by Vorjack
I first became aware of Robert Jensen’s work when his essay about rejoining the Methodist Church appeared on Killing the Buddha. Jensen is basically an atheist and a naturalist, but he had been invited to speak before a Methodist congregation by a progressive preacher. Jensen was taken by the aesthetics and the power of the rituals and set about joining the church.
Since the essay is entitled “The Inquisition,” I think you can guess how that went over.
A New Faith, that Requires None
Pullquote: My decision to join a church was more a political than a theological act.
But I suspect my atheist audience is struck by the thought of trying to rejoin the very thing we worked so hard to break away from. Why go back? As I mentioned, Jensen was struck by the sacred rituals, but there’s more to it than that. Jensen has a mission.
Jensen is defining a new type of religion, in line with modern liberal Christianity but even more secular. The core is his concept of “God as Mystery,” which we’ve previously discussed. Following that, he’s retooled – or at least sketched out ways to retool – such concepts as sin and the soul.
The result is a new take on Christianity that is almost completely secular, to the point that it could even be accepted by materialists. Granted, this requires an even more streamlined version of Jesus than is typical for liberal Christianity, but Jensen is more interested in the OT prophets anyway. Again, Jensen has a mission.
A Little Matter of Remaking the World
Pullquote: “The task is to create a system that gives us freedom from the illegitimate authority that people and institutions attempt to impose on us, but recognizes our obligations to each other.” (p. 102)
To call Jensen’s goals “ambitious” is to do them a disservice. Jensen wants nothing more than to reshape American society – and probably all western society by extension – into something totally new. Jensen focuses on discarding what he calls “the four fundamentalisms”:
- Religious fundamentalism: Fairly obvious.
- National fundamentalism: Nationalism in all it forms, most notably American exceptionalism.
- Economic fundamentalism: The notion that corporate capitalism is the only right way to organize the economy.
- Technological fundamentalism: The belief that “… the increasing use of evermore sophisticated high-energy, advanced technology is always a good thing and that any problems caused by the unintended consequences of such technology eventually can be remedied by more technology.” (116)
And this is only the tip of it. In addition to remaking – or removing – capitalism, he wants to shift from the hierarchical “power over” model of social organization to a more cooperative “power with” style. All of this is intended to address the extreme problems of social justice and environmental degradation that Jensen sees in the world today.
Jensen realizes that to change American society this completely, he’s going to need to start from the bottom up. Habits, traditions and assumptions will need to change. American ambitions will need to change, as the “good life” will need to mean something other that increased affluence. In fact, Americans as a whole will need to become accustomed to having fewer material possessions.
Feasible vs. Workable
Pullquote: “To speak prophetically is to refuse to shrink from what we discover about the injustice of the world.” (p. 144)
Jensen is clear that the fundamental problems of inequity, poverty and environmental degradation will require radical changes. He views his new take on religion as a lever for enacting those changes, by creating a new vocabulary, new values and a new ethic for living. He makes no pretense that he has a final answer, but sees the creation and embrace of this religion as an important first step.
Which is good, because he spends more time writing about the ills of the world than about the way the world will be healed. All appropriate for a prophet, of course. But here’s the dark side of this prophethetic tradition passed on by the ancient Isrealites: it failed.
Both Northern Israel and Judah were destroyed. By the thinking of the time, this meant that they had not returned to righteousness and were punished by God. By the thinking of our time, it’s hard to see how they could be considered a success. There’s no indication that the prophets convinced the elites of Israel to turn towards justice and mercy. It is instructive that when the Israelites returned from their Babylonian exile, there are no more writings from the prophets.
Jensen’s role of the prophet is important — even vital. But thundering from the mountaintop only does so much. When the work comes down to unromantic, tedious political wrangling over environmental protection, where will the prophet be? When the new religion begins to schism — always a problem for the liberal wing — where does the prophet stand?
Vorjack is a librarian/archivist and a public historian, living with his wife in history-soaked Albany, New York.
Fascinating. Fortunately and ironically, he may actually serve the cause of reason better after making his return than before. We all have to take our personality and needs to account when working with our world and ourselves. Great writing, thanx.
So essentially he wants to turn mainstream Christianity into Unitarian Universalism?
Not a bad idea. I might be an atheist, but I’m also a Humanist, so I’ve been an on-and-off participant at the local UU church here. There is something inherently satisfying about the rituals, songs, and fellowship. That’s actually where I met my secular progressive Jewish fiance AND the best man for our upcoming wedding!
“There is something inherently satisfying about the rituals, songs, and fellowship. ”
To each their own, I guess. As a former Christian, I find the rituals and songs pretty lame. I can’t imagine wanting to join any group like that.
