GOSPEL AND CULTURE IN THE

"80's

Muskingum College Convocation

Wednesday,

March 12

10:20 a.m.
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I am very pleased to bhtitiechc@ienititit od bebe te=Bemacon

including mine®

be valuable and
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the life of this campus for several days.

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Elton Trueblood, John Gerstner, John Bodo.

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and forces.
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of course,

\'some of them go back to infancy: \in fact, those

are the ones that get all the attention.
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.| I am more
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Eicon pleased to be in the company of recent resident lecturers,
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Those are names

and minds that command the attention of a wide reading public -
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I sincerely hope that our time together will
am grateful for the privilege of sharing in
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I understand that
to be part of the purpose of the lectureship and I want to
be available to you between the formal presentations in any
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way that will be helpful to you.
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I have chosen for a general topic (cosped for a New feat +

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a composite of many influences
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\2 am concluding,

\ however, that there is another very formative time in life,

a time very pregnant in terms of it potential and that is
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the time represented by graduation » idan college, graduate
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ich seem f r
whic eemed as safely ambiguous as I could make it ynsert 4F\
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For starters, What is the wew age? Who said one just ‘ —
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started anyway? |For you, I would submit the 80's are the
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new age.| Th
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or professional _ school and/or first job, [ana the process of
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tentatively finding a comfortable spot in American culture.
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I know now that events happening in the broader culture at
that point in my experience were very influential in terms im a
of who I bomain: | Oi names, for me, were Civil Rights,
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Martin Luther King, John F. Kennedy, Vietnam, MyLai, Set.
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Calley, Robert F. Kennedy. \Gog Save you from a litany
like that one - but for you, years with powerful formative
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potential are ahead.\ Years that bear thinking about, that
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=> The decade happens just to have changed and that event
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seems inexorably to invite the latent seer in all of us.to
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who are not, have had something to say about the 0's.\ In
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fact, there seems to be a consensus among those who think
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come out of hiding. \ anvone who is anyone and a good many
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bones)
seriously about the human condition that we are launching
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into a very important period for American, and indeed,
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western civilization.\ It is, apparently a time not unlike

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the years immediately prior to the Civil War when thought-
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ful men stood on tip toe, as it were, watching for what would

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happen next. \ Carl Sandburg wrote about those years that
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something was dying, and something was being born and nothing

would ever be the same. my Stas, b& Re tes Casa.
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In the highly sophisticated opinion of Futurist Magazine,
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for instance, ("tne 1980's may turn out to be a decade when
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many important trends change direction. \ The world seems to
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be entering a phase in which some key trends have lost their
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force and the structure of many institutional arrangements
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has been seriously underminéé." (The Ruturist, February 1980)

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The trends and institutions are economi growth | dominant »
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American military and economic power,| an of course, the
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revolution now occurring in the world of Islam which happens,
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by the way, also to be the world of/petroleum, a
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Gree against a culture which is, by anybody's guess,

about to do some substantial changing, is a Gospel which yor
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among other things, claims that while all else around it may ow

be evolving, it remains the sane. \ r+ is about the eternal
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God, his will for his creation, his self disclosure in a
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Jewish Carpenter some of us know as his Son,}/his continuing
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love and care in and through the forces of human history{ oom
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that doesn't change. {"...though the mountains shake in the
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heart of the sea: | though its waters roar and foam, though
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the mountains tremble with its turmult, God is in the midst

of her, she shall not be moved." | (Psalm 46)

wm Vet, in every age, there are particular challenges,

ideologies, political movements, philosophies sublime and
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ridiculous, which confront the Gospel of Jesus Christ with ‘
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strength and conviction. \ st. Paul called them #.sFrerr==
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Peeererpecidinbes''’, and when the Gospel retreats from them,
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wrapping itself in protective skirts of traditionalism?
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answering questions posed by laser technology with theological

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codes formulated at a council of Bishops in the fourth century -
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something will be discarded on the scrap heap of obsolete
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human dreams and ideas and it won't be the laser technology.

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The Gospel must respond to, contend with and have dialogue

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openly, intelligently and courageously with the Principalities

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and Powers of this world: \ not simply because its existence

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is at stake - which it always is - but more importantly
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because God cares a lot about this world and Jesus Christ
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came to redeem it and the job of Christian people cqyamupe ig o>
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My reading, my experience, my faith - lead me to identify

MM Principalities - ‘mee challenges which I think will lows
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continue to emerge in our culture in the 1980's and to which

people of Jesus Christ are called to respond.\ They are:
1. Technology gute |
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2. Pluralism (Giesingpieaas ) .
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I will be talking about « Sao _ = eee a

