New York Times columnist Ross Douthat recently offered a thoughtful piece entitled: "Can Liberal Christianity be Saved?"
Douthat's primary focus was the decline of the liberal wing of the Episcopal Church, but there are wider implications for other liberal denominations.
There is no doubt that all mainline denominations, but particularly those that embrace a so-called liberal orthodoxy, are in decline. What Douthat ultimately offers, however, is essentially a false choice.
By basing decline on the narrow contours of church attendance does a disservice to the argument. This is market-based analysis rooted not in theology. Preference for a particular orthodoxy means only that. It does not make it right nor does it make it wrong.
There have been widely attended churches over the centuries whose orthodoxy included support for slavery, Jim Crow segregation, the Holocaust, Prohibition and Apartheid, while opposing women's suffrage.
We should disabuse ourselves of the notion that there was at one time a liberal theology that served as the dominant ethos for the church as a whole. From the ministry of Jesus into the present day, liberal theology has found itself on the outskirts against a conservative theology that offered the perceived security of predictability.
But to place Christianity on the linear axis delineated by conservative or liberal orthodoxy cheapens the discourse. Defining Christianity as liberal or conservative is to ultimately offer inadequate precepts for the unpredictability of the human condition.
The warring factions that exist within Christianity have not been liberal vs. conservative, but Constantine Christianity vs. the teachings of Jesus.
Early Christianity was a rebellious underground movement until Roman Emperor Constantine made it his religious practice in A.D. 312. Constantine's conversion was based on what he viewed as a victorious sign from God prior to going into battle. His successor, Theodosius I, made it the official religion of Rome in A.D. 380. These events did more for the spread of Christianity than any proselytizing efforts conducted by the Apostle Paul.
But it was a religion that was subservient to the Roman Empire, bearing little resemblance to the radical teachings of Jesus. It has been this brand of Christianity, which has its roots in the Roman Empire, that has historically sided with some of the worst atrocities in human history. It is Constantine Christianity that stands as the self-appointed citadel in opposition to marriage equality.
It is the remnants of Constantine Christianity that serves as the most pervasive and influential strand of the church today be it mainline or otherwise. Constantine Christianity is void of self-reflective impulses, a prerequisite for humility.
Churches committed to the teachings of Jesus are rooted in what I define as inconvenient love. Inconvenient love represents the church at its best. It is the shared Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and Christian belief about ultimate reality where these differing religious traditions coalesce into a harmonic symphony.
Inconvenient love is understood as a creative, redemptive good will for all. It is a love that is not dependent on liking the individual or agreeing with the position taken, but possesses an overriding commitment to affirm the humanity of others. It is much easier and less time consuming to offer a theological rule than to see value in others, especially those who are different.
Inconvenient love is reflected in the parables of the Good Samaritan and prodigal child, and it is the ultimate lesson offered in the gospel narratives that chronicle Jesus' death on the cross.
I fear most churches, regardless of their theological application, are rooted more toward Constantine Christianity than the teachings of Jesus. The appeal of Constantine Christianity is its conformity to the perceived status quo.
Churches that actively pursue the teachings of Jesus will most likely experience low attendance. Does that make them wrong or irrelevant?
Authentic change invariably begins as the minority opinion, which places the teachings of Jesus at a disadvantage, at least where pubic opinion is concerned. Our posthumous commemorations notwithstanding, it is easy to forget that Martin Luther King's courageous stand in opposition to the Vietnam War caused him to be abandoned by liberal whites as well as black civil rights leaders. Moreover, change creates discomfort, an impulse that most willingly avoid.
Differences between Constantine Christianity and the teachings of Jesus should not be viewed as an either/or proposition. Churches committed to the teachings of Jesus are not immune from the impulses of Constantine Christianity.
But strident claims of vaunted superiority of the theology we embrace ultimately serves to obfuscate what's really at the core of those beliefs. Is it a Roman Emperor whose faith is based on war and domination that we subscribe or that of a Mediterranean peasant from Nazareth who places the radical notion of inconvenient love at the core of his movement?
