In an appendix to the book that I wrote telling the story of my life up to my 82nd birthday, I have several “top ten” lists, including one of “theologians and/or philosophers.” Although he is neither a professional theologian nor philosopher, the youngest person on that list is Brian McLaren (b. 1956).
Currently I am slightly revising and updating that book I wrote for my children and grandchildren, and I have just added McLaren’s 2022 book, Do I Stay Christian? A Guide for the Doubters, the Disappointed, and the Disillusioned, to my list of top ten 21st century non-fiction books.
No, I am personally not considering giving up being a
Christian. Neither do I include myself among the doubters or disillusioned,
although I am often disappointed with how so many Christians have lived and are
living.
But certainly there are many thoughtful people now who have already
left Christianity or are seriously thinking of doing so. With my lifelong
interest in Christian apologetics, I was most interested in seeing what McLaren
would say to those who have left, or would like to leave, the Christian faith.
The book has three parts: the first is “No,” ten chapters giving
reasons for not staying Christian. Part II is “Yes,” ten chapters giving
reasons for staying, and Part III is “How.”
There is much of considerable value in McLaren’s book, but I
am not attempting to review his book here or to summarize the wealth of ideas
worth thoughtful consideration. (I have made a page containing some of
McLaren’s important statements, which you can access
here.)
The ninth reason McLaren gives for not staying a
Christian is “Because of Christianity’s Great Wall of Bias (Constricted Intellectualism.”)
Although he has brief paragraphs about seven other biases, in that ninth
chapter he mainly considers the “confirmation bias,” and it is worth pondering.
“Confirmation bias names our brain’s tendency to
reject anything that doesn’t fit in with our current understanding, paradigm,
belief system, or worldview,” writes McLaren (p. 67). This bias, he contends,
has skewed the thinking of many Christians about nuclear war and ecological crises.
Perhaps this is the reason Mommsen failed to deal with
ecological overshoot, which I wrote about in my July
5 blog post.
Mommsen, the able editor of Plough Quarterly,
certainly is not “guilty” of the errors of the conservative evangelicals who
believe the (eminent) “second coming” of Jesus will take care of the problem of
ecological overshoot (although they haven’t used that term).
As far as I know, Mommsen has not written about the
“rapture,” which has been emphasized in much conservative Christian eschatology.
nor does he write explicitly about the second coming of Jesus. ++
But perhaps Mommsen’s belief in rather traditional ideas
about God acting in “supernatural” ways to consummate the world as we know it,
maybe even in the lifetime of people now living, is the reason he overlooks
overshoot—and the same is likely true for most traditional Christian believers.
On the other hand, perhaps it is Mommsen’s belief in the
Kingdom of God (KoG) that blocks his acknowledgment of overshoot.
Emphasis on the KoG has been a central emphasis of the
Bruderhof from the beginning, although he/they have not committed the “liberal”
error of thinking that if we just work hard enough, we humans can “bring in”
the Kingdom of God on earth.
Perhaps “confirmation bias” of Mommsen and others,
traditional and liberal, has prevented serious consideration of the collapse of
the world as we know it.
That collapse is projected by scientists based on their
investigation of facts rather than theological (or ideological) beliefs that
would skew their thinking because of confirmation bias.
(Of course, scientists are also sometimes biased, but generally
they are far quicker than religious believers to recognize and correct those
biases.)
In his next-to-last chapter, McLaren begins a prayer
for overcoming the confirmation bias with these words: “Source of all truth,
help me to hunger for truth, even if it upsets, modifies, or overturns what I
already think is true” (p. 210).
This is my prayer also.
_____
++ My March
25, 2015, blog post was titled “Do You Believe in the Rapture?” and it has
had more than 3,000 pageviews (!) as well as far more comments than usual.
** Some of you may be interested in watching (some or all
of) a YouTube interview of McLaren and his book I have introduced above: Do I Stay Christian with
Brian McLaren: One Question with Pastor Adam.
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What a curious prayer McLaren offers us. I'm not sure any Christian can ever pray that prayer in good faith. One would have to be open to criteria outside the faith that would undermine the faith itself. Here are some facts, according to me:
ReplyDeleteChristianity is fully dominated world wide by two major currents--a fully authoritarian, rule-bound, male-dominated, and rigid Catholicism/Orthodoxy and a similar evangelical-fundamentalism. It could be easily argued that Christianity is a failed experiment. The New Atheists claimed that moderates like you and liberals like me provide cover for the authoritarians and fundamentalists. (Incidentally, I know a former Catholic who resents liberal priests in particular for making the Catholic Church seem tolerable, when it is not, in fact.) The New Atheists are probably wrong. I suspect that moderates like you and liberals like me are too few and too weak to provide cover for much of anything.
Anton, thanks for your provocative comments, which, to be honest, seem rather "curious" to me.
