Last week, two renowned Christian clergymen died: John Shelby Spong on Sept. 12 at the age of 90 and David Yonggi Cho on Sept. 14 at age 85. These two men represented two widely divergent forms of Christianity—so different it is almost as if they were adherents of two different religions.
Spong’s Liberal Christianity
John Shelby Spong
was born in North Carolina in June 1931. After graduating from Virginia
Theological Seminary in 1955, he served as the rector of four Episcopal churches
in North Carolina and Virginia from then until 1976.
He was consecrated
the Bishop of Newark, New Jersey, in 1979 and held that prominent post until
his retirement in 2000.
 |
| [Spong in 2006; photo by Scott Griesse] |
Spong grew up in a fundamentalist
milieu, but he became “fed up with fundamentalism” many years before I
published my book by that title in 2007—and his anti-fundamentalist position propelled
him to what I have termed the opposite extreme, which is also unsatisfactory to
my way of thinking.
In my The Limits
of Liberalism (2010, 2020), Spong is one of the Christian thinkers I
criticize most for what I consider his too-far-to-the-left positions on numerous
Christian doctrines.
I wasn’t as harsh in
my criticism, though, as Russell Moore was last week. On 9/16 I received an
email that contained the “Moore to the Point” newsletter from Christianity
Today, Moore’s current employer. The subject line read, “Death of a
heretic.” (Here is the link to that article.)
Whether you agree
with Moore’s label for Spong or not, he is quite correct in saying that Spong
dismissed “key doctrines of the historic Christian faith as outdated and retrograde.”
Cho's Evangelical Christianity
In February 1936 David Yonggi Cho (Chō Yong-gi, 趙 鏞基) was born into a Buddhist family who lived on the southeastern corner of the Korean peninsula. He became a Christian as a teenager while hospitalized for tuberculosis.
In 1958 Cho joined with his future mother-in-law to start a new Christian church in Seoul. There were only four or five who attended their first service, but by 1979 they had 100,000 members! The church was re-named Yoido Full Gospel Church (YFGC) in 1984, and it had 400,000 members by then.
 |
| [Cho in 2013] |
(The church’s membership seems to have peaked around 2007
with more than 800,000 members.)
In July 1983, I was asked to accompany Seinan Gakuin University’s
Glee Club’s concert tour to Korea. During our time there, we visited YFGC and a
few of us were able to meet Pastor Cho. He was an impressive leader of a most
impressive church, which is affiliated with the Assemblies of God.
However, I have serious questions about some of Cho’s
beliefs and emphases. He preached something quite close to the problematic
“prosperity gospel,” and his statement that the terrible March 2011
earthquake/tsunami in Japan was “God’s warning” was not helpful.
To say the least, Cho’s strongly evangelical understanding
of Christianity was decidedly different from Spong’s. In fact, there was such difference
between the two, one might wonder if they were really preachers of the same
religion.
Still Seeking the Radiant Center
In spite of the wide divergence in the theology of Bishop
Spong and Pastor Cho, I still want to champion a Christianity that has a broad,
inclusive radiant center.
While I can’t accept all of Spong’s or Cho’s ideas, they
both have made important affirmations worthy of thoughtful consideration.
For example, Spong’s last book was titled simply Unbelievable
(2018). He writes nearly 280 pages about what he thinks is unbelievable about
traditional Christianity.
He ends, though, with a short, five-page Epilogue titled “My
Mantra: This I Do Believe.” There he refers to God as the Source of Life, the
Source of Love, and the Ground of Being (pp. 285-6).
Pastor Cho wouldn’t have used those words, but perhaps he
was in basic agreement—and I certainly am.
_____
** My Jan.
15, 2019, blog post was titled “Two Christianities,” and it is closely
related to this post without the references to Bishop Spong or Pastor Cho.
Leroy, you commented in your email regarding this post about the number of readers who come here. Remember of course that I, for one, and I assume many others, usually just read the email and don't even bother to come to the blog itself, so it seems likely that your number of actual readers is perhaps multiples of the number who show up here on the blog iteself!
