1. The first essay makes a convincing point. I’m one of those who believes that Christianity will never be able to dominate a culture. I also believe that nations can’t be Christian. I have little quarrel with anything Hunter says in this first essay.
2. What Hunter says about ressentiment in the second essay really rings true with me. I can see it in myself. I am so sick of the Christian Right and their unChristian tactics that I find myself naturally gravitating to the other views as a reaction. I’m not around a lot of people who push the views of the Christian Left, so that may be part of it. But even as I try to escape from politics, I find myself continually correcting mistruths and misconstructions, while trying to find the right attitudes that we all should have in such discussions.
3. As I’ve said before, I think Hunter works too hard at including the neo-Anabaptists in his critiques. Since his final views would be described as neo-Anabaptist by many, Hunter has a hard time separating his arguments from their views. Much of it ends up being semantic, like his discussion of power.

The third essay is excellent, and we’ll begin analyzing it tomorrow.

We’re also following two marching bands this year. Daniel is in the Big Purple at ACU, while Andrea continues in the Awesome Cooper Band at her high school.

It’s a nice time of the year.

So here’s to the Longhorns, Spurs, Cowboys, Wildcats and Cougars… may it be a great season.

Only by narrowing an understanding of power to political or economic power can one imagine giving up power and becoming “powerless.” The creation mandate is a mandate to use power in the world in ways that reflect God’s intentions. Thus, the question for the church is not about choosing between power and powerlessness, but rather, how will the church and its people use the power that they have.

The church has two essential tasks. The first is to disentangle the life and identity of the church from the life and identity of American society. The second task is for the church and for Christian believers to decouple the “public” from the “political.” The way of Christ differs. His way operated in complete obedience to God the Father, it repudiated the symbolic trappings of elitism, it manifest compassion concretely out of calling and vocation, and it served the good of all and not just the good of the community of faith.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

The first part of this chapter is one of the weakest links in all of Hunter’s arguments. He sets out to describe why power can’t be separated from human experience, then states that the reason is because anthropology has shown that power can’t be separated from human experience. Oops. Resorting to circular reasoning is one of the surest signs of a weak argument. Hunter then defines power so broadly that it encompasses all human interaction. To rephrase a line from the movie The Incredibles, when everything is power, nothing is.

Power can be rejected. People can refuse to hold power over others. As Todd said in the comment section of the last post, one can seek influence rather than dominion. Hunter could have left this section out without distracting from his argument; in fact, his work would have been much stronger had he done so. Apparently he follows this tangent to try and find something to use against the Neo-Anabaptists.

Hunter then states three facts about power:

1. Power tends to become an end in itself. “Even voluntary organizations protect their organizational interests against the interests and needs of the very members they are supposed to serve.” (p. 179)
2. Power always generates its own resistances. “Even the weak possess the power to challenge, subvert, destabilize and oppose.” (p. 179)
3. Power always seems to carry with it unintended consequences.

As the article begins to address power and theology, the Neo-Anabaptists come under fire. Hunter does make an important concession when he says, “there is subtlety, nuance and range in the theological positions of neo-Anabaptism for which a hurried summary cannot do justice.” (p. 180) This can explain some of the discrepancies commenters have pointed out thus far.

Hunter again argues that Neo-Anabaptism uses “a truncated theory of power,” while I would argue that Hunter’s definition is so broad as to be virtually useless in a discussion of theology, politics and power. When he says that “every grammar and every narrative is an imposition,” (p. 182) his desire to condemn all standard viewpoints has led him to hyperbole.

However, some of his arguments about Christians necessarily participating with the powers of this world are valid. The challenge for Christians is rightly defined as how to be in the world and not of the world. Hunter advocates the use of what he calls a postpolitical witness in the world. To achieve this, two things must be done. First, “Christians must disentangle the life and identity of the church from the life and identity of American society.” (p. 184) As Hunter points out, the way that Christianity has embraced the American political system is merely an outgrowth of the way believers have uncritically immersed themselves in American culture.

The second task is to separate what is public from that which is political. As Hunter explains, politics is a simplification of social life, and society is always much broader than the political arena. He states, “Politics is just one way to engage the world and, arguably, not the highest, best, most effective, nor most humane way to do so.” (p. 185) I’m actually a bit surprised that Hunter doesn’t do with the word “politics” what he does with the word “power,” for it would be easy to redefine both words to encompass all human social interaction. This time, however, he resists the temptation, probably because it wouldn’t advance his argument.