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Very few of these writers ever attempt to back up what they say with actual quotes from Jesus from the gospels. I am convinced that many of them aren't even familiar with most of the things Jesus had to say. They haven't actually read and studied the gospel accounts and they have no intention to.
There is the christian religion with their christian beliefs and actions. world of difference between the teachings of jesus and christian beliefs.
Quoting jesus is for the preachers and followers of the christian religion.
One example of this lack of understanding of the teachings of jesus. americans consider themselves a christian nation but have on going wars for corp profits.
Another example: americans love their capitalism more than their bibles and capitalism is nothing more than an economic system of survival of the fittest. closer to social darwinism then the teachings of jesus concerning the poor and the needy and sick.
Another example is capital punishment in a christian nation. go figure that one out.
Religion and ego are about quoting jesus.
Society always has dominant groups, the accepted public religion, whether Zeus, Ra, or Christianity or maybe even the country club or militarism. Once a group exists long enough or is large enough to become an institution, its goals change - from its original ideals to institutional preservation and promotion. Then membership and adherence to the institution becomes the religion.
There is not a lot of difference between the Greek Gods and Jewish God, including rationale and behavior. The changing of society from one religion to another is merely a relabeling of the same product and destruction of the old symbols. In the auto industry, they are called "nameplate factories," where a car receives its nameplate as it is about to emerged from the factory as some worker shouts: "Hey, is this a Caddy or a Chevy" - or "a Ford or a Lincoln" - or "a Toyota or a Lexus", etc. You get the idea. Christianity was a new nameplate for the old public religion of the Greek Gods.
Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose - The more things change, the more they stay the same.
That 'spread' wasn't so 'peaceful' as Christianity loves to claim it was, either.
Luther and Muntzer argued over the Word---The Word as the spirit of prophecy or the Biblical text. Which is more authentic? The ritual Peasant King. or Rabbinical Fundamentalists?
Constantine Christianity has one advantage--it tends to distill the important over time and ignore the dross. The Catholic schools and hospitals are testimony that Constantine structuralism is capable of doing some good in society.
The separation of church and state espoused by Southern Christianity and its heritage is coming under fire as school vouchers for religious schools are beginning to gather momentum. The great battle for the soul of the US is entrenched barrow-minded secularism which betrays the promise of religious freedom
St. Ambrose of Milan threatened Theodosius I with excommunication from the Church and that he could not receive Holy Communion as he had wanted to receive it when he was planning to come into Milan. Theodosius I literally massacred the inhabitants of Thessalonica, including Christians and non-Christians. I've read the letter itself, my medieval history professor, Jonathan Lyon, at the University of Chicago. Theodosius I was a Christian, or at least a very bad one, and St. Ambrose called him out on it, especially when Theodosius I massacred a city of Christians.
If you want to read the letter from Fordham University:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/theodoret-ambrose1.asp
My comments didn't regard the killing of Pagans in early Christianity. No group is really innocent in the killings of others, so it's not a bit of one ups manship regarding whether Christians have consistently done well in living the life of the Gospel, but this is the manner of human weakness, and if anything we fare off probably worse than them in terms of our vices.
This is the letter:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/ambrose-let51.asp
http://www.bidstrup.com/bible.htm
I strongly disagree. The more fundamentalist Protestant churches are very far from the Constantine tradition. They are non-hierarchical and reject the existence of establishment figures (saints and theologians and church officials) mediating between the believer and his God. They believe each believer is responsible for reading the Bible and taking charge of his own salvation. They are, truly, on the far left wing of Christianity.
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For good or bad you christians should thank Constantine because without him, your religion would never have taken root as there were many forms of early christianity and unfortunately the literalist one came through even though it was the most nonsensical. For nearly 400 years there was internal bickering before they hashed together an early form of the bible that was finalised somewhere around the 8th century. The bible by your bedside is NOTHING like what the early christians were reciting or writing, it was re-hashed, then re-written many times like a bad West End theatre play until we ended up with what we have today and remember, the bible was never intended to be a book, it was writings from earlier times handed down then someone decided to cobble it together and selected what fitted their ideals to keep the people in line.