Toward Religionless Christianity
I have recently been re-reading the later Bonhoeffer to help with my current writing and have been staggered by the insight contained in many of his letters from prison. Because he was writing under difficult conditions and only begining to formulate his thoughts on ‘religionless Christianity’ his writing is often fragmented, frustratingly embryonic and wed too tightly with his previous perspectives. However it feels, while reading these letters, that we are witnessing a metamorphosis taking place before our very eyes. It is as if we are glimpsing the very moment when a caterpillar begins to reconstitute itself in the process of becoming a butterfly. Yet, as we know, before the transformation was complete his life was snuffed out.
His letters are clearly marked by a serious reading of Nietzsche and can thus be seen as one of the early theological attempts to reflect on what faith looks like after ‘the death of God’. In these letters he imagines a church radically transformed, one which rethinks, at a core (ontological) level, its purpose and expression.
I am sticking my neck out here, but I believe that we are beginning to witness the development of dynamic faith collectives which Bonhoeffer would have recognised as concrete manifestations of his lonely prison thoughts (though there are fewer of these groups than one might imagine – for instance I do not include the vast swarm of neo-evangelical, crypto-evangelistic communities which so often cloud the horizon). While ikon, the group of which I am a part, is not in any way perfect I see it as a key experiment in this new movement (others include Aldea in Tuscon and The Garden in Brighton).
Anyway, here is a quote from Bonhoeffer (which I might use as the opening quote in the book I am currently working on),
“And we cannot be honest unless we recognise that we have to live in the world etsi deus non daretur [even if there were no God]. And this is just what we do recognise – before God! God himself compels us to recognise it. So our coming of age leads us to a true recognition of our situation before God. God would have us know that we must live as men who manage our lives without him. The God who is with us is the God who forsakes us (Mark 15:34). The God who lets us live in the world without the working hypothesis of God is the God before whom we stand continually. Before God and with God we live without God. God lets himself be pushed out of the world on to the cross. He is weak and powerless in the world, and that is precisely the way, the only way, in which he is with us and helps us. Matt. 8.17 makes it quite clear that Christ helps us, not by virtue of his omnipotence, but by virtue of his weakness and suffering”.
I would recommend John Caputo’s wonderful book, The Weakness of God to see an example of how this can be fleshed out.
Tags: Aldea, Bonhoeffer, death of God, ikon, John Caputo, Nietzsche, Peter Rollins, religionless Christianity, weakness of God, worldly Christianity
June 20th, 2008 at 9:33 am
Pete – I have been addicted to Bonhoeffer’s “Letters and Papers from Prison” for almost the past year, which I have been reading alongside your books, Caputo, etc. I never cease to be amazed at the prophetic vision of Bonhoeffer in these writings. His LPP writings so easily speak to our current situation and I too am hopeful that we are beginning to witness some of Bonhoeffer’s vision coming to life. I am so saddened that his life was taken in the midst of working through these new thoughts. A tragedy for sure.
If anyone is interested, I spent quite a bit of time reading through LPP and putting together a document with all the relevant excerpts of Bonhoeffer’s writings concerning “religionless Christianity,” “Christianity in a world come of age,” etc. I’ve been blogging through all of these quotations – you can find the link to download the document on my most recent post: http://adammoore.wordpress.com
Of course, everyone should also get a copy of the complete “Letters and Papers from Prison” – you won’t regret it.
June 20th, 2008 at 10:06 am
Is Caputo’s Weakness of God written in the same style as Prayers and Tears? I has started working through prayers and tears and love the poetic feel of it, but sometimes I feel really thrown when he uses words like “hyperousiology” (which I still don’t know the meaning of).
I have always been curious about the evangelical co-option of Bonhoeffer as it seems his writings must be quite deep and yet they are reduced to something less than they might be by people who are nervous about Neitszche and Kierkegaard, or as Tony Jones said at his revival the other night by people who sit around arguing about Barth in the church meetings.
June 20th, 2008 at 10:24 am
Two of my favorite LPP passages which I blogged a while back:
“What is bothering me incessantly is the question what Christianity really is, or indeed who Christ really is, for us today. The time when people could be told everything by means of words, whether theological or pious, is over, and so is the time of inwardness and conscience–and that means the time of religion in general. We are moving toward a completely religionless time; people as they are now simply cannot be religious anymore… In what way are we “religionless-secular” Christians, in what way are we those who are called forth, not regarding ourselves from a religious point of view as specially favored, but rather as belonging wholly to the world? In that case Christ is no longer an object of religion, but something quite different, really the Lord of the world. But what does that mean? What is the place of worship and prayer in a religionless situation? I often ask myself why a “Christian instinct” often draws me more to the religionless people than to the religious, but which I don’t in the least mean with any evangelizing intention, but, I might almost say, “in brotherhood.” While I’m often reluctant to mention God by name to religious people–because that name somehow seems to me here not to ring true, and I feel myself to be slightly dishonest (it’s particularly bad when others start to talk in religious jargon; I then dry up almost completely and feel awkward and uncomfortable) – to people with no religion I can on occasion mention him by name quite calmly and as a matter of course…”
and this one, the essence of helpful paradox:
“The transcendence of epistemological theory has nothing to do with the transcendence of God. God is beyond in the midst of our life. The church stands, not at the boundaries where human powers give out, but in the middle of the village…”
June 20th, 2008 at 11:24 am
As the compulsive archivist for crypto-evangelical churches and post-death-of-god faith(less) collectives alike (grin), I need URLs! For the two groups you mentioned. For instance, is this the Aldea you speak of? And, I can’t even find a website to The Garden. And we all know that if something doesn’t have a corollary in Platonic Idealspace (aka the Internet), it does not exist.
June 20th, 2008 at 12:24 pm
Currently my copy of LPP sits on a shelve in pristine condition with the spine uncracked. Your blog on it will encourage me to plough through it in the days to come
June 20th, 2008 at 6:12 pm
Great to see I am not alone in my thoughts here. Simon I would recommend Adam’s stuff above. Not because the whole book isn’t worth reading but because, if you are interested in the theological gems, Adam has brilliantly done the hard work for you (also the book I have listed on the right hand side bar is useful here).
Hey Colin – The Weakness book is easier than The Prayers and Tears, yet no less important. I think you will enjoy it. His On Religion is also both very readable and beautifully insightful (a great place to start with Caputo)
John – these quotes are heavily underlined in my copy!
Mike – I mention Aldea and The Garden because their brilliance is in direct contrast to their (current) invisibility (and these guys deserve to be heard). The Garden is very similar to ikon in look, feel and thought (while being unique) while Aldea has brought this thinking into a context that looks and feels more like a church (and they hope to soon have their own micro-brewery like the Trappists – http://aldeabrewery.wordpress.com/). Aldea can be found at http://aldeaonline.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page. Can’t locate The Garden at the moment – if any of you guys are reading this then please post your address.
June 20th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
PS I stupidly said The Garden were in Bristol – I meant Brighton and have changed the post accordingly – their website is http://thegardenbrighton.wikispaces.com/
June 21st, 2008 at 1:23 am
Hello,
It’s the first time I visit this website and I have to say there are really very interesting thoughts. “Matt. 8.17 makes it quite clear that Christ helps us, not by virtue of his omnipotence, but by virtue of his weakness and suffering.” Although it’s an interesting issue, I’m not really engaged in the deconstructionist, post-modernism and Christianity discussion. But when I read such a phrase, my thoughts go directly to Alfred North Whitehead when he describes God as “the Fellow-Sufferer who understands” (Process & Reality) and how this is develloped in process theology.
Bonhoeffer probably didn’t know Whitehead, but when Caputo writes a book subtitled “a Theology of the Event” involving continental philosophy, he should have found some interesting resources in process thought. I don’t know Caputo, but I’m wondering whether he does make connections to process thought? (The process theologian Keller is cited on Amazone)
What are your thoughts on process thought, confronting “deconstructive post-modernism” with “constructive post-modernism” (cfr. David R. Griffin)?
June 21st, 2008 at 9:10 am
Pete – a white elephant in the room has to do with select dudes being appointed as “emergent rock stars” replete with publishing deals, godly giggle girlie groupies and the accoutrements of faith fame as it were. How does one maintain the invisibility needed for the really transformative work to grow and flourish given the demands of the US publishing world to produce salable product not to mention the accolades one receives when one’ s work has been blessed by the bloggers and babes? One key advantage of being a woman writing about religion is that unless I adopt a PC feminist conformist modality of writing that gets you in with select conference circuits when they want a “woman’s” voice, I will always be on the outside looking in. I am just now starting to see the blessings of being in what some would consider a weak position. The vast majority of people I know in the US who are doing work that I sense are traveling in a similar mode as you do not self-identify with emergent church or even progressive Christianity anymore.
This is why I pulled away from all formal church and parachurch involvement choosing instead to call myself a pilgrim, who feeds herself where she finds nourishment. Like you, I’ve met too many groups of holy hipsters that are spiritually shallow when you peel away the slick veneer.
