Religion in politics: who's a Christian?
On the Christian right, it's common to question or reject the True Christianity of "liberals" and members of other suspect sects or "cults". We've seen some of that here on CrossLeft recently. In this interminable presidential campaign, the candidacy of Willard Mitt Romney has made the issue of "I'm a Christian and You're Not" an important, though carefully and slyly handled, one.
A couple of weeks ago, Mike Hucklebee blandly, with seeming naivete, inserted a Mormon doctrinal issue into an interview with a New York Times reporter. It's reasonable to assume that it was a calculated dig intended to raise the hackles of the Faithful Christian against Strange Unchristian Mormon Beliefs. Similarly, it's reasonable to assume the bookcase cross-effect in a Huckabee tv ad was a consciously crafted effect, suitable for a candidate whose fliers describe him as a "Christian Leader", differentiating himself particularly from the Mormon Romney, as well as from other less than evangelical Republican candidates.
So I've been reading up on Mormonism lately. Long ago, I lived in Salt Lake City for three years and got to know a bit of the basics. I've occasionally read some more about it (out of anthropological and comparative religion interests) and now, with Romney's candidacy, I've been taking another look. With Christianity so much in the public square, the question of who is and who isn't a Christian has taken on heightened political importance.
The arguments are always based on doctrinal differences. But since there are so many differences within Christianity, with doctrines changing throughout its history and with many doctrinal divides of greater or lesser importance existing today, it's difficult for an ordinary person to decide what doctrines should be considered out of bounds and what doctrines are genuinely normative for all who want to be recognized as Christian.
Looking at the problem in purely ideological terms, you see incompatible definitions. How to choose among them?
My suggestion is to chuck all the doctrinal discussions and look at physical behavior, not verbal behavior. The simplest first cut is to look at what books are being used in rituals and in training ritual leaders. We can call them "scriptures". What they contain isn't important to this analysis. It's just necessary to be able to identify the labels on the books.
Using this approach, at the elementary level it's clear that Judaism and Christianity are different religions because they use different scriptures. The Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh, is incorporated into Christian practice, but another book, the New Testament, is added. New scripture, new religion.
Islam, while acknowledging and giving some respect to the Jewish and Christian scriptures, has the Qur'an. New scripture, definitely a new religion.
Consider, then, Christian Science -- with Mary Baker Eddy's Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures as a necessary adjunct to the Christian scriptures. Christian Science ritual focuses on a Bible Lesson, composed of citations from both the Bible and Science and Health. Without the new book, there's no Christian Science practice and no Sunday and Wednesday ritual gatherings. Therefore, although Christian Science is an offshoot of Christianity, it's not Christianity.
With three new scriptures added to the Christian Bible, the Mormons, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), make the decision easy. The Book of Mormon, Doctrines and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price define a new religion, not just a new wrinkle within an old religion.
So, without doctrinal considerations or theological bias of any kind, it's possible to come to a completely objective classification of the LDS as a separate religion distinct from Christianity.
This approach saves the time and trouble that would come with having to read a lot of theological arguments. Of course, one can always go further into it and define a variety of Judaisms, Christianities, Islams, and Mormonisms by looking at the use of other books (like the Talmud in Judaism) and by observing other behaviors. In Christianity, for example, it's informative to see who can take communion with whom.
Considerations of doctrines can follow later, if one is so inclined. What I find helpful is to be able to make objective distinctions first, without having to ponder imponderables or dealing with charges of heresy or apostasy. Discussions of variant theological ideas, like Huckabee's idea of the Trinity vs. Romney's, can then be descriptive and comparative, without requiring the reader to adopt any particular doctrinal or judgmental stance. Establishing a "value-free" definition of differences might enable people to look at these things more calmly and rationally. (But I don't count on it.)
At the very least, though, it allows people to cut to the chase more quickly -- and, if they're going to discuss religion in politics, have their discussions focus on the impact, if any, of candidates' religious doctrines on policy.
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Comments
Gotta Disagree on this One, Bill
Sorry Bill but I have to disagree on this one.You have did what we dislike Fundamentalists doing, deciding who or who isn't a Chrisitan. Some denominations are different and use "extra-Biblical" authority. The largest single Christian denomination in the world, the Roman Catholic Church , uses "extra-Biblical" authority. Roman Catholicism uses "The Cathechism of the Catholic Church", Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition, and the church's Magisterium as guides to behavior, belief, and ritual, all of your prerequisites for classifying a religion. Surely you acknowledge Romans Catholics as Christians?
All the major religions of the world have a lot of diversity and variation, as does Christianity.
Oddly enough, I have been thinking about running a fourm or doing a post on "extra-Biblical" spiritual authority.Some denominations, such as the Quakers, recognize that the Spirit is always working , and divinely inspired ideas can have validity. The Pope is infallible in matters of religion and moral issues, says the Roman Catholic Church. Now that is definetly "extra-Biblical" authority. Can I quote the Buddha or the Bhagavad-gita, when it is not in conflict with Jesus's teaching, to demonstrate the universality of Jesus's teaching?
