This post was written by Patrick Rist on April 22, 2008
In our last posting, we mentioned what Ken Myers calls “Adverbial Christianity” – the notion that so often the world dictates the nouns of our lives, while Christianity is brought in so that we can pursue these pre-established goals “peacefully,” or “graciously,” or “honestly,” and the like.
This is an anemic vision of the Christian life, but it is quite often the status quo for believers in academia. The way out of it is not easy – there are not any quick fixes. But surely we can all affirm that we have been called to something higher, something better, and that faithfulness means at least trying.
It is in that spirit that I’d like to offer some thoughts on how to begin the process of integrating one’s scholarly work with historic Christian thought. On one hand, it would be hard to improve upon Paul Gould’s essay, “The Two Tasks Introduced: The Fully Integrated Life of the Christian Scholar,” in The Two Tasks of the Christian Scholar, but what I’ve been considering would probably be considered prolegomena (even to Gould’s prolegomena).
§ At the most basic level, integration means thinking theologically about one’s academic discipline. This presupposes that theology, and the Bible upon which valid theology is based, actually has something to say about things other than “religion” and “spirituality.” The Bible is not a science textbook (as we are so often and so tiresomely reminded), yet it presents itself as a true and accurate account of the world and the human condition. Therefore, unless we are willing to buy into a truncated, impoverished view of truth, we must take the Bible and theology seriously and allow it to speak into our understanding of our scholarly endeavors.
§ Once we take this step, then the hard work really begins. It is my belief that Christian scholars, whatever their discipline, should become lay theologians to the best of their abilities. There are far too many “Christian scholars” who are Christian by virtue of their confession but not by virtue of the “Christian-ness” of their scholarship. Scholarship that is thoroughly Christian is the product of much analysis (and judgment) of the reigning paradigms in a given discipline, not a little Christian jargon spread over the top like mayonnaise (and that goes for amorphous, often inane verbiage about “justice,” too).
In order to do this sort of analysis, it seems to me that Christian academics should begin to humbly learn theological categories. This is a process of replacing one’s mental furniture with new concepts – and training oneself in a different style of thinking.
It would seem that this would be a better preliminary step than going directly to books written by Christians in one’s field – if there are any. Having grounding in theological convictions would enable one to better ascertain the validity of what another Christian has written, and also to recognize the positive contributions that they are making.
§ Finally (at least for today’s post!), a key part of the integration process that is so often ignored, or at least left unstated, is reflection. What we have been describing – the serious study of theology, the replacing of mental furniture, the analysis of the presuppositions of one’s field – these are not things that can be simply checked off a “to do” list. These are ongoing, difficult projects, which require strenuous mental effort and time – time to digest, assimilate, and perhaps harmonize what one is learning. And only after lengthy reflection can one hope to actually produce something as a result.
I must state it boldly: There can be no integration without reflection. If you find that you are simply too busy, too “pro-active” to take the time to reflect, you may think that you want to do integration, but you’ll have to be satisfied with the adverbs.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on April 15, 2008
Recently I was talking with a Christian professor at a large state university, and asked her how her faith had informed her practice of her discipline (she was a sociologist). She replied that she tried to be a conscientious teacher and treat her students well. She also said she discouraged profanity in her classroom.
This was a good person, who undoubtedly is a sincere, pious Christian. But I was reminded of what Ken Myers (of Mars Hill Audio) calls “Adverbial Christianity.” The world sets the overall agenda of our lives, providing the nouns: the work, the goals, the purpose. The church only gets to provide the adverbs, so that things are done “peacefully,” or “lovingly,” or “gracefully.”
This adverbial posture is far cry from the vision of academic integration. And yet one suspects that this is where we might find the majority of Christian professors, whether they are at secular or church-related schools.
Why? Is the notion of integrating one’s scholarship with a Christian view of life and reality that difficult to grasp, simply as a concept? While it may be a challenge to flesh out in practice, particularly for some disciplines, it is deeply troubling to encounter academics to whom this notion has never even occurred as a possibility.
