On Sharing Faith with "Mormons"

In 2013 a friend of mine wrote me and asked for some advice on "witnessing" with some Mormon missionaries who had come to his home several times. I want to share what I shared with him, because it represents what I find to be some core agreements with classical Christianity, as well as central flaws in Latter Day Saint theology. 

Let me begin with how to address members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. As of 2016, there has been a movement within their Church to distance themselves from the title "Mormons", and simply be known as Latter Day Saints or Christians. This is because they do not want to be known primarily by reference to a word most people are unfamiliar with (e.g. Mormon). Instead they prefer to be addressed in terms of their commonalities with other Christians. They accept the Biblical data about Jesus Christ, his teachings, his death on the cross, and his resurrection. They are also Baptized into the name of the Father, Son, and Spirit. Thus, by the classical definition of Christian as someone who is baptized into Christ and who accepts Christ's teachings, death, and resurrection as the source of salvation, they are Christians. Latter Day Saints maybe Christians who have some beliefs that are at odds with classical Christian beliefs (which we will talk about below). But they are part of the Christian family. Every family has that one uncle who is a bit "different". The Latter Day Saint Church is that uncle.

With that said, I must preface this by saying that I have the utmost respect for many Latter Day Saints I have known and worked with for their commitment to their faith, to Jesus, to their families, and to moral integrity. They set a lifestyle example that other Christians should learn from. In terms of many moral issues, you would find me in total agreement with Latter Day Saints. Yes, I differ with them when I drink coffee and have beer with dinner. And yes, I would expand the definition of family beyond what they would, to include families with two dads or two moms. But as far as core moral values of integrity, love, compassion, justice, and commitment to sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ: I would be in full agreement.

Where we differ is in the explanation of WHY these moral values are core to life. We may agree on the practice of moral integrity. And we may agree on many details of Old Testament and New Testament history. But we differ as to the theory of history and view of God that upholds this moral practice and this Biblical narrative.

Scriptural Resources for Ecological Stewardship

A science teacher who I work with asked me to compile some Biblical resources on the stewardship of Creation. Since there are few good lists on this topic on the Internet (they usually include sparse Biblical references and LOTS of commentary), I decided to post this. It's kind of a bare-bones, "just the facts ma'am" list of Biblical resources on ecology, along with some prayers from the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer. I hope you find it useful for sermon or lesson prep.

Creation and Evolution, Science and Scripture

The following is an introductory essay I use in many of my classes to approach the questions raised by Science and Scripture. At the end I have included discussion questions based on the essay.

Ask the animals, and they will teach you.

The birds of the air, and they will tell you.

Ask the plants of the earth, and they will teach you; 

And the fish of the sea will declare to you. 

Who among all these does not know that 

The hand of the LORD has done this? 

In God's hand is the life of every living thing 

And the breath of every human being.

(Job 12.7-10)

There is grandeur in this view of life,

with its several powers,

having been originally breathed

into a few forms or into one;

and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on

according to the fixed law of gravity,

from so simple a beginning

endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful

have been, and are being, evolved.

(Charles Darwin, Origin of Species)

When studying the Story of God written in Scripture, one of the major questions that is often raised is: How does this Story relate to other stories that try to explain the world we live in? There are many stories found in other worldviews that seek to explain the world. But there is one other really big Story that has been accepted by most of the world since the 1800's: The Story of Evolution as told by scientific investigation. Both scripture and science speak of how humanity came to be, but they use different language to talk about it. Thus, what they say often sounds very different.

We greet God in the Face of "The Other"

Over the past couple of years I have been thinking about how to integrate some of the major themes of postmodern ethical theory into a genuinely Trinitarian, Incarnational worldview. Although I know whole forests of trees have been cut down to make books which (over)analyze these concepts, I would like to put forward some short and sweet recommendations about how to integrate these concepts into a Classically Christian spirituality.

My meditation will center around concepts of welcome, embrace, inclusion, tolerance, difference, "other"-ness (le autre), and "the face of the other" as popularized by thinkers such as Jacques Derrida, Jack Caputo, and Emmanuel Lévinas, and expanded and critiqued by theorists like Slavoj Žižek.

What does prayer do?

This is a theological meditation on something that I have been pondering for a while now: How can we conceive of prayer working if we operate within a contemporary scientific understanding of physics? Can a physicist- or anyone else- really pray and mean it? Or is prayer simply a form of talking to ourselves at a deep level?