VOU ana Ome e ¢ eC aS gaan”

of Pow — not because it stands alone but because Ss

no way I'll Haim time to get it in the = perimeters which
were part of my marcl »ordeg@ Finally, my hope is that
having raised some _gg@®Tions af tied a few strings - we
might beging@fe process of wrapping some@iming up with a little

dyggeSuUrse on happiness - tomorrow afternoon,

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Pte, aie mental question: \ the matter of God himself. | It is realted

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yr, .e* to technology. \ There is a sense in which high technology

cise has called the existence of God into question for many people .@
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For others, the apparent failure of technology to resolve
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GOD AND TECHNO GY - 0

@chnology He the obLéfM of God) - or
another wr °F 2

- March 12, ad” ec Ayal

\ Modern human beings, says Henri Nouwen up at Yale, are
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realizing that their creative power holds the potential for

self-destruction, that the jury is literally still out on
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whether our technology will save us before it kills us.
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A folk legend from ancient India tells it with uncanny
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"Four royal sons were questioning what specialty they ae
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should master. | They said to one another,/'Let us search ye aA

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the earth and learn a special science." 80 they decided, perry
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and after they had agreed on a place where they would meet yim

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again, the four brothers started off, each in a different ens

direction. | rime went by, and the brothers met again at the

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appointed meeting place, and they asked one another what

they had learned. |'I have mastered a science,' said the ~

first, ‘which makes it possible for me, if I have nothing

but a piece off bone_of some creature, to create straightaway

the flesh that goes with it.' as said the second, 'know

———————

how to grow that creature's skin and/hair if there is flesh
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on its bones.' \The third said, 'I am able to create its

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limbs if I have the flesh, the skin, and the hair,' )'And

I,' concluded the fourth, 'know_how to give life to that

creature if its form is complete with limbs.'

"Thereupon the four brothers went into the jungle to
find a piece of bone so that they could demonstrate their

specialties. As fate would have it, the bone they found

* db.

was a lion's, but they did not know that and picked up the
bone. One added flesh to the bone, the second grew hide and
hair, the third completed it with matching limbs, and the
fourth gave the lion life. Shaking its heavy mane, the
ferocious beast arose with its menacing mouth, sharp teeth,

and merciless claws and jumped on his creators. He killed |

them all and vanished contentedly into the jungle." \

(from: Tales of Ancient India, translated from the Sanskrit
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by J. A. B. van Buitenen (New York: Bantam Books, 1961),

pp. 50-51.) (The Wounded Healer, Henri J. M. Nouwen, p. 5-6)

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Sometime in the very near future the earth's supply of

oil will be gone: [ not just dangerously low —- but gone.\ The
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reason it will be gone is that our technology requires it:
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in fact, is addicted to ix. | pattorre Memorial Insittute
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sends its speakers all over Ohio with one message - to which

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we seem totally immune ree oil is running out! | We don't

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have much left! (= people who have a lot don't want to

sell it all to us, but even if they did, they'll run out

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shortly after we do!" \ I'm twenty years older than you and
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therefore, I may miss it.| But the odds are very good that
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you'll be around for the day of reckoning - if we don't blow
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ourselves up trying to get a quick fix of juice by simply
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stealing it (curiously, the way addicts inevitably resolve
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their addiction for better or worse. )

And so we keep voting down mass transit levies, and

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reducing the service and serviceability of the 19th century
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relic we call a railroad system, and the legislative passes
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a bond issue to fix up highways which makes as much sense at

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this point in time as establishing a graduate school for rain
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dancers to increase the productivity of Ohio corn fields.

Our technology may not save us. \ rt may, in fact, kill
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us first.| Gabriel Fackre, professor of theology at Andover
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Newton writese | "The list grows longer: { sx00 the silent

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violence accruing through the chemical wastes in our dumps
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and landfills, \additives in our tok, \asbestos ceilings in

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our schools, oes iation from our microwave ovens, feolor TV

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sets and luminous watch dials} to the ‘nore dramatic fire-fall

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of a structurally unsafe DC- -10 and the unthinkable possibility

of nuclear holoc vA by engineering miscalculation or military
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calculation... The major trajectory for the 1980's, for

this thinker, is the fall of Skylab. \ Remember that? | We
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weren't sure wheftit was coming down and were powerless to
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alter its course: held hostage for several days by our own

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technology. \ Fackre writes: [ "Here was one more technological

ill ere

misadventure to be added to the Three Mile Island peril that

preceeded it and the biggest oil spill in history that

followed it."| (Agenda for the '80's, The Christian Ministry,

January 1980)

There are a growing number of thinkers who conclude that

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the technological crisis we have made for ourselves has pre-
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cipitated a theological crisis.\ A crisis very fundamental

in nature.\ It has to do with the oldest riddle around.

there a “8 Goa? \ 1s there a God related to this mess we are
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making of the worta? Does his existence make any difference

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at all? lrnae, I believe, is the first, and fundamental

