When is enough enough?

It must be one of the questions that have been asked since the beginning of rational thought. Looking around at the world, the middle-aged Luddite mutters moodily:

“Round wheels? Who needs round wheels?”

or

“Horses? Why are we bothering with those, what is wrong with our oxen?”

And it is the role of every young oik to smile and with a glint in his eye proceed to trounce everyone else with the new technology.

So, dusting off my old-fart jacket and adorning myself with oik-repellent, I prepare myself for the onslaught: Why are we so addicted to new things?

Did you know, for example, that the new Ipod can hold up to 40,000 songs? Does anyone even own 40,000 songs?

A while ago our washing machine broke down. It had multiple programmes and a lifespan of less than 8 years.

We have been living without a washing machine for six months, and experiencing a little of what it is like to live without something we take for granted. It is possible, just difficult and annoying. Not so long ago the same thing happened with our fridge, which is even more difficult to live without.

My grandparents had an two tub model which lasted 30 years and never broke down. There were no programme controls, it was either on or off. What have we really gained by the extra complexity?

Ten years ago, constant access to the internet was barely conceivable for most people. Today it is everywhere.

The Luddites were a radical movement in England in the 18 century. Faced with rapid industrialisation of the textile industry, they saw their livelihoods destroyed, so rebelled and broke the new machinery. The owners and the state reacted fiercely and executed many of the leaders of the movement.

Since then the term has entered the language as a relatively mild form of abuse.

But surely they had a point - if our new technologies adversely affect the weakest of society, they are worthless however much we appreciate and lust after them. If they so insulate us from the realities of life for the poor, to the extent that we cannot really contemplate how we might live without a fridge or a washing machine, something is seriously wrong.

Maybe as well as new-monasticism and emerging church theology, we need Luddite theology. Maybe we need a few less conferences with a few less star attractions who jet from one to the next. Maybe we don’t need to go to worship events to hear what new thing God is planning. Maybe we don’t need more efficient cars - maybe we don’t need cars, period. Maybe we don’t need to try to make the lot of poor producers marginally better by offering them very small subsidies for crops they would never eat - maybe we need to help them learn how to grow the things they actually need and learn to become more satisfied with what we can grow ourselves. Maybe we need to move away from our flickering screens and do more to communicate with people who don’t know how to use a keyboard.

Maybe being radical and prophetic has less to do with new things and ideas and more to do with redeeming and reclaiming old things.

Perhaps it is not enough to stop the violence, to be aware of the pain. Maybe we have to start to deconstruct ourselves, to turn our swords into ploughshares.

Author Bio:: Joe is wondering why.

A Christian Presenter at Pagan Pride!?

Yesterday was the Pagan Pride event in North Andover, MA. I had been invited to give a workshop at the event. Matt the Pirate, and his wife Mary the Goth Theologian, John the Master Dream Interpreter (though he denies it), and The Prof. Carlos Z. joined me for the event.

I hope to develop a team of Christians who can hang out at such events, and actually be good examples - instead of silly, judgmental, and icky. “Icky” is a theological term, you know.

We want to do things like Dream Interpretation, training in Neo-Pagan/Christian relationships, and simple friendship development to show that we can all live in this world together without fighting like cats. Of course, Neo-Pagans and the kind of Christians who like hanging out with me have something in common - we are like cats, herding us remains an impossibility.

Now the day previous I visited one of the stores of a Salem Witch who was one of the presenters at the festival as well. Teri said to me in passing, “Did Carole tell you about the one rule of the workshops? They need to be performed skyclad.” Teri did not flinch a bit when saying this. Neither did I.

“That’s cool.” I replied.

So, the day of the event 5 of us drove out to North Andover from Salem at 7:30 in the morning. We arrived at the event early, and did so purposely. We put our hands to the work of setting up. Our plan was to make ourselves indispensable, which is really just another way of saying that we were going to be servants. We set up tents, we set up the Children’s area, moved picnic benches, set up signs, and Matt the Pirate helped the blacksmith haul anvils and organize the smithy’s area.

