12.25.08
Can I spread the contents of my stocking on the coffee table before I flagellate myself?
The postmodern controversy enshrouding Christmas gets thicker.
Michael Medved has a Townhall column in which he says that it’s come to the point where Christmas as a holiday is under attack from the left and right. The lefties, of course, attack it from the angle of all that smartass separation-of-church-and-state stuff, which is actually justification for their mindset that religion per se is an outmoded human institution. But then he points out that there is a growing number of fundamentalist / Calvinist ministers and spokespeople who insist on proclaiming as loudly as possible that nearly everybody is missing the real reason why Christmas is worth celebrating, which is that, despite God’s wrath over our innate and total depravity, there is a way to gain his mercy. Medved says that, even though polls show that most Americans pray and consider themselves religious – and that, in effect, means they consider themselves Christian – you’re just not going to get them on board with the idea of spending the Yuletide season examining the finer points of erternal damnation and the way to avoid it. He implores America to reclaim the middle ground, which is its traditional attitude toward the holiday, focusing on its role as a time for families and friends to gather and eat good food, sing carols and other seasonal songs, and exchange gifts.
Now, one may say, “Medved is a mere Jew; how is he qualified to address theological disputes withing Christianity?”
Well, perhaps he’s uniquely qualified, given that he’s a devout Jew and is steeped in what the Old Testament has to say about this God everyone is discussing.
Then I came across a post at the theological blog Parchment and Pen that said forthrightly – even in sort of a bragging tone – that if the easily offended postmodern really wants to be offended by something when it comes to Christianity, it would be the premise that God, in his wrath, finds you to be a vile and unworthy being. Pretty much the kind of thing Medved meant when he discussed the complications of Christmas coming from the right.
It’s at this point that the dialogue starts up in my head again.
A: What if the wrath-of-God folks are right?
B: Well, I doubt if they are. It looks like blackmail to me, a bastardization of Pascal’s Wager into a bumper sticker: “If you say there’s no God, you’d better be right.”
A: Are you sure you’re not embracing Kathleen Parker-style snobbery, looking down your nose at “oogedy-boogedy” types?
B: That’s a danger, and I want to make sure I’m not doing that. In fact, dismissiveness is intellectual laziness. (A few years ago, I met an old high school buddy for beers and at some point our conversation turned to our spiritual lives. He said he viewed Christianity as “some sort of blood cult.” To makes such a pronouncement and then be completely done with the world’s largest and most influential religion smacks of an incuriosity that will come back to disqualify one from participation in a variety of debates, it seems to me.)
A: So you’re willing to keep reading, asking questions?
B: Certainly. To say, however, that I go forward without any opinions on what I know so far – well, that would be dishonest, too.
A: Is it okay to wish you a Merry Christmas?
B: Of course. I find more reasons to love Jesus every day.
MR. Dings said,
December 25, 2008 at 4:43 pm
The blood cult is nothing new, stemming from the bread/wine, eating the body, drinking the blood thing. And you know, even as a cradle Catholic, I think your friend has a valid point there. So did the early Romans. I kinda like to envision the last supper when friends got together with their political radical teacher and reformer and broke bread and sipped wine, and we’re all still doing that in remembrance of him. But is what I kinda like the truth? Certainly the truth might defy reason, but, then again, so did the Dark Ages.
An American Buddhist recently described Christianity as “dharma for Jews.”
I dunno either but I do know hate ain’t great.
MR. Dings said,
December 26, 2008 at 12:40 am
Il Papa got down on selfishness in his Urbi et Orbi homily. Can you imagine Joel runnin’ that rap? It’s indeed a downer, says the man in the mitred hat:
Benedict said his Christmas message applied to “wherever an increasingly uncertain future is regarded with apprehension, even in affluent nations.”
Benedict spoke of violence and tensions in the Middle East, lamenting that “the horizon seems once again bleak for Israelis and Palestinians.” He denounced what he called the “twisted logic of conflict and violence” and said he hoped dialogue and negotiation would prevail to find “just and lasting solutions to the conflicts troubling the region.”
Ahh, the Pope. How many divisions does he have?