It may be time for us to re-visit some basic concepts surrounding the pursuit of the integration of the Christian worldview and the academic calling. We’ll try to do this in the next few entries.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on March 3, 2008
With the death of William F. Buckley (1925 – 2008) last week, America lost one of its most colorful and eloquent political commentators. Buckley’s political conservatism was always anchored in his conservative Catholicism – a fact that led to his break with atheist Ayn Rand in the 1950s.
Although not all Christians (especially Christians in academia) agree with Buckley’s political vision, are there other lessons that we can take from his life? I believe that there are many, and I’d like to offer some possibilities:
– Although not an academic by profession, Buckley was an intellectual, and was driven to learn. I once read an article about him that said he admitted being unwilling to cross the street without a book or magazine, lest traffic keep him immobilized for ten seconds.
– Much was made of his use of arcane words – even a word-a-day calendar was marketed under his name. It was hard to say how much of this vocabulary was a desire to show off, and how much of it was just part of who he was. Nevertheless, words are part of our inheritance, and like any inheritance should be preserved, not squandered. Buckley made a point of preserving the richness of our language.
– The payoff for the reading and learning for Buckley was that he was a prolific writer – evidently being able to write as fast as he could type. And the majority of even his thrice-weekly newspaper columns were of the highest quality prose and reasoning.
– But perhaps the greatest lesson from Buckley’s life is that even though he had passionately-held beliefs and convictions, and ardently defended those beliefs in the public arena, his public conduct and even his rhetoric was always gentlemanly (with a notable exception being an on-air row with the execrable Gore Vidal).
Increasingly, I seem to encounter Christians who are unwilling to hold positions strongly enough to defend them – ostensibly for fear of giving offense to non-believers. Or Christians who are so angry at the surrounding pagan culture that they are unwilling (or even unable) to engage in dialogue with those who don’t share a common starting point with them.
Buckley’s eloquent style, laced with wit and maybe a little satire, will long stand as an example for us to emulate. While standing firmly on his convictions, he had the confidence to engage in debate in a gracious yet straightforward way. We have come a long way from Buckley in his heyday, to figures like Ann Coulter (or Al Franken).
As evidence of Buckley’s friendly manner, he had longstanding friendships with people on the opposite side of the political spectrum. One of these was the liberal economist, John Kenneth Galbraith. It was Galbraith who, while speaking at a dinner given in honor of Buckley, said that while Buckley’s TV show, Firing Line, was a fine program, the real drama on it each week was whether or not Buckley would be able to part his hair with his tongue.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on February 25, 2008
D. Michael Lindsay is professor of sociology at Rice University, and author of the important new book, Faith in the Halls of Power, which was the result of a five-year study of evangelicals in the highest echelons of business, academia and government. Recently he published an article (found here) in which he details a disturbing trend among these powerful evangelicals: a full 60% aren’t involved in church in any meaningful way.
I encourage you to read the article (it’s quite short). But the gist of it is this: many of these wealthy and accomplished individuals feel that they have no time for involvement in the slow, inefficient goings-on of a local church. Many of them pour their religious energies into “high-impact” parachurch organizations. In addition, many are involved in what could be termed “niche” outreaches that service the spiritual needs of those in their unique situations – for example, the article mentions fellowship groups organized solely for CEOs.
Lindsay rightly laments these developments, as well he should. But such trends are probably the outgrowth of other assumptions common among Christians today:
§ Church should be fun. Few would state it so baldly, but this is what is probably behind a lot of complaints about different elements of the service. And after all, if everything else is either fun or attempts to be fun in our society, shouldn’t church be entertaining as well?
§ I should only go to church with people I like. Actually, a strong case could be made that the opposite is true – that being around people who scrape and abrade against us is actually good for our souls: hard relationships, properly pursued, teach us things that easy relationships cannot.
§ I should only go to church with people like me. Many churches and even denominations market themselves to certain segments of society – interestingly, poor and working class folks aren’t often targeted. The New Testament, though, seems to indicate that churches consisted of people from all walks of life and all income brackets. And this too, presented opportunities for growth (see above).
§ Church involvement is optional. Where’d this come from? Although the New Testament does not explicitly command church attendance (Hebrews 10: 24 -25 comes very close), it is clear that those who considered themselves sovereignly called by God out of paganism to himself, understood that he also called them into a new community in their city. “Joining the church” was not a “choice” they made – it was understood to go hand in hand with being regenerate.
