Christianity, like all religions has become a megalithic structure of varying beliefs and practices centered around a core belief. The core belief I am talking about goes something like this:
The resurrection of Jesus is what God did because his Son, Jesus of Nazareth paid the price of our sins, the sins of the world, by offering himself as a sacrifice for us on the cross; that if one believes this, one will be saved.
If one is a Christian, I ask you to spend some time with that belief. In particular, I ask you to challenge it; to question it.
It’s hard to do, isn’t it?
To even ponder the thought of questioning something so core to one’s understanding of what it means to be a Christian seems to border on disbelief, doubt, and denial.
Is my asking you to question this core belief an attempt to tempt you? No.
I’m simple asking you to think; to use your reasoning mind. If you feel that it is sinful to question that belief or that you are being tempted to question it, I think it safe to say such feelings occur because we have been taught to think that way.
The challenge I posed above is a thought experiment. The fact is, I find that most Christians simply don’t want to think about such things. Most Christians merely want to believe that by believing what they've been told as opposed to having to think through such things and figuring out how such things apply to their daily lives will save them in a hereafter.
The power of belief is such that it can override reason. In fact, beliefs can become concretized; set in stone to defy challenge. Once beliefs become concretized, entrenched, and ingrained, they can prevent one from using the reasoning faculties of one’s mind. If the Church is to undergo a true reformation, the reasoning mind must be present and all our beliefs must be on the examining table, including the one stated in the second paragraph. We must question beliefs from a position of knowledge (intellectual and experiential), reason, and above all faith.
Yes, faith. As any of my regular readers know there is a vast difference between belief and faith; that they are not synonymous terms as we are erroneously led to believe. If one wants to pursue this difference, click here, here, and here for a start.
This brings me back to the thought experiment I posed above. Starting with this core belief of Christianity, the resurrection of Jesus, we need to ask ourselves how is this relevant to life here and now?
What we know of Jesus’s death and resurrection is derived from the Gospels of the New Testament. We know that Jesus was tried, crucified, and died because he was considered a rebel by the Romans. There is no reason to question something like the crucifixion. History corroborates the fact that the Romans regularly crucified those considered to be rebels.
This story also tells us that Jesus's body was removed from the cross and placed in a tomb. This was not a common practice on the part of the Romans, as crucified victims were frequently left to rot on the cross as an example for all who passed both, but it is possible, given the account recorded in the Gospels, that a member of the Sanhedrin appealed to the Roman governor to have it removed. We are told that three days later when some women went to his tomb, they found that it was empty; that his corpse was missing. We can accept that a missing corpse from a tomb is within the realm of possibility.
What our knowledge of this story also says is that various disciples experience seeing Jesus suddenly appear and then disappear. It is at this point that the the story of the resurrection departs from the verifiable, even though the writers of the Gospels try their hardest to make it as real and verifiable as they can.
A rational understanding of these occurrences seems to suggest some sort of shared visionary experience that results from being traumatized. [See my previous post on the subject of trauma and the experience of resurrection.] The Gospels give varying accounts of the disciples experience with the resurrected Jesus. Jesus speaks to them and Jesus speaking appears to be what makes them aware of his presence, what opens them to realization of his being alive.
What I find interesting is what is missing in the story of the resurrection. If God wanted to change the course of human history by this event, it seems that the most effective way would have been to have Jesus appear in the Temple or in front of Pilate, but such appearances didn't occur. The fact that this did not happen casts these experiential visions in a different light. It casts these events in the personal light of revelation as opposed to the theatrical lighting of the world's stage.
The fact that Jesus's resurrection is not trumpeted from the Holy of Holies in the Temple or in the Roman Forum tells us something of our creative and creating God's intent. I have maintained throughout many of my posts that God is a minimalist; that God is evolutionary, that God expends Self to expand Self; that God is a kenotic force
The resurrection is a personal experience rooted in a kenotic faith. Jesus was not raised from the dead to pay the price for the sins or be a sacrifice offered to appease God's need for retribution for all the sins committed up to that point and for all the sins that would be committed thereafter.
Throughout much of the Hebrew Scriptures we read that God did not delight in sacrifices meant to appease; that God wasn’t affected by our sins; that God through the prophet Jeremiah proclaimed sin to be no sin. What underscores this perspective is the fact that for the past two thousand years since Jesus's resurrection, the human world remains pretty much the sinful place it always has been.
Jesus was raised up because he was able to forgive human injustice while a victim of it. Jesus was raised because he lived into being the son he heard God proclaim him to be at his baptism. Jesus was faithful to his calling even when he felt abandoned God, and God, who is faithful, raised him up.
The truth of the resurrection is experienced as an act of kenotic faith; when the self is expended to expand the Self we share with God in Christ Jesus. What permitted Jesus's disciples to experience the intense reality of the resurrected Jesus as a shared experience can be surmised as a deep seated faith that extended far beyond the realm of the their beliefs; a faith that caused them to drop what they were doing and follow him as his disciples from the moment they first laid eyes on him, from the very moment he said, "Follow me."
This thought experiment was conducted to provide a template for the type of examination required to bring about a true reformation of the hearts and minds of those who wish to follow Jesus. True reformation is rooted in a kenotic faith; a faith that allows for letting go to bring about a resurrection in which all things are new and revitalized in ways not experienced before.
We need to examine our core beliefs, the core teachings of Christianity with such a faith to present them in the light of the kenotic faith Jesus demonstrated throughout his ministry or shelve them as a relic of our religious past. Christianity must evolve if it is to remain relevant. The scriptures must be read in a clear non-indoctrinated light that sets aside concretized beliefs to allow a faith-filled understanding to emerge, one that is applicable and relevant in the here and now.
Until next time, stay faithful.
Norm
