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Why Long Beach?
"The fact that our modern culture is so explicitly evil is the reason why some who follow Christ, despite the biblical injunction to take up a world-wide cultivating ministry, still find it necessary to cut out of their lives as much culture as possible. Some Christians believe they should sell all that they have and join something like a Mennonite community in Paraguay or in the frozen blue mountain country of northern Canada where all your time goes body-heart-soul-mind into hacking sustenance out of the environment for your families, in moving dependence upon the Lord God generation after generation, as far from the secularized cut-throat world as possible. I respect much strong christian living as a personal decision for faith survival, but I believe its driving force is at bottom counter-creational and is mistaken when it is adopted as the direction for Christ's body on earth to take. It's true, if you covertly covet automobiles, it's better to demolish them and walk rather than keep your garage stocked with idols. And if you compulsively overeat and grow fat or pursue slim-hipped thinness of the American shape as your ticket to well-being, it's better, both ways, to put on a camel's hair shirt, eat locusts and honey, get a tough, durable body and baptize for a living as John in the Gospels did-although Christ's disciples ate and drank, healed the sick and told the people stories, parables, like their master rabbi. Indeed, it's better to cut down cultivating to the bone rather than go well built into hell. But what's "better" is not yet positing the full norm of goodness which our Father in heaven has given us to believe as the way of cultured life."
-Calvin Seerveld,
Rainbows For The Fallen World
5 comments:
It's good to see you blogging again, Bob.
My comment has to do not simply with this particular quotation, but to the neo-calvinist ideas of which it is an example.
One of my problems with neo-calvinism (granted, my understanding is limited), is that it uses the word "culture" as a general term to cover everything that humans create. Thus, the Mennonite-type communities are given as the example of people who reject "culture". But God wanted us to create and embrace culture. Therefore, the Mennonites are wrong.
Speaking of "culture" as a generic term for what humans produce rather than "cultures" seems to muddy the waters. It is not "culture" that Christians are called to be against precisely because the church is called to be a culture (a community with its own stories, practices, ways of construing the world, etc.) But the Church will often be against other particular cultures. The neo-calvinistic tendency to talk of culture in this generic, monolithic sense seems to be a bad habit of modernity. Talking of culture in this universal way assumes that there is no possibility for alternative forms of culture. An example of this occurs over and over again in the discussion of politics. It is assumed that some Christians should become congressman, that we should make sure we are responsible citizens and participate in the democratic process through voting, etc. If someone were to disagree, they would be considered anti-political, anti-creational, and thus wrong.
But what if we stopped assuming that politics=American form of gov't? What if we allowed for the term "politics" to cover more than its dominant form? What if the Church was called to be a politic, with its own relations of power determined by its crucified and risen Lord? Then calling an Christian anti-political because they don't vote would be the same as calling an American anti-political because they don't go to church.
This doesn't mean that creating an alternative culture (with its own politics, economics, etc.) is not a messy task. After all, the Church is creating this "culture of the new creation" in the midst of another culture. Does this mean we should stop buying clothes and eating In N Out and listening to music and watching movies? I don't know. Maybe. But this is precisely the question we must continually struggle with: What does it look like for a new culture to be born within the old one?
i just want to say im glad you posted a new post. im going to have to come back to it to make an insightful post which, realistically, may not happen. Yet, i am glad that you posted. We've all been waiting a while
Ryan !
Thanks so much for reading my blog. Now that I know someone reads these things I might start being careful about what I put on here. And thanks for caring enough to give me some strong push back...a very strong compliment indeed.
I also have gaps in my NC (neo-calvinism)knowledge even more in my (HW) hauerwausism knowledge. I know I sometimes feel like throwing in the towel and being Barthian...which is pretty much being HW as far as I can tell. So know your comments here are read with a sympathetic ear.
Let me see if I can take your thoughts piece by piece based on my research in Kuyperian (Bavinck and Kuyper) terms (which is not exactly NC but will do).
First you said, "NC thinks of 'culture' as everything humans create". On my reading, Kuyper's view of culture involves a more nuanced treatment:
Kuyper spoke in glowing terms of the complexity of various cultures as a manifestation of the glory of God. (See the end of his essay on "Common Grace" -Centennial Reader). He had a deep dislike for the way "modernism" had flattened out what he called the God given task of creating "multiformity" both inter and intra culturally. (See "multiformity: the curse of modern life"- Centennial Reader). In this sense he would have no problem with people moving to the backwoods of Canada to live off the land.
