Marc's Messages 3.0

Adam's Return: male spirituality

In the left margin of my blog you find links to some of the books I read recently. One I'd like to point out specifically is 'Adam's Return. The five promises of male initiation' by Franciscan author Richard Rohr. He touches on several issues related to shift/reformation that I raised on my blog before, like the need to 'rediscover' a male spirituality, and the role of liminality in our spiritual formation. You might want to check out Rohr's website and this excerpt of an interview with him for an Australian radio station. Some spicy quotes:

- Few transformations happen in church. The places where real transformation happens in our world are Alcoholics Anonymous, Ground Zero, the cancer ward, and of course the mountains of New Mexico.
- Church liturgies/programs are very much a confirmation of the present consciousness, the present politics, the present self-serving world view. To join the clergy is to join an establishment world view of status and security. And I think that's what my father St. Francis was trying to oppose. Churchyanity has far too often become a substitute for Christianity.
- Not secularisation is the big reason for the collapse of churchgoing, but the failure of the church and its leaders to use their imagination.

Going takes away our fear

Brother Andrew is a Dutch pioneer evangelist (and I'd say also a prophet) who boldly goes to places where most people wouldn't be eager to go. In an interview with Christianity Today he challenges Christians to pray for bin Laden. "That question shocks a lot of us. Of course we haven't prayed for him! That is why he is what he is. We have an evangelical black list of people we don't want to see in heaven and put bin Laden on top. Saddam Hussein is probably second. In my 50 years of ministry, my biggest meetings have been always in the Muslim world. Why are we so timid? Why are we so afraid? They barely let me speak at my own evangelical church in Holland! I'm being sarcastic, but it is the truth. I find it easier to get speaking engagements with the Taliban than with my own evangelical church."

Addressing Western militaristic policy: "We in the West are following or believing in the God of revenge as much as every Muslim does. We have to come down to the foot of the Cross and learn from Jesus. He came to forgive, and he came to die. I have seen this attitude in many Christians in Gaza. It gives me hope for the future. We should be flocking to Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and seek the Christians and help them. And then, please, for God's sake, listen to what they say. They have something to say. This should be the driving force in our lives. It's not solving political or economic problems. It's being Christian."

The Muslim world is not closed, but needs to be challenged on the right issues: "You can still go to any place in the Muslim world and preach Christ. Any place. I want to challenge the whole world with that statement. And if that is true, then why are we resorting to other weapons that, according to the Bible, are not weapons of our warfare? When are we going to be people of the Book? They claim to be people of the book. I challenge them at the Hamas university on dialogue - and I hate the word dialogue - I'm a proclaimer, a Calvinist at heart. I believe that faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. I told them openly, 'I'm not interested in dialogue with you guys. But I'm always willing any place, any time, with any group of you, to have a dialogue on this one question: What kind of person does the book produce - your book, my Book?' You come back to Jesus' words: You must be born again. And they appreciate that. Because I want to challenge them on that issue."

We need to move from a defensive to an offensive approach: "I'm an evangelist. I'm a missionary. If I'm saying things that are politically not correct, I know the Lord will forgive me. We have a message that God changes people. Going takes away our fear. We are fearful because we stay home and prepare for the worst to come, because we think that's what they are planning. That may be true, but it's because of our inactivity. The moment we take the offensive and plan to go there, we lose our fear. That's very Scriptural. I'm not a bit afraid of them. I feel completely at home."

Other Dutch prophetic voices on Islam

Talking about boldness in the face of Islam: CBN News just published this interview with former Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali. She is not a Christian, and would probably not side with Brother Andrew, but she certainly is a prophetic voice. Hirsi Ali points out that in its roots Islam is a violent and militant religion that's oppressing women and denying free speech. Therefore it's incompatible with democracy. She calls on governments in the West to take a much stonger stand against the intimidating forces of militant Islam. "Freedom is worth dying and fighting for." Hirsi Ali now lives in America, but already another young prophet stood up to take her place in the Dutch polder: Ehsan Jami, a 22-year old Iranian refugee and Social Democrat who calls for nothing less than a revolution in Islam. Daily newspaper Trouw published a quite interesting interview with him.

