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If Taylor is right, it seems to suggest that the Christian response to such converts to unbelief is not to have an argument about the data or \u201cevidences\u201d but rather to offer an alternative story that offers a more robust, complex understanding of the Christian faith (p. 77).[1]<\/strong><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/em>Coming fresh from our study of the worldwide explosion of Pentecostalism, we now tackle what some would say is the “deeper” end of the epistemological spectrum \u2013 a \u201cmap of globalized Gotham, a philosophical ethnography of our present.\u201d (p. 3).<\/p>\n James K. A. Smith, who taught a senior seminar on Taylor\u2019s work, has written a book to help us with the complexity of Charles Taylor\u2019s 800-page historical narrative and philosophical analysis of our modern world.[2]<\/a> \u00a0Taylor\u2019s book is \u201cheady\u201d stuff, yet Dr. Smith informs us that Taylor also wants us to \u201cfeel<\/em> (italics mine) the suffocating immanence that characterizes late modern existence, even for \u2018believers.\u2019\u201d (p. 3) How did we arrive at a time when \u201cexclusive humanism\u201d \u2013 a view in which anything beyond the immanent is questionable – is the widest choice for so many?<\/p>\n Though Taylor uses the method of story to answer this question, he is not as concerned with what<\/em> beliefs are available; he is more concerned with how<\/em> the shift<\/em> in what makes some things believable and others unbelievable came about. (Taylor is speaking about our Western, rational<\/em> societies. Anyone who has been on a foreign mission field can tell you that there is still a prevalent belief in the transcendent in other places.)<\/p>\n Dr. Smith highlights for us the major points of Taylor\u2019s work. In each chapter, Smith poses questions for readers to consider. I have some questions myself that I hope will be answered by Charles Taylor in his book.<\/p>\n Question<\/em> \u2013 Will Taylor show that Humanism is also a religion?<\/p>\n Question<\/em> \u2013 Presumably as a Roman Catholic, Taylor is not a Dispensationalist. Will he show in his book why he is optimistic about progress and why he thinks the place where we are is inevitable?<\/p>\n Question<\/em> \u2013 What do we say about all those people who just live day to day in their immanent world and don\u2019t ask questions? And speaking of the trancendent, what room is there in the \u201cbuffered self\u201d for the Holy Spirit?<\/p>\n Question<\/em> \u2013 In a world where many people don\u2019t think they need salvation how will we address the topic for those who think otherwise? How is (Taylor\u2019s) Roman Catholicism different from Protestantism in addressing the issue of how we perceive Salvation? Jesus Christ is our transcendent God and immanent, incarnated Savior.<\/p>\n Question<\/em> \u2013 Will Taylor prove some way other than \u201cfeelings\u201d or \u201csense\u201d that the desire for \u201cthe spiritual\u201d (p. 89) still exists?<\/p>\n Question<\/em> \u2013 How are we to address this as Christians? Will we take advantage of events like 9\/11 to begin a conversation with people about death, evil, the hereafter, etc\u2026?<\/p>\n Question \u2013 If Taylor\u2019s position is the correct one, how can we as Christians help people move from their \u201cspin\u201d or \u201ctake\u201d on sole immanence to his? As in the question above, can we use subjects like \u201ctime\u201d and \u201cdeath\u201d to \u201ctip\u201d a person into the \u201cOpen\/take\u201d position of the possibility of an all powerful God Who loves us and intervened in time and space to redeem us?<\/p>\n My Interaction:<\/u><\/p>\n Those who live in an immanent framework feel pressures that Christianity has the answers for. In the first place, our God is both far and near; immanent and transcendent. He lives in the hearts of believers. But He is also mighty enough to help us in our times of trouble.<\/p>\n Taylor\u2019s framework is helpful, but how do you make people go along with your position? One limitation seems to me to be no final authority. Even Kant seemed to indicate that you can\u2019t make<\/em> people obey the rules. Would Taylor go so far as to say that God is the final authority? That the Bible, His Word, gives answers to these questions that we can depend on?<\/p>\n I believe that Taylor is correct when he says that people feel<\/em> they are living in a \u2018waste land\u2019 and might begin to wonder if \u201c\u2018renunciation\u2019 isn\u2019t the way to wholeness and that freedom might be found in the gift of constraint, and that the strange rituals of Christian worship (Eucharist?) are the answer to their most human aspirations, as if, for their whole lives, they\u2019ve been waiting for Saint Francis.\u201d (p. 139) I believe that Christ Himself is the answer \u2013 not the Eucharist.<\/p>\n My final question<\/em> \u2013 What then is the highest good?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n\n
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