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The Upside of Critical Theory for Christians

The Upside of Critical Theory

An interesting question came out of last week’s video in response to ‘why evangelicals can’t do critical theory’. when someone asked “what is the upside?”

This is a fantastic question. I would like to submit that there are 3 major benefits of CT

  • It breathes new life into a root bound plant.
  • It levels the playing field.
  • It reflects the methods and the model of Jesus.

It breathes new life into a root-bound plant.

Not everyone has been a part of a community, congregation, organization, or institutions that they really loved. If you have been a part of a collective endeavor that meant a lot to you, you will probably know that over time things can become a little too insular or set in their ways or self-referential or internally focused. Unfortunately, this is all to common.

Even significant movements can stagnate, codify, and begin to fall into the rut of maintenance mode. It happens to the best of them. Some (or most) of the energy that once went toward out toward the ‘mission’ or the ‘out-reach’ slowly shifts and becomes about preserving what we already have (or once were) and maintained the administrative or bureaucratic apparatus.

When structures begin to become too limited in their scope, or they leave behind their original passion or vision, it can be like a plant – to use an analogy – that has been left in the same pot for too long. The roots can not expand and begin to grow around upon themselves and the unhealth known as being ‘root-bound’ can happen over time.

Loving the institution, at that point, is being daring enough to undergo the arduous process of pulling the plant out of its pot and pressing your fingers or an instrument into the roots to break them apart and create some space of new life and growth.

This is why the ‘tool-box’or critical theory can actually be a good thing for organizations, C(niche) or too self-referential, exposing ideas that have become taken for granted, challenging systems, bylaws, protocols, regulations, committees and boards that insulated from review or accountability – critical examination can help loosen that which is bound by tradition, set in its ways, or insulated by power and influence.

Loving something means not giving up on it and just walking away sometimes. Doing the hard work critical analysis (or decolonizing perhaps) is a labor of love.

It levels the playing field.

Critical theory (and specifically critical race theory) can be great ways of examining issues related to access, recruitment, training, funding, and empowerment (to name a few). Critical theory is an approach that that brings many tools to a project. The goals are to examine, expose, and advocate – to change, not just explain, an area of need.

Those who practice critical theory have a loose collection of commitments and general set of approaches that roughly configure them as an ‘approach’. Critical theory isn’t so much a ‘thing’ as it is a specific commitment to address a ‘thing’. It has a asymmetrical relationship to power: It wants the power to investigate the power – and will shout, claw, and demonstrate in order to do so.

We all see the disparity and inequality that manifests in our culture historically  and currently threatens to pull apart our society. Critical theory starts will the realization (or conviction) that something is wrong with that level of disparity and inequality. Critical theory is concerned about the marginalized, the oppressed, and the left-behinds – the unheard, the under-represented, and the taken-for-granted.

Critical theory wants know the rules of the game, ask who wrote the rule book, interview those that uphold and reinforce the rules, examine the bank statements of those that profit from the game, explore possible bias (or preference) by those who facilitate the game, interrogate those who seeks to exploit the game, expose unjust practices and policies within the game, and advocate for change to benefit those who actually play the game.

One of the ways that CT does this is to expose ideology – that is: mental frameworks that are so entrenched and assumed that someone who holds them and acts on them may not even know that they are there or be able to articulate or explain them. Ideologies can manifest as beliefs, values, convictions, ideas, opinions, attitudes, rhetoric, prejudices, priorities, rules, laws, standards, regulations, moral codes (spoken or unspoken), motivations, practices, disciplines, rituals, ceremonies, polls, surveys, censuses, political activity, economic policies, legal matters, hiring practices, advertisements, financial investments, beauty standards, sexual permissions and so many other manifestations and expressions.

Ask yourself: What I am not allowed to question? What would I get in trouble of asking?  What would my community get angry about if I told our critics?

This will tease out the first thread of ideology. Is the fear that if you pull too hard on this thread that the whole thing unravel?

It reflects the methods and the model of Jesus.

