[Oe List ...] 3/18/2021, Progressing Spirit: Rev. Gretta Vosper: If Not God, Then What?; Spong revisited

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If Not God, Then What?
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|  Essay by Rev. Gretta Vosper
March 18, 2021
My previous article, “Except for God”, challenges our habitual use of the word “god” in church because of its polymorphous tendencies, taking on a different shape and purpose for each unique individual. Using the word “god” to conjure an all-powerful deity with biblically-proportioned prejudices and condemnations is dramatically different from using the word “god” to call us to a “no matter what” sort of love.

I talk about this a lot. About ditching archaic language. About reading more than just the Bible or not reading the Bible at all. About questioning the prevalence of organ and choral music. About pews, though in the time of COVID, we’re not so worried about pews. About how the non-churchy parts of church are the perhaps most important - the things that get you to fall in love with being together. But talking isn’t enough. We all know what air is and how essential it is to our survival. But how many of us would know how to put what elements together in a way that would really let us breathe, even let us thrive? Not many. Our time is short and the task at hand is crucial.

The Essence of Church
In my second book, Amen[1], I pull the essence of the four basic types of prayer out of their ecclesiastical functions and into the realm of real life. What does prayer strive to do? What deeply human challenges did it evolve to address? Do those challenges still exist or are we, through the course of our history and the advancement of social institutions and our knowledge of the natural world, no longer in need of it? Are its purposes still relevant or have we kept it around simply for its comfortable familiarity? After all, even Pope Francis has argued that the god called God isn’t a magician with a magic wand.[2] 

Turns out, each of the different functions of prayer meets a specific human need: awe and inspiration; acknowledgement of our own personal failings; realizing and expressing gratitude; finding hope whether from within our own selves or the community beyond us. But addressing those needs doesn’t need to be undertaken on one’s knees or in church, at all.

We can do that same examination I exerted upon prayer to the whole of a Sunday service. And, in truth, we can do it with the whole business of church, not just the part that unfolds on Sunday mornings. The questions are the same: What is the essence of church? What does it strive to do? What deeply human challenges did it evolve to address? I think we’ll agree that church meets very human needs and that many of those needs are going unmet in contemporary society.

We are herd animals. We gain strength from one another’s presence, even if that presence is only intermittently welcome. We thrive in positive, affirming, intergenerational relationships and we excel within a network of them. Our brains evolved because of them. Human connection is crucial to our development. Only a small fraction of the mirror neurons we need to develop empathy are present at our birth and we have about eight months to develop the rest of them, something that only happens if we’re being nurtured in an empathic environment. If we aren’t, and those neurons don’t develop, things are permanently compromised. We can’t catch up.

Whatever our mirror neuron load, we can keep it in tip-top shape. That, however, requires regular, positive, emotionally engaged relationships that reflect our worth as human beings (not as “human whateverwedo”s). And where do we find those relationships? Well, for many of us, we’ve found them in church. That is where we have been nurtured in intergeneration settings as healthy, valued members of society. And because we are, society benefits through our voluntarism, philanthropy, service, political action, and community leadership. We engage in socially pro-active ways when we are valued ourselves.

Which is, of course, why this whole endeavour we call church is so important. This is the essence we seek: Church supports and develops people who support and sustain community. And true community makes democracy possible. So church, when it is working well, is a crucible for democracy. I kid you not. Take note.
 
Shifting Church
Two years ago, I wrote the following list about what we’d need to lose to be able to open church up to millennials:

Theological language, for one. The exclusive use of the Bible for inspiration, for two. The constant reiteration of ancient myths about who Jesus was and what he did… The words of your favorite hymns and choral pieces. All that traditional liturgy, its grandeur, pomp, and ceremony. Almost everything ever accompanied by a pipe organ. A few or a lot of those currently in the pews who are unable to transition the things they lose in the public church gathering to their private spiritual practice. The ease of pick-up and teach lectionary-based Sunday School curricula. And likely lot of other stuff.[3]

It is a challenging list. But here’s the worst part: Making all those changes provides no guarantee that you will safely transition. Change one thing and half your community will be hurt and resentful; the other half will be champing at the bit, challenging you to move faster. There is no easy resting place on this journey.

Additionally, the whole church endeavour is anathema to almost entire generations so our transition is invisible to them; they aren’t there to see it and you can’t explain it to them. Still, their need for the essence of church – supporting and developing people who support and develop community – is no less urgent than it has been for previous generations or for the concept of democracy. Filling that need will require something entirely new. And starting something that is not seen to be church but that creates the benefits of church is seriously challenging.

