sophiaserpentia | (no subject)

I don't understand my relationship with Christianity. It's as convoluted as a fractal.

I don't identify as a Christian and i don't "believe in" any of the primary doctrines. I reject the idea of original sin and therefore the whole notion of "redemption."

And yet it still feels like my home. I cannot escape it. I am still drawn to examine it, and i still find inspiration therein. I get angry when i see it employed in the service of oppression and exploitation, as if it were appropriated from me. As i've written before, i do not think that following the Way is about what one believes, but about one's compassion and faith.

Currently i am reading Schuessler Fiorenza's book In Memory of Her (the title is a reference to Mark 14:9). She pulls an idea i like from Koester and Robinson, about finding the "trajectory" of Christian striving. The trajectory i see describes an inspired yet human quest for justice and compassion. Redemption then is not us being saved from the world by a remote God, but learning to listen to the divine voice calling for compassion and encouraging us to fulfill our potential.

For example, lately i've been thinking about the idea that we are all participants in the murder of Jesus. There is no explicit Biblical support for this idea; passages which say we are all sinners are read as though this is what it means. Reading the passages on their own, you would never derive that meaning from them; you have to be told to read it that way.

But instead there *is* explicit Biblical support for the idea that we die with Christ. Here it is, explicitly:

[Romans 6:6] For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—
[7] because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
[8] Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.
[9] For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him.
[10] The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
[11] In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

We cannot both participate in the crucifixion of Jesus, and die with him. It must be one or the other. The difference is monumental, of course. If we are collectively the murderers of Jesus, then no punishment in hell or on earth is too severe. This in turn has been used as justification for anti-Semitism and other prejudice-driven abuse. If however we are co-sufferers with Christ, then God is on our side. We are called to revere the Christ which lives within each other person.

[Galatians 2:19] For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God.
[20] I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

The idea of "trajectory" means that we cannot rest upon what has been done before, but the struggle against injustice continues. It requires insight and honesty, the recognition that the fountain of spirit still flows. To use a metaphor from Alan Watts, a river cannot be trapped in a bucket and still be a river. It also requires the vigilance to see that the unjust seek always to misappropriate what can be used against them, so that it is nullified as a threat to them. The way i see it, this is what has happened to Christianity, starting with the writing and redaction of scripture and the establishment of a worldly church.

I veer back and forth, between despairing that Christianity has become so riddled with injustice and hatred that it is irredeemable, to angry refusal to let them get away with it. In the past i have described myself as a religious exile, feeling like my homeland has been stolen away and i stand on a remote plain watching as foreign occupiers live in my home.

By what authority do i claim it as my home? The claim is not predicated on "authority"; i am a bat nasha and the basileia tou ouranou belongs to all.

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This really struck a chord with me this morning.

I don't identify as a Christian and i don't "believe in" any of the primary doctrines. I reject the idea of original sin and therefore the whole notion of "redemption."

And yet it still feels like my home.

Isn't "secular humanism" the term for this?

Addendum: Ok, maybe with some tweaks on the "secular" part, depending.

I suppose, though typically that connotes atheism and i am not an atheist.

Yeah, point. I don't know. Heavily reformed Judaism?

Unitarian Universalism.

Are you familiar with Process Theology? The idea that we continue to evolve and co-create the universe? I think the campaign "God is still speaking" sums it up nicely with a quote from Gracie Allen: "Don't put a period where God put a comma."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_theology

I am familiar with Process Theology. I just haven't set time aside to read the source materials.

If you were raised with Christianity as your religion, I can very easily see how it would continue to feel like home, despite you not embracing or believing much of it. And yet, why should you NOT receive inspiration from it, despite it not being a religion you claim as your own? I pull inspiration from wherever I can, and yes, frequently it is OTHER religions.

