Let's Talk About Sex

Well, I made it through the four books I wanted to finish by the end of the year.

The fourth book is clearly the most controversial of the group as it challenges us to rethink our views on Christianity and sexuality. The challenge comes from Miguel De La Torre in Lily Among the Thorns: Imagining a New Christian Sexuality. De La Torre's purpose is to provide an alternative view to the conservative view which makes sex, even sometimes within marriage, taboo, and the liberal view which says sex is private and if no one gets hurt then anything goes.

The book begins by discussing how patriarchial views of society and sexuality throughout the centuries have led to the domination of women by men. This transitioned into the move by colonizers to feminize people of color, and supporting it with scripture, providing the justification to dominate people of color.

He then goes on to explain that great sex is that which exists between two consenting adults in a familial relationship, familial being a relationship of mutual giving and vulnerability. Familial is a relationship that is free of patriarchy and full of justice.

He chooses the word familial based on the fact that not all marital sexual relations are healthy, due to the power one partner holds over the other, and on his assertion that the Bible does not explicitly limit sex to marriage. (see Song of Songs) In fact, he asserts, if we look to the Bible for what it says about issues of sex and stories in which God is silent, the Bible gives a most "untraditional" and disturbing picture of sex and marriage.

To De La Torre, great sex is found in familial relationships of mutual giving and vulnerabilty in which each partner has equal power and freedom in a monogamous, non-extramarital context. These relationships result in the Hebrew concepts of shalom "that denotes peace, solidarity, well-being, and wholeness" and shelmut connoting completeness. The result is "a harmonius completeness" between lovers. This shalom and shelmut between lovers can then go on to instruct us on how to love others in ways that lead to justice.

The second half of the book then focuses what it takes to have orthoeros in one's life. Orthoeros is a term coined by De La Torre meaning correct erotic sex. He coins this term to focus on the need for justice in sexual relationships. Views on sex and sexual practices feed into political ideology and theology, thus playing a role in whether or not there is justice in the world.

This is a book that will most likely challenge much of what we think about sex. It will require many to rethink their views on scripture to deal with some of the troubling sexual stories we find in the canon. It challenges us to rethink if marriage is the only time people should be lovers, though the way De La Torre lays out familial relationships makes one think such a relationship is a precursor to marriage. It will also challenge the reader to rethink their views on homosexuality. Most importantly, the book demonstrates how sex is more than a private matter. It is part of a much larger picture of justice and the gospel of Christ.

With origins in a conservative Christian tradition, this book is an uncomfortable read as it is suggesting a complete paradigm shift in how we think about sex. It is brief, yet comprehensive, and makes some of the clearest arguments on the subject matter I have seen. It is a thoughtful, yet controversial book, and I urge you to challenge yourself by giving it a read.

Surprised By Hope

In his 2008 offering, Surprised By Hope, N. T. Wright sets out to re-evaluate the historical and literary data surrounding the New Testament and provide an alternative to the two prevailing views of the gospel. Those prevailing views are the liberal myth of progress which claims that we are the ones who will bring heaven to earth through our own efforts and the conservative view of despair that claims the gospel is about going to heaven when you die with little if any relevance for the here and now.

The liberal view, Wright asserts, assumes the need is to claim power structures for themselves not understanding that those structures are fallen and create the problems they seek to address. The conservative view, in assuming there is nothing that can really be done beyond acts of charity, ends up supporting these powers by default.

Wright explains that if we cast off the influences platonic philosophy of body-soul dualism, Constantian idealogy of Christian domination, and the hyper-individualization of the Enlightenment, we find a relevant gospel charged with fervor: Christ in facing death in the powers refused to participate in their oppression, in his resurrection defeated death, the tool of domination used by the powers, and in his return calls us to live the life of the resurrection (or new creation) by seeking justice in putting up building blocks of justice/new creation anticipating the final act of God when the kingdom of God is fully established and God's will is done on earth as it is in heaven and continuing to proclaim to the powers that they are not the ultimate authority and have already been defeated.

Wright states, "The difference between the kingdoms of the world and the kingdom of God lies exactly in this, that the kingdom of God comes through the death and resurrection of his Son, not through naked displays of brute force or wealth."

This book helped me have a joyful Christmas. I often go through all the ritual, both secular and religious, and feel we continue to miss the point putting me in a bit of a Charlie Brown-style funk. Yet, ironically, this book that suggests we should put more emphasis on Easter rather than Christmas, reminded of the hope found in the birth of Jesus. Christ was, is, and is to come. In remembering his birth, we are reminded that death, the greatest enemy of God and most threatening tool of the powers, has been defeated. We shall speak out against and resist injustice knowing ultimately, whatever the powers may do, we shall live.

Well, that book three of four which I hoped to complete by years' end. I've almost completed book four, so keep you eyes peeled to the blog.

Read any good books lately?

At our last meeting several mentioned that we hoped to finish some books we'd started throughout the past year - which led to the suggestion that we each post a short review or reaction to our reading here on the blog.

