The Paradox of Truth

Christian thought often seems dysfunctionally extreme, so very false. On one side are the exclusivists, the theological determinists (who I have already dealt with in past blogs), ones who claim God only wills to save a limited number of humans, and the rest of us are preordained to Hell for his pleasure and glory. Pray tell me where the Good News is in that hopeless despair.

On the other side, are the inclusivists, the universalists who emphasize that all humans will be saved, that Hell will eventually be emptied. This sounds so good and has found strong support among great Christians of the past from Origen to the Greek scholar William Barclay. The position has recently been championed by the Quaker writers Phillip Gulley and James Mulholland. But there is a huge problem here as well. See below.

In the New Testament, Jesus, instead, speaks in paradoxes. Consider this statement:
Matthew 7:14 NASB For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.

Why does Jesus talk so exclusively at this point when elsewhere in the biblical text, he is the ultimate inclusivist/universalist? He emphasizes how God is not willing for anyone to perish in his or her wrong ways, that God is like a father who longs for the return of his wayward son, like a woman who rejoices when her precious possession that was lost is found.

Here’s the key:
As appealing as the universalism of the Good News is—For God so loved the world; God sent not his son into condemn the world John 3:16-17—of what use is it to tell everyone that all people are saved, if we don’t help each individual change? For in fact, at this very moment millions of particular individuals are living in minor or major hells on earth or ‘living like hell’ hurting others. Of what use are liberal religious platitudes, no matter how wonderful they sound theoretically, if in fact we aren’t seeking to help ourselves and others to change right now? Of what use is theology claiming truth when at present Christians and Muslims are killing each other allegedly for God? Of what use is universalism when at present millions of individuals are suffering loss, being selfish, living immorally, being discriminated against, drinking to excess, abusing others or being abused, making war, living in greed, lust, envy…?

The Truth, the Good News, is only universal in the here and now when it is accepted, when we turn from our wrong thoughts, deceitful choices, egocentric ways, bad actions.

God doesn’t cease being True, Good, and Loving, but when we as humans refuse to respond to the Truth, the Good, and the Loving, God incarnate is again crucified within us and others suffer.

This is Jesus’ point! For example, Jesus loves the rich young man, but he can’t help him when the young man refuses to personally accept the truth and change.

The way to Truth is narrow though the Truth of the way is as wide as infinity:-)

In the endless Love of God,

Daniel Wilcox

The Nature and Destiny of Existence: Introduction

The title of my long reflection is, of course, a reference to Reinhold Niebuhr's famous theological tome--one of the best and deepest! I love reading all kinds of theology and philosophy--at least the parts I can comprehend;-);
HOWEVER,
And that is a "how" that goes on "forever,"
I am a pretty average guy and I've never stopped wondering how it is that famous theologians and philosophers of all stripes and spots think they know so much about Ultimate Reality. The Reformers and the Catholic Church, for instance, thought they knew God's reality and will so well that they executed (by drowning and burning) other Christians who didn't believe in infant baptism! Yet these same theologians and philosophers who "knew" God's eternal nature and hidden decrees didn't even know the basic nature of our local solar system or why people get sick (must be God's will).

And then there's the opposite extreme: the other Know-It-Alls, those of Nontheism who while being, also, only finite conscious mammals are sure, to a strong degree that there is no objective Meaning, no Purpose, no Truth, no Goodness in the Cosmos. We humans are a brief fluke of cosmic chance, one evolutionary twig on the natural selection bush (according to Stephen J. Gould, the famous Darwinian biologist).

Seems rather presumptuous. Of course, I've had my own times with humankind's dear friend, Pride, too--when I thought I "knew" much more than I actually do. As I get older and older, I know less and less.

So if you are misguided by the title of this reflection and think I am going to pontificate about knowing the Ultimate nature of everything and the whys and wherefores and to-dos for all, etc., you are about to be disappointed or relieved.

My goal here is very personal and very basic. Rather, by the love of God, I hope to share my own narrative experiential theology--how I have experienced God (at least in my own perception) and what difference that has made in me and my limited influence on others and the world.

For those who want the quick short version, rather than my own long-winded journey, here's a quote:

And when all my hopes in them and in all men were gone, so that I had nothing outwardly, to help me; nor could tell what to do; then, O then, I heard a voice which said, "There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition": and when I heard it, my heart did leap for joy. (...) Thus when God doth work, who shall let [i.e., hinder] it? and this I knew experimentally. My desires after the Lord grew stronger, and zeal in the pure knowledge of God, and of Christ alone, without the help of any man, book, or writing. For though I read the scriptures that spake of Christ and of God, yet I knew him not, but by revelation, as he who hath the key did open, and as the Father of life drew me to his son by his Spirit. Then the Lord gently led me along, and let me see his love, which was endless and eternal...
The Journal of George Fox


I think George Fox's statement (of his experience in life, his spiritual search, and encounter with what he perceived to be Truth) says its best.
Even though
I know all the naturalistic vultures;-) are circling waiting to pick Fox's experience clean until there are only factual bones of meaninglessness left.