June 21st, 2008 at 11:45 am
Pete, this question of post-religious expressions of faith has been exercising me for several years! When I (traumatically) left church in 1995 I thought I’d pitched myself beyond the Pale. Occasionally, however, it’d occur to me that someone prepared to radically let go of every church doctrine (in a way that missionary to the Masai tribe, and author of the 70s book “Christianity Rediscovered”, Vincent Donovan, didn’t quite manage to do) might find themselves in somewhat the same situation as I was. Sort of going so far undercover, as an evangelist, that they were even undercover to the preconceptions they had of themselves.
In 2003, deconstructed (by which I mean ‘up shit creek’), I experienced an inkling of Love, and resolved that if this experience was prepared to meet me in despair, as it seemed to be doing, it would probably sustain me if I risked continuing the life outside of church I’d been living. Five years on, and life since has been wild! Bonhoeffer is a hero to me, as is Jean Vanier, and others, including ‘The Garden’ – a seam of writers and activists running throughout church tradition who may have appeared inside the box at times, and outside it at others.
I make sense of it all by seeing the gospels as open to both institutional and decentralised interpretations at the same time. Different churches self-consciously occupy different positions between these poles at different times, but the end result is a universalist theology expressing a Love that goes anywhere, taking any form, in both strength and sublime weakness. And that leaves me free to play. Maybe that’s an answer for you, Becky, putting the white elephants in perspective (or at least introducing a mouse or two into the room with them): it ain’t about emergent or otherwise, it ain’t about publishing deals, and it sure ain’t about conforming to acceptable modalities or blog-blessing!
June 21st, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Thanks for the recommendations, Pete. I was surprised to find Prayers and Tears in my campus library along with a couple of others. I enjoyed How (Not) to Speak quite a bit and I think it is what tipped me off to really read Caputo. I definitely began to see the strength of his influence on your work when I began P&T.
I decided to read What Would Jesus Deconstruct and then On Religion; both were quite moving. I read a critique of the work On Religion by an author that felt that Caputo was simply rearticulating the Kantian religious project, sort of a universal religion. I sensed that the reader was somewhat dissatisfied with Caputo’s relatively wide idea that “religion is for lovers,” and I think he expressed some discomfort at Caputo’s inclusive message. (I am not familiar enough with Kant to comment heavily here, but from what I do know Kant was far more universalizing than to be as comfortable with the uniqueness of Christ and pluralism as is Caputo). I think Caputo touches on something that relates to a question I have heard in so many forms as I have read through the critiques of the emerging landscape of theology (and I think there is probably some element of this in most critiques of Emergent); namely, “Who is going to heaven when they die?”
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:17 am
Thanks for the mention Pete! The address for the garden wiki is http://www.thegardenbrighton.co.uk. As the URL indicates we are a project / community in Brighton, south coast of the UK. For those going to Greenbelt in the UK this summer we have been kindly given a room (the Winged Ox) where will be offering a piece of installation art called ‘The Possibility of the Impossible’ throughout the whole weekend with an event on Sunday evening and a couple of discussion sessions which Pete will be hopefully getting involved in.
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:09 am
Colin
This whole issue of ‘who goes to heaven’ is one that is starting to get attention again even from evangelicals.We are operating out of a very established world view and language system that has certain ‘buzz’ words e.g. eternal life,heaven,hell,damnation etc.They are wired with fear and are a handy tool in the armoury of most fundamentalist evangelists!
I have never been confortable with the contradiction between the image of God as portrayed by Jesus (father in prodigal son parable) and the ‘eternal damnation’ thing with us (believers) IN and them (unbelievers) OUT.
I have recently read a new book called ‘The Evangelical Universalist’ by Gregory MacDonald – it is a theological and philosophical examination of the whole question that I find quite convincing.
Another guy with a wicked sense of humour but great obsevational skills is a blogger and author Martin Zender who deconstucts the whole ‘hell’ thing like a dagger cutting through butter!Google him and you will see what I mean.His theory is that we have to read the original New Testament sources in Greek to pull the plug on the eternal punishment teaching.Did you know that there are 3 very different New Testament words each translated ‘hell’ in most translations?Did you know that the word translated ‘eternal’ (e.g. eternal life) in these versions is actually ‘aeonian’ meaning to do with period of time or an era.Zender may take a ‘dispensationalist’ view of these problems but I do love his style.Worth a read – you will laugh alot.
After much reading I have come back to the old ‘doctrine’ of ultimate Universal Reconciliation as advocated by Paul, some famous early church fathers such as Origen ( who was quickly made a heretic by the men in suits- sorry long robes) and mystics such as Julian of Norwich.
I realise Pete’s angle is that truth cannot be contained in a rational created system – theology especially – but at least we can explode false mind sets which don’t even spring from the scriptures in their original form.Many Christians leave the scriptures to the ‘experts’ i.e. and trust everything that is expounded.False teaching is a great tool in the hands of a controlling leadership – ‘hell’ is a great way of getting and keeping (at least temporarily) religious bums onto religious seats.
It’s now time to take a leap into the unknown as an emerging existentialist – lets hope someone is there to catch me!
Charlie
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:07 pm
Becky said, “a white elephant in the room has to do with select dudes being appointed as “emergent rock stars” replete with publishing deals, godly giggle girlie groupies and the accoutrements of faith fame as it were.”
Normally I detest pointed scriptural quotations, but I can’t help thinking of Ecclesiastes when I read that.
June 23rd, 2008 at 4:53 am
“the vast swarm of neo-evangelical, crypto-evangelistic communities which so often cloud the horizon”
It must be just me, but I don’t like the tone of this much Pete. Probably because I am one of those who is clouding the horizon and blocking the view to the future. I find it a bit snide and the promotion of Ikon as a fulfilment of Bonhoeffer’s vision somewhat self-important. There must be more interesting ways to have this debate without this kind of aside – and you and Ikon are notoriously interesting most of the time. It is also worth pointing out that Bonhoeffer’s few pages on this were somewhat flogged to death by a lot of people in the 60s and 70s and that work was felt by many people not to have led anywhere very promising… Maybe a fresh engagement will lead somewhere new and exciting, but it might also be worth investigating why people got fed up with it last time round and explaining why this new trajectory won’t just become ‘neo-liberal crypto secularising’ – I echo your phrase to demonstrate why I think if we all resort to that kind of aside it will block the dialogue rather than advance it.
June 23rd, 2008 at 6:23 am
Hey Doug
I respect you and so want to take on board what you say here. Will go through it bit by bit,
“I find it a bit snide and the promotion of Ikon as a fulfilment of Bonhoeffer’s vision somewhat self-important”
I can see why you think this, however I do stand by the fact that ikon is key in experimenting with the type of thought explored by Bonheoffer. I tried to mitigate this claim by saying that ikon is not perfect in any way and that it is only an ‘experiment’, (one which may go nowhere). Indeed I have been meaning to write a post called ‘if ikon is important how come its so crap’, in which I explore how ikon is both saying something interesting and yet often saying it very badly. Most of the people who think ikon is good have never been!
“it is also worth pointing out that Bonhoeffer’s few pages on this were somewhat flogged to death by a lot of people in the 60s and 70s and that work was felt by many people not to have led anywhere very promising… Maybe a fresh engagement will lead somewhere new and exciting, but it might also be worth investigating why people got fed up with it last time round”
That is very true. I think there is some great stuff to be found in those writings, however you are right, they didn’t really lead anywhere that facilitated large-scale change. I think however not all of their writings led to dead ends.
“‘neo-liberal crypto secularising’ – I echo your phrase to demonstrate why I think if we all resort to that kind of aside it will block the dialogue rather than advance it.”
This may indeed be true, however I think there is descriptive merit in the phrase ‘neo-evangelical, crypto-evangelistic’. Here I am referring to such things as seeker services which very much self-identify as new-evangelical and whose mission is a form of covert evangelism.
Anyway, perhaps we can have a fair and frank conversation at GB this year?
June 23rd, 2008 at 6:46 am
You have a terrible tendency to seduce by self-deprecation Mr Rollins – part of my problem is that I am not yet persuaded that either being neo-evangelical or evangelising are past their sell by date – or that those of us who are the cloudy ones are aspiring to be crypto or covert to the degree you suggest. I do like Ikon’s desire to be evangelised by others and remind myself of it regularly, but as we discussed at GB last year, I remain attached in a neo-Barthian (!) way to the imperative of proclamation. Someone once commented that Barth’s medicine was administered in merciless overdoses and I worry that your work (like Caputo’s) threatens the same with the medicine of deconstruction. (although a couple of 5ml spoonfuls is good for combatting cloudiness)
What I find difficult is the talk of vast swarms which sounds a bit de haut en bas for me – at least in its flawed practice Ikon remains down and dirty with the rest of us failing and flailing practitioners…
June 23rd, 2008 at 7:07 am
PS – why does the clock on your blog suggest i wrote this at 6:46am? I worry what people will think of me… (it was written around 11-30am)
June 23rd, 2008 at 8:27 am
American time Doug!?