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crisis of the 1980's. \ me future will require a Faith in
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God that is intellectually tough, conversant with the science

and technology of a new age = but not captive to it:\2

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theology op mystery and a dimension. ing which is

above and beyond physical science.
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— So think with me, if you will, about the Question:
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the question of cod.\ And think with me under three rubrics:
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God and Common sense, \soa and mystery, \ana God and Moral
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Imperative.
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Years ago John Ruskin wrote,/"The duty of the clergyman
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is to remind people, in an eloquent manner of the existence
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of coa.") (John Baillie, Our Knowledge of God,-p. 240)

but what someone called recently the("quiet atheism of the
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heart's not uncommon in some people all the time and, I
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believe, in all people some of the time \ the more you
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think about God, the more opaque he pecomes.. | PO ie
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astONTeHed At tHe $bOLUenesE-wWEtirwhTenh men propose to speak
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And so let us begin this presumptuous exercise. | A good
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starting point is the understanding that there can be no
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"ought" in the matter of belief. John Oman taught that.
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YTruth,* he said, Fis not something we agree to reluctantly
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but something that seizes us and compels our attention."{| 1
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“will never forget the situation in which I began to learn
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that difficult reson. \ as a Divinity School Senior I had to be
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examined for ordination by my prespytery.\ me meeting was in

Snow Shoe, Pennsylvania, a very small church in the mountains.

I had come by train and car - to Snow Shoe from Chicago and
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my theological statement to the Presbytery reflected all the

erudition which I could squeeze into several pages ‘\ It was
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quite a statenent..\ presbyteries can be gracious and forgiving

and so I passed, but afterward one of the retired members of

Presbytery put a fatherly arm around my shoulder, complimented
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me on my paper and said,/ "Young man - I've been a minister for
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forty-five years and you know what I believe in now, more than
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any thing e1se?"| I expected him to say something Like ("The

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Second Coming, or Heaven") but what he said was,]'More than

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anything, I believe in istegrity.”| That's what I remember
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about my ordination examination.\ I wasn't sure what he

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meant: \ I'm still not. | But I'm still thinking about it .| I
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think he was telling me that I was trying to believe too much.
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I think he meant,/that God doesn't make his love, or grace,
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or salvation, contingent upon our ability to believe things
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about him. | think he meant that God loves even the people
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who don't believe he exists. \I think the retired gentleman

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wanted the new man to know that “ought'" and "believe" never
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go together.

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We have trouble learning that, and along the way we shut
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out or turn out many of our brothers and sisters. \\We have a
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way of becoming defensive and then arrogant in the face of
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questions, intellectual challenges to our faith. | In the

recent issue of Outlook, William Phipps wrote,}'"Most Christians
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have been afflicted with pietists who conveniently squelch

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every difficult inquiry by sanctimoniously spouting, (‘Who are

we to question the word of God?'')/*I was saddened, frankly,

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by a paragraph from Chrales Darwin's autobiography I discovered

recently - DArwin, whose Theory of Evolution is still attacked

by some Christians. | Darwin/wrote that he was ("very unwilling

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to give up his belief in Christianity - but disbelief crept

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over me at a very slow rate, and was at last asa al

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can hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be
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true;|for if so.. the men who do not believe - and this

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includes my father, brother and almost all my best friends -

will be everlastingly punished, | This is a damnable doctrine."

(see Leslie Weatherhead, The Christian Agnostic, p. 45)

How sad that the conflict between theology and c on sense
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couldn't have been creatively engaged in the church.
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Faith in God does not have to be corensiye.| It certainly
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does not have to hide from the probing inquiries of human

rogic.\ God made the human mind too.\ Logic is his. creation:
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common sense is one of his better inventions.
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There is, I continue to believe, a case to be made for
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the reasonability of Christian taith;| not the ultimate
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case, to be sure, but a strong and stimulating one nevertheless.
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I believe that order and design in the universe leads
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logically to the conclusion that there is an orderer, a
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designer. a“ is an old argument.\ If you stumbled upon a

watch and examined all its springs and cogs and observed how
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it worked, you would not, on the basis of common sense, con-
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clude that the watch happened as a result of an incredible
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series of physical accidents. \ You would conclude, rather,

that there was a watchmaker somewhere \ Biologist Edwin
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Conklin writes, /"The probability of life originating from
accident is comparable to the probability of the unabridged
dictionary resulting from an explosion in the print shop." )

(Weatherhead, ibid. p. 87).] A bright atheist would have a

field day poking holes in it, I suppose, but I continue to
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conclude that it makes as much common_sense to believe in

creation by a creator than it does to believe in creation

by accid tf

I Know only a very little about astronomy but simply

looking at the stars makes a thgist.of me, even if I didn't

want to be.| I love “the story of the crusty old Scots High-
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lander who after a grim Sermon on election and predestigation

and eternal damnation, suggested that his preacher should
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spend some time studying the stars. “why? the minister

asked, {"Because you've an awful wee\God. \ That's why,'\ the

wise Scotsman pprsrel:| ite Dr. Wilkinson, Princeton -
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100 7 lion galaxies)

