Surprised the students in Theorizing Religion today by suggesting to them that Christianity might be more than they think it is... or maybe even more than anyone thinks it is. We were building on James Cone's argument, in The Cross and the Lynching Tree, that most white Americans' Christianity isn't really Christianity since it overlooks the continued centrality of the crucifixion - the paradoxical cruciform idea that the last are first and the way to hope is through suffering. Authentic Christianity - and God - is there whenever an innocent person is crucified, something which tragically happens all the time, though more often to people of color. Supposed Christians who ignore the ongoing reality of crufixion, especially in racist killings, are Christians in name only, Cone preaches.
I have the class read Cone for the significance of his ideas as well as to introduce them to the different kinds of claims made by theologians. Scholars of religion can't make the sorts of claims about true and false religion that religious folks are making all the time - or at least not in the same way. As a scholar I have to recognize that the people Cone criticizes would consider his Christianity inauthentic, even if, as a Christian, I want to take his side. I have, at least initially, to accept as Christian all who so describe themselves.
I wanted the students to appreciate that Christian theology has many mansions. What else, I asked, besides the crucifixion, might someone think is the central deciding event/symbol in Christianity? I went through a few important possibilities.
- Jesus' resurrection: the defeat of death and the promise of immortality, a refuge from the pain and sorrow of this passing world
- Jesus' incarnation: the paradox of the infinite taking finite form, human or - in more recent thinking - all other forms of created being, giving them a kind of infinite significance
- Jesus' teaching: love of neighbor and enemy, for the least of these, justice and beloved community
- Jesus' healing miracles: supernatural help for the struggle with the trouble of this world, health and abundance in this life
- Jesus' community: the establishment of the church as a way for succeeding generations to be saved and supported
- Jesus' casting out of demons: a protector in spiritual warfare, where we're otherwise outclassed by Satan and his powers and principalities
I noted that all of these had scriptural warrant and, while compatible with each other, really described dramatically different understandings of human life, its meaning and destiny - not to mention the nature of God. I emphasized in particular how commitment to the importance of one of these could go along with rejection of others (and admitted that I was inclined to ignore some, too, especially the last, although this was a widespread view in this country and globally). But, returning to Cone, one needed to see how glossing over the crucifixion on the way to the others could go hand in hand with the moral blindness of injust social orders such as American white supremacy. Not a kumbaya moment!