So what kind of “power” does Hunter think that Christians should be seeking? Well, the kind of power that isn’t really power. He says that this “power” has four characteristics:

1. It is derived from complete intimacy and submission to the Father.
2. It rejects status, reputation and privilege.
3. It is motivated by love for God and love for fellow man.
4. It is completely noncoercive toward outsiders.

(If you’re keeping score at home, this is what we mere mortals call “powerlessness”… but I guess I’ve voiced my disagreement enough)

The third essay will explore what it means to live out the model of power we learn from Christ.

Politics has become a “social imaginary” that defines the horizon of understanding and the parameters for action. What is never challenged is the proclivity to think of the Christian faith and its engagements with culture in political terms. For all, the public has been conflated with the political. But the ressentiment that marks the way they operate makes it clear that a crucial part of what motivates politics is a will to dominate. However, for politics to be about more than power, it depends upon a realm that is independent of the political process. The deepest irony is that the Christian faith has the possibility of autonomous institutions and practices that could be a source of ideals and values that could elevate politics to more than a quest for power. Instead, by nurturing its resentments, they become functional Nietzcheans, participating in the very cultural breakdown they so ardently strive to resist.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

“It is not an exaggeration to conclude that the public witness of the church today has become a political witness…” (p. 169) Hunter starts with this assertion, then quickly moves to “So what?”

The first problem is the fact that the state can’t solve all human problems. Laws reflect values, but, as Hunter explains, they “cannot generate values, or instill values, or settle the conflict over values.” (p. 171) The belief that the state can truly address the principal concerns of society is an illusion.

The second problem is a series of ironies:

• Politics is only about power unless it can depend on a sphere that is independent. Values have to be more than political slogans, but Christians have done more to politicize values over the last half century than any other group in society.
• The political activity of Christians has been counterproductive to the goals they seek to obtain. Hunter says, “But the consequence of the whole-hearted and uncritical embrace of politics by Christians has been… to reduce Christian faith to a political ideology…” (p. 172)
• Political participation often becomes an avoidance of responsibility. In Hunter’s words, “It is… much easier to vote for a politician who champions child welfare than to adopt a baby born in poverty…” (p. 172)

The final problem is the conformity of the church to “the spirt of the age,” the making of politics the church’s principal witness to the world. Christians did not create the present political culture, but they have become full participants in it. When Christians build their identity on the resentment and hostility that is today’s political arena, they are accentuating the things that separate them from non-Christians. They are contributing to the very cultural breakdown they are protesting against.

The mythic ideal that animates the neo-Anabaptist position is the ideal of true and authentic New Testament Christianity and the primitive church of the apostolic age. Constantinianism is a multifaceted heresy that surfaced and resurfaced throughout history. The archetype of neo-Constantinianism is the founding of the American republic, which has a strong view of the church and a separatist impulse. While the neo-Anabaptists attempt to reject it, they are also defined and depend upon it.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

The Christian Left and the Neo-Anabaptists share several characteristics: they tend to reject undiluted capitalism, they tend to be from the upper classes socio-economically, and they reject the discourse of the Christian Right. There aren’t a lot of Neo-Anabaptists in the United States, but the movement has a growing appeal among the younger generations.

Neo-Anabaptists seek a return to the pure Christianity of the New Testament church. (Could that be why so many within my movement are drawn to this viewpoint?—Tim) Part of the restoration spirit of the original Anabaptists was a rejection of infant baptism, insisting on adult baptism (hence the name of the movement). Anabaptist teaching continues in small groups like the Quakers, the Mennonites, etc. Neo-Anabaptists have adopted many of the teachings, but come from a broad range of Christian groups.

The Edict of Constantine is seen as one of the historical low points, the moment when the church fully sold herself to the State. The church embraced the powers of this world, with their violence and war. An ethic of coercion and power became common within Christianity. Thus the Neo-Anabaptists consider that the greatest harm to the church was done by the church itself. Their ressentiment focuses on this blending of church and State.

According to Hunter, the goal of the Neo-Anabaptists is “to lead theology and the church to a genuinely postsecular self-understanding.” (p. 160, emphasis Hunter’s) They emphasize the sharp contrast between the church and the world. They see worship as the central calling of Christianity.