Well, each of us takes our life journey and what trail we walk makes all the difference...

To be continued

The Problem with Sin or the Sin of the Problem?

In this new post, I planned to write on the wonder of worship--about a deeply moving time of spiritual encounter we had at Central Coast Friends yesterday. However, as a lead-up to writing, I stopped by Quaker Quaker and clicked on a link
http://onequakertake.blogspot.com/2009/02/why-do-some-quakers-hate-to-talk-about.html
to "Why do some Quakers hate to talk about sin?" by Timothy Travis, a convinced Beanite Friend. His blog reflection jumped out very violently;-) and grabbed me by the spiritual throat.

Ah, the problem of sin or the sin of the problem or of the sin problem-- "Missing the mark," "Original Sin," "national sin." Trying to reduce this horrendous topic to thought and then to print is no doubt like trying to tame Hurricane Katrina to take a shower:-) But here I go--

First a couple paragraphs of autobiography:
Growing up in a devout home and religious community in Nebraska in the 1950's, I very early came to awareness that all was not right within me and in my own moral choices. I was about six or seven. I loved my sister dearly but would sometimes be vindictive and tease her. And I knew stealing was wrong, but oh how I did want (and take) that item at the corner drug store..etc.

And I had a very deep sadness with how adults so often hurt others by their immoral choices both in my small town and in the world. I also received many, (probably more than my share of) spiritual talks on sin and its results and on justice.

What delivered me from my own guilt, helped me make wiser choices, and gave me a deep passion for seeing spiritual change and harmony come to all humans was an encounter with Jesus Christ (in my own childish way)one night on a gravel road coming home from prayer meeting. I was only eight years of age, but I still get spiritual goose bumps remembering that night and, now, when I feel the wonder and joy of God's love for everyone.

So I am not big on focusing on the negative, on the problem of sin, but rather dwelling on the Good News of God's love--sharing of the deliverance from sin and all the messed-upness that we experience in this broken world, from petty gossip to war in Iraq and Sri Lanka.

We all do have a problem with wrong-doing. Some think it is a problem that others have, not us, at least not Friends. Others think they are worthless and there is no cure. Others that there is a problem but no right or wrong--we're just one form of primate living out survival in a meaningless cosmos. And, of course, many religionists such as the Calvinists think we are born evil, have no choice but to sin, and there is only help for s few selected ones, while God leaves the rest of us to wallow down to despair and eternal judgment.

So what's the truth?

Original sin, total depravity--What about those abstract ideas? This last week, I again encountered individuals who hold very strongly to such a theological worldview:
We're all born evil and sin constantly and can't do right or seek God.

When I started this blog this morning, I thought maybe I would have something to say of such a philosophical outlook, but now that I am to this point, I realize that such a view of life is totally contrary to everything I have experienced and everything I hold dear.

As a literature teacher for many years, every five months I taught the famous Puritan poem "The Day of Doom" to high school students (and Edwards' Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," too). I sought to help them intellectually understand the Puritan mindset, though within my own spiritual self, I couldn't (and still can't) understand Michael Wigglesworth or Jonathan Edwards at all. Their view that infants who die shortly after childbirth go straight to Hell to be tortured for ever because of Adam's sin is abhorrent theology which makes no rational or spiritual sense to me whatsoever.

While I as a child did have a sense that I had deeply "missed the mark" and needed forgiveness, I also distinctly remember how I, too, had very deep spiritual yearnings. So while there was an ocean of darkness in myself and in others, I also saw Truth and Love, and Goodness--and trusted that the latter was far more powerful than the former. And that we all have a choice for God loves each one of us with limitless mercy and compassion.

Then, of course, there is the other extreme--the so-called "liberal" view of human nature where only murderers, tyrants, and "fundamentalists" commit evil. Most of us are decent human beings. We may err, but certainly aren't sinners, nor by any stretch of the imagination, are we evil.

This, too, doesn't resonate with either life experience or reasonable thought (in my opinion). While I consider myself a "liberal" Friend, I can remember very vividly times in my life when I have been tempted to commit horrendous sin. I can remember times, I chose wrong and how it hurt others.

And it strikes me as highly hypocritical that at the present time Americans of most persuasions oppose terrorism by others such as the Palestinians, yet the United States in the twentieth century carried out some of the most horrendous terrorist attacks in history! And this was done by "liberals." Maybe we nice "liberal" people are not nearly as nice and good as we think we are.