Jesus both modeled and employed methods that would be very familiar to those who employ critical theory. As Randy and I say in our recent book [Decolonizing Evangelicalism]Jesus could be seen as doing a proto version of deconstruction. In both his teachings and his use of parables, Jesus models ‘asking the question behind the question’. Where did you hear that? What is their authority? Why do you think things are the way they are? Do you think that is the way that God wants them? Why do you think that person is your enemy? Can the ring of inclusion be expanded? What really ails you?

Jesus challenged the status quo. He interrogated the ‘as is’ nature of society and its institutions. He advocated for those were disadvantaged, neglected, marginalized, and discriminated against. Jesus exposed performative religion, calling out the motivations behind the posturing and practices of the temple system. He even demonstrated against injustice with violent force.

Admittedly, Reading the Gospels through a capitalist lens neutralizes much of this emphasis and gives us a much more sanitized and sterilized version of Jesus. That is why it is important to read decolonial perspectives because the gospels read very differently on the underside of history then they do when one is high in the hog– as they say. The Jesus of empire lacks most of this prophetic witness and critical impulse. That version of Jesus is much more therapeutic then messianic. A postcolonial or anti-imperial reading however highlights the proto critical theory modeled in the life, teaching, in ministry of Jesus.

Those are three of the benefits that a critical theory approach can bring to Christianity: it breathes new life into a root bound plant, it levels the playing field, it reflects the methods and the model of Jesus.

If you are interested in this topic, please check out my other posts:

The Beauty of Critical Theory

Critical Theory Will Be Our Salvation

Why Evangelicals Can’t Do Critical Race Theory

Follow Up to Evangelicals and Race

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Lessons From Luke (recap)

The Gospel of Luke was a great read. Lessons from Luke: Recap

  1. Read Slowly
  2. Luke is a Quilter
  3. Parables Are Tricky
  4. Jesus Winks
  5. Bread Is Central

Read Slowly: there is a temptation to read the Bible quickly when you Believe that you already know the story. When you already have the plot figured out you tend to skip over some important details that actually significantly change the trajectory of the narrative.

Luke is a Quilter: the use over parallel layout of the Gospels was really helpful to see both material that Luke included that was not found in either Mark or Matthew, and was equally eye-opening to see how Luke stitched familiar stories together rearranging them and pairing them in the ways that contrasted or juxtaposed the different elements of the story.

Parables Are Tricky: parables are stories told in code in order to come in under the radar of the listener in order to ask them to question the assumptions they came in with. Parables interrogate the established order and the expectations of the listener. In the Gospel of Luke this often has to results:

  1. It makes the hero of the story somebody that the listener may not have thought very highly of. This can be foreigners, servants, and women.
  2. It calls into question the power and the wealth of the upper-class in the assumption talk to God’s favor is with and who God is working for.

Take Luke 16 for instance. In the parable of Lazarus and the rich man in the afterlife it is noteworthy that Jesus gives the name to this beggar who would have been I nobody but Jesus does not given name to the rich man who everyone in town would’ve known his name. Jesus is not giving us a map of the afterlife he is using that as a stage to talk about god’s involvement in the drama of human life now. Jesus is telling us what God values in this life.

Parables are not allegory. When you read parables as allegory assigning each character in the story a corresponding person in real life, you often get the point of the parable 100% incorrect. If each time Jesus talks about someone with Power and status, like a landowner, you assume that is the god character in the story then the Gospel of Luke really makes God into a monstrous, violent, and conflicted character. If however, you read the story that God is with the servants instead of the landowner, who is probably Rome in coded language, then Jesus is parable read in entirely inverted from the way most of us have been taught to interpret them.

Which brings up the next point.

Jesus Winks: In Luke 12: 38-40 we begin to see that Jesus’ teaching reads very differently if you are riding high on the hog then if you are on the underside of the beast (in this case Empire). If you have possessions like many of us in America do, the idea of a thief coming in the night causes worry and anxiety. In the context of the first century Jewish occupation by the Romans the thief coming in the night was the in breaking of the kingdom of God.

Earlier in Luke chapter 11 Jesus had talked about the need to bind a strong man if you’re going to ransack his house. And this was probably and allusion to Roman rule and Cesar would be the strong man.