Hunter points out that the Neo-Anabaptists, despite claiming to reject the systems of this world, have adopted the language of politics, speaking time and again of “the politics of Jesus.” Like the other two groups mentioned, Neo-Anabaptists make no distinction between the public and the political.

Hunter’s principal accusation against the Neo-Anabaptists is that they define themselves in terms of the very system they reject. More than standing for something, they stand against something. By using political terms, they themselves become political.

Progressives have always been animated by the myth of equality and community and therefore see history as an ongoing struggle to realize these ideals. The key word in the progressive lexicon is justice. The biblical tradition that Christian progressives appeal to is the prophetic tradition in its condemnation of the wealthy for their abuse of the poor, the weak, and the marginalized. However, in its commitment to social change through politics and politically oriented social movements, in its conflation of the public with the political, in its own selective use of Scripture to justify political interests, and in its confusion of theology with national interests and identity, the Christian Left imitates the Christian Right.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

Within the U.S., the Christian Left has not been particularly strong, at least compared with its overseas success in movements like liberation theology. Inside the U.S., politically progressive Christians were principally found within the mainline denominations, although there is now a growing number of evangelicals that align themselves with the political left.

Whereas conservatives are angry over the harm done to their nation, progressives focus on the harm done to the weak and disadvantaged. They show great hostility toward the leaders of the Christian Right, feeling that these men have hijacked the Christian faith. Not only that, but those of the Christian Left feel that the Christian Right has severely damaged their country through their actions. The ressentiment of the Left is not directed toward non-Christians but toward the Christian Right.

The Christian Left also has its own quest for power, first for “reclaiming the Christian faith,” then spreading into the political arena. Though the Christian Left often claims to be non-partisan, their opposition to the Right typically leads them to support the agenda of the Democratic party, and many progressives, in fact, are active within that party.

The grand irony is that, in opposing the Christian Right, the Christian Left ends up using the same methods of their opponents. As Hunter says at the end of this chapter: “The political goals are different, but the realpolitik is, in essence, identical to the long-standing instrumentalization of the Christian conservative constituency by the Republican party—control over the power of the State.” (p. 149)

Here’s the abstract of the second essay chapter 3 “The Christian Right” from Hunter’s website:

Politically conservative Christians are animate by a mythic ideal concerned with the “right-ordering” of society. They want the world in which they live to reflect their own likeness. A legacy of a Christian origin is understood as providing a sense of ownership over America and “radical secularists” have taken this away. The effect is harming to America, and people of faith, marginalizing them in public life. Their response has been one of political engagement, often conflating Christian faith and national identity in the political imagination.

There are changes occurring among the Religious Right. However, though the tactics have expanded to include worldview and culture, the logic at work—that America has been taken over by secularists, that it is time to “take back the culture” for Christ—is identical to the longstanding approach of the Christian Right. This is because the underlying myth that defines their goals and strategy of action has not changed.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

This chapter is full of an amazing number of quotes (130 footnotes in this chapter alone!), quotes from Focus on the Family, American Values, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Family Research Council, Christian Coalition, etc. As Hunter says, “the tone is as important as the content” (p. 112), so the large number of quotes is important.

In the quotes we can clearly see the two elements mentioned in the last chapter, the quest for power and the sense of ressentiment. He outlines the Christian Right’s interpretation of history, their fear and anger at “what they’ve done to us,” and how these feelings motivate them to action. There is a two-pronged call: prayer and action, and action invariably refers to political activity.

The Conservative Right places a great amount of hope in politics, expressing a clear desire for dominance, a controlling influence over the government. The logic is simple: America has been taken over by secularists and the main duty of Christians is to acquire and use political power to revert the situation.

Power now does the work that culture used to do. This is seen in the tendency toward the politicization of nearly everything. Politicization is most visibly manifested in the role ideology has come to play in public life, the well-established predisposition to interpret all of public life through the filter of partisan beliefs, values, ideals, and attachments. As a consequence, we find it difficult to think in ways to address public problems or issues in any way that is not political.

Politicization means that the final arbiter within most of social life is the coercive power of the state. Our times amply demonstrate that it is far easier to force one’s will upon others through legal and political means than it is to persuade them or negotiate compromise with them. What adds pathos to this situation is the presence of ressentiment, defined by a combination of anger, envy, hate, rage, and revenge.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

This chapter describes what Hunter calls “the politicization of everything.” The state has become the principal framework through which we understand everything. The language of politics shapes our understanding of our lives, our purposes and even ourselves. People are known publicly as pro-lifers or pro-choicers, liberal or conservative, Democratic or Republican, traditionalist or progressive. We even apply many of these political terms to our religious views, defining religion in terms of politics instead of vice versa.