§ And the foundational assumption: Christianity is infinitely malleable, able to fit easily into any cultural milieu. Thus, in a culture that elevates business management and marketing technique to the level of grand narrative (or low-brow entertainment, like The Apprentice), the church should be expected to function like a business. Christians should approach their spiritual lives with Stephen Covey-like efficiency.
Few of us have overcome these sorts of assumptions completely (or at least I’d like to believe that, because I certainly haven’t). Which one or two do you find to be strong in your thinking?
As those deeply concerned with the life of the mind, we often find ourselves “on the out” at church. How can we guard against an attitude of resentment and superiority, without sacrificing what we believe to be of enormous importance?
This post was written by Patrick Rist on February 11, 2008
Last week, a number of tornadoes tore through Tennessee, where I live. Many homes were destroyed, and dozens of lives were lost. Near our home, friends of ours lost their church in the storm. It was obliterated.
Natural disasters often raise questions concerning God’s providence and sovereignty. Why, if God is both all-powerful and loving, do these things happen? Does he allow them? Are they the work of Satan? Are such things simply beyond his control?
Questions such as these are, of course, categorized under the heading, “The Problem of Evil.” More specifically, the technical term for these questions and the arguments that seek to answer them is theodicy: the defense of God’s righteousness and omnipotence in the face of evil and suffering. At your next cocktail party, try to use the word theodicy in conversation – it’s a real showstopper.
There is a long and ever-lengthening history of theodicy in Christian thought, which is evidence of how desperately we want to understand this issue. It is also probably evidence of how far we are from resolving it. It seems to me that theodicies come in two categories: (1) the fairly helpful, and (2) the awful.
Under the fairly helpful category, one might place work that Alvin Plantinga has done. To simplify almost to the point of slander, Plantinga’s argument is that it is perfectly reasonable to state that if there is evil in the world, and if there is an all-powerful, all-righteous God, then there must be a perfectly good reason for God to allow the evil.
This is not a particularly comforting counsel to share with someone who’s grieving the loss of a home or a loved one. Plantinga’s main project was to demonstrate that it was not a logical contradiction to hold that evil and the biblical God could both exist. And remarkably, many of Plantinga’s philosophical adversaries acknowledged that he’d done so.
We may find Plantinga’s arguments pretty thin stuff. But at least he is not trying to get God “off the hook,” even at the cost of ignoring the biblical data, which is what many of the most awful theodicies seem to be attempting.
“Open theism” seems (to me) to spring from an unwillingness to allow the Bible to say what it says, and to take us where we would probably rather not go. Among other things, some of its advocates hold that while God knows everything that is knowable, he can’t know the future because it hasn’t happened yet. Thus, I suppose I could share with my friends who lost their church: “Take comfort! God’s just as surprised by this as you are!”
The Bible clearly teaches that God knows the end from the beginning; further, it is replete with sobering statements concerning his foreknowledge and foreordination of events, indicating a supervision and orchestration of history that I believe is beyond our ability to understand.
This is why I used the phrase, “fairly helpful” in describing the best theodicies. I do not believe that we can ultimately know the answer to the “why?” questions that natural disasters raise. We can and should try to understand all we can, but in the end we are left with mystery.
I have colleagues who think that I play the “mystery card” too readily. But we see Job getting an answer directly from God, and it is not an answer that causes Job to slap his forehead and exclaim, “Oh, of course! Now I get it! Thanks, God!” Instead, Job’s forehead is slapped by the ground as it rushes up to meet him.
Is appealing to and accepting mystery un-academic? Probably. But for the Christian, even the Christian scholar, there are worse things to be. For while there are many things we cannot know about this issue, there is one thing we can know, and it is the most important thing to know: The God who is sometimes pleased to allow hard and painful things into our lives is the same God who was pleased to crush his Son for our iniquities.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on January 21, 2008
So does the church need “public intellectuals?” First, I think it appropriate to say that, of all the things that the American church needs, public intellectuals would not be at the top of the list. There is a far greater need for average Christians in this country to be biblically and theologically literate. There is a far greater need for the church to be completely dedicated to the person and cause of Christ, than there is for a public expression of intellectual engagement.