DeleteTo begin with, I assume you have not read McLaren's book, and perhaps I was amiss in "dumping" the rich content of chapters 9 and 27 on you and other of my blog readers and expecting you to get the point without the benefit of reading those entire chapters.
I take a bit of offense, though, when you say that you question whether any Christian can pray that prayer in good faith, for I said it was my prayer also and I said that in good faith.
You said that one would have to be open to criteria outside the faith, but the title of the chapter in which McLaren's prayer is included is "Stay Loyal to Reality." and according to his faith, and mine, God is the source of all reality and the source of all truth. McLaren says he purposely didn't use "God" as the One to whom this (and several other prayers in the following paragraphs) prayer is addressed because of various misunderstandings of the nature of God. But God he believes, and I believe, is the source of all truth. So, I don't see any way this prayer relies on "criteria outside the faith that would undermine the faith itself."
McLaren deals with the first part of your last paragraph throughout Part I of his book. In fact, the title of the chapter giving the eighth reason for not staying Christian is "Because Christianity Is a Failed Religion." And while I think there is some validity in what the New Atheists have claimed, I don't see how McLaren can be accused of what they say--or, to be honest, how I could be. After all, my book "Fed Up with Fundamentalism" (2007, 2020) was highly critical of the "two major currents" you referred to. Those two currents certainly do not represent the type of Christian McLaren is (and he gives reason why he is staying a Christian) or the type of Christian I am.
I strongly recommend that you read McLaren's new book. (There are now four copies in the Mid-Continent Public Library system (one of which I have before me now). although there are five holds on those copies at this time. If, or when, you read the book, I would very much like to discuss it with you.
ble to be called a failed experiment on the day Jesus Christ rose from the dead. That is the crux (pun very much intended) of the matter. Christianity fails quite a bit because of the human condition. When we trust our own widom and traditions more than we Trust God (Father, Son, and Spirit & His Word is when we are most prone to fail
DeleteThanks, Dave, for your comments. I think what you wrote is correct--but it is different from McLaren's point. He claims that "Christianity has failed to transform surprisingly high numbers its adherents into Christlike people." And this is "one of the things that disturbs pastors on sleepless nights: why do so many Christians change so little?" (p. 61).
DeleteLeroy, I have reread your blog, the quotes from McLaren's book you provided, and his table of contents available on Amazon. McLaren's book certainly appears worth reading. In some ways it's similar to my Religion and the Critical Mind: A Journey for Believers, Doubters, and the Curious, which, however, is written more with regard to religion as such rather than specifically Christianity. However, I don't intend to read McLaren's book, not for any reason at this time except that I have too many unread and partially read books currently in my queue, and many of them are also criticisms and/or apologias for Christianity.
DeleteThe reason I said I'm not sure that any Christian could actually pray that prayer in good faith is because it is so radically stated and includes an implied conclusion in its own premise. The premise stated in the prayer indicates a prayer to someone or something external to human subjectivity, which is okay--certainly from a Western religious perspective--but does show a Western religious bias toward an objective God external to creation. You indicate something similar in your response to me that both you and McLaren believe that staying "loyal to reality" includes the assumption in your faith that God is the source of all reality and truth. I don't have any problem with that by itself. I've preached the same thing in sermons. And I never expect your blog to operate outside the realm of Christian faith.
The problem is that the prayer itself is stated so radically: "...help me to hunger for truth, even if it upsets, modifies, or overturns what I already think is true." The radicalness of that prayer can hardly be embraced if one presumes that one's fundamental Christian faith-paradigm is true. Already, because of the framework of the Christian paradigm, fully excluded is the possibility that Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, secular humanism, or some other framework could be truer instead of Christianity. All I'm saying is that such a radical plea for openness to having one's truth-beliefs overturned while leaving out re-examination of the parameters of the paradigm is . . . um . . . "misstated" (not quite the word I'm looking for). Thomas Kuhn is the one who famously taught us that the dominance of specific scientific paradigms are difficult even for scientists to seriously question. Theological paradigms are even more impervious to challenge because, except for the more rare theologies, they are not, like science, open to empirical falsification. That's all I'm saying.
Thanks, Anton, for these comments that you took time to write on a Sunday afternoon, and there are several things I want to say on response--more than I will have time to write at this time, partly because there is much I need to do today and tomorrow before my knee replacement surgery on Wednesday morning.
Delete1) I do appreciate your comments and consider them carefully. Even though I may disagree with some of what you say at times, I am always grateful for your thought-provoking comments and honesty.
2) I had thought before reading your comments of some similarities of McLaren's book and your book "Religion and the Critical Mind," which I just bought earlier this year and have not read much of yet. McLaren would likely agree with you more than you might think.
3) I know well the problem of having more to read that one can ever get to, and I understand your not planning to read McLaren's book at this time. Since the main point of issue here is what he wrote in the 27th chapter, though, I wish you could at least read that whole chapter.