I know that it doesn't prove a thing, but I find very

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provocative the idea that when you look at the stars, the
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very best you can do is see light which left its source in
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November of 1975, because that's how long it takes the light

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leaving the nearest star, Alpha_Centauri, to get here, and

that when you find teat reliable Pole Star what you are

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looking at is light which has been traveling at the speed
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of 186,000 miles per second since the year 1514. (vihen I

look at the heavens, the moon and stars which thou has

established...What is man that thou art mindful of him?”

It doesn't prove a thing, but I ask that question every time
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I look.

Religion must not ever be irrational.\ When an idea or
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proposition strikes us as illogical, unreasonable we have the
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responsibility, I believe, at least to examine it very care-

Fa
fully before accepting it | There are of

Shubert Ogden, who is out on the cutting edge
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Get to. conclude that there is no
truth outside the scope of the scientific method. | 4 pigtosist,

iy what happens. when a

young Man and young woman are together without dealing at all

with rove. Mathematicians can and have charted the precise

progressions in Bach's composition te vique without touching

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the reality of the St. Matthew Passion | There is, very

simply, truth that is larger than logic.

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But faith in God, I believe, is not blind, (re is not
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a matter of shutting capabilities,

swallowing hard and accepting what your common sense tells
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you can't be so.\

as you can: | listening to your own intellectual capacities,
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examing a11 the evidence and then deciding -— then making the
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commitment which takes you beyond the realm of reason and
execxemntE arELAtCEESts

10

logic, to the place of deeper truth. | You do that, after all,

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when you contemplate the miracle of another person's love for
aay

you. oy can't prove it.\ All you can do is 3 weigh the evidence
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and then trust. 1 easton nna

It rests finally, therefore, not on logic but on testi-
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mony and all hsede. can do, ultimately, is share his

own. \x measure mine by whatever common sense I have been
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given, and sometimes correct it or bring it in line, and some-
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times expand it.

I believe the notion of God as intelligence, designer, as
ove
creator, and Pee of his creation makes sense.\ Creation
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continues to astound me: \ trom the remarkable capabilities of
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a single cell to the majesty of a mountainA I am astounded

by human birth each time I am close to’it.\ Tertullian, second
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century church father, said it - and I believe it because it
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makes sense to me: Gare give you a rose and you will not
doubt God any more." ] I conclude, quite simply, that it makes

more sense to believe in a creator than in coincidence.
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I believe because Christianity, frankly, seems to me
to make sense, in profound ways, often beyond the perimeters
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of my initial responses \ I know the reality of power in the
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world. \ I also know that power as force does not work..| It
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is not, therefore, rational.\ What works is love, humility,
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self emptyi bi can argue about the details, the implications
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and ramifications, but the Roman_Empire is gone, so is the

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and year Reich; [ime new Soviet Empire, even our own

T Believe Wau Compl ctfealr of faviad pop’ meng
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Conn Famee. human reas b ubtbeabs

hohe nbd | Aad yet, thay Ls wr Cy tain
it esther .

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One of the significant curiosities of our time is that whale
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we appear to be entirely rational, logical, s 1 opie’
pp ¥ yn g wepemea] peop

Wi

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Gauehe™@eirereintd we dearly love movies like The Exorcist.

The occult is big business, | *ecmomt-biaaseesfowms-of=eTtei!-
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c \miaaions_of us con of us consult
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astrology columns, cupebbtede@liten@henmiaaaekedike, \|We have made
commun. 4 a

Jeanne Dixon into a celebrity, 2mdemteowserSeeEiewe TT) wane;
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|] seth iGeGleitnGeedinGenitaaancnerrS Pee TC In religion, we are fascin

ated by Transcendental Meditation, Yoga and other mystical
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Eastern theologies and one of the more dynamic and perplexing
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phenomena in the Christian Church is the Charismatic movement,

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so named because its adherents become possessed by the Holy
[=——4 EOI oo
Spirit and exhibit mysterious behavior, like speaking in tongues.
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There is something in us, it seems, that needs a dose of
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the supernatural: e will express that need in one way or
———————————————————

—_—-

14

another, if not in our religion, then elggwhere . \me pheno-

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menon has certainly been around a long time. | Bizical scholars

are utterly fascinated with references to the supernatural,

the nysterious | the divine manifesting itself in human exper-

lence: Moses and the burning bush, for instance, or on Mt.