All good bloggers have their roots in the old USA – even deconstructionist mystics like Pete.
Charlie
June 23rd, 2008 at 8:28 am
I would do more self-deprecation, except I’m not very good at it
I also see a place for mission in the church, indeed see it as central. I just want to interrogate what that mission is and what it communicates. For me evangelism is too caught up in a (one-way) presentation of information. I am big into re-discovering the gospel as evangelising me as much as other people, inviting me into a transformed mode of being. By giving up the desire to reach the ‘other’ with what ‘I’ possess I want to explore metanoia as something for us all. Instead of trying to ‘reach’ others one simply creates spaces for the Event of faith to be born in all of us. Giving up mission can become the most effect space for mission to take place.
June 23rd, 2008 at 8:35 am
LOL – very true Charlie. Looking forward to having you in the existentialist emerging waters!
Becky, you bring up a vitally important issue to do with celebrity/power in the church. Thankfully being in a place like Belfast means that I don’t get directly caught up in that murky water (and also not being that cool also helps!).
June 23rd, 2008 at 8:41 am
How do we “simply create space” – that sounds quite cloudy to me.. and can I not still have Jesus rather than “the event of faith”
And do we have the right to “give up” something we have been “sent” to do – and if we can see that our renunciation will be effective have we not already outwitted the paradox and given up on deconstruction…
A fairly standard account of missio dei would posit the church as first the object of mission before it is the subject – so I am not sure how radical a reversal your re-discovery is here?
Tell me if I am clogging up your blogging here…
June 23rd, 2008 at 11:49 am
I don’t think someone can have their beliefs betrayed, or deconstructed, or stripped of religion, or whatever we might call it, without their having been some construction, the reverse of all the above first.
I think evangelism and proclamation have a key place: we need to show people a construct that we believe is worth holding to. We need to explain to them the significance of an event, the person of Jesus etc… all of this I would put into what Rohr calls ‘the first half of life’ – the ‘construction of the container’.
But the critique of this then must happen in ‘the second half of life’ if it is to mature into something more conjunctive. I think the trouble that a lot of post-evangelicals have with evangelicalism is that appears to be a dead-end: once the gospel has been received, there’s nowhere else to go. Evangelicals would doubtless disagree, but I do understand the point. The Christian subculture – that hiding away from the world into some sterile alternative, is the root of so much trouble. In fact, it’s not a Christian thing. It’s a natural human cocooning response that we see in all fanatical forms of belief, and it’s the healthy critique of this that makes Pete’s betrayal a thing of fidelity.
June 23rd, 2008 at 12:12 pm
Hi Pete
I think I’m with Doug in being a little underwhelmed by this part of the Bonhoeffer corpus these days. For me, his ‘religionless Christianity’ only makes some kind of sense when it stands in a dialectical relationship with ‘religion-ful’ Christianity. I guess a rough approximation to this is ‘Christendom’ (although I’m aware of a few pitfalls in loose definition here). This means it’s all spiffing stuff if you want to stand out against a dominant Christendom (which confuses culture for the faith in so many ways). Hence it was very popular in England in the 1960s and 1970s. However, from my perspective as someone who pastors the two most liberal parishes in my diocese, I have to say that I don’t think it cuts much relevant mustard these days. The problem is that in England, at least, Christendom is such a spent force that it can no longer sustain the dialectic and the whole ‘religionless Christianity’ thing deflates as a foundation for building anything (theory or praxis) upon. Now I guess that it still tickles the tastebuds of people who are, for some reason, engaged with and immersed in some culturally persistent version of Christendom (eg. if you happen to live in the USA or Northern Ireland, or happen to have been seduced into an Evangelical church at some point in your youth) but as for something upon which we could build a post-Christendom version of Jesus’ community, then I think its inadequacy has been long proven.
There’s also a big question in my mind over whether we actually can (or need) to reinvent the cultural wheel of ecclesiology in the way that Bonhoeffer was toying with. I suspect that if he were to have read the kind of anthropological, sociological and ritual studies we now have available, he’d have realized the idea was hopelessly naive and founded on a questionable anthropology. I think that all churches need to forget the dream of recovering their own cultural innocence and realize that all Christian groups are, from the point of view of their religious culture, well and truly corrupt and un-decorruptable. (sorry, dunno if that word actually exists!) So religionless Christianity is, for me, a bit like a liberal version of Charismatic restorationism: a romantic and naive ecclesiology. So let’s stop playing virgins when we’re already well and truly sh*gged.
The thing you say about mission above isn’t exactly new is it? Actually making evangelization a two-way conversation and honest human encounter: well, bless me! whatever next? We’ll be sitting down and eating with the buggers next …
June 23rd, 2008 at 12:55 pm
Which Rohr do you mean Kester? My problem with second half images (very Euro 2008) is akin to my problem with Fowler (who I think you are keen on) – the orthodox/evangelicals get infantilised and labelled as stuck at a key developmental stage, while others move to the stage Fowler (and Rohr?) presumably believe they are at already – which worries me a bit and sounds like some of the things Ikon tries to unsettle….
June 23rd, 2008 at 12:56 pm
I just want to note that it might be easy to briefly encounter Bonhoeffer’s thoughts on religionless Christianity and lump it in as some kind of neo-liberalism. But I think a serious reading of Bonhoeffer’s last writings really can’t go in this direction. It’s certainly not where Bonhoeffer was wanting to go. An important quote from Bonhoeffer:
“Bultmann seems to have somehow felt Barth’s limitations, but he misconstrues them in the sense of liberal theology, and so goes off into the typical liberal process of reduction – the ‘mythological’ elements of Christianity are dropped, and Christianity is reduced to its ‘essence.’ – My view is that the full content, including the ‘mythological’ concepts, must be kept – the New Testament is not a mythological clothing of a universal truth; this mythology (resurrection etc.) is the thing itself – but the concepts much be interpreted in such a way as not to make religion a precondition of faith (cf. Paul and circumcision). Only in that way, I think, will liberal theology be overcome (and even Barth is still influenced by it, though negatively) and at the same time its question be genuinely taken up and answered (as is not the case in the Confessing Church’s positivism of revelation!). Thus the world’s coming of age is no longer an occasion for polemics and apologetics, but is now really better understood than it understands itself, namely on the basis of the gospel and in the light of Christ.”
Anyways, I just encourage people to do the reading – it’s good stuff.
June 23rd, 2008 at 1:09 pm
lol – love your last comment Paul.
I would of course want to right in the sky what GK Chesterton often said, ‘If I say anything new then ignore me’.
I am not so sure that Bonheoffer’s religionless Christianity can be dismissed so easily. I think that what Paul says is true enough of the interpretations of Bonheoffer that we saw in Robinson and Cupitt. The Sea of Faith movement shrinks as the Anglican church shrinks. However I think there is a different way of taking it – that Bonheoffer was expressing a mode of being Christian outside of what philosophers call onto-theology (i.e. outside metaphysics). Hence his statements like ‘How can Christ become Lord of the Religionless as well’. For Bonheoffer religion was simply one mode that Christianity could take (he did not necessarily have a problem with that, indeed he says that this was the dominant mode for nineteen hundred years). But that it could exist in different modes.
He was not simply engaging in a negation of an affirmation. His religionless Christianity was about negating the negation. In other words there is the affirmation (religion), the negation (non-religion) and the negation of negation (non-nonreligion – i.e. his ‘religionless christianity’). The negation of negation here is the attempt to move beyond a dialectic between religion and its (religious) rejection. Hence him writing about overcoming liberal theology and of rethinking the whole ecclesical structure of the church.
Now I am not unreservedly pro the later Bonheoffer. I have disagreements on most pages (problems for example with the idea that people are no longer, on the whole religious, that the world is come of age, that existentialism and psychoanalysis are bad etc.) but these do not take away from my broad endorsement of his fledgling project.
June 23rd, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Sorry, a few conversations going on here, just to respond to Doug… Richard was the one I was on about, and I can see what you’re saying about the infantilising of evangelicals etc. Couple of points on that:
I think the perception of being infantilised is natural. But those who are perceived to be doing the infantilising should know better than to be patronising, and those who are feeling infantilised should not be so precious about their position.
Personally, I don’t think the stages of faith / 2-halves model does infantilise. One little soundbite R-Rohr is keen on is the Dalai Lama saying ‘You must learn the law *very* well, in order that you can break it properly.’
Those doing the infantilising, I think, are perhaps not really ‘getting’ the real deal as far as Rohr (or Fowler) are concerned. I think that is good because it emphasises what so many are keen to skip too quickly over: learning the law very well. There is nothing infant about getting to grips with this, and battling with it. The danger of (at least the pop version) of Pete’s model is that people just jump to this very cerebral, nuanced view of faith that frankly is nebulous. But I think one of the key lessons that evangelicalism has to be grown up about is that people *do* experience a movement beyond it’s view of truth/scripture etc. And those who do are then left to wonder if they are simply backsliders. So what I’d like to see, and have tried to argue, is that evangelical churches need to have clear exits as well as entrances, and places like Ikon need to do proper work on teaching people the law. Though Pete will hate me saying that!
