Had a class this morning about the different contemporary interpretations of Christ. The gist is this ... Jesus death has often been characterised as sacrifice down through the years. The comment was made that this has encouraged some not to try to avoid or leave their suffering, but instead to languish in it, seeing it somehow as a positive thing. I suppose it was seen as leading the believer to a deeper relationship with God, greater holiness and generally being able to 'get through' some of the shit life throws at us. The criticisms are that this has led to the glorification of suffering, which many see as incongruous within a relationship with a God of love who 'wants to bless us'. Pannenberg, Barth and others would beg to differ, and think that this image of Christ is still of relevance today and indeed of core and essential value to the Christian gospel.
Others, such as Sally Mc Fague and Jurgen Moltmann (who could perhaps be seen as Liberationists) would suggest this idea is dead in the water today, and needs replaced. What I gather is that Liberationists in general see Jesus death as Protest, and solidarity. This has evolved out of countries (latin America predominantly I think) experiencing severe oppression and inequality. Its Christians getting away from the whole 'meek and mild', 'turn the other cheek', sit-there-and-take-it kind of attitude. Actually, I believe that in extreme cases, some of this mind have taken to paramilitary/aggressive actions in order to bring freedom to the oppressed - some church pastors inlcuded.
My friend Ian would say this is redressing the incarnational/redemptive imbalance present within much Western theology. I like it (not sure about guerilla tactics!) because it brings the focus of Christians off the afterlife, to the here and now. We have personal reposnibilty to take restorative/judicious action about the injustice going on in the world today. It rings true with my ethical shopping/globalisation sensibilities.
I wonder how well it would fit with a marxist poilitic? (Apart that Marx wanted to liberate from religion!) It reminds me of how he said that religion/state etc is the moral legitimation of the power based economic relations in Capitalist society. I wonder has such a theology of Christ as sacrifice (and in turn the value of enduring our own sufferings) filtered down through church structures through the years as a means of maintaining the power and wealth of Church Institutions and exploiting Joe Blogs and family....?
All thoughts welcome. Btw, none of what I just said is my opinion!
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2 comments:
Hey Dude,
I as yet have not got the email about Five Dollar. What account did you send it to?
Did you gmail me it? That address is broken.sounds@gmail.com
How are things with you? Life treating you well? Listening to anything good recently?
All the best, dude, and let me know what you are thinking re: Five Dollar.
Ross.
Or may be your critique of the 'sacrifice' of Christ as a power dynamic is an oversimplification of the processes of premodernity, modernity and postmodernity, which does not explore what the Christian narrative says for itself. May be the reason it has stuck maybe because of psycho-social reasons to do wit human-ness that were not political and therefore to do with controllablility. Maybe at its essence, there is something of God in it. But may be I am not being cynical enough - or am I just projecting my own stuff into finding a critique that reflects where I am at? Its easy to use a Marxist critique to demonise everything - I know I was one - its much harder to get beyond your own prejudices to seek the inner narrative for itself beyond our own thoughts and feelings which are a form of blindness....not that I feel strongly... in short - it is too easy to dis - much harder to seek the essence with a positive frame of mind and questioning
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