Interesting Exchange

I recently received an email from an old High School friend, a beautiful soul, really. She's teaching religion in the English public schools now and asked me if I was religious. We haven't spoken for years and after an MA in Theology and the Arts at Fuller, etc, she, being interested in world religions, etc. thought to pose the question. I think it's interesting at this point to reflect on the effect of studying theology on faith. Academic enterprise is colored by enlightenment thought, such that one steps back one remove from that which one studies, taking in the wide array of opinions from a variety of thinkers on a given topic. One has some critical distance, which, incidentally, I think is important to be able to think critically, to adjust, to ask questions, to be truthful, to make an accurate appraisal, to see the big picture, etc. etc. Another, less fortunate outcome of this is that studying and recofiguring different pictures of faith does not necessarily foster faith, just as reading a book on prayer or meditation will not necessarily induce prayer or meditation. This is a simple truth that most pastor's wives will tell their Seminary bound children. This is folk wisdom. INterestingly, as an English major, one spends the majority of one's time with the primary source, a given piece of literature one reads once or twice, discusses in class more in-depth, and finds some secondary sources to augment and buttress one's argument in the final paper. In theology, however, you spend more time with, shall we say, secondary sources, so that it is entirely possible to acquire an MA in Theology, or even emphasize in biblical studies and know more about Barth, Bonhoeffer, Bultmann, Calvin, Moltmann, Pannenberg, Zwingli, Luther, or whomever than direct contact with source material i.e.the Bible. Now, this may be different for different people, sometimes it takes years to relinquish emotional and psychological baggage from approaching or mis-reading a text, but still. In fact right now, I'm struck by the fact that I would much rather read Brian McLaren than crack open the New Testament. Am I innoculated against it by countless sermons? Am I a reprobate?
I'm wondering if one of the benefits of the whole postmodern brouhaha (besides the Message) will be new ways of encountering the Bible, not as moral yardstick of a life ill lived, but as an anthology of stories embodying and communicating transformative truth. I still struggle with reminding myself of this. And I don't just mean the Epistles and a few bite size portions of the Gospels, but Micah, and Amos, and Leviticus, and Lamentations, all of which I have glossed over at one time or another, but couldn't tell you all that much about, if pressed. Well, a little maybe.
Sitting in my knickers watching Harold and Maude after a long week. It's been recommended thrice in the last month or so, and I see why. (It's the black humor =)

Thought I'd post what I wrote to my old friend Charlotte in the good old UK:

I could give a sort of run down of what I believe and how that fits in with what other Christians believe, buuut, hm. Three authors I go back to on the matter are:
Brian McLaren - "Finding Faith"
Anne Lamott - "Traveling Mercies" or "Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith" aaaand
Marcus Borg - "The Heart of Christianity"
I mean there are other, more hoity-toity ones I like too, but these sort of provide a good sense of what I believe...sometimes. Basically, it would be a less conservative version of Christianity that sees the undercurrent of the Old Testament as the vision of shalom or wholeness on both personal and social levels as the whole point of God's relationship with Israel, and then Christ as a subversive truth-teller who fully embodies and points toward God, who somehow uniquely ushers in Kingdom, or Shalom, or Wholeness, which would have to consist of peace and justice (the whole emphasis in the old testament on whether or not people are taking care of the "widow and the orphan" or the social outcasts, and being punished if they don't, community, stewardship of the earth, which are all huge issues of course. I'd also say that've so individualized and privatized faith that we lose much of the original meaning, it's challenge to accepted power structures, political, economic, and spiritual. Now, other issues, virgin birth, things like that, I have a little more difficulty with. With close reading, it seems to me some of the biblical authors took on some poetic license and used symbol in their storytelling. But as an English major and one with a symbolic imagination, this is every bit as powerful as modern "journalistic" truth, if not moreso, because of its resonance. On the other hand, Hamlet tells us "there is more on heaven and earth, Horatio, than is dreamt of in your philosophy," meaning we in the West don't have enough of a sense of the Spiritual, which affects our overall health, and leaves us open to go down blind alleys in search of spiritual anything, so I wouldn't count out things only because they sound fantastic, but I also have to temper what I hear with what I've experienced.
I've been so preoccupied with practical considerations these days, job, budget, wedding, lesson planning for kids who really don't care what lesson you've planned...you're just an impediment to their socializing. Thinking about next steps these days, but not getting very far yet. I just got used to getting a paycheck, don't know if I want more school just yet. The point partially being I'm sort of failing in following even my own vision of some radical, subversive, imagination-filled, compassion-centered life. Although I do have a sense of what is toxic and destructive, and try to fight against it, or at least avoid it.