As for Euro 2008… well, it’s like Bonheoffer eh, no one knows quite how the bloody Germans do it
June 23rd, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Pete – Are you really convinced that Bonhoeffer was Derrida avant la lettre? (Sorry I’m having a pretentious Frenchious day – that’s the second time – and I’m drinking Talisker after midnight so don’t care). That he is reaching beyond onto-theology? (Which not all of us are convinced is either a good or a meaningful thing to do – but that’s another discussion) – is Bonhoeffer post- or extra-metaphysical?
I just want to check this is what you are saying because it seems kind of anachronistic to me – and the negation of negation also – a very Eckhartian reading of Bonhoeffer which is a sentence I never imagined myself writing… but bring it on..
This sounds like you Pete and you may be right or wrong about it – but does it really sound like Bonhoeffer? Is there a text in this class? Or are we reading Letters and Papers from Ikon?
Kester – I’m a bit underwhelmed by both Rohr and Fowler – and I do think that they can be experienced as hugely patronising of people they disagree with – I’d rather talk to someone about why they think I’m clueless than have them just categorise me as underdeveloped or insufficiently evolved.. Especially if they’re English!
I’m not clear what ‘law’ means in this context either, can you fill it out some more?
As for Euro 2008 for some strange reason I was backing Sweden…
Adam – that is a good B quote – I will ponder it some more – I don’t think Bonhoeffer was a neo-liberal [it was Pete I was accusing of that
way back when] – but nor do I think he was proto pomo – I will go back and read it in context
As for Talisker – the thinking man’s Laphroaig I reckon. But argue if you want that’s why we’re here
June 23rd, 2008 at 7:15 pm
Hey Doug – I do not read Bonheoffer as proto-Derridian. Although what I would say in that the religious reading of Derrida provided by Caputo could be seen to be an expression of what Bonheoffer was exploring. However let me be clear, we are talking about half a dozen letters written in a prison before his execution – there is not much to go on. I am not saying that Caputo is a faithful reading of Bonheoffer’s later fragments, I am saying that his project could retroactively be seen as a productive rendering of a possible trajectory.
I would say more than this however as I think it is clear from the letters that he is in tension with his early work (the orthodox reading of Bonhoeffer that tells us of an unbroken continuity does not seem to do justice to his hesitations about ‘The Cost of Discipleship and his concern about being seen as a heretic by his friend who is reading the letters). Add to this his knowledge of Nietzsche and I think we can read Bonhoeffer as sharing the onto-theological concern with Heidegger (which Derrida then took up in a less religious way). Now I don’t know how familiar Bonhoeffer was with Heidegger, but I guess he would have had some knowledge.
Bonhoeffer, from my reading, was in a transition stage in his last years. So there is a confusion at work between a metaphysical reading of faith and a phenomenological one (at least thats my reading). The one thing I would say is that while we do not know where he would have gone I would say that the signs are there that he would not go back!
Again, to be clear, I am not directly advocating the 60’s death of God theology as faithful to Bonheoffer (though I see more value in it perhaps than you – indeed ikon had Cuppit over for a talk just a few weeks back). The reason being that I think that movement was not able to properly negate the negation (to be crude). But I think that they were important none-the-less.
In terms of the text, I promise I have beside me as I type, I just couldn’t be bothered typing out quotes! But I guess I have to, so here are some examples of what I mean,
His critique of onto-theo-logy,
“‘God’ as a working hypothosis, as a stop-gap for our embarrasment, has become superflous… Who is God? Not in the first place an abstract belief in God, in his omnipotence, etc. Encounter with Jesus Christ”
“Belief in the resurrection is not the answer to the problem of death. God’s beyond is not the beyond of our cognitive facilities. The transcendence of epistemological theory has nothing to do with the transcendence of God”
“My view of [Bultmann] is not that he went too far, but that he didn’t go far enough”
His move towards phenomenology,
“The transendental is not infinite and unattainable tasks, but the niehbour who is within reach in any given situation”
His critique of the place of doctrine,
“The Problem of the Apostles Creed? What must I believe? Is the wrong question… All we can prove is that faith of the bible and Christianity does not stand or fall by these issues”
His move away from his old thought,
“You would be surprised, and perhaps even worried , by my theological thoughts and the conclusions that they lead to”
There are more, but need to go to bed!
June 23rd, 2008 at 9:07 pm
I think it’s important to realize how christocentric Bonhoeffer is in LPP (as in his other works). And how focused he is on “the way of Jesus” – a way of living in the world.
“To be a Christian does not mean to be religious in a particular way, to make something of oneself (a sinner, a penitent, or a saint) on the basis of some method or other but to be a man – not a type of man, but the man that Christ creates in us. It is not the religious act that makes the Christian, but participation in the sufferings of God in the secular life. That is metanoia: not in the first place thinking about one’s own needs, problems, sins, and fears, but allowing oneself to be caught up into the way of Jesus Christ, into the messianic event…”
“Faith is participation in this being of Jesus (incarnation, cross, and resurrection). Our relation to God is not a “religious” relationship to the highest, most powerful, and best Being imaginable–that is not authentic transcendence–but our relation to God is a new life in “existence for others,” through participation in the being of Jesus.”
June 23rd, 2008 at 9:08 pm
Pete – I hear you bud but it’s a helluva lot more trickier than what meets the eye initially. For example, there is a full page ad of you and Caputo in the AAR catalogue promoting whatever seminar you’re co-leading – hardly anyone who is presenting at AAR gets this much PR. Also, I think you know how you are received by the US emergent church crowd. Along those lines, I’ve lost track of the burgeoning church planters I’ve encountered in the States who tell me their dream is to create a cool church plant like Ikon. Like it or not, you are seen here by a sizable minority as the epitome of Christian coolness. I know this is weird as all get out and if it were me, I would find this scenario creepy as all get out but I am simply stating what is here in the US. Yes, being in Belfast does keep the Christian craziness at bay but it’s a different world when one lands on the US shores. My ancestor Roger Williams was the first American pioneer of religious tolerance when he came to the US in 1631 so I guess you could say battling Americana Christianity is in my genes – and to be honest I wish i didn’t have to fight so – that’s why I am so tempted to move to the UK and chill but then too many people keep telling me if I go then there won’t be anyone left with the cujones to say what has to be said (though as a chick it is hard to have cujones given I lack the necessary ontological equipment) — also the dollar continues to tank so that’s not an option at present.
June 23rd, 2008 at 9:22 pm
Becky – you seem to be a big fan of Shane Claiborne. Do you see his rise in popularity as a problem? Do you think it’s a problem that there are also many people wanting to start communities like Simple Way?
June 23rd, 2008 at 10:12 pm
I wouldn’t say I’m a fan of Shane was much as he’s one of the few I see who genuinely walks the walk and despite his popularity remains Shane. He’s the real deal. From what I can see, Shane has established a very strict system of communal accountability in place to keep himself grounded – a lot of this is outlined on the Simple Way website under the section about booking Shane for a tour.
I think it’s fantastic when people want to explore what it means to follow Christ in the 21st century. My satirical self gets antsy when people want to say replicate say Ikon, the Simple Way or any other community because these holy hipsters want to see themselves as part of what they see as the current cool Christian craze. I missed Ikon during my last visit to Belfast and hope to visit with them a bit the next time I’m in town – what they do is unique and while they are generous in sharing the fruits of their labors, these fruits were grown in Belfast. Replanting these fruits in US soil won’t work in the same way you can’t export Guinness. But there are learnings that can be shared across communities – to me that’s one of the joys of a place like Greenbelt.
June 24th, 2008 at 1:52 am
Sorry for saying “as all get out” twice but my brain goes on bit wonky at times when I describe Americana Christianity. It’s the durn bizarre.
June 24th, 2008 at 4:17 am
Thanks for the long post on this Pete – there is a bigger and possibly tedious debate about definition of terms in the background here – I value much of Derrida’s work – but I have come to feel that the term onto-theology functions a bit like ‘fundamentalism’ for those who use it pejoratively – like a kind of plumber’s foam that expands to cover everything people don’t like about the objects of their critique.
I also set to thinking about why so many people have made the detour via Bonhoeffer given the last pages are so brief – is there a desire to borrow some authenticity from his context or is it just because there are a few tantalising phrases.. I suppose to move it on, we would have to talk more about religion and what we mean by it and compare Barth’s critique of the same etc. Graham Ward has an interesting essay on the Christian invention of the concept of religion in a festschrift for John de Gruchy..
