introduce its purpose in this way: I recall that a number of years ago Peter Selby, then research professor in applied theology at the University of Durham, now Bishop of Worcester, commented to me that today - in an environment where the presumption is widespread that Christian belief as a serious intellectual proposition is finished - all theology needs to be, in a certain sense 'fundamental theology'.

The term has nothing to do with fundamentalism. It is derived from Catholic scholasticism and refers to our accounts of foundational elements of the Christian narrative - the identity and meaning of God, Christ, the Spirit, and so on. What Peter was saying is that people have mostly lost touch with a coherent way of speaking about such things. This is partly because they were assumed rather than argued for in civic 'Christendom culture', and partly because education within the churches has become so thin - at least when it comes to exploring core issues of belief. The upshot is that attempts to speak of Christian perspectives in the public arena have lost their moorings. Many people have ceased to have much of a clue what we in the churches are talking about. To them we speak in a code which they can no longer crack. This is our loss before it is theirs. The onus of communication is on the communicator. Indeed I think things are worse than this. It is frequently observed that communication is indivisible, and in that sense Christians struggle to speak to themselves too, as the appalling 'debates' about sexuality indicate. The Word has become silent, and not in a humbling and chastening way.

More than 60 years ago, Dietrich Bonhoeffer recognised this problem. He famously suggested in his prison diaries that it might now be necessary to find ways of expressing biblical ideas in non-biblical language for a post-religious age. His death at the hands of the Nazis tragically truncated his thinking on this and many other matters, but it is fairly plain that he was not talking about some superficial 'demythologisation' programme, or the evacuation of Christian meaning into a hollowed secular shell. Even as he wrote (knowingly) from the depths of Enlightenment culture, and out of one of the darkest hours of modernity, he remained a person sustained and resourced by the deep piety and theologia crucis of Lutheranism.

What he recognised, I think, was that in a world of evolving understanding and cultural autonomy, sustaining the core dynamism of Christian belief is not about building walls around inherited expressions, as if the fleshly Word really was words, but engaging in a process of continual re-expression -- finding ways, if you will, of digging fresh insight from ancient quarries, re-resourcing contemporary speech from the riches we have inherited. David E. Jenkins used to point out that this was, in itself, a biblical procedure. The living God of the Bible, in the words and events of Jesus and the prophets, is always to be encountered in the contemporary, not locked up in 'the biblical'. The language that speaks of a God beyond our grasp will always be fresh and new, and yet will - to those who recognise its resonances - simultaneously reverberate with what has been said and done and performed throughout the ages. (Something like that.)

Anyway, my essay is very far from achieving any of this, and its formulations are probably still too 'religious'. But it is an attempt, heavily indebted to the work of Nicholas Lash, and especially his book Holiness, Speech and Silence, to reconsider "the question of God today" in terms of contemporary philosophical challenges and the demanding call to discipleship - the following of Jesus through thick and thin. The key questions are 'who is God?', 'how do we speak of this God in a work of plurality, pain and darkness?' and 'what distinguishes God-talk that can claim vitality and aspire to truthfulness from the fantasy and non-sense of much religion?'

It's a stab, anyway. And it's based on my growing conviction that a durable theological language is not reductionist but subversively resourceful - in Walter Brueggemann's words, it "funds the postmodern imagination" out of a narrative stock and a grammar which connects us to the continuing liveliness of the God beyond our expectations and grasp - but who nevertheless touches us at the deepest, most vulnerable places of human longing and becoming.

[Apologies for the infelicities in the earlier version of this post - written late at night, and I was tired]

A CLASH OF TOTALISMS

In reading Terry Sanderson's Guardian article on the original sin of religion, and in responding to it (Resisting the polarizing mindset), I was brought back to some comments by Catheine Madsen, who is neither Christian nor atheist, from what I gather. She is, however, a wise woman:

[O]ur obligation to our fellow humans is to make our own point of view not unassailable but intelligible. She goes on (in Learning to converse like adults): [P]ainstaking thinkers of all cultures know each other intuitively across the boundaries of opposition. Totalitarians do not like them; indeed they are always at risk from the totalitarians in their own culture as well as those in the enemy's. In spite of this - or because of it- they are determined to construct a trustworthy language, a language dense and durable enough to resist the corruptions of politics.

TROUBLE IN THE TEXT DEPARTMENT

A couple of new review and culture articles from me on Ekklesia: Judas makes another comeback (The story about how Judas has been misrepresented in the Gospels and was mainly trying to rescue Jesus from false notions of messiahood has surfaced again - via a Jeffrey Archer 'novel'); and Endism is nigh, texts are tricky (responding to the apocalyptic non-sense purveyed by a good number of internet Bible sorcerers). There's also a lively debate on writer Dave Hill's excellent weblog Temperama about A. C. Grayling's less than nuanced into the debate about religion - An extended yawn. I normally try to keep clear of this kind of thing, but Dave's helpful post was too much to resist. And Lent is exactly the right time of year of re-negotiate with our temptations. Oh, I should also plug this, too: Current Research: Reconsidering the secular.