We also have come to view political solutions as the only viable ones for public problems. That’s why holding power seems to be so important to us, since we see this power as the only way to have a voice regarding social life.

Adding depth to this situation is what Nietzsche called ressentiment. It is a combination of anger, envy and revenge as a political motivation. It is grounded in a sense of entitlement and a belief that one has been wronged. Hunter doesn’t claim that everyone is power-hungry and resentment-filled; he does say that these are the dominant forces driving our political culture today.

Faith has become just as politicized as everything else. Outsiders view Christians as being very political, and Christians describe themselves in political terms. Hunter will discuss the three dominant political positions in American Christianity: Conservative, Progressive and Neo-Anabaptist. That will take place over the next few chapters.

When faith and its culture flourish, it does so, in part, because it operates with an implicit view of power in its proper place. When faith and its culture deteriorate, it does so, in part, because it operates with a view of power that is corrupt.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

The second essay will look at how power is understood and practiced in today’s America. Hunter will especially focus on the church’s relationship to this power. The blunt truth is that the church has allowed the world to define power and to dictate how it is gained and used.

What we need is a new understanding of power, which is what Hunter will seek to present in this essay.

Populism is organic to American Christianity, yet on the other hand, populism is, in some ways, at odds with what we know about the most historically significant dynamics of world-changing. In other words, there is an unavoidable tension between pursuing excellence and the social consequences of its achievement; between leadership and elitism that all too often comes from it. The antidotes to “seizing power” in a new way is a better understanding of “faithful presence.”

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

Yes, Hunter does like to use big words, something I’m not a fan of. I still argue that the true scholar is the one who can express deep thoughts in simple terms. Still, Hunter has some things to say, if you dig through the excess syllables.

In this chapter, which closes the first of the three essays that make up this book, Hunter returns to the concept of the creation mandate, which he discussed in chapter one. He maintains that a proper understanding of the creation mandate leads us to see that Christianity isn’t about changing the world at all. He says that

contemporary Christian understandings of power and politics are a large part of what has made contemporary Christianity in America appalling, irrelevant, and ineffective—part and parcel of the worst elements of our late modern culture today… (p.95)

(Yeah, I stood up and applauded at that one.) Christians are to reject the entire idea of “seizing power,” focusing on what Hunter calls “a faithful presence” (topic to be explained more fully in the third essay). Social theory, which explains how the world is changed, goes in the opposite direction of good theology.
What the church needs to seek, rather than power, is “faithful presence in all areas of life.” Again, that will be explained more fully in the third essay.

So that’s the gist of Essay #1. Hunter describes how the world is changed, then explains that Christians can’t be about changing the world without changing their mission first. Faithfulness to the cause of Christ means rejecting the idea of “winning the culture war,” “taking our nation back,” or any of the other slogans so popular over the last few decades.

What do you think? Take some time to read the summary of all seven chapters, then tell me if you agree with Hunter’s conclusions.

The actual vitality of American Christianity’s cultural capital today resides almost exclusively among average people in the pew rather than those in leadership, on the periphery not the center of cultural production, in tastes that run to the popular rather than the exceptional, the middle brow rather than the high brow, and almost always toward the practical as opposed to the theoretical or the imaginative. The collective impact of the Christian community on the nature and direction of the culture itself is negligible. They have been absent from the arenas in which the greatest influence in culture is exerted.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

Hunter looks at spheres of influence and Christian presence in those spheres. He grants that Christians have been actively pursuing a presence in politics. In the realm of economics, he finds that Christian influence is greatest in small and mid-sized businesses; there is little Christian influence on the leadership of American capitalism.

The author then turns his focus to what he calls culture. He finds the use of Christian funds to be lacking; little money is invested in developing Christian intellectuals, social innovators or artists. Christian cultural artifacts are being produced but they are almost exclusively designed for Christian consumption. What is produced tends to be marginalized, rather than mainstream, and populist, rather than innovative. They are not the kind of works that impact the culture at large.