As far as the NC view of culture I understand "culture" in the NC tradition as shorthand for the creational design (including its latent potentialities and multiformity) combined with the religious orientation of the heart. All cultures (including Mennonite culture living in the backwoods of Canada) are shot through with various religious motivations. The Kuyperian view is far less optomistic than you might think. And that's why they don't believe that culture can become pure simply by breaking it into sub/contra-culture or subsuming it into the church (which was the Catholic project). For Kuyper the antithesis between the Lordship of Jesus and the powers of darkness is far more insidious, subtle and operates in much more complex fashions intra-culturally regardless of which particular culture it is. (Even Canadian Mennonite culture can be jacked up.)
Now regarding what you said about the embrace of "everything humans create" as culture my read of Kuyper on this is the Kuyperian would say both a "yes" and "no". Yes, if that creation is a genuine development of the potentialities within creation. "Without common grace the seed which lay hidden in that field would never have come forth and blossomed." (Kuyper (along with Lewis) didn't believe the devil could truly "create" anything.) Kuyper would equally say "no" if that creation, even if it was bringing out the potentialities of creational design, was mixed with evil ground motives/producing evil. Kuyper, in fact, believed that common grace kept the human game going for good or ill...thus allowing for the anti-Christ and the increasing of evil in the last days.
The real issue for Kuyper and Seerveld regarding Mennonite communities is not that they are exhibiting an alternative "culture" but that they are more optimisitc regarding the ability to create a purely "Christian" culture by removing oneself from the broader development of hidden potentialities. In other words, their problem is with the idea that the hidden potentialities must be "opposed" because they are viewed with directional idolatry. Just because Hitler used the technological developments of the modern period to create massive evil does not mean we throw out those developments. They would say, quite the contrary, these developments can and SHOULD be brought captive to Christ. Thus Kuyper's famous quote, "There is not a single inch of the whole terrain of our human existence over which Christ does not exclaim..."Mine!"
As far as the NC view of culture being a habit of "modernism"...you should read Kuyper's own critique of modernism in "Uniformity: The Curse of the Modern Age". He was definitely NOT trying to be modern. Still, I think there are a lot of aspects of Kuyper that need to be "reappropriated". For instance, being from the Victorian era he has a relatively fixed notion of social reality. But his fault does not seem to be modernism as much as pre-modernism. (He reminds me of C.S. Lewis on this.) Still, his idea that one could know "creationl design" feels very "modern" to our constructivist ears. But remember, he is the forerunner of the reformed epistemology proejct including Plantinga, Wolterstorf, etc. These guys were attempting to work out Kuyper's view of knowledge without an appeal to foundationalism. Kuyper was very "postmodern" in that he believed all fields of knowledge were biased. He even spoke of a "Chrisitan Art", "Christian Science" etc. He believed (this is very post-modern of him) that because our epistemology was non-foundational in the end the religious orientation would affect the conclusions...even of the hard sciences!
The Kuyperian system does believe Christians, when possible, should be in dialogue with the broader culture. This is a manifestation of their view of common grace as enabling that discussion. (We can appeal to school boards to have cross walks,etc.) They did not have a blind optimism regarding the difficulty or messiness of this task.
Kuyper DID believe that the Christian call was to be antithetical to pernicious movements in the culture. (Thus his continual reference to "The Antithesis".) Kuyper himself formed a political party precisely becaues he believed the current options were deeply flawed and critiqued them based upon their political philosophy. He was fearful that a revolution might happen in Holland which would create a fascism and make being a Christian very difficult. (He was a prophet in this sense.) But within his own historical context he did not think that time had happened and felt he must engage and not simply evacuate the Dutch culture. Are there times to evacuate a culture as "given over"? Absoutely! And I think, if Kuyper was living in Nazi Germany, etc. he might have had a different MO and sounded more like Bonhoeffer or Barth. Kuyper himself would have no problem opposing and when necessary flanking what he viewed as a harmful movement in broader culture. (Again, this is the guy who started his own newspaper, school and political party because he didn't like the options given him.) So we can't say he simply played by the rules of what the culture gave him. He saw Dutch culture at a critical stage of it's development and that ensuing secular forces made Christian involvement critical less (and this is prophetic) Holland go through a fascist regime. He worked out his political views in such a way that the reaction of "statism" as a secular response to Catholicism or Lutheranism in Italy/Gemany did not take place. To the degree that he developed a political theology that refused the totalizing influence of the state and acted within the political channels - to that degree he did not have to be a Bonhoeffer or a Barth. Thank God! (This leads one to wonder what would have happened different politically if Germamy was not theologically liberal when Hitler came on the scene. Bart and Bultman develop their theology reactively - not proactively. Not that their contribution is not mind boggling sweetness on many levels.)