And when was the last time among Friends, that wiser ones, privately, sought to guide members who were making immoral choices?

As a "liberal" I would not want to go back to the days of the 1800's when members were excluded for wrongdoing. But should we not in love speak the truth to erring ones?

I guess all this leads to my next point which is the experience of Friends such as George Fox and John Woolman. In their journals both speak of the darkness of evil and sin, of humankind's need of deliverance. But their focus is not there; it is on God who loves us, on the Ocean of Light, on the spiritual symbol of the atonement.

Well, that's a start.

Any comments?

To be continued--

The Nature of Reality: Step #1

What is the true nature of Reality? Notice the capital R. I'm not talking about the finite observable present day-to-day temporal world of basic facts which includes humans as one form of primate undergoing evolutionary change.

Rather, I am speaking of the ultimate category of reality of which philosophers, physicists, and cosmologists refer to, and what religious people and mystics say they experience--the ultimate objective source of Being and Becoming.

Where does "all this" come from and eventually go to? After this cosmos in so many trillions and trillions of years either stretches out space to infinity or implodes back to a singularity, what will still BE? Why are we here? Are there eternal truths?

Of course some philosophers and scientists declare there is nothing "out" there. The cosmos-- maybe universes beyond universes--has no Meaning or Purpose, only IS for no reason. Scientists such as Richard Dawkins claim that even to think there might be some Meaning behind it all is to be deluded in the worst sort of way. He wrote The God Delusion to try and demonstrate this central non-theistic thesis. And Stephen J. Gould the famous Darwinian biologist, in a magazine interview, said humankind itself is only a "fluke" of evolution that probably wouldn't show up again if evolution were re-run another time. Other famous scientists in this chorus of non-meaning include Hutchens, Monad, Dennett, and Provine.

Dawkins' most famous statement against religion and the transcendent is probably his declaration in River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life:

"The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute that it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive, many others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear, others are slowly being devoured from within by rasping parasites, thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst, and disease. It must be so. If there ever is a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in the population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.

So there is the first option as to the true nature of Reality; Matter, Energy, and Chance or the natural, indifferent Cosmos itself. Humans are an accidental species who construct their own illusions.

In strong contrast, Friends have trusted for 300 hundred years that Ultimate Reality is Loving Relationship, that at the very center and heart of Reality are eternal truths, everlasting ideals, absolute love.

Some other faiths agree with the Society of Friends. Transcendent Love is the Center of the Cosmos. Martin Buber, the Jewish mystic wrote a book on God, titled, I-Thou, which speaks of a love relationship between God and each human. The Baptist minister and civil rights leader Martin Luther King, (despite his own moral failings), strongly held to Ultimate Reality being loving and good and true. In his sermon "Rediscovering Lost Values," he said, "The first principle of value is that we need to rediscover is this: that all reality hinges on moral foundations. In other words, that this is a moral universe, and that there are moral laws of the universe just as abiding as the physical laws...I'm here to say to you this morning that some things are right and some things are wrong. (Yes) Eternally so, absolutely so. It's wrong to hate. (Yes. That's right) It always has been wrong and it always will be wrong. It's wrong in America. It's wrong in Germany...It was wrong in 200 B.C. and it's wrong in 1954 A.D...It's wrong in every age and it's wrong in every nation. Some things are right and some things are wrong, no matter if everybody is doing the contrary. Some things in this universe are absolute. The God of the universe has made it so. And so long as we adopt this relative attitude toward right and wrong, we're revolting against the very laws of God himself."

No doubt early Friends would have ascribed non-theism to the "ocean of darkness" that threatens humankind. So how is it then that some Friends in the last 40 years have come out stating there is no God to worship, no Ultimate Reality to "quake before"? They say God is a fiction, a word which does not represent anything real.

It is uncertain why such Friends deny God's existence. We are all doubters to one degree or another, but when humans, especially Friends, claim for certain that there is no God, it is puzzling and distressing. After all both names--"Friend" and "Quaker"--are in reference to God. And the vital central focus of a Quaker meeting is worship. If there is no One--no Center--to worship, then it would appear that such individuals are consciously choosing to pretend, what other non-theists such as Dawkins term "delusion."

Before I continue with an introduction to the Friends view of worship, maybe I should say that I think all types of humans are invited to come to worship, even those who don't think there is any Ultimate Reality to worship. After all, remember what Stephen King that famous Quaker horror writer;-) wrote in his novel The Stand. In response to an atheist's statement that he doesn't believe in God, the heroic leader laughs and says, "But that don't matter. He believes in you."

To be continued