Even more critically, Hunter states, Christians are absent from the halls of cultural power. He lays out a cultural matrix, with headings of knowledge, morality and aesthetics, and he finds that Christians are not among the elite cultural players in any of those areas.

All of this seems to indicate, Hunter argues, that Christianity is a weak culture within the larger cultural spectrum. Two principal causes of this are fragmentation within the Christian movement and widespread acculturation by Christians in America. The result of all of this, according to the book, is “the idea that American Christianity could influence the larger culture in ways that are healthy and humane is, for the time being, doubtful.” (p.92)

Do you agree with Hunter’s assessment?

The alternative view of cultural change that assigns roles not only to ideas but also to elites, networks, technology, and new institutions, provides a much better account of the growth in plausibility and popularity of these important cultural developments. This is the evidence of history—particularly clear in an overview of key moments in church history and the rise of the Enlightenment and its various manifestations. Change in culture or civilization simply does not occur when there is change in the beliefs and values in the hearts and minds of ordinary people or in the creation of mere artifacts.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

OK, I’ll admit it. This chapter bothered me. Again, looking back, I can see that Hunter wasn’t really advocating what he was describing, he was merely reporting what had happened. In his description of the spread of Christianity, he in no way shows how the world changed the church even as the church was changing the world. In later essays, he’ll make it clear that that very thing is inevitable; you are always changed in some way by the very thing you seek to change. This especially applies to the church when it tries to use the ways of the world to change the world.

Getting back to the book, Hunter in this chapter traces key moments in church history and shows how the changes brought about at those times were top-down, institutionally-driven changes, rather than “grassroots” movements. Changes in beliefs and values don’t bring about culture change, nor does the production of artifacts (books, movies, etc.). As Hunter states, “ideas can have revolutionary and world-changing consequences and yet they appear to do so only when the kinds of structural conditions described here are in place.” (p. 78)

In the end, this chapter merely provides the historical evidence to back up the propositions of the last chapter.

Here’s the abstract of chapter 4 “An Alternative View of Culture and Cultural Change” from Hunter’s website:

Ideas do have consequences in history, yet not because those ideas are inherently truthful or obviously correct but rather because of the ways they are embedded in very powerful institutions, networks, interests, and symbols. Cultures are very resistant to change, but they do change under specific conditions.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

This chapter centers around 11 propositions, seven on culture and four on cultural change. The propositions are:

1. Culture is a system of truth claims and moral obligations
2. Culture is a product of history
3. Culture is intrinsically dialectical
4. Culture is a resource and a form of power
5. Cultural production and symbolic power are stratified in a fairly rigid structure of “center” and “periphery”
6. Culture is generated within networks
7. Culture is neither autonomous nor fully coherent
8. Cultures change from the top down, rarely from the bottom up
9. Change is typically initiated by elites who are outside of the centermost positions of prestige
10. World-changing is most concentrated when the networks of elites and the institutions they lead overlap
11. Cultures change, but rarely if ever without a fight

The chapter ends with the statement:

Christians will not engage the culture effectively, much less hope to change it, without attention to the factors here.

When first reading, I’m a little baffled at this point. Hunter still sounds like he’s advocating that Christians set out to change the world, yet the means he’s suggesting don’t fit with what I understand to be the Christian way. Actually, Hunter is merely laying a roadmap to proper engagement of culture, but that will only be clear (at least to me) at a later point in the book.

So what do you think of Hunter’s propositions?

Here’s the abstract of chapter 3 “The Failure of the Common View” from Hunter’s website:

If cultures were simply a matter of hearts and minds, then the influence of various minorities—whoever they are and whatever that may be—would be relatively insignificant. But they are not. The real problem of this working theory of culture and cultural change and the strategies that derive from it is idealism—that something non-physical is the primary reality. Idealism has three features in this view: ideas, individualism, and pietism. However, idealism misconstrues agency; underplays the importance of history; ignores the way culture is generated, coordinated, and organized; and imputes a logic and rationality to culture. Every strategy and tactic for changing the world that is based upon this working theory of culture and cultural change will fail—not most of these strategies, but all.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

In this chapter, Hunter talks about the apparent problem, the one articulated by “world change” advocates. This apparent problem has two parts: (1) Christians aren’t fervent enough; (2) There aren’t enough Christians who really embrace God’s call. Hunter argues that the real idea is what he calls “idealism,” the concept that what is real is the non-physical. The material world exists but what has “greater ontological significance” are ideas. To illustrate this concept, Hunter quotes Charles Colson as saying, “history is little more than the recording of the rise and fall of the great ideas—the worldviews—that form our values and move us to act.” According to Hunter, this is the belief of most American Christians.