I am still not at all convinced that Bonhoeffer is anything near as apophatic as you seem to portray him or that your way of negating the negation will avoid what I dislike about the Death of God/Cupitt modes of doing theology. For me the warning signs lie partly in the alternative parallel vocabulary you are evolving for faithtalk – a kind of labyrinthine mid-atlantic existentialese – but I’m still a sucker for Jesus loves me this I know, for the bible tells me so. So I would say that – don’t you miss the language of Zion now again brother?
June 24th, 2008 at 4:19 am
last line – now and again
June 24th, 2008 at 4:47 am
Pete, I’d probably side with Becky here. I think it’s too easy to say ‘hey, I’m in Belfast, I don’t buy into the Christian celebrity thing.’ In a similar vein, as we’ve discussed, to keep marketing Ikon as ‘failing’ is just too cool for school. Nothing wrong with that, but, as Doug says, the self-deprication can lead in strange places, and not necessarily towards a true view of the self, or the group. That said, it’s vital that people do resist the pressures that popularity put on them. I don’t think there’s any problem in other groups wanting to start groups like Ikon or the Simple Way, as long as they apply the spirit of the things locally, rather than just clone.
And Doug, hope the Talisker wears off. Just been given a bottle of local Jura stuff this morning – not the supermarket Jura, but something that rarely leaves the island… tempted to break the seal now, but it’s not yet 11am and I’m at work… Ah to be a professional christian like you lot and take a dram before midday
Which is a long way of saying I don’t have time or energy to get into terminological debates on what I meant by ‘law’! Briefly, I think’s actually talking about tradition in a way. When people join the church, they are joining a tradition, and it’s important for people to know and explore that before they can subvert it in a positive sense.
June 24th, 2008 at 8:48 am
Kester – I took a rather serious financial hit (and more grief than I care to remember – putting all Christian crapola behind me) to pen Rising from the Ashes because I believed that here in the states the mainline emerging voices were being squashed by the 800 pound post-evangelical emergent gorillas. (I included a few non-mainline voices as these were people who were promoting themselves to the mainline so people was aware of the full range of what’s out there.) The ministries that truly excited me here in the US when I was penning this book as well as some I’ve discovered since then that give me hope do not self-identify as emergent. (They might admit reluctantly to being emerging if pushed.) Simply put, they’re focused on trying to be the church to their community – they might read say Shane Claiborne or Tom and Christine Sine for inspiration but they focused on what worked for them locally. What really excites me is seeing the US Episcopal church take a serious interest and I hope to continue the UK-UK Anglican emerging connections here.
Alas, these groups are all too often in the distinct minority. What I am seeing are all too often are holy hipster cloning of church plants taking those models that have been deemed by the marketplace to be cool – you tend to hear more about them especially via the Internet because their leaders are very good at self-promotion. A major tip off for me is that everyone in the group tends to look identical with similar educational backgrounds even though the surrounding neighborhood is more diverse. There’s also the use of I, me and mine in describing their ministry. And you’ll find phrases like “one of the most innovative churches in the country,” “all stars of the faith,” and “emergent church pioneer” (all terms found on actual websites/blogs) to describe said missional madness. I could go on but you get the drift and I don’t want to make myself sick spiritually speaking.
Also, what you are saying is spot on re: tradition – here in the states, people from other religious traditions (or often no tradition) are often attracted to the Anglican liturgy. But one of the major reasons we’re having a split in the US Episcopal Church has been the infusion of Baptists, etc. who become church leaders and have no freaking clue about Episcopal polity. We also have universalists like Spong who have promoted an anything goes policy that also goes against Anglican tradition.
End of rant – like you I have to get to work.
June 24th, 2008 at 9:08 am
But Episcopal polity stinks Becky! It’s “but partially reformed”
Embrace your baptist incomers (and your inner baptist) – they are there to do you good!
plus I’m with Barth and Moltmann on baptismal practice – so I want it all (and as L’Oreal would say I think I’m worth it…)
I like the way Hauerwas (who I think just became a US episcopalian) in “The Grain of the Universe” calls together three witnesses: Barth/John Paul II + Dorothy Day/John Howard Yoder – from the three divided strands of Western Christianity – looking for an ecumenical theology which remixes the insights of all three traditions (OK he left out the Orthodox…)
for me, the Emerging deal is about the possibility of sampling, unbundling and remixing traditions – I love Anglican liturgy and can’t stand Episcopal polity
I’m also with you on the critique of descriptors – even Shane’s book – and I respect what he/they are up to – sent quite a few shivers down my spine – as much as anything we need each other on the blogosphere to burst the bubbles of hubris (”and you think you know but your old friends have to tell you again”)
Doug the presbyterian
June 24th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
Do I get a star for reading this far down the comments?
Lots of theology, and fine whisky talk, and some very pertinent points about the tension between being known and being anonymous.
The trouble with barthering Barthe back and forth, though, is that to the majority of us, American and British at least, Barthe lives in Springfield. And Molt, man, is Jack Daniels, or Teachers, ‘cos the Talisker, let alone the local drop from Jura, will remain, for the duration, out of reach.
Which is to say, that theological language is precious, and appreciated by the few who can afford it, but be under no illusions, those few, at present, are very few indeed.
What I’d like to know is, as the only new thing on the block is the Kingdom (and as it was ever thus), what new forms of the Kingdom are blossoming and thriving in the 21st Century? For the record, I think Pete is totally on the ball with his pursuit of the negation of negation. I rather think that’s what Jesus discovered when he lived the law (religion), died because of it (negation), and rose again (however mythically you understand it, the negation of negation). And that, by my reading, leaves us in a place where anything is permissible. It’s great to conjure up new theologies; it’s great to sustain and champion the old ones, but it’s also great to step out and live the adventure of life, leaving others to theologise (if they want to) with what you leave behind.
I guess, which you touch on in your interview, Pete, that that’s one way to be the kind of leader who creates space for others to create by getting out of their way. I sense that’s what Shane Claiborne is about, and you, and Becky, and Doug, and, and…
June 24th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
I don’t want to get into a debate regarding Episcopal polity except to note that all too often folks come into the Episcopal Church without even having read Richard Hooker and then proceed to deconstruct Episcopal teachings – what you end up with is a bunch of God goo. BTW-it’s also a classic rule of comedy. Master the rules – then break every durn one of them.
June 25th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Wow this post really grew. Wish I had time to chime in on everything of interest. There is one comment that I do want to address. Paul Roberts writes:
“There’s also a big question in my mind over whether we actually can (or need) to reinvent the cultural wheel of ecclesiology in the way that Bonhoeffer was toying with. I suspect that if he were to have read the kind of anthropological, sociological and ritual studies we now have available, he’d have realized the idea was hopelessly naive and founded on a questionable anthropology…. religionless Christianity is, for me, a bit like a liberal version of Charismatic restorationism: a romantic and naive ecclesiology. So let’s stop playing virgins when we’re already well and truly sh*gged.”
Paul – I see life in Jesus as a daily, regenerative reality. Religion occurs when perpetual renewal is replaced by static / conceptual idols. Codification of experience is not experience. Religious proxy breeds uniformity at the expense of unity.
Fluid / religionless ecclesiology emerges from a shared experience of the Ever New, not -necessarily- a shared theology. I think Bonhoeffer, increasingly sensing his own mortality, was reaching out to this ideal of ecclesial fluidity. He certainly wasn’t “toying” with this ideal – realizing it to be possibly his last words, LPP becomes the scholar’s weightiest insight.
Can we remain individually and collectively unbounded by the idolatry of religion? Maybe not, but that shouldn’t stop us from pursuing the highest ideals – ideals that become clearer when decades of unessential baggage are stripped away.
Those who are sh*gged have forgotten the ever-new wonders and freedoms of childhood. Indeed, children -are- naive. They are also not cynical. I doubt Jesus crafted his life around the leading “anthropological and sociological thinkers” of his day. Children play, and their rules are always in flux, they are always onto a new thing.
(is sh*gged naughty UK slang?)
June 25th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
Ah, finally a question I can answer – yes, sh*gged is naughty UK slang.
June 26th, 2008 at 6:58 am
Couldn’t help joining in with this great discussion. Pete, I’ve been wondering for a while about jumping in and wanting to engage a little more deconstructively with some of your thoughts and Doug and Kester have echoed a lot of what I would like to say. As Doug has intimated, the “religionless Christianity” stuff seems to have been done to death many years ago and it almost smacks of former evangelicals flexing their intellectual muscles rather than the arrival of a butterfly. Catholic, liberal and serious evangelical debates have moved on apace from the material of Honest to God and the Sea of Faith. Whilst hearing and applauding the need for deconstruction (previous epochs might have used the word “sanctification”?), a spirituality of betrayal by itself reduces the Christian vision to an individualistic, consumerist journey. Whilst having a huge “responsibility to the other” the logical endpoint of your analysis has “no responsibility to action”. And this is where I’ll depart from Doug, a truly cosmic vision of God’s newness (that comes in death and therefore is tangible in absence!) has something to do and say about structures in society, about leadership, about church, which is why episcopacy is a thoroughly reformed and Christian ideal. Anything less is sectarian, dualistic and reductionist.