Once the vendors were set up, and the people began to arrive, we milled around. I greeted old friends from Salem, and made a few new friends. Matt the Pirate hung out with the Blacksmith; John, Mary, and Carlos got to know the festival, which is a mid-sized Pagan festival with live music, about 20-25 crafters, an early evening ritual, and a dozen workshops from morning to mid-afternoon.

My workshop was from 12:15 to 1:15. We ate pumpernickel bread and cheese, passed out flyers for the workshop, and joined the drum circle during the time between finishing set up, and the workshop.

The description of the workshop was this:

The Circle and The Cross Talk: Re-visioning Pagan/Christian Relationships

Looking back to the Caesars, and to the Burning Times misconceptions and urban myths have had deadly results for both Pagans and Christians. In our own times, though mild in comparison, Pagans have been on the receiving end of the religious persecution. Some have chosen to remain in the broom closet, and others have faced the struggle head on - sometimes to bitter disappointment with family, friends, and work associates. This workshop is designed as a deeper look into the worldview differences between Christian and Neo-Pagan thought with a focus upon deconstructing, and re-visioning some of the beliefs which cause the greatest pain. Come learn to navigate this battlefield of philosophical tension. Topics of frustration to be covered include judgment, conversion, spiritual dissonance, and sexuality.

At 12:05 we made our way to the workshop location. The previous workshop on Greek deities was ending, and we waited for the group to gather. About 20 people arrived, and after the welcome I introduced myself and the rest of the gang.

Strangely, no one was skyclad. Teri had lied to me, and Bev my wife was happier for it.

I gave my credentials for teaching the workshop - I call it Pagan street Cred - I’ve been excommunicated from a denomination for making friends with Pagans. That’s pretty darn good Street Cred.

The workshop looked something like this:

I taught for between 7 and 10 minutes on 4 different subjects, and between each subject I had the class break up into three groups. John the Dream Master led one group, Matt the Pirate led the second group, and Mary the Goth Theologian and The Prof. Carlos Z. led the third group.

My goal was to teach about four basic Christian doctrines, and what caused these particular doctrines to be divisive points between Christians and Pagans. My particular focus was to highlight imbalances in the approaches and theology of many Christians, which caused their behavior and attitudes to be negative and hurtful.

I taught first about Hell and Judgment, and shared the fact that this doctrine ought to be a great equalizing doctrine in evangelical circles, because the belief is that all people are destined for Hell or deserving of it. Instead many Christians are proud of some unique heavenly status they think they have, and instead of finding commonality with struggling humanity they become judgmental.

Then the three groups discussed the point and how they felt about Hell and Judgment. There was laughing, and there was serious dialogue, and there was a mixed combination of joy to be talking about these things openly in a mixed religious group, and concern about the treatment many of the Pagans had received from Christians they knew and loved.

Then we discussed Conversion. I told them I was going to be giving them the inside scoop. Something many Christians did not realize, or if they did they somehow lost sight of it in the midst of their zeal. The point was this: No human can convert you. Conversion only occurs as an interaction between deity and a human.

Then our Christian group leaders had to rotate clockwise to change groups. For some reason they couldn’t quite figure out clockwise initially - evidence that they are not Pagans and don’t normally work in circles. Good thing I did not ask them to rotate deosil. Once they figured it out, the discussion on conversion appeared to be more personal, and filled with stories of pressure Pagans received from Christians.

Thirdly, I taught about Spiritual Dissonance, which is my redefinition of the subject Spiritual Warfare. When I mentioned Spiritual Warfare the group groaned, and understood the ramifications of the term. So we talked about the devil scares of the 1980’s through people like Mike Warnke, and Bob Larson. Then we looked for a more balanced view of the subject from a Christian perspective. My hope was to arm Pagans with sound views of Christianity in order to help them counteract bizarre unloving behavior from wacky Christians.