Really what is being addressed here is, can a someone calling themselves a Christian, use an "extra-Biblical" authority and still call themselves a Christian? I think they can.
re: your disagreement, Jim
The difference between what I done did and what Fundamentalist Christians do is that I'm not looking at doctrinal differences. I'm not trying to decide who's a good guy and who's a bad guy because of any doctrine I hold dear. I'm just looking at behavior.
Behaviorly speaking, only the LDS church has the Book of Mormon up there on the pulpit in the place of honor, taking precedence in their worship over the other scripture, the Bible. Only the Christian Scientists have Science and Health up there next to the Bible, being read in their rituals as the necessary explanation of the Bible.
But if you go to other churches that use the label "Christian", you won't find either the Book of Mormon or Science and Health on the pulpit. There are doctrinal reasons that people can give for that, but the behavior speaks for itself as a basis for making the distinctions I've made.
There's a difference between extra-Biblical authority and a new scripture. None of the extra-Biblical authorities you've mentioned have that pride of place that's given to the Bible, "the Holy Scriptures". In Christianity, all of the extra-Biblical authorities are treated differently from the Bible itself. "Scripture" has a special place: it's more than authoritative, it's "sacred". The other authorities all refer back it and base themselves on it.
With the LDS church, however, the Book of Mormon holds the highest place of honor in their worship. They clearly label it a new scripture, "another testament of Jesus Christ". They label the Bible as sacred but flawed in its present form because of an accumulation of errors over time.
Since I'm trying to confine myself to looking at behavior rather than ideas, the behavior that marks a book or any other religious text as "scripture" is its place in ritual and in associated verbal markers, like "holy" or "the Word of the Lord", or in behavioral markers like kissing and elevating the book during the ritual. (The specific content of the verbal markers doesn't matter. It's the setting up of a "sacred" boundary around special texts that matters.)
I tried this idea out on a conservative pastor whose website went in for classifying other denominations and doctrines in terms of their deviation from his orthodoxy. His response to my email was that my approach was useful, though he preferred to work with creeds and confessions. But then he made a strange comment. He couldn't agree with me that Christianity is a different religion from Judaism: he sees Christianity as the fulfillment of Judaism. My answer was that no Jew could agree with him, neither doctrinally nor behaviorally by putting a New Testament up on the bimah with the Hebrew Bible. Logically, the statement that Judaism is not Christianity has to be commutative, working in both directions.
Now consider this thought experiment: a Jew is asked to consider including the Book of Mormon in the Ark alongside the Torah scrolls -- or otherwise bring it into his rituals. Let's say that it's been translated into Hebrew and written out on scrolls. I can predict with 100% accuracy that the Book of Mormon won't make the grade. Observing that rejection a few times would be all I'd need to know to make a scientific classification that Judaism and the LDS are different religions. I wouldn't have to ask any questions about why.
But if I did ask my Jewish subjects why they rejected the Book of Mormon, I would surely get many doctrinal reasons that would support the classification.
The fact that the God of Israel, YHWH, is only Jehovah, the first born and physical son of God the Father, Elohim, would be bad enough. But that Jehovah went ahead and somehow physically impregnated a woman and had himself born into the world as Jesus would be so scandalous that it would be worse than the Python's "right out".
However, those same ideas, or at least the first sentence, presented by another Jew, as his interpretation of the Torah, would be taken as a weird unorthodoxy within Judaism. Perhaps a heresy. But it's their presence within another "holy book" that makes them a Mormon meshugass rather than a Jewish deviance.
Now substitute a Presbyterian (or any other denomination of your choice) for the Jew in this situation. You can be sure the Book of Mormon won't wind up on his pulpit, either.
The Presbyterian will also reject the Roman Catholic catechism and other of their teachings. But those are Biblical interpretations, applications, and commentaries, and not the Bible itself. Similarly, Episcopalians cite scripture, tradition, and reason. But only the Bible has special ritual status.
And take the Unitarian Universalists. You might find any number of religious texts being used in their services. Using the Bible only as an important text that's on the same level of significance as the scriptures of non-Christian religions, they aren't a Christian church, even though many members may strongly lean that way. (And I really like the UUs.)
So -- you ask "Can I quote the Buddha or the Bhagavad-gita, when it is not in conflict with Jesus's teaching, to demonstrate the universality of Jesus's teaching?" Since you stipulate the standard of not being in conflict with (your understanding) of the Bible, you have adopted a Christian standard, not a UU, Christian Scientist, or LDS standard. So go right ahead, Jim. I'm all for it.
A Lot to Think About
You have given me a lot to think about Bill, so I am going to have to think about it before I respond.
True CHRISTianity
The term 'Christian' was not even coined until the days of Paul, about 3 decades after Jesus walked the earth as a man.
Jesus was a social, justice, radical revolutionary Palestinian devout Jewish road warrior who rose up and challenged the job security of the Temple authorities by teaching the people they did NOT need to pay the priests for ritual baths or sacrificing livestock to be OK with God; for God already LOVED them just as they were:
Sinners, poor, diseased, outcasts, widows, orphans, refugees and prisoners all living under Roman Military Occupation.