Church from Scratch
About fifteen years ago, just as West Hill began to stretch itself into what would become its future orientation, the Toronto United Church Council decided to “plant” a progressive congregation not far from us. They committed what, for us, seemed an obscenely large budget to getting it up and running and hired a very competent and enthusiastic minister to make the dream come true. Bishop Spong travelled to speak at their inaugural gathering.

Some months into the project, the minister and I revealed our jealousies to one another. Mine was that she did not need to contend with the losses that our progressive direction was requiring of our members. Losing favourite hymns, dealing with changes to liturgies, giving up traditions – reread that list – each came with significant pain. Hers was revelatory. She had to create community, something I already had. In the end, creating community proved the harder project and the new congregation closed a few years later. West Hill, despite losing much-loved members who couldn’t bear the liturgical losses and found other churches where those traditions were maintained, continues to thrive. If you have community, you have the magic, if I can call it that. If you don’t, you have to create it.
 
Seeding the Magic
A few weeks before COVID arrived on our doorstep, I watched that magic come to life in a large room at a local community centre. Randell Adjei, a spoken word artist with a rough history, had created an organization called R.I.S.E. (Reaching Intelligent Souls Everywhere) Edutainment and is gathering a community together every Monday evening. On the night I attended, there were about two hundred and thirty people there, most of them Black and under thirty. Tables were set up to sell items to raise money for one thing or another. The Toronto Department of Mental Health was present; the day happened to be Black Mental Health Day. They were providing that evening’s meal for which the community would disperse part way through the program.

A tall, thin man took the stage. He welcomed the crowd which  welcomed him enthusiastically in return. Then he made reference to the special nature of the day – Black Mental Health. He said that he knew lots of those gathered had, or knew someone who had, struggled with mental health issues. And he asked them to share what they did that helped. Then, he handed his microphone into the crowd.

I still well up when I think about what happened next. For almost half an hour, the microphone rode from one hand to another through the crowd. People shared what was going on in their lives and in the lives of people they love. Fingers snapped in waves of support as the audience resonated with stories of pain, loss, resilience. The magic flowed from story to story, person to person. When that part of the evening was over, spoken word, musical performances, and storytelling kept the fingers snapping, the heads nodding, the magic flowing. No one left that room without knowing they were significant, important, cherished.

So, it me, it’s clear. We ask Randell or someone like him. And then we either make it happen or stand back so people like him, who know their communities and what they need, can make it happen. With our own congregational resources, of course, by which I mean dollars or buildings. Because, you know, saving humanity is going to cost something and I think churches should be honoured to get in on the ground floor.
~ Rev. Gretta Vosper

Read online here

About the Author
The Rev. Gretta Vosper is a United Church of Canada minister who is an atheist. Her best-selling books include With or Without God: Why The Way We Live is More Important Than What We Believe, and Amen: What Prayer Can Mean in a World Beyond Belief. She has also published three books of poetry and prayers. Visit her website here.
 [1] Gretta Vosper, Amen: What Prayer Can Mean in a World beyond Belief, HarperCollins, 2012.[2] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/pope-francis-declares-evolution-and-big-bang-theory-are-right-and-god-isn-t-magician-magic-wand-9822514.html?fbclid=IwAR2U7x8ZUiLZSYeWjp38NZFLG6IKBEsfVUBMzUH0680BklXElKewugj-Rdg. Accessed, March 4, 2021,[3] Gretta Vosper, “The Future Church: Over to You” Progressing Spirit,  June 6, 2019  |

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Question & Answer

 

Q: By Rev. Margaret

Am I the only one out here who makes sure my people understand the Eucharist/Lord’s Supper/Communion service has its roots in the Passover story and that the words Jesus spoke would have been the motzi and the hagafen? I am part of a noncredal tradition so we don’t recite the Nicene creed anyway and we offer communion to everyone at every worship service, but why don’t we educate our people to understand our Jewish roots?

A: By Rev. Roger Wolsey
 

Dear Rev. Margaret,

I hear your desire for helping contemporary Christians to feel close connection to the historical Jesus and his early followers. That’s a beautiful inclination. Along these lines, because Jesus and the first disciples washed each other’s feet before the last supper, certain Christian denominations always involve foot-washing as part of how they conduct the sacrament of Holy Communion. And yet most denominations do not do that, though I’m always moved by these opportunities.