The group rotated deosil once again, and began to discuss this subject. Of course the problem of evil arose in the groups, and this became a point of discussion.

Last of all we talked about the hottest subject of all - sex. I had the group shout a victory shout because we were going to talk about sex, and they did so raucously. I pointed out that the practice of heterosexual, monogamous, wait-til-marriage sexuality was actually a ritual lifestyle being lived out by Christians who believe that the Church is a Bride to the Son of God, and that our full realization of this union will occur in the second coming. Now we are engaged as it were to Him. Most Christians don’t understand that this ritual lifestyle is a choice of beautiful ritual, and not a harsh law. Because they do not understand this they sound harsh when they discuss this issue.

Once again the Christians turned deosil in the circle, and arrived back in the original group they had led. Then they talked sex with Pagans. This was a hot and wild subject. One group was very serious, another group was light but philosophical, and the third was a bawdy group from Salem (I should have known!) in which The Poor Prof. Carlos Z. was being hit on by my friend a gay Pagan and Mary the Goth Theologian was trying to keep a straight face.

The group ended after this, and we all had a good time. I met someone from the COG who was excited about the workshop, and thought it would be good to have in a COG setting as well. That would be pretty cool actually, and I would love to do that someday perhaps.

I talked with a number of new friends, and they all appreciated the open discussion combined with the attempts to bring peace between the worlds.

Later that day I talked with Teri. She had mentioned the skyclad joke, and the fact that when she mentioned it to Carole, Carole asked, “What did he do?” Teri replied to Carole, “He worked me, and simply said, ‘That’s cool.’” Yep, I did work her. I’m not easily surprised, and I’ve been to enough public Pagan events to know this was not going to be a skyclad event.

Well, it still seems strange to me, but I was able to talk about Hell, Conversion, Spiritual Warfare, and Biblical Sexuality at a Pagan Festival and people loved it. All I can ask myself is, “What the heck have Christians been doing wrong for so long that this has not been able to happen?” Then again I have to remind myself that I have been excommunicated from a middle of the road Pentecostal denomination for doing such things. So, I guess I already know the answer to that question.

Author Bio:: Pastor Phil Wyman lives in Salem, MA. He has been married to his Babe Bev for over 25 years. They have one son who is married and living in Asheville, NC, one greyhound, and a squirrel who leave the basement. He pastors a church in Salem called The Gathering, and they are getting ready for Halloween, which is a month long event in Salem. Wanna join them? It’s a missional blast.

Economic Matters: Socializing the Risk or Capitalizing the Reward?

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Homoemergicus Maximus

Call me homoemergicus maximus. I’m white, 32, and male. And chances are, so are you. We are slightly overweight, own way too many CDs, spend entirely too much time on blogs, and we like to think that we are eccentric.

So, why are we all so similar? Why homoemergicus? Two answers might buy most of the solution, and the third is hard to accept.

A final dilemma may be discouraging.

First, the fact that we have the time to spend on blogs reveals our privileged position in society. White guys on average earn more than any other demographic, and many of these high-income jobs come equipped with internet-ready computers. So we blog. We are also slightly better educated than most other demographics, so we think we have something to blog about. Finally, we are yet in our youths, so we are willing to be risky about what we write and share, more so as males, and more so as members of groups who will help to catch us if we fall.

Second, we are narcissistic. We like ourselves. A lot. And we like other people who are like us. Self-selecting groups often sort out this way. According to the magic that is statistics it can be shown that self-selection occurs even when preferences are very slight. Suppose you have a 51% preference for spending time with homoemergici and a 49% preference for spending time with other folks. Each time you are presented with the option of spending time with either of these two you will choose the homoemergicus. Though your preference is slight, the result is large.

These two reasons are spontaneously emerging in the non-homoemergicus sense. There is nothing anyone can do to stop them. Where there are injustices which prevent other groups from attaining higher education and incomes, we ought to protest and work for justice, but underprivileged groups are also self-selecting, and there is little we can do (short of becoming annoying do-gooders) about it.