Sinai," covered with clouds, with lightning and thunder, a

vivid experience of the reality of Godt |snepneras in the

field outside Bethlehem hearing the angeis'\ the disciples of

Jesus experiencing his trans figuration, ‘\tne conver

saul

on the panagcus road. | 411 of these experiences have been

accompanied by mystery and fear on the part of the people

who have witnessed them.

One time Jesus! disciples were fishing at night and had

ut into deeper water

caught nothing \ When he suggested the

they encountered a shoal of fish and caught so many they

almost c i d the boat. \ that phenomenon ffected Peter

that he fell down on his knees and said, (“Depart from me, for

I am a sinful man, 0 Lord." | Peter sensed somethi
. —

going on
here beyond the normal human phenomenon . As he did through—

out, Peter seems to have been sensitive to the holy, the divine

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in Jesus. | ana, frankly, it scared him to death. {He didn't

want to have any thing to do with it. It was literaliy, "holy

EENEE te finitive study

on the subject by a very scholarly German , Rudolph Otto, under
agate tenes

the title, The idea of the Holy.\

terror."

or Numinous", fthe "Mysterium Tremendum" and observed: { "The

ve

15

feeling of it may at times come sweeping like a gentle tide,

pervading the mind with a tranquil mood of deepest worship.
— et Sqnsatar es

It may burst in sudden eruption from the depths of the soul...
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It may become the hushed trembling and speechless humility
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of the creature in the presence of - whom or wnat? \ Tn the

presence of that which is a mystery inexpressible and above
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all creatures."\(Ibid., p. 12-13).

The testimony of history is that human beings sense,
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somewhere deep™knside themselves, that whi¢ “is greater:

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that which ‘cannot be® “nind lone.\ In the

explained by the

\ face of the Holy, the "My Seat im Tremendum", or God, if you
\ will, the response meet naw reverence, fear,
\ dread, “holy uthentic and per-
haps ey very healthy. \m fact something important about
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/ ou ts lost when the experience is no longer available.
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\ The trouble is that the culture in which we live, qe Choeav
COSA.

wel, cow fer il - Oerepr MW ATPase & reWwgievs Cul ts .
i We are, first of
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all, altogether too rational. \ Nurtured on the scientific
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method, we have concluded that if you can't weigh and measure
beeen S53 £—~== m=

it, it can't be true.\ Scientists, by the way, don't believe

qe Se Sees

that. \ tev deal with things like quarks, quasars, and black

holes. \mey know, that is to say, about the unknown.| It
eee “Slee =~
is the lay person who is persuaded to buy toothpaste because
‘eee SS =
an actor in a white coat pulls a three ringed binder from

a a
the shelf and intones the sacred litany,
Se

aaa
show..." )

‘Laboratory tests

16 s
British theologian J. S. Whale War "The greatest

r : ‘ ,
danger we run is that we put a pipe in our mouth and our

feet on the mantle and sit down in’an armchair to discuss
beer eae |
theories of atonement iy of bowing down before the
wounds of carist;\enat we Scurry round the burning bush
eee OT
taking photographs from suitable angles instead of taking the
eS

shoes from our feet because the place whereon we stand is
= eS

f= eae. 2)
Holy Ground." | (Christian Doctrine).
fr
No one brought more intellectual muscle ‘to bear on
Te
religion tha Pascal.\ No one struggled harder. \ And he con-
Sq SS Ee
cluded® ]"If one subjects everything to reason our religion
pean aS

will lose its mystery “and its supernatural character. \1

one offends the gota ai) reason, our religion will be
ea

absurd and ee Ko are two equally dangerous
SPSS ae

extremes, to S BMH $5 reason out d to othing else in."

a
I will argue for

ogy based on the very

best thinking we can do.\ I believe that truth commends itself
aS
SSS =z.
and that we should examine every idea with great care.\ I want

(Rudolf Otto, ob. cit., Prefact\ to)

common sense in religion: | for theo

also to suggest that we are required to balance intellect
QE 1 eee!

with emotion, what we know agd can understand with the

Bama |
reality of what we don't know and can't understand I want
SST aR, eee

to argue that the wisest thing we can do is be open to awe,
a. ee

mystery, perhaps even a little fear (we do not, in fact,
eS ereae aS sa
know it all.\ Lewis Thomas, President of the Memorial Sloane
— See
Kettering Cancer Center in New York has published an absolutely
a ee

delightful collection of essays, "The Lives of a Cell", most
SS a ee ee

f ich mak int; {1 f th h sts that
of which make that point \n one of them he_ suggests tha

L7

we agree to suspend all further research into how best to

destroy life until (we have acquired a complete set of infor-

natn

mation concerning at least one living thing." | Then at least

we will know what we are killing. | te proposes a simple one,
har‘steniainiaieieidiaetiamiaad

the protozoan, Myxotricha paffadoxa which lives wn the diges—
wee a
tive tract of Australian termites. 1 Dr. Thomas knows that we
_—

really don't know much at all! (p. 26)

In another essay Thomas pokes gentle fun at the bresump-

and

L warning that we

so wrong, he suggests, than the ecological

Cece,

are endangering life in the ecosystem. \Life is durable, he

suggests, [14te will go on. | We are the delicate part, the

7
weak link. Human life is transient, vulnerable. Fear for

the snail darter, that is to say, but reserve your hely

terror for the fact that we are in the process of committing
—_ = as

determined Suicide ecologically.