Take Luke 12

4 “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that can do nothing more. 5 But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority[a] to cast into hell.[b] Yes, I tell you, fear him! 6 Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten in God’s sight. 7 But even the hairs of your head are all counted. Do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.

When Jesus talks about the one it can be tempting to think he’s talking about God. But it is not God who after he is killed you has the authority to cast you into hell! That is Caesar. Jesus is speaking in code and this should probably be understood as part of the literature of the oppressed. You speak in code when you are not safe just say what you really think. We know that the One in verse 5 (who throws people in hell) is not God because in verse six Jesus name’s God as the one who care about every sparrow.

Jesus often had to speak in code, almost with a wink to his listener, and it’s easy to imagine a Roman century and standing just offscreen keeping an eye on the group that was listening to Jesus. There is so much more that could be said on this topic but I think it would benefit you greatly when you read a parable to ask if the person in power–whether that is a land owner, strongman, the one, etc. – is more likely Cesar character or God. If you make every powerful person in a parable a god character you end up creating a monstrous, even demonic, two-faced and violent character.

Bread Is Important: Luke uses more stories about meals and food, specifically bread, then the rest of the Gospels. It comes up all the time. It can be used as an object lesson. It often involves Women being central to the story. Food plays an important part in the Gospel of Luke.

In fact, if you were to ask me what is the big point, the takeaway, from the Gospel of Luke I would say that it is found at the end of gospel in chapter 24.

35 And they told about the things that had happened on the road, and how He was known to them in the breaking of bread.

It may surprise you, it’s certainly surprised me, that the major point of Luke’s Gospel maybe that Christ is known in the breaking of bread. I Been thinking about this a lot in the past month. It was ironic to me that we were not able to celebrate our normal tradition of having a meal together after we wrap up Reading a book of the Bible. In the absence of eating meals together because of social distancing and quarantine, it has become clear to me how often Christ is reveled in the breaking of Bread.

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Lessons from Luke (ImBible Study)

Reading the Bible through a progressive lens is so much fun!  I recorded a video about what we have been learning by reading through the Gospel of Mark.

Join us this Wednesday at 7pm for a lively (and irreverent) time of reading the gospel.

It is not your average Bible study!  Join the zoom here: https://zoom.us/j/585770550

The 4 layers of our ‘surplus of meaning’ and 3 surprises from the Gospel of Luke.

We ask the text 4 Layers of Questions:

  1. What would the original audience have heard?
  2. What has the text come to mean in history?
  3. What do we do with the text now? (application)
  4. What is the most the this text can mean? (future horizon)

Three themes that emerged in Luke:

  1. Jesus uses ‘Dog Whistles’
  2. the Bible reads differently for those on top or the underside
  3. Parables are not allegory

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Moving On From SuperNatural

In a recent podcast of the Peacing It All Together Book Discussion Group, a question was asked about moving on from a the concept of the supernatural to a more integrated or indigenous perspective.

From minute 7 to 14 there is a nice discussion about different ways of moving on from this poorly manufactured thought construct.

I come from an evangelical-charismatic perspective in my past where the supernatural was just assumed.  It was almost like a second language that not fluent but fairly versed in. It has taken my 12 years of incremental work to move out of that language and worldview in order  to make room for a more wholistic and (possibly indigenous) perspective.

Here is the steps that I took to (re)orient myself.

1) Jesus did not believe in the supernatural. There is no Jewish concept like ‘spiritual’. It just wasn’t a category for them like it is for us . That division starts for Christianity in the Greco-Roman world (think of Plato’s philosophy) but comes to its height in the European Enlightenment. It is helpful to simply realize that the Bible does not have this word.

2) It has not born good fruit for the past 500 years. This dualism between natural & supernatural have had devastating consequences in the colonial, then industrial, then technological eras. Jesus said that you will know a tree by its fruit and this is bad fruit. Many of the problems we face today are rooted in this kind of binary (either/or) thinking. The church has been complicit in some pretty horrific stuff – partly because it was participating in this natural/supernatural split.