Personally, I believe there is a string of truth running through the basis of all religion... Heck, even The Force of the Star Wars mythology can be included. There is a truth to all of them, on some level. Whether we submit ourselves to all of the pomp and circumstance that humanity has built up around that essential truth is relatively unimportant, as long as we "get" that basic essence, that whatever-it-is that makes us live as better humans, more loving and "evolved" beings. The fact that you resonate with SOMETHING within Christianity is probably why you rebel SO HARD against that built up muck being used to inhibit/defame it, why it feels "stolen" from you.

Yes, much of our journey is still (as it was for Christ) to remind people that said essence, and not the laws and doctrine and dogma and built-up-muck, is what's important. Any Christian who feels they can just sit back and rest and relax and drift hasn't been paying attention, to the scriptures or the modern media...

I completely reject almost every form of Christianity I have come across, but I have much respect for and derive much inspiration from the (purported) words of Jesus. In fact, I have almost no use for any organized religion.
Look for the spirituality, not the rules.
And I hate Paul, I know we have this argument. I think he is basically useless and I don't understand looking to his interpretation of what Jesus said rather than looking at what Jesus said.

I don't identify as a Christian and i don't "believe in" any of the primary doctrines. I reject the idea of original sin and therefore the whole notion of "redemption."

And yet it still feels like my home. I cannot escape it. I am still drawn to examine it, and i still find inspiration therein. I get angry when i see it employed in the service of oppression and exploitation, as if it were appropriated from me.

Perhaps because you can intuitively sense the truth, the attitude, the frame of mind that originally lay behind the words that have atrophied into dogma and doctrine? I feel like this about many spiritual traditions, included but not limited to Christianity. I don't wear any labels on my sleeve though, because people always misinterpret them.

(Incidentally, there are certain possible interpretations of the concept of the "original sin" that do make sense to me. I tend to come at it from a more alchemical angle.)

I enjoy reading your essays about Christianity. I'm glad somebody is reinterpreting it, keeping the wisdom alive.

Christianity is the spiritual tradition of Europe and America, so it's normal we would consider it a kind of home. So many of the writers and thinkers of past centuries had Christian ideas as part of their mindset.

Christ was a great teacher, and the Christ story a powerful metaphor for human existence-- the proof is that there are so many different ways to approach it, as you explore when you suggest that we die with Christ, rather than murdering him.

I don't like fundamentalists and feel their message of fear and condemnation goes against the teachings of Christ. But in this world, it's often those who declaim the most stridently that get the most followers; those who frankly admit their struggles with doubt are seen as weak. People don't want to hear "we can interpret it this way, or this other way." They want to know what rules to follow to ensure God's good favor.

And yet the struggle with doubt is so fertile and necessary.

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<<I don't identify as a Christian and i don't "believe in" any of the primary doctrines. I reject the idea of original sin and therefore the whole notion of "redemption."

And yet it still feels like my home.>>

Ah,how many times I have thought that about myself...

as I was saying elsewhere in lj today, there's the character and his life and then there's the christological stuff ... forest and trees sorta thing.

I had a jolt in the last week when I realized that for pretty much everything the Bible says except for the love-oriented words of Jesus, I either have metaphorical "it can't really mean that" interpretations or just reject it. Even just "getting back to the Bible" can't get you away from the perversions and injustice and hatred, too, which you know far better than I do (cf. your last entry on removing women from the Bible).

I know what you mean about Christianity feeling like home, even though my issues with it have not been the same as yours, or as long and hard of a struggle. It's hard to know what's true, except for what we know to be true by our own consciences. But you are right, the kindgom of heaven does belong to all, and I think we do have enough good in us to see when something is good and beautiful, and to see when something makes the earth a little tiny miniscule bit closer to it. I've rejected the idea that conversion or salvation can be sudden, I am sure that both are lifelong deals if anything (at least for some of us). My biggest steps seem to come when I do think or do something new about spreading justice and compassion, or when I see that very strongly in someone who is Christian, so your trajectory idea seems true to me. When I am feeling cheesy, I think of it as that to become closer to God's love we have to become instruments of love and justice for others.