THE QUESTION NONE OF US WANT TO ANSWER

Over at RD magazine, Hollis Phelps asked a question with which tends to make us uncomfortable.  Yet, the truth is, it is one I think almost all of us have wondered about at least to ourselves if not when we uncork the bottle and let our hair down among friends. 

Phelps takes the recent developments with the defrocking of Rev. Frank Schaefer by the United Methodist Church and the chastisement and "firing", Duck Dynasty's Phil Robertson.

Rev. Frank Schaefer officiated his son’s gay wedding and as a result he was stripped of his ordination for forcefully and deliberately disregarding the teachings and discipline of his denomination.  For this Schaefer has become a Cause célèbre among gay activists and liberal Christians.

Phil Robertson on the other hand has raised the ire of liberals of all stripes (not to mention the guardians of the various "inclusive" pieties) for comments he made about homosexuality in GQ magazine.  His comments were, shall we say, quite critical.  As a result, citing the intolerance of divergent opinions by liberals and the powers that be, Robertson has become a rallying point among conservatives and traditional Christians.

Without getting into the right or wrong in these two different cases, Phelps broaches the taboo misgiving:

Both events have been the subject of intense, at times vitriolic, discussion on social media, especially, of course, among those who identify in one way or another as Christian. Both events have made clear once again the differences between “socially liberal” and “socially conservative” Christians when it comes to issues related especially to sexuality, with both sides appealing to the Bible in support of their opposing views.

 

Some of my more pastorally minded friends have intervened, urging mutual understanding and stressing unity among Christians. The sentiment generally goes something like, “Sure, we may disagree when it comes to issues such as homosexuality, but let’s remember that at the end of the day we all serve the same God.”

It’s a nice sentiment, one that is often appealed to to remind Christians that the church is, ultimately, “one body,” united in its common confession and worship of Jesus Christ, whom Christians take as God incarnate. In other words, the appeal is to some sort of transcendent commonality that unites the Christians across time and place despite differences, including differences on issues related to sexuality.

I’ve often wondered, however, if such a claim is accurate. Sure, it has theological merit and backing, but it tends to cover over the real differences that divide individuals and groups that identify themselves as Christian. I would suggest that if  we attend to these differences, there’s often not much in common between Christians who identity as “socially liberal” and “socially conservative.” In other words, I’d suggest that when disagreements among Christians flare up as they have in the past few days, we are not witnessing different expressions of an underlying, unitary tradition called Christianity. We are, rather, dealing with different “religions,” as separate from each other as one “religion” is normally taken from another.

Sure, “socially liberal” and “socially conservative” Christians share, to a certain extent and differences aside, a common book, a common language, and common practices. But if we dig further, if we do a little “thick description” as the anthropologist Clifford Geertz urged us, the extent of the commonalities is not at all clear. For instance, all Christians in one way or another take the Bible as a locus of authority, but how the Bible is read and how it functions as authoritative varies significantly for individuals and in denominations.

We only need to look at the difference between Frank Schaefer and Phil Robertson to see that this is the case. We often frame such differences as differences of interpretation, but perhaps it would be better to ask the question: Are they (Schaefer and Robertson, “liberal Christians” and “conservative Christians”) really reading the same book? I’m not so sure that they are.

Or take a practice such as baptism, which is, again, ubiquitous among those who identify as Christian. Is baptism in a Southern Baptist church the same things as in an Episcopal Church? At one level it is, since the practice in both contexts ultimately derives from a common source, Jesus’ baptism for the forgiveness of sins. But there is considerable difference between the two in when baptism is usually performed (believer/infant), how it functions (ordinance/sacrament), and its relationship to different understandings of community, sin, and salvation. Material similarities, in other words, don't necessarily mean that the practice is the same across contexts.

We could provide many more examples, and all of these would lead to one question: are “liberal Christians” and “conservative Christians” worshipping the same God? Again, I’m not so sure.

Such questions are sure to make many—on all sides—uncomfortable. But if we really want to understand the vast differences among those who identify as Christian, we should, perhaps, start thinking about these differences not in terms of degree, but in kind. That may not be theologically satisfying, at least initially, but it may be more descriptively accurate. 

Ok.  I am not prepared to declare that those Christians on the liberal side of the aisle are not my brothers; but one doesn't have to go the full distance with Phelps to acknowledge that he is getting at something. 

Long ago, a Lutheran pastor turned university professor and a bunch of us students were discussing the intricacies of Karl Barth or some other 20th century theologian--didn't seem to matter who.  In the middle, while mulling over his doubts about Luther's doctrine of baptism, he finally let it out.  Beholding the obstinate, divergent stances of his students, he said that within Christianity, across all denominations, there are really only two churches.  One liberal.  One conservative.  Both read from the same Scriptures.  Both use same words.  But we meant two entirely different thing by them.  Even in talking about Jesus, an outside observer would conclude we were talking about two different people who just happen to share the same name.

His considered opinion was that someday there would be a great sorting out with each side jelling into denominations of more like-minded consistency.  This may be the only way we can come to stand each other.

I suppose to some degree this is already happening.  From the ELCA has come the North American Lutheran Church.  The Anglican Church is on the verge of coming apart worldwide. Congregations of many communions has disassociated themselves from their respective denominations.  Even some traditionalists have taken the enormous step and escaped into Catholicism or Orthodoxy.

Is Jesus really as tolerant, non-judgmental, and accepting as liberal Christians would have it?  Or is Jesus really such a catalyst for disunion among the men and women of the world as the traditionalists hold?  Is there really something called the brotherhood of man?  Or is the only commonality among men that we are objects of His love and precious little else?  How is the Bible to be read and used?

It may well be that how one answers these questions (along with a host of others equality crucial) tells more about oneself than is convenient.  With both Liberals and Traditionalists charging the other with selling out to some non-faithful ideology, I don't see the two sides making peace anytime soon in spite of all the protestations of fellowship and good-faith dialogue.  Especially when talking often times makes it all the worse.

Don't think I'm particularly happy about this.