Thankfully, there is one area where we can make active improvement, though it is costly. We can sign off and sign up. Homoemergicus tends to have chameleon-like qualities, and changing his environment can vastly adjust his appearance. Consider sitting on your hands and letting someone else comment on a post for a change. Consider limiting your screen-time to a certain amount of time per day. Then get involved somewhere less homogeneous. The ideal location is your local college or university. Seek out international students, you’ll soon be able to impress your friends with your knowledge of world geography (where is Slovakia, anyway?), and you will have the opportunity to make room for the gospel in a land it would have cost you 10 times as much to travel to yourself. Volunteer in the inner city, at a tutoring center, or the boys and girls club. You get the idea. Once the blue computer-screen-induced glow fades from homoemergicus’ face he is well on the road to recovery.

Our homoemergency can be dealt with, to a degree. Unfortunately, there are other impediments to diversity. Those who are not among the privileged class will find it much harder to adopt a pacifist ethic. While many recognize the privilege as the crime, fewer hope that the privilege can be removed. Most believe the only path to justice is expansion of franchises. To reject this strategy as inaugurating of empire leaves the outcast dejected. To this dilemma I find no solution, only God’s sovereignty.

Author Bio:: Nathanael Snow is an Economics Ph.D. student at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA. He worked for eight years at Agape Corner, an inner-city boarding school in Durham, NC. After graduation he plans to develop tools to teach the nexus of Economics, Common Law, and the Christian Ethic.

The Death of Evelyn and the Failure of the Church

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The Man and The Couch

There is a man. And we’re sitting on his back.

Not directly on his back; but the couch we’re on does sit on his back. And since we’re on the couch, we’re sitting on his back.

I’m not sure how he got to where he is. Maybe I put him underneath, maybe you did, maybe someone long ago did. Whoever it was that first made him carry this couch doesn’t matter; we’re still on his back.

Who needs to argue history here?

Maybe there is more then one person carrying the couch we sit on. It could just be this guy though.

However, I’m sure comfortable up here. I really appreciate what that he carries us from here to there. But mostly I forget that he’s down on the ground,

with a couch on his back.

One day someone was missing from the couch. I couldn’t figure out where he went. Then I saw another set of feet by the man who carries our couch. So I decided to jump off and figure out what was going on.

“Why are you down here?” I asked my fellow couch potato.

“Well, while everyone was sleeping I saw this man crying. I couldn’t sleep with this noise, so I decided to find out what was the matter. He told me that every now and then his back really hurt from carrying this couch. Some days he can ignore it pretty well, others not so well. I figured since I haven’t stretched my legs in a while it might be a good to get some exercise, so I decided to help carry the couch. Then I realized that it was a lot of work to carry it and this man’s back must hurt quite a bit. So I stayed here.”

“Does it really hurt that bad?” I asked the man who carries the couch.

“Some days the pain is unbearable. Other days I can ignore it. But most days just fly by like a blur.”

So I decided to stay and help him carry the couch as well. It makes me sad when people cry.

After a few days of carrying the couch I decided that I needed a break. My friend had already gotten back up on the couch to rest a few times.

Why can’t I?

While I was resting upon the couch I told all of my friends of the adventures I had carrying this couch. I told them of the mans plight. And we all came to the conclusion that we must do something.

“Why does there need to be a couch?” A couchling asked. “We shouldn’t burden the man simply by providing an object for our own comfort. We can do away with it and simply sit on him. When we do this, then we will be able to better see the path he walks.”

I found this to be a great idea. We can all be enlightened as to the hardships others go through for our own comfort.

But soon the boniness of the man’s back began to make us all uncomfortable.

“Must I sit here, watching this man toil, it makes me uncomfortable. His back is awfully hard and when we consider it, we really haven’t helped him all that much. Maybe we should build a better couch, a couch that will not harm him so much. Maybe even one that will help him eat better!”