June 26th, 2008 at 8:27 am
Pete, I’m thrilled to see you taking on Bonhoeffer’s maddening intimations, and look forward to where you might take them. One early question: in How (Not) to Speak of God, you reference (and strongly endorse) the prejudice of love. How might we approach LPP’s inherently heady endeavor from a perspective of love?
June 26th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Really interesting discussions, thanks to all for this. Pete, I am fascinated by how your reflections resonate the final chapter of Barry Taylor’s final chapters on “Entertainment Theology” which I think is the best book yet I have read yet on exploring what is going on in our post-secular culture of resacralization and spirituality driven by consumption and information technology. Below I add a page from Barry Taylor and a final reflection:
>>
Bonhoeffer wrestled with many issues about Christianity in a changing world. His call for a religionless Christianity was an attempt to come to terms with what Christianity would have to face in a world in which “presuppositions of metaphysics and inwardness” have been replaced, I, of course, contend that with the implosion of modernity we have entered a postsecular time in which much can be found in common with Bonhoeffer’s wrestlings. He seemed to have a fairly negative view toward all of this, something that I do not share. I think these are exciting times for the realm of faith and belief. We live in a world where metaphysics is challenged, where interconnectiveness has been replaced inwardness as a key religious impulse, and where religions that once held the imagination and cradled the faith of many are no longer seen as vital sources and resources for life and living. Bonhoeffer also wondered whether there was a future for the Western form of Christianity and asked some hard questions about the shape of Christian faith in the light of its demise:
If our final judgment must be that the western form of Christianity, too, was only a preliminary stage to a complete absence of religion, what kind of situation emerges us, for the church? How can Christ become the Lord of the religionless as well? Are there religionless Christians? If religion is only a garment of Christianity – and even this garment has looked very different at different times – then what is religionless Christianity?
My contention is that religion is only a garment of Christianity, one which no longer fits well and therefore needs to be discarded in favour of something other to regain the vitality of the message of Jesus. It is once again, and perhaps as never before, a time for new wineskins.” (Barry Taylor, E Theology p187).”
<<
In the Moot Community we have been challenged by this text from the Bonhoeffer prison texts:
“The renewal of the Church will come from a new type of monasticism which has only in common with the old an uncompromising allegience to the sermon on the mount. It’s high time women and men banded together to do this.”
As a community we are exploring this mode of being a Christian spiritual community drawing on a post-religious post-secular re-engagement with a culture of new mysticism and searching, so that church as ekklesia becomes a radical community engaging with an emerging new form of spirituality.
Thanks again for a great discussion!
June 26th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Ian – that’s really helpful. I will be checking out Taylor’s book.
With the “new monasticism” quotation you mentioned above, I like to pair the following from LPP:
“…being Christians today will be limited to two things; prayer and righteous action among men. All Christian thinking, speaking, and organizing must be born anew out of this prayer and action.”
I see this as another way Bonhoeffer was talking about the “new monasticism.”
June 27th, 2008 at 6:47 am
Good continuing discussion brothers and sisters – aahhh Richard and Becky – you know it was only a little gentle teasing (hence the joke term ’stinks’), provoked by the suggestion that ex Baptists should read their Hooker – religiously! I respect (though don’t support) episcopal polity, but I am serious about ‘emerging ecumenism’ – about different polities learnng from one another and new hybrid traditions emerging within and beyond mainstream traditions – witness the interest in new monasticism, which again I am personally sceptical about, but fascinated by and learning from.
On the substantive, I do think we need to revisit the debates about what we mean (and what Bonhoeffer meant) when we say ‘religion’ – interestingly the term ‘religious’ applied to women and men has of course been a traditional designation for those who went into monastic communities!
One of my concerns about the turn to “mysticism” negative theology and the apophtatic tradition has to do with the real threat of elitism – of a kind of gnostic elite of the unclouded developing, whose approach to faith and doctrine is miles away from the vast majority of people. The post-liberal, radical orthodox stream represents an alternative response to postmodernism and deconstruction, one which is still willing to speak of God in ways which display rich and radical continuities with tradition. So I am serious about standing with Barth in his ‘Jesus loves me this i know’ moment and wanting to be part of an ‘emerging’ church which does not feel the need to only use the language of praise and proclamation under erasure. But this depends on there being some sense of how God continues to make God-talk possible – and – like the later Barth – not always having to pronounce the negation alongside the affirmation. Not the least of my problems with this is the evolution of the parallel faith-talk, which tries to inscribe its own failure within its own practice and performance – but will always to my mind be creating new linguistic idols which may suffer from the old diseases and be less adequate for what we need to say to, for and about God.
June 27th, 2008 at 8:07 am
In our “post-secular culture of resacralization and spirituality driven by consumption and information technology” and with “Christian spiritual community drawing on a post-religious post-secular re-engagement with a culture of new mysticism and searching, so that church as ekklesia becomes a radical community engaging with an emerging new form of spirituality” I think I’m going to need a bloody dictionary just to get me socks on in the morning, let alone get to church/pub and order a post-ferment hopped beverage.
“One of my concerns about the turn to “mysticism” negative theology and the apophtatic tradition has to do with the real threat of elitism – of a kind of gnostic elite of the unclouded developing, whose approach to faith and doctrine is miles away from the vast majority of people.”
I’d agree Doug. But the academy has always promoted elites through it’s attempt to rationalise everything into well-ordered language. I don’t think it’s particularly new. Unfortunately.
June 27th, 2008 at 8:50 am
hi there,
hope you don’t mind me joining in – i’ve read through this thread and would like to say a couple of things.
I’m totally with Doug on the Jesus loves me thing. man, it can get so complicated, and fair enough – you’re professors etc so its your job to be complicated (i am friends with a few PhD students so i can sympathise:), and also work in a research dept).
But essentially, one Day i had a crazy experience i can only understand as God/Jesus, and from then on followed as best i could. i didn’t know any words to describe what had happened, or even know if praying worked if you didn’t speak out loud etc. I still met God. i still love Jesus. My theology has changed loads since, hopefully its a bit better, but who knows? Maybe we’re all totally wrong about Hell being not so bad (for example) and giving people the heebie jeebies really is the best way of preaching!!
Anyway, Pete, thank you for a very interesting post. i read Bonhoeffers letter and missed all this crazy theology stuff, but was very touched by his obvious doubt and gentleness. woudl have loved to have been there to take him home.
maybe see you lot at Greenbelt
June 27th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Laurence after a lot of intellectual clanging bells and cymbals/symbols ……… I think you may have found the key. Bonhoeffers Doubts and gentleness. Perhaps we could all learn from that.
I’m with the story of Rabbi Hillel, the older contemporary of Jesus who’d been approached by a bunch of pagans who said they would convert to Judaism if Hillel could recite the entire Torah while he stood on one leg. And Hillel stood on one leg and said, “Do not do unto others what you would not have done unto you. That is the Torah, the rest is commentary. Go and learn it.”
enjoying the discussion – even the amusing bits like Kester complaining about someone else using big words …. hey man sometimes its complex.
June 27th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Responding to Doug >>
One of my concerns about the turn to “mysticism” negative theology and the apophtatic tradition has to do with the real threat of elitism – of a kind of gnostic elite of the unclouded developing, whose approach to faith and doctrine is miles away from the vast majority of people. The post-liberal, radical orthodox stream represents an alternative response to postmodernism and deconstruction, one which is still willing to speak of God in ways which display rich and radical continuities with tradition.
I hear what you are saying Doug I really do. I am not proposing a support of guru elitism such as the approach of Matthew Fox for example. I have been challenged about the need for a missional, grounded, shared and practical form of the faith that engages with a culture of new mysticism. It will therefore need to draw on a new form of grounded mysticism that is rational, has some continuity with the past, but is incarnated in contemporary culture. I don’t think this is just an exercise of contextualisation, but about seeking fresh expressions of church and articulations of the faith in a new context. In this way we can hold onto a Jesus that loves me but in a strange new land with new paradigm of thought and understanding of humanity and culture. So I don’t see this as selling out, but the persuit of seeing a theology that is informed by starting from a missional contextualised situation of new forms of mysticism. Again its about defining mysticism. I am seeing this in terms of being creative, knowing through experience, a commitment to a pneumatology, an understanding of Christ of the Spirit, a commitment to learning through the arts and creativity as well as thinking and the rational. So rather than dumbing down on the faith, I am proposing a reorientation of depth of the faith, and hence my interest in Trinitarian theology and ecclesiology as a basis of understanding the Christian God as a basis for Christian Spirituality.
Kester I agree with you, elitism is always a threat in all explorations. But I wonder if this is more of a question of people being over-defensive of a position when feeling threatened by new thinking. I hope in all of this Christian exploration, we can recover a Spirit of generosity and learning from each other by facing dangerous questions, as we are all still learning and nothing is being attacked other than the need for us to look forward and not backwards…
June 27th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
I’m not sure elitism is a function of people feeling defensive, though it may be in some cases. I just think we need to be careful not to fall into a trap of thinking that careful and accurate definition actually leads to transformed practice.
