Praising Contradictions – Progressive Christian Writers

There is one thing that many scientists and orthodox Christians share: that is, a dislike of contradictions. That an electron can appear as either a particle or a wave is as disturbing to the scientist, as the mystical phrase You are God and not God is to the evangelical Baptist. Literal Bible readers take extraordinary flights of fancy to erase the many contradictions of the Good Book, or simply ignore them altogether. Even among Progressive Christian writers, contradictions are usually avoided while they try to build a logical edifice on which to hang their theological hats.

But there is no inherent shame in contradictions. Contradictions are not always antithetical to logic and reason, but often arise from the very nature of human reality, a direct result of the limits of human language and individual perception. This is the reason why neither Jesus nor Buddha wrote down their teachings.

It is the tension of opposites (between good and evil, particle and wave, heaven and earth) that gives rise to the Spirit of Truth. It is through paradox’s window that we view the unity and diversity of Life.

George Orwell once said that “to accept an unorthodoxy is always to inherit unresolved contradictions”. That is the inheritance of Progressive Christianity, and one which we must embrace wholeheartedly. A contradiction need not be a sign of weakness but one of strength.

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes. — Walt Whitman

In the end, we just might see that there weren’t any contradictions after all: only apparent contradictions.

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If you would like to read about why Progressive Christians do what they do, please go to: Why Progressive Christianity?

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

Patrick Henry & The Great Christian Divide

Any series on the Founding Fathers and Christianity would be remiss without addressing the topic of slavery. For us today it seems amazing that such enlightened men, who demanded liberty and freedom for themselves, couldn’t see the hypocrisy in keeping slaves. But many of the Founding Fathers did clearly see the evil of the slave trade and bore no illusions as to themselves being masters over another race.

For some perspective on this matter, we turn to Patrick Henry, the former governor of Virginia, who is famously remembered for his “Give me Liberty, or give me Death!” speech, which was a call to arms against the oppressive British government. The following passage from Patrick Henry is taken from a letter to a friend who had sent him a book condemning the slave trade. What is especially poignant in this commentary (for the modern reader) is Henry’s observation of the great divide that exists between what Christians know is wrong in their heads, and what they actually reject as wrong in real life. It is great chasm that still exists today, even among Progressive Christians.

I take this opportunity to acknowledge the receipt of Anthony Benezet’s book against the slave trade. I thank you for it. It is not a little surprising that the professors of Christianity, whose chief excellence consists in softening the human heart, and in cherishing and improving its finer feelings, should encourage a practice so totally repugnant to the first impressions of right and wrong.

What adds to the wonder is that this abominable practice has been introduced in the most enlightened ages. Times that seem to have pretensions to boast of high improvements in the arts and sciences, and refined morality have brought into general use, and guarded by many laws, a species of violence and tyranny, which our more rude and barbarous, but more honest ancestors detested.

Is it not amazing that at a time when the rights of humanity are defined and understood with precision in a country, above all others, fond of liberty, that in such an age and in such a country, we find men professing a religion the most humane, mild, gentle and generous, adopting a principle as repugnant to humanity, as it is inconsistent with the bible, and destructive to liberty? Every thinking, honest person rejects slavery in theory, yet how few in reject it in real life from conscientious motives!¹

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Read the next article in our series on the Founding Fathers: Thomas Jefferson on Jesus, Religion, & Reason.

Gain fresh insight into the Lord’s Prayer. Read our free online book The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life. The prayer’s hidden teachings will enrich and inspire you. Click the following link to begin reading the Living Hour book now: The Lord’s Prayer.

1. The above passage from Patrick Henry was edited lightly to make it easier to read by the modern reader. [↩]

Progressive Christians & The New Reverend’s Role

Having put forward the idea that as Progressive Christians we are all ministers, albeit in various forms, the question now follows, just what is the role of the Reverend, the Minister of the bricks and mortar church? Like other Pastors, Progressive Reverends guide religious ceremonies (such as weddings and funerals), as well as serve as spiritual counselors and community organizers of good works aimed towards those in need. But what separates them from Pastors of the religious right is the way they manage the pulpit.

In our current age of dumbing down and superficiality (where even elected officials are so self-absorbed that they feel compelled to “Twitter” their trivial thoughts and actions to the world), we need more than ever the Reverend who possesses both great erudition and an expansive soul: Pastors who are well-versed in scripture, the humanities, and the sciences, and who serve their congregations as daily conduits within which the wisdom of God and Man merges and re-emerges with strength and vitality.

Progressive Christian Reverends therefore must speak from the pulpit with more than just the Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other–an image which strikes much too close to the Bible-pounding preacher of old. Instead, they should be able to move effortlessly from the Gospels, to the Talmud, to Shakespeare, to Carl Jung, to Einstein, to the Newspaper, and back again: so that the teachings of Jesus Christ are re-imagined, refashioned, and retold in ways that can inspire and challenge the mind and spirit of the contemporary parishioner: the individual upon whose shoulders the revitalization of our communities, neighborhoods, families, and sense of purpose rests.

To read our suggestions for how Progressive Christians should think about worship, please go to: How We Worship.