So finish that book and share your thoughts with us by adding a comment to this post.

The Powers That Be

Well, book two of four is complete. This time I read Naming the Powers by Walter Wink. It is the first of a trilogy he began publishing in 1984 and that is quickly becoming a classic.

Here, Wink's goal is to counteract centuries of biblical interpretation that has failed to realize that the language in Scripture referring to powers and authorities does not refer solely to spiritual forces. In fact, he asserts, while the language refers to both spiritual and earthly powers, it mainly refers to earthly powers.

This was brought to my mind today in Sunday School when the question was asked, "Why is the gift of Christ the greatest gift of all?," and was followed by the question, "How do you give the Christmas gift of Christ to others?" I explained when I think of Mary's Magnificat and that the angels appeared to shepherds and foreigners instead of those Jesus seemed to have came to deliver, I am reminded that God identifies with those who are exploited by the powers that be.

I said this makes the gift great, that Christ's birth proclaimed to the powers, powers created by God and inherently good, that they are not reflecting the goodness of their creator and shall be called to task for the many injustices they have trangressed.

As Wink puts it, these powers have falsely established themselves as the ultimate. Christ proclaims a different spirituality: he is the ultimate and his way is love rather than domination. This, Wink says, is where both conservative and liberal Christians have missed the boat. They have sought to overcome these corrupt powers by gaining that corrupt power for themselves not realizing that these powers are fed by a false spirituality.

So we proclaim the gift of the true spirituality of Christ as the ultimate whose Lordship revolutionizes what the worldly powers have made lordship to be in their image. We give this gift by speaking truth to the powers, including those that fuel the system in which we live and benefit, and by providing what refuge we can to those who are exploited by the powers.

The result will be twofold: 1) the very existence of the powers will be threatened by the proclamation of a true spirituality, and 2) people will find deliverance in an authentic way of life instead of that destructive value system they were duped to participate in.

With that, I began book three and wish you an excellent Advent and a Merry Christmas. Remember, in this season we celebrate the arrival of God's Kingdom on earth.

Anselm's God-Man

Well, I'm blogging. Sorry it took awhile. It's been a busy couple of weeks. After all, I still have 2.5 books to read by year's end.

I just finished Joerg Rieger's Christ and Empire. The premise of the book is that the doctrine of Christ has been understood to have developed in a vacuum. By assuming this, we have missed how the doctrine was shaped by the political contexts in which it was found and that it ended up supporting empire as it was formed by those in positions of power. However, the idea of Christ itself is so dynamic and unable to be boxed in by empire that even these traditional doctrinal statements leave openings to be reintepreted to resist empire.

The chapter that caught my eye the most was on Anselm's doctrine of the God-Man. This doctrine is that which affirms that Christ was fully God and fully man and sets forth the satisfaction theory of atonement: Christ came and took our place to restore the violated honor God.

There's two major points here. First, the idea of satisfaction needs to be placed in its historical context. This doctrine came together in the days of the feudal system. Within the Norman conquest of England, there were many fiefdoms. The lords of these fiefdoms were responsible for their territory and demanded absolute obedience of their subjects who had to answer to them and the king. Obedience meant order and honor. Disobedience meant chaos and dishonoring the lord and the king. So when someone was disobedient, they came down hard. The lord and the king's honor had to be restored. Honor was important because recognizing one's place in society is what maintained order.

There were two ways to restore order: punishment and satisfaction, instituting interpersonal relationships that overcome the distortion of the relationship.

So here are a few observations:

1) Satisfaction is not about God getting violent revenge, but restoring order.
2) The satisfaction theory of atonement was formulated with the existing power structures in the background and fails to redefine lordship.
3) Despite that failure, notice that Anselm chooses the nonviolent option for restoring order. This will become important in considering the second point.

The second point is this, Anselm wrote of this doctrine in Cur Dues Homo in which he speaks to a student of the need to convince "unbelievers" of the reasons why God becoming man makes sense. This is important in this time in which the church felt the need to reconcile God's omnipotence, impassibility, and immutability with the idea of God becoming man and dying. Now, today we assume "nonbelievers" refers to people without any kind of faith. Yet, that was not the concern then like today when battles against secular humanism and other such things tend to be the focus of many Christians.

Instead, other religions were the main issue. Yet, the issue goes even deeper than the level of religious ideas and is a response to two developments: economic developments that led to a migration of Jewish peoples into urban areas of the Norman Empire and the Crusades. The result is the repression of the Jewish peoples and military action in Jerusalem.

The significance here is that what the empire tried to achieve by the sword, Anselm tried to achieve by reason. Anselm again seems to think in terms of peace while not questioning whether or not God really backs the empire and assuming superiority to his counterparts.

Rieger's insights challenge us to evaluate all out traditional doctrines and see where they lead us to support abusive power structures. My mind goes straight to dispensationalism and the end times. I see a great deal of this in Left Behind thinking and back in our history with Manifest Destiny. What do you think of any of this?