Now here is the rub. Kuyper believed he could not actually bring about the kind of political change necessary (given his context) unless he actually was political in the way he was. And here is where all this business about moving to the wilderness in Canada as a Mennonite "politic" is fuzzy to me. Now, if the broader culture has become so death dealing that we may no longer engage in the political system, etc. then fine. We must move forward in a way that is incisive. The prophets were poignant precisely because they knew the language and spoke as insiders with a new heart. (Bonhoeffe & Barth were prophetic BECAUSE they had served at major German universities and could now offer a different theological project.) Even a prophet must have knowledge of the the culture he addresses(again - we can't critique microsoft if we don't own computers and have no idea what email is.) There ARE times when Hitler, or Stalin, or Pol-Pot is in control (read anti-Christ) and we must completely withdrall and speak a prophetic word while we await our death. Yet, is that REALLY what is happening right now? Is America the great whore of babylon? Is the democratic politcal system in our country such that it is given over to death-dealing? Remember - I'm not one to wrap the bible in the American flag. Yet, I have no problem thanking God for the particular good things in our culture that I perceive to be part of HIS GRACE (Yes, that does inclue In-N-Out burger when eaten to the glory of God.)
As far as everything you wrote in your last paragraph. Amen! Except for that "stop eating at IN N OUT" business. After all...they have Bible verses on their cups! :-)
Thanks for the reply to my comment Bob. Your reply certainly shows that Kuyper's view was much more nuanced than perhaps my comment indicated. The problem arises when neo-calvinists don't speak with as much nuance as Kuyper when discussing culture (Andy Crouch comes to mind) or discussing what those Mennonite communities are up to when then decide to live out in the woods.
Perhaps at the end of the day, we only differ on our "hunches". I have a hunch that we ought to lean more towards withdrawal and you have a hunch to lean more towards engagement.
With that said, I have one more issue I'd like to raise. I'm not all that comfortable with relying on "common grace" as the reason why we should work within the systems of culture-making already at work in the world. I agree that God showers down his grace "commonly" on the world...and perhaps this is reflected in things like Beethoven's symphonies, Monet's paintings, and America's quasi-democracy. I guess I'm just unsure what we as Christians have to do with all this.
Romans 13 is the classic example that shows how political systems are willed by God - perhaps we can say that the Roman political structure was "common grace". The jump is often made to conclude that Christians shouldn't be pacifist...because part of God's common grace includes the emperor wielding the sword. Of course I would counter that this only works if we are part of the Empire. I would argue that no matter our social location, Christians are called to live out their lives under a different lord, one who disarms his followers (i.e. Peter) rather than arms them. God's intentions for His church underneath Lord Jesus are simply different from those who refuse to obey Him. God uses Rome...great. We are not Rome. My point is this: I can affirm common grace without believing that this has much to do with Christians.
Are we called to create culture, develop the potentialities within creation? Sure. Christians are called to be "truly human" and this involves us creating art, music, etc. But it seems to me that God has called out a people to himself who live and move and "create" underneath the lordship of Christ. The problem with using "common grace" as the basis for culture-making is that it then becomes separated from the lordship of Christ. Let me explain. When we engage with American culture, for instance, it can be safely assumed that the lordship of Jesus is not part of the conversation. So what must we do if we want to create culture with those who deny the lordship of Jesus? We must find a "neutral language" - a third language that we can agree upon, one that doesn't bring any particular faith committments. Supposedly this "neutral language" is tied to common grace. And so we decide to substitute terms like "the lordship of Jesus" with "for the good of humanity". But when this language shift has taken place, I no longer think you can create culture Christianly. After all, what makes us so sure that acting Christianly will make the world a better place? Perhaps, for instance, if the church became a louder witness against the mistreatment of the poor, the economy collapses. Will we have made the world a better place? I don't know.
