Political Faith - duh!

The one thing that really holds me back from being very vocal about the need for Christians to be proactively political, is the thought that some Christians who are already proactively political are scarily reactionary! At the time of writing this piece, the ekklesia news-feeds on this blog give a glimpse of the divergent politics of Christians - from the Scottish Christian Party with its homophobic, pro-capital punishment, apparently anti-human rights agenda, to the Archbishop of York's newspaper advert calling on people to get out and vote (in local elections) against the BNP. When Christians hear the call to put their faith into political practice, they hear very different calls. It has, of course, always been this way - and it would be inconsistent of me to wish for a neat and tidy political package, since I am generally in favour of mess! But I can't help but be embarrassed, even ashamed, by certain Christian voices which claim to speak decisively for Christian politics - but their lack of grace, lack of awareness of structural injustice, let alone their lack of good news can be so overwhelming that it's not easy admitting one's own Christian affiliation. For isn't it high time we got serious - radical, even - about humanity? Isn't it high time, not least in this year commemorating the abolition of the British slave trade, that we put human beings before profits, before prejudices, before preservation of any oppressive status quo? Isn't it high time we dared to stand in solidarity with anyone 'crucified' today - for their sexuality, ethnicity, tribe, class, gender, nationality, age, politics or views? It is not Christian to stand only with Christians, or only with people like 'me'. Instead, it is Christian to stand with all who suffer - with all the contradictions that can bring. And if that means that Christian politics is inherently 'progressive' or left-leaning, well so be it ... but can we nevertheless still stand with reactionaries and right-wingers too?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Telling a progressive story confidently

It's a challenge. Something about the liberal disposition makes it very difficult to escape from reticence. Even though in some respects there can be an air of arrogance and presumptuousness around the religious liberal (like me), nevertheless the greater feeling is one of reticence - I/we get so caught up in the provisionality of things, that sometimes I/we fail to make definite claims; we become embarrassed about the evangelical certainty which sometimes looks like idolatry, as though a human being can pinpoint "the truth" with as much clarity as is apparently claimed. So the challenge is to offer 'a big story', a meta-narrative if you will, which speaks in progressive terms - about peace, social justice, equality, the provisionality of knowledge, the plurality of reality, the quest for reconciliation - but without degenerating into a debilitating relativism. The point is to say, 'Yes, we do have good news, we do believe that our faith can make a difference, we do believe that a faith community has a real and radical contribution to make to the compassionate transformation of the world, yet we do not make our claims imperialistically ...' Where this will differ, perhaps quite fundamentally, from the meta-narratives of religious conservatives, is in terms of the historical debates: what are the foundations of belief? what do we believe were 'the big events' of our faith, which foster our ideological commitments today? Of course, though, from a progressive viewpoint, it is not about asserting that I know what was historical, but that does not mean we can avoid the debates - and we can dare to say that we are not so sure that particular readings of history are coherent or appropriate. This need not make us arrogant; it suggests we want genuine dialogue between faith, history, science, etc. And here I stand, confidently.

Renewal / New wineskins

There's a lot of it about. Renewal is in the air. The Government is talking about it - though different people mean different things by it ... does it mean Gordon Brown, does it mean revising policy, does it mean speaking to the anxieties of the day, does it mean generating solutions tio the big questions of the world, does it mean 'anything but Tony'??? Renewal is a great idea, but very slippery. And so it is with the churches, too. Presumably the many people who have been leaving the churches in recent years mean a whole range of things by their voting-with-their-feet - they may mean that renewal should involve 'becoming less wishy-washy', or others (hopefully!) mean that churchy-ness should start to re-engage them in a way that relates to real lives in the real world. When I say 'hopefully', I don't mean "I hope that has been the churches' failure"! I mean, "I hope that is people's analysis, because it happens to fit with mine!" We all have our agendas, don't we! So how should we renew? It can't be avoided that many growing churches, in the 'west' and in the 'south'/developing world, are 'conservative' - i.e. their 'new wine' message is very traditional, and in many ways quite old! (though the wineskins are changing). So for those of us who find ourselves drinking a different wine, we must revitalise this commitment to new wine as that which brings about "genuine" renewal - but what is it? Isn't it very much to do with "where peace is taking root", "where the hungry are fed", "where equality and dignity are upheld", "where justice is done"? But what do they mean? Social democracy? Or something distinct again?