The Good Old Days were not so good

The other day my dad sent me an email that reminisces about how good, and simple, and inexpensive things were when he was a boy in 1955. Some of the list is sentimental and cute, harkening back to an idyllic age that people remember as children (precisely because they were children and were not aware of the complexities and contradictions of adult life). But much of the list is politically charged in a "let's turn back the clock" kind of way.

So, I sent my dad back an email that said this:

The Perfectly Imperfect Journey

"Although Christ was in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God as something to be held onto, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant..." [Philippians 2:6-7]

The perfect journey. The perfect meal. The perfect destination. We throw the word "perfect" around a great deal to signify our search for something or someone that is without flaw, without taint, without regret. At the very heart of human existence is a yearning for a transcendent experience or relationship that will somehow complete us and leave us without yearning or need. One of the reasons why we journey, in fact, is to seek such an experience. We want to leave the mundane, imperfect world we inhabit and find somewhere that is, well, perfect.

But what we often find is that our journeys are not perfect.

A Definition and Application of "Religion"

As we come to the end of my third academic year, I am doing a mental review of what I can change and improve for next year. As chaplain and religion teacher, one of the conversations I quite frequently get into is exactly what is religion, and what counts as the study of religion. In particular, certain vexing questions are often asked:

Does religion require positing a God or other Divine Beings? If so, what do we do with religions that do not have an explicit place for Divine Beings, such as various forms of Buddhism or Confucianism?

If we are going to define religion in such a way that we include "religions" that do not have God(s), what stops anything from becoming a religion? If I have an ultimate concern for finding the ultimate grilled cheese sandwich, and I pursue this concern "religiously", does that then make me an adherent of the religion "Grilled Cheese Sandwichism"?

Theodicy in Outline

In light of the recent Boston Bombings, I thought I would publish the following notes on the problem of Theodicy. This is, admittedly, an academic rather than pastoral treatment of the problem of suffering. I figure many people will be doing pastoral works over the next few days and weeks. I thought I would instead publish something that is both academic and readable by the average person.

The following is a teaching outline for discussing the problem of suffering in the light of a God who is said to be both all-good (desiring the full flourishing of all persons made in God's image) and all-powerful (able to bring about the full flourishing of those he desires good for). Thus experiences of suffering and tragedy cause us to question the goodness, power, and existence of God. This is a skeletal outline intended mainly as lecture notes.

On Miracles, Hubris, and Arthur C. Clarke's Third Law

Today in chapel I preached on resurrection. And in speaking of the miracle of the resurrection, I invoked Arthur C. Clarke's Third Law of Technology to talk about the events which we describe as miracles. Clarke's Law states:

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic (or miracle)."

I went on to talk about how the miracle of the resurrection perfects nature, not by working against nature, but by working through the "laws" of physics. I used the analogy of all the technology we use today, that works WITH the "laws" of nature, which would seem like magic or miracle to earlier humans. I continued by saying:

On Soul as Emergent and Eternal

Once I had a conversation with a friend of mine who teaches science and who is agnostic. We were talking about whether or not the soul was an emergent property that arises from our biology, or an eternal "substance" implanted in us by God. I tried to explicate that the soul was both-and, a sort of di-polar entity, in which both the Transcendent and the Empirical were necessary and sufficient causes.  The conversation about souls got me thinking about what exactly I meant. and didn't mean, by calling the "soul" an "emergent property" of complex systems. So, if you will indulge me, I would like to explain.

On Christ's Descent to Hell

A friend asked me over Christmas break in 2012 about the meaning of "Christ's descent to hell" alluded to in 1Peter 3.18-20. It is only appropriate that I should post this today, on Holy Saturday, which yearly commemorates Jesus' "harrowing of hell". The text in question is one of the many Scriptures that is used to assert that Jesus "descended to the dead" or "descended to hell" during the time of his death, to release those in bondage in the realm of the dead.

On "The Theological Turn in Youth Ministry"

The Theological Turn in Youth Ministry is actually a pretty huge topic, and I don't have all night to write on it! I think that this book is a great step in the right direction. Kids who are actually still coming to Church in our culture are doing so because they want to find something different than the prevailing culture of consumerism. That something different may be genuine agape-based relationships with caring peers and adult mentors. But often along with that (or because of that) there comes a hunger for WHY Christian life is (or should be) so different from the prevailing culture. This WHY question is precisely theology: Helping people think in a God-centered way that is well-ordered and rational (i.e. theo-logical).