3) See the living world as a revelation of God. It is a valid loci for theological reflection. I am not separate from creation but very much a part of it. I am a narrative mammal – complete with nipples and a belly-button. I both need creation and am called to care for creation because I am a part of creation – from dust I came and dust I shall return.

4) The church messed up by conceding the ‘natural’ to science because the more that science can explain the less we need God. God has gotten smaller and smaller over the past couple centuries. ‘He’ is less powerful than ever before and at this point all ‘He’ can do is give us goosebumps during worship, get us a good parking spot at the mall (?), and speak to our heart when we are feeling bad about ourselves. How it that ‘super’ natural?

We messed up in the western worldview when we conceded the rules of the game to science and said that we would take everything that science or reason can’t explain and call that ‘super’natural. Everything else is natural?   That is why we must re-claim  proclaim that …

5) God’s work is the most natural thing in the world. We have made God into an idol – a ‘being’ who is a lot like us but just different kind if not degree. This is the danger of personification (anthropomorphism) when it goes from being fluid (theo-poetics) and it hardens to become more concrete in doctrinal statements and foundationalism.

The problem is that there is no ‘there’ there. This view is god is both unsatisfying and ultimately impotent. God is not ‘a being’ like we are a being – god is divine being. When we reference God ‘speaking’ is not by pushing air over vocal chords. When we talk about the hand of god we are not being literal. It is a poetic way envisioning or imagining the way in which the divine presence influences and animates all of creation.

I have tried to move toward a more integrated worldview that is holistic and interdependent.

So want to invite you to begin to or continue to deconstruct this terrible thought construct that we have inherited by looking out the window to creation and saying out loud:

 “There is no such thing as the supernatural. God’s work is the most natural thing in the world”.

Please don’t think that this is merely semantics or a rhetorical device. It is a completely different worldview – complete with different ontology, cosmology, and metaphysic. I am not being clever or tricky when I say this stuff. It really is a different way of believing and participating in the world.

So in summary:

  1. Jesus didn’t believe in the supernatural (only the miraculous).
  2. The natural/supernatural split has not born good fruit historically.
  3. Creation is a living thing that God loves and that you are a part of.
  4. The church messed up by conceding the ‘natural’ world and taking the leftovers.
  5. We profess and confess that God’s work is the most natural thing in the world.

Please let me know your thoughts and your questions. I would love to be helpful in your migration to a more integrated and wholistic worldview. I hope that this model helps.

Somebody asked about miracles!

Miraculous is when the result is greater than you would expect from the ‘sum of its parts’. It is an event (in philosophy).
So we say ‘the miracle of child birth’ or ‘the miracle on the Hudson’ when Sully landed that plane.
I still believe in the miracle of healing. It is not predictable or formulaic or even reliable … it is always surprising. BUT it does happen. Medicine can be a part of it, diet is a part of it, rest is a part of it, and prayer can be a part of it.
I can believe in the miraculous without the addition of another super-natural ‘realm’ beyond this one. The super-natural split just comes with so much extra (and unnecessary) baggage.
Keep in mind that the Gospel of John calles them ‘signs & wonders’ … which is much healthier and more helpful.
A sign (in this way of thinking) is a symbol that participates in the reality that it points to. Miracles are signs of the inbreaking Kin-dom.
Communion can be like this for us! It is a symbol (the bread and cup) that participates in the reality that it points to – we all gather around the table as the body of christ – but the bread and cup are not supernatural.

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Why Us vs Them

I am preparing to lead a 3-month book discussion of The Church of Us vs. Them by David Fitch for the adult Sunday school at my church.

My plan is to pair the chapter in the book with a different book, school of thought, or historical movement. Some of these include The Argument Culture by Deborah Tannen, The Peaceable Kingdom by Stanley Hauerwas, and the Anabaptist tradition.

