Still Christian
Samuel Cardillo
I just finished reading David Gushee book, Still Christian. It was captivating enough to read it in one sitting, since Gushee’s experience in the world of Evangelical Christianity mirrors my own in many ways (although he writes from the point of view of an established scholar and from a church background very different from my own). Still, many similarities.
In this autobiographical sketch, Gushee talks very openly about how his academic pursuit prompted his navigation through questions that challenged his devotion to Evangelical Christianity as he struggled to not only make sense of his own religious experience, which for him, meant to walk that line between Evangelicalism and Liberalism, but also to establish himself in an academic career in light of that struggle.
For me, the core of his message is where he writes: “When Sunday School faith meets scholarship in religion, many crises of faith can ensue…” He is telling my story when he talks about “the transition from brittle certainties to a more supple and mature faith that usually (but not always) leaves one stronger for having wrestled with the tough questions” (At least I’m hopeful that that’s my story; it’s still in progress). As I’ve said before, I grew up believing without question in those certainties that he has in mind. I don’t mean to downplay the meaningfulness of those “certainties” to my fellow Christians, but in my case, a blind and unquestioning adherence to those certainties, while comfortable, constricted my ability to look outside of that fundamentalist box… and to wrestle with the tough questions; a process that I believe was inevitable in my case for a variety of reasons… but that’s another story.
My earlier religious fundamentalist outlook predetermined for me what was allowable or acceptable belief and what was outside of the limits of that acceptable system. For example (and this is one of Gushee’s main points with which I am in entire agreement) — Evangelical Fundamentalism simply fails to keep up with (or stay current) with the changing world that we live in. Times change; the world we live in changes. Anyone who has lived long enough and who has thought deeply about his or her faith (to the point of questioning the foundations of that faith) will certainly tell you that the life of faith is anything but static with regard to the challenges it brings to the surface.
One of Gushee’s most insightful examples of this is where he discusses a problem close to my own heart — Christian anti-Judaism. He writes:
The Holocaust… reflected a two-thousand-year buildup of contempt for Jews, rooted in Christianity itself. If this was the case, Christian theological response to the Holocaust must try to go to the roots of Christian theological anti-Judaism and remove the elements that have been so disastrous for Jews. Among those elements might lie such core Christian convictions as the messiahship and resurrection of Jesus” (p.45).
In other words, very simply, Christianity should never blame Judaism for failing to automatically accept the messiahship of Jesus; Why? Because the history of Christian anti-Semitism (which has its roots in both the gospel account and in Paul’s writings) is characterized by a deeply-felt hostility of Christianity toward Judaism — which is based primarily on the biblical (New Testament) texts. Much more can be said about this, and most of the Evangelical Christians I know would argue the opposite — that the New Testament does not carry an anti-Semitic message. My only response to that argument would be, go to an authoritative source — ask any practicing Jew (that is, any Jew who has not converted to Christianity).
That’s one example of Evangelical Christianity’s failure to account for a changing world over time. Another perhaps more relevant example would the topic that Gushee addresses at the end of his book — the LGBT question. Keep in mind one of the main points underlying Gushee’s argument — that biblical sensibilities change over time; what once was considered unacceptable moral behavior in one period is not necessarily unacceptable later in history. Or (just as importantly), vice-versa: what was once considered acceptable behavior becomes unacceptable (morally) — slavery is one clear example. Gushee makes his point about the LGBT question on p.132ff. With all of the heated arguments that come into play here, the basic issue here is simply the question of inclusion. As Gushee puts it,
“All kinds of nuances are possible, of course, and traditionalist attitudes toward LGBT people can range dramatically from hateful to largely inclusive but still discriminatory. Much of the last generation of church life in evangelicalism has consisted of steady movement toward less hate and more inclusion…
That idea of “inclusion” needs to be fleshed out… It’s not merely a “tolerance” of the person as a valued member of society; rather, it’s the idea of unqualified and unreserved acceptance and integration into one’s community.
The point I’m trying to make here is that change happens over time; and that includes changes in a group’s theological viewpoint. There’s no intrinsic merit to hanging on to antiquated religious beliefs that might have made sense in an earlier (pre-modern, biblical) period, but whose relevancy has long ago stopped making sense in a changing world. The problem with holding such a tight grasp on the idea of biblical inerrancy is that it fosters inflexibility where inflexibility no longer makes sense. Now don’t get me wrong… There are certainly moral ideals or virtues in Scripture that are constant and universal; for example, those the Apostle Paul names and specifically declares that they “remain”: faith, hope, and love, or what Plato considered the basic (cardinal) virtues, Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance. Those virtues are intuitively good; they are self-evidently good. The problem arises when one uses the Bible to impose “secondary” values or restrictions that might have been (or better, “seemed”) relevant in the distant past but are no longer sensible in a changed world.
It’s certainly true that the closer (in time) one is to any controversial issue (especially an issue like LGBT that occupies a central place in the Evangelical mindset), the hotter the range of attitude and hostility. We see this not only in the LGBT question, but also in other controversies — for example, the climate change debate, on which the Bible is silent, simply because it was not an issue in biblical times. Yet that debate highlights the point: The tendency of Evangelical Fundamentalism is either to dig in, to deny that the problem is real, to resist, often to the point of hostility; or to argue that the problem is simply not relevant today because it wasn’t an issue in biblical times.
Much of what Gushee’s experience mirrors my own. I can entirely relate to him when he says
“I was not going to run away from the hard questions… but neither was I going to throw up my hands in despair. I would lean into the questions while attempting to hold onto the beliefs that were most important…” (Granted — holding on to those beliefs isn’t easy).
Anyway, my story is much the same. Some of the questions became crystal clear once I determined to stop hiding behind my literalist, fundamentalist, unquestioned certainties about the faith — certainties that were handed down to me and had become comfortable, even if nonsensical. Very simply, it is becoming increasingly impossible for me to continue walking that fine line between the Fundamentalist Evangelicalism of my youth and the open-minded liberalism that offer more reasonable and more substantial explanations that take into account real life as it unfolds through time.
As I’ve said many times, it’s not easy walking away from one’s religious roots. The sense of security that goes along with a certainty of faith are comfortable, and therefore hard to walk away from. But when those certainties begin to crumble, when those assurances that sustained one’s faith no longer bring the assurances that they once brought, it becomes a matter of dishonesty to hold on to them so tightly.
