To My Christian Readers,
I read another
interesting book today; A Public Faith
by author and Yale professor, Miroslav Volf. In the introduction he writes,
debates are raging today about the role of religions in public life, and it is
not difficult to see why. Religions of all faiths are on the rise. In a provocative
statement he writes, religious people fear impositions—different faiths fear
each other.
He argues; Unlike
those who think religion should stay out of politics, religious people ought to
be free to bring their visions to the good life into the public sphere – into
politics as well as other aspects of public life. It would be oppressive to
prohibit them from doing so. The author adds,
some refer to this as religious totalitarianism; the ghosts that haunts
discussions of the role of public religion today. He cites Sayyid Qutb’s Milestones, to sketch his point.
Miroslav
designates a religious political pluralism, emerged within Christianity, but it
is not the Christian position.
He explores
three questions. One; In what ways does the Christian Faith malfunction into
the contemporary world, and how should we counter these malfunctions. Two; What
should be the main concern of Christ’s Followers when it comes to living in the
world today. Third; How should Christ’s followers go about realizing their
visions of living well in today’s world in a relationship to other faiths and
together with people with whom they live under the roof of a single state.
In chapter two;
Idleness, he states his three reasons for idle faith. One; the character of
believers—shallow faith. Two; very little effort put into their faith. Three; their
faith has very little meaning to them—irrelevant faith. He also states, many
Christians turn from faith due to materialism.
He believes God
is not a demander; God is a giver. He further believes, the more we reduce
faith to vague religiosity that serves primarily to energize, heal, and give
meaning to the business of life whose course is shaped by factors other than
faith, the worse off we will be.
He writes,
Christians have used and continue to use their faith to legitimize violence
they deem necessary, and they have done so on a massive scale. Misconceptions
of the Christian Faith mirror the wide spread misbehavior of Christians.
I Sharing
Wisdom, he writes, we live in an age of great conflicts and petty hopes. Petty
hopes generate self-subverting melancholy experiences.
Although
Miroslav Volf’s book, A Public Faith,
was interesting, I detected almost from
the beginning a lack of passion or personal understanding for his topic;
rather, a tremendous amount of research rewritten. I felt he used the words Christian and
Christianity far too loosely. I detected a lack of personal understanding of
the topics. He somewhat validated my suspicions
in his conclusion, With these eight points I trust I have sufficiently attended
to the problem of faith’s coerciveness – at the level of theory, of course, not
at the level of practice.
I will admit to
disconnecting emotionally from this book in the second chapter when he stated
his reasons why Christians turn from their faith—shallow faith, no effort, and
irrelevant faith. From my experiences, many people turn away from faith and churches
as an act of emotional survival of the moment. When a heart has been broken by
betrayal, hypocrisy, or an act of evil by a church or church associate, the
only viable option is to run; then try to understand why—later. I have seen
this wreck a person’s faith far more than this author’s reasons. That is why I
suggest this author is lacking person experience in his topic.
Having said
that, the book, A Public Faith, was
interesting to read. I only recommend that someone reads it from the point of
view of a very successful college professor who is well studied in his trade
but probably has never experienced the heartache that church members can cause.
In Christ’s
Service,
Shepard Cross
No comments:
Post a Comment