December 14 - The Gospel in a Pluralist Society

Central Argument. Newbigin’s central argument is that the missiology of the Christian Church has been hamstrung by and co-opted into the surrounding “pluralist society” (1) and he seeks to “examine the roots of this culture which we share and to suggest how as Christians we can more confidently affirm our faith in this kind of intellectual climate” (7). Ultimately, despite its protests otherwise, this pluralistic society is itself based on matters of faith and other unsubstantiated assumptions upon which each society or culture is based. Newbigin asserts that the church should reassert her role as the unique community sent to reveal the unique “story” (182) of God’s interaction with the world and unique “Master” (241) that is the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the unique revelation of God in this world.

Sub-points. Newbigin fights a two front war in this book. His primary nemesis is the pluralist society around us which is rooted in the humanist thought of the Enlightenment. His secondary nemesis, and one that is arguably more problematic for a missional minded Christian or Christian community, is that part of the church that has been co-opted into the Enlightenment by accepting its “dogma” (8). Something which Newbigin describes as “reasonable … a Christianity that could be defended on the terms of my whole intellectual formation as a twentieth-century Englishman, rather something which placed my whole intellectual formation under a new and critical light … I … had been guilty of domesticating the gospel” (3). Newbigin asserts that religious faith is now a “private matter” that has been relegated to being one silo into which all each of our lives are compartmentalized and isolated. As such this creates a disconnect between private and public morality, a dissonance between “facts” and “beliefs” (19). In such an environment of pluralism, epistemology is reduced to “this is true for me” (19) which is a “logical absurdity” (22). Yet all “knowing has to begin with an act of faith” (19), no one is immune from the influences of their culture.

Even the pluralist society has its own dogma, beliefs, authority and traditions; so we must “learn to indwell in our tradition” (49). While pluralists may assert that no claims to absolute truth cannot be made as each truth comes out of a unique cultural context, Newbigin retorts, that that is in itself a culturally biased claim, “What is the social context within which this claim can be formulated” (57). Such a claim came to be formulated in a culture where the church was associated with the power structures of that culture, rather than being associated with the oppressed. This should teach us a great lesson in how to be missional in cultures to which Christian faith is new. For Christian mission to be vital, we should “listen sensitively to both the desires and the needs of the people” (153). We cannot set our “word and deed … against each other”, “action for peace and justice in the world” must be “central” to “evangelism” (137), and:

“…the major role of the church in relation to the great issues of justice and peace will not be in its formal pronouncement but in its continually nourishing and sustaining men and women who will act responsibly as believers in the course of their secular duties as citizens” (139).

Drawing on his fundamental belief in the doctrine of election, Newbigin, while decrying the pluralist society in which we live, believes that “pluralism [is] a reality which God evidently wills” (157). Newbigin portrays himself as a Universalist for several reasons including that asking about the eternal damnation of non-Christians automatically “starts with the individual and his or her need to be assured of ultimate happiness, and not with God and his glory” (179). Newbigin believes that our goal as Christians is not to proclaim God’s judgment, but rather we should point “to Jesus as the master-clue in the common search of humanity for salvation and [invite] others to follow” (158). Also, while God’s embracement of pluralism “endorses an immensely wide diversity among human cultures … it does not endorse total relativism” (197).
Newbigin calls the church to be ever permuting the immutable message of the gospel in culturally relevant ways so that we may most effectively reach the unchurched wherever that may be found. For Newbigin Jesus Christ is the embodiment of universal truth. The truth of Jesus Christ shatters the relativism and subjectivity of a pluralistic culture. Ultimately we point to Christ who gives hope, reason, truth and eternity.

Compliment and Clash. Again, these books are building upon each other. American Cultural Patterns focuses on American culture form a secular perspective. How Does America Hear the Gospel discusses American culture from a Christian perspective. Contextualization in the New Testament develops the biblical foundations and rationale for contextualizing the gospel within any given worldview. Clash of Worlds develops the terms and background for how the historical and emerging worldviews come into both constructive and destructive interaction. The Gospel in a Pluralist Society looks back critically at secular culture, how much of the church has been co-opted by it in the name of tolerance, and how we can recast our notions of Christian faith, leadership and community to address modern pluralism.

However, Newbigin presents the first solid clash between our required authors. Firstly, Newbigin is an unabashed believer in Calvinism. In fact, he devotes an entire chapter to “The Logic of Election” (80-88). The doctrine of election permeates nearly all his reasoning: from “God’s election of a people to be the bearers of his purpose for mankind” (15), “the doctrine of election is central to any true exposition of the Bible” (80) to his recounting of the “story of election” (166-167). Doubtless Burnett, the apparent classical Wesleyan, would have something to say about this matter. The ironic thing is that, like many Calvinists, whether they admit it or not, yield to the scriptural sense and evidence that God is preveniently active in the world: “It is indeed true, gloriously true, that God goes ahead of his Church” (168).