Hunter argues that this fails to take into account the material realities that drive culture. It ignores the “institutional nature of culture” and overlooks the fact that structure is “embedded in structures of power.” (p. 27)

In a coda, this chapter looks at Andy Crouch’s teachings about “culture as artifact,” culture being defined by the goods it produces. Hunter admits that this view overcomes the dualism of the primary view, but it doesn’t recognize the structures holding culture up.

Both of these views, idealism and “culture as artifact” focus on the individual, rather than the church. Hunter insists that there must be an alternative view. That view will be expressed in later chapters.

Here’s the abstract of chapter 2 “Culture: The Common View” from Hunter’s website:

The “common view” is that culture is made up of the accumulation of values held by the majority of people and the choices made on the basis of those values. If a culture is good, it is because the good values embraced by individuals lead to good choices. If people’s hearts and minds are converted, they will have the right values, they will make the right choices and culture will change in turn. Common View Summary: 1) Real change is individual, 2) Cultural changed can be willed into being, and 3) Change is democratic—from the bottom-up by ordinary citizens.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

The style of this chapter is quite interesting. You go through the whole chapter with Hunter making a case for this view, presenting the evidence to support, quoting from a wide range of religious leaders. In the next-to-the-last paragraph, Hunter says:

At the end of the day, the message is clear: even if not in the lofty realms of political life that he was called to, you too can be a Wilberforce. … If you have the courage and hold to the right values and if you think Christianly with an adequate Christian worldview, you too can change the world. (To Change The World, pp.16-17)

Then he drops the bombshell:

This account is almost wholly mistaken. (p. 17)

I’ll admit, the last sentence came as quite a relief. I mean, on the one hand, I understand the importance of worldview and its role in culture. Yet so much of what Hunter seemed to be advocating was the “rah, rah, let’s make this nation Christian again” rhetoric that mixes spirituality with nationalism. My interest in the book rose as I realized Hunter was not going to repeat the usual mantras of Americanized Christianity.

Little did I know that Hunter had in store several more roller coasters of expectations for his unsuspecting readers.

I know it’s early on to react to much of what Hunter is saying (since he’s mainly presenting views he doesn’t agree with), but I’d like to know if I’ve explained his point well enough for you to see what he’s saying. Feel free to ask questions. I’ll do my best to answer according to the content of the book, not just my own ideas.

]]> http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?feed=rss2&p=3637 2 http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3637 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheKitchen/~3/_-d32-LBoXM/ http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3630#comments Mon, 16 Aug 2010 13:00:25 +0000 Tim Archer http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3630 Continue reading →]]> On Friday, I gave an overview of James Davison Hunter’s To Change The World. I want to go through Hunter’s material chapter by chapter over the next few weeks. My primary reason for this is purely selfish… I want to use some of this material in the future, and this is a good way to force myself to analyze it and preserve the important parts.

However, I also believe in slow cooking here in the Kitchen, so this step by step process will help us all to be able to comment on Hunter’s thoughts as we go along. To get us started, let me quote the abstract of Chapter 1 “The Christian Faith and the Task of World-Changing” from the author’s website:

Human beings are, by divine intent and their very nature, world-makers. People fulfill their individual and collective destiny in the art, music, literature, commerce, law, and scholarship they cultivate, the relationships they build, and in the institutions they develop—the families, churches, associations, communities they live in and sustain—as they reflect the good of God and His designs for flourishing.

Hunter contends that the dominant ways of thinking about culture and cultural change are flawed, for they are based upon both specious social science and problematic theology. The model upon which various strategies are based not only does not work, but it cannot work. On the basis of this working theory, Christians cannot “change the world” in a way that they, even in their diversity, desire.

http://jamesdavisonhunter.com/to-change-the-world/chapter-abstracts/

This is a short chapter. (To be honest, the abstract seems disproportionately long). The chapter begins with a reference to creation and to the mandate given in Genesis 2:15—“The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” Hunter says that the two main Hebrew verbs in this sentence mean (1) work, nurture, sustain, husband; and (2) safeguard, preserve, care for, protect. (As I went through the book, I was disappointed to find that this initial use of Scripture in the opening paragraphs is not a sign of things to come. Most of the book is the analysis of a social scientist, not a theologian.) This creation mandate, the book affirms, requires Christians to be engaged with their world, actively trying to make it better.

