You would think working from home would help cease the madness of road rage. Well, unfortunately, I live right by a main road, so traffic is heavy (yay). When the traffic is bad, the rage flows like the ancient rivers of Babylon (dramatic?). Just today, I heard from my window a man cuss-out an older gentleman for almost “killing him”. Called him a “old fogie f%$#”, I believe.
We could go in many directions with how this type of act affects anyone involve (all in all, a negative outcome with all parties). What I would like to do is use an analogy with Christianity and its doctrines (excited?). It seems like there is not that much of a difference between us raging in our vehicles versus raging with our doctrines. If you merge into our belief system lane, watch out because we are going to rage against the differing beliefs!
Does what we “Christians” believe really matter in the end? It is a very funny thing how we go about our day-to-day life, not actually “doing” what we believe in. It’s not as if worldviews and truth are not important, they just aren’t prevalent if they don’t bring about some type of relevant wholeness.
Objective truth is only as good as it’s subjective practice. Some examples to better explain. Let’s say you are a strong believer in world peace (I know, I know–what is this, a Miss America pageant?), but you do not participate in any type of action that will bring about peace within the world. Instead, you give your interests and time into something that does the opposite.
Or how about all the social media memes, from all sides of the Christian antipode (progressives to conservatives alike), showing what we believe but how much time are we spending “parading” what we believe but not actually doing anything about it? A little virtue signaling, anyone?! Now, now – I am not trying to point fingers here (I am guilty of it too). We all cannot hide from the fact that we hold onto numerous beliefs which we really do nothing to reflect those views in “real time”.
We also can hold our beliefs so firmly that we let it numb us to what is going on in the world around us. Like the whole hoopla over the second coming of Jesus, for example. Several Jesus people hold this belief so firmly, resulting in no care of environmental protection. If Jesus is coming back, who gives a shit about being stewards of this earth, right? Theologian Peter Rollins paints faith like this:
Until we start participating in the actual reality of Christ (The Flow of Love) within the world, then we can forget about our belief systems. We need to let go, breathe, and embrace our embodied life if we ever want to see and hear the reality of Christ-consciousness in this current space and time. I guess I’m proposing some type of theology? Ah, the wonderful world of Christian theology…isn’t it the best (crickets)? It seems within the context of Christianity, we want our theology to be at the forefront of our faith instead of being one of the many tools to navigate through our faith. I think it is more about how we believe than what we believe when it comes to our theology and doctrine.
How the hell does that work, you might ask? Well, for starters, we will need some sense of humor (buzz word) to be able to even fathom such an idea (along with some humbled ego). If we can’t give some grace to others’ theologies (and our own), I don’t think we can ever come together as a diverse and unified collective. Like the scientific method, theology should be seen more of a process instead of the definitive. Yes, like the scientific method, we want results and answers, but it is always an ever changing, revolving pendulum. Now, I know theology cannot be exactly compared as an exact science, but I think it helps to see the similarities. If theology isn’t someone’s way of living in the world, what is the point?
Now, some will say “well, it’s about heaven in the end, not this world”. Ah, see I get it. Sometimes this world can bring you down to the dark abyss with no end in sight. Life blows super chunks at times, no doubt. So, I get the desire for something better on the other side of this life. But escapism we’ll never be the final solution to our worldly woes. The final telos was, is and always will be LOVE–as in The Kingdom of God (I.e., the reality that heals and liberates ALL things). A sense of humor can help with all of this. When we become looser with our theologies, we become more graceful towards others and ourselves. This will help us let go of that rage and become freer with our doctrines.
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