I know that Kuyper believes that Christ claims every inch of the creation as his, and so it seems my worries are unfounded. But don't you think that use of the term "common grace" employed by neo-calvinists is a call for finding a "neutral language"? And if so, isn't this too much to sacrifice?
Ryan,
I too enjoy the dialogue as it has provided an opportunity to expose our “hunches” as well as articulate our own concerns.
The reason common grace provides a basis for working on the systems of “culture making” is that common grace is not free floating but grace regarding creation. Because God has decided to restrain the effects of sin on the created world it is precisely that world which both believer and unbeliever are able to “perceive”. Moreover, it is precisely that world which they are to address. Granted, we can attempt to engage in “culture making” on our own, but the created world is not an endless set of possibilities. Take, for example, the field of fashion. There are not an innumerable number of materials that one can make pants out of. So, even if I say that I am not going to make pants in cahoots with non-Christians, I still am limited by the possibility of exactly what kind of materials will work well in enveloping the legs of people. [Note, it’s interesting that I would be starting with the idea of “pants” itself…no doubt something developed as a result of the flow of general (a.k.a. “profane”) culture. ] And, I might add, I will most easily do so by borrowing from the previous discoveries of those OUTSIDE of my “Christian Culture”. In addition, I will be using the English language which was not exclusively created by Christians. In short, to have a hermetically sealed cultural project is impossible by virtue of the fact we are still “in the world” and therefore part of the same creation, in God’s image, dealing with the realities of historical, political, linguistic, sociological, scientific, mathematic, etc. etc. commonalities. So, if you are going to be involved in making culture you must do so in a way that does have something to do with non-Christians and common grace.
This leads to your complaint that “common grace” supports the idea of a “neutral language”. I think Kevin Vanhoozer’s critique of the sociology of language school of postliberalism is adequate for addressing the inadequate categories of “netural” vs. “non-neutral” language. Of course our language is not neutral…but that does not mean it can be hermetically sealed nor is communication impossible outside of my particular sociology of language.
In between creating a culture that denies the Lordship of Jesus and one that comes under his Lordship are simply the pieces of culture that can be shared. For example, we could ask the question, “Are cross-walks for the American Empire or for Jesus’ Empire?” The answer is yes - they are for both. And Christians do not need to rethink cross-walks or develop their own cross-walks within Christian think tanks. Why? Because cross walks are cultural “givens” ( I dare not say “neurtral”) and as such they can be used for or against Christ’s kingdom. This is the helpfulness of Kuyper’s category of “structure” and “direction”. For Kuyperians, pieces of culture that utilize creational structure because of common grace are not therefore neutral because they can still be used for various purposes. Yet, this does not mean that Christians should disengage from their development waiting until they see exactly for what end they are used. I don’t refuse to help create shopping carts as part of a design team because I’m not sure how those carts will be used (for helping people shop or ramming into automobiles). I, by virtue of the same common grace as my fellow employers, design a better cart with the intent of helping people and then both believers and unbelievers will choose how those carts are used in the mixture of wheat and tares that we live in.
The Kuyperian vision is that the various aspects of state, church, business, family, etc. were not meant to be enveloped within the church. This does not mean the church cannot speak to the proper roles of these various components (and critique them when they are out of line). Yet, it does not assume to take these roles. It is not clear to me how a non-Kuyperian approach could have the church be anything other than either (1.) attempting to absorb the state, family, etc. into it or (2.) living in a parasitic relationship, denying the legitimacy while depending upon the actual blessing of infrastructure. This is why the Anabaptists were criticized so harshly by the Reformers. Their beliefs would either result in a much more intolerable theocracy (as it in fact did in Munster), or make the church a parasite on broader culture. The Kuyperian view allows the various domains to have their rightful place, allowing the church to voice opposition (even pacifism if conscience demands) without slipping into either theocracy or simply being a parasite.
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