At the same time the mystery - the sense of the holy
mameerenmenencetas

people have always experienced in their religion is slowly
SE

being replaced by cozy cliches. \one eritic put it this way,

"When each sermon becomes a children's sermon, the taste for

spiritual junk food expands until faith is a lollipop and
a amie

theology is a twinkie."| Instead of struggling with the real

issues such as peace, surviygl, economic equality, modern

Christians are out Cencountering where it's at in group

gropes,| or getting drenched in Pentecostal downpours of the
ee

spirit .|\ Whereas Peter cried out, (Depart from me, 0 Lord’,

a —

today we cry out, [10 God, you make me feel so good.'

(Theology Today, 1/80, p. 535, Religion by Cliche, Leonard Sweet)

18

I, for one, don't want to be so friendly and warm that
aaa =

I forget that I go to church to get in touch with none other
SS he

than the Lord of Creation. \\ American piety is not at all
Lie cee

comfortable with the idea of a God mysterious enough to in-
Se, Ca ae a [SS

spire ave\ We talk piously about him walking in the garden

with us, and talking with us, and telling us we are his own,
ell Ca ae

whereas if the Bible is to be trusted he is also the high and
aE Sa wea

holy one who is the sovereign Lord of all nations.\ Gertainly
eerie a - .

he walks with us but he is also striding through the
Wa SE =

justice. \ In the place of Jahweh, whose name the Israeli

— =e bie i] qa
were afraid to pronounce ,\ American piety“has substituted e
See
®Man upstairs."

i aa taal
A
People have met the mysterious, and have felt awe or
fear - in encounter with the limits of life: (bots birth
Ss, SETS i eRe

and death,\and again our culture tilts in an opposite
Besa Se ee

direction .\ In every age before us, both birth and death

happened naturally, at home, in full view_and with much

personal involvement on the part of other members of the
SSS ==

tamily. \Today both happen, in isolation, antiseptically,
rarely at home, too frequently without any contact from other

members of the family. \It is quite possible to live all of

SS

life and never encounter pergonally, birth or death - except
a Ey, omme SSE

one's own. | We are insulated against the holiness - the mystery

TD hanna ee cceeio
inherent in both events. | Langdon Gilkey, University of

—a SE SS
Chicago theologian writes: [any person who has witnessed the
Baa,

birth of a child has experienced the wonder, tergor and
RRR ————
ultimacy of that event...it is almost unavailable to modern

———————

lg

men." (Naming the Whirlwind, p. 318) [ssopity, that is

changing.4 Yet, not long ago, hospitals rele ated expectant

Our life, too often deprives us of it, and we need it.
=o a mel

an absolute moral imperative. \1 wish to suggest that in our

concern to moderate the theological extremism which believes

up with a God who doesn't seem to care at all about how we

behave.| People before us were afraid of what would happen
to them if they misbehaved, and that was not always healthy.

But the reverse, the total moral meutrality of current

ae aoaes =
theology may be worse. | re ss not @ very popular topic, but

may i venture to suggest that we are accountable to 2 just

and sovereign God, and that there is every reason to fear
mmehivpmniteaRHIENID >

the consequences of violating his wint\ My, that sounds

archaic, doesn't it?
————————

Thomas Jefferson once remarked that he shuddered for

his nation when he remembered that God was

just: | a prophetic

comment, I would suggest.
a

—

We paid dearly and are still

paying dearly, I believe, for the historic evil of slavery.

a0

We have paid dearly and are today paying dearly for supporting
oo OE acim

tyranny and oppression and torture in other nations.\ [Iran is

a

teaching us a lesson we do not want to learn and that is that
atmo Caters

we, along with every other nation, are ultimately accountable

for our behavior. \3 believe that is reason for fear}

believe when Peter encountered Jesus he was afraid because of
emracsecomm

and a matter of life and death today.
—

=

I believe we are accountable for violating, system tically

and defiantly, the ecosystem - and that the law suits several

in our bedroom drawers than anyone else in the world — and

more violence, and more murder and we simply refuse to learn

that it is related.

noe

Religion might, it seems to me, venture a_li

fashioned fear of God into the common life of the culture

by suggesti

is just, and that
L
he cares about won, love - and that we are

accountable for our behavior.