Here are the 7 conversations that I hope will come up in the next 3 months:

  1. The church is supposed to be an alternative way of life – a prophetic and subversive witness to the world – that critiques the ways of the world and provides an alternative way of being in the world. She works best as a minority position within the larger culture and is not designed to be in charge or in control of culture.
  2. Neither the Republican or Democratic party can fix the problem of society. The Democrat and Republican parties are two sides of the same flawed coin. They are not the solution to the problem – they are manifestations of the problem.
  3. The church is not a middle way between these two camps (compromise) but it supposed to be a third way (alternative) to their ways. What we call ‘the church’ is so saturated with both Empire and consumerism that it is completely impotent to confront the ‘powers-that-be’ – which crucified the Prince of Peace (as a scapegoat) – and these powers continue to make life worse for most of humanity.
  4. The American ‘church’ is in bed with the systems of this world that reinforce racism, sexism, poverty, and militarism – 3 of those 4 things Martin Luther King Jr. called the ‘triplets of evil’.
  5. There is a way of living, which Jesus modeled for us and taught about, that leads out of the muck-and-mire we find ourselves in and opens up the hopes and potential of a different way of being in the world. That is the good news of the gospel (evangel).
  6. The church has the potential (capacity) to be the most beautiful and profound vehicle (venue) for unleashing human flourishing and peace. She does this by resisting evil, acting in love, and advocating for those who are vulnerable or on the margins.
  7. The kingdom (or kin-dom) of God is actually within reach but the church has compromised and been corrupted by being in alliance with Empire and the systems of this world. What we call ‘church’ is a shadow of what is supposed to be. Us vs. Them thinking is a symptom of that disease.

Here is a quick video (5 min) to introduce the topics:

Let me know your thoughts, questions, and concerns.

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God Loves Who?

Our Left – Right politic divide creates problems for understanding and living in God’s love.

God loves us AND them.

I have been thinking about Identity Politics in the Gospel of Luke.

Identity Politics are great for politics – everyone should bring their whole humanity to the table and should vote according to their social location.

While Identity Politics are great for politics, it is not great for community.

It exposes that the Left is just the inverse of the Right – and neither is the gospel.

The gospel of God’s love transcends and even subverts our current political divide.

Check out the video and let me know your thoughts.

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The Gospel of Mad Magazine

Mad Magazine is ceasing its publication of the print edition. This is going to be a huge loss.

Mad Magazine used parody, caricature, and satire to lampoon the ridiculous elements of our age.
This was the role of parables in Jesus’s age.

We have been taught to read parables poorly. They have been neutered, sanitized, and de-fanged.

Many of us were taught to read parables as:

  1. Aesop’s Fables
  2. Proverbs
  3. Allegory

Parables are none of those things.

Parables are small stories about birds and farmers, widows and foreigners designed to come in underneath the listener’s radar to that their defenses are down … and then once in, to interrogate assumptions and undermine (subvert) the status quo.

Both Mad and Jesus’s parables utilized irony, skepticism, exaggeration, and satire to poke holes in the hypocritical and unjust elements of the establishment.

Mad’s legacy has now passed to TV shows like the Simpsons, South Park, the Daily Show, and even Saturday Night Live.

Here are two great articles about the end of Mad Magazine (one in the LA Times and one in the NY Times) .

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2007-mar-18-ca-mad18-story.html

Watch this video and let me know what you think.

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Nobody Reads The Bible Literally

Nobody reads the Bible literally. We are all interpreting – and this is a good thing!

This admission allows us to say:

Since we are all interpreting, let’s talk about how we are interpreting.

I first realized this about the book of Revelation (apocalyptic literature). Then it became clear about other genres of scripture like wisdom literature (like Job) and the gospels (like Luke).

Here is a recent sermon that I gave on the subject. You can also listen to the full version of it (including a lot of joking at the beginning) on the VHUMC podcast.

I would love to hear your thoughts, questions, and concerns.

I will be saying more about the idea of ‘moving your application up to your interpretation’ in the months to come.

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Bad Bible Reading

I am having so much fun this Summer challenging assumptions. Every Sunday morning we tackle a different difficult topic.

This past week was ‘bad readings of the Bible’, especially as they relate to God and hell.

We used Matthew 10:26-31 and the parallel passage in Luke 12.

Below is the YouTube link to the Vermont Hills’ page. You can also listen to the podcast audio if you prefer or watch it on FB.

Let me know your thoughts, comments, concerns, or questions

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