I’m just reading Betrayal of Fidelity now (Jonny lent me his free copy – don’t worry Pete, I’m not lining your feckin’ pockets) and one of the things I think Pete is critiquing – and perhaps this is a paradox even trying to write about it – is our very human desire to denominate, define, rationalise and carefully describe the ‘life’ that we have encountered. The metaphor Pete touches on is the inability of science to show us what life really is… and yet we are desperate to try. I wonder if theology can therefore be a form of idolatry: our desperate spouting of words cover up the Word, and we end up worshipping the wrong thing.
It’s probably going to be impossible to say this and have it taken seriously, but I think we can also see, in the same way, theology as rather like masturbation. As Woody Allen says, ‘it’s sex with someone I love very much.’ Objectified, narrowed. And I hope no lack of generosity is taken by anyone. I fully consider myself, as a writer and someone engaged in theology, to be a big w&n%er. But I guess I’m trying to do so less, for fear it may blind me.
June 27th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
wow so much
)
and as i post a delight to follow my coleague who would rightly note there is a lot more in LPP than theology…:o)
and who knows me well enough to guess when i sad mortal i am studdied it i read out everything but the theology…..which goes to show we need a whole raft of people in God’s kingdom other than those who do the theology stuff…and i liked Kester’s last post on language…after reading too much Milbank…
Becky, i think a good question on which i have some very personal thoughts… i think a seperate post….
so Bonhoeffer
got th chance to do some stuff on this, not just LPP but his other works, at theological college and really thought it worth some effort so glad to see it discussed…and Pete do you always generate this much repsonse? well keep up the good blogging!
Ok at the time i picked up on a thread about ‘humanity come of age’ i think that fed a lot of the death of God theology, a sort of idea of ‘outgrowing religion’ that might be present in Bonhoeffer. i felt that was indeed a piece of bad theological anthrpology, a mistaken reading of humanity in an age that often promoted an almost darwinian idea that we had eveolved to become so much better. i think some of the human reponsibility language also picks that idea up….i think there Bonhoeffr is of a passing day, seriously modern and not postmodern. and i think crucially departing from a christian understading in which the divinee image and the corruption of that lie within all of us.
but not all of the religionless christianity rests on that.. some of it is grasping at the failure of the way church operates and i think perhaps even more profoundly at the fialure of Christian language to speak effectively. here i think Bonhoeffer’s call for a silence is to be heard. actually i didn’t agree at the time, but i think the more i engage with mission after christendom the more i get Bonhoeffer here. indeed there is also a sense of knowing the damage of our ‘religion’ and just being slightly dumbstruck…and here of course Bonhoeffer perhaps unwiitngly becomes an icon of a post Holocaust world in which Christendom has to cope with its legacy towards the Jews and may feel it has nothing to say.
personally i think faltering words and explorations of new speach are the way forward, and indeed there is much than can be said without retrurning to dubious conversations or worse agressive proclomations. but there is a great tradtion of silence in the face of God, i’m not sure this is Boihoeffer’s point, but i think it might be that of many-a-mystic we could well learn from.
i kept coming across a phrase in LPP that i really didn’t get back then, and recently i think i suddenly get it. Bonhoeffer often talks about how the church was living in the Old Testament and hadn’t entered the New. this was cleary very closely linked to many of his comments on being religionless and lving with who Jesus really was. recent reading for some writing I’ve been doing brought me to comments in Dulles on apologetics on how once the Church entered Christendom it had to look increasingly to the Old Testament for its key texts, only they spoke of running a religious nation. i think that was what Bonhoeffer saw, the whole concpet of the christian nation was a monumnetal mistake, it plunged us back before Jesus to a national ethnic faith, and one that ultimately would lead to nartional religious conflict and national German Christians. this of course was the essence of Christendom…and i think therefore the key to his concept of religionless christianity, a post natioanl faith, a post christendom faith would be post religious…and would also be a faith for all people not just the right people as i think Bonhoeffer desired.
in LPP he also brilliantly pricked the bubble of the Chrstendom shepard evangleism modle dsicribed as “snifing around in people’s riubbish hoping to catch them out” and longed for a faith that would meet people where they were strong. here he righlty exposes what happens in chrsistendom culture i nwhich all atre assumed to be christian so mission becomes the policing of thier indescressions. too mjuch evnagleism has indeed been that, which may be why some have some problems with it ;o)
so for me death of God theology? a co-option of Bonhoeffer to other agendas…and yes we are in that danger. but there indeed insights for what i think he stareted to see as a post-christendom world in which evangleism became a meeting of people at their best seeking to move forward into thr New Testament Jesus, moving on from a religosity that was too compromised by national political idenites.
June 27th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Becky
clebrity emergance
mm.. my first comment is i am reluctant to send this post, and the reasons i am i think say something. i’m about to send something personal to a very public blog…welcome to the internet age…but i falter because well i may be missread. i just posted on a theologocal debate i may also be missread on that but i can argue my case, debate and will come out unscathed. but here i may be viewed as trying to ‘big my self up’ which when you see what i am about to post…well if that is the reading i will not know what to say….and i may here simply be to used to a culture of scepticsim that also understand. Ok i posted that becasue all of it is part of tyhe deeply uncomfortable tight-rope anyone has to walk once they get any kind of small profile as a Christian speaker or consultant or writer, blogger, whatever. so with all that and my heart in my hand….
when i moved to a post in which i found people paid to book me to speak on issues of mission and future of the church this was great, truth is i hadn’t massivley moved ffrom the guy i was in the previous Job, but i had a nrw title and a bit of a profile and this was exciting, excitign because i am passionate anout this stuff i hope i can help the mission of the church, i want ot give myself 110% to people doing this stuff and now i can. But i noticed that i also became very aware of speaking engagments, conferences and things in addition to those i was doing and i started to ask ‘why didn’t they invite me…i’d be so much better than…’ and so you start to promote you as the person needed….well radio 4 was my saviour (how un-cool is that!) a series on the seven deadly sins on car radio as i drove to work. the one on envy….defined as beleiving you ought ot do what others were doing…ouch and true….and i am not a big name speaker, but only became a little name speaker got me going there…so all names we might mention may be immune to this, but i suspect they may not be. so i have really leant to value the folks who gently take me down a peg, and the other folks doing brillaint stuff i celebrate rather than envy…and yes sometimes i have to check myself.
June 27th, 2008 at 11:57 pm
Kester – I was the one who gave Jonny the free copy you’re reading (though if y’all keep borrowing Jonny’s free copy then how is Pete ever going to pay his bar tabs?) – it’s often easy for me to get review copies here in the states to known bloggers like you -So if there’s a book you really need (and think you’ll actually blog about), holler and I’ll shoot you the publicist’s name. If they can’t ship overseas, I’m often able to score a free copy that I can then mail. In fact, I was able to score an extra copy of Caputo’s WWJD for Pete.
Steve – I’m fascinated to hear the UK perspective on Christian celebrity because when I was in the UK last summer, I found it was such a breath of fresh air to be away from Americana Christianity that I didn’t want to return home. What you’re noting in the UK is amped up beyond belief here in the US – there almost needs to be a crash course to bring overseas authors up to speed on the dynamics of US religious publishing except my hunch such an indoctrination would give everyone a splitting headache and nausea to boot. You have developed an awareness of this dynamic, which I would argue is key – the people I see who tend to crash and burn are either unaware of the dynamic until it bites them in the arse (and it always does eventually) or worse, they embrace faith fame and all the perks that come with being an emergent rock star – and like most rock stars, the fans are fickle and they soon move on to other fare. My late spiritual director (Rev. Judy Baumer – an amazing soul) kept reminding me that we all have egos – it’s part of being human. The Q is how to keep the ego in check. When I sold my first book, I put everyone I know on jerk alert because it can get weird as all get out if you don’t have people around you to tell you when you’re getting a bit puffed up so you can deflate before you implode. I use Phyllis Tickle and Andrew Jones as my role models of people who use whatever influence they have to further the work of the kingdom without being too concerned about their personal street cred – they are two of the smartest and sane people I’ve met to date. My prayer is that somehow I can follow albeit quite wobbly in their footsteps.
June 28th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
Becky
indeed the UK may well be a breath of fresh air ;o) i know when i am in the US it is different, and one of my passions is that we need each other, both ways which has not been the traffic of late….and celebrity may be part of that.
but as you say all of us in our big our little ponds need to get ourselves wise on out own egos!
June 29th, 2008 at 10:18 am
You said it brother. In fact, would venture that celebrity/ego remains the major obstacle to many Christian ventures getting off the ground. I find I am my biggest obstacle – it’s what I call Wormwood at work. He tries to prove to us that whatever we have achieved, we did it on our own accord – and if we buy into that line of thinking, we’re dead to Christ. I’ve gotten pretty durn sick but so far haven’t died.
