by VorJack
I wrote about the conjunction between evangelicals and mixed martial arts in a previous post, based on an article from the New York Times. One of the subjects of the article, Brandon Beals, is taking exception to the way he was portrayed.
Beals is a pastor at Canyon Creek Church, a small non-denominational church that Beals helped to start as part of a thesis project. Beals is a fan of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) circuit and MMA in general. He blogs at Fight Pastor, a black themed, blood splattered blog where he hopes to tell you about the Prince of Peace.
I’m being snide, and I’ll stop. Beals does have a legitimate beef, and it’s the same one that people have been dealing with since the beginning of print journalism. Basically, the paragraph description and single quote that the NYT provides does not do the situation justice, and it’s led to some misunderstandings. Plus they got his age wrong, but he’s not really complaining about that.
His church is not directly involved in UFC or MMA. He simply shows pay-per-view events at his church. He has no comment on the perceived feminzation of American Christianity, but the article quotes him in a way that makes it appear that he agrees with Ryan Dobson.
It’s not clear what this means for the other “700 of an estimated 115,000 white evangelical churches” that the story claims are associated with MMA. Presumably, Xtreme Ministries, which leads the story, is reported accurately. Their website is paired with the “Clarksville MMA Academy,” and they do have the motto, “Where Feet, Fist, and Faith Collide.”
Beals is a pretty ordinary guy. We know, because he tells us eight times. What he doesn’t tell us is how he reconciles his interest and advocacy of a violent sport with the tradition of Christian pacifism. Or, how can you talk about the love of Jesus Christ while watching men kick seven kinds of crap out of each other?
It’s a bit dicey for an atheist to be asking questions like this of Christians. What right do I have to be telling people how to interpret their own religions? But as an outsider, I’m fascinated by how religion and culture interplay. It seems to me that here culture has trumped religion. The faith that ended the gladiatorial games in Rome now has adherents that see no problem with the vicarious enjoyment of violence.
“What right do I have to be telling people how to interpret their own religions?”
I assume you’ve read the Bible. That is the one and only source of Christian authority, and each reader of it, as with any other piece of literature, must interpret it on their own (this is why many “Christians” have flawed interpretations of the book — they’ve never read it, and even if they have, they are free to bend and twist its lessons into any shape that gives them the maximum benefit, right or wrong). What right do you have to interpret a religion you do not subscribe to? You not only have the right, but also an obligation to intellectual honesty to hold people to the standard they profess to adhere to.
Here’s an example:
As a teacher of literature, I assert that the book “Moby Dick” is about a race horse that breaks a leg and who goes on to recuperate and win the Kentucky Derby. Should I complain and assert my authority as an “expert in literature” when a student, having only scanned the text of the novel, challenges my “interpretation” of the story?
The generally accepted interpretation the Bible (and the ostensible teachings of it’s protagonist) by “Christians” is a blatant example of rank revisionism for political/social/monetary gain.
The best path an atheist can take in interactions with Christians is to read and understand their own book better than they themselves do (better yet to live the lessons without attributing the ideas to a deity).
Same goes for Judaism and Islam.
I assume you’ve read the Bible. That is the one and only source of Christian authority
And with this, you’ve just knocked aside a good number of Christian religions that don’t believe that the Bible is the “one and only source of Christian authority”. Including the largest single Christian denomination on the planet (Roman Catholicism) and if you don’t lump all of the Protestant denominations together into one denomination, the SECOND largest single Christian denomination on the planet as well (Eastern Orthodox Catholicism). There are probably others – I’m unfamiliar with how the other Orthodox religions view the Bible – but I know that these two deny that the Bible is the one and only source of Christian authority and instead make Apostolic Tradition the source of Christian authority.
Sola Scriptura is a Protestant thing, not a Christian thing in general. And not all Christians are Protestants (no matter what some Protestant denominations may think on the matter).