ReplyDeleteRegarding this post: Having "come out from among them", I have for years held a rather warmly tolerant view towards fundamentalism and conservative Christianity. Events of recent years have drastically changed my views on this. But this branch of Christianity has demonstrated itself shockingly compliant with the aggressive campaigns of right-wing, anti-democratic politicians to seize political power and subjugate creation at any cost in service of greed. Not only "compliant with" but actively supportive of.
This experience has forced me to ponder the dangers of losing commitment to rigorous intellectual inquiry and placing blind trust in faith. This is an open invitation to the worst potential of human beings for self-delusion. The same dangers exist on the left too, of course, but the dangers at present come far more from the right, who feed burgeoning anti-democratic instincts and continue to actively block efforts to address the global crisis in climate realities.
Without saying that conservatives and fundamentalists are "evil", I believe that these networks actively support powerful people and organizations who are doing great evil. Recognizing this, I no longer feel comfort in any sort of fellowship with the Christian right. In the end, God is the judge, but at the present moment, I am so troubled by the failure of these groups to recognize the devastation their political affiliations are causing on humanity and creation that I don't trust any bonds of commonality with them at all. I would rather give up the name of "Christian" if I had to (I did not say give up Christ, mind you, and remember that Jesus himself never called anyone to be "Christian") than be associated with them.
How is it that they ended up so blindly serving other gods, even while pompously insisting that they have a corner on truth that others do not? Until I see them reckoning with this question, I consider the Christian right more a part of the problems I believe we are called to respond to as followers of Jesus than a solution thereto.
John Stoner years ago called for reclaiming a willingness as Christians to declare our enemies, pointing out that Jesus taught us to love our enemies and do good to them. In that spirit, events of recent years have brought me to consider Christian conservatives as my enemies. I struggle to wish them no personal ill, and to maintain a heart of love towards them. But that is a daily challenge of mind and heart as I witness the destruction of human beings and the future of my children and grandchildren I believe they are assisting.
Ron, thanks so much for taking the time to post such meaningful comments.
DeleteFor many years prior to publishing my book “Fed Up with Fundamentalism” in 2007, I was quite negative toward fundamentalism. But there is more variety among conservatives, and thus less reason to be negative toward all who are in that camp. I have often said that all fundamentalists are conservative, but not all conservatives are fundamentalists.
Since 2016 I have become even more strongly opposed to fundamentalists and the conservative evangelicals who became Trumpists. And I agree that there is so much harm being done by those on the extreme right that I do not see them as being able to be included in the “broad, inclusive radiant center.”
There is much schism within christianism. There have been MAJOR schisms before, even in what I would have considered to be foundational Christianity - 451, 1054, 1517. (500 years have passed since the last. Are we due again?) You have addressed this with a "radiant center". Outside of the major creeds, I'm not sure that there is Essential Unity, Non-essential Liberty, or even Charity.
ReplyDeleteRegarding the latter, Jesus emphasized four commandments: 1) Love The Lord you God! (Shema!) 2) Love your neighbor. 3) Love your enemy. 4) Love one another (The Church) - whoever that is...
I am watching schism all over western christianism (and some in other places). But how should a schism divide this time? (Note: There have supposedly become 30,000+ protestant denominations since 1517. Some have affiliation/affinity, but even there we see schism.
The King surely has a Kingdom at war with itself (and has been since shortly after His ascension - among the first being the Gnostics, and Marcionites along with several others mentioned in the New Testament).
Ron, it is sad to see those with conservative Christian views as part of the real problem within the Church. But having personally faced the vicious militancy of the "justice/righteousness" side regularly, I would have to say that they are just as much of the problem. Love? There is no love with either of the militant (political?) sides of the Church. There is a lot of self-righteousness on both sides. Both sides probably have good rationales for their belief and behavior. But there are NONE righteous. No NOT one! (Despite the heretical nature of the statement, give me people of goodwill any day - regardless of who they are - over the "Christians" of ill-will. Especially the self-righteous who glory in their evil ways and support of those who do such things.)
ReplyDeleteOf Sprong and Cho - who knows. I would favor one, but still, each had serious issues.
Tim, I agree there is plenty of viciousness and judgementalism on both sides of the theological/political spectrum, and I'm sorry to hear that you've experienced it from the "left". It's there, too, and it's wrong.