Nevertheless, despite the “dumbing-down” of American culture, and the sad fact that evangelicals reflect that phenomenon, there is certainly a need for a Christian voice that can publicly articulate a Christian vision for life. The definition of what constitutes the public square today is fluid and varied: it might consist of blogging, of op-ed pieces in newspapers, of being on the “resident expert” list distributed to the media by your university. For those especially motivated and capable, it would certainly mean writing articles for popular audiences.
But there would seem to be a proper approach to this, and an unfortunate approach.
Many of the most prominent Christian voices today seem compromised by the political interests they represent. This would be true of someone like the rather odd Pat Robertson on the right, and the insufferable Jim Wallis on the left. Both seem to be simply spokesmen for their respective political parties.
An alternative would be to give a solid biblical rationale for one’s thinking on an issue first, then the political implications. This might lead one to endorse the position of a given political party; it might very well lead one to hold both parties in judgment.
The key point, though, is to be able to communicate the theological underpinnings of how Christians should think about a given issue. This requires serious study and contemplation.
It also requires that we submit our preferences and predispositions to a ruthlessly biblical critique. So-called “Red Letter Christians” who supposedly arrive at their views of social justice via the words of Christ (which are in red letters in some bibles – a dubious practice anyway) fail at this because they do not take the doctrine of inspiration (of all the bible) seriously enough. But many of the right wing, “Christian America” folks fail as well because of sloppy exegesis and a rather “selective” hermeneutic.
We cannot cede the public square to increasingly aggressive secular voices. Despite the ascendancy of entertainment as the greatest good, professors still wield a good deal of cultural authority in our society. Ask God if he would have you leverage that influence for the Kingdom as a “public intellectual.”
This post was written by Patrick Rist on January 14, 2008
In a recent article (found here) on the Chronicle of Higher Education online edition, UCLA history professor Russell Jacoby decries the decline of “public intellectuals” in America.
And just what is a “public intellectual?” My best attempt at definition would be someone who either makes or greatly supplements his/her living by writing for, speaking to, or appearing on television in front of the more educated classes of this country. Today, this person is most often a professor of some sort, although that has not always been the case.
It is probably a proof of Jacoby’s argument that the best examples of who and what public intellectuals were and did come from decades far in the past. If your parents or grandparents were college educated, they may have had books on their shelves by such names as John Kenneth Galbraith, Daniel Bell, or Jacques Barzun.
Today, says Jacoby, intellectuals (read “professors”) don’t write books for the general (educated) public; they write books for each other. Their writing style is dense, even opaque, and is solely for those in their own guild – the academic journals of their fields.
Further, the hyper-specialization that characterizes today’s academe prevents its inhabitants from developing a voice with which to address larger “questions of the day.” We all know what it’s like to be shot down for speaking about something “outside your area of expertise.”
And of course, the “intellectual climate” of our society has changed – to the extent that it is difficult to not to use quotation marks around that phrase. People who 50 years ago may have been reading books are now watching TV, talking on cell phones, or wasting time on the internet (but mostly they’re watching TV). While never a majority, the percentage of even college educated Americans who are truly intellectually engaged has certainly decreased. Therefore, there is now less of a “market” for public intellectuals.
Are we poorer for it? Do we need public intellectuals? What of the church – is there a need or a place for this type of work in our witness? We’ll look at some of these questions in my next entry.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on December 11, 2007
When one hears all the shrill, alarmist language from some quarters of Christendom concerning a movie like The Golden Compass, some of us may be tempted to respond with a, “C’mon, is it that bad?”
This is understandable, considering that similar shrieks greeted every Harry Potter book and movie. However, The Golden Compass is a quite different issue.
For an excellent overview of the movie, the books on which it is based, and the not-so-hidden agenda of author Philip Pullman, please visit this link to an article by Dr. Albert Mohler. Dr. Mohler is always a measured voice, yet a clear thinker and excellent communicator.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on December 6, 2007
The word for today is “kitsch,” meaning something created to appeal to sentimental, popular or undiscriminating tastes. It is often an elitist word, used as a weapon to discredit that which is disliked.