I’m not an advocate of Christians seeking to engage in Christian-led seder meals.  “The first reason is historical.   The Seder ritual, as it is practiced today, did not exist at the time of Jesus. It was only fully developed by the rabbis in the years following the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E., in other words, at least two generations after Jesus. Many assume that Jesus, at the Last Supper, conducted what we now know of as a traditional Passover Seder with the Pesakh (pascal) offering of the lamb, matza, bitter herbs, the telling of the tale of the Exodus from Egypt, and other rituals as found in the Jewish Passover Hagada. This is incorrect. To put it bluntly, Jesus certainly celebrated Passover, but neither he nor his disciples ever attended a Seder, any more than they drove a car or used a cell phone.”

Yet the reason that matters most is seeking to not be offensive to the overwhelming majority of our Jewish friends. Most Jews tend to experience gentile Christians “doing their own seders” as unwelcome cultural appropriation which tends to Christianize their sacred rituals and they experience it as outsiders “playing Jewish” and diminishing the Jewishness of a Jewish tradition. Moreover, the hamotzi prayer is used on a weekly basis by Jews as part of their weekly Shabbat rituals and many Jews feel that this “steals their thunder” – i.e., takes away the specialness of their weekly ritual which is integral to Jewish identity. See these 3 articles: Why Christians Shouldn’t Do Their Own Seder Meals; Say No to Christian Seders; Christians Shouldn’t Celebrate Seders.

And, as the apostle Paul advised (with admitted loose exegesis and proof-texting), “If your brother/sister is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. …It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother or sister to fall” (Romans 14:15 & 21) and “Food will not bring us close to God. We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do. But take care that this liberty of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block“ (1 Corinthians 8:8-9)

That said, it is massively important for gentile Christians to be reminded of the Jewishness of Jesus. Too many western Christians think Jesus was a fellow Christian (though I can posit a case that he was a Christian, in that he attained Christ consciousness and was seeking to help others to experience their own Christ consciousness – but that’s an esoteric, outlier perspective). Consider these resources: 1) “The Jew Named Jesus” by Rebekah Simon-Peter; and 2) “The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus” by Amy-Jill Levine.

Interestingly, I have previously argued that “in some ways progressive Christianity is a re-Judaizing of the faith.” By this I mean, however, progressive Christianity embraces a fuller concept of salvation than what it’s been reduced to by evangelicalism (which is wedded to the American ethic of hyper-individualism). Instead of salvation as “believing X, Y, & Z in order to go to heaven when you die,” when Jesus was referring to salvation he was referring to the Hebraic concept of it – meaning “healing, wholeness, fullness, and well-being.” And not just for individual persons, but for the collective. Jewish salvation means well-being and healing of the nation(s), of the peoples. Progressive Christianity calls for a heightened emphasis upon the corporate and collective aspects of salvation which involves embracing the Jewish concept of tikkun olam- “world-repair” involving well-being for all beings which involves social justice and care for the planet.
 
Moreover, progressive Christianity embraces the Jewish practices, traditions, and perspectives of: reading the Bible as story; not considering it inerrant; not interpreting it literally; allowing for paradox; and embracing midrash – wrestling with the text and on-going reinterpretation of it. 

~ Rev. Roger Wolsey

Read and share online here

About the Author
Rev. Roger Wolsey is a United Methodist pastor who resides in Grand Junction, CO. Roger is author of Kissing Fish: Christianity for people who don’t like Christianity and blogs for Patheos as The Holy Kiss and serves on the Board of Directors of ProgressiveChristianity.Org. Roger became “a Christian on purpose” during his college years and he experienced a call to ordained ministry two years after college. He values the Wesleyan approach to the faith and, as a certified spiritual director, he seeks to help others grow and mature. Roger enjoys yoga; playing trumpet; motorcycling; and camping with his son. He served as the Director of the Wesley Foundation campus ministry at the University of Colorado in Boulder for 14 years, and has served as pastor of churches in Minnesota, Iowa, and currently serves as the pastor of Fruita UMC in Colorado, and also serves as the "CRM" (Congregational Resource Minister/Church Consultant) for the Utah/Western Colorado District of the Mountain Sky Conference.
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|  As a non-profit ProgressiveChristianity.org relies heavily on the good will of donors. We want to continue to bring individuals and  churches the messages of progressive Christians, along with many of the resources and tools needed to further the vision. 