Jesus has left the building

In Greece I read Paul Vieira's challenging book 'Jesus Has Left the Building'. Paul relates his own journey out of organized religion, and gives some excellent examples of biblical precendents where God is challenging and even destroying the organized religion of Israel (like the times of the exile). Overall it's a highly prophetic book that speaks to the heart of an emerging generation to really be the church where it matters most: right in society.

The good thing is that Paul is not bashing the existing churches, but paints a picture of how Jesus intended his Body to function, and that's a quite effective reformation message. The book will be published in Dutch by next Autumn, and I will write a little foreword or recommendation. As Paul is covering the basics of what I planned to cover in my own book on shift/reformation, I'm rethinking what would be a good angle to take. There's certainly more to say, and stories to tell from a European edge.

Rodney Stark on Early Christianity

Alan Hirsch published a highly interesting interview with Rodney Stark on his weblog. Stark is a sociologist who calls himself an agnostic, but nevertheless wrote the fascinating book 'The Rise of Christianity: How the obscure, marginal Jesus movement became the dominant religious force'. The interview offers many eye-openers, as to how Early Christianity changed the very set-up of society. "What Christianity gave to its converts was nothing less than their humanity," says Stark.

"Among the pagans, no one took care of anyone else except in the tribal way. It’s what we’re seeing today in the Balkans - you take care of your brothers, and you kill everybody else. Christianity told the Greco-Roman world that the definition of 'brother' has got to be a lot broader. There are some things you owe to any living human being."

As I mentioned in my earlier post on Stark, 'The female factor', the Gospel of the Early Church was also highly liberating for women.

Revolutionary life together

I have to admit it's refreshingly uncomfortable to my western mindset and lifestyle - the way Gene Edwards and Dietrich Bonhoeffer describe genuine church life.

In 'Life Together. The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community' Bonhoeffer states that Christian brotherhood is not the same as an extraordinary social experience. "Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize, it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate. It is a spiritual and not a psychic reality." Creating a community on human notions, picking the people you like, is not just creating a dreamworld, it's even a hindrance to genuine community in Christ.

How to cope then with 'difficult' people? "I must meet my brother only as the person that he already is in Christ's eyes," says Bonhoeffer. "Human love constructs its own image of the other person, of what he is and what he should become. It takes the life of the other person into its own hands. Spiritual love recognizes the true image of the other person which he has received from Jesus Christ; the image that Jesus Christ himself embodied and would stamp upon all men."

Living together physically and sharing resources was also a hallmark of the early church in Acts. In 'Revolution. The Story of the Early Church. The First Seventeen Years, 30-47 AD' Gene Edwards paints a picture of the Early Church that's quite alien to our church experience today. Edwards suggests that the 3,000 that started to follow Christ on Pentecost, of which a majority were visitors, did not return home, but stayed in Jerusalem. In this city they developed a revolutionary lifestyle that complety upset the social standards of that day - they sold what they owned, pooled their resources, and lived in community and charity, while sharing Christ and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. We know this of course on a rational level, but not many Jesus followers are living this kind of community today.

"The conforming element in men was dealt a mortal blow," says Edwards. "The very birth of the church smashed all past concepts man had ever held toward 'religion' in any form. This radical new beginning - touched off by living in common - set a very high standard of what it meant 'to be in the church'. It was unorthodox, informal, rambunctious, daring, elastic and glorious. It was a 'corporate experience'." In other words: Christ-centered church life embodied the heavenly reality of the Kingdom of God here and now.

"Look around!" says Edwards. "What is the church made up of? There are (1) twelve apostles, (2) three thousand people, (3) a huge shed, and (4) an awful lot of homes, plus a lot of self-giving and a lot of unleashed joy. This was the church. And Christ was real. He was being experienced."