Hunter points out numerous Christian groups that mention changing the world as one of their primary aims. He included Abilene Christian University in the list, I guess because of the “Change the World” fundraising campaign from early this century. The rest of this essay will focus on showing that Christian efforts to change the world are based on an erroneous assumption about how the world changes.

]]> http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?feed=rss2&p=3630 0 http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3630 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheKitchen/~3/ySDDFEhwCUY/ http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3618#comments Fri, 13 Aug 2010 13:00:32 +0000 Tim Archer http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3618 Continue reading →]]> Others have written about James Davison Hunter’s To Change The World, enough so that I almost feel like the late-comer to the party. Let me encourage you, for example, to read through Jay Guin’s analysis of the book.

Still, I feel that Hunter’s subject matter aligns so closely with matters near and dear to my heart (and oft written about in this blog), that I’d like to take some time to look at this book. Today I’ll do a bit of a review, or at least an overview. Later I’ll examine some of the ideas in a closer way.

The full title of the book is To Change The World: The Irony, Tragedy and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World. The title is intended as a bit of irony, mainly because Hunter will argue that Christians can’t change the world without being changed by the world in the process. He contends that the world is changed not only through ideas (worldview) but also through elites, networks, technology, and new institutions. World-changing implies power, power that typically is defined in terms of conquest and domination. When power is seen primarily in terms of political domination, it becomes the opposite of what Christians are called to be.

Hunter analyzes three types of Christian politics: the Christian right, the Christian left and the neo-Anabaptists. He calls these views toward culture, respectively, “defensive against,” “relevance to,” and “purity from.” He sees these groups as utilizing ineffective means for engaging culture.

Hunter argues that the principal issues to be addressed are difference and dissolution: how do we relate to a world that is not our world and how do we deal with the “deconstruction of the most basic assumptions about reality.” (p. 205) The solution that Hunter proposes is “faithful presence.” Using Jeremiah 29:4-7 as his textual base, Hunter says that Christians should maintain their distinctiveness but do it in a way that serves the common good. He observes,

“In short, commitment to the new city commons is a commitment of the community of faith to the highest ideals and practices of human flourishing in a pluralistic world.” (p. 279)

In the end, Hunter says that Christians shouldn’t worry about changing the world, because the world, and history, cannot be controlled and managed. He states,

“To be sure, Christianity is not, first and foremost, about establishing righteousness or creating good values or securing justice or making peace in the world. … But for Christians, these are all secondary to the primary good of God himself and the primary task of worshipping him and honoring him in all they do.” (pp.285-286)

Hunter says that Christians won’t create a perfect world, but will help to make the world a little bit better.

Chapter abstracts of the book can be found on Hunter’s website.

]]> http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?feed=rss2&p=3618 3 http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3618 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheKitchen/~3/X2lXeLsXVUw/ http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3616#comments Thu, 12 Aug 2010 13:00:55 +0000 Tim Archer http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3616 Continue reading →]]> [We're discussing a couple of sayings this week. One is from a Facebook group:

"I SHOULD NOT HAVE TO PRESS 1 TO HEAR A MESSAGE IN ENGLISH... WE ARE IN AMERICA, LEARN THE LANGUAGE."

The other is something I wrote in response:

"Everyone who complains about immigrants not knowing English should have to use Bibles printed in Greek, Aramaic and Hebrew."]

In order to pretend not to be bigoted, some will claim to merely be looking out for the good of immigrants. It will be in their best interest to learn English. This is true, of course. Just as all of us would benefit from learning another language. We can hide behind the fact that English is the dominant language in the U.S., but the fact is, most people in the world speak multiple languages and it would benefit each of us to be multilingual.

The case can also be made that it would be of benefit to all Christians to learn biblical Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic. There is always something lost in translation, so being able to study the Bible in the original languages would be good for all of us.

We don’t take the time, nor go to the trouble to do so. One reason for that is the fact that we have the Bible available to us in our native tongue, so we don’t see the need to learn other languages. If depriving immigrants of language aids will help motivate them to learn English, maybe taking away our translations will do the same for us with the Bible.

What do you think?