4) I am somewhat perplexed by your second paragraph. What you say is true of course, Christians who affirm theism (as most have in the 2,000 year history of Christianity) do believe in "an objective God external to creation," a Being (of the "ground of being," as Tillich emphasized) who is the source of all reality and truth. But how can it be otherwise? No one can think without presuppositions that cannot be proved--including those who would say that prayer is only an expression of human subjectivity that is unrelated to any objective reality. Rationalists/secularists operate on the basis of presuppositions the same as religious believers, Christian or otherwise. (There is much more I would like to say about this.)
5) Your last paragraph is also closely related to the issue of presuppositions, and I see considerable relationship of presuppositions and paradigms as explained by Thomas Kuhn--and I know that both are not easily changed, for they are the lenses through which we see "reality." But I don't see the problem with McLaren's (and my) prayer that you question. Only fundamentalists believe that they know "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth." McLaren grew up in a fundamentalistic church (as I did) and his faith journey (as mine) led him to an understanding of truth that upset, modified, or overturned what he thought was true. And the journey continues. It is arrogant for any religious believer (of any religion) or for any secularist/humanist/rationalist (or whatever) to think they know all the truth and there is nothing more to learn.
"That sounds intriguing. I wonder what prompts McLaren to ask that question." (Thinking Friend Glenn Hinson in Kentucky)
ReplyDeleteThanks, Dr. Hinson, for reading and responding to this morning's blog post.
DeleteMcLaren's book title comes from his having talked with so many people who have already left Christianity or who are thinking about leaving--or would like to leave.
As I indicated, it is one of the most important books I have read in the past 20+ years, and a book that I think you would find to be of great interest.
Here are comments received this morning from Thinking Friend Eric Dollard in Chicago:
ReplyDelete"The pastor at Wicker Park Lutheran is currently reading McLaren's 'Faith After Doubt,' and encouraging other congregants to read it, which I am determined to do. (Yesterday, I tried to find a copy at a nearby used bookstore, but without success. I may have to borrow a copy from the church office.)
"Humans cannot build a perfect society, but we can definitely build a better one, and we should endeavor to do so. Using the End Times as an excuse to avoid the hard work of building a better society strikes me as a copout."
I have read many of McLaren's books, but not the one you mentioned, which was published last year. Like all his books, I'm sure it is well worth reading, although perhaps you and your pastor at Wicker Park would soon like to read McLaren's new book, which mentions "Faith After Doubt" two or three times.
DeleteMy next blog post, which I am planning to make early next Tuesday (a day early) makes a brief reference to "Do I Stay Christian?" but I will say more about his 2005 novel, "The Last Word and the Word after That," the third book of his "A New Kind of Christian" trilogy, which I also highly recommend.
Eric, I should have mentioned that the subtitle to McLaren's 2005 novel is "A Tale of Faith, Doubt, and a New Kind of Christianity."
ReplyDeleteBack in 2018, per BNG (Baptist News Global), CBF (Cooperative Baptist Fellowship) posted a link to a Brian McLaren blog where he called out most Baptists (for example, the SBC) as "doing harm to our nation and world." That may put some specificity to many readers. You can find the BNG article here: https://baptistnews.com/article/brian-mclaren-says-baptists-doing-harm-to-nation-and-world/?gclid=CjwKCAjww8mWBhABEiwAl6-2RQv2uiSbOk1csX3mYSaKim7AUiuP2U81O4JlnR_nGcQ58Ggp_qjJQhoCZX4QAvD_BwE#.YtOMUuzMKRs
ReplyDeletePersonally, I am reminded of the February 18, 2021 blog on the book "The Gospel in Dostoyevsky" which begins with The Grand Inquisitor passage from "The Brothers Karamazov." The whole passage is a profound meditation on two antagonistic versions of Christianity, one espoused by the Grand Inquisitor, and one alleged by the Grand Inquisitor as being the true (but failed) Christianity of Christ. The Grand Inquisitor had to fix Christianity to make it work. I suspect McLaren is struggling with how to embrace that gospel of Christ without being sucked into the horror of the Grand Inquisitor's version. You can visit that blog here: https://theviewfromthisseat.blogspot.com/2021/02/the-gospel-in-dostoyevsky.html#comment-form
Thanks, Craig, for linking to two related websites. I read many of the BNG articles, and I either missed or forgot the 2018 article about McLaren, but I enjoyed reading it this morning. (And for your and others' information, when giving links, everything after (and including) the question mark can be deleted, and it will still (in most cases) link to the desired website. Try
ReplyDeletehttps://baptistnews.com/article/brian-mclaren-says-baptists-doing-harm-to-nation-and-world/
I also appreciate you linking to my blog article on Dostoyevsky.