That’s the part of Bonhoeffer that rings true for me today – he never lost sight of the real prize no matter the cost. I know I lack that degree of courage and conviction.
July 1st, 2008 at 7:57 am
Pete
This should get the creative juices flowing.
http://mattstone.blogs.com/glocalchristianity/2008/07/angels-without-god-post-atheist-spirituality.html
- How apophatic theology can prime atheism
- The shape of post-Atheist spirituality
August 2nd, 2008 at 9:20 am
[...] posts have appeared in the last week concerning Bonhoeffer’s religionless christianity, here, and here.. Here is a selection from the latter post: Bonhoeffer’s great insight in LPP as far [...]
August 12th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Dear all,
I’m excited to discover like-minded Christians. Thanks for putting your thoughts “out there.” BTW, what is GB? Clearly, a conference, but I need more to go on if I’m to be able to see what it is much less go to it! Thanks for any help with this,
Christian
August 13th, 2008 at 1:52 pm
Hello Christian
GB usually refers to Great Britian ( England, Scotland Ireland and Wales) – the poor country cousins of America!
cheers,
Rodney
August 13th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
I was guessing at that, except that Peter and Doug Gay both spoke of discussing something “at GB.” In American Standard Dialect, one does speak AT events but NOT at places; one speaks IN places. So, I figured they were talking about a conference. But perhaps this is another illustration of Shaw’s quip that the US and UK are two countries
two nations divided by a common language?
August 13th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Christian
Ireland is NOT part of Great Britian – I would be hung drawn and quartered by many of my fellow countrymen for such a daft mistake !!!!!!!
A bad moment of premature senility.
It is quite common to speak at a ‘place’ in the UK so I believe Shaws quip holds true!
If you ever get to the UK I would recommend an annual Christian/spirituality arts festival called Greenbelt where Peter and Doug are speakers this year. It is a wonderful mix of music,speakers,seminars and art.
Rodney
August 14th, 2008 at 11:29 am
Hey… On the road at the moment so can’t write much but GB is indeed Greenbelt. Check it out online – its fantastic
August 14th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
Thanks, Peter. And don’t worry Rodney, I won’t report you. You were probably just channeling Ian Paisley there! (I’d try switching that channel!)
November 2nd, 2008 at 10:43 pm
[...] that said, voices like Peter Rollins remind us that graven ideologies are just as insidious (and idolatrous) as graven images when [...]
November 5th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
[...] like Peter Rollins remind us that graven ideologies are just as insidious (and idolatrous) as graven images when [...]
April 13th, 2009 at 4:23 am
Hey everyone,
In reading through this blog it has become apparent to me that the general concensus is that ‘Religionless Christianity’ was some particular concept Bonhoeffer just happened to be playing with near the end of his life. Though some do seem to give it slightly weightier significance. I would, however, like to suggest that the roots of this concept go back to the very beginning of Bonhoeffer’s theological career; back to His dissertations and beyond. I have in fact recently written a brief dissertation on the topic which traces the foundations of this concept from His ‘teachers’ all the way through His writings and have come to the conclusion that Bonhoeffer was on the cusp of making this his defining ‘umbrella’ concept for all of his previous theo-philosophical assertions. While it is a humble treatise and probably does not measure up to your learned writing skills, I believe it can add to if not inform the discussion. While I realize that this blog has not been written in for some time now and none of you may even receive this entry or be interested; if any of you ARE interested in reading it please let me know. (It doesn’t seem practical to post the whole thing here). My email address is hwhy_neb@hotmail.com I would be extremely greatful for your feedback, criticism and/or discussion. Below is a teaser by way of my proposal for a concluding definition of ‘Religionless Christianity’ which I support and defend throughout the meat of the paper.
‘Religionless Christianity’ Defined
‘Religionless Christianity’ was in the process of being designed by Bonhoeffer as an umbrella term under which to radically redefine terms like ‘Christianity’, ‘Christian, ‘Church’ and ‘Religion’. It was the product of the whole of his lifelong theological and philosophical inquiry, arising finally from his dual realizations that the world had ‘come of age’, making religion superfluous, and that the Church had failed in its God-given purposes precisely because of its entanglement with ‘religion’.
‘Religionless Christianity’ was intended, by Bonhoeffer, to galvanize his assertion of the hostile, antithetical nature inherent between the ‘Church’, which ‘acted’ as a continuing ‘dialectic’ form of revelation of both God and ‘real’ humanity; and ‘religion’ or ‘religious community’, which ‘judged’, standing over and against the Church proper as a form and propagator of its non-existence. It was meant, then, to distinguish Christianity from its heritage of and as ‘religion’; thus, liberating it and setting faith and salvation free so that a correct and unsullied ‘costly grace’ gospel– which proclaimed the temporal embracing, promoting and embodying of Christ’s self-sacrifice, weakness and vicarious suffering as essential factors for true repentance, faith and freedom – could find realization, both in thought and practice.
‘Religionless Christianity’, therefore, meant an utter rejection of religion as ‘the heart turned inward on itself’; as metaphysical and individualistic inner reflection and conscience. It meant a rejection of religion’s use of God as the ‘deus ex machina’; its denunciation of the ‘worldly’ in deference to the ‘beyond’; and its ‘cheap grace’ gospel. It, moreover, meant the rejection of all static ethical systems as Pharisaical judgment concerning ‘good’ and ‘evil’ rather than timely, responsible action as Christ.
‘Religionless Christianity’ meant maintaining intellectual honesty, quite irreligiously, by interacting with the world, in light of the gospel’s ‘weakness’, according to the world’s chosen terms, ‘esti deus non daretur’, from the position of servant. It meant speaking in terms that the world could engage with, and thus, it meant a ‘religionless’ re-interpretation of all Christian theological concepts, leading to a renewed understanding of theology and ethics consistent with the ‘this-worldly’ emphasis of the Old Testament. It meant, in fact, the reevaluation and adaptation of all Christian theology and ethics in terms of Bonhoeffer’s assertion of their indivisible nature, as ‘Theo-ethics’.
‘Religionless Christianity’, furthermore, meant a return of the Church to a primal, pre-fall, ‘worldly’ community. It meant the wholehearted embracing of ‘worldliness’, with all its pleasures and pains, by the Church as simply ‘the world in its conformed state’, a subset within the world community, through the auspices of Christ’s incarnation having made God and the world, the ‘Realm of God’, inseparable. It meant the complete unification of one’s ‘secular’ and ‘religious’ identities as a realization of the Christian’s con-formation into Christ’s ‘world’ validating incarnational image. It meant, then, that Church and religion, and not Church and world, are antithetical.
Finally, ‘Religionless Christianity’ meant the ‘free’, ‘faithful’ and ‘social’ re-presenting of Christ’s reconciling incarnational love, which was the basis of all ‘reality’, to the world. It meant the temporal acting out of the ‘Will of God’, which lay beyond ‘good’ or ‘evil’, as Christ incarnate, toward the ‘other I’. It, therefore, meant ‘living the life of Jesus Christ’; ‘doing’ the reconciliation of mankind with God its Origin in concrete historical circumstances through the situationally subjective objective truths contained within Christ’s incarnationality, according to the concepts contained within the ‘Sermon on the Mount’. It meant responsible and righteous ‘vicarious representative action’ on behalf of both God and mankind, under the covering of God’s indispensible grace, through faith, which provides forgiveness for and solace within the consequences of such sin-bearing vicarious actions. It meant a confessing Church, not a sinless one, which sought not ‘success’ but justification and sanctification; to be righteous, not ‘good’. It meant Christology centered ‘Theo-ethics’; it meant ‘Christo-ethics’.
A Concise Definition
‘Religionless Christianity’, then, can rightfully be described as Bonhoeffer’s culminating, all-inclusive term for his religion rejecting; return to the primal state avowing; ‘Theo-ethical’; dialectical; ‘reality’ actualizing; non-religious interpreting; world respecting and embracing; whole person affirming; ‘costly grace’ gospel asserting; static ethical system abandoning; incarnation re-presenting; vicarious representative acting; ‘Christo-ethic’.
‘Religionless Christianity’ is ‘Christo-ethics’. ‘Religionless Christianity’ exists exclusively in Christologically inspired, situational, ‘vicarious representative action’ and this is the very thing that justifies it as a ‘Christo-ethical’ term.
April 14th, 2009 at 2:47 am
Hey Micheal. Thanks for this. Will check it out.
I am not enough of a Bonhoeffer scholar to argue that Religionless Christianity has deep roots in his previous work. However I am hoping that you can show me it is! I am very keen to show that his work on religionless Christianity is luminous and important rather than marginal.
Thanks
September 14th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
[...] and rampant consumeristic theo-capitalism. Even further, what about his thoughts on a “religionless Christianity” that could be no more influential than now, in our increasingly postmodern, dare I say post-theist, [...]