Life, it seems to me, may depend on our recovering the
commer semenneemnicrsrie

experience of mystery and the resyuitant Holy Terror, 4 But

the need essentially, is not external. \We need the sense
eEeUROe Eee

21

of a transcendent God and the awe of the Holy which goes with

Ss
it - in order to be fully human \ Artists, poets, musicians,
SaaS Sh

\ Tk ts Fee”

have always known that about us. canoe, I believe, to

rs a
confess it about ourselves.\ We never stand taller than when
PS ea ey we

we are on our knees in prayer. \\we are never stronger than
SSS SS

Se

when we confess our need for God.\ We are never bigger than

aS Sa
when we acknowledge that which is greater than we are.
Pe eS =

Jesus Christ scared Peter to death. \ me good news is

Ee

that when Peter, in Holy Terror, said, "Depart from me";

Jesus didn't depart. | Rather he stay

“stuck it out with

Peter through thick and thin. \ Pet 's fear in the face of

is growth as “man .| He

could come to grips with himgelf honestly only by

¥#7stance betweenJesus and himself.

He didn't get there wifh his arrogancé or his presuming

Christ was an important step in

acknowledging the great
a a

that he knew it a

or his physical strength. \ He opened

his life to Jeéus Christ in the very words "Depart from me,
O Lord, f

I am a sinful nal"

—_> So our faith, it seems to me, is best, strongest and tS

most full of possibt oe ap os aa can Rane
be called Holy terror hen we can hear the
in a very wise olds ual - ~ <)
"Were you there when they crucified my Lord?" WN Le,
and respond honestly - an

"Sometimes it causes me to tremble." ame

Common senge, h a eneasen Lay in\Goa.
ae i a A ther.

And yet, they do not

ifaw ha o>
Gv ow %

The second major challenge to Christian faith in the

PLURALISM

Muskingum College

2

=

1980's will, I believe, be pluralism: \ ne dramatic ascen-
‘Sm ie)

dence of other, competing religions to a position of atten-

a

tion and centrality.

It has been coming for some time now { The fervor of the

ied Eo

Nineteenth century missionary movement has waned.| Two gen-

—

erations ago young men and women gave themselves to 4
De nal Dent aa tar al
glorious vision of converting the whole world to Christianity.
EE Dal

("The World for Christ in our generation." | Off they went -

to China, Africa, Indonesia;|/highly motivated, deeply committed.

—

It may have been one of the high moments in Christian
Uvgie —

history in terms of its een and commitment.

Several things happened as a result.\ Christian churches
i — rn
were started and grew and thy oday on every continent:
& fbi GenteP TAY y
heroic, obedient, sometimes persecuted minority churches.

mimes

The other thing that happened is that Christianity encoun-

tered other religions and in some cases, at least, experienced
Be rescmrnnerieneratiem Bene

As the encounters increased and as the world grew smaller

luralism became a fact of life.

and smaller religious

Most of us first encountered it when in the middle of the

Civil Rights movement we stumbled on a full blown religious

institution in the Black Community we hadn't ever known

2

existed petore: | the Black iustins .\ We were jarred when the
er ,

TEA

heavyweight champion of the worid, Cassius Clay, the
Ce

Be

Louisville Lip, converted, changed his name to Mohammed Ali,
be]

and after each victory in the ring insisted on giving Allah
REL,

the credit.

The sudden reappearance of China in world attention

underscored the fact that there are an awful lot of non-
et,

Christians out there, people with a culture, hopes, dreams,

and religion, not exactly sitting around waiting for us to

tell them our secrets.

But the event tha

documented the realit of pluralism

more than any other happened as the decade of the 70's was
dest, OG"
winding down. \ our friend, ere and bon vivant, the Shah,

incredibly was deposed and another surprise confronted us,

every bit as surprising as the Black muslims in the 60's;

‘gee
+

namely, the Shiites, |and their enfuriating enigmatic leader

re

the Ayatot{be Khounenie. \ tere were people, totally committed

of seeing things: \ powerful in their disciple-

to another WAY

ship, frightening in their certainty, and utterly hostile to
se

things western, including Christianity,

ome aa
The religious future, I think, will continue to feel

tee

a

the impact.| Gabriel Fackre writes: Ls massive challenge to
the finality of Christ is on its way as a result of the

collective impact intercultural exchange, the sensed need
[eee

for learning to live together in a volatile world, the good
a

i
things perceived in other religions... fhe author pregicts

that just as some theologians announced the death of God in

1967 ~- in the 1980's someone will announce that one can be
. a,

a Buddhist and a Christian. (op. cit. p. 8)

eer
In fact, in a pastoral situation, I've already had to
face that one. 4} A young man in my parish, a practicing
SS

ee
Buddhist since a stint in the Peace Corps, and his wife,
ine

both of whom worship with us, requested baptism for their
a

Ce tel

chad. \ they regarded themselves as Christian Buddhists:

I thought there was no way I could baptize their china.| I
Earle”

was prepared to take that stand:\4 after two long conferences
SS

I went ahead with it.\ I was convinced that they are what
ee et

they say they are - Christian Buddhists. ‘

Fackre refers to it as "plural shock# that it{'will mean

Christological heart failure for a good many in the 80's. It
2 ee

will not be an easy time to witness to the scandal of
SE

particularity." (op. cit., p. 9)

The immediate concern, I believe, will be relationship
Siena

and dialogue with a new vigorous and confident Islam.

