{"id":39220,"date":"2024-10-31T11:44:06","date_gmt":"2024-10-31T18:44:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=39220"},"modified":"2024-10-31T12:50:13","modified_gmt":"2024-10-31T19:50:13","slug":"can-we-still-call-this-christianity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/can-we-still-call-this-christianity\/","title":{"rendered":"Can We Still Call This Christianity?"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s the season for chili here in Tennessee. It\u2019s getting cool; the leaves are changing, and chili recipe videos are now a part of my algorithms. Last week, I ran across a chili recipe that looked amazing and had great reviews. It inspired me! I got all the ingredients and made it for the family. I doubled the recipe, and, in doing so, the flavor was a bit strong, so I added some water, making it a little soupier than I like. It wasn\u2019t as hearty as I prefer, but it was still chili. What\u2019s my point, and what in the world<\/em> does this have to do with Russell Moore\u2019s book, Losing Our Religion<\/em>?<\/p>\n

At what point and how much water could I have added to my pot of chili so that it no longer looks or tastes like what it was intended to? If enough water had been incorporated into the pot, it would have become so diluted that it could no longer be called chili. Russell Moore and many other Christians are recognizing that the faith is becoming increasingly diluted and even contaminated by nationalism, American values, power dynamics, and cultural priorities, making it unrecognizable and even unappetizing for people in the faith and outside it. Can we still call this Christianity?<\/p>\n

Since Christianity\u2019s inception, cultural, social, and even pagan values and perspectives have always<\/em> influenced the religion. Frank Viola and George Barna wrote a book called Pagan Christianity<\/em> that explores the pagan roots of certain Christian church practices and behaviors still present today like church building architecture, order of worship services, and sermon structures.[1]<\/a> David Bebbington also busts some myths by saying, \u201cNothing could be further from the truth than the common image of Evangelicalism being ever the same. Yet, Evangelicals themselves have often fostered the image. They have claimed that their brand of Christianity, the form once delivered to the saints, has possessed an essentially changeless content so long as it has remained loyal to its source.\u201d[2]<\/a> \u00a0There is always going to be and always will be a degree of political and cultural influence in the faith. Moore acknowledges this as well, which I appreciated.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The issue at hand, at least from what I gather, is the amount or degree to which nationalism and American culture are diluting Christianity\u2019s central message and transformative power. Some, like Russell Moore, believe that Evangelicalism is reaching the point of not only concealing the heart of Jesus but allowing racism, tribalism, consumerism, and nationalism to \u201cmasquerade as Jesus,\u201d as he puts it.[3]<\/a> \u00a0Anything that sounds like empathy, compassion, love for neighbor, helping the foreigner, or aiding the poor is immediately labeled as \u201cliberal,\u201d \u201ccommunist,\u201d or \u201cweak,\u201d even if it comes from the lips of Jesus. Russell Moore lives about 45 minutes from me in Brentwood, TN, so I could relate to some of his stories of being categorized as “this or that” when you’re doing your best to follow Jesus in the American South.<\/p>\n

There has always been a tendency to force prevailing hopes, ideals, and expectations onto Jesus as early as the first century, with Christians, understandably, waiting for the sky to split open for Jesus to destroy their enemies.[4]<\/a> There were also times in Christian history when the faith was baptized in human nature\u2019s darkest inclinations (domination, brutality, division, greed, violence, etc.) to the degree<\/em> that it was anti-Christ.[5]<\/a> All of it was done in the name of the religion. As Edmund Burk says, \u201c<\/strong>Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it.\u201d Once again, many Christians, republican, independent, and Democrat, believe the faith is being contaminated with ideals that are adamantly opposed to Christ\u2019s message and heart.<\/p>\n

It feels like the root issue here for Russell Moore is that a specific version of Christianity has yet again emerged in history, particularly one that views Trump as the American messiah that does not match what he feels represents the conservative Evangelical Jesus he has in mind. I could just <\/em>say \u201cJesus,\u201d but I also want to acknowledge Russell, just like me, has a version of Jesus in mind that reflects his hermeneutic, experience, and denomination. There are places in this book where Russell and I align and other areas where we likely don’t. What’s new?<\/p>\n

This, of course, muddies the water again on whose version of Jesus is correct and who and what determines that. Let’s say the Bible, or at least the \u201ccorrect\u201d interpretation of it, determines our view of Jesus. Now, we get to wade through a variety of interpretations and theologies. I have loads of books on my shelves that examine or reflect different groups who have used the Bible to argue for universalism and some that fear only a few will make it, doctrines that support predestination, and doctrines that support free will, some that support women\u2019s rights and some that deny it, pastors who favored slavery and pastors who were abolitionists, denominations that forbid gay marriage and others that celebrate it, arguments for a literal creation story and arguments that hold to creation as myth, German theologians who were antisemitic and Germans theologians who were not, \u00a0the list continues\u2026<\/p>\n

\u00a0The irony is that they all use Scripture to support their case and claim to have the \u201ccorrect\u201d hermeneutic, context, and interpretation, like Evangelicals on both sides of the political and religious debate right now, that Moore is addressing. This touches on a much deeper issue that Tom Holland addresses in Dominion<\/em>,[6]<\/a> and Jennifer Knust, who is a New Testament scholar and one of the committee members who helped translate the NRSVUE, mentions in her book Unprotected Texts<\/em>.[7]<\/a> Ultimately, we choose<\/em> which interpretations, passages, and verses will be prioritized to align with our deepest values and capture what we believe to be the heart of Jesus in our day and age. Father Richard Rohr argues that experience, more than tradition and Scripture alone, has always guided the faith, no matter how much we claim the latter, and the more I learn, experience, and observe, the more I agree.[8]<\/a> I\u2019ll gladly choose, along with Moore, to leave parts of my Evangelical religion at the altar if it increasingly nurtures division, promotes selfishness, and dilutes the compassion humans have for one another.<\/p>\n

About time to take the kid\u2019s trick-or-treating and enjoy some chili!<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Viola, Frank, and George Barna. Pagan Christianity? Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices<\/em>. Carol Stream, Ill: BarnaBooks, 2008.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Bebbington, David, Evangelicalism in Modern Britain: A History from the 1730s to the 1980s<\/em>, London: Routledge, 2005, 271.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Moore, Russell. Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America<\/em>, New York: Sentinel, 2023, 244.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Ehrman, Bart D. A Brief Introduction to the New Testament<\/em>. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> MacMullen, Ramsay. Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries<\/em>. New Haven London: Yale university press, 1997.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Holland, Tom. Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind<\/em>. Paperback edition. London: ABACUS, 2020.<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> Knust, Jennifer Wright. Unprotected Texts: The Bible\u2019s Surprising Contradictions about Sex and Desire<\/em>. 1st HarperCollins pbk. ed. New York: HarperOne, 2012.<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Rohr, Richard. Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality<\/em>. London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 2016.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s the season for chili here in Tennessee. It\u2019s getting cool; the leaves are changing, and chili recipe videos are now a part of my algorithms. Last week, I ran across a chili recipe that looked amazing and had great reviews. It inspired me! I got all the ingredients and made it for the family. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":171,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2310],"tags":[3334,3325],"class_list":["post-39220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-doctor-of-leadership-3","tag-moore-losingourreligion","tag-russellmoore","cohort-dlgp02"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/171"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39220"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39223,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39220\/revisions\/39223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}