So we did. And we reflected upon the times when we helped carry the load, when we sacrificed our comforts for this man’s journey. We felt proud of ourselves, but soon forgot about the man.

I think of him from time to time. Some of us go down, a few at a time to help him carry the load. Give him new clothes. Even some new shoes from time to time. And we felt good about ourselves.

But all the while, the man continued to stumble on, with a couch upon his back.

Author Bio:: Nate is a Pentecostal who recently realize that he’s living in exile. He occasionally like to play shoegaze, write science fiction, and rant about things he doesn’t quite understand.

Image by David Austria.

Thy Kingdome Come

**The following was inspired in part as I was reading N.T. Wright’s “Surprised by Hope,” a work of theology which is at times quite poetic as well. If you would like, you may consider this equal parts “poem” and “book review.”**

The Kingdom of Heaven has captured my heart
the more I feel it’s power take root
the more I yearn for Beauty and Justice

Today, I thought about buying a building.
something old, abandoned, ugly
and turning it into a castle for the Kingdom
A sanctuary
stain glass replacing iron bars
a hedge of roses instead of the fence
that everyone expects
in this neighborhood…

I want to see a sick person get well again
not so they’ll listen to me
or attend my church
or go to heaven
but so they can know, like I know
the kingdom of heaven is near

I want to be a portal to an alternate universe
a stitch where the fabrics of heaven and earth are sewn close

I want to write the most beautiful words I can imagine
and paint them on a billboard
over ads for beer and cheeseburgers

I want to walk these city streets till all the walls crumble
build porches for all my neighbors
and sit
and talk
about how great the Kingdom is starting to look.

Author Bio:: Ted works for the Kingdom of Heaven in Asunción, Paraguay with his wife Sarah. You can read more about their adventures at their website tedandsarahvoigt.org

Traveler´s City

Everything was new and beautiful. We were free and unattached. A vague itinerary had us wandering through the forests and dunes and lakes of Michigan and Canada, with ice cream shops and backwoods bars as reference points. A half-gallon of organic milk in the cooler, a borrowed tent, and deflating party balloons in the backseat.

Honeymooners.

We had planned to amble along the coast a few hours at a time, alternating between campgrounds and hotels, taking in the idiosyncrasies of small-towns and the slow-paced beauty of state parks and wildlife refuges. We had just bounced off another roadside farmer’s market (you can grow anything in Michigan) and started north on highway 37 towards Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. My Michigander-of-a-wife was graciously putting up with my Hoosier delight in such an abundance of sand and open water.

Someone was walking north on the road. I measured her up quickly – not getting her mail, no flat tire, disheveled, frustrated.

Hitchhiker.

Of course, I maintained my speed. My wife and I both passed a “sorry-mate-if-we-had-a-truck-you-could-ride-in-the-back” look and then stared straight ahead. Gospel swirled through my head. I thought about my God, the one who takes on in the most distressing disguises – the crazy veteran, the poor kid with a swollen belly, the gay high schooler who is everyone’s favorite target. I thought about all those words that slice straight through the layers of excuses, self-protection, and “rational” thought that I cocoon myself inside. An orange sign. Slowing traffic. The urge arose and… a moment of decision.

U-turn.

I explained, “Well, dear, I just thought, ‘Ya know, I’m sick of always living for the next big thing. Waiting for tomorrow. Putting things off. What if we just…”

“I know,” my wife replied. “I was thinking the same thing. Let’s do it.”

Our target was still disheveled, still frustrated. I had a moment of hesitation and thought about the worst-case scenario. But upon seeing her again, I relaxed a little. I don’t remember ever seeing a “Suzanna” on the FBI’s Most Wanted list.

She crawled into the backseat amongst clumsily packed belongings. A real live hitchhiker; this weekend was just full of surprises.

“Sorry about the balloons on the floor,” I apologized. “We just got married.”

For the first time in my life, I was given responsibility for another human being, a petite female goddess I was crazy in love with. What was I thinking? I hadn’t even been hitched for 100 hours. The painted reminder was still fresh on my window - “Keep your hands on the wheel!”.