While I can understand a desire to use popular entertainments as a preacher’s “hook,” and to keep the flock engaged, it does seem a rather odd way to advocate for a religion whose founder is supposed to have said — rather famously — that “all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword” (Mt 26:52). I don’t think there’s anything “dicey” about inquiring into why a preacher might do this, especially given the wide apparent gulf between UFC and MMA on the one hand, and the teachings of Jesus — which includes the above, plus the Sermon on the Mount — on the other.
Historically there has long been a conflict between Christian teachings and violent popular entertainments. The Church Father Tertullian wrote on this very topic near the end of the 2nd century, in the treatise De spectaculis. He condemned in every possible way Christians’ attendance of “the games” (which in his time included not only gladiatorial combats, but also chariot races and athletic games … he opposed all of the traditional Roman and Greek “games”).
Tertullian gives several reasons for why Christians should avoid the “games.” Among them is that they were — he said — relics of idolatry. Another objection is that it appeals to and incites the “bad part” of human nature. (Although he did not word it the same way they would have, this argument might have seemed familiar to the Gnostics of his own time, as well as other mystical traditions before and after.)
Tertullian’s conclusion was that, if Christians were to get any “entertainment” out of brutality or the expression of physical prowess, it should not be in this world, but in the next, and should come in the form of Christians, in heaven, watching the “unsaved” be tormented by God’s “justice.” That great, unending, cosmic “show” would be a spiritual/divine expression rather than a physical/human one, and that meant there would be no “downside” to it.
As for Tertullian’s relevance to modern Christians … any Christian who has a Bible containing the Old Testament is following Tertullian’s admonition that the Hebrew scriptures were sacred for Christians (as he explained in Adversus Marcionem). So it can’t really be said that Tertullian has no authority for modern Christians (yes, even though, later in his life, he abandoned what was, then, “orthodox” Christianity for Montanism and took up residence in that sect’s enclave near Carthage).
There are various degrees of spiritual maturity. Just because one believes it doesn’t mean that he/she is instantly a “spiritual” man or woman, its a process for “with much tribulation one enters the kingdom of God” (in the here and now). In John’s epistles he speaks of little children, young men, and fathers in the faith. He is referring to three various stages/degrees of spiritual growth.
This is partly why non-believers find it hard to get a consensus from the so-called “Christian community”, because while we have one (indwelling) Lord, we are at various points on the journey, most are mere “babes” and sadly never progress on to inherit that good land, that high ground in the spirit that God longs to give His children, the seed of Abraham (of faith). That is why we read that “we have not many fathers” (in the faith) for few have climbed that holy mountain, few have ascended (spiritually speaking).
So we hear (if we have ears to) Paul saying in Ephesians regarding this delta, this degrees of spiritual growth dilemma “until we all attain to the full measure of the stature of Christ”, translation…till we all grow up (in Him).
Speaking as someone who earned her brownbelt in Karate, I object to characterising watching MMA as mere “vicarious enjoyment of violence”. I’m sure many people watch MMA and UFC to enjoy violence. But for a martial artist of any genre, watching those can be more like a technical display. More like an artist visiting a museum! Watching a professional practice something you work hard at is a good experience. You see things you can employ in your own sparring, see good representation of that technique you’ve been working on for months, and get a better idea of how much a body can really handle.
I’m not terribly keen on these Christian fighing club, or at least as they’ve been portrayed in these last couple of articles. I didn’t take up karate because I enjoy beating the everliving shit out of someone; I took it up because I was so unfit I couldn’t run 100m, I don’t like gyms and my friend was going. I stayed because it helped me develop physical and mental stamina, made me feel more confident on the street at night and I happened to be good at it. There is something very heartwarming about being the person your sensei calls on so you can demonstrate the head-high kicks on him.
Our club had a strong practical focus and so we’d do self-defence stuff pretty often. The instructions in those cases, to men and women was “put him down for long enough to run for the hills” not “put him down and make sure he stays down”.
People from outside of the martial arts will always see MMA fights as two meatheads beating the crap out of eachother. I guess its the same as the way I see formula 1 as a bunch of guys driving around in circles, not overtaking.