This is what we used to call Christian formation or even discipleship (at least the cognitive, worldview portion of it). But it's tricky. And there are at least 4 reasons why theological formation with youth is tricky:

On Ritual and Relationship

Recently, I taught in chapel on the Story of Mary and Martha, in which Jesus ends by helping Martha to re-focus her perspective to see the necessity of BOTH action AND contemplation in her journey with Jesus:

Luke 10.38–42 [38] Now as they went on their way, he entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. [39] She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. [40] But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” [41] But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; [42] there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

Based on this teaching, one of my students wrote and asked me:

Why Biblical Christians need Biological Evolution

Over the last few years in educational ministry, I have continually had questions asked about, discussions over, and even debates because of the topic evolution and faith. Can one believe in the Bible AND in evolution? Is it possible for a faithful Christian to have an evolutionary worldview? And even if it is possible, is it permissible within the limits of classic Christian orthodoxy? And after all of this, I think it is finally time to move beyond asking whether it is merely permissible for faithful, Biblical, Christ-loving Christians to have an evolutionary view of how God is at work in creation.

Biblical Christians need to think in evolutionary terms to be faithful to Christ.

On teaching evolution in a world of creationism

A friend of mine who teaches science recently expressed, once again, his legitimate exasperation at people who want to grant creationism equal time with evolution in science classrooms. His frustration has all to do with the differences between repeatable, empirical claims of science, versus the moral, existential claims of ideology. He believes creationism is an ideology, not a science. And, actually, I have to agree with him. Ideology, philosophy and theology are real academic subjects (along with history, literature, art, etc.). And there is a place in the world to discuss and debate ideology, but that is not in a science classroom.

In the Bible belt, I think our cultural uneasiness with evolutionary thought ultimately has to do with emotions and existential angst and a feeling of seasickness while being set adrift in a universe of flux and change.

Is there any better symbol for God than the Trinity?

What is the best, most complete possible way to speak of the nature of God? In the Christian Tradition, the answer is clear: The Holy Trinity. And for the sake of argument, let us posit that the idea of the Trinity is the most complete expression of the data about God that has been revealed in Christ, through Scripture, within the Christian Tradition.

Even if it is the most complete expression of God available on the basis of the data of revelation, does this mean that there could not possibly be a better model, or symbol, of God's nature, if we were only able to increase our intellectual ability, or develop new categories of linguistic expression?

On Elisha, Bears and Bullying

In light of recent tragedies, I wanted to comment once again on the issue of violence in the Bible. On the whole, I tend to view Biblical violence, done in the Name of God, as a series of object lessons about how the God revealed in Jesus Christ does NOT want God's Name to be used, and how systemic violence can rot the core out of a society.

First of all, there are episodes of horrendous violence done in God's Name. Think of Joshua and the Israelites wiping out entire cities in Canaan, killing every man, woman, child, and animal for God. When we read these stories and then look telescopically across the trajectory of Scripture, I think we must ask ourselves: Do these violent actions create the society of justice, compassion, and peace that God repeatedly asks for?

On Atheist Fundamentalism and Christmas Wars

That's right folks: The Holidays are here again, and with them comes yet another round of the Christmas wars! Today I read a nice article summarizing the current battle lines for public displays of religious affection all over the country. And, upon reading the stories about how anti-religious groups are trying to shut down governmentally-sanctioned religious displays and events, I am struck by just how angry and determined many of these anti-religious groups are. And I don't actually blame them for the anger. There are very many people who have been mistreated in the name of God, and it is only natural to want to lash out. It is logical to want to shut down a force that you believe to be detrimental to the healthy functioning of society.

I get it: Religious people (and institutions) have hurt you, demeaned you, marginalized you, and in some cases abused you. Now it is time to silence religion so it does not happen to others. But is all the anger and bitterness and constant ideological war working for you? Is it working for the health of our society? Is it working for our children?

Secular or Religious?

Recently, the head of the Evangelical charity "World Vision" came out and said that "Conservative Christians" need to stop waging their so-called "culture war" on "secular culture", and instead focus on doing Jesus' works of Love in society. Bravo! I heartily applaud this move, and support it with all my heart and mind.

And yet, I do want to call the question of what is "secular" and what is "religious". How do we identify secular things and religious things? Is something "religious" simply because the name God or Jesus is slapped on it (along with appropriate Biblical proof texts)? Or is something "religious" when it embodies the values and policies of religion, even if it does not claim religious identity or even recognize God?

While I do think we need to maintain terms that help us differentiate whether we are doing something with reference to God (i.e. religious, spiritual), or without reference to God (i.e. secular), I do think these same terms can sometimes hide the realities at work within cultural phenomena.