DeleteWhat has finally caused me to despair regarding the right, however, is that as far as I can see the vast majority have given up on any quest for truth. They have their own blindly trusted info sources, an echo chamber with an enormous amount of untruth mixed in with whatever accurate statements are made. They just withdraw into platitudes, or withdraw from communication in the face of evidence that doesn't fit pre-ordained answers. It's hard, if not impossible, to have real dialogue.
My calling is conflict resolution, so by training and life experience I'm skeptical about claims like the one I've just made. It's a generalization, and typically generalizations are unfair and exaggerated. But at this moment, I'm sad to say that my statement describes what I've experienced in recent years. I believe there has been some kind of sea change in American conservatism in recent decades, away from commitments to pursuit of truth, and towards embrace of dogma and polemic.
(Washington Post columnist Ross Douthat, a conservative Catholic, is a wonderful exception to this - there must be others - but they appear to be a tiny minority.)
The left has its own echo chambers too. Could it be that I am trapped in those myself or by the affects of curmudgeonly aging, hence my despair about conservatism? I can't rule that possibility out, but at this time I remain more wary of the right than of the left, even while pained by the viciousness that is often enacted by both sides.
Aye. Welcome to the world of cynicism, Ron.
DeleteBeing with a Christian para-church group which serves churches from Pentecostal to Catholic and Methodist to Orthodox, I yearn for a unity of the Spirit - in Truth and Love. But most of those seem to be splitting as well, led by both sides. And even my own home church is moving toward a split, with much animosity. Love one another is out the door, and the pastors are caught in the middle. Another friend has started a church just to serve ministers being fired - its coming from all sides. Oh God, please give your Church love (and truth).
I recently listened to the business book, "Critical Conversations" again. But I have been to a few gathering outside of business. In business, it must work or there are dire consequences. In the divergence of life (and religion), community gatherings can't allow open conversation - too much of personal belief and experience. As CS Lewis put it in his Narnia Chronicle,"The Final Battle", "The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs."
Here are comments received this morning from Thinking Friend Kevin Heifner, who is a medical doctor in Arkansas:
ReplyDelete"Probably most of your readers are 'church folks' to some degree, likely tilting toward the progressive end. As someone who interacts with a fair number of non-religious people regularly, I think it’s difficult for us 'in the fold' to grasp the degree of distaste and disdain they hold for those of us who practice some form of organized faith. Adjectives I usually hear include hypocrisy, judgmental, harmful, and mean spirited…directed at organized religion. Also my experience has been whenever I try to engage someone who has suffered harm at the hands of the church… An absolute conversation stopper is to begin with any sort of faith based or religious language. They exit stage left very quickly.
"Bringing me to the two gentlemen you wrote about. Regardless of where we fall in terms of agreement with their particular approach… doctrinal issues, which I suspect people like you, me and your readers find interesting… is often anathema to the people I describe in the second paragraph. And that’s a conundrum. My sense is that once we begin to over-complicate doctrine beyond the concept of acceptance and love… We are basically in-fighting, navel-gazing, and running off other folks. I don’t mean that to come across as harshly as it may… but that has been my experience.
"I enjoy music. Two songs spring to mind that have resonated with me recently which can be searched on YouTube. One is a song by a guy named Danny Schmidt called 'Company of Friends.' The take-home of this song is the line 'in the end I do believe.' The other is an older song by Iris DeMent called 'Let the Mystery Be'."
Thanks for your thought-provoking comments, Kevin.
DeleteI think you are probably right that doctrinal discussions/disputes are mainly off-putting for those who are not Christians. That is one reason why years ago I began to shift in my thinking and writing from doctrinal theology to Christian social ethics. In my June 15 blog post this year I wrote the following: "Back in 1975, Christian ethicist John C. Bennett (1902~95) published a seminal book titled 'The Radical Imperative: From Theology to Social Ethics.' The emphasis was on moving from an emphasis on religious doctrines to focusing on the social responsibility of (Christian) believers." It was probably a few years after 1975 when I read that book, but I think it made an important point that I have remembered through the years.