What I don’t get it, why does the ritual & song have to be religious at all? I get the same high from listening to average music, after all…
Maybe I just dislike/am inherently distrustful of large group activities.
Whenever a situation involves a lot of people doing exactly the same thing in an emotionally charged atmosphere, my first thought is, “What am I being brainwashed to accept, here?”
Word.
The music isn’t even good – lots of people who can’t sing, singing is not my idea of a good time… plus, the grape juice hurts my stomach.
Well, it’s like a karaoke and I enjoy it -it would be funnier drunk, of course, but for some reason I never went drunk to the church
Tsk, you should. Squirrel some of that “holy wine” out, mayhaps?
The rituals for the UU church basically consist of lighting a few candles. The songs are pretty-much self-afirming “we can all make the world a better place” kind of deals.
We actually joke that it must have been an important message when our minister actually utters the “G-Word”… God. Normally its something like “the universal brotherhood of humanity” or “the spirit which connects us all” if religious concepts are even introduced.
Sermons are about things like equal rights, social justice for the poor, or protecting the environment. Anything “religious” is done through the lens of self empowerment and improving yourself. In the UU church, there’s no dogma, no hell, and you’re free to believe or dis-believe whatever you like. Sunday mornings are more like an intellectual coffee-klatch than a religious ceremony.
Well crap, now I sound like I’m evangelizing…….. Seriously though, UU churches are really open. Everyone there knows I’m an atheist (and I’m not the only one either) and we’ve had some pretty interesting discussions.
I didn’t mean to sound critical. I’ve heard very nice things about the UU church from a number of people I respect.
Maybe I just hate singing.
@ Siberia
Come on, you can imagine the difference of communal singing vs. solo on your I-pod, no? This is a big draw for most — community. I play WeiQi and it is very different in person than on the internet. Skype, for example is making all this typing seem silly too. Humans like to meet – we are social. I imagine singing around beers after a victorious Rugby game is the equivalent — but you don’t always win ! But at church, you can always imagine yourself the victor.
Well, yes, that’s what concerts are for, duh. I’ll take my Slipknot over gospel wishy-washy stuff anyday, thankyouverymuchso. :p
I know what you mean, though. Community is a good thing, but then again, there’s lots of ways to be communal without doing the whole song and dance over a corpse in a stick – or maybe it’s just the inner roleplayer talking.
Plus, church parties are boring.
You obviously don’t much about the Unitarian church.
Our parties generally involve red wine and import beer (we are a bunch of liberal intellectuals after all)
Can I get the wine and beer without the church?
Because then I’m in!
UU party groupie? Hmmm….
“I’m really only here for the free booze” is my philosophy on life.
“I was told there would be pie and punch.”
That was totally me for a while actually! Never went on Sunday mornings but would hang out with everyone anyway.
Hard to, seeing as it doesn’t exist over my piece of land :p Or, if it does, never seen it.
But, do tell more about this wine and import beer thing…
Our parties generally involve red wine and import beer
To get the harder stuff, you gotta come party with us Episcopalians. Hey, the don’t call us “whiskey-palians” for nothing.
Do I actually have to know or care about anything Episcopalian in order to drink their whiskey? Because if not, then I’m in.
They tend to be quite free with their whiskey.
@ Ty — I agree, maybe that is why some of us find it easier to escape the sweet gospel songs. People often describe the religious as demographically/genetically determined — maybe we are too. Everyone wants to think that they have thought out their course in life but instead it is often that we take a course in life and think it out afterward !
I thought this was done many years ago?
Zen & Zen Buddism is essentially sechular with a touch ‘smoothed out’ mystical stuff that didn’t really matter. Or at least thats how I interpert it. Besides even a ‘smoothed out’ jepus is not that great a guy either. He’s still an old testiment jew no matter how many rose colored glasses you put on.
What this dude is trying to do is reinvent Taoism in a Christian-ish perspective (admittedly, he’s in for the song & dance). He says Mystery, I say Tao, same diff.
I would suggest that comment hierarchy is turned off — it is really difficult to follow long conversations a when returning to the site to find a recent comment is very awkward. IMHO
Either that, or redesign the html around the comments to make threads are more clear. I think people click on “reply” not really knowing what they’re replying too. Currently, the comment box doesn’t appear under the comment, but at the end of the thread. It’s very confusing and has pretty much turned every long discussion into spaghetti because most people don’t double check which comment they’re replying to.
If you think it’s crazy with threading, try following a conversation without it. It’s an endless list of @’s where you have to keep looking back to figure out what’s going on. Having threading has made the comments far more active and interesting, IMO. I agree it has disadvantages, but on a site with this many comments, it has more advantages than disadvantages.