MMA contests are very different from Roman glatiatorial contests, the most obvious being that the participants enter of their own free will. As to whether Christians should be watching these contests. Is there any prohibition in the Bible about watching sports? I don´t know. If there is, then they shouldn´t do it. Especially not whilst wearing mixed fibre clothing like those ´Tapout´ and ´Affliction´ shirts.
Buddist monks practice martial arts, don’t they? There’s a difference though, namely it isn’t mixed martial arts. They actual follow a particular discipline, and thus it has some religious quality about it (teaching discipline). And there’s all that don’t fight unless you have to its only for self defense stuff. Mixed martial arts ain’t about that. Its not about repelling an attacker with minimal force but about hurting the other guy as bad as you possibly can. If some church wants to follow Paul’s “But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.” (1 Corinthians 9:27) They ought to do it by an exercise regiment that teaches disciple and restraint, not unbridled violence like MMA.
Except for boxing, most of the “martial arts” have their origins in Asia and I’m yet to see ANY martial art class without at least a faint tint of eastern religion. My style started and ended each session with bowing to the dojo-shrine-that-we-pretended-was-there (to signal respect to the dojo and everyone in it) and meditation (explictly described as such). I don’t see how the more evangelical types could reconcile that with that pesky commandment about idolatry.
They probably focus on the fights themselves rather than the traditions around them.
But I second you: liking martial arts doesn’t necessarily mean one enjoys violence – there’s the physical conditioning aspect of it, the discipline, the traditions, etc., involved in it. Plus, some of them are just beautiful to watch.
Focusing on the fights = YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG.
Oh wait, I forgot who we’re talking about here. Never mind.
RE: only for self-defense. My dojo never taught that explicitly. It was understood that going looking for trouble was a silly idea, but if you were going to fight, you were gonna bloody well win. None of this minimum force neccesary nonsense. “Put him down for long enough for you to run to the hills” meant “get him on the floor and then smack him, HARD, and then run for the hills”. Aim for maximum pain but low likelihood of death – break his nose, stomp his airway, break his arm on the way down if he’s going down on that angle anyway. Then RUN.
Keep in mind that Buddhist has its share of blood as well. Yes Buddhist monks practice martial arts and at various times and places their temples wielded immense political and military power. I believe this was the case in both China and Japan. In Japan some temples got special dispencation from the emperor that allowed the Monks to eat meat. At a time when killing a bird or land animal was a crime in the rest of the country. It may have started out as a training of discipline but the Temple leaders quickly learned that a small highly trained and disciplined force could kick the butt of a mach larger army. And this was the way things stayed until People with guns arrived on the scene.
Ditto for Tibet where the office of Dali Lama was established by a military coup in the first place. The man who did it had himself declared the third Dali Lama (retrospectively giving that title to the previous two leader of his order). He then went about ruthlessly persecuting the other Buddhist denominations in Tibet for a while just to make sure that his order stayed at the top.
Depends on the martial arts. I dare you to find a Buddhist monk who practices capoeira ;)
But there is a discipline to capoeira thats all it’s own and at least as much philosophy. Just different philosophy.
Well of course; didn’t say it didn’t have it. But I’ve never seen a Buddhist monk practice it…
Noticed a strange number of referrals from this site…now I see why.
1. Our church isn’t small. We average over 700.
2. Our church isn’t a non-denominational church. We are Assembly of God.
3. Fight Pastor is my MMA site. The purpose of the site is to tell you about MMA.
As far as the defense of Christianity and MMA….that I have blogged on multiple times.
1&2 – Damn, I seem to have misread some of the material on your church website. My apologies for that, I’m deeply sorry that I let those slip through.
As for your defenses, a casual search didn’t turn those up and I didn’t see a reference to them in your original post or its follow-up. Could you link to them?
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John Renken who was featured in the story about MMA in the New York Times, Dateline and The Daily Show runs Xtreme Ministries in Clarksville TN. Before the New York Times came down to do the story on him, John was kicked out of his own church for having an affair with a woman he married at his church to another member of his flock. John has kicked people out of his gym and church in the past for exactly what he was doing. He owes money to a lot of people and is a con-man. John and his followers all knew about what was going on but have let the media run with the story so he can get his name out.