What got Jesus crucified was disturbing the status quo of the Roman Occupying Forces of his time, by teaching the subversive concept that Caesar only had power because God allowed it and that God preferred the humble sinner, the poor, diseased, outcasts, widows, orphans, refugees and prisoners all living under Roman Occupation above the elite and arrogant !
The early followers and lovers of Jesus were called members of THE WAY-being THE WAY he taught one should be;
Nonviolent, a Peacemaker and one who did the will of the Father .
"What does God require? He has told you o'man! Be just, be merciful, and walk humbly with your Lord." -Micah 6:8
Jesus remained NONVIOLENT and forgiving even while being mocked, whipped and nailed to a cross and he promised that it is the Peacemakers who are the children of God, not the peace-talkers, or those who bomb, occupy, torture others.
2,000 years ago The Cross had NO symbolic religious meaning.
When Jesus said: "Pick up your cross and follow me."
He was issuing a POLITICAL statement, for the main roads in Jerusalem were lined with crucified agitators, rebels, dissidents and any others who disturbed the status quo of the Roman Occupying Forces.
Jesus NEVER said go out and make Christians-he said go out and make disciples and a disciple is one who DOES what the Master teaches.
About 2,000 years ago, when Christ was about 33, he hiked up a hill and sat down under an olive tree and began to teach the people;
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven."
In other words: it is those who know their own spiritual poverty, their own limitations and sins honestly and trust God loves them in spite of themselves who already live in the Kingdom of God.
How comforted we will all be, when we see, we haven't got a clue, as to the depth and breadth of pure love and mercy of The Divine Mystery of The Universe. God's name in ancient Aramaic is Abba which means Daddy as much as Mommy and He/She: The Lord has said, "My ways are not your ways. My thoughts are not yours." -Isaiah 55:8
Christ proclaimed more: "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."
The essence of meek is to be patient with ignorance, slow to anger and never hold a grudge. In other words: how happy you will be when you also know humility; when you know yourself, the good and the bad, for both cut through every human heart.
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, they will be filled."
In other words: how happy you will be when your greatest desire is to do what "God requires, and he has already told you what that is; BE JUST, BE MERCIFUL and walk humbly with your Lord."-Micah 6:8
"Blessed are the merciful, they will be shown mercy." In other words: how happy you will all be when you choose to return only kindness to your 'enemy.'
"For with the measure you measure against another, it will be measured back to you." Christ warns his disciples as he explains the law of karma in Luke 6:27-38.
"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they see God."
In other words: how happy you will be when you WAKE UP and see God is already within you, within every man, every woman and every child. The Supreme Being is everywhere, the Alpha and Omega, beginning and end. Beyond The Universe -and yet so small; within the heart of every atom.
"Blessed are The Peacemakers: THEY shall be called the children of God."
Oh how happy the WORLD will be when we all seek justice and pursue it, for there can be none without the other.
"Blessed are those who are persecuted because they do what God requires, theirs is The Kingdom of Heaven."
And one fine day the lion will lie down with The Lamb and man will make war no more and that is the Kingdom of God.
Eileen Fleming,
Reporter and Editor of
http://www.wearewideawake.org/
Author "KEEP HOPE ALIVE" and "Memoirs of a Nice Irish American 'Girl's' Life in Occupied Territory"
Producer of "30 Minutes with Vanunu"
re: True Christianity
Although I agree with your understanding of what Christians should be doing, Eileen, and have agreed with it every time you've posted that particular message, your headline is precisely the kind of thing that my blog post was aimed at. We get harangued at by conservatives about what they think True Christianity is. And we sometimes respond in kind. I think it doesn't work when they do it and it doesn't work when we do it. Now it's just the headline that bothers me. The message is fine with me, otherwise.
One point of my blog post is that if we start with the observation that we're all using the same scriptures, and presumably taking them seriously, then we can reasonably conclude that we're all part of the Christian enterprise. Whether we're right or wrong in our doctrines and in our conclusions about how best to be a Christian, I think it's right and good to accept each other as members of the Body of Christ.
I remember years ago when some members of my church were complaining about Jerry Falwell, that he wasn't really a Christian. I spoke up for old Jerry, saying that I despised his work but he's still a member of the Body. Someone said "okay, but he's the [inelegant word for anus] of the Body of Christ." I replied that, "no, that part of the body performs a useful and necessary function. You shouldn't disrespect it by comparing Falwell to it. Instead, I think of him as a pimple on the butt of the Body of Christ." I could have gone on to talk of pimples being a serious matter when they get infected but I didn't want to beat the metaphor to death.
The point is, of course, that while it's fine that we have our opinions about people, I think that we who say others shouldn't be so judgmental should remember that it's not for us, either, to judge who's in and who's out, who's a true Christian and who isn't.
Having disagreements about what we should be doing as Christians is natural and unavoidable. But it's the labeling that can be destructive.
To be sure, extreme cases are tempting. But extreme cases are a trap. Look at us: we're extreme cases, according to some Christians.