Part of trying to have dialogue will be, I believe, acknow-
i , ee

ledgement of the fact that much of the traditional Jansuags

Oe

of Christianity is rooted in a Greek philosophic system
owen aT ee at TR

which is no longer used, and which is totally alien to the
a tn ene

world of Isiam\ The doctrine of the p

rinity, for instance,

is a major stumbling block to conversation. Islam, rigidly

ba eT
monotheistic, hears Christians talking about God the father,
God the Son, God the Holy Spirit - and counts 1, 2, 3
exe EE eer cee, ee
aieties .\ Muslims read the Nicene Creed to wit: | "We believe
a

in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten son of God...

Tree

God of God, Light of Lights, Very God of Very God...” We

ae ern.

know or think we know, what that means. (: know that the
Di EEE,

Fathers of the Constantinian Church, Greek phi Losophay
scholars, who when they said (or one substance with the

father'' were using a concept_familiar to all thinking

people, }~ knew exactly what they meant \ But, with the

Nicene Creed in your hand, try to convince a bright, Muslim

that you don't believe in at least two, if not thr eparate

gods.

The response to pluralism, can be, of course, an evan-
Da |

gelical rennaisance, accompanied by_ beological

imperialism. | That is the erux.\ My hope is that we will be

Boos oY
open: \it Jesus Christ is the truth and the light, that we
es, oe Eee
welcome him wherever we find truth and light: {that we will
Se hein eat

be willing to reformulate our faith, even as that may mean

loosing our grip on certainties which have served us well

in the past.

Greek chratisn, -

hooting - Ay sata a

int telat
od ant ae ‘al Qual me

leks refrumlae ou. (aurd “aearan ese —

wae

nuclear guaranteed muscle - none of it is forever. | one
of it compels\permanence \ 1 believe in the reasonability of
(ner

God and the Gospel because I know - as you do that it is

——_ \

true -— that love is better than hate,| kindness is better
ae | ——E

than cruelty, [compassion is better than indifference,

equality is better than discrimination, that the exceptions
SS

are the aberations, the sick peopte. \ 1 believe e Christian
a ee \ ——e
faith compels the attention of the rational mind because its Vv
ethic - its understanding of the human condition, makes_sense. *
oe \

— Cc mM -

I believe in God because of Jesus christ. | He was, at

=

least, the best we have ever produced.\ I believe more than
RL] a

that about him, but he was, at least, the best of as \ Not
aaa Gikesr=m=ay7

to believe is to conclude that he was wrong, a fraud perhaps,
ee Seow Wit los

mad perhaps, deluded perhaps, but utterly, dead wrong: \ that
Sees TET
when he said there was a Kingdom coming like yeast in bread,
ae ead Ss
he was wrong; \that when he told the story about a father
Ba ee |

ore
running down the road to meet a wayward son and let his

Cs |
hearers tie that up with God, he was wrong;\that when he
Oe a ea_—|_ “===

said, at the hour of death, ("Father, into your hands I commit

my spirit, ) he was talking to nothing.

I believe because, even if I didn't want to, the ques-

tion keeps asking itself. \ I can't escape it .\ I know what
Say

eae eae |
Sigmund Freud said about our desire for a father and our
— Ss So-- + --___--,
capacity to create one, but understanding that doesn't
[ESS
resolve the question \ I believe because I have felt what
Umevess Sn ieee aaa |
Rudolf Otto called the '"Mermumpews'' - the "Wholly Other",
SS SSD wee
what Paul Tillich described as that moment he .could accept
pnd

the fact that he was accepted by something greater than
ze a ea er

wz

reengs ."' “I believe because "the mind is alive"; to borrow
Pieces —
words of a Frenchman, Henri DeLubac/"and so is the living
a Re
God who makes himself known to it."/ (Ogden, The Reality of
ta,

God, preface.)

I have come to believe that the question itself is not

evidence of psychological insecurity or neurotic obsession

but the mysterious moving of God. F pelieve he has created

the need within us. ("My soul thirsts for thee, my flesh

thirsts for thee in a dry and thirsty 1ana.) the Psaimist

wrote.

I believe because we are restless until we find cur
=e

rest in him\ That is my testimony, remarkable only because
—_— aa

it is mine, \1 invite you to discover yours; to measure it
‘See

by your own gift of common sense.

ee