CHRISTIANITY AND THE NEED FOR A COPERNICAN REVOLUTION - ORIENTATION

It was an earth-shattering moment when Nicolaus Copernicus presented the Christian (western) world with a heliocentric understanding of our solar system,   To no longer find ourselves on a flat earth at the center of creation, with the vault of the heavens revolving around us and the infernal depths below us was not only dislocating where we were but also where God was in the scope of things and, more importantly, what our place in this emerging understanding of the universe is.  When something that was held as fact for over a thousand years becomes a farce, everything associated with that farce is open to question.  

In the multitude of discoveries that have dwarfed Copernicus' discovery in the centuries that followed, we find ourselves in a universe that has no center to speak of.  A center can be anywhere, everywhere, or nowhere, which brings us back to Paul's use of the Greek poem to Zeus that defines God as that Being in which we live and move and have our being in Act 17.  God is everywhere, but no one can point a finger and say this is the precise location where God dwells. 

Was Paul just being clever by beating the Athenians at their own game in order to protect himself from being convicted of introducing a new religion within Athena's city or did Paul truly view God as a being we are part of?  One can't be certain, but what is certain is that Paul entered that particular definition of God and us into the biblical record and it has become increasingly prevalent in today's understanding of who we are and who/what God is.  In a universe that has no discernible center, Paul's definition of God as Being in which all beings exist is truly mind-bending and ahead of its time.  Suddenly, we find ourselves connected to and proceeding from something beyond comprehension; something that exceeds the limits or limitlessness of the universe itself.   

What Copernicus unintentionally accomplished was to reveal a crack in the theological certitude regarding the inerrancy scripture. Church authorities were stricken with justified fears that if people could no longer be certain about the inerrancy of scripture (i.e. that God could cause the Sun and Moon to stand still in Joshua 10) would they be certain about the Church's doctrines and dogmas derived from them and would it ultimately lead to questioning the authority of the Church's leadership?  While there was some comfort for them in the fact that the vast majority of the people attending worship services remained illiterate, the handwriting was literally on the wall with the invention of the printing press and the ability to widely distribute information throughout Europe.  

I think it safe to say that this fear remains to some extent intact today, and while science is more readily accepted, the crack that began with Copernicus' discovery has been widening into a canyon.  While the inerrancy of scripture has been largely dismissed by most mainline denominations, the doctrines derived from an inerrant perspective of them remains largely unquestioned and untouched.  

The bridge used to spanned the theological crack opened by Copernicus' discovery has been and continues to be ecclesial traditions; particularly, in liturgical churches, but as the gap widens that bridge is increasingly stretched beyond sustainability as long-held traditions in mainline churches devolve into traditionalism or concretized beliefs in the inerrancy of scripture in pentecostal or fundamentalist denominations as the last bastion against to fend off the findings of science and the intellectual advances in biblical research.  

Our scriptures are sacred to the extent that they are our stories that speak of our relationship to each other within the context of the creation we live in and of the creative force which brought it into being, the source of being we call God.  The Abrahamic scriptures of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, along with the scriptures of other religions are vital to understanding our story, the human story, and the meaning they give to our existence in the expansive and expanding universe we find ourselves in.  They embody the core and foundational beliefs of who we are and what we are part of and belong to.  

There is a need to orient our understanding of these ancient scriptures in the light of science and our contemporary life experiences.  We need to look at them with fresh eyes that are not tethered to long-held traditional beliefs that insist on understanding and interpreting our scriptures in a particular ideological or theological way.  While within these scriptures there is found a human theologic about who we are and who God is, there is a need to freely explore scripture objectively apart from it. The value such theologies within scripture contain is not in the concretized truth religious authorities assign to them, but rather that they exemplify the ever-evolving story of our endeavor to seek the truth and understand ourselves in light of our relational experience to each other, the world we live in, and the kenotic force that brought us into being, God. 

Until next time, stay faithful.

Norm

  

CHRISTIANITY AND THE NEED FOR A COPERNICAN REVOLUTION

Is Christianity in need of a Copernican style revolution, an orientation to the world and the universe as it is?  Has Christianity been too reliant on premises that are misleading?  

Beginning with this post, I will reflect on things that I no longer feel comfortable with regarding the religion I was born into, Christianity.  I am a church-goer.  I have been all my life, but throughout my life I have become increasingly interested in the impact emerging scientific revelations about the universe, our world, and human history has on how many of us Christians think about Christianity.   

I was raised to believe that the Holy Bible is the inerrant Word of God, to be taken literally as fact unless something was declared a parable.  I've lost that belief some years back.  Today the Bible is not the Word of God to my mind, but rather words about God.  For me the Bible is more about understanding the world of our making in relationship to the world intended by the source and force behind Earth's and the universe's creation, God as portrayed in its scriptures. 