Secondly, however, Newbigin, if he does not directly dive in, he teeters on the edge of universalism, like many pure Calvinists who yield to secular culture. His most passionate attack on orthodox Christian soteriology (173-174) is made by assuming that the assertion of exclusivism requires a kind of plan for spiritual quality control, where even “brainwashing” would be acceptable (173). This is a false argument. None of his described spiritual quality control engineering is truly any more necessary than placing video cameras in the bedroom of every teenager who takes a ‘true-love-waits’ vow. Our Lord only requires of his church that soteriology only needs proclamation, not certification. Using this as a defense for universalism, the ultimate acquiescence to a pluralist society, shows Newbigin’s hidden colors of cultural compromise. I feel certain that Burnett and Flemming would agree with me. It was such a joy to read Newbigin as he detailed how the Christian church fell into its current malaise, how pluralism rose, how it is as dogmatic or worse than the Christendom which it replaced; it hurt a great deal to watch Newbigin intellectually and victoriously wrestle with modern pluralism and then submit to the very worldview he himself sees as a great danger to his faith.

Scripture, Tradition, Reason, Experience. With his reliance on a shade of Calvinist universalism for his soteriology I cannot say that Newbigin stands up well next to scripture. While he is obviously dedicated to the story and man that is Jesus Christ, he still feels the need to pick and choose what he will believe and reinterpret that with which he does not agree. Even realizing that the first three centuries of Christianity were lived in a pluralist society much the same as ours, Newbigin stops short of embracing the orthodox Christian soteriology. Also, given that he embraces the doctrine of election, forgetting the fact that free will is axiomatic in Judaism and orthodoxy Christianity, sounding much more like the fatalism that Burnett sees in Islam, I cannot give Newbigin very high marks on Christian tradition either. However, where he does excel is in the areas of reason, experience, church polity and church leadership.

Writing mainly from the perspective of English culture, Newbigin demonstrates a masterful knowledge of European and Christian history, and most importantly the interrelationships between them. With impunity, he assails the assumptions and dogma of modern pluralism; the most incisive part being his attack on the “myth of the secular society” (211). While such societies pride themselves on not advocating any particular viewpoint, they are in fact, based on the viewpoint that creation is not under the “sovereign rule of God” (217) and is based on pluralism itself, where the preferences of the community or individual are held in higher esteem than absolute concepts like justice and peace. Public morality and private morality are kept very separate. Ideas that are emotional or irrational are unwelcome and shuns “models held up for emulation” as there are no absolutes (219). The church then, according to Newbigin, should shun all these ideas and realize that it is “bound to challenge in the name of the one Lord all the power, ideologies, myths, assumptions, and worldviews which do not acknowledge him as Lord” (221). Now, despite his soteriology, that is a truth that will preach.

Vision of Class Discussion & Ministry Application. We read this book to explore the opportunities for missions that exist in our pluralist society. Despite the theological issues that I have with Newbigin, the bulk of his argument rings true. Were he shed of his Calvinism and universalism, I might find him more of a father in the faith. Nevertheless, like an epic film, this is one of those books that one must experience several times to glean all that can be gleaned.
One area that I would like to see discussed is the practical application of this book as well as the practical elements of The Shaping of Things to Come. Usually in these books I find their application to ministry is found more in forming me so that I may form others. His view of the church is very profound for me as it helps me wrestle with, as Newbigin himself puts it, how we are to be “compassionate yet totally uncompromising” in our ministry to the world. His answer is ironic for a writer of books writing to a writer of papers: “Jesus … did not write a book but formed a community” (227). This community was centered on “praise” (227), “thanksgiving … truth” (228), “deeply involved in the concerns of its neighborhood … men and women are prepared for and sustained in the exercise of the priesthood in the world” (229) and “mutual responsibility” (231). As Newbigin said, it is so very easy to slip into the old paradigm of the “‘ordinary, parson-led congregation’” (227).

While this is the eternal challenge of the pastor, and it must be accomplished in a more or less intuitive fashion in each context, Newbigin’s challenges to a pastor are greater. While he is not so radical that he advocates the dissolution of the clergy, he is radical in that he gets to the roots of the gospel message: “the task of ministry is to lead the congregation … in a mission to the community as a whole, to claim its whole public life, as well as the personal lives of all its people, for God’s rule” (238). This sentence, among many in this book, flies in the face of the modern secular culture that all of our others have worked to describe: a culture that compartmentalizes, personalizes, and in the end trivializes the Christ who calls us, who cares for us, and who demands of us that we submit all of our lives, everything, all the gifts upon us which he has bestowed, for his glory and his glory alone. While we can disagree about soteriology and the goals of evangelism, I can agree with Newbigin on many things, including the fact that evangelism “which is politically and ideologically naïve, and social action which does not recognize the need for conversion from false gods to the living God, both fall short of what is required” (210).