But it is just as often used accurately. Certainly the art world is in confusion, and manifests a substantial amount of moral corruption, but unless we want to jettison all critical judgments, it should still be possible to distinguish between good art, not-so-good art, and kitsch. However, those distinctions and how to make them go far beyond what I want to discuss here.
Ask the average churchgoer to name a Christian artist, and sad to say, you will probably hear the name Thomas Kinkade. Kinkade’s work is (dare I say this?) the epitome of kitsch. While technically quite competent, his pictures present fantasy world of light, pastels, and imaginary settings that have nothing to do with our lived lives. In this sense, Kinkade’s work is akin to pornography. It tells lies for emotional effect.
Perhaps that’s a bit harsh. Pornography is evil for multiple reasons. I would not say that what Kinkade is doing is evil. But it is misguided, and when one sees the level of promotion that sustains Kinkade’s empire, one suspects that he is painting to please a market rather than his Creator. And the two are not the same, even if the market is mainly evangelicals.
The question that interests me, though, is that even if we believe (as I do) that Kinkade’s work lies, what does our enthusiasm for the lies tell us about our desires? Are those desires legitimate? Could it be that Kinkade’s popularity tells us something about our souls, or at least about our vision for the Good Life?
Kinkade presents a life like this:
But in reality, most of us live like this:
The fantasy and the reality are so far apart, Kinkade could just as well include a Pegasus grazing in the front yard of his cottages.
But would not most of us rather live in the Kinkade picture, even if we wouldn’t hang it on our wall? Why is that? What does it say about how we want our lives and homes to be?
My suspicion is that Kinkade’s popularity contains clues to deep-seated longings shared by many, if not most Americans. The challenge is draw out these longings into the open. There they can be discussed, and compared to the decisions that we make as a people that condemn us to kitschy fantasy rather than a better reality.
This post was written by Patrick Rist on November 29, 2007
Marxism was supposed to produce the “New Man.” He’s a little late, but the New Man may be emerging in communist China.
A recent Reuters story (found here) describes the younger generation of twenty-somethings found in the wealthier districts of China. Almost all of them were raised as an “only child,” and evidently display many of the narcissistic, self-centered personality traits long associated with children without siblings – at least in popular lore. (I should probably add here that some of my best friends are only children.)
The article specifically focuses on the widespread (and quite casual) failure of marriages among this group. With the Chinese economy booming, and personal options and choices expanding exponentially, many Chinese simply can’t be bothered by the necessary give-and-take involved in sustaining a marriage. Considering the needs of another person is, after all, something with which they have had no previous experience. Divorce has become completely un-stigmatized in this echelon of society and marriages sometimes last only a few weeks.
Cohabitation is on the rise, and even extra-marital sex (quaintly called “cheating” by some in American society) is becoming accepted. All of these changes are an enormous departure from the Confucian ideals that have guided Chinese society for centuries.
To give the Marxists their due, I don’t think this is what they had in mind when they predicted the New Man. But is it possible that what is happening in China represents something actually new? A non-Western, and hence, non-Christian society passing from traditional mores to a post-modern, self-centered ethic – essentially within the span of one lifetime; other examples of this would be hard to find.
This cultural change presents something of a challenge to those of us who maintain that the way of living described here is contrary to human flourishing, and damages our souls. While perhaps true, convincing the young affluent Chinese would be a hard sell. They have no residual common moral ground in which such claims would make sense, even less than young affluent Americans.
Most of us Christians want to believe in natural law. We all take great comfort from Lewis’ arguments for a universal moral code in Mere Christianity. Yet a new generation of essentially amoral Chinese, living intently focused on material and sexual desire, would seem to present a great challenge to these notions. Perhaps we need less theory and more real life, hard case examples of seeing natural law apologetics in action.
Almost all of us know Chinese here in the US, either graduate students visiting, or professors. Perhaps this Reuters article could be a way to start a discussion of mores and morals. Of course, one should avoid an opener like, “What a selfish, immoral lot you Chinese are!”
Rather, one could ask:
– Have you seen examples of what the article describes? Do you think it is accurate?
– What are the implications of these trends for China’s future?
– Does it matter? Are some ways of living better than others? How does one decide that?
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