In the brief time I've had the pleasure of serving as President and, even more recently, as Co-Executive Director at ProgressiveChristianity.org, a formula for why our spiritual community is so robust and enduring has made itself clear. While that formula includes our highly-skilled, dedicated, and caring staff, as well as our list of writers and resource providers, it is very clear to us that the constant that holds it all together is YOU.
 
Every day we see in our communities and in the news, the misshapen mess that some folks have made of Christianity. When we see it, it further encourages us in the need and responsibility to provide the counterpoint of view of a more inclusive, connected, and loving understanding of God. That is certainly one of the main efforts here at ProgressiveChristianity.org. Given the formula that makes this community work, it is clear that YOU are a crucial part of our efforts to continue to do so.
 
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Let me personally thank you in advance for whatever amount you decide you can give to support ProgressiveChristianity.org.
 
PEACE!
Rev. Mark Sandlin
President and Co-Executive Director
ProgressiveChristianity.org
Progressing Spirit  |

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Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited


The Origins of The New Testament, Part XXXIII:
The Gospel of John

Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong
August 12, 2010
If I had to give my readers one clue and one clue only that would unlock the Fourth Gospel and allow its honesty and wonder to flow forth, it would be that in reading John one must always keep in mind that the author is not writing history or biography. Indeed, this author is constantly poking fun at anyone who would take his message literally, misunderstand his use of symbols or attempt to literalize the words he has attributed to Jesus. Can any of us imagine for one moment an itinerant prophet named John the Baptist literally saying the first time he meets Jesus, “Behold, the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world,” and then claiming for this Jesus the status of a pre-existent divine being? Yet that is what John the Baptist does in the first chapter of John. It is a text that sets a pattern that this gospel writer will follow. What does it mean to name Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world? What does it mean to claim for him a pre-existent status? What experience is this author seeking to communicate? That is the question with which one is confronted in the opening chapter of this book, and that is only the beginning.

In the second chapter, we find equally enigmatic words. Here we are told that at a wedding party Jesus actually changes water into wine so that the party can go on! Can any of us imagine a set of circumstances in which that narrative would be taken literally? Medieval alchemists spent centuries trying to turn iron into gold and failed. Given the price of good wine today, perhaps they would have been more successful if they had followed Jesus’ example and tried to turn water into wine. Surely John did not think of this as a literal story and the suggestion later in the story that Jesus’ freshly fermented beverage was so superior to that which was served first that it violated the social norm of the day, which was to serve the “good stuff” first and then when the guests were well drunk to bring out the “screw top gallon bottles.” So we need to ask just what it was that John was seeking to communicate when he opens his second chapter with this story and calls it “the first sign” of Jesus’ public ministry that “manifested forth his glory.” Perhaps this author drops another clue that these words are not to be taken literally when he begins this particular narrative with the words, “On the third day,” since these words would be deeply fraught with meaning in the company of believers to whom these words were addressed.

In the next episode described by John, Jesus is in Jerusalem and there he drives the money changers out of the Temple. In the earlier gospels, this story of the cleansing of the temple is the provocative final act that leads directly to the crucifixion. John, however, places it at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. Once again the Jewish audience that first reads John’s words would immediately identify this narrative with a reading from the book of Psalms (69:9), which stated that the Messiah would show zeal for the house of God — zeal indeed that would consume him. They also knew that John was using this episode not to describe something that happened, but to make a messianic claim. These readers would have been familiar with the account from the book of Zechariah, which said that when “the day of the Lord” came, “there would no longer be a trader in the house of the Lord of Hosts (14:21).” That was destined to be only the first of many references that John would take from the book of Zechariah, a book that shaped the Jesus story far more than most of us have imagined.

Continuing the same theme in chapter three, John has Jesus say to a man named Nicodemus, “unless you are born anew, you cannot see the Kingdom of God. ” Nicodemus is baffled because he hears these words literally and wonders how it is possible for a grown man to be born anew when he is old, “Can I climb back into my mother’s womb and be born a second time?” Literalism makes no sense, but John is not writing a literal story.
In the fourth chapter of John, the author has Jesus speaking to a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well about water. The conversation began when he asked the woman to give him a drink from the well. When she demurred and retreated into the boundary that separates Jew from Samaritan, Jesus said to her, “If you knew who it was that is asking you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” The woman looked at him with the blank stare of literalism and said, in effect, “Man, you don’t even have a bucket!” The Jesus of John’s gospel then says, “Whoever drinks of the water I give will never thirst again.” The woman still trapped in the prison of literalism responds, “That is great. Give me your water and I will never have to come again to this well. That would make my life easier.”