I was happy to hear again from local Thinking Friend Marilyn Peot:
ReplyDelete"Thanks for today's post.
"I'm wondering when each person opens one's self to the Spirit, we are given Truth that sometimes we misconstrue.
"Since Truth is really another name for God, then just maybe we need to sort out the Whispers of the Divine and come to a deeper realization that we are seeking Truth--not necessarily having the complete Truth. As you and I spend our lives open to the Divine, we will always be called to a deeper awareness of what is Truth. Would you agree? If God is the Unknowable One, would we not be called to live a life of discernment? That would take living into always going deeper and more aware. And at the same time bringing folks into our life that don't have our same idea of Truth...there is always more.
"I think of Gandhi who realized that if God is Truth he would always seek Truth...do we ever have the whole Truth?
"Thanks for listening. Having others to share with while living in the Spirit always opens new vistas to us. How beautiful!"
And then, as usual, I received short and meaningful comments from Thinking Friend Glenn Hinson in Kentucky:
ReplyDelete"I view Spong more favorably than either you are Russell Moore, Leroy. Although I would not agree with much of his theology, I think Christianity benefits from people like him who challenge a lot of accepted conventions."
Local Thinking Friend Vern Barnett send me these comments--and a picture of him with Bishop Spong that I am unable to post here.
ReplyDelete"I met Spong a number of times (alas, all before I even thought to become an Episcopalian) and had dinner with him once. My problem with Spong was his lack of understanding of myth. One thing I love about the Episcopal Church is that we have learned that heresy is better than schism, which is why I am comfortable as a heretic, with the Creeds and Liturgy exceedingly meaningful without fussing about Spong's rejection of them."
Thanks, Vern, for your comments and for your reminder of the "broad church" tradition among Anglicans/Episcopalians. Unfortunately, not all Episcopalians seem to have learned that "heresy is better than schism," so the Anglican Church of North America was formed in 2009 partly (largely?), if I am not mistaken, because of Bishop Spong and his "heretical" ideas and questionable (to them) practice of fully accepting LGBTQ people.
Delete[Posted yesterday, slightly edited and reposted now.]
ReplyDelete"And then, as usual, I received short and meaningful comments from Thinking Friend Glenn Hinson in Kentucky:
"I view Spong more favorably than either you or Russell Moore, Leroy. Although I would not agree with much of his theology, I think Christianity benefits from people like him who challenge a lot of accepted conventions."
Thanks for your comments, Dr. Hinson. In American society with its strong undercurrent of fundamentalism, I think there were many benefits from Spong's writing/speaking. In spite of my disagreements with his doctrinal positions, I affirm his efforts to speak a meaningful, and Christian, word to ex-Christians, anti-Christians, and non-Christians. But in Korea, especially from the time Pastor Cho started the Full Gospel Church at least until the early years of this century, Pastor Cho's evangelism and preaching/proclamation of traditional Christianity was probably needed far more than Spong's liberal views.
DeleteLeroy, I think you probably expected me to respond to this blog because of its content. When I read it, I was due on the tennis court, so I didn't have a chance to respond but do remember thinking I don't have anything new to say. I have now read it again and all the comments. Of course, I knew nothing of Rev. Cho. I have come to the conclusion that conservative Protestantism, especially American, is bereft of truth or reason. I don't know about conservative Protestantism in other countries. I can't, of course, claim that the world would be better off without conservative Protestantism; that would require a wisdom beyond mine. I myself came up through conservative Protestantism, so I have to appreciate it for the grace I’ve received from those early experiences. Frankly, I wish I had not come up through it, but, again, I don’t have enough wisdom to be sure some other upbringing and spiritual experience would have been better.
ReplyDeleteI'm one of the few liberals I know who has not read Spong. I've come across mention of his ideas frequently and have liberal friends and acquaintances who love him. I have always guessed that his work would have no effect on conservative Protestants, not to mention conservative Catholics. Neither of those groups has any use for rational thought except as propaganda to defend their authoritarian doctrines.