]]> http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?feed=rss2&p=3616 11 http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3616 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheKitchen/~3/Oia4UtU54Oo/ http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3606#comments Wed, 11 Aug 2010 13:00:17 +0000 Tim Archer http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3606 Continue reading →]]> [We're discussing a couple of sayings this week. One is from a Facebook group:
"I SHOULD NOT HAVE TO PRESS 1 TO HEAR A MESSAGE IN ENGLISH... WE ARE IN AMERICA, LEARN THE LANGUAGE."
The other is something I wrote in response:
"Everyone who complains about immigrants not knowing English should have to use Bibles printed in Greek, Aramaic and Hebrew."]

“Learn the language!” That’s the loving response that so many Americans* offer to those that want to come to this country. Never mind that most Americans can’t write their own language correctly, nor speak it in a grammatically correct way. Before you get too mad, let me point out that I include myself in that. I learned a lot while trying to teach English in Argentina, because the colloquial English I learned isn’t exactly “by the book” English. It would be interesting to see how the average American would score on the TOEFL test. Most would fail a simple test over the difference between their, there and they’re. ["Your so rite," you say] It’s time that Americans refudiated such language errors. (To quote one of the exemplary speakers of the xenophobic movement)

Add to that the fact that many countries require 12 years of foreign language in their public schools, while American schools rarely require more than 2 or 3 (if that much). The old joke runs like this:

Q. What do you call someone who knows three languages?
A. Trilingual
Q. What do you call someone who knows two languages?
A. Bilingual
Q. What do you call someone who only knows one language?
A. American

No, I never heard that joke overseas. That’s one we tell on ourselves. Americans travel the world demanding that everyone speak to us in English, then sit at home shouting “LEARN THE LANGUAGE!” to those who would come here. We’ve sent ambassadors to other countries who did not speak the language of the host country.

The second largest economy in the world will soon be China. Do you want to guess what the proportion of English-speaking Chinese businessmen is to Chinese-speaking American businessmen is? Probably about like it’s been with the Japanese.

Now let’s lay aside the cultural issues. What about us as Christians? Is it our place to demand that others do what benefits us? Some urge immigrants to learn English out of concern for their welfare. But that’s not the attitude expressed in these groups that we’re talking about this week. Let me say it clearly. Christians have no business joining with those that express such unloving attitudes. If we think people should learn English, it’s our job to reach and help them do so, as many loving Christians are doing.

It’s not our task to whine about having to press a button during a phone call.

*And yes, I’m using the term “American” in the ethnocentric way, despite the fact that I know many countries besides the U.S. can lay claim to the term “American.”

]]> http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?feed=rss2&p=3606 3 http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3606 http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheKitchen/~3/pbKFFmwwN60/ http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3601#comments Tue, 10 Aug 2010 13:00:25 +0000 Tim Archer http://www.timothyarcher.com/kitchen/?p=3601 Continue reading →]]> So the other day I posted the following on Twitter: “Everyone who complains about immigrants not knowing English should have to use Bibles printed in Greek, Aramaic and Hebrew.” Then Paula H. made the tragic mistake of quoting me on Facebook, sparking a lively discussion about the topic. Well, I guess the liveliest part of the discussion happened when people tried to decipher that cryptic tweet.

So let me try and unpack it a bit. I’d hoped to get some insights into why people would complain about help being offered to those who don’t speak English as their first language. Unfortunately, nobody stepped up to the plate (at least not yet). I’m not surprised when non-Christians join such groups, but I can’t conceive of why Christians would do so.

My only guess is that it’s done out of a lack of understanding. Let me offer some basic points:

1. Most immigrants would really like to know English. There are some who have no desire to learn, but that’s definitely a small minority. Therefore, well-meaning phrases like “Learn the language!” don’t do as much good as you think they might.
2. Even those who have a fairly good command of English still need their native language for critical situations. Add to that the difficulty of holding a phone conversation in your second language (no visual cues) and the difficulty that we all have in navigating phone menus.
3. It would be good for all Christians to have some proficiency in the original languages, but most people will never go to the trouble to do so. One reason they don’t learn those languages is the ready availability of translations.
4. Some argue that if we didn’t offer translations to those who speak English as a second language, they would make more of an effort to learn. By that argument, we should do the same with our Bibles, taking away the “crutch” of translations to make people learn.

Of course, being able to read the Bible isn’t nearly as important as being able to talk to your insurance company. Right?

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