A Faith for Today ... and Tomorrow

Among my life’s greater blessings are young friends who remind me of what it’s like to be youthful, who inspire me with their intellect and creativity, and whose curiosity about all things arouses my own.  Some of these young friends are drawn to participate in my faith community by what they find and hope to find there, such things as a community that shares and promotes the values they learned as children, faith stories with which they can identify and in which they find wisdom for living, and an environment that encourages their search for meaningful faith.  Some express appreciation for elders who are open and responsive to their questions about life and faith and who allow them room to express themselves and pursue their searching free from fear of correction, censure, and rejection.  They look for those who, like them, are making their own faith path, one that best serves them and their human family.

What many encounter in their taste test of institutional religion are belief systems that seem to be set in stone by those who earnestly believe that religion must identify and hold on to what they embrace as timeless truths essential for moral living in an ordered society and which form a fabric of life that cannot be broken without devastating consequences.  Such truths, often held in the sanctity of differing tribal traditions, are credited to divine revelation and not subject to question or alteration.  This creates a conundrum for minds trained to be inquiring and critical of all assumptions.  What are such minds to make of “blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed” (John 20:29 KJV) in a world where “seeing is believing” is accepted norm and where finding answers and solving mysteries is both expected and rewarded performance?  Does not the ecclesiastical community, by and large, deal with this as a faith matter, or more precisely, a “lack of faith” matter, with the fault attributed to the questioner’s apparent inability or unwillingness to abandon intellect and accept as “mystery,” ideas that require an expression of faith beyond an assumed reasoning capacity of the human mind?  Trust and Obey, very spiritually meaningful words for my mother, can present difficult challenges for younger generations conditioned to view such words as idealistic and naïve. 

If I were once again a young adult, I would not want to associate with a church of “club mentality” whose existence relies heavily on conformity of thinking and where non-conformist  thinking is dismissed as impertinent and heretical.  The Church continues to founder wondering why it cannot increase its participation and membership.  The vitality and effectiveness of the Church are weakened by declining participation due to death of older members loyal with their participation and resources, disenchantment with “the way the church is going,” frustration with church politics, squabbling and division within the ranks, and a diminishing sense of direction and purpose.  What can the Church do to change this unwelcome reality?

Perhaps it is time, if not well past time, for institutional religion, i.e. “the Church” however named, to come of age, just as society expects its young to come of age in their acceptance of responsibility for who they are as world citizens functioning in an increasingly complex and interdependent world order.  Might failure to do so spell doom for an institution dependent for its survival in humanly recognizable form on the committed resources of people … many people?  How can a church established on ancient and unsophisticated understandings make timeless truths real to present and future  generations whose cultures promise to be the antitheses of “ancient” and “unsophisticated?”

What doctrines of the Church are problematic for Generation Xers and Millennials?  Why does the Church consider them essential for the believing Christian?  Is it time once again to rethink identity and purpose, to remake the Church into a Church for today rather than one fixated on ancient truths “good enough for Paul and Silas” (therefore good enough for all time and all people)?  What spiritual concepts would characterize such a church?  How might it reframe its belief system without losing its uniqueness of purpose and message? 

The Substitute

In church, as a child, I learned about the Holy Ghost, God’s continuing presence with us.  A less frightening “Spirit” was later substituted by church fathers (no mothers) - no difference in meaning.  In more recent years I have tried to understand why God, whom I think of as spiritual presence (“God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” John 4:14 NIV), needs a second identity, let alone a third to explain the second.  I find it at least challenging to accept that a multiple God- identity is a God-inspired concept. 

Christian Church history informs me that the term “Holy Spirit (Ghost)” first came into faith  language as a means of explaining the presumed divinity of Jesus - God in human form, having a time-related human beginning and human ending.  This God-concept sees God as Father, Jesus as Son, and Holy Spirit as a necessary pre-existent and continuing presence.  It would seem that absent the human construct of a divine Jesus, God’s continuing presence is sufficient unto itself, requiring no division of function – a single entity does it all.  No second or third persons are required lest we reduce an infinite God to the confines of our finite understandings. 

Why is it necessary for Jesus to be God in human flesh any more so than you or I?  Does it satisfy and make real the understanding of human sacrifice as a necessary substitutionary compensation for an “original sin” condition that renders humans otherwise unacceptable to the God who created them, and without which they are destined for an eternity of separation from God – damned to a hell from which there is no escape or relief?

Did Jesus have to experience an agonizing death to close the gap between me and God?  Why would I subscribe to such a theory?  Am I so flawed as to be incapable of closing that gap myself?  Whose judgment would make me so?  Why is a substitutionary sacrifice necessary for Christians for whom systems of reward and punishment are worldly realities, but not a reality of the God of love and forgiveness personified in the life of Jesus?  The Biblical account of Abraham and Isaac teaches me that God puts no space or requirement of sacrifice of things between God and me.  “The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.” (Ps. 51:17 RSV)

I choose to see Jesus as a flesh and blood human being, like me, but a clear and complete reflection of the character and personality of God, having achieved the highest level of God-likeness and God-consciousness.  Perhaps God is not a being, somewhere “out there,” separate and apart from me, but pure being, present in every aspect and dimension of all that is, yet incomprehensibly greater than all that is.  If I choose to see God as a being, I can objectify God as subject to my personal construction and manipulation.  I can thus fashion God in my image, serving my purposes, subject to my agenda.  Such an image can give license of “higher authority” for worldly claims and justification for worldly ambitions.  History is littered with evidence of the destructive effect of such belief. 

But there is ample evidence also of the work for good of those who choose to experience God as “presence within,” awaiting manifestation in the life of each of us.  Only as I acknowledge God as being am I able to experience God’s full and constant presence in my life as a force for goodness, wholeness, and unity that makes a positive difference in the way I live my life.

Is it not possible for all of us to be one with God as an abiding presence within?  No doors for entry and exit, no sacrifice other than self, no cosmic court, no reward for success or penalty for failure beyond the natural law of cause and effect.  Can a follower of Jesus envision such a God?  Perhaps, but only a new kind of Christian I think, more concerned for the present and future than an ancient past of limited knowledge and unsophisticated understanding, and responding to a simple invitation – “Come and follow me.”

I welcome your response.