As if that were not sufficient warning that this book is not to be read literally, John continues his theme when he relates the story of Jesus’ disciples returning and interrupting this private conversation. They then urge Jesus to eat. To this urging, however, John’s Jesus responds by saying, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.” The disciples, still blinded by the literalism through which they hear his words, say to one another: “Has anyone brought him food?” The theme of anti-literalism goes on.

In the sixth chapter of John, Jesus is made to place his message into Eucharistic language and then to watch as his words are once again heard as if they are meant to be understood literally. Here he says: “he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me.” The literal-minded disciples are repelled by what seems to them to be a reference to cannibalism, and they begin to draw back and to cease following him. Time after time, the author of the Fourth Gospel displays the truth that this book is an interpretive book not a literal one. It is a symbolic book, not a historical book or a biographical story. No one can read the Fourth Gospel with literal eyes without missing the essence of his message. Yet, throughout Christian history, this book has been read with literal eyes and this literal misreading has been used to buttress the case for orthodoxy, binding creeds and such rationally incomprehensible ecclesiastical doctrines as the Incarnation and the Holy Trinity.

One other unique aspect found in John alone is the fact that Jesus time and again is quoted as calling himself by the name, which, according to the book of Exodus, God revealed to Moses as God’s own at the burning bush. Tell them, God said to Moses on that occasion, that “I AM” sent you. So John now has Jesus say, “Before Abraham was, I AM!” When you see the Son of Man lifted up, then you will know I AM.” There is no “he” in that latter statement, despite the fact that the translators add one because they do not understand what this gospel writer is trying to say. At the time of Jesus’ arrest in the dark of night in the Valley of Kidron, John portrays Jesus as approaching the band of soldiers and Temple police led by Judas and asking, “Whom do you seek?” They respond, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus says, “I AM.” Translators once again render that “I am he.” John’s context, however, renders that translation inoperative, for John goes on to state: “When he said I AM, they drew back and fell to the ground.” It was strange behavior for an armed guard confronting an unarmed political prisoner if he had said something as mundane as “I am he.” If, on the other hand John was portraying him as uttering and claiming the divine name as they were about to arrest him, then that would be quite another matter.

“I AM” is a key concept in the Fourth Gospel repeated over and over again. John alone has Jesus say such things as: “I am the bread of life; I am the door; I am the way, the truth and the life; I am the vine; I am the good shepherd, and I am the resurrection.” Jesus even asserts through that “I AM” claim that he is the exclusive pathway to God, a statement that has been used throughout Christian history to justify the basest forms of religious imperialism and to fuel the most insensitive kind of missionary evangelism.

John’s gospel must not be literalized if it is to be understood. It is a profound, even mystical, interpretation of the life of Jesus of Nazareth, written by a person deeply rooted in Palestinian Judaism and its words are designed to lead John’s readers beyond literal words into a life-giving relationship with God. History reveals what a high price has been paid because Christians have insisted on literalizing the words of this gospel. At the Council of Nicea, a literalized understanding of John was used to justify the new orthodoxy of a man named Athanasius, which was destined to cloak the Christian story in a hierarchical authority system in which it became oppressive, insensitive and anything but life-giving. When the shell of literalism is broken, however, the gospel of John enhances life, expands consciousness and calls us into a new relationship with the one whose deepest claim is to be a doorway into a new experience of that which is transcendent, holy and other. The call of John’s Jesus is not into an engagement with a supernatural being, created in our image, who somehow lives above the sky and who, in the person of Jesus, was thought to have masqueraded as a human being. This is, of course, a caricature but only a little one. John’s gospel is a work to be entered, a message to be breathed, and a doorway into a life to be lived. It was not written to enable us to play religion’s oldest game, “My God is better than your God and I control the doorway into true belief. No one can come to God except through my faith system”

I once was repelled by the Fourth Gospel because I related to it as if it were a literal document. When I broke the bondage of that mindset, I found in this gospel a real understanding not just of God and of Jesus, but of life itself. Someday, I hope to spell out that thought in detail. For now, I must content myself to sketching a new vision of this gospel that all can see.

~  John Shelby Spong
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