I am a theist. I believe there is a reason and a cause for my existence and existence as whole that is more than mere happenstance.  I wouldn't go so far as to call it an intelligence, but rather a desire far beyond the reach of our intellectual capabilities to fully comprehend it.  In my opinion the only proof of "God's" existence is existence itself, the paradoxical "because" response to the unfathomable question why anything exists.   

While I no longer view the Holy Bible as the Word of God, I consider it to be holy; in that, it consists of group of diverse writings and types of literature written over a period roughly encompassing a thousand years from which evolves an inspired understanding of our relationship to God, ourselves, and the universe we live in.  Holy does not imply something to be scientifically or historically accurate or factual.  Holy means that something is sacred; that it is something to be respected and honored.  Holy scripture implies that literature designated as such requires deep and patient consideration in order to discern its deepest meanings.

It seems to me that what the writers of the Holy Bible had to contend with was how to adequately portray the life-changing and ever-evolving human experiences we all encounter in a way that captures the imagination and awakens the hearts and minds of it listeners and readers to that Being "in which we live and have our being."  (See Acts 17)   Paul's use of that poetic description (derived from a poem about Zeus at the altar the Unknown God at the Agora in ancient Athens) is a fine example of a Copernican moment as it represents a giant leap in our understanding of God and who we are.  It was Copernican in the sense that it orientated or should have oriented Christians to where we stand in our relationship to God and what is meant by Jesus' use of the term, "The Kingdom of God.  

Unfortunately, throughout much of Christian history Paul's adaptive definition of God has received very little attention.  Increasingly, however,  there is a sense of a new approach in mainline Christian denominations in their understanding of scripture as a result of the scientific and the historical revelations that have been taking place over the past 100 years.  This is an apocalyptic age, an age of revelation; a period in our history where we are being confronted by historical and scientific facts that are making us take a hard look at long-held "truths" that have suddenly appeared permeable and open to question.

While it has taken the West roughly four hundred years to fully accept and apply the scientific ramifications that began with Copernicus's heliocentric view of our solar system, it has taken Christianity roughly six hundred years to begin understanding its ramifications when it comes to Christian theology.  While most mainline Christian denominations accept the science of astrophysics, anthropology, and the overwhelming evidence of evolution, they have yet to explore their ramifications when it comes to what they tell us about our scriptures and in particular how they inform our understanding of God, Christ, and Jesus.  In a sense, many denominations are tongue-tied to a way of speaking about God, Christ, and Jesus that has been around since the dawn of the Christian era.   They struggle with trying to make the language of the ancient church convey new meanings such language does not possess as a way to accommodate new understandings by cloaking them in traditional language; something that strikes me as being in defiance of Jesus' warning against trying to put new wine into old wineskins (Mark 2:22).    

Two contemporary examples come to mind.  It has become popular in some theological circles to redefine certain scriptural terms as a way to help us look at scripture in a new way.  Atonement is one of them.  By definition, atonement means making reparation for some wrong-doing or sin.  This is how it is used in scripture and what it means in scripture, however, it is being redefined as "at-one-ment" by some.  While I understand the novel appeal in trying to recast atonement as meaning being at one in Christ, it does so at the expense of its original definition. 

Another term is that is mistreated is when Jesus said, "Do this in remembrance of me." at the Last Supper.  Remembrance is exactly what Jesus meant, to remember him.  Today, some have recast it as meaning that when the community of the faithful are present during this sacrament they are literally "re-membering" Christ (literally putting Humpty-Dumpty back together again) in themselves by ingesting the symbols of Jesus' body and blood, the bread and wine used at Holy Communion.  

While these fanciful redefining efforts are an attempt to present new or renewed theological understandings regarding the Body of Christ in the world, they are done at the expense of these words' original meanings.  In themselves atonement and remembrance serve a historic and theological purpose within scripture.   We are not bound to agree with how they have been applied or are being applied today, but we shouldn't change the original meanings of such words as if the authors who used them in scripture got it wrong or meant something other than what these words were meant to convey.

What is needed is a reorientation with regard to what the scriptures are saying in the light of new scientific and historical discoveries about our world today.  In short, there is a need for new language that speaks clearly and directly to what our scripture are saying without the need to change the meanings of the original words found in Scripture. 

Throughout scripture there are important clues that can keep us orientated to the unfathomable being-ness of "God" and ourselves.   There is a need to examine what makes these scriptures holy and useful in understanding ourselves and the world we live in and the trajectory they cast our journey through life in.  During this series, I will utilize some of these stories found within the Holy Bible that are Copernican in nature; that keep us orientated to God and what they tell us about this life's journey. 

Until next time, stay faithful.

Norm