CHRISTIANITY WITH ATTITUDE

That's the title of a new book from my colleague and friend Giles Fraser, pubished by Canterbury press and available to order through the internet here (through Ekklesia's affiliate shop). There's a sample chapter ('Family Values') here, in *.PDF format. Much of the material is derived from columns in the Guardian and the Church Times, along with BBC Radio 4's 'Thought for the Day'. The blurb sums up the overall impact as follows: "Giles Fraser is one of the most passionate and outspoken figures in the church today, and a refreshing antidote to the bland and soggy language of much of modern Christianity - not least, he admits, of his own liberal tradition. Inspired by the fiery language of the Bible, whose writers believed in what they said as if their lives depended in it, here is a real prophet for our times who has the honesty and bottle to say what he believes without hesitation or qualification. In Christianity With Attitude he gets to theological grips with a wide range of subjects including the morality of war, the meaning of death, church committees, sex, atheism, giving up smoking, Bratz girls and why you can't trust Christian cowboys."

IS IT MAD TO CRY DISCRIMINATION?

Crackpots or cracked pots? (Guardian comment-is-free). Simon Barrow March 19 07, 12:30pm: Those who claim that Christians are being discriminated against are wrong, but not mad. We need careful argument rather than demonisation as the demise of Christendom generates change and uncertainty.

SURVEY SAYS... YOU HAVE MAIL

We are in for another row about public religion, after research commissioned by 'The Heaven and Earth Show' (BBC survey says Christians feel they are discriminated against, 18 Mar 2007) - and a debate being pushed by The Mail on Sunday.

Further responses from Ekkesia: UK Christians urged to be positive not negative about loss of status and Grounds for discrimination? Full press release: Crying 'discrimination' harms churches' message.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Various additions by Simon Barrow: The History of Christian Thought - Review; a feature article Lords and bishops go a-leaping (reform of the second chamber in the UK); and Current Research: Reconsidering the secular.

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FAMILY MEANS MAGNANIMITY

The contested nature and shape of 'the family' in contemporary Christian imagination and practice has been thrown up by many recent arguments in Britain: about the place of LGBT people in the church, in the Catholic adoption row, via the question of children at communion, and more. The careful and thoughtful argument about why magnanimity (rather than exclusion) is at the heart of an alternative vision of family, rooted in the dynamic of the gospels, is set out by Deirdre J. Good in her important new book, Jesus' Family Values. It's available (via the link) from Metanoia's bookshop. Today Ekklesia offers an introductory excerpt: Wrestling biblically with the changing shape of family.

"When I kneel side by side with someone whose construction of family looks radically different from mine, I witness to a God whose ways are not our ways, whose judgments cannot be limited by our finite understanding, whose generosity and creativity must not be circumscribed by our tiny hearts and minds." ...

"Reading ancient texts like the gospels or letters of Paul is hard work. It’s not just a question of investigating ancient sociological or literary contexts; it’s a question of asking critical questions about bringing ancient texts to bear on modern realities. Our interrogation of ancient texts, more often than not, lays bare not so much the texts as our own presuppositions. But our fidelity to these texts and their authority for us makes it imperative that we continue to do it in full awareness of the provisional character of our readings and applications."

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A CLIMATE OF DENIAL

Respected environmental author Bill McKibben on the US religious right's denial of human influence on climate change, and their attack on faith groups (especially mainstream evangelicals) who are taking up the issue: "[James] Dobson, [Jerry] Falwell, and their ilk are the voice of a Christianity so deeply compromised by its embrace of American materialism that it needs to treat as a threat our brothers and sisters in Christ who come bearing the news of physics and chemistry. Rich Cizik has been faithful in reading the signs of the times, and so it is unsurprising he is under attack. But one way or another, his moral clarity will prevail."

See: Drowning your neighbours? and Dobson and friends get personal on global warming.

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THE STATE AND FAITH COMMUNITIES

There are a number of models for how government, politicians and policy specialists can engage with people of different beliefs in modern Britain.

In thinking about these, the All-Parliamentary Humanist Group will be joined by Simon Barrow, co-director of the Christian think tank Ekklesia, and by a representative of the new organisation British Muslims for Secular Democracy on 14 March 2007, at the House of Commons.
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"Why has the government chosen to engage with ‘faith communities’ in the way that it has, privileging them as communities of identity, extending the right to run state-funded schools to them and encouraging their involvement in the provision of public services and in the formation of public policy? What alternative models for engagement are there?

"The situation here appears more complex than in other western countries, both because of the establishment of the Church of England and its consequences (not least our large number of state-funded Christian schools) and because of the great diversity of belief that exists in the UK today. Things have been further complicated by the difficulties posed by hard-line Islamism."

These and other issues will be explored.

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LIVING IN THE PRESENT MOMENT

The golden moments in the stream of life rush past us, and we see nothing but sand; the angels come to visit us, and we only know them when they are gone. ~ George Eliot (thanks to Maggi Dawn).

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GIBSON'S PASSION AND JESUS' ANGER

Two different angles from me on faith and rage: a note about the essays concerned with Mel Gibson's 'The Passion of the Christ' in Consuming Passion (here), and a reflection on Jesus' assault on the Temple money system (Violent for peace?). Incidentally, in his Guardian review a few weeks ago, Giles Fraser described Gibson's latest film, 'Apocalypto', as a Mayan follow up to "a Christian snuff movie". Ouch.