As you already know, I don't think the fact that fundamentalism and liberalism have shortcomings is enough of a foundation to justify your "radiant middle." I think this is the first time I've heard you imply, following John Bennet, that a shift away from doctrinal emphases to social ethics might be the way to go. Perhaps I missed that in your earlier writings about the “radiant middle.” I think there’s serious promise in that idea, but it seems to me to be a complete paradigm shift and so not a good candidate for your "radiant middle." I’d have to give it a lot more thought. I should also read Bennett’s book.
I appreciate very much Vern Barnett’s emphasis on the value of myth. I think that’s how a lot of liberal preachers have been able to appropriate Christian traditions and remain in the flock. It is, however, such a subtle understanding of knowledge and reality that I’m not sure it could ever be the redeeming move for a truly vibrant Christianity that lives well with others. Time will tell. Perhaps given how much we live by myth in the modern world (movies, novels, TV, video games, etc.), we can develop the appreciation for it that many of the intelligentsia already have. But, of course, there are constructive and destructive myths, which we see coming from America’s radical right, maybe also some from the radical left, perhaps too from the middle.
As you already know, too, I’ve been contemplating in recent years whether religion is inherently authoritarian. I haven’t come to a conclusion yet except for this: Insofar as a religion has some authority (Bible, doctrines, Pope, whatever) that trumps reason and experience, it is authoritarian at its core.
Your point that these different branches of Christianity could be viewed as different religions is well taken. Of course, it would depend on our concept or definition of religion, but it makes sense to say that Christianity is a collection of religions, in much the same way as Hinduism and Buddhism are, or so it seems to me.
Thanks so much, Anton, for taking the time to write six paragraphs about this blog post. I will respond only to your third paragraph, although there would be much I could say about the other paragraphs as well.
DeleteI was a bit perplexed to see that I wrote about the "radiant middle" rather than the "radiant center," although I think the two terms are synonymous. The latter, though, is what I advocated at the very end of my book "The Limits of Liberalism," and I should have been consistent and used the same term in this blog post.
Please note, though, that I have not tried to justify the inclusion of fundamentalist and liberals in the radiant middle/center because of their shortcomings but rather in spite of their shortcomings. I certainly don't think that all the ideas/emphases on either side can be embraced, but I think there are good and important points on both sides that should be affirmed and included in the radiant middle/center.
In the book about my life story, which I published last year, I wrote about my shift of interest/emphasis from doctrinal concerns to Christian social ethics in the mid-1980s. That wasn't because of Bennett's book, but I resonated with what he wrote in that book. I sort of mentioned that book in passing in my June 15 blog post, that ended with the third section being about social ethics. (See https://theviewfromthisseat.blogspot.com/2021/06/so-what-about-blind-men-and-elephant.html .)
My books on fundamentalism and liberalism were intended to be parallel to a large degree. But there was a major difference: my criticism of fundamentalism included many ethical issues to which I found exception. I wrote about being fed up with fundamentalism's view of religious freedom (Ch. Six), war (Ch. Seven), women (Ch. Eight), and other controversial issues, namely, abortion, homosexuality, and capital punishment (Ch. Nine). By contrast, my criticism of liberalism was almost completely doctrinal. I sought to counter liberal views of the Bible (Ch. Five), of God (Ch. Six), of Jesus Christ (Ch. Seven), of Sin (Ch. Eight), and of world missions (Ch. Nine). I found problem with Spong's views in most of these areas. But I did not find a problem with his social ethics--and that is generally true in my evaluation of other liberals. It is their social ethics affirmations that I want to include in the radiant middle/center.
Religion evolves. That is just what everything associated with life does. While it has been a long time since I read Spong's "Why Christianity Must Change or Die," he did not so much prescribe change ad describe it. We can learn from life forms, that have basics in common, like DNA and the energy cycle, yet vary in many ways. We see convergent evolution at times, where difference decrease based on the environment. Whales started out as land animals, but evolved to be a lot like fish.
ReplyDeleteJust as we can learn to appreciate the diversity of religion, just as we celebrate the diversity of life. Love is the DNA of religion.
Craig, I think there needs to be a qualifier before your last word. There seems to be much done in the name of religion that doesn't look much like love. Perhaps we could say that love is the DNA of true or healthy religion.
Delete