The Nature and Future of Christianity: A Study of Alternative Approaches

By Edward LeRoy Long Jr.

This book briefly characterizes the many different ways Christianity is currently understood and practiced. These include approaches that center primarily on beliefs and doctrine, those that focus on the support of personal wellbeing, versions of Christianity that nurture special kinds of community in response to particular group identities, those that give attention to Christians' role in society, and those that offer different ways of thinking about the role and function of the church. Long then considers how these traditions relate to each other in both ecumenical and interfaith encounters. He concludes by developing a theological foundation for recognizing and celebrating what is valuable in each of these many diverse approaches.
Written primarily as a resources for adult education groups in parish settings, this book will also be of interest to professionals, scholars, and lay readers alike. It considers the strengths and possible limitations of each approach and the challenges that all Christians confront in facing the future.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wipf and Stock
• Release date: Mar 17, 2014
• ISBN: 9781630872533

Edward LeRoy Long Jr.

Edward LeRoy Long Jr. is James W. Pearsall Professor Emeritus of Christian Ethics and Theology of Culture in the Theological School of Drew University. He previously taught at Virginia Tech and Oberlin College and is a past President of the Society of Christian Ethics and the American Theological Society. A Presbyterian Minister of Word and Sacrament, he now lives in Oberlin, OH.

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The Nature and Future of Christianity:

A Study of Alternative Approaches

Edward LeRoy Long Jr.

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The Nature and Future of Christianity:

A Study of Alternative Approaches

Copyright © 2014 Edward LeRoy Long Jr. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

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Table of Contents

Title Page

Preface

Chapter One: Approaches Involving the Content and Function of Beliefs

Chapter Two: Seeking Personal Well-Being

Chapter Three: Approaches Involving Group Identities

Chapter Four: Religious Concern for Society

Chapter Five: Rethinking Ecclesiastical Patterns

Chapter Six: Interrelating Traditions

Concluding Reflections: Embracing Diversity: Being Faithful Modestly

Bibliography

Dedicated to the Theological School of Drew University where I concluded my teaching ministry

and to the First Church in Oberlin, Ohio within whose congregation I have spent more of my life than in any other parish setting.

In both places alternative approaches can be respected.

Preface

Something is happening to religion in our time that deserves thoughtful attention. Participation in the so-called mainline denominations is down, yet many people are moving from one faith orientation to another in a search for something that seems to more adequately address their needs and concerns. Institutional dynamics, behavioral practices, and foundational assumptions about the way to understand the human condition are all in flux. Various forms of Christianity are no exception to this state of affairs.

There is no longer any single intellectual perspective that provides the matrix for theological reflection. What is often called modernity—with its confidence in instrumental reason to sustain human well-being—no longer constitutes the basis on which there is a consensus about how to think about the present with assurance and look forward to the future with confidence. Claims for the uniqueness of one particular tradition are no longer persuasive as globalization confronts us with religious diversity on a scale unimaginable just a generation ago. Other religions are now practiced—not only in far away places—but by our close neighbors and associates in the workplace and in recreational encounters. Churches south of the equator—in many so-called third world countries—are growing, and in the process are amalgamating Christian loyalty with perspectives and cultural practices that differ from those of the Western world, which have been the vehicles for the forms of Christianity most Americans know best. Moreover, moral ideals no longer provide the basis for a unity that can be achieved apart from belief commitments. All of these developments pose challenges for persons of faith.

What is striking about the present state of reflection on these matters is how many different proposals are being advanced by those who believe religion, including Christianity, has a future and needs to be changed, or at least given new forms, in order to enjoy continued life. This diversity of approaches may be the result of increased freedom for the embrace of religion and the loss of religious authority. The door is open to almost anybody to make a suggestion or to act independently. Or it may reflect the fact that the whole field of human awareness and reflection is now much more complex than it has been in previous eras. Religion is not the only aspect of human deliberation that is marked by seemingly irreconcilable differences; differences of approach are just as severe in politics, economics, aesthetic endeavors, and even to some extent in how science and technology are to be understood and applied. Whatever the explanation, the consequences are inescapable: While it might have seemed to provide a source of unity in earlier periods of Western culture, Christianity in our time offers no single vision.

Just how massive are the pressures for diversity and change that confront us is hard to discern. Some consider them transient and temporary threats that can be overcome by a return to an imagined normalcy of the past. Others look upon them as constituting a crisis—that is, a special moment in time—that will result in as great an impact on the nature of Christian belief and practice as occurred when Eastern and Western Orthodoxy split apart in the eleventh century or when Protestantism split from the Roman Church in the sixteenth. It is not given to any of us to know with certainty how great are the stakes, yet to pay no attention to the issues or to have no engagement with their consequences is to ignore some of the most momentous challenges that confront us.

Despite this present conceptual turmoil a considerable amount of religious thinking consists of enthusiasm for some single approach that captures the imagination of its advocates, often without being examined in relationship to alternative possibilities. The result can be an uncritical embrace of a single but only partially examined possibility. This may create enthusiasm for a seemingly exciting option, but enthusiasms often have a short life and get forgotten before they have made much of any impact or have left an enduring legacy.

In the pages that follow the primary effort will be to step back and take note of many different approaches that are currently shaping Christian faith and practice and consequently generating different visions for its possible future. Although many possibilities will be described in this overview the coverage may not be complete—the variations are too numerous and often too fleeting to permit total coverage. Nor can every option be examined thoroughly and in complete detail. But even snapshots are better than no picture at all, and awareness of the many options has more to commend it than an argument for just one possibility presented as though it could totally suffice if only everybody would embrace it.

To be sure, people are entitled to offer their own perspectives for shaping the future and should be respected when they do so. The vast range of suggested ideas deserves attention, and all of these ideas need to be considered—primarily in comparison with one another. It is very doubtful whether Christianity has ever had just one expression, and equally doubtful whether it will ever have just one form as long as many faithful, yet different, followers give it content and structure. But instead of rendering it amorphous and insignificant, this very diversity might make it exciting and rich. Being faithful should not be equated with wearing the same straitjacket even if it must include deeply trusted convictions as to what it means to be human.

Some of the approaches to be discussed in this book attract media attention and their existence is generally well known—being objects of an either favorable or unfavorable public curiosity. Some of them might be regarded as so superficial as to not merit serious attention. Other approaches to be discussed are embodied in professional theological writing that circulates primarily, if not entirely, among members of a specialized guild. There is a large amount of such writing in contemporary religious life, much of which is read only by specialists, if at all. At one time doing theology was deliberately reserved for the authoritative leaders—keeping common folk from tampering with the sacred. Most traditions have long since done away with that way of divesting the full body of believers from a serious role, but making theology into an academic specialty may have the same shortcomings as placing reliance only in the hands of ecclesiastical officials. Unless the work of religious thinkers can be widely understood by the public little of value will be accomplished. What is especially challenging is to make the thoughts of specialists or authorities available to the rank and file of followers in ways that sustain their interest.

This book is not primarily concerned to settle the question whether or not Christianity, or any other form of religion, has a future. There may be places where addressing that question is appropriate and might even come up with plausible suggestions. The book will bracket out, or deliberately side step, this question because every proposed answer to it (either affirmative or negative) constitutes a reading of the present religious situation by those with their own set of commitments and convictions regarding the nature of that future. Such predictions tend to shed more light on the orientations of those who make them than on what will actually take place.

The characterizations of the various options treated in what follows are intended to be fair, even if admittedly brief. To cover them all exhaustively would make the book very long and crushingly weighty. Hopefully, what is presented here can prompt further study of ideas that individual readers deem to be of potential value and even perhaps lead to an