Introductions and a pause. I teed off first. “Our religious teachings say that you can find God in people in distress, people in need, so we thought we’d help you out.” Jeez, Adam. You don’t have to be a freak about it. I’ve often tried (unsuccessfully and awkwardly) to bridge the gap between Old Time Religion and the New Age, offering something sufficiently orthodox yet still relevant and comprehendible to post-modern man (and woman). My beautifully simple wife cuts through all the crap. She urges me, “Honey, just tell people you’re a Christian. They’ll understand.” That’s what I’m afraid of. I usually settle for something in between, like “follower of Jesus”.

For a few dozen miles I played out knife-attack scenarios in my mind (dodge blade! swerve car! detain while stunned!) while my wife craned her neck around to attempt eye contact, listening politely. We heard tales of failed automobiles, knife-happy doctors, and unpaid bills - basically drawing of the short straw day after day for an entire lifetime. Who knew that Michiganders were so self-righteous and inhospitable? Not like those humble folk in the Southwest. Our traveler ensured us that hitching a ride in Flagstaff was as easy as ordering lunch. You’d be hard-pressed to get a ride in Michigan, that was for dang sure.

I began to probe a little deeper, wondering where she actually needed to be taken. It turned out that she needed to get to “Traveler’s City” to get money wired from her step-brother-in-law (once removed). I looked at the green highway sign: “Traverse City: 43″. I figured that we could drop her there and leave before she realized that she had not indeed arrived at Traveler’s City. I also figured out that it was about 30 miles out of my way and that I had an appointment with the dunes. But the voices wouldn’t leave me alone: If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. Give to the one who asks you. Oh, God - why? But then I looked at her in the rear view mirror and realized that she really might not get another ride today and that modern humans survive much better in the city than in the woods. I tried to calm my breathing. Don’t think of gas, don’t think of time, don’t think of honeymoon…

As we approached our destination, it turned out that she wanted to visit the hospital for her sore hips, which explained her constant shifting in the backseat. Those blue “H” signs along the road that you never really think about actually do lead you to a hospital. At her insistence, we arrived at the door labeled “emergency”, another first for me and what I assumed to be a weekly ritual for her. A young man emerged with a wheel chair before I even put the car into park. Our guest exited the car after requesting some money to hold her over and, after a bargaining session, settling for a few pieces from our food cache. I drove away before medical personnel could ask any questions or mystery lady could change her mind. The Parable of the Good Samaritan knocked: Look after him, and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have. I sighed, my muscles relaxed, and I pointed the car toward the shoreline.

I hadn’t planned on any meaningful interactions with strangers on my honeymoon. I didn’t particularly like our visitor or care to hear her tall tales, and she probably didn’t enjoy traveling through Michigan. But we did share a few miles together - spontaneous, nervous, and new. It made my flawless vacation a little dirty, but also a little more real. I probably won’t ever see her again, but if I ever do find Traveler’s City, I’ll be sure to look her up.

Author Bio:: Adam and his wife are currently funemployed and are hunkered down with a few brave Word Made Flesh gringos in El Alto, Bolivia. They generally steer clear of hitchhikers, gringo or otherwise.

3 Openings at Radical Living in New York City

Radical Living–a new monastic community in New York City–has rooms for 1 female and 2 males. They are, from what I’ve heard, one of the more “solid” new communities out there, so this would be a great opportunity for those of you interested in living in intentional community.

Here’s some info about Radical Living:

Radical Living is an intentional community located in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. They are a multicultural, intergenerational and non-denominational community of artists, workers and students that includes single men and women, a married couple, three dogs and a cat.

There are three houses–Hart House, Marcy House and Pulaski House–connected to Radical Living. They are located within one block from each other and function as one community with 17 members (not counting the dogs and cat).

In essence they are dedicated to living a meditative, prophetic and prayerful life, centered in Christ, engaged in their neighborhood, concerned with social justice, and led by the Holy Spirit.

