A Generous Orthodoxy
For Sunday January 2, 2005
Lectionary Readings (Revised Common Lectionary, Year A)
Jeremiah 31:7–14 or Sirach 24:1–2
Psalm 147:12–20 or Wisdom 10:15–21
Ephesians 1:3–14
John 1:1–18
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A Generous Orthodoxy by Brian McLaren |
"Grace and truth," reads the Gospel of John for this week, "came through Jesus Christ" (John 1:17). Grace and truth capture the spirit of a noteworthy book that I finished this week entitled A Generous Orthodoxy (2004) by pastor Brian McLaren. McLaren founded Cedar Ridge Community Church in the Baltimore-Washington corridor, has authored a half-dozen books, and is the de facto leader of the so-called Emergent Church movement.1 In his own disarming style he describes himself as a theological amateur who has never taken a for-credit seminary course, even though last year Carey Theological Seminary in Vancouver granted him an honorary doctorate.
You have to love the subtitle of A Generous Orthodoxy, even if you quibble with McLaren's confessional-like manifesto; and he has detractors aplenty: "Why I am a missional + evangelical + post/protestant + liberal/conservative + mystical/poetic + biblical + charismatic/contemplative + fundamentalist/calvinist + anabaptist/anglican + methodist + catholic + green + incarnational + depressed-yet-hopeful + emergent + unfinished CHRISTIAN." If this sounds glib, cavalier, or contrived, at times he reads that way, gliding over complex matters in an evasive or superficial manner. Scholars in the professional guild will have their bones to pick.
But McLaren intends to provoke, and so he deliberately adopts a playful, mischievous persona. There is a method to his madness. He is very serious about pushing Christians beyond their ghetto mentality, political fault lines, and petty arguments about peripheral issues, their sometimes well-deserved reputation for arrogance, exclusivity, and insensitivity, to the urgent business of, well, a robust commitment to the ancient orthodox faith that is boldly generous. McLaren's mantra and book title come from the Yale theologian Hans Frei (1922–1988), who coined the term as he worked to move the church beyond the liberal-conservative impasse. "Generosity without orthodoxy is nothing," wrote Frei, "but orthodoxy without generosity is worse than nothing."
As I reflect back on my experiences of the year past—travel to rural Kenya and Uganda, conversations at soccer and football games, books and Scripture, performances of Mozart's three comic operas, neighborhood parties, marathons, hospital visits, mistakes made, and a whole lot of church-attending, McLaren's book provoked me to ask: what do I hope for in the coming year? What might a freely generous, fully gracious, and unapologetically passionate commitment to Jesus look like in my life in 2005?
Love the Least: Generous orthodoxy will "speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute" (Proverbs 31:8), for God Himself is biased on behalf of the vulnerable, the peripheral, the weak, the forgotten and the disenfranchised. These people comprise a disproportionate number of our fellow human beings around the globe. You can also find them right around the block. A few weeks ago the NY Times (December 8, 2004) reported that rich nations have cut their aid budgets in half since 1960, and that 1.4 billion workers earn less than $2 a day, the highest number ever recorded. That bothers me. Ditto for 65 million people loved by God who are infected with HIV. It also bothered me to hear how a colleague described his struggle with cancer. Ken lives in a nearby community, one of the richest zip codes in the country, but I felt his pain, loneliness and sense of abandonment when he described how his neighbors have responded: "Not a single card. Not one cup of soup. They see me walking in the neighborhood every day, going in and out of my house, my goofy hat covering my hair loss. I have lived in this house for eleven years, but not one, single inquiry." Generous orthodoxy recognizes that when God in Christ assumed a human identity, that meant that there is no such thing as a disembodied "spirituality." Rather, we see ourselves as bound to every person, especially to the weak and the least, and to every person's care, so we will work to "rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter" (Proverbs 24:11).
Marvel at the Mystery: Generous orthodoxy will celebrate the mystery that "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself" (2 Corinthians 5:19), rather than reduce, dissect, distort, solve or conquer that mystery. I pray that theological modesty will temper confidence, that listening will eclipse speaking, and that hubris will give way to humility. I want to remember that my sinful, limited, socially-constructed, genetically-wired, subjective self will only understand the mystery of the Gospel dimly and in part (1 Corinthians 13:12). Even further, I resonate with the sage reminder of Peter of Damaskos (12th century), that "St. John Chrysostom says that we do not know wholly even what is given in part, but know only a part of a part." So, in 2005 may adoration of the mystery imbue any analysis of the message.
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Exclusion and Embrace by Miroslav Volf |
Embrace Everyone: I cringe to read Marcus Borg describe the stereotypical view of Christianity held by his unchurched university students. They "consistently use five adjectives to describe Christians—literalistic, anti-intellectual, self-righteous, judgmental, and bigoted." So, in 2005 I pray to repent of whatever ways I have turned the name of Jesus into a symbol of elitism and exclusion that creates an "in group" that "out-groups" others unlike me. Instead of an "I'm-in-you-are-out" clique, a narcissistic narrowness, I believe that Jesus wants to create a "come-on-in group" (McLaren, pp. 70, 247) whose main characteristic is bridges not walls. Reading McLaren's Generous Orthodoxy reminded me of the German Pastor Martin Niemoller (1892–1984), who protested Hitler's anti-semite measures in person to the fuehrer, was eventually arrested, then imprisoned at Sachsenhausen and Dachau (1937–1945). He once confessed, "It took me a long time to learn that God is not the enemy of my enemies. He is not even the enemy of His enemies." When I read John's Gospel for this week that when He came into the world, Jesus "gave light to every person," and that "from the fullness of His grace we have all received one blessing after another" (1:9, 16), I imagine that God intends something like a "no human being left behind" kingdom.
Befriend Brokenness: Finally, forever, and gladly, I forfeit a spirituality of perfection that, however well-intentioned, perpetuates an oppressive burden and unattainable goal. And as father Bruno of the Camaldoli Hermitage reminded me, such perfectionism can masquerade as the quest for "wholeness." Rather, I take a sort of comfort from my faults that allows me to take my place among humanity rather than set myself apart on a pedestal. I believe that God uses my faults and failures as easily and as well as He uses my successes, that He can draw a straight line with a crooked stick (Luther). Generous orthodoxy, suggests McLaren, "sees in our worst failures the possibility of our deepest repentance and God's opening for our most profound healing" (p. 230). With Don McCullough I believe there are even "consolations in imperfections," and with Joan Chittister subscribe to the "sanctifying nature of mistakes and miscalculations." In his book Finding Faith, McLaren suggests four stages of faith development, not as a linear movement from one to the other, but as an "ascending and widening spiral"— simplicity, complexity, perplexity, and finally humility. Having experienced human weakness and thus humility, wrote St. Maximos the Confessor (seventh century), the Christian "never belittles anyone," for "he knows that God is like a good and loving physician who heals with individual treatment each of those who are trying to make progress."
To readers from over 80 countries, for 2005 I wish you a truly generous orthodoxy on your journey with Jesus.
[1] On the Emergent Church see www.emergentvillage.com, and the cover stories in Christianity Today (November 2004) and The Christian Century (November 30, 2004)]