Please call either 917.459.3813 or 212.444.2701, or email radicalnyc@gmail.com to request an application.

Striving for a Just Peace without the Myth of Redemptive Violence

The gospel of Jesus Christ is so central to the Christian faith that no other alleged “gospel” can ever be acceptable. No other person, agenda, or story can compete with the gospel of Jesus for saving the world from our rebellion and just punishment. The good news that Jesus lives, reigns, and saves is a specifically religious proclamation, but the gospel permeates and affects Christian belief in all areas of life, public and private.

It is tempting to rest our Christian hopes for realizing God’s kingdom on a particular political ideology or strategy. In other words, while seeking to fulfill our responsibility to be engaged politically, Christians can unwittingly come to trust in a political, kingdom-promising “gospel” that proclaims how the world’s salvation from wrong, evil, and its cursed condition can be achieved. While being faithfully politically engaged, corporately and individually Christians can become co-opted into being politically confined within a particular party or agenda.

One way to correct that temptation is to stay ever mindful of the Christian Church’s fundamentally international identity. Central to the good news of Jesus is the truth that all kinds of people belong to his people: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you all are one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). No aspect of Christians’ multifaceted identities is deeper than that of being “one in Christ Jesus” – whereby our Jewish-Greek national-ethnic loyalties are trumped by our transnational Christian unity. Christians of all nationalities should have their politics informed by the viewpoints of others around the world, thus checking the ever-present sinkhole into nationalistic provincialism that affects all people everywhere.

The same story that inspired Roman imperialism is the false gospel we are concerned about today; it is what theologian Walter Wink has called the “myth of redemptive violence.” Expressed in the ancient Babylonian creation story called the Enuma Elish, this myth says that the universe and human beings are the leftovers of a bloody war among the gods. Creation itself is a violent process, and history is naturally the violent struggle to bring order into the realm of chaos. Like the Babylonian Empire before it and many others since, the Roman Empire spread with this violent but glorious message of hope for humanity. The Roman Caesars claimed to be gods and saviors of the ancient world because their military conquests brought the good news of Roman order into the realm of barbarian chaos. Paradise lay within the boarders of the Pax Romana, or the Roman Peace, while the war between good and evil continued to rage along the frontiers.

Christian mission has to pursue contextualization while avoiding syncretism. On the one hand, contextualization is the retelling of the Christian story in the language of a particular culture’s false gospel; for example, saying that Jesus is Lord instead of Caesar or saying that God is defeating evil through the cross rather than through human war. Syncretism, on the other hand, holds on to the original false gospel while adding a gloss of Christian language and symbols on top.

Writing in the early 1800s during the development of German nationalism, G. F. Hegel used Christian language to express ideas that were patently un-Christian. He fashioned his philosophy of history after the Creation-Fall-Redemption structure of the Christian story while completely identifying God with the historical process itself. As a variation on the myth of redemptive violence, Hegel identified violent struggle between competing political ideologies as the driving force in human progress. When we hear academics today call liberal democracy the “end of history,” or when we hear politicians say that the United States has a “calling from history” or that “the war on terror is the defining ideological struggle of our generation,” Hegel is the quiet elephant sitting in the corner.

One major challenge for Christians in the United States today (especially theologically conservative evangelicals like the authors of this article) arises from the fact that two of many Americans’ most valued political ideologies also tell violent grand narratives, Social Progressivism and Neo-Conservatism. The older one, Social Progressivism, developed in competition with Communism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The newer one, Neo-Conservatism, grew out of Liberal Anti-Communism in the 1970s during a resurgence of interest in Hegel’s philosophy of history. Each of these political ideologies envisions a utopian future brought into the present by efficient violence and skillful use of less violent, but still coercive, soft power.

Over the past few years and across the U. S. political spectrum, clever speech writers and political consultants have decided to use Christian language to communicate their secular ideologies. One political party has begun trying to use “the language of faith” to win back religious voters. The other major party, which has been contextualizing its political vision into Christian language for several decades now, has recently included in its rationale for two wars religious rhetoric claiming that “History” or “Providence” (depending on the audience) has called our nation to vanquish evil. Our president and his speechwriters have taken words from the Bible about Jesus and applied them to American idealism: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness will not overcome it.” Neo-conservative intellectuals and policy makers are talking about a Pax Americana and arguing that the U.S. military is “the greatest force for freedom the world has ever known.” They believe that violent American power, wisely directed at establishing democratic governments sympathetic to the interests of a globalized free market, has the best chance of bringing order to a barbaric and chaotic world of terror.

Sincere, Bible-believing Christians often will disagree about particular political issues, including how most effectively the United States should fight hostile terrorism in a post-9/11 world. Even so, when narrowly focused narratives about the political process morph into all-encompassing stories about human development and restoration, they have gone too far. Grand political ideologies about the violent unfolding of human history are false gospels, plain and simple.

We see two ways that these false gospels have sometimes become synchronized with American Christianity. In some communities, political ideology is brought into the church and completely melted with Christian language and theology into a single thought system. But syncretism also happens when political ideology gets artificially sealed off from the rest of our theology and assigned to the task of political, social, and material salvation. We must beware our tendencies to keep Jesus as our spiritual savior while making the glorious violence of the U.S. military our hope for a better world. The only way to confront this compartmentalized form of syncretism is to do what Paul does in his letter to the Colossians: announce that Jesus is Lord Redeemer of all areas of life, including all powers and authorities, and that his victory over the forces of evil happened on the cross and in his resurrection.

In general, conservative evangelicals in the U. S. are behind when it comes to identifying and publicly denouncing the myth of redemptive violence in our culture’s political ideologies. Why have we been so slow? We have been slow because this terminology first developed among liberal theologians like Walter Wink in the early Nineties. We have been slow because much of the impetus for denouncing the myth of redemptive violence has come from the Sojourner’s movement and from others who identify themselves as theologically evangelical and conservative but politically progressive, a scary label for many of us. We have been slow because the helpful concepts criticizing the redemptive violence myth have been inappropriately used to criticize God’s violent judgment upon sin and the sacrificial atonement Jesus offered to his Father on the cross. Finally, our natural alliance with U. S. socio-economic-political power (domestically as well as internationally) might cause us to lose a great deal in terms of our socio-economic-political comforts if we criticize the ideology that helps to underpin that power.

Because we think in terms of redemptive history and believe that Jesus is Lord over all of life, we should be the first Christians to protest when violent political ideologies are expressed with the language and structure of Creation-Fall-Redemption-Consummation. We should be the first to protest when politicians use biblical language about Jesus to describe American ideals spreading violently around the world. And we should be the first to distinguish carefully between the judgment of God, which is appropriately violent, and eschatological progress in this age between the two advents of Christ, which has nothing to do with the violent advance of benevolent empires or political ideologies. In the Bible, violence is punishment, not progress.

Embracing God’s mission around the world means opposing false gospels that compete against Jesus’ way of bringing God’s reign to earth. Like all human beings, Christians will always have hopes for the future, political and otherwise, and we might communicate those hopes in the form of stories. But we shouldn’t pair Jesus up with a political ideology and teach that each is sovereign over their respective realms. Some of us might continue to identifying ourselves as progressive or conservative on Election Day, but without a syncretistic gospel, we might not accuse Christians from another political persuasion of working for the Enemy.

A just peace is a goal toward which all Christians can gladly aspire. We will disagree on how to move toward that goal, especially regarding political-military issues. Surely, though, we can agree that espousing military violence as the primary means by which a just peace will be achieved is a false gospel. Jesus reigns, and he is returning. May that gospel shape the contours of our hopes and dreams for God’s redemption of his world.

Author Bio:: Bill McLellan is a senior at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, MO.

Dr. J. Nelson Jennings is a professor of world mission at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, MO.

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